Twenty Six year old Blake Hunter is the Alpha of the largest pack in the region. Finding his mate is the last thing on his mind.
But, in the midst of dealing with uninvited relations, aspiring future Lunas and increasing rogue attacks on his easter...
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"Alex! For Goddess sake! What have you done to my map?”
As the afternoon wore on and the sun stretched across the sky, the tall pine trees outside cast increasingly long shadows towards the vast windows of the pack hospital. Asher had joined Blake and his lieutenants to hash out a plan for the pack in the coming weeks; new security protocols, training sessions and EVAC drills.
Blake's brother was recovering well and proving harder to contain within the boundaries of the house, even for Aunt Sarah. He had indicated more than once that he'd be leaving them in a matter of days to organise his own pack, but was utilising his expertise to help set up the Blackridge defences.
Blake leaned, half-propped up against the pillows of one of the beds. Lost in thought, his eyes watched the tips of the evergreen silhouettes that seemed to compete with one another to reach out and touch the cold stone walls – in the Alpha's mind, they mirrored the blanket of darkness stretching towards the village from the western borders.
Hannah, always eager to learn more about the pack, sat close by, tracing her fingers over the official plan of the Blackridge borders. Her features crinkled into a frown of concentration.
They both looked up in response to Marcus's exclamation.
The Beta had an open map across his knees. A plan of the territory and surrounding landscape that Marcus had spent months painstakingly constructing by hand. Tucked away in the packs, the paper had survived the ambush intact and was still in surprisingly good condition.
As Marcus had tried to keep an accurate record of the rogue movements and the packs defensive countermeasures, the creases in the paper had become slowly more prominent. Some of the pencil had smudged where lines had been rubbed out and moved. It was never out of his sight and he treated it with the same gentle delicacy that any artist would treat his prize possession.
Blake had admitted weeks ago that so far, the hand-drawn map proved far more accurate than any printed copy.
Alex hadn't let the map out of his sight since he'd rescued it from ruination on the hospital floor. Only once convinced that his friend was making a full recovery, had he returned it to the relieved Beta with a flourish.
Blake glanced over the area currently unfolded. It now bore the signs of slightly rougher handling but he could see nothing that would warrant such a cry of despair from his Beta. In fact, all in all, it seemed to have survived its brief stint in Alex's possession.
Marcus, as familiar with his own work as with the back of his hand, had spotted the new additions almost immediately. The chart was now adorned with a flurry of new symbols scattered almost randomly across Marcus's carefully drawn lines.
“What the hell is that?” Marcus jabbed at his map.
Alex squinted at it. “It's a frowny face,” he said matter-of-factly.
