The Shadow Alpha

Chapter 1: Found Fleeing

Chapter 1: Found Fleeing

Holly

                   I'm running faster than I've ever run before. Trees appear more like dark disfigured monsters that loom over me, all blurring past faster than I can process. My lungs and legs are working so hard, my heart pounding in my ears; this is what it feels like to truly be running for your life.

            Images of the attack flash through my mind. There was fire, there was blood, viscious snarling and the ripping of flesh...And the screams that followed. My God, it was a horror scene come to life. I hate myself for not being able to do anything—I could only bear witness to my pack being attacked with the chilling knowledge that despite everything we were going to lose.

            I had been out for the day, wandering through the forests, foraging for different herbs and berries that my adoptive mom Carmen uses for various teas and recipes. I don't know my true parents—I was orphaned for reasons I still don't know of, and the Half-Moon pack's Luna—Carmen—found me underneath a holly tree, hence my name: Holly.

            Luna Carmen took me in, she says, without a second thought, allowing me into the pack and raised me in the years that followed. Our Alpha, Garrett, has always been kind and good to all he encounters, never causing any disputes among others, or painting our pack as a target. We've lived peacefully along the Northern California coast for years—until now, that is.

            The pack that came for us is stronger and more vicious than any other I've seen in my life. I at first thought it was the Shadow Pack—the legendary pack which has a more brutal and bloodthirsty reputation than any other pack in our history. The Shadow pack is said to be the strongest and most violent pack of them all. I've never met anyone who belonged to the Shadows, but the stories are enough to keep the children scared at night.

            So it goes: the Shadows have some kind of desire to rule all of America, at the very least. They want to spread their boundaries to become unstoppable. They've been doing so, very successfully, for years; taking over and forcing other packs to surrender themselves and their land. Word is that they've been heading west, having already occupied much of the Eastern and Mid-West areas.

            But Shadows are identified by the unmistakable black bands around their arms, whereas the people who were after us tonight sported red zigzag shapes along their shoulders and backs.

            I had found Luna Carmen and Garrett together, dead. Their chests were slashed open, and I could tell they'd suffered greatly, but their hands were clasped tightly around each other as they left this life as they walked this one: together. I didn't have time to cry or grieve—I knew I needed to get out of there, or I would soon be lying beside the, just as brutalized, just as lifeless.

            My pack members around me were either fighting or already dead on the ground—and I was somehow lucky enough to go unnoticed amid the chaos. I wanted to stay and fight, but I know a losing battle when I see one. I did my part, to an extent, but only because I had to. A few smaller wolves—juveniles, I'm sure— came after me, but I fought my way past them. The entire time my wolf was snarling at me to run, to save myself from the inevitable end that would be Half-Moon's complete destruction.

            So I ran, and now I'm still running. I can feel my blood trickling down my arm from the slashes across my shoulder blade that one of the juveniles had given me as I turned to flee. But that pain is nothing compared to the pain of realizing most everyone I've come to know is going to be dead by morning.

            The Half-Moon pack won't exist after dawn. And I don't know if I'll make it out of our attacker's radius in time to save my own life.