Alpha Aiden's Protection Program

Chapter 12: Little Piggy

As the next few days went by, I began training. The training regiment that was the building blocks for this pack's infamous reputation for being cruel and dangerous was rough, tough and almost blood inducing.

It was the most disciplined system of training that I've experienced. The Blood Moon pack back home trained us well and I knew my way around rogues. But the Oaks Pack trained us for something much worst.

Since the vamps were almost faster and stronger than werewolves, we couldn't simply train as if it was another wolf that would end up at the ends of our canines. First, I had to learn to narrow my target because the vampire's had a smaller shape than a full grown wolf, which made it harder to capture them.

Next, Gamma Dylan had me running patrol during the day. It kept me moving, increasing my agility, speed and reflexes as I trudged through the unfamiliar terrain. It also helped me to adjust to the scents of the ocean's salt water and other unfamiliar scents that may hinder my senses from detecting the scent of rotting flesh, the sign of a vampire nearby.

As my sped and senses picked up, Kai helped me master the art of 'staking'. Fighting in wolf form was easy. Natural. It was a part of us. But fighting in human form was rougher than I expected and Kai wasn't an easy soldier to defeat. My hand-eye coordination had me in shambles when I was first given a wooden stake. It had felt like I was back in a classroom, fiddling with my pens between my fingers as if it was a mini bo staff. Except now, it was real life and I had to master handling the weapon if I wanted a chance at fighting.

A chance at protecting a withering  species that meant more to my mate than anything else in his life.

That's why I kept practising with the piece of wood on and off the training grounds.

Beside the physical, I also began learning as much about the vampires as possible. Every detail about their existance, strengths and weaknesses.

Aiden and I were still in the 'friends' territory, but he was warming up to me...well at least I hope he was. Between him having his duties, me training and both of us spending time with Tourmaline, it was hard to deepen a relationship that had been labelled to be surface level from the start.

His inner book nerd, though, was something I didn't see coming. He spent his spear time in the library. At first I thought it was because I was there reading up on vampire and mermaid history but according to Calypso, my mate was an avid reader. Although, the only books he's been reading were to find answers that would suggest the mermaid blood will not help vampires walk in the daylight.

Sort of wishful thinking, but it was the only way to get the vamps to stop. He had to try, even if it meant reading hundreds of ancient texts, some being written in Greek.

And the answer is yes, Aiden learnt Greek in order to translate the text.

It wasn't just all old text filled with the works of supernatural beings that he read...oh no. I caught him reading poetry in between pouring over the archaic texts.

I'm talking Emily Dickinson, Oscar Wilde, Sappho and T.S. Eliot.

The ocean eyed man with locks of blonde hair surprised me every day. If only I didn't have to learn about him from the sidelines. Surfer by morning, Alpha and Uncle by day and secret poetry reader by night.

On the days that he was free, Aiden did show me around his pack. He took me to the controls room where the screens that monitored the water played live footage. Then we went down to the marsh where the vamps usually came through since it was harder to detect them through the swampy water.

It was no romantic picnic, but it was something. I got a first-hand witness to the proud spark in Aiden's eyes and the comfortable steps he took through the terrain of his land. This was home for him.