The Assassin’s Mate

The next morning I was up and dressed for 7, before Nadia came to my room. I was excited to meet new people and finally make friends.

Nadia brought me to Alpha Crane's office and knocked on the door.

"Come in." Said a soft voice from behind the door.

Nadia opened the door and walked in with me. She showed me where to sit and told me to be quiet since the Alpha was on the phone, then she left the room.

I sat in the chair looking around the office when an older lady with grey hair came up to me and sat besides me.

"Hello Elise. My name is Margie and I am the principal of the school here."

I smiled at her and said hello.

Alpha Crane got off the phone and said "Elise, Mrs Margie will be coming with us to show you the school today. I have to leave early though for some business but she will answer all your questions."

"Yes, Alpha Crane." I said as we all stood up and walked out his office.

The walk to the school was a short one. It was behind the pack house and protected with a tall iron fence. Mrs Margie hit some buttons on a screen and the door opened.

Once we were inside we walked behind her towards the building. It was a big brick house that had two floors and lots of grass and trees around it. It was so pretty and clean.

"Elise, this is the courtyard where all the students meet every morning. We say our pledge then we howl out our anthem. Now, Alpha Crane said you had a tutor that helped you at your old pack?"

"Yes, ma'am. She was an old lady who smelled like moth balls and her textbooks were dusty." I said as in crinkled my nose and the other two laughed.

"So what have you learned so far?"

I smiled big showing off my missing two front teeth and said "I know all my ABCs and I can count to 100. I also know how to write my name and just before I left Ms Neena was teaching me how to read."

They looked at each other then back at me and said "Wow you must be a very smart little girl!"

I nodded my head and skipped ahead of them to the front door. We walked down the halls as she showed me each class.

She then explained to me that in wolf school, we go three days a week for the whole year only getting breaks for the Full Moon and Harvest Moon festivals and the other two days of the week were for training.

Each class of wolf gets a certain training, with Alpha children getting the most intense, then the future Betas getting the next best then so on and so on down to the least important wolf.

My training should have started last year but my father didn't want me getting Alpha training because I was a girl and he didn't want me to be able to defend myself if the threat came. He wanted me to die.

After we toured the school and walked around the pack house, Alpha Crane left for his meeting and Mrs Margie explained some of the rules of the pack.

"All meals for anyone under the age of 18 are to be shared here in the cafeteria. This won't be a problem for breakfast and lunch because you will already be here but for dinner you have to come here. Now Nadia will be with you at that time of the day so she should bring you here every night."

I nodded.

"You will go to school Monday's, Tuesday's and Thursday's while you train on Wednesday's and Friday's. Since you haven't started training yet, you will begin with the 5 year olds and hopefully you will catch up fast. Do you have any questions?"

"Um, not about training. I'm just not used to being around people. What if I don't make any friends?"

She knelt down and grabbed my hands. "Elise, you are a sweet wolf. You will make many friends and do great things, trust me."

She brought me back to the cafeteria for lunch then after that we went back to the pack house.

Alpha Crane was just returning home when I made it to my room. Ms Margie had given me some worksheets to do so I ran upstairs to my room excited to get them done.

When I finished my last sheet Nadia had come to get me for the tour of the whole pack house, since Alpha Crane had to leave earlier. He was supposed to show me everything when he got back but he was on an important call so Nadia came with me.

She showed me where everything was that I needed to know, like where I would report for training and what I had to wear.

After we were done, we walked back to the school to get my uniforms then to the dining hall for supper. I wasn't used to eating with people so once I got my tray I walked to a table way off in the corner where no one was sitting.

I picked at my food for a while before a brown haired boy walked up to my table and whispered "Be careful of those tator tots, that mean old lunch lady poisoned them." He said while pointing to a big lady wearing a hair net.

My eyes widened as I threw my fork on my plate and jumped up from my seat. The boy sat there laughing and hitting his knee saying "You're an easy one to scare." He held his belly and he continued to laugh.

"That was not funny. I'm gonna tell on you." I marched around the table but as soon as I got by him he reached out and grabbed my arm.

"I'm sorry. I was just kidding. I didn't mean anything by it." His eyes were big and brown and I could tell he was sorry.

I huffed and folded my arms saying "That isn't something to joke about."

He shuffled his feet on the floor as he dropped his head to the floor. "I'm really sorry. Do you forgive me?"

"If you promise to never, ever, ever do something like that again. I might think about it."

"Ok. I pinky promise." He said with his pinky out urging me to link our fingers together.

We linked fingers and shook. Then he looked at me and said "What's your name?"

"Elise. What's yours?"

"Paxton. My dad is the Beta. You must be the new kid everyone was talking about. What pack were you from? Who's your dad? Is he an Alpha or a Beta?"

I started shaking and crying at the question. I didn't ever want to remember him let along say his name. Before I knew it I was running out the door of the hall and into the woods. I ran and ran and ran until I couldn't run anymore so I laid down on the ground curling into a ball crying my eyes out.

I must have fallen asleep from all the running because when I opened my eyes the sky had gotten dark and I didn't know where I was.