ONE - LESSONS BEFORE DINNER
Ace
Early dismissal at Moon Alliance Academy should have felt like freedom.
It did not.
Freedom usually did not come with my father waiting for me in a training field.
The final bell rang just after lunch, and the whole school erupted like someone had opened the gates to a cage. Chairs scraped. Lockers slammed. A few freshmen actually cheered, which told me they had not been werewolf students long enough to know better. At Moon Alliance Academy, early dismissal was never just early dismissal.
There was always a reason.
A teacher meeting. A security drill. A pack emergency disguised as a schedule change. Some adult somewhere deciding the students did not need to know enough to panic but needed to leave fast enough to make us suspicious.
I shoved my notebook into my backpack and stood as everyone rushed for the door.
Carlito was already leaning against the frame, grinning like he had personally arranged the half day.
“Come on, future Alpha,” he said. “Move like you have somewhere to be.”
“I do have somewhere to be.”
“Yeah. The dirt.”
I gave him a flat look. “You’ve been waiting all day to say that.”
“I’ve been waiting since your dad texted you during lunch.”
“He did not text me.”
Carlito’s grin widened. “You looked at your phone, sighed like your soul left your body, and then Carissa said, ‘Training?’ and you said, ‘Training.’ That counts.”
Behind him, Julio adjusted the strap of his backpack and glanced down the hall. He was not smiling, but Julio never needed to smile to be amused. It lived in his eyes, quiet and sharp, like he was collecting evidence for later.
“He’s not wrong,” Julio said.
“He usually is.”
“Not this time.”
Carlito placed a hand over his heart. “Coming from you, that means everything.”
Carissa appeared beside her twin brother and shoved him lightly out of the doorway. “Move, Carlito. Some of us are trying to escape before Headmaster Ashcroft changes his mind and makes us finish seventh period.”
Carlito stumbled one step, then looked deeply offended. “That was aggressive.”
“You were blocking traffic.”
“I was providing emotional support.”
“You were flirting with your reflection in the trophy case.”
Julio looked toward the glass case across the hall. “He did check twice.”
“I was making sure my hair survived lunch,” Carlito said.
Carissa gave him a sweet smile. “It didn’t.”
I laughed before I could stop myself.
Carlito turned that wounded expression on me. “Et tu, Alpha?” (And you)
“I’m not Alpha.”
“Yet,” Carissa said.
One word.
Small.
Casual.
But it slipped between my ribs anyway.
Yet.
Everyone had been saying it more lately. Teachers. Parents. Pack members. Allied families. Even people at school who pretended they did not care about rank until they needed someone’s last name to matter.
Ace Silva.
Son of Alpha Antonio Silva and Luna Staci Silva.
Future Alpha of Blue Moon.
Seventeen years old.
Seven days away from eighteen.
Seven days away from my wolf manifesting.
Everyone talked about it like it was a countdown to becoming complete.
I kept wondering what would happen if my wolf woke up, looked around inside me, and decided the Moon Goddess had made a mistake.
“See?” Carissa said.
I blinked. “What?”
She pointed at my face. “You did the thing.”
Carlito leaned closer. “The brooding future-ruler thing?”
“I don’t brood.”
Julio started walking. “You brood.”
“I think.”
“Brooding with vocabulary,” Carissa said.
Carlito threw an arm around my shoulders as we joined the flood of students moving down the hallway. “Don’t worry, Ace. If your dad destroys you in training today, I’ll give a beautiful speech at dinner.”
“I’m touched.”
“You should be. I’ve been workshopping it. Very emotional. Lots of pauses.”
Carissa groaned. “Moon save us from men with imaginary microphones.”
Moon Alliance Academy smelled like cafeteria fries, floor cleaner, perfume, sweat, and too many teenage wolves trying to pretend they were not paying attention to everyone around them. It looked like any private high school from the outside—cream-colored buildings, wide windows, manicured lawns, a mascot painted on the gym wall, banners for upcoming games, clubs, dances, and college fairs.
But the windows were reinforced.
The gym floor was reinforced.
Half the lockers had dents from students who forgot their own strength too close to manifestation age.
There were rules posted in every hallway: no shifting on campus, no dominance challenges, no scent-marking, no pack intimidation, no claws, no fangs, no using enhanced hearing to cheat on exams.
Normal high school.
For werewolves.
We passed a group of sophomores whispering near the main office. One of them looked at me, then quickly looked away.
Carlito noticed.
Of course he noticed.
He noticed the social things Julio pretended not to care about and I pretended not to feel.
“Want me to trip over nothing and redirect the attention?” he asked under his breath.
“No.”
“I’m very good at it.”
“You’re good at tripping?”
“I’m good at making it look intentional.”
Carissa snorted. “No, you’re not.”
Julio pushed open the side doors before Carlito could defend himself, and Sacramento heat rolled over us.
Late September sunlight flashed across the parking lot, bright enough to make half the cars look white at the edges. The air smelled like hot pavement, dry grass, exhaust, and the faint sharpness of river wind drifting in from the west. Students spilled out around us in noisy clusters, phones already out, backpacks hanging open, conversations bouncing between weekend plans and complaints about homework.
The Blue Moon SUV waited near the front curb, black and polished and impossible to miss.
Carlito let out a low whistle. “Your mom’s vehicle looks cleaner than my future.”
“That’s because my mother values the SUV.”
“And not your future?”
“She values that too. She just doesn’t let people eat chips in it.”
Carissa lifted one brow. “That sounds personal.”
“It was one time,” Carlito said.
“You spilled nacho dust in the cup holder.”
“It was an accident.”
“You licked your finger and tried to wipe it out.”
I unlocked the SUV. “And that’s why you sit in the back.”
Carlito stopped with his hand halfway to the front passenger door. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
“I’m your future Beta.”
“You’re currently the reason my mother banned orange snacks.”
Carissa slid into the front passenger seat before he could argue. “Leadership requires consequences.”
Julio opened the rear door. “Get in.”
Carlito looked from Julio to me to Carissa, betrayal written across his whole face. “All of you are going to remember this day when I have authority.”
Carissa buckled her seat belt. “We’re counting on you having better priorities by then.”
“Unlikely,” Julio said.
I climbed behind the wheel, trying not to smile too hard.
This was normal.
Or as close as my life got to it.
Carlito was my future Beta, even if nobody had officially put the title on him yet. We all knew it. He knew how to stand beside me without standing behind me. He pushed, joked, challenged, and somehow knew when silence would help more than words.
Julio was my future Gamma. He had been born with the expression of a security briefing and the patience of a locked door. If Carlito watched people, Julio watched exits, hands, shadows, and anything that could become a problem before the rest of us noticed.
Carissa was Carlito’s fraternal younger twin sister by seven minutes, a fact she hated mostly because Carlito treated those seven minutes like a royal decree. She had a fast mouth, a sharper mind, and the terrifying ability to make all three of us feel stupid with one look.
They were my friends.
My family by bond if not always by blood.
And someday, Goddess willing, they would be the people standing beside me when Blue Moon became mine to protect.
The thought made the steering wheel feel heavier beneath my hands.
“You’re doing it again,” Carissa said.
I glanced over. “Doing what?”
“The thing where you disappear into your own head and act like nobody can see you leaving.”
Carlito leaned between the front seats. “He’s probably thinking about how many times Alpha Antonio is going to throw him down today.”
“I am not.”
Julio looked out the window. “You are gripping the wheel too tightly.”
I loosened my hands.
Carlito made a soft, dramatic gasp. “Exposed.”
I pulled away from the curb.
“That would kill him,” Carlito said.
“It would kill you first,” Julio said.
Carlito considered that. “Fair.”
I pulled away from the curb.
For approximately four seconds, we made it almost to the exit.
Then someone shouted my name.
“Ace! Wait!”
Julio turned before I checked the mirror. “Samson.”
I sighed and guided the SUV to the side. In the rearview mirror, my cousin was sprinting across the parking lot with his backpack bouncing against one shoulder and one hand raised like we were abandoning him in a war zone.
Carlito leaned toward the window. “Toward us or from something?”
“Toward us,” Julio said.
“Disappointing.”
Carissa smacked his arm. “Be nice.”
“I am nice. I was hoping for plot.”
Samson reached the SUV breathless and bent with both hands on his knees. “Can I ride with you?”
I rolled the window down. “Hello to you too.”
He waved that away. “Mom said I could go to Blue Moon if somebody responsible brought me.”
Carlito leaned forward with interest. “And you came to this vehicle?”
Samson looked past me, eyes moving over all of us. “I came to family. Responsible was negotiable.”
Carissa laughed.
I unlocked the doors. “Get in before the buses trap us.”
Samson opened the back door and found Carlito sprawled like royalty across more space than one person deserved.
“Move,” Samson said.
Carlito blinked. “Excuse you?”
“You heard me.”
“I’m older.”
“Barely.”
“I’m the future Beta.”
“I’m the future Alpha of Crescent Moon and outrank you. You’re in my seat.”
Julio shifted to make room without a word.
Carissa turned around, delighted. “I like him more every year.”
Carlito moved with an offended huff. Samson climbed in beside him and buckled up, grinning like he had won something.
“You know,” Carlito said, “respect for future leadership is an important pack value.”
Samson looked at me in the mirror. “Ace, do we respect him?”
“Only under adult supervision.”
Julio nodded once. “Correct.”
Carlito pointed at each of us. “When I’m Beta, I’m remembering this.”
Carissa smiled. “And when you’re Beta, I’m submitting formal complaints before breakfast.”
“Denied.”
“You can’t deny them before I submit them.”
“I’m practicing.”
I pulled back into traffic, and Moon Alliance Academy disappeared behind us.
The drive toward Blue Moon territory was familiar enough that I could have done it half-asleep, though my mother would somehow know and resurrect me just to kill me herself. Sacramento stretched around us in sun-baked roads, shopping centers, neighborhoods, dry fields, and the distant shimmer of heat rising off asphalt. The city was human enough on the surface, but beneath it ran invisible lines of pack territory, allied boundaries, old treaties, and places every werewolf child learned to avoid before they learned algebra.
Blue Moon did not hide from the human world exactly.
We existed beside it.
Around it.
Under its nose.
Carlito fiddled with the air conditioning vent. “So, what’s the schedule? Training, suffering, meeting, dinner?”
“Pretty much.”
Samson leaned forward. “Aunt Staci’s home, right?”
“She should be,” I said. “Uncle Carter and Aunt Monica too.”
“Good. Mom said not to bother Uncle Antonio before training.”
Carlito nodded solemnly. “Your mother values your survival.”
“So do I,” Samson said. “That’s why I’m finding Aunt Staci first.”
Smart.
Everyone thought my father was the dangerous one because he was Alpha Antonio Silva. He had the size, the stare, the reputation, and the kind of calm that made aggressive wolves rethink their entire bloodline.
But my mother was Luna Staci Silva.
Which meant she could smile, ask one soft question, and somehow make a grown warrior confess to things no one had accused him of yet. And that was before anyone remembered she was a white wolf. Incredibly powerful. Rare enough to make old wolves whisper. Dangerous enough to make smart ones lower their eyes.
“Is the meeting really about rogues?” Carissa asked.
The SUV quieted.
Not silent.
Just aware.
I kept my eyes on the road. “That’s what Dad said.”
Julio’s gaze flicked to me in the mirror. “How many?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know that either.”
Carlito’s grin faded slightly. “They didn’t tell you?”
“They told me to attend.”
Carissa’s voice softened. “That’s different.”
Yeah.
It was.
My parents had included me in smaller meetings before. Training discussions. Territory briefings. Alliance history. The kind of things a future Alpha was supposed to absorb before anyone expected him to act on them.
But this felt different.
Maybe because my eighteenth birthday was a week away.
Maybe because my wolf had not manifested yet, and everyone seemed determined to teach me everything before he did.
Maybe because once he woke, people would stop seeing me as almost and start expecting me to be ready.
Samson tilted his head. “Are you nervous?”
Carlito sucked in a breath. “Bold question from the cousin section.”
I glanced at Samson in the mirror. He looked genuinely curious, not teasing.
So I gave him the closest thing to honesty I could manage.
“A little.”
Carissa did not make a joke.
Neither did Carlito.
That was how I knew they understood.
Seven days.
In seven days, I would turn eighteen.
In seven days, my wolf would manifest.
People described it like a second heartbeat waking inside you. Like a voice that had always been there finally speaking clearly. Like a piece of your soul opening its eyes.
Most werewolves looked forward to it their whole lives.
I did too.
I just also feared it.
Because everyone expected my wolf to be powerful. An Alpha wolf. A Silva wolf. The future of Blue Moon in everything.
No one said what happened if he was not.
No one said what happened if I was not.
Carlito broke the silence first, gently for once. “Well, if your wolf wakes up next week and decides he hates us, I’m blaming Julio.”
Julio looked at him. “Why me?”
“You look hate-able.”
Carissa choked on a laugh. “Carlito.”
“What? He does. Handsome, yes. Approachable, no.”
Samson nodded. “He does look like he reports people.”
Julio stared at all of us.
I laughed, and the pressure in the SUV loosened.
Carlito grinned like that had been the plan all along.
Maybe it had.
The city thinned as we approached Blue Moon land. The roads widened, trees thickened, and the human noise softened behind us. The first patrol marker appeared near a private road tucked between lines of oaks—a carved stone pillar marked with the Blue Moon crest.
Something in my chest eased.
Not magic.
Not my wolf.
Not yet.
Just home.
At the main gate, two warriors stepped forward. Both recognized the SUV immediately. Marcus, one of the senior gate guards, approached my window as I rolled it down.
“Afternoon, Ace.”
“Marcus.”
His gaze moved through the vehicle, counting passengers out of habit. “Academy let out early?”
“Unfortunately.”
Carlito leaned forward from the back. “We were released into the wild.”
Marcus’s mouth twitched. “And Blue Moon survived the warning?”
“Barely,” Carissa said.
Marcus looked back at me. “Alpha Antonio is expecting you.”
“I know.”
“Good luck.”
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
“For a reason.”
The gate opened.
I drove through, and Blue Moon territory unfolded around us.
Every time I came home, I tried to see it the way visitors did. The long drive beneath old trees. The training fields spreading wide under the California sun. The guards stationed where they looked casual but were anything except. The distant rise of the castle beyond the main grounds, stone and glass and history built into something that still somehow smelled like dinner by sunset.
To everyone else, Blue Moon was power.
To me, it was where I had scraped my knees, stolen cookies, gotten caught lying badly, trained until I hated breathing, and fallen asleep during more council dinners than I would ever admit.
It was home.
And one day, it would be mine to protect.
I parked near the side entrance.
Samson was out first. “Can I go find Aunt Staci?”
“Do not run through the halls,” I said.
He froze mid-step. “I wasn’t going to.”
Carlito climbed out behind him. “His face announced otherwise.”
I shot him a look.
He smiled.
The side doors opened before any of us reached them.
My mother stepped into the afternoon light.
The courtyard changed.
It always did when Staci Silva appeared. People did not stop working. They did not bow or scramble or make a show of respect. Blue Moon was not built on fear. But conversations softened. Shoulders straightened. Attention shifted like the whole pack had taken one quiet breath.
Mom wore dark jeans, a cream blouse, and her hair pulled back from her face. Simple. Elegant. Dangerous in the way moonlight was dangerous when you realized it could reveal everything you had tried to hide.
Her eyes found me first.
Then Samson.
Her face warmed. “There’s my favorite nephew.”
Samson ran to her.
I opened my mouth.
Mom looked at me over his head as she hugged him. “He’s waiting, Ace.”
I closed my mouth.
Carlito murmured, “Terrifying.”
Carissa elbowed him.
Samson pulled back, grinning. “Mom said I could visit if I didn’t bother Uncle Antonio before training.”
“A wise woman,” Mom said. “Your Uncle Carter is in the west sitting room with Monica. Wash your hands first.”
“I’m not five.”
“No,” she said sweetly. “Which means you know where the sink is.”
Carissa covered her laugh with a cough.
Samson sighed like cleanliness was an ancient injustice and went inside.
Mom’s gaze moved over the rest of us. “Carlito. Julio. Carissa.”
They greeted her with the perfect blend of affection and self-preservation.
Then she looked at me.
“Your father is waiting in the east field.”
My stomach tightened.
“Yes, Mom.”
“You have fifteen minutes to change.”
“I know.”
“And drink water.”
“I know that too.”
She lifted a brow.
I immediately regretted my tone. “Yes, Mom.”
Carlito made a tiny sound like he was trying not to laugh.
Mom’s gaze flicked to him.
He became silent.
Amazing.
She stepped closer to me, lowering her voice enough that only I could hear. “You are allowed to learn today, Ace. You do not have to arrive already knowing.”
I looked away for half a second, toward the field beyond the courtyard.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
No.
Not really.
But I was trying.
Mom touched my cheek once, quick and warm, then let me go. “Go change.”
Fifteen minutes later, I stood in the east training field with dust under my shoes, heat on my neck, and my father across from me.
Alpha Antonio Silva looked nothing like a man preparing to put his only son in the dirt.
He looked calm.
That was how I knew I was doomed.
“You’re tense,” he said.
“I’m focused.”
“You’re tense.”
I rolled my shoulders. “Better?”
“No.”
At the edge of the field, Carlito, Julio, Carissa, and Samson had gathered like my personal audience of traitors. Samson had somehow acquired lemonade. Carlito looked far too comfortable. Carissa sat with her knees pulled up, already watching me like she planned to critique my emotional development afterward. Julio stood with his arms crossed, studying my stance.
My father glanced at them once.
All four became very still.
“Again,” Dad said.
I lifted my hands.
He moved first.
Not with full Alpha speed. Not with full strength. He never used more than I could handle, which sounded comforting until you understood my father’s definition of handle included pain, humility, and occasional grass stains in places grass stains should not be.
I blocked his first strike.
Missed the second.
Barely avoided the third.
He swept my leg, shifted his weight, and the world went sideways.
My back hit the ground hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs.
Carlito winced. “There it is.”
Carissa whispered, “Shh.”
Dad stood over me, sunlight behind him. “What did you do wrong?”
“Got out of the SUV.”
Samson laughed, then clapped a hand over his mouth.
Dad’s mouth twitched.
Barely.
“Again.”
I pushed myself up.
Again became the shape of the afternoon.
Again became sweat running down my spine, dust sticking to my palms, muscles burning, pride bruising faster than my body. Dad corrected my stance. My timing. My breathing. My temper. Once, insultingly, my chin.
“Do not lift it like that,” he said.
“I’m looking at you.”
“You’re presenting your throat.”
“I’m not a wolf yet.”
“No,” Dad said. “But you are becoming an Alpha. Start learning before instinct has to save you.”
That shut me up.
Because he was right.
I did not have my wolf yet. Not his voice. Not his strength. Not the second presence everyone promised would wake inside me next week and make the world feel different.
All I had was myself.
My training.
My choices.
And apparently, a chin with poor survival instincts.
Dad came at me again.
I lasted longer that time.
Not long enough.
The ground was beginning to feel personal.
After the seventh or eighth time he dropped me, I stayed on one knee, breathing hard.
Dad circled slowly. “You fight like you are trying to prove something.”
I wiped sweat from my jaw. “Aren’t I?”
“No.”
I looked up.
His expression had changed. Not softer. Deeper.
“Stand.”
I stood.
Dad stopped in front of me. “Power is the easiest part, Ace.”
The words settled over the field.
“Any wolf can bare his teeth once he has them. Any Alpha can dominate a room if strength is all he wants to show. That is not leadership.”
I swallowed. “Then what is?”
“Judgment.”
The air seemed to hold still.
Dad lifted one hand, palm facing me. “An Alpha does not win because he can break everyone in the room. He wins because no one has to wonder whether he could—and because he knows when not to.”
I held still, every part of me listening.
Maybe somewhere deep inside, the wolf I had not met yet was listening too.
Or maybe that was just hope.
Dad stepped back. “Again. But this time, do not come at me like my son.”
My chest tightened.
“Come at me like someone responsible for everyone watching.”
I heard the words.
Then I felt them.
Everyone watching.
Carlito at the edge of the field, future Beta grin gone quiet. Julio studying every movement. Carissa seeing too much. Samson looking at me like cousins could become legends if they stood in the sun long enough. My mother somewhere inside the castle, already knowing whether I had learned the lesson or only survived it.
Everyone watching.
One day, everyone depending.
I breathed.
Then I stopped trying to feel like an Alpha and started thinking like one.
Dad moved.
I did not rush him.
I did not chase the opening he wanted me to chase.
I watched his shoulder, his hips, the shift of weight before the strike. I let him push, let him think I would answer strength with strength, then turned at the last second and used his momentum instead of meeting it.
For one perfect heartbeat, my father’s balance changed.
Not enough to drop him.
Enough to make his eyes flash.
Then he knocked me flat anyway.
The sky spun above me.
Carlito clapped once before apparently remembering he valued his life.
Dad looked down at me.
This time, he smiled.
“Better.”
One word.
One simple word.
It should not have meant as much as it did.
But it settled in my chest like sunlight.
By the time training ended, I was sore in places I did not know had names. I showered, changed into dark slacks and a clean shirt, and met my parents outside the council room just as the late afternoon began sliding toward evening.
Mom adjusted my collar the second she saw me.
I let her.
Dad stood beside her, composed and unreadable, no sign at all that he had spent the afternoon throwing me around a field. He looked like the Alpha now. The leader. The man other Alphas measured themselves against and usually resented for it.
“You will listen first,” Dad said.
“I know.”
“If asked to speak?”
“Answer clearly. Don’t guess. Don’t perform.”
His gaze held mine. “Good.”
Mom touched my arm. “And breathe.”
I almost told her I knew how.
Then I remembered who raised me and chose silence.
The council room doors opened.
Voices reached us immediately. Low. Serious. Layered with concern.
The allied leaders had already gathered around the long table. Uncle Carter sat near the right side, Aunt Monica beside him, calm and observant. Border captains stood near the map wall. Two allied Betas spoke quietly by the windows. The room smelled like polished wood, old stone, evening air, and tension.
Conversations paused when my parents entered.
Then several eyes shifted to me.
Not all.
Enough.
I followed my parents to the front of the room and waited behind my father’s chair until he gave a small nod toward the seat beside him.
Beside him.
Not at the head.
Not yet.
The distinction mattered.
Dad sat. “Tell us what changed.”
A border captain stepped forward and touched the map. “Three rogue sightings in two weeks along the eastern approach. No breach into Blue Moon territory, but they came close enough to test patrol response.”
Another captain added, “Two supply routes connected to allied territory were disrupted. No confirmed kills, but the pattern showed organization.”
Coordinated.
That word moved through the room like a blade sliding free.
Uncle Carter leaned forward. “Rogues do not usually coordinate.”
“No,” Dad said. “They scatter unless hunger, fear, or leadership forces them together.”
Mom’s gaze stayed on the map. “Any signs of forced movement?”
The first captain hesitated. “Possibly. Tracks were messy near the first site. Cleaner after.”
“Cleaner how?” Mom asked.
“Like someone taught them where to step.”
The room tightened.
I kept my mouth shut.
But my mind moved.
Random rogues were messy. Desperate wolves made desperate decisions. They stole food. Attacked weak points. Left scent trails because panic made them careless. Coordinated movement meant something else.
Planning.
Pressure.
Or a hand behind the chaos.
Dad looked at me.
My spine straightened.
“Ace,” he said, “if these were random rogues, what would you expect to see?”
Every eye in the room turned toward me.
My heartbeat hit once, hard.
I wanted my wolf then.
For the first time all day, I wanted him so badly it almost hurt. I wanted that second heartbeat. That instinct. That certainty older wolves talked about like it would rise and tell me where to place my feet.
But my wolf was still seven days away.
So I breathed.
And answered as myself.
“More inconsistency,” I said. My voice came out steadier than I felt. “Different targets. Sloppy retreat paths. Strong scent trails because panic makes wolves careless.”
One of the warriors folded his arms. “And if they are not random?”
I looked at the map instead of the faces. Easier to think that way.
“Then either someone is leading them, or someone is driving them.” I paused. “The difference matters.”
Dad said nothing.
Mom’s expression softened just enough for me to see it.
Uncle Carter nodded once. “Why?”
“If they’re being led, they have a goal. If they’re being driven, someone else does.”
The room stayed quiet for one long second.
Then Dad turned back to the captains. “Increase patrol rotation along the eastern approach. Quietly. I do not want panic in the lower villages.”
The meeting continued.
And I listened.
Really listened.
They spoke of borders, routes, frightened families, patrol fatigue, and the danger of responding too loudly to a threat that might want attention. I watched my father weigh every report. I watched my mother ask the questions that made people reveal what fear had hidden. I watched Uncle Carter focus on logistics and Aunt Monica on the people those logistics affected.
And somewhere between the map and the voices, between rogue tracks and dinner waiting downstairs, I understood something I had not understood in the field.
Being Alpha was not one lesson.
It was all of them.
It was strength in the dirt.
Control in a fight.
Patience in a meeting.
Silence when others needed room to speak.
Questions when answers came too easily.
Every guard at the gate. Every child in the lower courtyard. Every family that slept because they believed someone stronger was awake and watching the dark.
By the time the meeting ended, sunset had turned the windows gold.
Dinner was louder.
Thank the Goddess.
Samson sat between Uncle Carter and Aunt Monica, retelling my training session like he had witnessed a historic battle. Carlito and Julio had reappeared freshly washed and hungry enough to be a threat to public safety. Carissa sat across from them, correcting every exaggerated detail Carlito tried to add.
“He did not fly six feet,” she said.
Carlito lifted a roll. “Emotionally, he did.”
“Physically, two.”
“Three and a half.”
Julio reached for the butter. “Two.”
I pointed at him. “Whose side are you on?”
“The truth.”
“Future Gamma loyalty is inspiring.”
Dad chuckled from the head of the table.
I looked down before my face betrayed me.
Mom noticed anyway.
She always did.
Dinner smelled like roasted chicken, warm bread, herbs, and home. For a while, the rogue meeting felt farther away. Not gone. Never gone. But softened by familiar voices and plates being passed. By Samson laughing too hard. By Carlito trying to steal the last roll and Carissa stabbing his hand with her fork.
Lightly.
Mostly.
I sat there with bruises forming under my shirt, my father’s lesson still echoing in my bones, and the weight of the council room tucked behind my ribs.
In seven days, I would turn eighteen.
In seven days, my wolf would wake.
Everyone kept saying both things like a celebration.
After today, they sounded more like a door opening.
And I was starting to understand that once I stepped through it, I would never be just a student, just a son, or just Ace again.
