An Alpha's Charge
Chapter 4

Forest Fires

The cubs are now six years old, and there have not been any attacks on their pack. Everyone was at peace; all the pups and cubs were in school, learning self-defense and training. Most of the bear cubs turned when they were three or four years old; some will turn later. Lane and Steven turned only once, at the age of four, so their bears could scent their parents and vice versa. Lily and Everest had mighty alpha pups and would be special alphas one day.

“MOOMMM, Steven won’t leave me alone!” six-year-old Lane yells.

“Steven, what are you doing to your sister?” Mom asks.

“Just playing with her, OK, roughhousing with her.”

“No ruff housing inside the house; move it outside, OK, you two?”

“We are the same age, and this will help with her fighting in the future.”

“I agree, and that is why you both are training to fight and defend yourselves and each other. For now, take it outside, not inside.”

“Fine, mom.” They both said in unison.

They took their ruff house and played outside when they saw something resembling a mixture of black and white smoke several miles away. They could smell smoke, and the wind did not help to blow toward them. They quickly ran inside, changed clothes, and returned to the living room. Their mother wondered why they came back inside to change clothes and ran outside. She followed them and was shocked at what she saw and smelt. She mind-linked Everest to what she was seeing.

“We are going back outside to replace the fire just over the ridge. We must help see if humans are hurt and make a line so the fire does not pass over it. We must protect our pack and the little ones younger than us. We must go, Mom; we must replace Daddy.” Steven said

“Oh no, you will not go to fight fires; you better get your bottoms back in here right now! I already contacted your father to see where he is and assess the situation; stay put till I get back.”

They listened to their mother and waited till she mind-linked Everest as she watched the smoke bellowing in the distance with the kids watching along with her. They were getting scared that the fire was getting too close to their territory. They had a bad feeling that they would be homeless and rogue bears and did not want that to happen to them or their pack. Lily kept rubbing both of their heads while speaking to their father. He was on his way home barking orders to those around the territory, telling the women who were pregnant or had little ones to seek shelter, preferably far away from there.

He burst through the doors, huffing, looking frantically to replace his wife and kids. Neither knew that Lily was pregnant again nor was she not far along where her scent had changed. He grabbed his kids, pulled her outside, and went to the sea. Igloos are built on lakes and some stable icebergs. Lane and Steven knew what would happen, and they started crying, not wanting to let their parents go. The fire was coming faster than they cared for, and their mother broke off a large chunk of ice and moved them a little further out where they would be safe.

“I am trying to protect you two; we will return for you shortly. Always remember that we love you very much and want nothing more than for you two to stay together,” Lily told them, crying, placing them in an igloo with blankets and pillows.

She took off and heard them crying and screaming for their parents to return. Everyone knew they would be separated for life, and their parents would not come back from the fire this time; it was too big and coming too fast to put out, but they all worked hard to try and put it out.

The cubs could hear the screams of the families as the fire swept through their territory and engulfed their homes in flames. They just prayed that there would be survivors and their friends would survive. But they would never know who lived and who died that dreadful day. They knew their parents had fallen to the flames of death as they never returned to retrieve them.

They stayed in their igloo and did not move from there; they were too scared to look outside. Lane and Steven could feel the igloo drifting, which scared them. They bumped into something and floated away, only to bump into it again. Steven told Lane to hang on and that he would check it out. As he popped out of the opening, he saw people in a large fishing boat.

One of the anglers saw the child and started to scream at his boatmates. Three got out of a rescue boat and headed towards the igloo. They had blankets for the children, and the ship captain had called the coast guard to meet them at a designated spot so they could take the children.

The men grabbed the siblings, pulled them into the boat, and wrapped them in blankets. ‘Lane does not tell them we are werebears; it will be death to us.’ Steven’s mind is linked to his sister. She looked at him and gave a slight nod.

The men in the boat met up with the Coast Guard boat and took the children. They had asked where they were from and when the last time they ate was, and they told him it was a couple of days. They fed them some soup to warm them up, and the chef made them sandwiches to go with the soup.

When they arrived on shore, the police were there with social services, and the children were taken away. The people from social services took them to a human orphanage, where they lived for a couple of years until a couple came to adopt a child.

The couple that came to adopt a child wanted a son, and the boy they wanted was Steven and not his sister. The people were doing their best to ensure that both siblings stayed together and demanded they be adopted. The couple refused to adopt the girl as they did not want her, just her brother. The siblings hung onto each other, knowing their fate was sealed and nobody would help or keep them together.

They always thought their parents were alive and demanded not to be adopted because they were waiting for them. The current caretakers tried everything they could, but according to the judge, the people could take whomever they wanted, and the orphanage nor the siblings could say otherwise. Steven vowed to Lane that he would come and replace her and not lose hope or faith. They would be together again one day soon.

That one day, she soon turned into a nightmare of years of being in and out of foster homes for Lane. She was always getting into trouble, nothing too major but enough to keep placing her elsewhere. When she turned sixteen, she was with an abusive foster family, but not that mattered because Lane was abused constantly in every home she lived in.

She was verbally and mentally abused, but nothing like this; she was physically, emotionally, and mentally abused. Lane was nearly raped, but a step-sibling stepped in and threw the man off her. He told her to leave so she would be safe. She called her case worker, pleading that she be taken out of the house she is currently living in.

She advised her case worker that she was being abused and had several broken bones and a couple of broken ribs, and the list went on, adding the attempted rape by her foster father. Her case worker was not in her court and made her stay where she was.

When Lane was at the hospital, she did not receive much hope as the doctors and nurses believed her foster parents when they told her she had some bone disease and was constantly breaking bones. She knew the truth, and so did her foster brother and sister; he was the one who kept her from being raped. They were also stuck and had the same case worker as Lane. Without delay, she would run away and get a job to work her way down the coast or in the Midwest.

Right then, Lane decided she would run away, Lane was in Seattle, Washington attending high school, but when she was not in so much pain, she would run away somewhere nobody could replace her. She had a job and was saving money in her mother’s name so that nobody could take it away from her.

She had to sneak away to work and be back by a particular time at night so that neither of her foster parents would notice her being gone. She worked at a local high-end restaurant, The Rogue Bear, and made good money. It was high-end, the tips were never less than a hundred dollars a table, and she pocketed every dime. Some men wanted her for their pleasure, but she would turn them down since she was still a minor.

After she had healed and could move a little faster, she packed her bag with her books and left for work. She did not care what happened this afternoon and was checking out for good. She had made sure she closed her savings account, obtained her school records, and bought a train ticket to leave at midnight after she got off work.

While at work that night, a few customers heard she would be leaving Seattle and bought a plane ticket to San Antonio, Texas, where she would finish high school. Someone had purchased the train ticket she had purchased for twice the amount she paid, and they would use the train ticket to check on her later to make sure she was doing well for herself.

The restaurant’s patrons, including the owners and workers, pulled their money together and gave her some cash so she would only go with cash. They all knew of her circumstances with her foster parents, and they were all too willing to help her escape. One even gave her new identification cards so she could have a different birth date for an apartment, buy a car, and other things that a sixteen-year-old would need. She also would need a job and finish high school, which she would deal with when she got to Texas.