Bound

Chapter 3 - Dmitri

Dmitri

"Your excuses are falling on deaf ears. Let me remind you that these were the terms you agreed to in exchange for valuable information regarding your rebel issue," I continue, not allowing for any interruptions.

"We have arranged for a week from today to start renovations and building. Get the land cleared by then, or we cancel the deal, and you will find yourself footing the bill for everything up to now with additional compensation for my inconvenience."

My voice remains calm as I proceed. "Breach of contract will result in our alliance terminating, ending all intel I receive that could assist you. We will also become unavailable should you require assistance from my warriors," I end succinctly, allowing my words to sink into the Alpha on the receiving end of my call.

Alpha Jacobson from the Silver Wood Pack hesitates slightly before reluctantly apologizing and conceding before I cut the call. Wise decision on his part. He should know better than to think there was any other way. He would be left vulnerable without my alliance should the rebels be brazen enough to launch a full-on attack. Information regarding the broken agreement and Jacobson's lack of reinforcements could give them the necessary courage.

With his pack closest to the suspected rebel camp in the South, he needs all the help he can get. My intel had already saved two of his pack members' lives just last week when we intercepted communication regarding a planned kidnapping, resulting in a trap being set and four rebels being captured. The High Council was currently interrogating them, unsuccessfully, it seemed.

I throw my phone on the desk and loosen my tie. It has been a long day of meetings and calls, and I hate wearing formal attire. A requirement when meeting with the High Council of Elders. They seemed frozen in time, their beliefs and doctrines still stuck in the old ages, prolonged past expiration. Their futile attempts to extract helpful information from the four rebels have made them anxious. Considering their less-than-humane extraction techniques, I'm sure that if the rebels knew anything of value, they would have said so already.

They want me to lead a full-on attack on the rebel camps in the South based on a rumor that the headquarters may be there and that they may be working with Hunters. I'm not willing to lose men based on unvalidated information. Not to mention it would draw unwanted attention from the human race. I have been working on eradicating it quietly, infiltrating their network, and picking them apart from the inside. It takes more time, but casualties are reduced, and we remain under the human radar.

The Elders fail in some ways to understand that the supernatural world has long since evolved, becoming more modernized and less conspicuous. We no longer live in secluded areas, far from humans, huddled together. Instead, over time we had slowly taken over small towns and neighborhoods, forming communities adjacent to human ones, with them largely unaware of our true natures. Mine even less, as Lycans are few and far between, resulting in our race rarely entering the rumor mill, if at all. It helped that werewolves lived longer, allowing this to happen gradually as humans in a chosen area died off, assimilation done without force.

"You look like you could use a stiff one," my beta Ivan says as he walks into my office, lowering himself into an oversized leather chair on the opposite side of my desk.

"Confirm with the builders that we will start building on the Jacobson land next week as scheduled. They have two weeks to complete everything," I say to him as I sit in my chair, eyeing the huge oak desk filled with stacks of paperwork. Still to be checked and approved. Meetings have eaten into time that could have been better spent.

He nods in agreement. As the Alpha of the strongest pack in the Northern Hemisphere, the White Claw Pack, my orders rarely, if ever, are disobeyed.

"I visited the town bordering the Jacobson land as you requested," Ivan says, referring to Willow Falls.

"Alpha Jacobson spoke to the Sheriff of the town, and he is happy with the arrangement to continue as it has in the past. I advised him of the timeline for the new tenants taking occupation on the land and that he should expect some new faces around the area," Ivan elaborates, referring to our pack members that will be moving there as soon as the existing housing has been renovated and additional housing erected. Jacobson's people were supposed to be off that land yesterday, but some had still not relocated, hence the necessity for the earlier conversation with him. I couldn't afford delays.

Part of the pack members relocating to the Jacobson land would be me, my beta, and my gamma, freeing up the current space for new pack members arriving at the end of the following month. The location of the land was ideal as it allowed us better access to monitor the major entry route into our pack lands. Better control over who was coming and going meant better security for pack members. Rebels and Hunters still posed a threat to us. There would always be someone trying to exterminate supernatural's. It had been like that for centuries and was unlikely to change anytime soon.

Jacobson stated that bar the sheriff, who was aware of what we are, the older, more established residents of the town had unfounded suspicions, nothing we had to worry about. Rumors about supernaturals were everywhere but usually remained just that, hearsay. We are good at covering our trails. So long as the town remained protected, as stipulated in our agreement when taking over the land, everything would be as it was before—a historic and long-standing agreement between us and the town.

"Sheriff Mauret gave us access to the database containing all the files on all the current residents in the town, bar a few which are still pending completion," Ivan states just as my gamma Kira enters the office.

I met Ivan over two centuries ago, becoming close friends, brothers even. Kira grew up with him from infancy, and they were inseparable, meaning that when I befriended Ivan, Kira came as a package deal. Not that I minded. I trusted her as much as I trusted Ivan, which is what mattered in a second and third in command.

Looking at Kira, you wouldn't think her the gamma of such a large and prestigious pack. She was smaller than most werewolves at 5'8", muscular with bob-cut brown hair and brown eyes. What she lacked in size, she made up for in speed and intellect. Her smaller size made her faster, even in her human form. She was also one of the best strategists in all the packs on this side of the equator. Many wars in the past had been fought and won thanks to her ruthless military strategy. She oversaw training our werewolf warriors, renowned as the strongest and most ruthless for the last two hundred years.

"I've already started running analytics on the database files so that we can check for any anomalies," Kira states, taking a seat on the armrest of Ivan's chair.

We ran in-depth checks to determine any irregularities on any of the residents in Willow Falls. This was done by Jacobson's pack already when they started living on the land. However, our technology was more advanced and gave us quicker results matching against a more extensive array of external databases. We also needed up-to-date information as the last checks were done over five years ago. 

Irregularities could be ties with known werewolf hunters, large money deposits, or previous criminal records. The checks we carried out wouldn't be considered legal, but we never abused the information gathered and only a select few had access to the database information and results. Privacy was important, but we also needed to protect the residents and my pack. It was a fine line.

Hunters have been known to recruit residents and even implant Hunters into communities close to packs for surveillance purposes. An entire pack in the East had been taken out in this manner twenty years ago. It led to stringent checks being carried out in instances when a bordering town fell under werewolf protection. One that Jacobson clearly hadn't been keeping up with, as the resident checks should have been updated every two years at least.

"Give the Sheriff two weeks to hand over the rest of the files," I say to Ivan, hoping the checks come back clean. I wasn't in the mood for drama. 

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