A week passes, and my life becomes a strange balance between two worlds. During the day, I'm the quiet Beta's daughter who keeps her head down. At night, I'm training with Sage and the others, learning to be the warrior I was always meant to be.
Nobody seems to notice the change in me. My father barely looks at me. My brother ignores me like always. But I notice the difference. My body feels stronger. My mind feels clearer. For the first time in my life, I feel like I'm doing something that matters.
But there's something Sage isn't telling me. I can sense it. The way she's always asking questions about the pack structure. The way she seems to know things about people before anyone else does. The way she's constantly planning something that goes beyond just training.
One night, after Kira and Mira have left, I stay behind with Sage.
"Why are you really here?" I ask her directly.
Sage is quiet for a long moment. Then she sits down on a fallen log.
"My family is from a different pack," she says finally. "Northridge. My father was the Gamma there, and he was best friends with your father."
"Was?" I ask.
"Your father destroyed him," Sage says, and her voice is hard. "Accused him of theft. Accused him of betraying the Alpha. It wasn't true, but it didn't matter. Your father convinced the Alpha that it was. My father lost everything. His position, his reputation, his standing in the pack. He eventually had to leave."
I feel like the ground is shifting under me. "My father would never do something like that without a reason."
"That's exactly what I thought too," Sage says. "Until I found out the truth. Your father did it because he was jealous. My father was going to be chosen as the next Alpha instead of your brother. So your father made sure that couldn't happen."
"That's a serious accusation," I say. "You can't just—"
"I can and I have," Sage says. She stands up and walks toward me. "Your father is the reason my family was torn apart.And I came here to make sure that everyone knows the truth about him."
"How?" I ask.
"By helping his daughter become someone he can't control," Sage says. "By showing the pack that there's a better way. By building something that will make people question the power structure that keeps people like your father in charge."
I want to reject what she's telling me. I want to defend my father. But looking at Sage's face, I know she's telling me the truth. She wouldn't make something like this up.
"What do you want me to do?" I ask.
"Keep training," Sage says. "Keep getting stronger. And be ready for when I need you to stand up and show the pack what you're really capable of."
The next day at school, I start noticing things I never noticed before. The way my father holds power in the pack. The way certain families seem to benefit from decisions that are made. The way people talk about other packs and how they're treated differently.
I see it in small things. A family gets denied access to hunting grounds because someone says they're not "pack material." A student is kicked out of school because their family isn't ranked high enough. People are oppressed by a system that seems normal because it's always been that way.
And I start to see what Sage is trying to do. She's not just here to get revenge on my father. She's here to change the entire system.
That's a much bigger and scarier goal.
Kira and Mira feel it too. During training, they're more intense. More focused.
"There's something happening," Mira says one night. "Sage is planning something big, and she wants us all involved."
"Did she tell you what?" I ask.
"No," Kira says. "But I heard her talking to someone on the phone. Something about the Warrior Trials."
The Warrior Trials are held once a year. Fighters from all the local packs compete. It's a prestigious event, and only the best fighters are allowed to participate.
"I think Sage is going to enter," I say, understanding dawning on me.
"Not just her," Mira says. "All of us. She wants us all to compete."
"That's impossible," I say. "We're not registered fighters. We don't have official training."
"We do now," Kira says simply. "Sage has it all planned out."
The next night, when I get to the training grounds, Sage explains everything.
"The Warrior Trials are held at the Neutral Zone, which is controlled by the Alpha King himself," she says. "It's the only place where pack politics doesn't matter. Where a fighter is judged solely on their skill and strength."
"Okay," I say, still not seeing where this is going.
"If we win at those trials," Sage says, "if we show that girls from local packs can beat anyone else, then we prove that the system is wrong. That women deserve to be warriors and leaders, not just supporters."
"And that hurts my father how?" I ask.
"It proves that his way of thinking is wrong," Sage says. "It proves that his control over you, over all women in this pack, is based on lies."
I can see her plan now. It's brilliant and terrifying.
"What if we lose?" I ask.
"Then nothing changes," Sage says. "But we won't lose. You're already better than most of the fighters we've seen."
"I'm not better than you," I say.
"No," Sage agrees. "But together, we might just be unstoppable."
Over the next few weeks, our training becomes more intense. Sage brings in a new person, someone she's known for a while. His name is Kai, and he's from the Neutral Zone. He teaches us strategy and how to fight in different styles.
That's when I notice something strange. The way Sage looks at Kai when she thinks nobody's watching. The way her voice changes when she talks to him. The way she smiles at him differently than she smiles at anyone else.
"Are you two..." I start one night when it's just the two of us.
"We grew up together," Sage says. "Before my father was destroyed. Before my family had to leave."
"So you do have history with him," I say.
"Ancient history," Sage says. "He's part of why I'm doing all this, but it's complicated."
"How complicated?" I ask.
"He can never know that this is about revenge on my father," Sage says. "He believes in the cause. He believes that women deserve better. And I can't let him find out that I'm using his beliefs to settle a score."
I'm starting to realize that Sage might be more complicated than I initially thought. She's not just a warrior fighting for what's right. She's also someone with hurt and anger that runs deep.
One night, Kai doesn't show up to training. Instead, there's someone else. A girl who looks like she's in her early twenties. She has dark hair and sharp eyes that seem to see everything.
"This is Raven," Sage says. "She's an Elite Warrior who works directly for the Alpha King. She's going to help us prepare for the trials."
Raven walks around us, evaluating us like we're pieces on a game board.
"You're good," she says to me directly. "Better than good. You could probably be training with the official pack warriors right now."
"My father won't allow it," I say quietly.
"Of course he won't," Raven says. She looks at Sage. "You chose well. This one has the kind of power that scares people like her father."
I realize then that Raven knows exactly what Sage is doing. Exactly what this is really about.
"The Alpha King has an interest in finding warriors with untapped potential," Raven continues. "Girls who have been held back by their packs. If you win at the trials, the Alpha King will offer you a position as an Elite Warrior."
The idea of that is almost too big to comprehend. An Elite Warrior. That means power. That means respect. That means independence from my father.
"All of you have the potential," Raven says, looking at Mira and Kira too. "But only if you're willing to push yourself further than you ever have."
For the rest of that night, we train harder than we've ever trained before. By the time we're done, I'm bleeding from a cut on my arm, and my muscles are screaming. But I've never felt more alive.
As I'm leaving, Raven pulls me aside.
"Your father," she says, "he was once offered a position as an Elite Warrior. He turned it down because he wanted power in his own pack instead."
"How do you know that?" I ask.
"I told you, I work for the Alpha King," Raven says. "The Alpha King knows everything that happens in every pack. He knew your father turned down that offer. He also knew why your father destroyed the Gamma's reputation. The real story, not the story everyone believes."
"Why didn't he do anything about it?" I ask.
"Because that's not how the Alpha King works," Raven says. "He lets people reveal themselves through their choices. Your father chose power and control over honor. And now his daughter is going to prove that there's a better way."
I walk home that night feeling like the entire world has shifted again. I'm part of something bigger than I realized. Something that involves not just my father, but the entire pack hierarchy.
The next morning, I get called to my father's office again. My heart immediately goes into panic mode. Did he find out about the training? Did someone see me?
When I get there, he's looking at documents, and he seems genuinely frustrated.
"There's been a report," he says without preamble. "Someone has been training outside of official pack supervision. Illegally."
My blood runs cold.
"What does this have to do with me?" I ask, trying to keep my voice steady.
"Nothing, hopefully," he says. "But I wanted you to know that if I find out you're involved in anything like that, there will be serious consequences."
"I understand," I say.
"You're staying home tonight," he says. "I want you where I can see you."
As I'm leaving his office, I realize that someone has reported us. Someone knows what we've been doing.
That night, I sneak out anyway, but I go to meet Sage at an empty house instead of the training grounds. She's already there with Mira and Kira.
"My father knows," I tell them immediately.
"We know," Sage says calmly. "Kai told me. Someone in the pack reported us to your father."
"Do we know who?" I ask.
"Yes," Sage says. Her expression is hard. "Your brother. Marcus."