Joel
"Come on Lyla, JUMP!" Mark shouted.
"I'm scared!" Lyla shouted back.
"Don't be such a wuss!"
"I'm not a wuss! I just don't trust you!"
"That's a load of bull, now JUMP!"
"Ok, I'm doing it.....oh god, I'm doing it.......AAARRRGGHHH!"
Thud
On hearing the noise, I finally looked up from the pile of stones I was lazily stacking into a sort of pyramid.
The rope swing had predictably not been able to take Lyla's weight and had snapped, plummeting Lyla into the small dried up stream bed. Not that Lyla was heavy. No, Mark was just that bad at making rope swings.
"Ooowwww," Lyla moaned while moving slowly to check her limbs were still attached.
Mark slowly started backing away, a guilty look on his face.
I smirked and went back to my pyramid.
This was typical behaviour for these two. They were always getting into scrapes together. Saying that, I was usually right there with them, but I just hadn't been in the mood recently.
"MARK! GET YOUR ARSE BACK HERE NOW!!!" Lyla screamed, making me jump slightly, resulting in a small rock slide down the side of my pyramid.
"Lyla! Hush!" I whisper shouted at her.
It was Sunday and we were supposed to be training. But once again we were skiving off, deep in the woods.
She winced, and looked over at me apologetically. I just hoped no one had heard her.
Lyla came and plopped down next to me, putting her head on my shoulder.
"Why can't you make me a rope swing?" she pined, "Mark's rubbish at them."
"Yet you still keep trying them. Are you sure you're ok, that was quite a thump?"
Lyla shrugged nonchalantly. She had always been a bit of a tomboy growing up, and never moaned when she got bruises and cuts like some of the other girls did.
I always found it a bit odd that she was like that seen as she was raised by just her mum and had no other siblings.
Mark sidled over, and sat down a few meters away from us.
Lyla tipped her head to glare at him.
"What are you doing over there Mark? I won't bite."
That was not true. And knowing that, Mark sensibly stayed sat where he was.
We sat in silence for a few minutes.
It was Lyla who broke the silence.
"So, it's the wedding next week."
I heard Mark groan, and even though I wasn't looking at him, I felt the eye roll.
Both of them had avoided talking about anything to do with the wedding, for the fear of upsetting me, but I knew it was eating Lyla alive.
Really when I thought about it, I was incredibly proud of her for not talking about it for this length of time. Gossip like this was her thing. I knew it must have been extremely hard for her not to mention it at all.
"It's fine," I said, "it's not like I can avoid it this week, so you might as well talk about it. It's not like ignoring it is going to make it go away."
Lyla looked like she wanted to squeal with joy at being finally given the green light. Mark just let out a huge sigh. I think secretly, he'd been enjoying the radio silence himself.
"I've heard that there are going to be 600 guests," Lyla said excitedly.
"Actually it's only 350." I replied.
Lyla scrunched up her nose in disappointment. "I also heard that Emily was arriving in a helicopter...."
"Nope, not true," I interrupted.
"...and that she is having 10 bridesmaids."
"Try 4."
"...and that Casper will be wearing a purple suit."
I let out a snort of laughter. "Purple, really? Casper hates purple."
"Casper hates purple? How can anyone hate purple? And how on earth do you know that?"
"I might have overheard him say it once," I mumbled while poking the ground with a small stick.
I felt Lyla's eyes observing me, and thankfully she let it drop.
"I guess none of the rumours are true then," she said disappointedly.
I shrugged. "I think they want it to be low key."
"That makes sense," Mark finally piped up, "I've heard that there's been lots of hunter activity recently, so the last thing we need to do is draw attention to ourselves."
I'd heard this too. Humans and werewolves had lived peacefully side by side for hundreds of years. Not that the humans knew this of course. But throughout history there has always been a group of humans who were adamant that werewolves existed, and were sure that we'd raid their villages at night and eat their children, or some shit like that. And consequently, they made it a bit of a sport to hunt us down.
In recent years, the number of reported killings by the hunters was on the increase. And it was no secret that there seemed to be a particularly active group only about 50 miles from our village.
Lyla didn't seem keen to discuss such boring things though and after finally being given permission to talk about the wedding, she wasn't going to get moved off the subject that easily.
"So is Jamie the best man then?" She asked me.
"Yes," I replied, "and Nathan and Ronan are the Ushers."
"Oh wow, I've never seen Nathan before," Lyla said going a little dreamy eyed.
Mark sniggered, "Well maybe you should speak to Joel then, because he's seen him up close, actually very close!"
"WHAT?" she said, her head snapping towards me with such speed that I thought it might snap off. "And you didn't think to tell me??!"
"I didn't think it was such a big deal?" I said shrugging.
Mark laughed, "No, of course headbutting robo-wolf is no big deal!"
"You headbutted him!" Lyla shrieked. "How are you still alive??"
I couldn't help but laugh at Lyla being over dramatic as usual.
"He's not that scary," I replied, although in truth, I had feared for my life a bit at the time.
"He may be sexy as hell, but he is also hella scary," Lyla said emphatically. "I've also heard that he actually rejected his mate. Apparently she wasn't good enough for him or something."
I laughed at Lyla. "Tell me, did you hear this from the same place that you heard all the stuff about the wedding?"
"Actually, I've heard about the mate thing too," Mark said.
I raised my eyebrows at him trying to figure out if he was just trying to get Lyla to forgive him for earlier, or whether he was actually telling the truth.
To be fair to Lyla, the information she did hear and choose to pass on was usually surprisingly accurate. There were just so many made up stories about the wedding, that it was difficult for anyone to know what was actually true. And of course, she had been cut off from her primary source of info on the subject - me.
"So what's the story with Ronan?" I asked Lyla. "What's up with his leg?"
"Skiing accident," she replied. "It happened about 5 years ago, just as he was about to take over as alpha."
"Has he done permanent damage?"
"They say not, but then would you let the world know that your future alpha is permanently incapacitated?"
I shook my head slowly. It was no wonder that Emily's dad Archie was keen to rebuild relations with our pack.
A loud horn sounded in the distance.
We all jumped to our feet, morphing into our wolves.
Training was over and it was time to head back.
__________________________
After training I went home for a shower and then headed back to the manor for my evening shift.
A movement in the garden caught my eye, and against my better judgement, I walked over to see what it was.
"Hi Joel."
My hand flew to my chest as the voice just appeared next to my left ear.
I spun round to find a rather amused Emily smiling at me.
"Holy crap! Don't sneak up on a wolf like that!" I panted, trying to calm my beating heart.
Emily giggled. "Sorry, I didn't want people to see me."
"Oh sorry, I'll go then," I said, turning to head back to the manor.
"Not you, silly," she said, holding onto my arm. "It was you I wanted to speak to."
I immediately felt uneasy, but tried not to let it show. What did she know? Had Casper said something? Would she be mad? She didn't exactly look mad.
"Ok, what did you want to speak to me about?" I asked.
She looked around, and started to pull me further into the garden. When she was content with the distance from the manor, she turned to me and said, "I need to talk to you about Casper."
I swallowed hard. "What about Casper?"
Emily chuckled. "Stop looking at me like that," she said, and hit my arm playfully.
"Like what?" I asked.
"Like you think I'm going to go all killer wolf on your boney ass."
I frowned and turned my back on her. "My ass is not boney, thank you very much." I said, jutting it out in her direction.
Emily laughed, but it stopped quite abruptly.
I turned to look at her.
"I've missed this," she said, gesturing between us.
"Me too," I said smiling at her.
"Casper told me," she said, her expression suddenly becoming serious.
I bit my lip nervously. I didn't want to insult her by pretending to not know what she meant, but I also didn't know how much he had told her.
"What exactly did he tell you?" I asked.
"That he might be your mate. And because of that, you've been avoiding each other and haven't spoken in weeks."
So I guess she knew then!
"Something like that," I said with a small sigh. "Wait, does he think we are actually mates? Because last time we spoke, he didn't seem too convinced."
"Well I'm definitely convinced," Emily said with conviction.
I looked at her in surprise. She didn't look happy, but I didn't see any anger on her face. Just sadness.
"I'm sorry." I mumbled, suddenly remembering how awkward the whole situation was.
"Don't be sorry," she said, reaching out and touching my arm. "You can't choose your mate. Neither of you asked for this."
"True," I mumbled, not really knowing what else I could say.
There were a few moments of silence, where I could feel Emily's gaze burning into me, but I couldn't bring myself to look up at her.
"He misses you, you know," she said quietly.
My head shot up. "Please don't say that."
Emily's eyes widened slightly and I saw a flash of guilt cross her face.
"I'm sorry," she said, "I wasn't thinking. What I wanted you to know though was that this is affecting him too. I don't want you to think that you're going through this alone. Even if you can't talk about it to him."
"Thanks," I said, giving her a small smile. "I guess it does make me feel a little better knowing that."
I kicked at the grass a little with my foot.
"I better get going." I said, gesturing towards the manor. "My shift is about to start."
"Yes, ok, I suppose you should."
I turned to walk away when I suddenly remembered something.
I put my hand into my trouser pocket and pulled out the small tiger pin I had been carrying around for the last few weeks.
"Can you give this to Casper," I said, placing it into Emily's open palm. "Maybe not before the wedding though," I added as a bit of an afterthought.
Emily turned the pin over in her hand, looking at it in detail.
"Maybe after the wedding?" she said.
"Whenever you think it's the right time." I replied. "I trust you to know when that time is."
Emily curled her hand round the pin, then closed the gap between us, throwing her arms around me.
"I wish things didn't have to be like this," she murmured into my shoulder.
I pulled her back gently and looked her in the eyes.
"Things are like this because they are for the best. You and Casper together is the best thing to happen to this pack. Please believe that Emily. And don't worry about me. Hell, when I turn 23 you're not going to see me for dust. Parties, travel, sex and booze - I can't wait!"
I was trying to put a smile on her face, and it kind of worked.
"Anyway, I really do need to get going," I said stepping away from her.
"Yes. Bye Joel," she said with a small nod of the head.
"Bye," I replied, while walking off. "And good luck."