POV - Chaos
"Oh, El-eeyyyeee-aasss!"
The sound shocked Kyas out of a dead sleep, filling me with pure panic.
'Evelyn! How did she find us here!?' Kyas screamed. I bolted under one of the twin beds, shaking, with Kyas' memory flooding my responses.
The omega maid that had come in screamed at an animal scurrying under the bed, certain that there was a huge rat in Elias' room, and ran out.
This brought two gaurds, the Alpha and the Luna, running into the bedroom. A guard tried to reach under the bed and grabbed my hind foot, sending the panic into overdrive, and I set up crying like I did to make everyone at Cedar River stop trying to kill me.
The noise was insane, Elias was up, yelling loudly, trying to get to me, but a guard held him back, the maid screaming I was dangerous and had attacked her, and that Elias needed to be protected. The Alpha and Luna were trying to figure out what was going on, and everyone was shouting over each other.
The guard tried again to get my foot, and I cried louder. My mind was completely wrapped up in fear and confusion.
Finally, the Alpha shouted, "Enough!", and everyone except me stopped.
"Papa!"Elias shouted. "It's not a rat. It's the dog! I can fix it, I just need to touch him. I can calm him down!"
Luna Ruby had her hands over her ears. "That's the dog making that racket? Blaze?" She yelled.
"Yes!"Elias shouted back. "Something scared him. He's terrified right now!"
"Safer for you to keep away then," the guard holding Elias said, "best way to get bit, trying to touch a frightened animal."
"Papa! Please! Just let me touch him, I can calm him down, and he won't hurt me." Elias pleaded.
Finally, the Alpha nodded for the guard to let Elias go. Elias dove under the bed with me, opposite the side of the guard, and threw his arms around me. He was like an anchor in a sea of confusion. I used his contact as a lifeline, his soft words allowing me to focus and calming Kyas down.
I stopped crying and slowed my breathing, and realizing that Elias and I were now both under the bed, I licked his face. Elias giggled, then scooted out the way he had come. I followed him, still trying to maintain contact. Elias giggled again and ruffled my fur. We had only met last night, but I adored Elias. For a moment, I forgot everything. It was just him and me in the room.
Elias stood up, looking away from me, at the people still in his room.
"See, Papa? He's ok. He was just really scared. He needed me to help him calm down." Elias beamed at his father.
The Alpha smiled. "I do see that, son. I take it that you liked my surprise? Are you ok with Blaze being here?"
I felt a wave of emotion swell up in Elias, but I saw he was trying hard to hold it back. I nudged him, and he broke. He climbed over the bed and launched himself into his father's arms. "You got me a dog! I'm not alone anymore!"
Alpha hugged him tight, emotion written all over everyone's faces. "You were never alone, Elias, but I'm sorry if I ever made you feel that way. I'll try to do better, I promise." the Alpha said. In the back of my mind, Kyas said 'I wonder what that feels like.'
The moment passed when someone mentioned breakfast, and everyone went to get dressed for the day. I took the opportunity to go outside and returned to Elias as he came downstairs.
The family went to the pack dining hall, sitting at the head table, but the atmosphere in the room was wrong. It was quiet, somber. All I had to go off of was Kyas' memories, but they were full of him watching from the shadows, the places he wasn't allowed to go. In the Cedar River pack, their dining hall was a buzz of conversation and activity. As Kyas called it, full of color. The "real" pack members are comfortable and socializing with each other. This pack, though... it's like they were still in mourning.
Alpha asked a server to bring me some food, and I was shocked when it came. The fish was a huge red thing like I had never seen before, the meat a flavorful pink color. Sadly, it was gone in seconds. I decided to see if I could beg something more from the table, like I'd seen Fred try with Sam.
I sidled up to Elias in his chair next to Alpha, nudging his elbow and then pulling the "don't mind me, just sitting here, in case you wanna drop something" look. Elias smiled and slipped me a slice of apple. Then, to my surprise, Alpha slipped me one, too!
"Where did you get him, Papa?" Elias asked, breaking the silence in the room.
"In battle!" Alpha told him dramatically.
Elias gasped, as did other pack members throughout the room.
"Tell me!" Elias begged.
The Alpha then told the story of the Cedar River battle. I thought I would feel different about it, sad or something, but I guess they weren't really nice to us at all, until they made me a dog. Hearing the story from an outside point of view, it did sound pretty amazing from a survivor's perspective.
The change in the room's atmosphere was noticeable. Pack members moved closer, laughed at the part where I pulled the she-wolf's tail, and asked excited questions. Kyas was in awe. He said the black colors were changing right before his eyes. I saw it too. The bonds were there, they had just been left…unattended. Now, the colors were showing through.
From the battle, talk turned to the pack run scheduled for the evening. It seemed that this pack had a tradition of shifting and running the borders as a pack on every full moon. Cedar River never did anything like that. It made me wonder what that would be like, running with them.
"I wish I could go!" Elias whined. I could feel his disappointment and nudged closer.
"Your time will come, son. When you meet your wolf. But... you can stay up and play with Blaze in the moonlight. How does that sound?" He asked in compromise.
Elias brightened. "I can!?"
"Sure," Alpha said. "You're ten, I think you can handle it. There are rules, though. Blaze is new here, so I don't want you wandering far from the packhouse, especially at night. You'll have a gaurd with you and you must stay in sight of them at all times. Also , absolutely NO hiding games. Those are daylight only games, that must always end when the sun goes down. Understand?"
"Yes, Papa." Elias answered seriously, very aware that his father was placing trust in him. In us. I barked affirmative, too, causing the room to laugh.
When breakfast was over, the family left the table, going separate ways. Alpha Carlisle headed for his office, Luna Ruby, to the kitchens, and Elias started to go upstairs, his loneliness and sadness returning, I could feel it. I barked at him and looked outside, asking him to explore with me. He smiled and ran for the doors, passing me, and we both ran out together.
I hadn't realized just how lonely and cut off I had been, I mean, I always had Kyas with me, but running around with Elias was a whole different level. We explored everywhere. The farm, where we chased nearly every animal, except Elias, rode on the backs of the pigs, and I rolled in the mud. The barn, where we jumped out of the loft and rolled in fresh straw. The pond where we washed all that off us.
We explored the wine cellars with row upon row of neatly racked barrels, nearly every thing was new to me and Kyas, and we were properly impressed with everything Elias showed us.
At lunch, once again in the dining hall, Elias excitedly shared our adventures, not only with Alpha and Luna, but the room as a whole, infecting them with his youthful spirit, and after quickly eating a sandwich (and slipping me more apple slices), we were off again. This time, we played in the small glade beside the pond.
Other couples and families were there too, setting up barbecues, picnic spaces, or sitting together. Elias and I played all the games I played with Alpha, but Elias couldn't shift, so I had to be gentle. The physical contact was like water to us. It was like neither one of us knew how much we needed it, and now we couldn't get enough. We tussled, chased, and tackled each other countless times.
As evening drew near, dinner was served buffet style this time. There were a lot more pack members this time too, and there were easy conversations going on all over the room. The bonds between the people, the colors, were blooming like flowers. After a mouthful of peas, Elias leaned over to me.
"They're talking about us, Blaze. " he said, and then he giggled and went back to his plate.
I hadn't been paying attention, but he was right. Every happy conversation was about something we had done that day. Things we had been seen doing, interactions we had had, there were even conversations about the times we did nothing, taking a short rest in the glade after a rough tussle.
Sunset came, once again setting the scene ablaze in the light. The pack members came out of the packhouse, facing the forest. They stripped, excitement building, I could feel it coming from Elias. Alpha shifted first, followed by the rest of the pack. He howled at the sky, though the moon was not yet up, and the pack howled in answer as one. Even us pups that had come out to see them off. And off they went, disappearing into the dark forest.
Mothers of younger pups took them inside for bed, but Elias and I stayed with a group of pups around our age. We hung out in the glade, pretending to shift and tussle as our wolves would, with me being the ultimate sparing partner because I already was one, even if I was small.
One by one, though, as the moon finally topped the horizon, the other pups got sleepy and returned to their mothers and their beds. Eventually, it was just me and Elias in the glade by the pond. His mother, being the Luna, was with the pack.
After a long and active day, sleep overtook us, and we slept under the stars and the light of the moon, Elias' hand on my back. One of the mothers who had already put her pup to bed watched over us.
I was woken by Kyas again, getting anxious. Again, he heard movement of a large number of wolves moving through the trees, but to his credit, he didn't panic. I got up and moved toward the treeline. I sniffed the air, and I relaxed. It was the pack returning. The full moon now shone directly overhead, illuminating everything in it's pale light.
The pack members headed for the porch and their clothes, and some of them were shifting to human while leaping. Happily, I bounded along with them, on the edge of the glade, and on one leap, without even trying, I shifted, and Kyas hit the dirt.