Just a Wolf
Winter Solstice

Amelia

As the first snowflake settled, it whispered secrets of a winter tale waiting to unfold. Ha! I shake up the snow globe, one of the decorations we have set around the place to prepare for the ball, and watch the little snowflakes swirl like a tempest around the tiny mountain scene. I set the snow globe back on the shelf. Enough procrastinating. I have work to do.

The pack house is bustling with activity as we prepare for tonight’s festivities. There is so much to do, and it all has to be perfect for the Winter Solstice Ball. Alpha Kanen will not be forgiving if we fail him. So I have been up since well before dawn, checking items off at least a dozen lists of duties which have been assigned to me. Being the assistant to the River Moon Pack’s Gamma means that all sorts of tasks fall to me. Like, all the tasks that nobody else can be bothered to do.

And half the time, they are tasks that nobody else has even thought of doing, but obviously have to get done or everything will end in disaster. Did anyone tell me to measure the rental tables and compare them to the dimensions of the forest green tablecloths that we ordered? No, but I did, and realized they are the wrong size, and so I ordered new ones. Does anybody notice, or even know, that the reason the tables will look beautiful tonight is only because I figured this out?

Nope. Of course not.

“No, they won’t notice us,” mopes my inner wolf, “they never do.” She sighs melodramatically, somehow making the sound inside my mind. I hardly ever let her take over our shared body, I am far too busy with my job to spend time in the background of our brain letting her out to play.

When I graduated early from high school, and was given the honor of being chosen to work for Gamma Michael, third in command of our pack, I committed myself to performing my job perfectly. I moved into the pack house, where I have a small bedroom in the basement all to myself, and I am devoted to being as helpful and hardworking as it is physically possible to be. And it seems that the better work I do, the more work I am given. When I mentioned this to my parents the last time I visited their house for dinner several weeks ago, my Dad nodded wisely. “Cursed with competence,” he remarked, and I laughed. “The more you demonstrate how good you are, the more the Gamma will rely on you,” he explained.

He was so right. Michael has assigned more and more duties to me, and although I am thrilled to have inspired his confidence, it means I don’t have time to do anything most days except work. I snatch a few hours for sleep every night, then get straight back to work. So for the last couple of months, I’ve really only let my wolf out during our weekly Friday night Pack Runs, when everyone transforms into their wolf form together, and lets them run wild through the forest under the moonlight for a few hours. I know she understands why she is being kept inside, but it is hard for her to be patient.

“Has even one single person wished you happy birthday?” she grouses.

“Well, no,” I silently respond, “but you can hardly expect anyone to be thinking about that on the day of the Ball. I don’t blame them.”

“Your 18th birthday is more important than a Ball,” she sniffs indignantly. “Every year has midwinter. You only turn 18 once. And you know what that means!”

Oh, I do. When a werewolf turns 18, that means that their ability to scent their fated mate is triggered. I have heard that sometimes it can happen on their actual 18th birthday, wolves meeting the one person that they are destined by the gods to be with forever.

Pfsh. As if that would happen to me. I’m just a wolf, not some special or powerful or enchanting person destined for a glorious future. It was enough for me when my inner wolf manifested back when puberty began. Having her with me all the time, and being able to let her transform us into a beautiful and powerful dark-furred wolf is all I will ever want. The feeling when she takes over, and I just ride inside her mind while she pounds across the forest floor is the most exhilarating and wonderful thing I could ever desire.

“Maybe if I get a chance later, after I’ve done everything and the Ball is in full swing, we can sneak off and have a nice birthday run,” I tell her.

She perks up hopefully. “That’d be really nice,” she concedes.

For now, though, I have to get back to work. It’s already mid-morning and I still have a million things to take care of before the guests arrive at sunset.

Dominic

Tonight we are attending the Midwinter Ball of the River Moon Pack out west in Humboldt County, so I am busy getting everything ready for our caravan of cars to depart at noon. My father is the chief mechanic for Dark Woods Pack, and I’ve been his assistant for the past couple of years. We’re doing a final check, inspecting the oil levels and the tire pressure of all the vehicles, doing a last vacuum of the interiors, a last polish of the gleaming black paint. Alpha Ross made it clear that we are to present our best image as we arrive. He and the other leaders will never notice how spotless and well-maintained the vehicles are, but you can bet they’d notice if they were dirty or malfunctioning.

Dad straightens up from under the hood of the Alpha’s Escalade, wiping off the dipstick with an oily cloth. He’s wearing his mechanic’s overalls and work boots, but I’m just wearing a t-shirt and shorts and flip-flops, easy to get off and on when I shift. He looks over at me, where I am inspecting the tire rims. He closes the hood, and says, “Well, I think that’s everything. You can start pulling the cars around to the front of the pack house.”

I nod and get into the front seat of the Escalade, where the keys are already in the ignition. Dad strides over and hits the button to open the main door to our huge garage for me, and I ease the car out past him as he waves. He knows I’ll be back shortly for the next one.

It’s a short drive from the garage in town to the secluded pack house, just over four miles. We try to meld in to normal human society, so a lot of our businesses and homes are in the regular community, but the pack house really needs to be farther away. It would be a lot harder to hide a big group of werewolves smack in the middle of town. The humans think the pack house is some kind of private resort, with its huge hotel-like structure and the surrounding outbuildings, hidden away behind the security fence and concealing hedges. That’s another reason to have a lot of us scattered here, living in town: to keep track of any gossip we might hear, and try to deflect attention away from the pack.

Being a werewolf is awesome, of course, but maintaining our secrecy is important. Humans wouldn’t like knowing that they aren’t the dominant species. Let them maintain their delusions, it doesn’t make any difference to us. We just want them to stay happy, so that we can live amongst them and take advantage of their infrastructure and service economy. That’s what they taught us in History of Lycans and Wolves back in high school, anyway.

When I get to the compound’s gate, I enter the code and pull through when the door swings open. I stop the Escalade right outside the front door of the mansion along the huge circular driveway, leaving the keys in the ignition. I nod to the guard out in front of the entrance to the house, and slip back behind some trees to shift.

I strip off my clothes in a flash, stuffing them into the light bag I’ve brought with me, then shift to my wolf. It doesn’t even hurt any more, the bones and muscles and skin and hair all smoothly transforming until I have become my big wolf, with blondish pale fur, much lighter than the dark brown skin of my human form. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the appearance of your wolf - hair color doesn’t match, or eye color, or really anything. My human eyes are nearly black, but my wolf eyes are a much lighter brown color with flecks of green. Or so I’ve been told. Who’d waste wolf time staring into a mirror?

I pick up the bag, clutching the strap in my teeth, and let my wolf run. He is delighted with today’s task, knowing that he’ll get to run back from the pack house several times after I deliver each car. It’d be a long walk to the garage in my human form, but in my wolf form it is as fast as driving a car. I ride along inside while he runs, hovering in the back of our mind as he sticks to the trees on the outskirts of town, our paws pounding along the dirt path hidden from the eyes of humans. When we get close enough, he slows down, and as soon as he stops I shift back. I pull on my clothes quickly and run my human form back to the garage.

Dad is waiting, looking at his watch when I zoom in. He looks at me with a mischievous smile on his broad, dark face, and says, “Sixteen minutes. Not bad.”

I laugh and protest, “Hey! I hit three traffic lights before I got out of town!”

He pats my back, grinning at me. “Good job, kid, that one’s next,” he says, nodding at the next SUV in line.

I climb in and say, “Don’t start timing ’til I get out the door. I’ll bet I can get it down to fourteen!”

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