Two days after my emotional shift into hardened, slow-simmering anger, Luna Rashida came over to me during lunch. I still had no appetite for food and embraced her hands in mine.
"Miss Zara." Her eyes pooled as she looked at me like I was the only person inside the crowded dining area. "How are you feeling?"
The best answer to her question was none. While the initial shock, mental overload, and subsequent mental shut down I experienced in the library had passed, my mind and body both felt numb. Even days after being bombarded with shocking amounts of information, I didn't register my environment. Keeping to myself, I probably came off as cold and detached to the Yellow Sun pack but I... couldn't pretend anymore.
Or, not at this moment.
Part of me acknowledged that Luna Rashida felt she acted in my best interests, but an unspoken, condescending air that I should've known the truth before now was very off-putting.
Not my fault I'm not as smart as the bookworms.
If I knew this crazy 'choose your mate' trip was fake, then I wouldn't have gone.
A stark, sobering realization became obvious.
He would've come up with something else.
My voice was tight and strained, "Best I can."
I needed multiple, three-hour training sessions with Raina and Idris until my aggression worked out. Each session, I stopped when my body collapsed down into the grass, my muscles screaming for relief and breath burning my lungs. We concluded the last one, a two-on-one against me, with an audience that included Torak and Rose.
I hadn't spoken to Torak since our lake incident. He got over the experience and still smirked at me whenever he could catch my gaze, but my current unstable mental state left me distracted. A fleeting smile before a cold shoulder was all I had to offer him, or anyone else.
Like within my father's house, here I felt alone within a crowd. I was different, segregated, and lonely. Lumi retreated after learning she might have a developmental delay and my quiet headspace unsettled.
Rose and Idris however, were attached at the hip. For a healer who spent most of her days cooped up in the infirmary all day, she was extremely curious about life outside the Eastern territory. Their instant bond made me wonder what her and Idris' long-term plans were, but my place wasn't to barge into their personal business.
"And Lumi?" Luna Rashida snapped me out of my thoughts as her hands gave mine a gentle squeeze.
"She's still sorting things out." Terse and bitter, my normal filter wasn't present.
While she hadn't spoken a word to me, she emerged from her comfort shadows during a few fights against Raina, then slunk back after.
"I'm going to let her run again this evening, see if that will make her feel better." Masking a smile, my words felt forced and pretentious.
My relationship with Luna Rashida was strained. I appreciated her up-front honesty and wanted to trust her but my walls of insecurity were up. An unfortunate side effect of having my eyes opened was that I lost my blind trust in people.
It's better in the long run.
I wasn't going to be rude about my reservations though. At the end of the day, I was a guest in their home and they deserved my best manners.
"Before then..." Her hazel eyes sparkled. "I was hoping that Torak could show you the greenhouse this afternoon?"
"Oh, yeah." I forgot how much I wanted to see the greenhouse space. "I'd like that very much."
"Wonderful!" Her eyes shone like flecks of sunlight reflected in her irises and her lips pulled into a full smile revealing her beautiful, white teeth. "I'll inform Jonah that you'll be visiting for a tour. Elena is wrapping up in the library today but you're welcome to have Raina or Cole join you."
Elena...
I cringed at her name. Our friendship was fractured by this experience, with the only strings holding us together were me believing two things. First, she'd been lied to as well. And second, she thought she acted in my best interest. I wasn't ready to look past those to repair a now awkward gap between us but knew we needed a long conversation before leaving here.
"I'll ask." I returned her bright smile with a shaky one.
Certain that Raina and Cole had no interest in pretty flowers and herbal medicines, I resigned to ask. After I saw they spoke with Alpha Stephen, I excused myself.
Two seconds after asking, I had two firm 'no's. So, after avoiding him for five straight days -
"Looks like we have a date, Miss Zara," Future Alpha Torak greeted me with a familiar smirk and glint in his eyes.
Luna Rashida's widening smile made me suspect that instead of her son randomly bumping into me, she mindlinked him that I was here with her.
I tried to force another polite smile, but couldn't help and groaned.
Lovely.
"Oh, wow..." I gasped at the sight my eyes took in.
Torak and I stood inside the greenhouse's entrance, within the smallest of three glass structures. I felt very tiny, as giant glass enclosed around and above me.
"Like it?"
My fingers registered the gentle touch as Torak took my hand and led me down the central aisle. We walked past rows upon rows of beautiful, colorful flowers. Through the damp, warm air, I walked speechless, my jaw dropped at the visual beauty and the wonderful, vibrant smells of each of the flowers.
After one squeeze from Torak's hand on mine, I struggled to find my voice.
"It's..." I searched to find the right choice of words, but mine fell short. "Beautiful."
"It is," a voice spoke up behind us.
I jumped in my brown leather boots and whirled around. A tall, thin young man stood over me, with shoulder-length brown hair, curious brown eyes behind round glasses, and his arms clasped his elbows behind his back. His casual attire and brown apron streaked with brown and black dirt smudges suggested he worked here.
"We have hundreds of plant specimens here." A sense of pride burst through in his voice. "From the most common houseplant to exotic hybrid flowers to the most advanced alternative medicines, they're all grown here."
"And some are only grown here, as your friend from the North can attest." He passed in between us. Waving one hand for us to follow, he led us to a patch of familiar-looking colored flowers.
"Like these." He reached over with a pair of clippers in his hand, snipped off a rainbow rose, and handed the delicate stem to me.
A soft smile curled up the corners of my lips, softening my strained cheeks for the first time in days. "Thank you. They're so pretty..." I lifted the rainbow rose up to my nose, my eyes fluttering at the sweet scent.
"Jonah." His non-clippers hand extended to mine. "I'm one of the greenhouse workers."
"Zara." As my head bobbed a few times, I noticed that his hand didn't release mine.
Instead, he tucked his clippers back into an apron pocket and his warm palm enveloped over our clasped hands.
"That's quite obvious." He smiled before a flush of red crept into his cheeks.
Torak's posture stiffened next to me and I smiled when he released a low growl of warning.
"Jonah," he muttered. "We're here to see the greenhouse, not have you stare uncomfortably at Miss Zara."
"Of course." Jonah dropped my hand, turned, and walked a few steps ahead of me.
"Jealous?" My smile widened as I teased the small scowl that turned Torak's lips downward.
"Playing the part." He shook his head, loosening his curls and keeping his eyes fixated on Jonah. When he brought them back to mine, he smiled widely. "I assumed you'd be pleased with a possessive approach."
"Don't even start thinking that you have any idea about what pleases me," I whispered.
My thumb and forefinger twirled the rose as I stepped behind Jonah. A warm hand circled my free hand's wrist and, with one yank, prevented me from taking a further step.
"I assure you, Zara..." A pair of blazing hazel eyes bored into me, pupils enlarging with a mix of anger and desire. "I'm quite capable of pleasing you in all ways you can imagine, and some that you most likely can't."
"Silly Torak..."
I slid my hand up, placed my palm flat on his chest, and ignored an odd sensation to be closer to him. Playing his game, I inched closer and stopped when our lips were an inch apart. His breath fanned over mine, parted them open, and breathed into his mouth, "If you're feeling all hot and bothered, then I'm sure that the lake is a good place to cool yourself off."
With that, I closed the gap, leaning in so he believed I was going to kiss him. At the last second, I turned my face away and allowed his lips to graze a chaste kiss on my cheek. With a huff, I patted my palm on his chest and stepped away.
"Nicely played." He chuckled behind me.
I didn't respond, smiling even though he couldn't see it. Lumi didn't say anything but snuffed at my rejection.
The second greenhouse, ten degrees warmer, housed the Eastern pack's food gardens. My eyes drank in rows of lush fruit trees, green herbs and spices, and sprawling vegetable gardens. More species of edible plants than I knew existed grew here and my shoulders relaxed as we walked between them.
After my curious eyes had seen enough, Jonah led us into the largest greenhouse structure. Rows and rows of odd-shaped potted plants surrounded us. Looking at the lushy expanse of green plants with shiny, pointed leaves, a pungent, unpleasant floral smell engulfed my nostrils.
"Ugh!" One of my hands clapped over my nose. "That smells awful."
"It's an acquired smell," Jonah admitted, stuffing his hands in his apron pocket. "You get used to it eventually. This greenhouse's benefits far outweigh its smell."
"Eww..." My voice sounded nasally through my pinched nose. "What is it?"
"Hemp," Torak replied in a cool, even tone, lifting his eyes to mine. "For medical purposes."
"Oh, thank Goddess." I stepped closer to the door. "I thought you were going to say it's medical marijuana."
Torak and Jonah exchanged an amused smile and their glazed eyes told me they mindlinked. I frowned as I waited and hoped they finished soon because the inside of my nostrils burned.
"What?" I asked from the doorway.
"Hemp is grown in the first six rows," Jonah explained, his lips twitching. "The rest is as you assumed."
It's... It's -
My mouth dropped open and I backed out of the greenhouse doors.
I've definitely seen enough. We can go back to the flowers and fruit trees now.
"Now you're shy."
Torak laughed as he and Jonah followed me out. His chuckles echoed against the walls of the central corridor as we walked back to the greenhouse exit.
"It's quite fascinating, Zara," Jonah assured with a hand on my shoulder. "We have an oil and powder form for all kinds of medical or recreational applications. It doesn't have to be smoked, we can accommodate it into any recipe."
"Recreational applications." I snorted as my palms pushed into the doors. "Thanks for the tour though Jonah. Very eye-opening."
With that, I burst the doors open with a bang. My chest heaved as I breathed in the fresh, cool late afternoon air. Using quick steps, I rushed down the short set of steps down to a sidewalk that went either left to the lake or right back to the packhouse.
"Zara, wait!" Torak caught up to me in a few steps. "Does what you saw bother you?"
"That you're all... a bunch of potheads?" Scoffing, my eyes cast down on the sidewalk at my feet. "Not at all. I don't want to participate in your... recreational activities."
"Didn't take you for the judgmental type," his voice clipped in my ear. "Since some of those medicines helped you heal in the hospital."
A low grunt left me. I stopped in my retreat and faced him, palming my hips. "Is that why my mind was foggy and I couldn't mindlink?"
The sun highlighted the auburn in his hair as he shook his head. "Not unless they also gave you painkillers."
That answers that.
My feet resumed their retreat, stopping at the sidewalk fork. Before I turned to head back to the packhouse, he placed one hand on my shoulder.
"Zara," his voice flowed softly into my ear. "I assume that your mind, out of anyone's here, could need some calming down."
"Maybe, but that's not the way I'd like to go about it." I removed his hand and flinched as the warmth it had left disappeared.
"I get it." His sculpted shoulders strained his black T-shirt as they shrugged. "Not personally but when I found out a month ago about your visit, I figured this would happen. Luna Rashida had me and Rose down in the library for a week preparing for your visit and I still can't wrap my brain around all of it."
"What do you mean?" My eyes narrowed.
His eyes softened and once again, he looked at me in sympathy for a few moments. For the second time, the first being when he saw my scars, he looked at me without no teasing or unspoken intentions.
"I'm sorry this is happening." His sincere tone softened my glare. "No one deserves to be treated cruelly, especially by their parents."
"I wish I could say I was surprised." The husky whisper out of my lips didn't sound like my own voice. Dropping my eyes and hugging my waist, I admitted, "He's never been honest with me."
"You've been fed a lot of lies," he admitted in a low voice. "And it must've hurt to find that out."
"I-" I started when I remembered the reason he wore scars across his body. While we weren't mates, we shared a few common connections. "Thanks, Torak."
"So, does this mean we can go back to your room and console each other?" He wiggled his eyebrows.
A sudden fit of laughter bubbled up and escaped my mouth. Shaking my shoulders, I released laugh after laugh until gasping for breath.
Hearing Torak's chuckle, I cut off my laughs. "Not a chance, Torak."
The next several days were... normal and boring compared to the first two weeks I stayed in the Eastern territory. Mornings I trained with Raina, deflected Torak's teasing, and started spending time with Alpha Stephan in the afternoons. After Rashida released me from her library out of sympathy since Elena remained, Stephan offered to discuss 'routine Alpha pack responsibilities' with me.
Having never been given that offer from my own father, I accepted.
I was whole-heartedly disappointed when almost all of Alpha Stephan's work involved him sitting behind a desk reading, checking, updating, writing, and not filing away reports. It was... horrendously boring and anti-climactic.
The actual reports varied in different subjects from pack developments to social interactions and security details. My neck slacked and I groaned once I learned the majority of his actual pack work was mundane paperwork.
Saying that Alpha Stephan's office was cluttered was an understatement. He never threw away a single piece of paper, invented new stacks all over his office. I couldn't have described what his office looked like if I tried, because I couldn't see what was buried under giant, random, self-created mountains of paperwork.
"Have you thought about... updating these?"
After observing his scattered approach for three days, I pointed to a large floor stack that tipped over and papers scattered. One look at the half-inch of dust coating the computer on the edge of his desk answered my question.
"We're in the process of updating the library archives for electronic documents." His fingertips realigned the slanted paper stack and salvaged his current pile. "Luna Rashida wants to create a searchable database of all pages within all of the books within the library."
"All of them?" I blinked at him, slack-jawed. "That'll take -"
"Decades." He chuckled, sat back in his desk chair, and stroked the gray hairs along his square jawline. "Until then, my tasks are resigned to pen-and-paper style."
Archaic.
"I could..." I pointed at his dusty computer. "Update some things for you, if you'd like."
"Be my guest." He waved his hand at the monitor and grunted. "But let my eyes see the documents before you discard anything."
"Of course," I assured him with a nod.
A smile tugged up the corners of my lips. I wasn't excited about being an office assistant but wanted to contribute.
My days turned into a routine. After breakfast, I had morning practices with Raina, showered, ate lunch and worked afternoons in Alpha Stephan's office, sneezed at his dust collection, ran Lumi around the lake, ate dinner with some of the pack members, then ran her again.
Structured like when I lived in my father's house, with the large exception that I chose when I did what activities, my life wasn't the most interesting but I was occupied.
As much as I prodded her, Lumi remained quiet. I tried to be patient, but my concern over her well-being weighed on my mind. She put half the effort on our runs, despite my relenting control to her every time.
I don't know how to help her.
For the first time since 'meeting' her, I didn't know what to say to Lumi. The first day I tried positive mental messages of support, like, 'Don't worry Lumi, we'll get through this.' I know she heard me but her silence ate away at my confidence.
After a few days' worth of gentle attempts, she refused to budge. So, I made the difficult decision and gave her some space in the mental shadows and let her come out when she was ready. This silent arrangement wasn't uncomfortable but after we'd shared the same headspace for two months, even with her short vocabulary, my mind felt unusually quiet.
I used my office time to pick Alpha Stephan's brain, who offered his opinions, policies, and leadership methods. We had an interesting conversation about Torak, inspired by a burning question leftover from my library searching days.
"Alpha Stephan..." I started as my fingers typed in some new macros for pack security assignments.
Setting up spreadsheets and Gantt charts, I arranged the security schedule so the borders each wolf preferred had the highest probability of assignment to them but they still rotated through the other locations. Alpha Stephan wasn't impressed with my efforts, but Beta Valko and Gamma Sebastian were and promised me that they'd 'work on him.'
Whatever that means.
"Mmm-hmm?" His brown eyes stared through his reading glasses at the eighteenth stack of paperwork shoved at him today.
With a cough, I cleared my throat. "May I ask something about Future Alpha Torak?"
"He's very fond of you," he replied without a single flinch in his expression or body language. "Although from what angle, I haven't yet distinguished."
"Umm, no." My cheeks warmed at the idea of me and Torak together at any angle. "I wanted to ask about his monthly challenges."
"We've postponed this month's challenge while you're visiting us." He released a sigh and lifted his eyes to mine. "It can be a bit nasty to witness, I'm afraid."
"Why do it at all?" I asked him with a timid voice.
Why was the question I hated the most, since my father never answered that question. However, with this question, Stephan was not my father, and obliged me with an answer.
"Torak never had interest in training to fight." He set down his papers and perched his glasses atop his forehead. A temporary wave of concern flashed over his eyes before he masked the brief emotion with a hardened determination. "If he's going to be Alpha, then he must be physically strong enough to protect it."
"But it shouldn't be the Alpha's job to fight everyone off," I started when he corrected himself.
"No, but it would be his position to defend his Alpha title against a challenger of another pack, rogues perhaps."
"I see." My voice reverted back to my default answer for when I didn't understand. "He... doesn't seem like the fighting type. That's all."
"He's not," he confessed with a tinge of hesitation in his voice. "Honestly, I didn't think he'd participate in it, or would have quit a long time ago. I suspect he only does it out of some blind obsession with proving me wrong."
"I see," I repeated in an even quieter tone.
Wondering if Torak felt as trapped in his current situation as did, if he felt the same unbridled desire to please his own father, squeezed my heart.
The possibility that we had that in common, as well as the resulting scarred evidence, gave me a different perspective past his playboy image.