Amber racked her brain for where gammas fit into the pack. It had been a long time since she had studied the pack hierarchy. All she could remember was that they were below the beta, but somewhere above a regular pack member.
Even more confusing, this had taken a turn in a direction she had not seen coming. “Join your pack? There’s normally an application process that takes a year,” Amber said, skeptical of the offer. The way this alpha was speaking to her was all wrong; and her wolf hated him. “I don’t want to be in a pack with a douchebag like Samuel either,” she said, pointing at the idiot who was still staring at the ground.
Donovan bristled slightly, but kept his expression calm. “You would be of a higher rank than Samuel. I’m sure you could cope.”
“Why would you want us?” she asked, gesturing to Tommy and Genevieve behind her. More than anything, she was suspicious of his offer. It was too good to be true. “You don’t know anything about the three of us.”
“Us? The offer is for you, and you alone. There is a limit to how many wolves I can add to my pack each year. Going over the quota would force me to pay some very hefty fines. Besides,” he said, eyeing Tommy and Genevieve distastefully, “I’m not interested in weak wolves.”
“Then what would happen to us without an alpha?" Tommy blurted out. He immediately shrunk back when all eyes turned to him.
“The other two would be put into the system," Donovan said, speaking directly to Amber and ignoring Tommy. “They would find a pack, eventually."
Tommy’s panic ripped through Amber like an alarm. Her heart beat like a drum in her chest and the wolf in her head snarled angrily. She had to protect him, but what could she do? She wouldn’t be able to stay his alpha if it was illegal. Hell, she didn’t even want to be a werewolf. Being an alpha came with responsibilities she knew nothing about.
“This is your fault,” Amber snapped, stepping forward. “Whether Samuel was supposed to be watching that omega or not, this is still on you, Alpha.”
Donovan’s expression grew dark, and his eyes flashed red. “You are in no position to chastise me, little girl,” he said, his voice edging toward a growl. “I offered you a chance. Take it or leave it. If you want to go in the system with the others, who am I to stop you?”
“I am not leaving them behind,” Amber insisted. “And how many more people did Peter attack last night? How can you be so callous?”
GENEVIEVE
Genevieve watched the exchange grow more heated by the moment. Amber was refusing his offer, which was insane. The system, as the other alpha put it, was terrible. Bitten werewolves went in for a year, but they never came out with a pack. After their stay was up, they’d be dumped back in a city and told not to make trouble. Most ended up homeless.
Tommy edged closer to her. He was trembling. Putting a comforting hand on his shoulder, she shut her eyes and took a deep breath. She didn’t get involved with shit like this normally. There was a reason that she hadn’t used her degree, despite having passed the bar exam almost two years ago. She didn’t want anyone depending on her; she always ended up letting them down.
Amber yelled at the other alpha again and Genevieve stepped up to her side, putting a hand on her elbow.
“This whole conversation is stupid.” Her voice came out quieter than she had intended. Clearing her throat self-consciously, she continued, “Amber can remain our alpha. She doesn’t have to join anyone’s pack,” she said, louder this time.
Donovan turned his creepy red gaze on her. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, dismissing her.
“Actually, I do,” she said, stepping past Amber. “A bitten werewolf may become an alpha the same way a born wolf can. The Alpha Trials are open to anyone that can find a sponsor.”
Donovan curled his hand into a fist and glared at her, losing the final remnants of his friendly pretense. “And who would sponsor her?” he asked, spreading his arms wide as if he expected her to have someone volunteer right then. “No pack around here would do something that stupid.”
“It doesn’t have to be a werewolf,” she said, jutting out her chin stubbornly. Her heart was racing in her chest and she thought she might vomit, but there was no backing down now. “It can be any paranormal that can fund the pledge. Amber has until the next full moon to prepare.”
The alpha snorted. “She will never pass the Trials.”
“Yes, I will,” Amber said, stepping up next to Genevieve. Her expression was one hundred percent determined.
She had no idea how Amber could be so fearless, but it bolstered her own confidence. “She has the right to try. You can’t stop her.”
“We’ll see about that,” the other alpha said. He turned away, snapping his fingers at the other three werewolves. They followed him to an SUV on the other side of the parking lot and climbed inside.
Genevieve couldn’t see them through the darkly tinted windows, but as they sped off, gravel flying from under their tires, she got the impression she was being flicked off. She slumped in relief. She never did that kind of thing. Part of her wanted to take it all back and just let whatever happened…happen.
“A sponsor?” Amber asked quietly, glancing at her.
“Yeah,” she said, feeling awkward for volunteering Amber for something she barely understood. Finding a sponsor wasn’t going to be easy either. “We’ll have to find one soon. At least a week before the Trials.”
“What exactly are the Alpha Trials? I’ve never heard of them,” Amber said.
“Um, that’s because they’re kind of shrouded in secrecy.” She twisted her fingers in the hem of her shirt, feeling like an idiot. She had volunteered Amber for something crazy and Amber had just backed her up without question, giving up her chance at getting a pack.“I actually don’t know much about them, other than that they exist, and any wolf is eligible to take them with a sponsor.”
Amber stared at her blank-faced for a moment before speaking again. “What is the sponsor for?”
“From what I remember, they have to cover any fines should the alpha or pack do something stupid,” Genevieve explained, trying to remember the details she learned in her magical law classes. “The month between the time the werewolf claims alpha status and the Alpha Trials are a test of sorts. If they can’t keep control of their pack during that first month, there’s no point in them completing the Trials. The sponsor is also somehow responsible for whatever the pack does. I don’t remember the details, though.”
“I’m surprised it doesn’t have to be a werewolf.” Amber running her fingers through her tangled hair.
Genevieve shrugged. “A technical loophole. A werewolf sponsor is expected, but not legally required.”
Amber looked back at Tommy, who, now that Genevieve thought about it, was being weirdly quiet. Tommy stood with his arms wrapped around himself, staring at his bare feet.
“Tommy,” Amber said, “I’m not going to let them put you in the system.”
He looked up and laughed once, a despairing sound. “You’re going to try, but you don’t know anything about being a werewolf. None of us do.”
“Hey,” Amber said, marching up to him and grabbing his shoulders. “If I became an alpha, there has to be a reason. I’ll jump through these assholes’ legal hoops, and then we’ll all be fine.”
“Well, technically the only reason you became alpha is because you happen to be naturally more dominant than either of us. It doesn’t really mean…” Genevieve trailed off at the irritation on Amber’s face. Oh. She was trying to calm him down. “But you seem to be a natural, so I’m sure it’ll all be fine,” she said, plastering a fake smile on her face.
Tommy jerked out of Amber’s grip and scuffed his bare toes on the pavement. “I couldn’t find my shoes,” he muttered.
“I can take you back home to get some more,” Amber said gently.
Tommy scowled at her. “I don’t have a home,” he snapped.
Looking at him more closely, it was obvious. His clothes
were dirty and threadbare like he wore them every day. His shaggy hair hung almost to his shoulders and was knotted pretty badly. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen.
“Then you can come and stay with me,” Amber responded without hesitation. “I’ll get you shoes and some clothes too. And a haircut if you want one.”
Genevieve thought about going back to her friend’s apartment, but the wolf inside of her really didn’t like that idea.
“Can…I come too?” Genevieve asked, feeling like an idiot.
“Of course,” Amber said with a frown, rubbing her hand against her stomach. “The idea of being separated makes me feel all wrong inside.”
Amber fished her keys out of her pocket. “Come on,” she said, waving at them to follow. “Food, shoes, and then sleep. In that order.”
Tommy looked at Genevieve, waiting for her to follow Amber before he did as well. They walked silently behind her, each of them lost in their own thoughts.
Chapter 5
AMBER
Early morning sunlight streamed into the small apartment, muted by smoke drifting past the window. Amber hurriedly flipped the bacon out of the pan. Half of it landed on the floor, the rest on the counter. The bitter smell of burned food filled the kitchen.
“I think I have some ramen in the pantry,” Amber said, eyeing the bacon with distaste. She could rebuild an engine, and stick an IV, but cooking just wasn’t her thing. They had gone through everything easy to make in the refrigerator the evening before, which, to be fair, wasn’t much for three people.
Tommy’s stomach growled loudly behind her. She threw down the spatula and turned to face him and Genevieve, hands on her hips. “You know what, let’s just go to The Market. They have food stalls. My treat.”
“The Market?” Tommy asked tearing his eyes away from the ruined food and perking up. His face cracked into the first smile Amber had seen. “I’ve never been.”
“If you’ve never been, then we have to go. It’d be stupid to miss it while it’s in town,” Amber said. The wolf inside her watched eagerly as excitement shivered through the pack bond. Providing for them felt right.
“Anything to get food,” Genevieve agreed. “I’ve never been this hungry in my life.”
“Is that a werewolf thing?” Tommy asked as he carefully pulled on his new shoes. He treated them like they were made of glass. Amber was surprised he was willing to walk in them.
Amber wiped sweat from her brow and nodded. “We haven’t had a proper meal since we shifted. It takes a lot of energy and makes you super hungry. We need protein more than anything else right now.”
Before she could sweep it all into the trashcan, Genevieve swiped the least burnt piece of bacon from the counter. Amber raised a brow.
“I’m really hungry,” Genevieve said, shoving the blackened pork into her mouth. She grimaced, but swallowed resolutely.
“How do you know so much about werewolves?” Tommy asked, his voice was carefully neutral, casual almost, but Amber could feel his suspicion like an alarm bell through the pack bond.
She swept the last of the bacon that had fallen on the floor into the dustpan before answering. “I applied to join a pack when I turned eighteen,” she explained carefully. The last thing she wanted was to get into the details of what had actually happened. “Didn’t get accepted, but I spent close to a year learning about basic werewolf stuff. Unfortunately, nothing about being an alpha, since I didn’t think it mattered.”
“You’d have had a hard time finding any information on it anyhow,” Genevieve piped up. “The werewolves don’t like all their rules being public knowledge.”
“Speaking of,” Amber said, eager to turn the attention away from her history. “How do you know all this stuff that isn’t supposed to be public knowledge?”
Genevieve shrugged and looked at the floor. “I studied magical law in college.”
Amber narrowed her eyes. Genevieve didn’t look old enough to have gotten through college, but she decided not to push it. She didn’t want to talk about her past, either.
She grabbed her keys and reached for her jacket, then remembered it was shredded.
“Do you want me to try to patch it?” Tommy asked hesitantly.
Amber looked at him. “You could do that?” She knew she had said it too harshly as soon as the words came out of her mouth. Her desperation to have it fixed had come off like she was angry, which was far from the truth.
Tommy shrank back. “Yeah, it wouldn’t be perfect or anything, but it would hold together.”
Amber forced herself to relax and stop freaking Tommy out. “Anything you could do would be great. Thank you,” she said softly. “We’ll get whatever you need to patch it while we’re out, if that’s okay?”
Tommy straightened a little and nodded. “Yeah, that’s fine.”
“Let’s go,” Genevieve said, waiting by the door impatiently.
They headed downstairs and piled in the truck. Genevieve sat in the middle of the bench seat while Tommy scooted as close to the door as he could get.
“How old is this thing?” Genevieve asked, eyeing the dials on the dash skeptically.
“Old on the outside, but the engine was replaced six years ago,” Amber said, patting the steering wheel. “She’s built like a tank.”
She cranked the engine and it sputtered ominously. Genevieve raised a brow and turned to say something, but Amber raised a hand in warning.
“Speak ill of her and you’ll be walking to The Market,” she threatened.
Genevieve snapped her mouth shut and turned back to the front. On the second try the engine turned over and rumbled to life. Amber threw it into gear and glared at her passengers one last time before pulling out of her parking spot.
TOMMY
They’d had to park almost a mile away from the Market. Tommy’s stomach growled impatiently. A few food trucks were parked along the street, and the smell of cooking food made him ravenous. His new shoes pinched at the sides of his feet, but Tommy was relieved to have something without holes to wear. Something clean. He hadn’t appreciated how nice it was to be able to wash his clothes regularly until he couldn’t anymore.
“There it is,” Amber said, pointing in the opposite direction he had been looking.
The Market was…magical. He stopped in his tracks as people surged around him and stared at the archway that led inside. It had planted itself between two one-hundred story office buildings in the center of downtown. The sight hurt his eyes; it shouldn’t have fit, but there it was.
The archway itself shone like a beacon even in the bright sunlight. The word MARKET hovered overhead, spelled out in green fire that twisted in on itself, making each letter appear to writhe. The concrete sidewalk gave way to opalescent cobblestone that shimmered every time a step landed on it. With so many people walking on it, the path seemed to wobble.
“Come on,” Genevieve said with a grin, grabbing his sleeve. “It gets better.”
Even Amber was smiling softly. She was less intimidating when she wasn’t scowling at everything that moved. Tommy followed Genevieve. She’d put her hair up in those buns again; they made her look like she was eighteen or nineteen, but he got the impression she was actually in her mid-twenties. She slipped sometimes, shifting from teenager to adult when she wasn’t thinking about it.
Amber never slipped. She was wary, and angry. They were all upset about being turned, but he knew there was something worse going on with Amber. He just had no clue what it was. She’d practically bitten his head off this morning when he’d mentioned he could patch her jacket, but she hadn’t been angry. She was just desperate, which was even weirder.
They passed under the archway, and all thoughts of why Amber was acting weird fled from Tommy’s mind. Music and chatter pounded against his newly sensitive hearing, but he didn’t care. This place was magic. Not just magical. Every part of it seemed to be created from pure magic itself.
The first stall was formed out of a flowering tree. The
workers stood inside the trunk, leaning over a counter created by a low hanging branch that curved at a ninety-degree angle. Purple and pink blooms unfurled as people approached, releasing a sweet scent. A pretty elvish girl harvested a few flowers and wove them into a hairband that was then sold to the next customer.
Ahead of them a man dressed in colorful silk was juggling fire. Actual fire, not flaming batons or chainsaws, but large balls of fire. Every few rounds he tossed one high in the air and it exploded with a shower of blue sparks, then snapped back into shape before he caught it again.
A weird scraping noise overhead caused Tommy to look up, and where the sky should have been, there was water. Strange shapes flitted through the darkness. A face appeared, and Tommy startled. Webbed hands pressed against the surface of the water, and the slitted, green eyes of a mermaid stared down at him. Her tail swished behind her. It was a brilliant rainbow of colors, but the fins were lined with serrated spikes. She smiled, her teeth razor sharp, then disappeared from view.
“Don’t worry, they can’t get you,” Amber whispered with a grin right next to his shoulder.
“I’m not—it’s just cool. I’ve never met a mermaid before,” Tommy stuttered out.
Amber grinned. “You can trade with them farther down, I think.”
“I don’t have anything to trade.” Tommy shrugged.
“You might be surprised,” Amber said cryptically before walking further down the path.
He moved to follow, but a familiar scent stopped him short. Curious, he turned back toward the entrance, but couldn’t see anything. He wasn’t sure what he was smelling, anyhow.
A bony hand wrapped around his arm, and claw-like fingers bit into his flesh. He spun around and found an old woman draped in shawls leaning out of her stall. Her arm was stretched taut between them. If he took another step forward, he’d drag her right out of the opening. Her foggy eyes looked past him, unfocused.
Misfit Pack (The Misfit Series) Page 3