Feral

12

What had she done now? He had seen the bodies of the dogs laying around her, and smelled the scent of humans.

It dawned on him...the hunt for the "beast" that was today. Or had been. Where any other humans killed?

Alpha Raymond had already chewed him out on their way back to his lodge building.

"I wish to speak with this female, now," he said, once all were shifted and in their human forms once again. The shewolf had rode on Damien's back on their way to the lodge, to injured to shift and run with them.

She was a mess. Her neck was raw and bleeding in a couple of areas, her leg was torn by the bullet wound and her arrow wound had reopened. Four of her wolves had followed them back.

"Let's first clean her up and get her dressed, Alpha," the female beta of Raymond's pack said, her name was Ash.

"Fine, but I want answers," the female beta took the shewolf away.

"We have ourselves a conundrum, Damien. Those men were hunting that wolf. I saw with my own eyes how she defended herself against their mutts. I understand that they are good people, and that your business is good with them, but if they were to find out about our nature, they would have to be destroyed," Damien knew his words were true. The council of alphas for this continent would see his town gone if word spread.

An aggravated scream echoed through the lodge, followed by snarls and yelps of pain. Both Damien and alpha Raymond were quick to rush to the scene. What he laid his eyes upon was far from what he had expected. The feral female had her arm wrapped around Ash's neck, blood dripping from her nails, looking to be her own judging by new the bleeding wound on her side.

"Alpha, I'm handling this," Ash said against strained windpipes. The other female growled at her. It was a display of dominance, Damien knew it because she'd attempted to do the same thing to him before. His arm still prickled where she'd bitten him.

"This wolf is crazy," alpha Raymond said. No, she wasn't crazy, just hurt, confused and tired.

"Damien," the shewolf spoke, her eyes were filled with tears. Her voice was still rough from disuse, but her pain was clear.

"Let her go," he responded, motioning at her to unhook her arms from Ash. He could see how reluctant she was to do so, but she did and collapsed onto the floor.

"Ash, Alpha Raymond, I can take it from here. She doesn't trust easy, and it was wrong of me to allow Ash to be put in harm's way," he picked the shewolf up, and laid her on the table.

"Really, though, Alpha Damien, I'm not harmed at all, it's nothing you need to concern yourself with, I can continue to help her,"

"I will stay here, it will take at least two of us to fix her up, it just sucks that she reopened her side wound. I had just bandaged it a couple of days ago," both him and Ash donned proper attire for surgical procedures, as well as making sure they had the right equipment as well.

Alpha Raymond lingered in the room, watching closely as he operated on the now unconscious wolf. The wound to her leg was severe, and had to be flushed with iodine before they could stitch it up, this time he knew there would be no chance of infection as he would monitor her healing all the way through. It had been idiotic to leave her in the woods. But what's done is done.

Now that he had proper equipment the severity of her arrow wound was shown in full light. Muscles had been torn, but he couldn't tell if it had been due to her shifting and the stitches ripping or if it had originally been like so. The arrow had slipped between her ribs, but hadn't caused any internal damage.

Once the stitches were properly done, they cleaned her of the remaining dirt and put her in a hospital gown. All they had to do was wait until she was conscious again.

"I was under the assumption that feral packs had been eradicated by the council," Damien nearly jumped out of skin when Alpha Raymond spoke. He had been sitting in silence for nearly an hour beforehand.

"From what I've experienced, she was born feral, or left to the pack. She knows very little of our kind," Damien replied. "Or of humans really," he added as an afterthought.

"There are at least forty wild wolves waiting outside of this building, I hope I'm right in assuming that they are hers, they growl and go to attack anyone that approaches the building," Damien gave him a stiff nod. He had a feeling her beta would kill to protect her.

"I hope she doesn't shift when she comes to, it'll destroy the sutures," the other alpha scoffed.

"That's all that you are worried about? Damien, her actions have risked our exposure to a race that we have lived peacefully together with for centuries, and you're worried about fucking sutures? Are you really that much of an idiot?"

"She did what she had to in order to protect her pack! I would expect either of us to do the same," Damien retorted, rather hotly. That seemed to catch alpha Raymond off guard. Good. Damien thought.

"I suppose you have a good point," he did, and it angered him that people wouldn't agree. She was like a mother defending her child, or children.

It is the duty of the alpha to protect the pack.