The Alpha’s Call

*Ember* I steered my car through the winding roads leading back to Plains, Montana. Leaving the urban chaos of California behind and heading back to my birthplace after all these years felt like stepping into the pages of a long-forgotten chapter of my life. The sunset’s golden hues painted the prairie in a warm glow, casting long shadows across the undulating hills. The Big Sky stretched like an endless canvas, and I couldn’t help but feel a connection to this land—a connection I hadn’t known I missed until now. It was spiritual and strange but familiar, nonetheless. It had been well over ten years since I’d been back here; mom moved us to California when I was just a baby, and we’d only ever visited Grandma Iris during Christmas. The last Christmas I spent in Montana ten years ago was the last Christmas I would ever spend with my mother again. She passed away two months later. . . . It was a rainy Sunday evening in February when we were driving back home from our weekend trip to the lake. We spent one weekend at the lake every month, and it was our thing. Mom was Driving cautiously because the narrow roads coming back from the lake were slippery, and she wanted to be careful. I’ll never forget the pitter-patter of the hard raindrops on the windshield as she navigated through the dark and heavy rainfall. She looked up at me, her Light brown face pale with worry. “What’s wrong, Mom?” I remember asking her. “The brakes aren’t working.” She whispered. I was only thirteen, and I didn’t truly understand the magnitude of what she was saying. Still, I remember the car swerving and mom gripping the steering wheel, trying to avoid oncoming traffic. As we weaved in and out of traffic, I grabbed the center console; fear overcame me. “Mom, what are we going to do?” I asked her, tears spilling from my eyes. “There isn’t anything I can do, Ember; we will crash.” She didn’t yell or cry. She spoke calmly. “Mom, I’m scared!” I shouted. She looked at me regretfully and then turned the steering wheel with all her might to the left. The car went flying off the road and down the rocky mountainside. My head slammed against the passenger side window, and darkness overcame me immediately. I don’t know how long I was unconscious, but when I came to, all of the chaos of time was frozen. I was still in my seatbelt, only the seat wasn’t in the car. I fiddle with the seat belt until I hear it unclick, and then I try to get up, my body aching with every movement. I scan the area. The rain had stopped, and clearly, the car had been totaled when it crumbled down the mountainside. Thick black smoke rose from the rubble of the car wreck a few feet away, and I stumbled to my feet, desperately trying to locate my mom. “M..Mom? Where are you?” I shouted. I try to take a step, but I crumble to the ground in agony. I look down, realizing that shards of thick metal protrude from my leg. “Ember?” my mom yells in a hoarse voice. “Ember, I’m over here, pinned under the car!” she shouts. I crawl in the direction of her voice, the direction the smoke and rubble is. And sure enough, what remained of the car was on top of my mom, and her mid and lower body was pinned underneath it against the ground. Hot tears spill from my eyes as I get closer to my mom. “Mom! The car is smoking; we have to get you out of here; we have to try to move this off of you now.” I say, panicking. “No, Ember, I cannot move from this spot. My body is severed internally; I cannot feel anything below my stomach. I am bleeding internally, and I am going to die.” She says with fear in her eyes. “no, mom! You can’t die; you can’t leave me here! You can’t leave me here alone!” I plead with her. She smiles sadly. “You’ve got to be strong now, my girl. I know you are strong because you have my blood in your veins. You are a Cabot and an O’Shire like me, which means you are powerful. So I need you to run, my child, run as fast and as far as you can to get help for yourself.” . . . Another hour passes before I reach the solitary dirt road, which leads into the forest’s depths and eventually to my grandmother’s home. By this time, it is already dark out, and the forest has come to life with eerily creepy sounds. Shuffling, howling, and loud thumping noises can be heard from outside my car, and I take a deep breath to prevent myself from flooring the gas. The dirt road is too narrow for me to be speeding through, so I take another breath to calm myself and continue navigating the forest. The deeper I get, the louder the noises become, and it’s almost as if a pack of wild dogs are following me, hunting me down. A soft light glows in the distance and catches my eye, and I see my grandmother’s house just ahead. But before I could even reach her property line, a large black wolf leaped from the brush and stood in front of my car, causing me to slam on the brakes. My heart races as I stare into the giant beast’s emerald orbs. He’s a few feet away from the car, but that does nothing to dispel the fact that this wolf is supernaturally large. It begins to stalk over to me, a look of wonder in its eyes, and instinctively, I put the car in reverse and back up slowly. But this does nothing to deter the wolf from following me. His eyes lock onto me like a predator’s on its prey. I almost shut my eyes in fear, but the loud blow of a gunshot forces my eyes open. In nearly an instant, the wolf takes off through the trees and is gone almost as fast as it came. A chilling howl reverberates through the forest, followed by dozens of thunderous footsteps. A soft knock at my window startled me, and I looked up to find my grandmother standing there with a shotgun and a severe look on her face. I roll the window down. “Nana, What are you doing out here? Where did that big-ass wolf come from? And why the hell do you have a shotgun?” I ramble. “Watch your language, child. I’ll explain everything once we are inside the house.” She says and then gets into the back seat of the car. I waste no time driving through the remainder of the trees and straight to Nana’s house. “Let me help you with your bags, dear.” Nana offers. “No, Nana, you go inside and rest. I don’t want you getting hurt.” I tell her. She looks at me quizzically, a devious smirk spreading on her face. “I may be old, but I still feel as young as ever.” She jokes. I smirk; my Nana always had a sense of humor. She helps me take my two suitcases and duffle bags out of the trunk of my car and carry them inside the house. I leave the few boxes that are in there for later. Upon walking inside, I’m immediately nostalgic. Memories of Christmases with my mom and Grandma come flooding back. We were by the wood-burning fireplace with our Christmas stockings hanging up, the fire crackling as we drank hot cocoa, opening presents around our Christmas tree, and the smell of pinecones circulating through the house from our tree. I fall asleep on the dark green sofa that, surprisingly, Nana still has sitting in her living room and watching the white blanket of snow grow higher and higher across the span of Nana’s yard. I fight back tears as a lump forms in my throat. If there was nowhere else I considered home, then this was the closest place I had to a home—where the only family I had came together and made the most beautiful of memories. Nana eyes me, her chocolate brown eyes only filled with kindness and empathy. She pulls me into a warm hug, and suddenly, I feel the hot tears streaming down my face. I had buried my feelings of grief as a child and young adult and threw myself into my education. But the sudden realization that the place where my mother grew up, where we spent time together as a family with my grandmother, would never feel the same again because she was not coming back. It was just Nana and I. I didn’t know my father and my grandfather, Nana’s Husband, had died before I was born. “It’s okay to feel sad, dear child. But you are home now, and everything will be okay as long as we have each other,” she says, patting me on the back. I smile at her and nod. “Come now, it’s late, and you must be starving!” She says, changing the subject and leading me to the kitchen. It still looked the same as I can remember: brown cabinets, her oval-shaped table with four wooden chairs around it, and her white refrigerator with photos clinging to it. Nana goes to the stove and starts rummaging through the simmering pots. But the images on the fridge caught my eye. There are pictures of me at my boarding school graduation, my birthdays back at my mom’s house in California, some photos from our Christmases, and pictures of my mom as a young girl and teenager. One image in particular catches my eye. Its mom. She couldn’t be older than I am right now. She’s sitting on the hood of an old Chevy in Nana’s yard; the summer sun has her freckles standing out, and her reddish brown curls are tousled wildly, similar to mine in the mornings. She’s wearing a white tee with denim overalls. There is a Blonde-haired, tall, and muscular guy with no shirt on standing next to her with his arm around her shoulder; they seem to be laughing at someone off-camera. Could this be my father? My mind starts to wonder if Nana knows anything about my father. I turn to look at her at the stove, but she’s already staring at me with a look of indifference on her face. “Nana, is this..” “Your father,” she whispers, cutting me off before I ask the question. “So you knew him?” she nods, setting two bowls of her chili with cornbread down on the table. I slide the photo from under the magnet and bring it to the table. The delectable aroma from the bowl causes my stomach to rumble loudly, earning me a chuckle from Nana. “Eat, child, before you keel over.” She jokes. I won’t waste another second before I dig in, the flavors dancing on my taste buds. “I knew you’d like it. It was your favorite when you were a girl.” She smiles. “It’s good to have you home finally. I wanted you to live with me after Amaya’s death. Still, your mother had strict orders in her will to send you to the boarding school that she had already paid in full for. Then, upon your eighteenth birthday, you were to receive your trust fund, which included a full ride to any school of your choice. If it were up to me, you would have been here with me full time instead of up at that school for girls. I never wanted you to be alone.” She whispers. I reach over and place my hand on top of hers. “It’s okay, Nan, I wasn’t alone. You were there for me through every milestone. Lord knows I couldn’t have survived if it wasn’t for you.” I reassure her. She smiles. “Your dad was someone who I thought was a nice boy. He said he was from England and that his father was a diplomat. He was visiting his aunt and uncle in Plains that summer and he and Amaya grew incredibly close. He was working here on the ranch, helping with the horses and stables.” she tells me. “Your Mother was only twenty-one. She found out she was pregnant with you at the end of that summer. She and your father had a falling out. From what I could tell, he didn’t want her to keep the child because his parents had arranged a marriage for him back in England. As his father was a notable diplomat, I don’t think it would’ve worked out between them. Your mom was an average country girl, riding horses and wrangling cattle; she loved being down in the dirt and mud. I think he loved that about her, but his fear or disapproval from his parents ultimately led him to return home to England that fall. I’m unsure if your mother had any contact with him after that. She stayed with me throughout the pregnancy and your first year, but one day, when I returned from town, she packed up a few bags for you both and told me she was moving away. I begged her to stay. Plains would’ve been a wonderful place for you to grow up, with the mountains and forest, the wide open land and horses! But she had her mind made up. I guess the memories of your father here in Plains were too much for her, and she needed a fresh start. So she took you and left. Soon after, those retched wild animals moved into the surrounding forests. I hear their god-awful howling every night. They never get close to the property lines, not until tonight, that is.” her face screws up as she looks like she’s in deep thought. “Nana, that wolf was huge earlier. It was almost unnatural how huge it was. And you scared it off with your shotgun. What if it would’ve attacked you or worse!” I say to her. “Don’t scold me, child! I’ve been alive long enough to know that a single gunshot from this shotgun could have put that god-awful creature down. This was my husband’s gun. She says, lifting the shotgun she had earlier. It had silver hollow shells that he made himself. He assured me it could kill any beast that dared invade my yard.” she says, smiling. “Who was my grandpa?” I ask, curiosity peaked. “That’s a story for another time,” she says, dismissing the conversation. “But Nana, where did the wolves come from?” “Nobody in town knows; most people have only ever heard them running or howling. I have physically seen them on more than one occasion, but I have to tell you, Em, this was my first time seeing one up close. I worry they are trying to find a way into the stables. I don’t want you going out late at night alone; it’s dangerous, and you don’t know your way around the forests yet. Stay within the property line if you go out.” I give her the ’im grown’ face, but she shakes her head. “Please, Ember, for your safety.” she pleads. “Fine!” I Huff. “Why don’t you take your things up to your room? You must be exhausted from the drive,” she says. “Yeah, I think I will.” I place the photo of my parents back on the fridge, but Nana stops me. “Take it with you. I’m sure it’ll do you more good than it has me.” she smiles. I hug her and then go upstairs with some of my things. Nana’s house is vast. The long hall has several bedrooms and bathrooms as well as closets. Some of the rooms are just empty or storage rooms, but I distinctly remember the room at the end of the hall being the one I always slept in with my mother. I open the door, and the room looks almost the same as I remember. Only my toddler bed is gone, leaving the white queen-sized bed in the center of the room. Old books sit on the dresser, and some dolls lie on the nightstand. The bed is made neatly with fresh white and purple sheets, and a black book with a lock on it lies flat on the bed. A little note is attached to it that reads. “This belonged to your mom. I never could figure out how to open it; maybe you can.” love Nana. I run my fingers over the wrinkled leather journal. How long had Nan had this? I wondered. I’d have to figure it out tomorrow because all I could think about was sleep. I kick off my muddy boots and change out of my denim shorts and blouse into an oversized t-shirt. As soon as I lay down, I drift off to sleep. The exhaustion of moving and wild beasts was overtaking me.