In The Shadows (Re-written)

-TWO-

Dust flew up everywhere around the apprentice who had been flipped over the shoulder of his master and into the dirt with a heavy thud. He groaned and flung his arm over his eyes. "Is it lunch time yet?"

His master stood over him, amusement in his eyes as he held out a hand for the young wolf. "We've only started an hour ago. You've got awhile kid."

I enjoyed watching the other apprentices train. I learned a lot just by listening to them teach and watching. I watched the teachers mostly because they executed everything correctly, but I would also occasionally sneak a glance at the apprentices to see what they were doing wrong.

The apprentices hated it when I watched them. I could sense their aggression when they passed me. They thought I was judging them when I had no skills of my own. They thought I had no place in being around them when I didn't even have a beast.

I curled my legs into my chest, wrapping my arms around my legs and resting my chin on my knees. I didn't let their loathing looks dissuade me though. This was as close as I would ever get to warrior training. I sighed and continued to watch, observing Judah, the apprentice, try over and over again until he finally did it right.

I felt a sudden prickle raise the hairs on the back of my neck. It was a familiar feeling, I was used to being stared at, so I tried to ignore it. My brows screwed together as I focused on what Judah's teacher was telling him about keeping his claws from slicing his own skin when he went to punch.

However, it grew increasingly difficult for me to actually pay attention, the uneasy feeling settling over me, no longer just discomforting but setting off a sense of danger within me.

Slowly, I twisted to look over my shoulder. My eyes scanned the wooden bleachers behind me. I never sat in them since I would be too far away to properly hear the teacher. It didn't matter much to me if I sat in the dirt by the edge of the ring outlined in white chalk, or on the hard wood. They both offered the same amount of comfort in the end.

There was no one else in the bleachers, the seats usually empty unless higher ranking warriors wanted to have a go at each other.

My eyes moved to the slit between two of the rows, and that's when I caught who it was that was staring at me.

I gulped as I met a pair of grey-blue eyes that somehow always put me more on edge than my own father's did. There was genuine malice in his stare that bored into me. It chilled my blood and I was frozen in place, unable to move.

The beta scared the hell out of me. Coda was a massive male, he stood at the same towering height of my father. I would hardly come up past his midriff if we stood face to face. His expression was always severe and disapproving. Just a single look from him would shut up any boastful young werewolf or hunter running off their mouths.

I had witnessed it many times.

Coda was the subject of gossip in every imaginable way. The young boys looked up to him every bit as much as they respected my father. Coda was an exceptional warrior. He was an alpha himself after all, and that was a fact he never let anyone forget even if he wasn't the alpha of this pack.

The beta's name was whispered between the young females just as often. They'd send him hooded looks, unable to hide their attraction for the middle-aged male.

His jaw was more square than my father's sharper jawline, but his cheekbones were more pronounced. Accompanied with a straight nose set between those greyish blue eyes, it wasn't a surprise the beta was the crush of almost every female, young and old in this pack. It didn't matter that Coda had a more aged appearance that showed just how much he had seen and how long he had been around. He was definitely a man, not a hint of boyishness about him and I think that many of the young females in the pack had developed a fetish for older men because of our handsome beta.