When Anna awoke the following morning the morning sun illuminated her room. Glittering specks of dust shined in the rays of sunlight as she stretched and looked out her window.  Yawning, she removes the covers off her body and shifts her legs to hang off the side of the bed. As her feet touch the hardwood floor, a shiver courses through her from the abrupt temperature change. She stands up and goes over to her dresser to pull out some clothes before her door abruptly bursts open. She throws the clothes in her hands up into the air as a blood curdling scream escapes her. When she realizes the person who threw her door open is Keith she wills her breathing and heart to calm. 

“Anna, I’m sorry. I didn't know what to do in this situation. I'm the new alpha but you told the council to go to you for everything. Also I'm really sorry to intrude so early in the morning but I have no idea what to do.”, Keith starts, his face full of distress.

“Keith, I just woke up. What could be such a big emergency that you had to interrupt me while I was getting dressed.”, Anna responds, a hint of annoyance in her tone. 

“Well. Um, I think you need to see for yourself. It isn't something I can explain. Just get dressed and meet me by the council room.”

"Ok I'll meet you down there in ten minutes."

Anna gathers up her clothes that were scattered on the floor and closes the door Keith left open. She quickly changes and hurriedly throws her unruly, unbrushed honey brown hair into a bun on top of her head. Walking her fastest pace she bolts out of her room and down to the council room. It’s not even twenty feet from her room when she sees what had caused Keith such distress. The entire council chamber wing emanated pungent odor. It almost burnt Anna’s nose but she could clearly make out burnt wood and gasoline. The walls, floorboards, and what was left of the council room are charred a deep pitch black like the color of death. As she ventures further deeper into the burnt wreckage she sees the chair her father had sat in while being the Alpha, the one she'd refused to sit in for the sake of his memory. It lays on the floor burnt, disfigured, and full of ash. A tightness fills her chest as the reality of the damage truly sets in. A visual metaphor for all the loss she's endured within the past two years. The council room is a sacred place in their pack, a place of peace and order. The destruction of that sacred place was beyond anything she could have prepared herself for. It just put the nail further into the coffin of how much the pack broke down during her rule. She had thought after announcing Keith things would settle down. That the anger people in her pack harbored would fizzle out. She drops to the floor, her breathing growing rapidly as her already fragile world crumbles even more around her. She feels the eyes of all the remaining council members on her. Feels their judging like they always had but doubling ten fold. Tears begin welling up in her eyes as she tries to steady herself. Keith tenderly reaches out to her a worried look on his face as he squats down to rub her back gently. In all the years of knowing Anna, Keith had only ever seen her this distraught one other time. 

"Anna, are you good? I know this is a lot to process right now but the pack needs you.", Keith gently says as he stays squatting next to Anna his hand still placed on her back.

"I hate to ask this of you Keith but I can't do this anymore. Not after seeing this, please take over for me. Just this once.", Anna says, her voice quivering as she holds back a fountain of sobs. 

"Whatever you need I'm here. If you need me to take on my Alpha duties a bit sooner I can. Also if you need someone to talk to just let me know ok.", Keith responds gently from behind her.  

"Of course."

"Now go rest, I'll take care of everything here okay.”, he says to Anna, voice laced with earnest concern.

"Thanks Keith I know it's a lot to ask considering everything I said yesterday but after this. After everything it's just too much for me to handle anymore.", Anna says as Keith reaches his hand out to help her to stand. Anna carefully grabs his hand and stands. She hears the murmurs of the surrounding council members. However she ignores them wrapping her arms around Keith to hug him. He hugs her back squeezing her a bit too tightly causing her to emit a gurgled groan and laugh. 

When he releases her a soft chuckle escapes and she can see he was trying to make her feel a bit better. Even if it was something small, even just for a moment he just wanted to know that she was going to be okay after it all. She turns on her heels and walks out the blackened burnt doors, her smile slowly fading. 

Anna had always pushed aside her personal emotions for the betterment of the pack. She'd never let her fathers passing affect her so much that it'd cause harm to the pack. But everyone has their breaking point. The point in their life where everything boils over and becomes too much for the pot to hold. This was that point. Her brother's death, her father's, the dwindling of the pack and then seeing the destruction that the council room was left in. It pushed Anna to her breaking point where she felt emotionally overwhelmed and broken. 

She more than once prided herself on her capability to hold it together emotionally. She was easy to anger but when I came to feelings of hopelessness and sorrow. She bottled up those feelings so tight not even the strongest person on earth could unscrew the cap. It was only her that could show and allow those emotions out. However she avoided it like the plague because it haunted her. She never thought this day that this incident would be so traumatically emotional for her that she wouldn't be able to keep the cap on the bottle from bursting. But she couldn't, the bottle shattered and everything came rushing all at once like a tsunami crashing onto shore, violent and destructive. 

When she finally made it into her bedroom she let every emotion she had held in for the past year flood out. Broken sobs racked her thin body as she dropped to the floor hugging herself. Wave after wave of emotions washed over her as she intermittently shivered. She couldn't remember the last time she broke down like this. Couldn't remember the last time she actually let herself feel like this, if only for a moment. Clutching her chest she sniffles as tears continue to run down her face onto the floor. She hardly ever let herself feel like this. It was in her mind detrimental. She feared by doing such a thing she wouldn’t be able to be a good leader. 

A rapping on her bedroom door catches her attention and she attempts to collect herself as she stands to open the door. Grabbing a tissue from the tissue box sitting on the nightstand next to her bed she blows her nose. She knew that her eyes would be red and puffy but she could at least blow her nose.

When she opens the door Wilfred stands there face serious and business-like. She greets him with a forced smile masking her obvious distraughtness. 

"Hello, Miss Anna. You told me to inform you when I've talked to the event coordinator over at Maple Estates.", he says in a professional tone. His eyes only briefly meet hers. If he noticed her unseemly state he didn’t acknowledge it. 

"Yes, go ahead.", Anna urges him to continue and guides him into her room. He pulls the worn out desk chair out from under Anna’s desk and sits on it facing in the direction of Anna who is now sitting on her bed. 

"He informed me that they are not doing a theme and to just make sure your and your fellow members wear the proper formal attire. So floor-length dresses for you and your mother and then a suit and tie or bowtie for Keith." 

"Thank you, any other information he gave you?", she asks him, ensuring that she has all the details.

"Just asked that you be prompt and on time. Apparently tardiness is something the Alpha King does not tolerate. Otherwise he said all other details you'll be informed when you arrive at Maple Estates.", Wilfred says as he leans forward as though he still had more to say.

"Thank you for getting all the details Wilfred."

"Can I say something, Miss Anna, not about the celebration?" he asks, rubbing his palms together in a nervous manner. 

"You know I'm always open to hearing what you have to say. Speak freely."

"I understand why you wouldn't put yourself as Alpha, but you should consider another leadership role within the pack. You are a natural born leader, and I know your father would have wanted you to be more than just a mate and produce heirs."

“Wilfred, correct me if I'm wrong but you were friends with my father, yes?”

“Yes, but my friendship with your father doesn’t affect my opinion.”

“Explain to me how it does not. If you were close to my father than you may have extreme bias to the people in his life.”

“Anna I’ll admit I’m not entirely unbiased but I tell you this from my personal observations this past year. You have become an excellent leader and if you would have pushed for alpha you could have been the alpha. We don’t live in the same age that we once did and I know that it would have taken some time for many to get used to a female alpha but they would have eventually accepted it. But I understand the hesitance just promise me you won’t rule out a future leadership role; you're a natural at it.”

“I appreciate you believing in me Wilfred but you know the Alpha King wouldn’t approve. It's against tradition and thus against pack law. It could cause a civil war and worse could deem the pack my father built a rogue pack. I wouldn't do anything that would jeopardize the stability of the pack. I’ve put this pack through enough the past year.”

“Anna, don't blame yourself for what happened. None of it was your fault.”

“Not my fault. Have you not seen the state of the pack. Have you been blind this whole time.”

He stares at Anna, his eyebrows furrowing in slight anger and annoyance. People didn’t tend to talk to the elders like that. Anna feels the words on the tip of her tongue fully aware that they were needlessly harsh and hurtful. However she couldn't take them back so she stood firm and waited for his response. 

“Anna, that jab was unnecessary. I understand that you believe you’re the only reason this pack has gone to shit but you alone can’t have that kind of effect on a pack. You keep blaming yourself, don't you think it's time you stopped. Don’t you think it’s time for you to move on and grow.”

She feels the anger build and a tightness in her chest form once more. She wants to stand up and scream at him. Tell him he’s wrong. However she knows that first; that's wrong and completely unnecessary but second he’s right. She’s blamed herself internally for so long she hasn’t been able to recognize it and say it’s time to move on. To put everything behind her and learn from all the mistakes she made that year. Instead all she keeps doing is whining and complaining about how she’s put the pack where it is. She hasn't done anything to prove that she's ready to let all of that go. Sure naming Keith the alpha was a step in that direction but it was more for the pack than for the betterment of herself and her mental well being. Not that it didn’t help relieve some of the stress she felt weighing on her shoulders. It certainly had but even so she knew she wasn’t doing it for herself but rather the pack. All Wilfred was trying to tell her was that it was time to focus on herself.

“I’m sorry Wilfred I know you only mean well. However you must understand I don’t want a leadership role. I was in one for a year and it only brought me headaches. Keith was made for that role.”

“I’m not asking you to take on a large role, just consider a small one and not immediately turn it down. You were made for a leadership role just as Keith is, don't sell yourself so short.” 

"Ok fine. I concede I will give it consideration. However, if my final decision is to not take up any offer like that. You'll do your best to respect that decision, understand?"

"That's all I ask. Now I pray that you rest and relax. Mother Luna knows you need it.”, Wilfred says as he politely bows his head and walks away. However about four feet down the hall he stops. And he turns to look back at Anna. 

“Your father and brother would be very proud of the wolf you have become. Never forget the strength you possess.”

“Speaking of my parents would you happen to know where my mother is. I should probably go check on her and let her know what happened.”, Anna says as she walks up next to the elder. 

“They didn't tell you? Anna, your mother was the first one to know. She was the one who found it like that. When Keith made it to the council room she rushed off.”

“Where did she go?”, panic hits Anna like a freight train as she asks frantically. 

“She didn’t say but she did shift into her wolf before she ran off.”, Wilfred answers his voice solemn. He'd known Anna's parents for years. And it was clear to Anna that he felt just as much concern for the former luna, as Anna had felt for her mother. 

“I have to go.”, Anna says, quickening her pace. She graciously thanks Wilfred and makes a b-line towards the back door. Anna knew her mother. Unlike her father, her mother rarely ever turned into her wolf. It wasn’t that she hated it. Anna had learned through observation that her mother only shifted in stressful situations. Thus she concluded must have gone to one place, Anna's father and brother’s grave.

Running out the door Anna shifted into her wolf’s form, the cool winter air hit her face as she sprinted down the plain and near the woods where she knew her father and brother were buried. 

‘Why didn’t you tell Keith to actively search out those traitors? Did you not see what they did?’, Adira, Anna’s inner wolf, invades her mind. She never really said much while Anna was in human form. But once she would shift she would incessantly pester Anna. 

‘Adira, I’m not going to tell my future Alpha to actively put himself in a dangerous situation regardless of what those traitors did. Sometimes you have to take the higher ground.’

‘Higher ground? How is letting them walk away scot free taking the higher ground?’

‘When you choose to think with your head instead of your heart. When you choose to not go after a group that would stoop so low to destroy your property you are taking the higher ground.’

‘Is it though. Many may view it as a cowards move. And I wouldn't blame them.’

‘Adira I don't have time for this.’, Anna growls inwardly at her wolf clearly frustrated.