Abandoned Treasure

Warrior Vic Knightly’s POV

Denali Pack Fieldhouse

Wednesday, January 5, 2015

“Knightly, you have the unshifted for conditioning.”

I didn’t expect a better instructor assignment during the early morning training session. The Alpha was being pissy about things, even though years had passed since I quit my job as a Council Enforcer. I was only a Warrior rank within the Pack. That wasn’t because I was weak; I’d easily beat the Beta and Head Warrior in a fair fight, and they knew it. No sparring meant no ranking challenges. I hadn’t fought in the ring since I was an apprentice, and those sessions were rarely one-on-one.

The Alpha would not consider me for a higher position, so fighting was pointless.

And the Unshifted? There was only one male in that age class. He was the Alpha’s only son, Anthony, and he was ten years old.

And by ‘conditioning,’ he meant running him until he puked.

I nodded and walked over to where Anthony was waiting for me in his gym clothes. He was tall for his age but thin. He’d put on a hundred and fifty pounds of muscle and bone before he finished growing into his Alpha-blood wolf. “You have me again, Warrior Vic?”

“Yep. Stretch out, then we’ll start with a two-mile warmup run.” The Denali Pack had an indoor fieldhouse we used for training in the winter or bad weather, meaning it was in use for two-thirds of the year. It was the largest building in the Pack complex at just over 36,000 square feet. The one-tenth-mile running track ran around the outside of the space with locker rooms and storage in the corners. Inside the loop was a basketball court, fighting rings, and wrestling mats. Every male in the Pack trained daily.

Five minutes later, we started running. I set a pace of fifty seconds a lap for an eight-minute mile. Anthony kept up, but he was breathing hard as we finished. I set my watch to give us 30-second intervals for the next part. We’d sprint for thirty seconds, then we’d walk for thirty.

Five minutes later, Anthony was dragging. He looked back to see how far I was behind him and didn’t see the wolves tearing out of the ring towards the exits. I yelled for him to stop, but not before he collided with his father.

He landed hard on the rubberized track before rolling to a stop, groaning in pain. Alpha Alan shifted and went to his son.It wasn’t to comfort him. No, that wasn’t Alpha Robertson’s style. “YOU FUCKING IDIOT,” he yelled as he yanked him up by the back of his neck. “HOW DARE YOU RUN INTO ME!”

“I’m sorry,” Anthony got out. He was scared of his father, for good reason.

Alpha let him go, only to backhand him across the cheek hard enough to open up a cut below his eye. He looked at him with disgust as Anthony held his hand over his bloody face. “Worthless and weak.” The wolves that had stopped their training looked at their shoes as the Alpha heir sat up. “Get him cleaned up,” he ordered me. He shifted and rejoined the Betas, running off towards the Pack House.

“Come on,” I said. I extended my hand to the boy and helped him stand. He limped as we walked to the locker room. The spill had bruised his hip, plus he had friction burns on his knees and right elbow. I helped him to a chair in the first aid area. Our Pack Doctor had stocked the space with everything needed for minor injuries that might come with training.

I cleaned the cut on his face, then had him hold a gauze pad over it while I treated the scrapes. “You’re going to need stitches,” I told him. I linked Doc to come here and fix his ‘training injury.’

“What else is new,” he complained.

Nothing. I’d never understand our Alpha. He has an heir, young and gangly and uncoordinated from growing fast. Alpha Alan Robertson was a bully who thought his son needed to be ‘toughened up.’ How that translates to beating him is beyond me. Of course, smacking your mate around until she is broken and utterly submissive to him makes no sense, either. He still did it, and the Pack pretended not to notice.

Our Pack Doctor sewed him up and told him to ice his bruised hip. We entered the tunnel leading back to the house, finally out of earshot of the other wolves. “I’m going to stop him,” he vowed. “I’ll challenge him for the Pack.”

“He knows that is coming, and he’s scared of it,” I replied. “You’re growing fast. The muscle will come later. If you train hard? You’ll be Alpha sooner than you think.”

“When I get my wolf?”

I had to be honest with him. “Another decade or three. Your father is a selfish man, and he won’t give up power easily. He’s afraid the Pack will back your challenge, and he is getting old and soft. He’ll try to keep you weak, then force you to challenge him before you are ready. Hide your training and your strength as long as you can.”

“How, Vic? He or his Beta watches everything in here.”

We’d almost reached the end of the tunnel. “Then we train in secret. You and me, and nobody else is to know about it.” I held out my hand. “I’ll figure out how we can do it. You will hide your true skill level around the others and hold your wolf’s true dominance down. He must think you are weak until it’s time to prove you aren’t. If you’re going to challenge him, you better win.”

He reached for my hand, looking into my eyes with a determination worthy of an Alpha. “I will.”

“Put ice on that hip for ten minutes every thirty, and stay off of it.” I watched him walk into the Alpha Wing.

I’d almost returned to the field house when the Alpha linked me. “Warrior Vic, pack a bag for three days in Montana and be ready to go in fifteen minutes. The car will be waiting out front.”

“Yes, Alpha.” I ran back to the Warrior’s Quarters and took a quick shower. I dressed in jeans, a flannel shirt, and boots before grabbing my go-bag from the shelf in the closet. I tossed a few extra clothes in, grabbed my winter gear, and was out the door in ten.

The Suburban was in front of the house. An Omega was driving, so I took shotgun. The Alpha didn’t like me, but he wasn’t stupid. If we were heading to another Pack’s territory? He wanted the best fighters in the Pack as his bodyguards. Since the Beta would stay behind with the Pack, that was me or the Head Warrior, Carl Broderick. I was surprised when both Carl and Alpha Alan got in the back before we headed to the airport. “What is going on, sir?”

“Fucking Bitterroot Pack,” the Alpha replied. “The Council arrested the senior leadership and is holding them for trial.”

“What did they do?”

Beta Carl had his phone out and passed a screenshot to me. “Recognize these guys?”

The sketches were pretty damn accurate, and I recognized the two members of Bitterroot from previous visits. The two kidnappers were dead after a gun battle with the police in Rochester, Minnesota. “What the fuck were they doing in Minnesota? That’s far from their territory.”

“So was the Arrowhead Pack,” Alpha said. “The girl they went after? She was the Alpha’s daughter, Charlotte King.”

“The Chosen One?” Everyone knew how the Blessing ended when the Arrowhead Pack got wiped out of existence. Charlotte was the last of the King’s line, a maternal blessing of fertility passed from mother to daughter for thousands of years. “She lives?”

“It appears so,” the Alpha said. "She looks a lot like her mother."

My head was spinning. “She’s got to be what? Sixteen? Seventeen? Has she shifted yet?”

“That’s why this is such a fucking headache,” Alan replied. “Not only did Bitterroot wipe out Arrowhead, but they left the only survivor in the hands of humans.”

Fuck. Double fuck. This trip was going to be rough. In a typical meeting, the Alphas were only allowed to bring one bodyguard. The host Alpha was the one guaranteeing security, but here? The Council would have to do it. “What are my orders, Alpha?”

“You’ll join the Enforcers and do as the Head Enforcer directs. Don’t fucking embarrass me again.”

“Understood, sir.” Our charter jet took us to the airport in Stevensville, where a Pack Omega picked us up. Omega Rhonda’s fear was evident as I helped her load the bags into the back. “Relax, Rhonda. No one is going to hurt you.”

She nodded slightly, avoiding my eyes. “Everyone is so angry,” she whispered.

“None of it is at you, and I won’t let anything happen to the innocent. I promise.” We got in, and Rhonda focused on driving. The Alpha and Carl were holding mental conversations I wasn’t privy to, so I made small talk with Rhonda to get her mind off the turmoil in her Pack.

Soon enough, we were pulling into the Pack compound. The Alpha and Carl headed for the conference room. Rhonda took our bags while I reported to the Head Enforcer. “Mark,” I said as I entered the temporary office.

“Vic! Thank the Goddess that you are here.” My old boss shook my hand; we’d seen little of each other since that time in Anchorage. “It’s a shitshow, and I need experienced interrogators.”

“If these men wiped out Arrowhead and hurt an underage girl, you may not want me in the room with them.”

“Those men are all in the cells. I need your help interviewing the Omegas. The females are scared as hell and no longer under Alpha command. They must have witnessed a bunch of shit, and we know they weren’t involved in the Arrowhead attack. You’re older and know how to dial down your dominance, so I’m giving them to you.”

I nodded. “I understand. How should I handle the interviews? If the Omega who picked me up is any guide, they will be skittish.”

“Don’t do them anywhere near the Alpha wing. Pick somewhere they feel safe, away from the other madness. If there is someone they trust, bring her in the room.”

“I’ll get right on it.” I left him to the madness and went back to the entryway. Omega Rhonda was waiting there for me. “Rhonda? A moment in private, please?”

She nodded nervously and led me to a small study with leather chairs and bookshelves. I sat down to reduce the height difference and invited her to take the other. She declined, probably trained not to sit in the presence of higher-ranking wolves. “The Council assigned me to interview all the Omegas.”

Her fear levels spiked. “All… all of us?”

“Yes. Is there someone you all trust? It doesn’t have to be a higher-ranking wolf. It can be another Omega.”

“Why?”

“I need someone to sit with them and keep them calm while we talk. I figure meetings with senior wolves didn’t always go well here.”

That got me a brief smile. “You need to talk to Sally. Everyone likes her.”

“Can you link her and ask her to join us?”

“Yes, sir.” A few minutes later, the older wolf entered the room. She wasn’t as nervous, and she had kind eyes.

I told Sally who I was and my assignment. “You may as well start with me,” she said. “Can Rhonda return to her duties? We’re busy with all the guests.”

“Of course.” The younger wolf practically ran from the room.

“Thank you. Everyone is so nervous right now.”

“Why is that? I doubt any Omegas were involved with the attack on Arrowhead or the kidnapping attempt on Treasure Olson.”

“The Alpha has a history of harsh punishments for those he thinks are betraying him and the Pack. He’s under arrest, but what if the Council lets him go? We will pay the price of his anger, not you.”

I shook my head. “The Alpha will not escape this one. Even if the Pack had nothing to do with Arrowhead, he risked exposing our kind to humans with the kidnapping attempts.”

“You’ll understand if we hold back until he’s found guilty,” she replied. “If there are any questions related to those crimes, I can answer them. I’d rather keep the others out of it for now.”

“You aren’t afraid to testify against your Alpha?”

“I’m scared, but I trust you can find a way to protect one old wolf. Protecting dozens of Omegas is a much more difficult task.”

“I can have the Chairman put Alpha command on you.”

“You could, but is that necessary? These women are scared enough as is.”

She was right, and I let her know that. She had been in the Pack since before Alpha Todd was born and the senior Omega in the Alpha wing for decades. Her memory was sharp as a tack, and we talked for over an hour about the time around the events in question until my Alpha called me away.

The trials were about to start, and everyone had to attend.