Eclipse Child
Chapter 23

Who we are and who we

need to be to survive

are two very different things

The run had done nothing to clear the tension that seemed knotted in the back of my neck.

My habits of the wolf were being shoved away and stored. I pulled out instead the actions I had done before leaving the pack. Dusting them off for reuse.

Rising before the waking of the world and watching the ascending sun.

I walk inside the pack house, a mood of anger slowly wrapping around my thoughts for what I knew I had to do later.

I stop short at the sight of Orion in the kitchen.

The image of him almost took my breath away as he stood over the counter, a look of deep concentration on his face while stirring mixture that was contained in a large bowl.

He wore a grey hoodie, low ride sweatpants and – a pink apron.

He immediately looks up at my approach and moodily glares at me before going back to his stirring.

I’m frozen in both shock and confusion.

Sandra chooses that moment to turn around and notice me.

“Good morning dearie.”

I nod stiffly back at her.

“Did you have a nice run? This one,” she pokes Orion in the back, “came down in a fit when he couldn’t find you. I had to calm him down by letting him stir the pancakes... though,” she looks down to inspect the contents of Orion’s bowl. “They’ve been done for a while now...”

I watch as Orion’s cheeks slowly start to match the color of his apron.

I sit down at the kitchen island that overlooks their work.

“I run in the morning,” I explain to Orion.

He still avoids my eyes, focusing instead his full attention on stirring the pancake batter that now had gone flat.

I smile at the sight and watch as Sandra tries and fails to get the bowl away from him.

Leo walks down the stairs, a rare sight for him to be up so early. He jumps back, startled at the appearance of Orion. A low yell leaves him, making Orion turn around to look at him.

“Soraya what-,”

“This is Orion. You met him yesterday remember?”

Leo’s eyes and mouth are wide as they take in the wild image of Orion. The scent of silent danger that could just faintly be traced back to him.

Leo cautiously moves around him to sit next to me on a stool.

“Good morning.”

Leo jumps at the deep sound that vibrates from Orion. The noise only sent a thrill of heat through me. Pink aprons...who knew...

“Morning...”

Leo and I both watch as Sandra tries, again and again, to get Orion to give up his mixing bowl. Eventually, he does but with great regret written all over his face.

“The pancakes are flat now,” Sandra’s eyes speak murder as she turns to glare at Orion. He only shrugs.

I turn to Leo while the others are occupied, “can you watch Orion for me?”

His mouth immediately twists at the request, but I stop him before he can decline.

“I’m going to the training area and I don’t want...”

Understanding fills Leo’s eyes as he sighs and nods.

I quickly eat breakfast and turn to Orion, “stay with Leo.”

He doesn’t speak as I move away from them and out the door. I hear Sandra’s heavy sigh follow me. It does nothing to reassure what I know is about to happen.

The training area was vast, holding enough space for all three levels of experience to practice.

Beginner, intermediate and expert.

I had fought and pushed my way into the expert group. I managed to enter at the age of 19, to the disbelief of many. I would never say out loud how many hours I trained when no one looked. How each day I seemed to rise earlier and earlier- and run farther and farther- until I had clawed my way into that group.

Even then, I still did not give in an inch. I knew the thin balance that hung upon a warriors way of life.

I had been gone for three months though.

Things had changed.

The group that I had fought so hard to be in had left me behind. I had gained another advantage. But who knew what tricks they also had learned.

Before I can enter, I hear a familiar voice.

“I knew this would be the first place you went to.”

I turn around and smile at the sight of Henry. I can tell he had been putting more effort into his training during my absence. The gap of time between us is nonexistent. Henry and I could go months without talking and still fall into a line of familiarity.

I jerk my head towards the field where the others were gathering. “What do you think?”

His calculating eyes stare at the expert warriors. Watching their movement.

He sighs, “I think he’s going to give you only one choice.”

I feel my shoulders drop, “they need the reminder then?”

A sad smile enters Henry’s face.

“They will probably need more than a reminder Soraya. Most are not happy to see you back. They liked the easy life of training with no challenge over their shoulder.”

His eyes travel up and down my figure, “you seem different...”

I turn my head, popping out a stiff joint as I face forward towards the waiting group.

“You’ll see why soon.”

Henry trails close behind me as we approach. The other males stiffen at the sight of me. The handful of woman who have the title of expert sigh in relief as we come closer.

“Gone to play and now you come back as if nothing is wrong?”

I stop short as the group closes in around me.

“I didn’t play,” the words are spoken with a low growl. A hint of threat. I want more than anything, for them to realize it and back away. To not issue forth the words that I know they are dying to say.

“Doesn’t work like that Soraya. You can’t just walk back as if nothing happened. You left.”

“And now I’m back.”

The others look around, an understanding passing through all of them. They had discussed this beforehand what they would do if I returned.

The clustering of the group has caught the attention of Rhett- the wolf who oversaw training within the experts.

He moves closer, his eyes narrowing as he takes in the eager stance of the males.

I have always respected Rhett. He’s a good teacher. To him, training was training. It was pure and simple in his mind. Pack politics, gender, whose father was who and what you were born into all was tossed aside when you stood in front of him. He stripped down the presence and looked at nothing but the strength the body could offer.

“Soraya, you’re back from your training.”

I feel a tension rising in the air, but Rhett is oblivious like always to the discord.

He crosses his arms and stares down at me, “You know what to do to get your spot back.” He says nothing more. Like a shadow he steps back, fading away and letting the others come forward. I still feel his eyes on me. Watching.

“Come on then,” I step back, letting the circle around me disperse. “I knew this would happen. Come on.”

No one moves.

“Come on!” I shout the words out, all the encouragement one male needs to push himself forward.

He darts out, breaking off from the group and towards me. A feral snarl leaves him as I step aside to avoid his attack.

His exposed back soon is met with my falling elbow. I pick him up by the collar of his shirt.

“Submit.”

His head folds down. He knows he won’t win.

Before I can react, a force hits me from behind. Another male had broken off, using my distraction as an opportunity to attack and taking advantage of my weakness.

And that is when the real fight happens.

“Come on!” I shout the words out with fury as they come forward, each a look of pure abhorrence on their faces. Others have gathered to the side with Rhett, those that know and have already accepted my return.

But there are still the ones that fight back.

They have their varying reasons for why they fight.

Some because they cannot stand to have a female beside them.

Some because they resented my lineage, thinking such a fact caused things to come more easily to me.

Some because they don’t like watching me train like a pack was coming to attack ours at any second.

I don’t know the other reasons. I don’t know why others are joining in with a look of deep thought pulled into their faces.

I think just because they can.

Because I was opening up this opportunity to them to test and see if they could put me down.

They know my weakness.

Many gather in groups, trying to corral me to turn my back to someone in the efforts of having it exposed.

But it doesn’t work.

I throw down a male that had charged and kick him aside.

The action only prompts them to resume their fight with more vengeance.

Some shift.

A bitter taste rises in my mouth as the unneeded violence flows forth.

I lose myself in the wreckage of skin.

The hitting of flesh while I watch red drip down their hands, noses, and mouths.

I know they are stronger than me. I had to swallow that bitter fact years ago after fighting uselessly with Vincent and gaining no upper hand. It wasn’t until Grandjay took me aside and taught me how to fight. Trained me himself.

He was the only one who believed in me and put effort into my cause when I was small.

His words always came back to me when I fought with others of the pack.

Weak spots Soraya, if you’re attacked go for weak spots.

These males have plenty of weak spots that I do not possess.

And I use all of them to my advantage.

Wolves gather, waiting for my shift to happen also.

I don’t though. My months in the woods had taught me to look at their movement, take in what they were doing, and evaluate how best to attack.

Weak spots.

A gurgled laughter spills from my lips as I watch the wolves growl at my feet. Compared to the pack in the mountains, they were nothing. Their movements were clumsy and awkward, holding none of the grace that could be seen within the true predators who roamed the mountain.

And that was when I realized another thing the mountains had taught me.

They did not teach me the art of fighting.

They taught me the art of how to kill.

And I forgot that concept.

Because the wolfs did not fight their pack. They did not want to harm their family.

This was not the animal that drugged itself up to snarl in my face.

This was skin showing full and well.

We only needed someone to be above us so we had another to blame for our hardships. And that’s exactly what I had become in a lot of their minds.

A hardship.

A burden.

So they attacked.

Two wolves jump at the same time. I let them hit me and grab their necks in a choke hold as their whimpers fill the air.

Another wolf darts forward but the body of his companions quickly knocks him down.

“Is that it? That’s all you have accomplished while I was gone?”

They surge forward, anger renewed from my mocking.

Claws dig into my skin. I snarl at the action. Once the sight of red came onto my skin I lost it.

The battle blurs around me.

I don’t remember what I am doing or what my mind is telling my limbs to do.

All I remember is coming out of the haze from the sound of a snap.

The snap of bone as I pulled the male’s arm back to far.

The others stop at the sound.

I push him down, letting another cry slip through his lips as his injured arm crushes against the ground.

“Submit.”

We are all panting. Slowly, one by one, they do as I order.

No. This was not what the wolf did.

This was skin.

Tainted and stained skin.

One male stumbles forward. My fist is raised to strike him for his defiance before a hand catches it.

“Soraya they understand.”

A snarl rips from my throat before I realize it was Rhett that had stopped me.

Behind him I lock eyes with Henry. Slowly he lowers his head to expose his neck to me.

Rhett’s head remains high, his eyes dark and calculating as he releases my hand.

I spit on the ground, looking at the mixture of saliva and blood.

Only then am I able to take in the destruction I have caused.

Men are passed out on the side. Others groan- the sounds low and full of pain.

I had gone too far.

I had not stopped myself when I should have.

I look up at the entrance to the training grounds and see Leo with his arms wrapped around Orion’s wolf.

My feet drift involuntarily to them. Leo seems to be holding Orion back, but the action does not match what I think. It seems to be Leo just trying to seek some comfort away from the sight he just witnessed.

I’m still full of anger and fighting. My voice comes out short and harsh. Impatient.

“Leo I thought I told you to wat-,”

“He ran after you.”

I look down at Orion.

His eyes meet mine, as his wolf examines me.

I look at my hands and still. Blood coating my arms from where claws had ranked down me.

Bruises already were forming on my skin.

“Go back to the clinic.”

Orion and Leo do not move.

Slowly, Leo rises and walks towards the injured men.

I walk to stand next to him as he starts to clean off their wounds.

“You’ll have to go to the clinic,” he whispers, taking in the man who still laid on the ground, crying and bleeding while clinging to his broken arm.

“I’ll take him.”

He flinches from my words but does not resist me as I help him up.

“Keith...”

“I submit.”

His voice is flat. Emotionless.

I swallow whatever words I was about to say and continue to move him forward.

Ignoring the eyes on my back, knowing a set of grey stayed upon me, watching the whole time.

Orion finds me later.

I sit on the edge of the forest, just behind the clinic.

I didn’t want to go back to the training area. I didn’t want to see the weary eyes that held fear while looking into Rhett’s own stare and being told I had earned my spot back- but from what price?

I didn’t want to go back to the pack house and face dad’s anger. Or his silence.

We all knew though in the end, that it had to be done.

The skin side would only submit if they had a reason to give up.

He approaches and sits next to me.

We stay in silence until I look away and whisper, “I didn’t want you to see that.”

The wolf does not move.

I continue to stare at the floor of the forest, taking in the shift of seasons.

Orion slowly moves down and begins to lick the cuts that adorn my arms and face. My neck and hands.

“I didn’t want you to see that.”

I repeat my sentence, frantic for this male to understand.

“It’s not what wolfs do. I know that now but it still needed to be done. I knew I had to but I didn’t want...” my words die away when I realize I would be repeating the sentence again.

Instead, I stay silent and watch Orion as he continued to try and clean my wounds.

“It’s fine,” I push him away but he presses back against me, a low whine leaving his jaw.

“I said it’s fine. I’ve had worse.”

I stand and walk away. Another whine leaves him, one that makes my heart constrict and squeeze tightly together. I wanted to turn around and face him- to fall down at his paws and ask for his forgiveness- to ask him what he thought of me. But I felt too ashamed of what had happened. How I had given into my anger...just like...

I slipped.

I had slipped.

My mask that I wore had somehow fallen off from those months with the wolves.

I forgot to put it back on.

I slipped. I broke the image of how they saw me. I wanted it to be kept a secret of just how much anger I had inside me. I didn’t want them to know the bloodlust that curled my veins and consumed my thoughts.

I wanted to push those feelings aside and think of good things- good things so that the pack would like and want me.

I had slipped.

And now I knew, just a day after coming back, that my return would not be welcomed with open arms.

I slipped.

And I had blood on my hands to prove it.

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