The Woods ✔

Midnight Awkwardness

Caden wrapped his arms around his bent legs and sighed contently. The strategically planted reeds swayed in the by now chilly wind and he wondered if Kaliska would get mad at him for shifting.

She was inside - he could hear her voice faintly through the cracked door - and she didn't need to know about it. He just wanted to stretch his limbs for a few minutes; that couldn't be too bad, could it? She was probably too engrossed by her sugarplum to notice anything, anyway.

Caden was about to step off the porch and shed his clothes when the sound of approaching footsteps made him freeze. Damn, could this woman read minds?

But instead of annoyance he solely felt fear when the scent of the disruptive person reached his senses. The need to whirl around and defend his little piece of freedom battled with the urge to cower and defer to the bigger predator inside of him while he stood there like a fool and the hairs on his neck prickled.

Ajax simply sat down on the garden chair after glancing at Caden for a brief second. He didn't seem to be fazed by the cougar's presence and calmly stretched out his long legs in front of him.

Caden cautiously lowered himself back onto the porch step and willed himself to keep cool. After all Ajax was right because fear triggered predators' instincts and their need to hunt down anything that had a heartbeat. He contemplated going inside but there were more lions - although they were not so fucking scary like Ajax - and the constriction of four solid walls all around him. Here on the outside the woods were in sight distance and he still believed he would be able to reach the trees before a certain alpha male took a bite out of his butt. It was a foolish assumption however he would otherwise follow the deer shifter's lead during the next ten seconds and Nicolas would have to fish him out of the pond.

He risked a glance in Ajax' direction. The lion sat there motionless and stared at the dark night sky which was indeed breathtaking with thousands of bright stars littering the black infinite space. For a moment he couldn't breath when he spotted the constellation Ursa Major that resembled - with a lot of imagination - a big bear. Michael once told him that it was so big because all of the bears on earth went there when they died. Now Caden couldn't help but wonder if Michael had joined all those other bears, too.

Hastily he looked down at his feet as soon as tears gathered in his eyes.

Taking deep breaths he concentrated on enjoying the cool night air, the way it tickled at the back of his throat and how it bit into every exposed inch of his skin. It was not cold enough to transform his warm breath in white fog yet though he nearly could feel the advancing snow already. A shiver of fearful excitement ran down his spine.

Hunting was a lot more difficult when snow erased any traces of prey but the fragile flakes that sometimes piled up so high that they swallowed up little trees, morphed everything into a completely different world. It was astonishing and frightening at the same time.

At the moment the trees struggled stubbornly to keep the wind from ripping their leaves from their twigs and the animals took advantage of every remotely warm day to stock their reserves and find a safe place to endure the cold season.

A quiet creak behind him made Caden flinch and he stared wide-eyed at Ajax. His heart raced and adrenaline shot hot and heavy through his veins.

"You're damn scared for a cat," Ajax remarked slightly annoyed and Caden huffed quietly. Everyone would be scared if an alpha male were to literally breathe down their neck.

"I'm cautious," he contradicted and Ajax raised mockingly his eyebrows but didn't say more about it.

Caden reminded himself that he had decided that Ajax could go fuck himself and he wouldn't let the other male's hostility bother him. In the end he would try to get out of this town as soon as possible without looking back once. Perhaps tomorrow he would already leave everything behind and resume his life in the woods. That sounded honestly great.

"Did you tell Kaliska to keep me from going outside?" he asked without thinking about it and hoped Ajax couldn't hear the nervousness in his voice.

Said man cocked his head to the side and stared at Caden for a long time.

"No, I don't give a fuck what you do," he answered gruffly and went back to watching the night sky.

"So you're okay with me living in the woods around here?"

"No, I'll make sure that you get your fuzzy butt out of my territory as soon as Kaliska loses interest in her new plaything."

Caden instinctively recoiled from the harsh words and bit his tongue until he tasted blood. So, he was just a plaything? A cute animal the female took pity on? Whatever he had eaten for dinner threatened to come back up.

"Make her lose interest and I'll be out of your hair," he offered seriously, facing the alpha male head-on. Those green eyes nearly made him tremble and he remembered how they had looked at him after Ajax had forced him to shift.

"As if that would be possible," the man scoffed snidely.

"Why not?" Caden dug deeper and was surprised by his own confidence. He still wanted to bolt but on the other hand he wanted to get rid of Kaliska for good.

"She's a woman," Ajax replied cryptically. Caden didn't understand how that could be considered an explanation but didn't ask further. Maybe women just were this way.

"You seem to get along quite well with this lioness," he blurted out and hoped that his red cheeks weren't visible in the dim light.

Ajax' expression darkened and he shook his head in irritation.

"My parents think she would make a good mate," he bit out with a humorless laugh and Caden lowered his eyes as to not anger the lion further. "They think I should take care of the next generation, providing the pride with their future leader."

Caden kept quiet and didn't dare to move a muscle when Ajax rose from his seat to angrily pace the length of the patio. His movements were powerful and fluid, the animal obviously at the forefront.

"What about you?" Ajax wanted to know and Caden held his breath.

"I think she's n-nice?" It sounded more like a question and he waited for Ajax to attack him.

"Nice," the man repeated slowly. "Nice will get you nowhere in life."

Caden nodded meekly and stared at his hands which trembled the slightest bit in his lap. Admittedly, as intimidating as Ajax was he was not as bad as a whole group of lions. Dinner had been a lot more nerve-wracking than their conversation now. Somehow Caden doubted that he would lash out at him just like that. Yes, Ajax was driven mostly by instincts but animals - carnivores, too - usually avoided getting into fights and risking injury.

Of course this survival instinct was totally ignored when it came to defending a potential mating partner from a rival.

He wondered just how violent someone like Ajax would become to scare off any other males. Or which male would be stupid enough to challenge him in the first place. They had to be truly suicidal.

Just like the person who accepted his courtship.