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“Ah, you cannot deny him if you wanted to. He is the spitting image of you,”
My father gazed back at me, and his eyes held something never before seen in them when he looked at me. My mother brought me closer to her side, and I knew she did not want to let me out of her sight. I didn’t see much of our resemblance since he was so much bigger.
“Well, come in, we will have a feast and then get him into a room. Nolen, this is my Delta, his name is Eric, and he will be the first part of your training. My Beta, Adam, will help you strengthen yourself,” Alpha Roman told me as he came up to me and placed his arm around my shoulders, leading me into the packhouse and away from my parents, “Don’t let your father fool you; I have known him for years, and he was just as scrawny as you at this age.”
I glanced back at my father and mother, and I could have sworn I caught him rolling his eyes as my mother smiled. I had not seen her smile since my brother passed. I continued with the Alpha, and his son came up to my other side and nudged me.
I looked over at the sandy-blonde boy beside me, whose muscles bulged a little more on him than mine, but he looked friendly enough. His green eyes shone against the tawny color skin of his skin. “We’ll be training together. We’re going to make our packs the best of the best when we take over.”
I nodded, thinking that this alpha heir was going to kick my ass in the training ring.
At dinner, the Quartzite pack and I were introduced, and they all applauded me and wished me well in my training. I met the Delta’s daughter and his wife, along with Beta Adam’s mate, who was heavy with pup. I sat without speaking to anyone while my father and Alpha Roman talked. I couldn’t help but notice that the Alpha’s daughter kept glancing over at me. She started to make me feel uneasy since no girl had ever paid much attention to me at my own pack.
Learning the tiny pup approached her tenth birthday unnerved me, her being three years younger than me and already giving me more interest than others at Rhyolite. I continued to keep my head down until Sawyer, the heir to the Quartzite pack, came up and sat next to me.
“So, Nolen, what do the girls look like at your pack?” he inquired as he tore into his plate of steak, potatoes, and corn.
“I wouldn’t know,” I told him, my eyebrows furrowed.
Sawyer gave me a look of surprise, his fork halfway to his mouth, “What! You are an alpha, they should be falling at your feet.”
I kept my eyes on my plate while putting more potatoes in my mouth and swallowing, “I’m nothing in the pack’s eyes. They worshipped my brother.”
“Why, because you haven’t come into your own yet? I mean, you could have been training your body before now, but that can be remedied.” Sawyer chuckled as he shoveled food into his mouth. This wolf was blunt. I didn’t know if I liked that or not. He kind of reminded me of Archer.
I shook my head as a few of the girls from his pack strolled by the table, their eyes sizing me up, but they didn’t linger on me. Their eyes went to Sawyer, and he seemed to relish their attention. His mannerisms were exactly like my brother, girls falling at his feet without him even trying.
“So, what kind of training have you had?” Sawyer continued to question me in between bites.
“Not much, since I wasn’t going to be next in line. Besides, no one would want me as Alpha anyway,” I told him, finishing up my plate of food.
“Well, tomorrow is going to be fun then!” he exclaimed, his eyes shining in delight.
I rolled my eyes and groaned; how could any of this be fun? In the past, when Archer would wake me up at four in the morning, I could hardly stay up the rest of the day. Now I would be living the life intended for him. I surveyed the pack as they sat there enjoying their meal. How many of them have lost a loved one? I wondered. I realized that even though I would not like my life over the next few years, I needed to get strong enough to kill the wolf who took my brother away from my family.
I would become an Alpha that Archer would be proud of.
When the knock came upon my door that morning, nothing would prepare me for what awaited me. I pulled on my shirt, jogging pants, and running shoes and went downstairs. Sawyer met me in the dining room, where we sat across from each other. An Omega brought two plates of food and glasses of water to us. The meal was kind of bland; nevertheless, I ate it.
“Beta Adam doesn’t want us upchucking as he runs us to death,” Sawyer mumbled with a mouth full of toast. I grunted, not fully awake yet, dreading what lay before me. The moon still sat in the sky when we finished our food. We both headed out, and I spotted Beta Adam standing out on the steps with his back turned, waiting for us.
“Next time, you both need to be out here before me; if not, you will run two laps more around the pack lands,” Beta Adam instructed, turning to face us, “and if it continues, another lap will be added each day. This is your first and last warning.”
That woke me up. If this pack’s territory compared to anything like mine, it was huge. I shared a glance with Sawyer, and he seemed just as surprised as me.
“Now that I have your attention, pups, this is how our morning routine is going to work. You will wake up, have breakfast, and be out here before me. If not, you now understand the consequences; then we will run until I cannot run any longer. Once we are finished running, we will strength train; after that, you will have lunch. After lunch is your studies with Delta Eric. For the first few weeks, you will meet me out here three days a week. You will meet me the other two days at the training fields, where you both will spar until I see improvement. Are we clear?” Beta Adam questioned us, his eyes shifting between ours. This wolf was intimidating. I couldn’t believe he was a Beta.
Sawyer and I both nodded, “Yes, sir, Beta Adam.”
I noted the slight grin on his lips, and then it faded. He nodded, jogged down the steps, and we followed him. I hoped that I would at least be able to keep up with him. Otherwise, I was sure that he would make me run more laps.
By the time Beta Adam got tired, Sawyer and I were gasping for breath. We’d stayed together and never stopped running, but this damn pack land was bigger than I thought. Much bigger than ours, that was for sure. Stooped over his hands on his knees, Sawyer tried to catch his breath. It took everything in me to keep upright, and I crossed my arms over my head to extend my lungs better. Sweat poured off me in places I didn’t know it could leave the body.
Beta Adam stood there a moment before he motioned us forward, and I dared not make a sound as he led us over to a building. Once inside, he assigned us to different machines. He put me on a simple stand-alone with a long barbell rod. I sat down at it, and he put twenty pounds on each side. I peered up at him, afraid that I would disappoint him even with this light of weights.
Beta Adam stared down at me, a take-no-shit expression on his face. “This is lighter than you should be lifting at your age. You have till the end of the week to increase to more than this.”
I started curling the forty pounds, and I continued to push myself until I couldn’t any longer. He switched us often to different machines. We continued to change devices until noon, when he stopped us, and we went to lunch. My whole body hurt, and I had never been pushed that hard, even by my brother.
