by Angela Foxxe
Noemi immediately looked more like a pup in the way that her features brightened. Even in the dead of night, Alexa could see the way that her eyes were glowing with pure joy. She wanted to reciprocate the feelings, but she couldn’t let her guard slip so easily. Not when they were drawing so close to what they needed to achieve the whole time: freedom.
“How is this going to work?” Alexa asked, motioning to the other alpha that had taken guard around the two females. He was farther away, and couldn’t hear their whisperings.
“Tracy will give us the signal, and then we can leave with her. Don’t worry, she’s got it all under control,” Noemi said. “For now, just stay as relaxed as possible.”
Taking her own advice, the she-wolf in front of Alexa shifted into her wolf form, and stretched out languidly on the hard dirt. She crossed her legs in front of her, and rested her chin over her paws. Her eyes were intent on Tracy, watching for the mysterious signal.
Alexa, figuring that she might as well take Noemi’s word, shifted into a wolf and stretched out next to her. She settled in relatively the same position as Noemi, although made sure to turn her body just slightly away from the alpha. If they were caught both staring at Tracy, it might draw more unwanted attention.
For what felt like hours, Alexa waited for Noemi to move, or to see the signal from Tracy. She still didn’t know what the signal was meant to be. Any move that Tracy made drew Alexa’s attention. It seemed to her that every single motion could be the signal. It also didn’t help that about half the time, Noemi would shift or move in response to one of Tracy’s moves.
Alexa completely sat up at one point, and was given a growl by Tracy. Alexa flattened her ears to her head, and sank back down onto her belly. She turned and pawed at Noemi, giving the she-wolf a whine.
Noemi huffed at Alexa, and continued watching Tracy with intent, fierce eyes. She couldn’t focus on Alexa, not when the signal would happen so quickly and without warning. Luckily, Tracy had been able to relay the information to Noemi at all before it was too late for them to do anything. Noemi just hoped that for Alexa and Antony’s sakes that they would be able to leave soon.
At half past midnight, long after Noemi had woken up Alexa from her nightmare. She could see that her friend was starting to dip back into sleep, but Tracy lifted her head until her nose was pointed directly at the moon. The she-wolf took off at a trot a moment later, leaving Noemi to stir Alexa back to her senses. Alexa grumbled quietly, unwilling to stir at first. It wasn’t until she heard Noemi moving away from her that Alexa jumped to her feet. She tried to be as quiet as possible, so as not to bring the attention of the male behind her and Noemi.
Ahead of her, Noemi trotted along, her head and tail raised. She didn’t glance over her shoulder, simply assuming that Alexa would follow or she would die. It didn’t bother Alexa that Noemi didn’t look behind her. She was more than used to Noemi leaving her behind, especially at times like these. Alexa knew that it was Noemi wanting to survive, the alpha side of her demanding that her pack mates kept up, whether or not they truly could.
Alexa kept her own head down, trying to make herself as small as possible. If it weren’t suspicious enough that two prisoners had gone missing, it would be even more suspicious that an alpha had gone missing with them. She didn’t know how this plan was ever supposed to work itself out, not when she didn’t know a single detail about what was happening. Certainly it couldn’t be as simple running off with two alphas, finding Antony and living a happy life outside of the packs? She knew that that wasn’t the answer. It had to be more complicated than that.
Until they reached the edge of the pack grounds, Alexa remained completely silent. She didn’t want to risk another wolf finding and coming after them. As soon as they left the pack grounds, Tracy’s scent veered off course. Alexa had been expecting them to go the usual route that she and Noemi had taken many times through the clearing where she and Antony had first met. She was looking forward to seeing the moon and stars above her, but had to settle for the trees. She hadn’t seen Tracy once, only smelled her. The only time that she had seen the she-wolf had been at the pack grounds. Now, she only had Noemi’s hindquarters to follow.
Alexa barked at her alpha, longing to draw Noemi’s attention, but Noemi only flicked her tail. A slight motion, to let Alexa know that she had heard Alexa’s cry, but was not willing to respond with the time that they had. Alexa ducked her head once more. She knew when she was intruding on Noemi’s focus.
Rather than bothering the alpha anymore, Alexa decided to allow her human mind to wander. For a while, she could allow her wolf side to take over and run things. The wolf inside of her was more than happy to be freed for a while, for once not restrained by a more rational human side. The animal ran free with joy as Alexa lost herself to her own thoughts, although the beast was cautious and certain not to disturb her alpha. The wolf pulled risky moves, running close to her alpha and dodging away at the last second. She was in a playful mood, after so long of having to be restrained and under pack order.
Noemi growled at the other she-wolf, still retaining her dignity as an alpha. In such a stressful situation, she could not allow herself to be distracted by such playful banter. This nipping at her heels was driving her insane, but she figured that Alexa needed the time to play here and there. Otherwise her wolf might go stir crazy, what with being locked up so often.
Eventually, Noemi’s wolf began to get the better of her, as well. She found herself responding to Alexa’s requests for play or for racing, though it was never for very long. She couldn’t risk losing Tracy, not when they were so hot on their escape. They were only a mile out from Antony’s pack ground, if she was reading Tracy’s signals correctly. At the loping pace they were going at, it wouldn’t take long for them to travel a mile. What seemed like great distances to their human sides were nothing to their lupine sides. Noemi could run for miles without tiring, and she wished that the stamina could carry over to her human side.
Only half an hour later, and Noemi and Alexa had finally caught up with Tracy. The she wolf alpha was on her stomach, although her entire body was tensed. She was ready to pounce at any second, though at what, neither she-wolf was quite certain as to what she was ready for.
Noemi crawled up next to Tracy, the two alphas communicating in a series of growls and grunts. Alexa wasn’t far behind them, although she made sure to maintain her spot in the pack ranks. She wasn’t an alpha, and thus was not permitted to sit with the alphas in front of her. The most she could do was remain just at their heels, nose practically pressed into their feet.
Noemi glanced back at Alexa, and huffed at her. She shifted into a human, still stretched out on her belly. Alexa did the same, peering up at Noemi and waiting for the explanation.
“Antony is here,” Noemi said. “And he’s alive. We need you to go to him and free him. He is far more restrained than we were. This pack isn’t as gentle with their prisoners.”
As much as Alexa didn’t want to interrupt, she couldn’t help but burst into Noemi’s explanation. “What will you two do? How do you know all of this?” she asked, unable to stop running her mouth, even with the harsh glare that the alpha gave her.
Noemi couldn’t help but to smile at her friend. She understood the confusion; they hadn’t exactly told her what it was that they were planning.
“We’ll get you to Antony, and then we’ll stand guard. Get the two of you out before it’s too late and you end up in trouble,” Noemi said. “Shift back,” she ordered.
Alexa nodded and shifted back into her wolf form. She sat impatiently behind the alphas, tail flicking from side-to-side in her antsy wait. She could hardly see straight, each muscle tensed. The two alphas in front of her were able to sit as still as possible, unaffected by the tense mood. The only sign that Noemi or Tracy gave to the mood was the way that their ears flicked this way and that.
It was clear that they were uncomfortable, but it was nothing compared to how Alexa was feeling. Kn
owing that she was so close to Antony, after spending what felt like forever away from him, she couldn’t sit still. How could she be expected to sit still through all of this?
*
A growl brought Alexa out of her daydreaming. She wasn’t even really sure when she had slipped into a fantasy world that was so far away from reality. All she knew was that Noemi was seconds from biting her, unless she started to pay attention. Alexa whined out an apology at her alpha. She hadn’t meant to slip away for so long, but she was back. Noemi glanced in the direction of the pack grounds that Antony belonged to. They were going to be moving in soon.
Alexa stood up on the command of her alphas and launched forward into the bushes just behind them. There was no time for them to stop and gather their wits. As soon as they entered the pack grounds, they were breaking the law. From the moment that they had left the original pack grounds as prisoners on the run they had been in serious trouble, but that didn’t mean that they wouldn’t try.
Alexa ran faster than she thought she ever could as she trailed after Tracy and Noemi They were much faster than she was, sleek bodies toned with more muscles than she could ever hope to achieve. It made a little twinge of jealousy course through her body, wondering what would happen to her if she had been decided as an alpha, rather than as a no-status wolf with no power within the pack.
Alexa shook her head. There was no time for thoughts like those. She was an alpha. Perhaps it hadn’t been decided by the pack alphas when she was born, but there was alpha blood in her veins. What her mother and dream had told her was proof enough. She didn’t need any more hope than that, and it gave her the courage to move on and move forward. Antony needed her now. He didn’t need a wolf who was scared witless and willing to roll over at the first sign of danger.
The two alphas pressed forward, and showed Alexa exactly where it was that they needed to go. It seemed as though at every corner they turned, they were going to be confronted. It never happened, and Alexa’s fears were put to rest as they traveled further and never encountered danger. Tracy and Noemi were running at breakneck speeds, with no time for concern about what was going on around them. They had both let their wolves take over, the beasts running and thinking for them. The only part of their human brains that remained was in the direction that they ran. The entire time they stayed on course, heading towards Antony without a care in the world to be had. There was no time for cares.
Alexa brought herself out of her thoughts when the two alpha she wolves in front of her screeched to a rearing halt. They both kicked up dirt under their feet, sending it flying this way and that as they tried to put a halt to all of their sudden bursts of speed. Alexa was following close behind them, her paws skipping over the uneven ground as she went. She barreled forward between the two alphas, but they took no notice of the insubordination. If it bothered either of them, they were certain not to show it. There was no reason for them to be angry now, not when they were so close to their final goal: in front of the three she-wolves, a tattered male wolf who was stretched out, breathing labored and choppy.
Alexa barely noticed when she shifted into a human and skidded on her knees the rest of the way to Antony. She could already smell her blood staining the ground from cutting up the delicate skin on her knees, but she couldn’t be bothered by it.
“Antony!” she practically screamed.
Alexa wrapped her arms around the neck of the gigantic wolf lying in front of her, the great creature struggling to keep up with the pain that it was under. Her entire heart was calling out for Antony, wishing that he would wake up and give her a smile. All she needed was one sign that he was okay, and that he was going to make it through. From the way that his breathing was uneven and wheezing, she didn’t know if Antony had a hope in the world. If he continued on in a state like this, he wouldn’t last for long.
Alexa wanted to look back at the two alpha she wolves who had accompanied her, but they had both long since vanished. There was no time for them to be bothered by the love affairs of two young wolves. They needed to establish a border. Within no time, their scent would be found out and they would need to run before it was too late.
She didn’t want to think about what would happen to them if they had to leave Antony behind; so much work for absolutely no reason. It would have meant that she had put yet another life in danger, and all because she was so in love that she could not see.
“Please, Antony,” she pleaded. Alexa ran her fingers through the coarse, bloodied fur of the wolf held in her arms. Antony stirred, but didn’t open his eyes to look up at her. “I need you here with me now, Antony,” she begged. “I love you.”
The words seemed to stir something within the gigantic wolf. His sensitive ears flicked this way and that, and his eyes struggled to open. Eventually he achieved his goal, able to look up at Alexa and see her beautiful eyes looking back down at him. He whined at her, the noise weak and pained.
Alexa’s heart cried out at the sight before her. The last thing that Antony deserved was to be in pain. It had all happened because of her in the first place, it just wasn’t fair. She hugged Antony’s head close to her chest and nuzzled against the top of his head. The wolf tried to wag his tail in response, but even that part of his body was struggling for control through all of the pain that he was feeling.
“Don’t try and move,” Alexa insisted. She patted the top of Antony’s head, and then backed up just a step.
The wolf whined once more, concerned that his mate was going to leave him. When he noticed the profuse bleeding from her knees, Antony leaned forward and pressed his nose just above the bleeding. It didn’t seem to be from another wolf, just from Alexa’s clumsiness. It quelled some of the growing hatred inside of him as he licked along the open wounds. As he licked, the bleeding stopped.
Alexa’s bleeding may have stopped due to Antony’s gentle care of her body, but his gentle care didn’t stop her tears from forming. She felt like a horrible person, having led Antony into such a state of weakness. Alexa stood up, and brushed off her legs, getting rid of the last traces of dirt and dust. Not far from where they were, Alexa could hear the fighting of two wolves. One of the wolf’s snarling sounded rather similar to Noemi’s. Alexa wasn’t surprised that she had been the first to initiate a fight.
“Antony, we need to move now,” Alexa said, her voice as firm as she could possibly make it. At a time like this, there was no way that she would let Antony see any sort of weakness peeking through and threating to take over her. “Are you strong enough to get up?” she asked, looking over the trembling beast.
Antony nodded his great head with effort, and struggled to his feet. Each of his legs was shaking like a leaf, but when Alexa went to help him, Antony head butted her away. She was trying to be strong for him, and so he would be strong for her.
“Are you too weak to shift into a human?” Alexa asked, looking over her mate. “It might be easier for us to take you somewhere else if you were a human,” she explained.
Antony curled his lip in response to Alexa’s question. There was no way that it was going to happen. He was far too weak, and the last thing he wanted was to slow things down even more. He hobbled to his feet, and loped ahead of Alexa. He knew the grounds better than she did, and he was determined to get her out of there safely. He could faintly smell the scents of two other females, no doubt from Alexa’s pack. They were the scents of strangers, although one was more familiar than the other: Alexa’s alpha friend who he had met multiple times already. He had no doubts that she was one of the wolves that Alexa had brought with her.
That was where he was determined on traveling first, wanting nothing more than to get Alexa back into the care of a wolf who could actually defend her. When they came upon the scene of Noemi ripping holes into the wolves of Antony’s pack, neither other wolf was surprised. She was as violent as possible at the best times, although it seemed to turn her into a demon of sorts.
“Noemi, stop!” Alexa ordered. “We have got Anto
ny, and we need to leave! Right this minute, Noemi!”
The only reply that the she wolf alpha gave was to end another battle with a swift bite to another wolf’s jaw. She shook fiercely, discombobulating the wolf and sending him scurrying away.
After that fight, Noemi took off at a run. Antony was quick on her heels, with Alexa running as a human behind Antony. Antony could run nowhere near as fast as Noemi in the state that he was in, and it allowed Alexa to keep up with him as a human. It made her heart twinge with pity, to see such a strong and rippling alpha in such a state of weakness. She wanted nothing more than for him to be better, for the two of them to be living somewhere far away where they could no longer be hurt by anyone or by anything. Alexa longed for those days, and she knew that they would happen soon if she just held out hope. Hope. It seemed like such a foreign concept to Alexa as she ran after her mate and her best friend in the entire world. What would happen if their entire plan fell to pieces at a crucial time like this? She shook her head, there was no time for thoughts like that. They were going to make it and they were going to be okay.
Alexa wasn’t sure where Tracy was, but she wasn’t really certain if she had the time to stop and think about it while she was keeping an eye on Antony. He kept stumbling over the tiniest things. His huge paws were nowhere near as graceful as Alexa remembered him being. In her mind, she could picture his perfectly powerful body, sending her through throes of pleasure at just one touch. He was incredible, and she couldn’t deny it. He was a feat of nature and all she wanted was for him to be better.
“We need to find Tracy!” Alexa called out, drawing Noemi’s attention.
The she-wolf alpha barely paid attention to what Alexa had said to her. There was no time for her to stop, not when things were coming so close to an end. If they couldn’t focus now, then there was no reason for them to have tried in the first place. She couldn’t tell that to Alexa. If Tracy was going to catch up with them and escape to her freedom, then she was going to do it of her own free will. Noemi wasn’t going to coddle her through it. Tracy was a big girl, and she could handle herself.