My summer is falling into a mildly comfortable routine. I spend weekday mornings training with the youth of the pack, and in the afternoons, I teach summer school math classes with a variety of grade levels. Weekends are spent with Matthew; we’ve been rummaging through the library on information about wolves with two mates. I get a feeling it has something to do with whatever Grandmother and Mother are hiding from me.  

I still get violent flashes of memory full of smoke, screaming, and fires. Mother always said they were just nightmares but when I reminded her that Yanna also experienced them, she would just remark on how close we were as siblings and perhaps should have been twins. The 10 years difference in age never swayed her opinion on this. There were nights for us both, we couldn’t sleep without Mother shifting and cuddling us into her fur. 

Dark memories aside, it was difficult to find actual werewolf literature that spoke of multiple mates, same-sex mates, or shifting at extremely early age. There is some in the lyken literature, but it’s very old, and still reads more as lore than fact. We gave up searching the internet for information; all we can find there is human’s dreamy fiction of abused she-wolves finding their mates, or second chance mates, and getting revenge.  

Grandmother had never mentioned being related to Lykens, so I don’t think the lore is applicable. Also, Lykens are naturally dominant over wolves, but both Matthew and Jonquil have strong enough alpha auras to push me to submit. I know I can too, to Matthew, but I haven’t spent enough time with Jonquil to know if I can with her. There is something a little strange I noticed when discussing the situation with Alpha Ryan and Luna Daisy. The man is every bit an alpha, but she appears to choose her submission. I can only see this because it’s the same with Mother and my stepfather, although Luna Daisy does seem to pull it off more naturally.  

Some nights it is very hard to sleep with all this running around in my head. On those nights I look forward to morning training. When I push myself physically, I can drown out the mental exhaustion. Along with that is bonding with more of the high school students. Some of the boys, friends to Beta’s banished son, were wary of me. His daughter, however, had no issue looking me in the eye and challenging me during training.  

Ariadne didn’t appear to have many friends, at least, none that attended training. I learned, at one point, that she is Alpha’s niece which explained why she was close to matching me in height. We were often paired for sparring, not just for our matching height, but her quick development of muscle and technique. She remained lithe and fast, but she excelled at strength training as well.  

One morning she didn’t show up for training until break, limping in with her left arm in a sling and some bruises. Her stoic demeaner pushed others aside as she bee-lined to her father and Alpha. I could read the conversation from body language alone. Alpha Ryan and Beta Lucas, both turned her away from training while healing. Her face reddened with anger and hurt as she insisted there were things she could do. She glanced my way, catching me staring, and quickly turned herself away from me, attempting to close me out.  

I reminded myself to not get involved and went back to stretching casually and drinking my water. She’s a smart kid. Even if Ryan and Lucas are too distracted to figure it out, she will. I glanced back to see her watching them as they talked over their clipboards. In fact, for the rest of training, she just casually followed them around.  

On my walk from the training center to the school, I was caught up thinking about my mates. Matthew was almost as tall as me with dark hair that tousled in the sexiest way, and bright blue eyes. He’d been raised to be a pack Alpha, so he was strong, and cunning, but he had always appeared aloof. Jonquil was very different. She was petite with a wild mane of dark brown curls and a singular strip of platinum blonde coming from her left temple. The contrast was stunning and carried over into her eyes. One a deep dark brown and the other the palest grey. She was reserved in all the right ways for a pack’s Alpha, but expressive and emotionally secure.  

I literally haven’t seen her since that first day, and, thankfully, the bond hasn’t developed sexually, so far. Emotionally, though, I want to see her, talk to her, learn what makes her smile and protect her from what makes her cry. I want to go on sunset walks, and midnight runs with her and Matthew. I want her to help research how and why our bond is this way. I want her to meet my mother and grandmother. 

I want to be doing all the things with her and Matthew. I have a year to wait.