fate of the alpha - episode 3 by Tasha Black Page A

times. But this time it came easy — maybe because she needed it to be.
    Time slowed down.
    Mary dove between Miss Bonnie’s legs and out into the open space at the mouth of the mine. She splayed her paws to stop herself from sliding out of control on the gravel.
    The smells of the mine overpowered her wolf nose, and Mary struggled to focus on Erik’s smell. It was a spicy amber scent, and once she had it, it was easy to follow.
    Suddenly, something big landed on her back.
    Another wolf had her by the scruff.
    She tried to shake it off, but it held fast.
    A second wolf landed on her back.
    Desperately, Mary snapped at them. But she knew already it was useless. Her tail fell between her legs.
    The spicy scent vanished into the mouth of the mine.
    Mary lifted her snout and howled mournfully.
    The night air filled with echoes of her song. Every wolf in Copper Creek had joined her in her pain.
    She sighed and felt herself slide back into the form of a girl again.
    Instantly, the jaws on her neck were gone.
    Her mother licked her cheek once with a raspy tongue, before shifting back to human herself, and wrapping Mary in her arms.
    “This had better work,” Miss Bonnie hissed, the moment she had shifted back.
    “The cave-in’s already blocking off the section of the mine where Jake and the boys were. What’s Erik going to do that hasn’t already been done?” LeeAnn whispered back over Mary’s shoulder.
    Before anyone could answer, an earth-moving rumble tore through the ground. Mary felt the earth come up to meet her, and her naked hip hit the gravel hard enough to bruise.
    The twins began to cry, and the wolves on the ridge stirred nervously.
    Mary looked up to see smoke pouring out of the mouth of the mine.
    “What happened?” she whispered, not expecting an answer.
    The crowd behind them began to buzz.
    “That crazy son of a bitch opened the east branch!” Ted Mullin’s voice lifted over the crowd.
    “What?” a woman’s voice asked.
    “The gas. He lit the gas,” yelled another man’s voice.
    “That thing will burn for a hundred years. What are we supposed to do now?” Jimmy Brewer shouted.
    “We can’t mine anymore,” said another voice. It was Mr. Kirkland, one of the foremen.
    “Without that mine, this town is doomed,” a woman’s low voice carried across the night air.
    Mary felt the weight of a new anger pull at her shoulders.
    “He just put an end to Copper Creek!” screamed another voice.
    Enough.
    Mary stood, feeling taller than the mountains.
    “Shut up!” she screamed.
    Silence, sudden and complete, blanketed the crowd. The eyes of the whole town bore down on her.
    Just yesterday, she would have been ashamed to stand naked and dirty before a single person. And now she stood proud, letting the cold wind whip her hair and buffet her body. Since her first change, she hadn’t needed her glasses anymore. But she had hid behind them anyway, they were another layer between Mary and the world. Now they were broken somewhere in the gravel, and she was glad.
    “You shut your mouth, Jimmy Brewer,” she shouted. “And you too Mr. Kirkland.”
    Her voice had taken on a deeper quality that frightened her, but excited her all the same.
    The men sensed the power behind her words, or the fallacy in their own, and looked at their feet.
    “The man that just went into that mine is a hero to this town,” she said. “Just like my daddy. Don’t you ever forget that. Anyone that says different is going to have to answer to me.”
    It was a silly thing for a fifteen year old to say — she knew that. But no one questioned her. She could feel the fire in her own eyes as she held the pack in her gaze.
    A murmur of excitement rippled through the crowd. They began to point and crane their necks to look past her.
    Mary whipped around to face the mine. Something was coming out.
    If Erik had failed, and the creature, whatever it was, had gotten loose, they were all doomed. Mary headed toward the entrance, a low