Rolling my eyes, I picked up my bag and left the canteen. There was no point trying to talk to them in that mood. It wasn’t their fault. They hadn’t been on a decent run all week, and it was almost that time again. The more dominant wolves needed their freedom more often.
I was okay with the local rabbits that our alpha had encouraged to overbreed in the nearby woods. That was part of the problem, according to the others. I was more boy than wolf sometimes. But real boys weren’t exactly friendly either. Some of us weren’t meant to fit in anywhere. Maybe that was why the new girl stood out to me so much. We had that in common.
After school, a bunch of us walked home to avoid being trapped on a bus together, but the air remained charged with aggression. I could already tell the others would run that night. They had to.
Alison tripped me. I kept my balance and ignored her. There was no point in doing anything else.
She thumped my arm then lifted her shirt to show off her abs. “Hit me, Dorian. Let’s see how hard you can go.”
Mara laughed, her highly-strung laugh that meant she was too close to the edge. “He would never.”
“Wimp.” Alison bared her teeth, her voice unsettlingly inhuman. “Victor should make you bleed just for that.”
Victor made a show of cracking his knuckles.
“Here we go,” Mara snapped. “The big man wants to come out to play.”
“You wish you could have a go on the big man,” he said, eliciting laughter from the rest of the boys.
For all her strength and dominance, Mara wasn’t comfortable with that kind of banter. She had been hurt too much before the pack found her. If Victor had paid attention to anything beyond himself, he would have known better.
Mara’s nostrils flared, her hands curling into fists. I couldn’t let her face the punishment that would come if she tore Victor apart on the street.
“That’s enough, Victor,” I said loudly.
Their attention drew to me. Victor’s eyes gleamed with excitement. I patiently waited for the onslaught. The others couldn’t let me away with speaking up. They had no choice. I wasnothing. They picked on me to help them feel better, to ease the struggle against the wolf beating against its cage. I was no Omega, but I was obviously the lowest member of the pack. It was better for everyone if I just accepted that role without argument.
By the time we reached Wolf Row, the part of the neighbourhood we nicknamed because the pack owned all of the homes, the others had egged on Victor until his fur was almost shooting through his skin.
“Look at him,” Alison sneered, tossing her sleek black hair away from her face. “Looking at you like he’s man enough.”
Victor shoved me against the wall outside my house and refused to let me by. “Did you just look me in the eye?”
I sighed. “No, I did not look you in the eye.”
“Do you know what happens to weak wolves who look dominant wolves in the eye?” He gripped my face in an attempt to force me to look at him. He was shorter than me, but far stockier, and his fingers felt like vice grips on my jaw.
The others had backed away. Victor was too caught up in his own excitement to sense the new presence.
A large hand gripped the back of Victor’s neck and lifted him into the air as though he weighed nothing. Nathan Evans growled from the back of his throat. “Tell me, Victor, what happens to weak wolves?”
The boy let out a whimper, much to the amusement of the others in the group. I wanted to curl up and die. I felt his embarrassment twofold, and I knew that he would pay me back eventually for being the cause of it. When Victor dropped his gaze, mortified, Nathan let go, and the boy fell.
Victor scrambled to his feet. “Sorry,” he said sullenly. “I’m just ready for tonight.”
“No excuses.” Nathan relaxed his body to look less intimidating. It wasn’t easy to look at him when the wolf looked back at you through his eyes. But he wasn’t like some other wolves who felt the need to constantly remind us all of their position in the pack. Still, he wasn’t above teaching us a few lessons. “Being dominant isn’t an excuse to be a dickhead. That’s not what you’re taught in this pack. You’re just lucky the alpha didn’t catch you instead of me. We don’t tolerate bullies, even on the days we run. There’s no dominance without control. Remember that.”
He stood there until the others had all shuffled toward their own homes before turning to me. “You doing okay?”
“I’m fine,” I said grumpily. “I can handle it.”
He ran a hand through his straight black hair, but it fell back over one eye almost immediately. “Of course you can. That stand there and take it technique is working so well for you.”
“They can’t help it, Nate.”
“Yes, they can. Control is important for all of us.” He narrowed his eyes. “You have the control, Dorian, but you really need a bit of aggression sometimes, too. Stop letting them win.”
“It’s not a war.”