13. Ylfa
By the light of dawn, we leave the human city and embark for the western coastline. It’s a real effort to put all my faith in the humans we have in our company now. Are they truly trustworthy? Will they betray us when we arrive at their rendezvous site and kill us, even if we made a vow of peace?
We make them sick, so I suppose their actions would be justified. Fear does crazy things to a rational being’s head, after all.
It’s a really big risk being out here with them. We’re alone now. We’re just a small pack, and we have no way of defending ourselves if they decide to take action.
Brianna won’t tell me how many humans will be waiting for us when we arrive, so I just bite my tongue and go along with it.
Besides, it appears we may have more wolves joining us. Butch and his entire pack have decided to leave the city to the animals and accompany us on our mission, much to my delight.
While we need the extra wolf power, I find the middle-aged shifter far too eccentric. When we first met, I assumed it was only Butch and his two betas, but his pack was much larger than I realized. Nowhere compared to the couple of hundred wolves back at home, but still pretty substantial.
He mostly has males in his pack. He has a few females too, but they’re the most ragtag looking group of shifters I have ever seen. Their clothes are... creative: an amalgamation of every human fashion trend from the late twentieth century. Butch told me his pack was for packless wolves. Shifters who were banished from their original packs, just like me.
Maybe if I had never run into Luna’s moon pool that night, then I could have eventually found my way to Butch.
Who knows? He says his pack is for oddballs and eccentrics, and I was certainly an oddball. Would butch have accepted a dud?
What’s strange is that Butch refuses to be called “Alpha”. Everyone in his pack refers to him by name alone, and it’s a pleasant change from what I’m used to.
It appears Butch regards his pack as if they’re his equals, which is a surprise. He was so dominant when we first met, and even scoffed when I told him we were an equalitarian pack. But it appears he was just the same as me.
Had he been testing me? To see if I was worthy to stay in his city?
Brianna and the other two don’t look pleased with the additional wolves, but the wolves leave them be. Even without me giving him all of the details of our plan, Butch pretty much figured out that we were working with them, anyway.
I watch the dread-locked human as she pushes her way ahead, and it’s no surprise she keeps a wide berth from the new wolves of our pack.
We were carriers of a deadly virus that killed off a large portion of their people, and an uncomfortable knot grows in my chest.
It’s guilt.
I suppose some would argue that the humans had it coming. There were heretics amongst their own kind who would have agreed with that sentiment too, blaming it on the rapture or something.
While true that the humans were destroying the planet, they didn’t deserve to die in such a horrific way.
I wouldn’t wish that kind of fate on anyone. Not even my enemies. Not even Natasha...
Butch rushes up beside me, and it’s good to see he’s fully clothed again. “So, the word on the street is that you used to be a dud...”
By street, I assume he means the abandoned streets of the ruined city that he left behind.
“Yes,” I sigh.
He grins. “Well, you’re in good company. I have a dud in my pack too.”
My eyes pop from their sockets, and now I spin around, staring like he has grown an extra eight heads like some creepy hydra. “What...? Another dud?”
His smile widens. “Yes. You didn’t think you were the only one, did ya? I’ll introduce you. Zack! There’s someone who wants to meet ya.”
My head’s still whirling when a teenage guy who looks about seventeen steps away from a small group. “Yes, Alpha?”
Butch knocks him across the head. “I told you not to call me that. This here is Ylfa, and she’s a dud like you. Well, former dud.”
Zack falls completely motionless, staring at me now like I’ve grown an extra eight heads like the hydra from Greek mythology.
I know the feeling; I thought I was the only one too. I now know there had been other wolfless lycans ever since Silver revealed her past to me, but I didn’t think there were any alive right now.