Free Alpha by Sophie Fleur

 
Chapter 1
     
    You can never go home again.
     
    Fred Awley wished that were true. He didn’t want to go home, yet
here he was, riding along that same road he’d left on more than a year before. At
20, those thick oaks and thin rivers had been like an inescapable maze. He’d
been desperate to escape the quiet chirping of birds, the sight of deer hoof
prints and the smell of fresh air. Most of all, he’d wanted to be free of James
and those feelings that had always tied them together tighter than a red
string.
     
    He sat in the back of a truck, watching as the woods got darker
and thicker. The old farmer had promised to take him to the property line and
no further. Not that Fred could blame the man. This was pack territory, where
human law did not apply. The wolves who lived past that fence line did not care
about the politics or niceties that most of society followed. The pack’s
justice was tooth and claw and combat. Strength was all.
     
    Fred shuddered. He was going back to the place he’d thought he’d
escaped from. He hadn’t minded the wolves. Most of them weren’t cruel, just
indifferent. He’d been the youngest son of the pack doctor, small and scrawny
even for a human. He’d been family, but not pack. Allowed to go wherever he
wished, following along at first his father’s and then James’s heels.
     
    The truck rolled to a stop near the line. Fred got out with
difficulty. His ribs were bruised and it hurt whenever he moved. He picked up
his duffle, dragging it on the ground.
     
    “Are you sure about this?” the old farmer asked him through his
open window.
     
    Fred nodded. “I’ll be safe here.”
     
    “Don’t know about that.”
     
    Fred wasn’t sure about that either. The woods did not seem
friendly. Dark shadowy trees loomed ahead as he stood.
     
    The farmer drove off, leaving Fred alone. There was no real fence.
No barbed wire. No red line painted in the dark earth. Nothing marked the
beginning of the pack territory but a single white cross. Fred used to joke
that they needed to paint a dragon on it like in the old maps.
     
    Beware, for here be dragons. Or werewolves. Same difference .
     
    He couldn’t carry his duffel. Not yet. Instead he let it trail
after him as he moved past that invisible line. It made a thumping sound as it
rolled over rocks and roots.
     
    Home.
     
    He lifted his nose, smelling the pine needles and red dust that
surrounded him. Birds chirped from high trees. Squirrels and other small
animals jumped from branch to branch as though they were following him. The
sounds comforted him like a song he’d heard before, over and over.
     
    He had to stop every few minutes to catch his breath. He cursed
the men who had done this to him. The cowards had attacked him near his
apartment at dark, three on one. He wasn’t a large man. He was barely five foot
five and had the thin frame of a runner. He usually forgot to get his sandy
blond hair cut and now it reached his collar, curling over his neck. He had a
sharp nose and blue eyes flecked with brown and bits of yellow. He’d always
thought his face was ordinary but he hadn’t wanted it broken.
     
    They’d hurt him, calling him a “wolf lover” as they did. Fred
didn’t know how the men had known where he came from. He never spoke of it to
his friends or his roommate, Kyle. He’d wanted to get as far away from the pack
and pack politics as he could. That’s why he’d run to the city.
     
    Wolves tended to avoid any large gathering places of humans
because they said humans smelled bad. Fred thought it had more to do with all
of the metal and iron in the cities. Wolves didn’t like being closed in. They’d
rather die than be caged. Plus there was the constant smell of smog in the air
and food being cooked on street corners. Of garbage rotting in the street. Come
to think of it, he hadn’t liked the city all the much either. But he’d stayed.
It was better than seeing James every day, knowing that James