Chapter 38: Lessons

Lessons

Dominic

By the time I get to Eureka and find the North Jetty Beach where Theo told me to meet them, they’ve already gotten their wetsuits on and are down near the water. A couple of folks are already paddling out on surfboards, but the others are with Evan on the sand, obviously giving him a little lesson in how to stand on the board and such things before letting him try. It’s kind of funny to watch, this big blond surfer dude getting his first surfing lesson.

Theo turns and sees me pulling my SUV next to his, and he comes jogging up to the parking area to greet me. “Hey,” he says, “we’re just getting started.” He opens up the hatchback of his vehicle. “Here,” he pulls out a wetsuit, “I think this one should probably fit you. I already carried a board down there for you.”

“Thanks man,” I tell him, and start stripping down to the boardshorts that I’m wearing under my jeans. As I am pulling the wetsuit on, I tell him, “I’ve got a couple of hours, I figure, then I should get back to pick up Amelia.”

He nods, just waiting for me to finish getting ready.

“Hey,” I ask him, “what’s up with all the hippies in Arcata? I thought it was a bunch of homeless people, and I was worried about Amelia being alone there. They looked pretty suspicious.”

He snorts. “It’s a lifestyle choice for most of those folks. They’re harmless, don’t worry about her. She probably knows most of their names, and will be buying them lunch before the day is over.”

Huh. Okay then.

“Ready?” he asks, and I nod. “Okay, Evan’s about to paddle out for the first time. Let’s go with him.”

Amelia

What on earth have I gotten myself into? Here our packs are in the middle of preparing for a rogue battle, and I’m sitting in a cafe sipping hot cocoa with one of them? One of the enemy?

How can I see her as an enemy, though? I mean, look at her. She’s thin, and dirty, and cold, and appears to be scared. She certainly seems miserable.

But I also know that the way that the rogues lured Dark Woods into their ambush was to have a young woman pretending to have car trouble, to trick them into pulling over to the side of the road. For all I know this is the same young woman, she matches the description.

My guard goes up, and I regard her warily. I just come right out and say it. “Is this some kind of ambush? Do you think you’re going to trick me into something? Are your friends about to jump out from somewhere?” I’m not actually worried, this cafe is owned by River Moon and I can see at least three fellow pack members right from where I’m sitting. I don’t do anything to alert them to trouble, though, I’d rather figure out more about what’s going on before taking any action. If nothing else, I’m gathering information, doing reconnaissance, just like Dominic was doing when he found the rogues’ hidden lava tube.

She bites her lip and looks down. “No,” she says, “I’m done with that.”

“So you admit you have done that kind of thing? Was that you three days ago, up on the 299?” I’m not going to beat around the bush - I want information and being direct seems the best way to do it.

She looks back up at me, and I see the dark circles under her eyes, a look of deep exhaustion on her face. “Yes. I confess. Does that make you trust that I’m telling the truth? I am done with that, done with them.”

Well then. I would have expected her to deny it. I lean back in my seat, and cross my arms. “Why don’t you just tell me what you wanted to say. You’re the one who came over to me. So, fine. I’m listening.”

She sighs, shakily, and keeps her fingers wrapped around her mug. “I’m trying to get away from the rogues. I don’t want to be a rogue any more.”

Pfsh. That’s not much of a surprise. Being a rogue is like a jail sentence - nobody in jail wants to be there either. But there is a reason that wolves get exiled from their packs. They aren’t fit to be a part of the group, based on their own choices, their own behavior.

She obviously sees my dubious expression. “I suppose you think that I deserve it,” she says sadly. “That’s what most wolves think, I guess.”

“We would only exile someone who deserves it,” I reply, shrugging. “There’s a whole procedure to make sure it’s fair. Just because you regret the outcome, doesn’t undo whatever you did to make it happen.”

Her face crumples, very briefly, then she makes a visible effort to pull herself together, shaking her head and taking a deep breath.

“Yeah, maybe that’s how your pack does it,” she says. “I suppose some packs are fair. That’s not how it happened with me.”

Well, I suppose I have heard hints about some packs being a lot more brutal than River Moon. We pride ourselves on being decent to everyone, to being honest and fair and just. Alpha Kanen holds us to a very high standard.

I’m willing to hear her out. “Tell me what happened,” I say.

She sighs, and swallows some more of her cocoa. I see her mug is almost empty, but I’m not ready to start offering her anything else. I need to figure out what she is really after here.

“It was pretty soon after my wolf emerged,” she says, in a low voice, staring at the table. “I was late, nearly fifteen by the time it happened. I was an omega in our pack, pretty much just a slave. I didn’t have parents - I guess they died in a battle when I was a toddler. So I grew up working in the packhouse kitchen. I never got to go to school or anything.”

I wouldn’t believe any of this, it is so different from how we do things in River Moon, but I’ve heard rumors about stuff like this. It’s awful to realize how mean people can be to each other.

She looks up at me, and sees me watching her, listening, waiting for more. “So,” she goes on, her voice dropping to barely a whisper, “nobody cared what happened to me. And when the Alpha’s son decided that he wanted to use me, I was expected to just let him.”

I frown. “Use…?”

“You know,” she shrugs, “for sex.” She looks up at me, and I am sure I look shocked. “He pulled me out of the kitchen one night, right after I turned fifteen, while I was up late scrubbing dishes, and made me come into the woods with him. He forced me to…” she stops, and covers her mouth with her hand.

Oh, god. That’s appalling. I have a flash of my situation, how different it is, how I have a wonderful patient mate who is giving me all the time in the world to adapt. And this poor girl was forced when she was only fifteen? I don’t disbelieve her any more. She clearly is traumatized just remembering it. Every instinct in me is telling me that this is a true story, and that she is sincere as she tells it.

“I believe her too,” my inner wolf tells me, and it startles me a little. I have heard very little from her for the past couple of days. She has been so happy now that we have found our mate, that she has seemed content to just remain silent at the back of my mind. But I’m glad to hear from her now. I always trust her instincts.

Tears are threatening to spill over onto Corinne’s cheeks, and she brushes them away, almost robotically, like this is something that happens all the time. “When he was done, I was bleeding, and crying, and my hands and knees were all scraped up. He kicked me and told me to get back into the kitchen and finish my work. He left me in the woods.” Her voice is numb as she describes this.

I’m staring at her, my hand on my own mouth, my cocoa getting cold in my mug. She seems lost in a reverie as she continues. “I got back to my cot at the back of the kitchen, and cried all night. In the morning, I went to the Alpha to complain.”

I watch, waiting to hear what happened next.

She looks back at me silently, as though her story is over.

When she doesn’t say anything else, I say, “Well? What happened?”

A little sarcastic smile brushes across her face. “This,” she says, waving her hand around, indicating her current situation. “That was my crime. Complaining. I was exiled within the hour, walking away from the packhouse with nothing but the clothes on my back.”

“That’s how you became a rogue?” I ask, astonished. “But….” I can’t even think of what else to say.

“Your pack might be fair to people,” she says. “Most aren’t, from what I’ve heard.”

I have to understand how she got to where she is now. “What did you do?” I ask her.

Tiredly, she says, “I was alone for a while. A few months. Then I found another rogue, a man, and I stayed with him. He gave me food, and protection, in exchange for….” She looks to the side. “You know.”

Has her whole life been like this? Nothing but abuse and exploitation? I’ve never heard anything so sad.

“We moved around a lot. Stayed with other rogues sometimes. He got killed in a fight, I was passed to someone else, and eventually I made my way out here. I’ve been with this group for a few months, sometimes living around town here, sometimes out in the mountains. Doing… well, you know what we did. The trick on the road, then the fight with the other wolves.”

She looks at me with regret all over her face. “I hated doing it, but it was the only way they’d let me stay with them. The rogue Alpha was furious at me the other day for how badly it went for us. He beat me after he recovered from the wounds he got during the fight. That night I slipped away from them. I don’t want to go back.”

This entire story is utterly shocking to me. I clearly have lived a very sheltered existence, have never been exposed to anything remotely like what Corinne has experienced. It seems that I have a lot to learn about life. Dom is teaching me, in a wonderful way, about the things that poor Corinne learned through fear and pain. I am glad that my lessons are so much kinder than hers have been.

When she doesn’t go on, I ask, “So, what… why did you want to talk to me?”

She looks at me earnestly. “I knew what pack you are from. I’ve been watching here in Arcata, and I can see that your pack is strong, and decent. I hoped that you’d tell me if there is any way to join your pack? I’d do anything, be an omega, be a slave, work in the kitchen, scrub toilets, whatever. I just want the security of being in a pack again. I just want a chance, a way to be safe.”

“I… I don’t know,” I tell her. I’ve never heard of anything like this happening. Once a rogue is exiled from their pack, they can never return. But do packs ever accept rogues from elsewhere? Not that I’ve heard of. Why would they? Rogues are criminals, that’s what we’ve always been taught.

But Corinne deserves a second chance, I believe. Yes, she has probably committed crimes to survive, but the original reason she was exiled was not a crime. She was a victim, and she was unfairly punished. Alpha Kanen has always made it clear that River Moon stands for justice, and what happened to Corinne was unjust. It wasn’t our doing, and isn’t our responsibility, yet how can I allow it to continue? Now that she is here, asking me for help, laying her problems at my doorstep?

I have no idea what to do. I’m not a leader, not an expert in pack law, not powerful or resourceful or strong. I’m just a wolf.

But looking at her expression, both hopeful and fearful, I know that I have to try to figure this out.