Amora POV: The City

Running through the forest was so freeing, I almost forgot how nervous I was.

Stopping a few yards before the end of the forest, I shifted back and got dressed.

We arrived a little quicker than I was ready for. The city is about an hour run for my wolf, but for me to walk as a human, would have taken all day.

I left early in the day so I could be in the city around noon. This would give me time to scope out a safe area to find a mating partner in and head back to the forest to find a good spot for hiding my belongings and a comfortable spot for sleeping in my wolf form. Keska wants a sleeping spot that doesn't smell like humans have been there recently. We really don't want any campers stumbling upon us.

Keska is bigger than the average wolf, all adult shifters are quite large, think small car. Alphas are said to be the biggest of all of us, I can't say from experience though.

I've never met another Alpha besides Avenix and her mother, Alpha Allina.

Allina was beautiful. She was tall with long wavy blonde hair that reaches her waist. She also had piercing light green eyes.

I can remember her shifting into her wolf to chase us around the park, when I was a kid, giving out mothers a break . When we'd all be too tired to fight it anymore she'd lay in the grass, letting us rest our heads on her furry body, while we all took a nap.

She was like a mother to everyone in the pack, always knowing what someone needed and willing to help. She was no push over though. She was a warrior and she made sure to train her people to be one too.

Training didn't start until your tenth birthday, so I'd never been trained by her myself, but I had watched her and my mother train together. Allina was a fierce warrior, my mother was no slacker herself, she trained us when Allina couldn't. They were pretty evenly matched, but Allina was bigger, which is what ultimately got her the win, in my opinion.

Even back then I could tell Avenix was a carbon copy of her mother, in looks and skill. I'd often see them training together. When they weren't train to fight, Allina was training Ave how to be the Alpha. Ave was playful, always laughing. Kya is three years older than me, so she remembers better than I do.

Kya told me Avenix was rarely serious. She was always joking and didn't take her Alpha training very seriously. In her eyes that was at least a decade off.

That changed when Alpha Allina decided she wanted another baby. Avenix had to take over for the week her mother was gone. Everything went smoothly as far as I know, most likely she only had to take over the everyday, meanial tasks. Allina came back and soon found out she was expecting a new pup. Maybe it's because I was four, but that none months seemed to take years.

So when I was told she was in labor and the pup was finally coming, I was very excited. The pack was thrilled, sadly that didn't last...

I remember being in the kitchen when I heard the news. I'd been looking out the window, watching Kya's wolf wrestling around with some other pup, when I heard glass breaking. I turned around to see my mother bent over, clutching the center of her chest, anguish written all over her face, and a broken cup on the floor. Paniced, I ran to her, grabbing her leg. I was so worried she was hurt. When she saw me she crouched down to my level and, with tears running down her face, she told me the Alpha had died in child birth and so had the baby.

I didn't know it then, but shifters couldn't heal from everything, excessive blood loss being one of those things.

I was crying so hard in my mother's arms that I didn't heard my sister come in the house. My mother let me go to wrap my sister's bare form in a table cloth, then she picked us both up and went to the couch. She held us there, telling us how thankful she was to have us. We all slept in my mom's bed together that night, but before I fell asleep I remember looking at my mom and sister fast asleep in each other's arms. They both looked so peaceful; their red circles over lapping on the pillows, their ocean blue eyes were closed, freckles sprinkled across their faces.

I started to think how devastating it would be to lose them. Where would I go if they died? Would my father in the human city want me? I didn't know anything about him, not even what he looked like. Did I look like him? My black hair and forest green eyes were nothing like my mom and sister's appearances. I decided it probably was something I got from him, or at least someone in his family. I did get my mother's pale skin and freckles naturally appeared from the sun. At least we had that resemblance, even though it wasn't much. My eyes started to water thinking about Ave. She was all alone now. My whimpers must have partially woken up my mother because the next thing I knew, I was pulled into her side, wrapped in her safe arms. I peaked over her to check that Kya was still asleep, when I saw she was, I snuggled into my mother's embrace and finally cried myself to sleep.

The tears that dropped from my cheeks pulled me out of my memories. I wiped my eyes, took a deep breath, and finally walked my way through the last of the trees.