Escalating thoughts are ascending themselves around the radius of us.

Leaves rustle a disturbance the wind is starting to blow in.

"How do I beat you, Odin?" The question is not simplistic to me.

Hierarchy at its finest, there can ever only be One true Alpha.

"You make me bend to you?" Odin's answer filters easily from his lips.

"I don't want to hurt you, Odin. You're my half?" When the last words leave my mouth, he falters as if the world just swayed underneath his feet.  His cheeks hold a spike of blush before it fades away quickly.

"It's only pain, Charlie." A hand is placed on my shoulder, that slides nails down my arm. He weaves our fingers together before bringing my wrist to his lips.

Skin against skin

Bounding pulse surges through engorging blood vessels. Darkening pupils consuming the color of the forest before he smiles against my skin - the only way he knows how to do.

"Let's make the most of your visit here. I'm sure your parents are waiting for you" He's right, my parents are probably waiting for me to come inside.

Looking towards Shamus, he's watching the dust trail of the trucks settle down against the surface of the road. His grief wears on his facial features that aren't hidden.

There are males that are coming out from the edge of the forest, young males in their transition from juvenile to full adult male.

When looking at them, they look back without a filter. Which makes me feel exposed by their greedy gaze. The Far North males never loitered their vision on my skin, Odin has set a standard for all to be wary of.

Some openly hold deliberate want in their eyes; I'm still the same as when I left, what's changed? They haven't acted this way before.

The Wild within Odin surges its sound.

Violent

Menacing

Seething

Tension and flexion of shifting tendons on bone. Birds take flight with the Wild's vocabulary that moves the current of air around us. Odin's natural sound spreads itself violently into the bodies of the males that are blown down in a forgiveness, submission stance. Soft parts of their necks are showcasing their apologies.

The Wild within Odin seems to want no apologies.

A shifting jaw is protruding, the cocoon of skin starting to break. Internally Odin's fight is of a full magnitude war; the Wild's will ascending, his will weakening underneath her full strength of ownership. This is what I feel from him, our connection making me understand the great hardship he goes through to keep the Nature of him from tearing away the throat of every male.

Everything stops. His violence is without restraint, without hesitation.

Primitive vision, primary thoughts of a male wanting to keep his half to himself.

With a blink, ancient forest greens are replaced by the dilating, engorging blackness of his pupils.

His vision has just blown out.

The males start to back up slowly at the advanced approach of Odin; he's trying to stay upright on shifting legs. A whine from some going belly up in the form of self-preservation. With a hand, Odin reaches the first male. A neck is snapped so quickly by Odin it seems as if these next-generation warriors are without training.

Enraged, Odin goes to the second male without any restriction or hesitation. "You males hold no worth; you want to look at my Half? Then you need to look at her Half, first." Words are coming out tight and muffled as teeth are threatening to come out a shifting jaw. A muzzle on the brink of extending forward. Odin's eyes stare directly into the face of the male he's holding by the throat. Squeezing the flesh, so there is no chance to inhale a single breath. Ryeson looks on, without interference. He makes no move to help his firstborn brother. Instead, he eyes all the males up and somehow I think they all fall short in his assessment of them.

Within Odin I can feel the hierarchy surging through his veins, he is the Alpha. He is the one my Wild's eyes are fixated on. The way his carotid artery is engorging on the side of his neck. The scent of him surrounding my radius,

power,

masculinity,

strength, has me inhaling deeply.

Taking that smell inside, holding the breath in, a feverous warmth fires downward, spreading, seeping into my very marrow of bones.

Everything is affected by this show of dominance.

A deep breath out once I can bring myself to release that scent away from me. A tilt of my head to hone in on the regular beat of his heart that isn't straining with the exertion of the moment.

Another neck is broken quickly with a snap again, Odin moves to the next. They try to defend themselves against something that is not worldly made. He's losing himself to the Nature of his Wild.  No one stops him; Shamus watches, Paley watches, the Wild within me is glued to her Half's education.

"Odin, enough." Calling out to him, when he turns his head in my direction he's got complete control over his Nature. His nose lifts upwards, nostrils flare, cheeks shift to a flush. Odin's heart rate now is accelerating inside his ribcage as all his focus is on me now. I can hear it; I can feel it as if my own heart is trying to escape my chest.

Heavy, short breathes as Odin's carnivorous eyes devour my entire body. There is a sudden complete loss momentarily - Odin's nose presses against the soft part of my neck.

Skin against skin

"I need to go take a run, to settle us down, or else no unmated male will remain living in the pack. I'm having a hard time controlling my limitations, Charlie." Teeth scrape then threaten to break through my flesh; I can feel them press into the soft spot of my neck. His body tremors as does mine before he removes himself from my space with his flushing breath.

Ancient forest green rimmed in blood lock onto mine before Odin breaks the cocoon of skin to shift into his Wild. The Nature within Odin is on full display to the remaining males whose necks are not broken. A whine goes up, an apologetic sound comes from their throats, before the Wild puts his head underneath my hand, his body walking, pushing into my thigh, hip, side of my chest. So my hand runs the length of his spine before he starts a run that blurs his movement. There is a launch of speed to him, a blurring movement that eyesight has a hard time keeping track.

"Charlie," Shamus is the first to speak between the three of us. The gathered males all slink away as if their tails are still curled tight between their legs. Shoulders have a bend to them. Some try to help the ones with their necks snapped up, but Shamus bristles. "Leave them there until they can walk themselves." Paley turns to me, "I think those males forgot about what happens if they looked too long at you."

"What do you mean, Paley?" No understanding what he's saying.

"Why did no male ever look at you while you were growing up?" Shamus interjects with his question.

"Because Odin was my mate, and my dad would kill them." Stating the truth out.

"That was a major factor, and also us Charlie. Odin couldn't be around all the time and neither could your father." Shamus states out loud, while Paley faces me. "We were always around you Charlie for a reason. We kept the males away." Paley now says in a voice I still have a hard time recognizing. Ryeson is listening to our conversation a small distance away. I can see his eyes as they fall away from me quickly.

"What do you mean? Are you saying you guys would fight any male that ever looked at me?"

"Always, Charlie." Paley who I have poisoned, who I have made the toilet his best friend at times was secretly protecting me from the advancement of anything male.

"How come I didn't know this?"

"You were always in your world, Charlie. You never looked around; you were always looking down picking plants. You never were interested in anything else., unless it was to seek retribution." Shamus is speaking words of truth plainly, and clearly and I understand it all.

"You are in your world, you always have been," Shamus is telling me all these things that he has never mentioned to me before. Who does he think I am now?

"Why are you saying this to me?" A divide is felt between the two of us at this moment. That we aren't' the same anymore as if we didn't grow up den brothers and sister,  that we didn't grow up together underneath one roof.

"I'm sorry, Charlie." Shamus looks away back into the direction that his mate left.

"Shamus, are you alright?" Walking towards him, Paley doesn't speak he just stares at Shamus, at me.

"I'm alright; it's been a big day so far." Shamus doesn't smile; he looks to be weighted down on how big his day just was.

"We should go back to our house; I need to sit down for a while." Shamus turns in the opposite direction I was expecting him to go in.

"Shamus, the house is this way?" An inflection of my voice.

"We have our own house now, Charlie."

"Who, you and Paley?" Now I realize that I've missed a lot since I've been gone.

"We thought it would be better to move out. It's good for us to  have our place a little further away from our parent's house." Shamus is walking heavy footed towards an unknown place to me. Ryeson follows behind us not saying anything.

"What about Keegan?" Looking at Paley now who seems more of a stranger. He's got several scars on his throat, thick gouges that were never there before I left. He's gotten so much bigger, except Shamus has surpassed him in height as the walk side by side.

Paley walks on Shamus's left.

"He has his Kalla," Paley's voice is deeper than I remember it, he's got the maturity of a full grown male. His face holds a shadow of a beard, when could he start growing a beard? This only makes me realize how left out I feel in their lives.

"He does, and you'll meet yours soon." Shamus bumps his shoulder into Paley who nods his agreement back.

"How are you doing with everything, Paley?" Knowing the difficulty of the situation to be around Kalla and his twin, Keegan. Wanting to change the subject off of me.

"It's hard," That's all he says before his mouth shuts.

"Charlie," Mom's voice yelling out through the air, as if I'm a pup again and need to come inside from my day of foraging. This time I'm older, and I don't have my leather satchel anymore. I don't have any books, no plants to bring back to the house to draw.

"You should go see your mother; it's been hard on her since you left." Shamus's voice hurts my chest.

"What do you mean?" An acid creeping against the back of my throat to lift itself to the roof of my mouth to burn a hot breath out.

"She's just not herself." When has my mother been nothing but herself?

"Charlie," another vocal call for me, but when I really listen to the voice, it's not as strong as I remember it to be. There is more of a delicateness to it - a fragility that doesn't carry as far as it once did.

"I should go to her." Turning from my cousins who seem fine without me now. Have they gotten so used to life without me that I'm just a visiting thought taken out on occasion then nicely tucked back inside to become a memory once more? The four of us turned to three, now they stand side by side, and it's me who steps away.

"Ryeson, come with me." Turning to Odin's brother who tries to shuffle his eyes away from my skin quickly.

"He can come with us, your parents have been waiting for this day since you left. Ryeson can stay with us until you can come and get him." Shamus and Ryeson both stand straight, their eyes never wavering from the other.

It's a quick walk towards the house; it's bigger than what I remember it to be, a huge mansion with thick wooden doors. Rounding to the back of the house, my mom is standing on the back porch holding open the screen door.

Cheek against cheek in a greeting, neither one of us pulling away. She holds me to her tightly, and I hang onto her with a slight whimper. I'm not sure why I'm starting to cry, but I do, and she lets me without questions. So I cry into my mother's arms while she strokes my hair, nudges my cheek with hers.

"I've missed you," mom's voice cracks and I crack from the inside out. I've missed so much in the little time I've been gone, I've missed their life, I've missed it all. Pulling back from mom, she has more of a dusting of grey in her midnight hair, a few wrinkles that I notice now. Her frame is still strong, but at the same time I notice that I'm a few inches taller than her now, did she shrink or have I grown more?

"Tell me about your adventures, Charlie." Mom waits for me to compose myself as she holds the door open, allowing me to walk through first. The day still holds the heat but when I step inside the coolness of the house has the shine of sweat ease away. Her hand doesn't leave my body, and I don't shake it away.

The smell is different, but the same and I start to cry again.

"Are you happy, Charlie?"

"No," the edge of my voice trails down like how I feel. I thought this was going to be a fun visit, but what I realize is everything that I'm missing. How things are changing, and I'm so far away that all this change is magnified.

When I come into the kitchen, dad's sitting in his chair, always his chair at the table he heads. His face is a bloom of deep purple and black hematomas. They look painful, but he doesn't care as he rises to hug me with his swollen cheek against mine. I embrace him back as if I am little again and I can't stop my tears.

"Charlie, what's the matter?" Dad's eyes on the verge of tears, my mother grabs his hand before her nose presses into his shoulder. She inhales while wiping her eyes on his clean shirt.

"I miss it all, Dad. It feels like I'm a stranger. Shamus and Paley have their own house; things look different. I just feel as if this isn't my home anymore."

"You'll never be a stranger here, Charlie this is your home, always." Dad gives my shoulders a squeeze.

"How's Aunt Meela doing? Where is she?"

"She's upstairs with Uncle Grey." Mom's voice dips itself down.

"Will she be alright? Will she forgive dad?"

"What your father did was what anyone would have done if someone was going for your throat. You kill them before they kill you. Charlie, remember that. If someone comes for your throat, you go for their first." Mom's voice hardens its edges of sound.

"He wouldn't submit, Charlie. He won't bend, if I let go, if I just let go he would have kept coming and coming. He thought he was more than me. He wouldn't have stopped, he never did stop with your Uncle. Uncle Grey never wanted to hurt your Aunt. So he let him always live, I would have ended him long ago." Dad says this without remorse of thought. "I feel bad that it was me to end him, but he put himself in that position, he's to blame not me." There's no remorse for Dad's tone.

"Where's Odin?" Mom is looking out the back window.

"I don't know; he needed to go for a run." Waving a hand in the air, my mother catches my wrist. She turns it, so the inside is facing her eyes. "These are Odin's lips?" The back of my neck feels hot.

"They are, he tattooed them on me."

"He did a good job."

"Do you have any more tattoos?" My mother is looking over my body.

"I have one more." Showing her my arm where the Endurance tattoo is leaping off the canvas of skin in a mind-blowing visual.

"What does it mean?" Mom's face smiling at it.

"Endurance," I can't help the way it sounds proudly out. A little puff of my chest before realizing what I fought to get it.

"Why that tattoo?" Looking between my mother and father, her tears path have dried on her face. My father holds her by her side, pressed into his body. That's how I always want to remember them, pressed into each other and if I answer her questions, they will part themselves away. I know this because they only ever fight over me.

"I walked with Odin into the biggest blizzard this world has ever known. We Endured the storm together. I was able to get the tattoo." I won't tell them about the line of retribution that I had to face after the walk in. It's not worth upsetting my mother; this is to be a happy visit.

"Tell us about your life there?" My dad walks us to the living around. The living room is three of Odin's home. Just the living room of the house is three of ours. Pictures all hang on the wall of us, our pictures from the newest of years to the oldest of years. I need to stop and look at each one of them. A compulsion to touch every face with my fingertips before turning to my parents who are now seated on the couch. A gap between them and I sit in the middle. Both of them press their cheeks into me before my stories begin.

The back door shuts to say someone is inside. Footsteps stretch themselves out on the wooden floor. Odin stands in the doorway, he's dressed holding our bags in his hands. This is the first time I've seen Odin look out of place as if he has no understanding what to do, how to act?

He shuffles his body one foot then the other one, not entering fully into our space.

"Come in, Odin. Sit with us." Mom points to one of the leather chairs close to the main couch.

"Thank you, Mother Wolf." He gives her a slight bow of his head, putting his hands behind his back. When he looks towards my father, he has no words. He does look at the pictures on the wall, they hold my entire life through years and years of smiles. A raised edge of the corner of his mouth turns upwards when his eyes catch on a very young picture of me with a toothless smile showing gums with a fierceness that I don't remember possessing.

"Charlie was just going to tell us about her adventures." Mom once again puts her cheek against mine, and a nibble of teeth is felt from the Wild within her. A small whine from her chest, the center of mine whines out her needful voice.  There's not enough time for the visit I need and want.

When Odin sits, he's rubbing the bone that lies dead center his chest; he seems to be in discomfort precisely the way I'm feeling right now. When our eyes meet, his still hold the shade of blood in them.

Odin watches me now, I can feel his eyes on my lips, then it dips to my neck, he readjusts himself in his seat, spreading his legs slightly and I need to look away from him because I'm growing flushed.

"Where should I start?"

"From the beginning." Mom's hand brushes through my hair that stops at my shoulders.

So I tell a censored version of my life in the Far North, I tell of the great walk in, the shaving of heads and what that means. How beads in the hair have meaning. I tell of the summer land, crossing great raging streams, the hunting of animal, the carrying of food back to the winter grounds. I tell them how I started my training, how I call the females that I fought against as ants. Mom laughs at certain parts, my dad just listens. Odin doesn't interrupt he just sits looking at the pictures on the walls, at a giant family living underneath one roof.

"Odin, I have a question for you." Mom's voice is gentle when talking to my half.

"Ask me anything, Mother Wolf." Mom smiles to herself before opening her mouth; Dad looks at her with a slight frown as she assesses Odin. For Odin's part, he does not turn his shoulders down, he keeps them straight, proud of who he is. The tattoo on his neck that sits against his carotid artery holds the color of my lips. My eyes hone on it, the color stands out in a sea of black ink. When his hand raises to touch the spot I'm looking at, all the canvas of skin that's not covered with the material of his shirt shift as if all the eyes of the animals are watching all of us. Taking my mother and father in with eyes that appear to have a life inside them. Trapped within the ink, the essence of them remain. There is an eerieness to the sight of his canvas of skin.

"How come the females stood in front of the males when there was a threat. Why did Borson gather all the pups around him behind the all the lines?" Mom sits up slightly leaning towards Odin. He regards my mother very correctly, he holds no malice in his face like the way I'm used to seeing it towards my father.

Odin clasps his fingers together. A calmness settles inside him that shuffles away the awkwardness of sitting inside my father's house. Something he said he would never do.

"The Old Ways tell of this, it's called Bulwark. If we are outnumbered and it looks like we will fall, then we will fall in a way that all die as warriors in a wall of teeth and claw. The entire world has let the Old Ways be just a memory. There are still traditions that are followed but most have vanished with time. The Far North is the original pack and we will always hold to our true traditions." Odin looking at my father, before he takes a long breath out. My father for his part stays calm while looking towards Odin as he starts explaining why they formed that specific battle formation.

"No female wants to live knowing their pups will die before them, that's why they stand in front of the males. Our wolves who have lost mates stand in front of everyone, they are the ones with the black band of tattoos around their heads. Their job is to take out the Betas and top fighters first, they will only go for the top of your Warriors like ants swarming them. They look forward to this, and their training is specific for this threat. One can only hope that you die as a Warrior in the service of your Pack." Odin's voice is stunning with the conviction of his beliefs.

"When the black banded wolves fall, then the least skilled Far North females take over. They have silver giving them an advantage over wolves with just teeth and claw. They are fighting to save their pups, nothing is fiercer in this world than a Mother Wolf defending her cubs." Odin's chest rumbles from within which has my Mother's Wild sounding off her agreement with the male who is in the chair talking.

"When the weakest line of females falls, they would have brought down a lot of your finest fighters, Finian. They would not have stopped your legion, but they would have picked off some of your strongest. The next line holds more skilled females, when that line falls, the most skilled females are standing shoulder to shoulder. They are a wall, a Bulwark, your males have never had to go against something so strong. You have the numbers, they are fighting for their pups lives and their packs lineage. All the females hold poison on them, there knives even if they don't kill the males they will nick them, dying within days of the Elder mushroom poison. The females will make all their nicks count." Both of my parents including myself are leaned in towards our storyteller. He has captured all our attention.

"When the last line of females falls, I can guarantee you would have suffered a significant loss of elite fighter, but you have sheer numbers on your side. Your volume of wolves would now meet the first line of our Males. You have the numbers, Finian...you have a sea of ants. They would fight tooth and claw until that first line falls." He's painting us a picture of what would have happened if it would have come to War between our packs.

"The more the fighting continues our elite Male warriors would strike down the hoard, but you have the numbers, and we would be consumed by them. We would have done great damage to your gene pool. Those Betas, Enforcers, the elite fighters would be no more, and you would be left with stock that holds no significance. When the last line of our Elite fighters threatens to breach, it's up to the strongest of our wolves, the Alpha to do his job as a leader to the pack. He would take the life of every single pup we have. We fight as One, die as One. When the last cry of them is silenced, the Alpha will fight the remaining of your warriors taking out as much as he can, in the end, your numbers would surround him, but he would be smiling because there is no greater beauty than dying for your pack as a Warrior."  Odin is looking at all of us, but he's not looking at what's in front of him but what he is seeing in his mind.

"But Odin, you're stronger than your father, why would he be in the back and not you?" Asking my question with slight confusion.

"I'm not the Alpha yet." His eyes are on me. "I'm meant to fight the Alpha of the pack, then anyone else that is in the way. If my mother were unable to take your mother out with silver, it would be up to me to take a throat." Mom's Wild within sounds out instantly in a deathly low threat, it's a warning to watch his words. Odin bows his head slightly to my mother, but he is without apologies, no bend of his neck is shown.

"Could you have fought me if it came to it, Odin? Would you have fought me?" Sitting between my parents, I don't waver my eyes from Odin's.

"Mates don't fight mates to the death, we fight for submissions, but never deaths, Charlie." The tone of Odin holds a finality to it.