Page 49 of Pack Dreams

“So that’s why he ran away. Now that I’m here, he’s finally free. I get it. He said it was too much for him. But I don’t feel any different? I don’t feel like I can command legions or tell anyone what to do?”

“You haven’t had your alpha ceremony yet. When the curse on your uncle passed to you, I hesitated to stop the attack. I’m sorry, but I hoped that since you’d replaced him as alpha, you’d just instantly acquire the voice as well. I can see now this situation is far more complicated than we thought.”

That word reminds me of my previous question, and I give her my steeliest gaze. “That’s right, that’s something else no one has explained yet. What do you mean, curse?”

ChapterTwenty-One

Layla

* * *

“The curse is… complicated to explain,” Roxanne starts hesitantly.

“After everything that’s been thrown at me in the last week, I kinda feel like I can keep up.”

She sighs. “Okay. So, you know how I said there were four key families in the pack, and the alpha mates a descendant from each to keep each tied in?”

I nod wordlessly, and she continues.

“Well, originally there were eight.”

I wait, but she doesn’t seem inclined to continue, as if I’m just supposed to understand what that implies.

“Yeah, you’re gonna have to give me more than that.”

“So before moving to Smoky Falls, we had dominance battles for the role of alpha. Reasonably, it could switch every full moon—that’s when the wolves could challenge for position. It was volatile. There were so many families of equal strength that the alpha hat just got passed around and it was far more wild, far less civilized, than the leadership we have now.

“When we came here, there were no pre-made sanctuaries to work with. The witches had to use our own magic to open the earth magic for protection, and the alpha at the time volunteered herself. What no one realized was that magic tied the earth magic to that blood, not just to the wolves. So the enchantment is only viable so long as someone of that blood is here. The pack voted and agreed that the only solution was for the Harridan family to remain alpha. Each new alpha would take mates from the other families, as many as she could manage, to be ‘co-alphas’ thus creating harmony and stability in the pack.

“This is when the seers became important. They’d always been used to determine fated mates, which used to be more infrequent but has grown almost inevitable at this point. Prior to this point, if the seer foresaw more than one mate, that person could choose which one to mate and the others sought other mates. Now, she took as many as the seer foretold. The seers began foreseeing mates for the alpha children, but it was never over three. More often than not, those three were descendants of the same three families—it was rare that one came from the other four.

“Needless to say, they were not happy about it. The unrest grew among the pack, and because we had not woven their bloodline in with the alphas as strongly, they eventually could defect and form their own pack. It was a painful split—most people were related to all others, so as the pack broke apart it was really people from all eight bloodlines that left, however tenuously they were connected.

“But the worst part was that they were vindictive in their departure. Still convinced that we forced them out instead of leaving of their own accord, the Montrose Pack had their witch cast a curse on the Smoky Falls Pack. The alpha, so tied to her lands, could never leave for more than twenty-four hours. And furthermore, she could only shift between the hours of midnight and one am.

“So that’s where you find us today. Unfortunately, your manifestation freed Dom from the curse and immediately placed it on you. I don’t know if it’s because your mother is already gone, or just that Dom was so poorly adept at being alpha that the magic believes you’re a better choice. Either way, it’s not what we predicted would happen. I’m sorry.”

My mind spins with all this information. “So you’re telling me I’m stuck here? Forever?”

“Do you remember how your uncle couldn’t come visit you in LA? This is why—he had to be back on the soil in Smoky Falls within twenty-four hours or the magic protecting this place would end, and our pack magic would dissipate. We had to charter a private plane to get him back on time.”

“Well boo-hoo for him, I feel so bad about that,” I snarl. “But I’ve just had a curse dropped on me with zero warning. What happens if the magic ends? Why is that so bad?”

“Wolves can only shift on magically protected land. When they go so long without shifting, they lose the ability to shift. Also, the alpha can only maintain a pack on protected land. So there would be no more Smoky Falls Pack.”

“Seems like a pretty simple solution to me. Give up the magic, give up this fated mates nonsense, and everyone gets to live the life they want, finally, after all these years.”

Roxanne scrubs a hand over her face. “You don’t understand. This is our culture, our legacy. We don’t have the ability to just walk away from it. In your heart of hearts, you know that. Didn’t you feel something, something different, when you came to Smoky Falls? Something you didn’t realize was missing until you got here and felt complete?”

I’m too angry with her. I don’t want to give her the satisfaction of confirmation. So I just stare blankly at her instead.

“You can’t fool me. I know you did. That was your connection to your wolf, your soul, of sorts. If we lose the pack, everyone loses their wolf. Their soul. An essential piece of their makeup will be gone.”

“I thought you said that some people who are born without fated mates go live in the human world just fine? Why would this be any different?”

“For one, you’re talking about ripping out the part that connects them to their fated. Second, those people who leave do so before they manifest. They might feel a slight emptiness from time to time, but they never bonded with their wolf. For someone who has, it would be like losing an arm or a leg. It doesn’t happen very often, but when we banish a wolf from the pack, they don’t live more than a year.”

“What happens to them?” The question is little more than a whisper; I’m afraid to find out.

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