Beck

I think I'm marked for death.

I heard the warrior who spared with me had to get stitches on his head because of the injury I inadvertently caused on him. He's fuming now, itching to have his way with me.

And I don't mean that in a sexy way. Not that I want anything to do with him. Plus, he's already mated to a woman.

No, I meant in the sense that if he fights me once again, he'll be gunning to kill me. It's highly offensive for him to have lost to me, a non shifter.

When I say offensive, I mean for his pride. No one really cares about what happens during training except for other warriors and my father.

People in the reservation have more important stuff to worry about, like putting food on the table. Make sure their families are taken care of.

But for him that hurt his pride. Especially in front of the Chief. My father barely acknowledged the fact to me, only making me train harder like somehow it's gonna toughen me up.

I'm already forced to be tough, if you ask me. In fact, all I ever want is to be less tough now and enjoy my final year as a carefree teenager before senior classes start.

Unfortunately, I'm only wishful thinking. There's no enjoying any free time for me. My schedule basically consists of me waking up, having breakfast, spending all day with my father, then returning home for dinner and sleep.

I cannot believe my high school friends are having the time of their lives doing whatever while I have to learn and train.

I wish to Goddess that wasn't my reality. And now with this looming threat over my head, that's just the cherry on top of an already horrible cake.

I highly doubt he is actually going to kill me. Not that he is not able to, but I'm still the chief's only son. But accidents happen, just like the one he had yesterday.

Except mine could be deadly. And purposeful.

Anyway, it is what it is. I have to face the music and wish for the best. I can't show fear otherwise it gets worse for me. Werewolves can smell fear and like a predator, the stronger it scents on you the eager it'll be to kill you. I'm not kidding.

It's a battle like any else, even if you're outnumbered or outgunned, you still have to put up a strong front. I learned from History classes - and the occasional movie - that a soldier's moral on the battlefield is just as important in order to face the enemy.

I mean, he needs to believe he can win the fight even before he picks up the sword. Or else the battle is already lost.

My morning starts with breakfast in the kitchen where my parents seem estranged from each other. My mother is still not sleeping with my father.

She wants me to not spend all my available time by his side, but he's adamant I should learn the ropes, whether I want to or not.

In all honesty, I couldn't think of a worse job for me than to be chief of the tribe. It's not because I'm weak or soft, or can't take up arms if necessary.

I'm neither of those things and am perfectly capable of defending myself. The problem is I don't want to. This is the 21st Century.

There are even native american influencers on social media. I follow a couple of them on TikTok.

My point being there's more to life and I wanna explore it. Some things that aren't related to my origin or even to the fact that I'm a werewolf, in the broad sense of the word at least.

Our kind has greatly evolved since the times when we were compelled to shift under the full moon. Nowadays, we shift only when we want. The Moon doesn't compel our true nature, except in some extreme cases.

And the fact that I can't even shift into a wolf only makes matters worse [for me]. I feel so detached from my own species sometimes.

After we arrived at the tribal center, I helped around my father's office, typing, reading and replying emails, even organizing his schedule.

A lot of the time my father spends behind his desk, returning calls or answering his personal email. Later in the morning when he's overseeing the warriors training, that's when he comes alive.

He lives for this stuff, though I fail to see why.

"Good morning, little wolf. Did you miss me?" - The same warrior who I injured yesterday greets me as we meet up. I tried to get a different partner for today's training, but I couldn't get away from him.

He obviously arranged with the others so I wouldn't have any choice but to fight him. And I can't exactly run off to the chief saying I'm too scared to face him. That's not how this works.

No retreat. No surrender.

"Good morning. I'd really appreciate it if you stopped calling me little wolf. It's condescending." - I spoke, trying hard to mask my fear by projecting confidence.

I should say for the record that Kuckunniwi literally means 'little wolf'. I was born underweight and premature, but that's not the point here. It's the way he calls me that irks me, the patronizing tone. I absolutely hate that.

He's staring at me with this maniac smile, like he knew he was about to kill me. It's extremely off-putting and intimidating, no matter how hard I try to summon my inner strength.

"Sure, Beck. That's how you like to be called, right? I can do that." - He spoke in a mocking tone, mouth practically foaming as he geared up for a fight.

Somehow, he made me feel worse by calling me by my preferred name. Sweat trickled down my forehead on this hot summer morning. I wish I could be on a beach somewhere instead of possibly being murdered.

He came at me smart. He didn't use his full force like before because he wouldn't want to give me an opportunity to counter attack like I did last time.

In two swift moves, he had me pinning into the ground with his knee above my chest and hand around my neck.

I tried to gasp for air, but couldn't. My lungs were deprived of its fuel for a minute while he cherished overpowering a smaller, younger person as if that was supposed to mean anything.

I tapped the ground loud enough so that my father could call this off before I died. Luckily, werewolves have sensitive auditory capabilities.

The chief ordered him to stop, so he had to get off of me. Finally, I was able to breathe again. Instinctively, I took a huge breath of air, trying to get my respiration normal.

I was already turning blue before I escaped his powerful grasp, not that he minded. On the contrary, he laughed at the situation like it was funny somehow.

Some people really get off on having control over life or death. It must be a power trip for him. I'm completely at a loss as to what the hell he gets out of it. It's not like he had a grudge against me, other than for yesterday's accident.

"What is your problem? I had already tapped out. This is a training exercise, it's not a challenge or a battle. You get nothing from killing me." - I complained, baffled by him.

"Who said anything about me wanting to kill you?" - He fakes innocence, which only angered me further.

"You could've fooled me!" - I snickered, grimacing at him.

"Cheer up, Becks. If you want, I can fight you with one arm behind my back." - He offered in a condescending tone.

"I don't! I'm not asking for your pity!" - I snarled at him, fuming. If my eyes glowed like normal werewolves, they'd be glowing right about now. I'm fucking furious.

We go again, as he expertly maneuvered with his superior strength, I barely manage to escape from his strong grip. Instead, I played to his tall figure by climbing him until I managed to wrap my legs around his neck.

Quickly, he uses his hands to grab and pull me to the ground with full force. Except as he did that, I latched onto his neck with my legs and as I was about to hit the ground, I supported myself with my hands and used the weight and propulsion to toss him to the ground hard.

It all happened so fast and next thing I know, his whole body is hitting the ground heavily, making a thundering sound that alerts everyone around us.

He winced in pain from the falling, but at least he didn't hit his head like yesterday. Some of the warriors were impressed by this, which of course only angered him more.

"Nice job, son. That's what I'm talking about!' - My father complimented me on a rare occasion. And I do mean rare.

"Are you okay to continue?" - He asked the warrior, now getting up from the ground.

"Yes, chief." - He replied, dead in the eyes.

Now I can see clearly that if I get under his grip, I'm not surviving this time. I don't think he's gonna allow me to even tap on the ground. He's nearly shifting, he's so furious.

My father is not fazed by his facial expression at all. He doesn't even care that his warrior is about to kill me for daring to outmaneuver him.

I cannot believe I'm gonna die virgin and mateless. I shouldn't have waited this long. I had a romantic fantasy that my mate would rescue me from this hell hole.

Now all I have to show for is being killed by a deranged man. He should be glad I gave him a fair fight instead of a simple beat down.

But then again, this was never a fair fight.

As I imagined, he came at me with vengeance in his eyes. As soon as he could, he gripped my throat as tightly as he could.

I squirmed under him, desperately.

Tried as I may, I couldn't get him off of me. He was too strong for me to disarm, too ferocious for me to manage to take his hand off of me.

Feeling my life flashing before my eyes, I did the only thing I could think of. My arms weren't strong enough to push him off of me.

He was kneeling down next to my body, his hand on my neck and a sadistic smile on his lips. I swung my thin, limber body and crossed my legs around his neck, pulling him down with my core strength.

Immediately, he lets go of my neck to get my legs off of his neck except now I'm the one on top of him. Barely having any time to breathe, I clawed his hands off my leg and leaned in with my whole body to pin his arms to the ground.

Now I'm basically sitting on top of his throat, with my hands keeping him from fighting back. This is the angriest either of us have ever been at each other, but I'm done now.

I refuse to live in fear. He squirms and swings his body, trying to get me off of him but he is much heavier than me. He can't pull off getting his legs to my neck like I did.

He persisted in trying to get me off, shaking his body as I dug my nails into his arms in the tightest of grips.

I will not let him bully me. This is not gonna be my narrative. And my core weight causes his circulation to stop as I clung onto his neck.

I'm so mad. I could see he was running out of time without air, but it took my father tapping me out for me to get off of him.

Only then, he took a massive inhale, gasping for air as if he was submerged in water for too long.

Watching this scene play out, my father proudly smirks:

"So you do have the killer instinct after all." - He looks at me proudly, not that this brings me any joy whatsoever.

"It was either that or be killed, not that you care." - I grunted, seriously annoyed at him. He was unfazed by my rhetoric, not that it surprised me.

After that, it was time for lunch. But I think I got the point across with the warrior. Maybe now he can respect me and stop calling me little wolf. Under these circumstances, it's demeaning.

In the next morning, the warrior was no longer anticipating revenge against me. In fact, I was surprised to be paired with another person.

So either he's scared of me or he learned that he shouldn't underestimate his opponent, even a smaller one such as myself.

This is not gonna be the end of me. I'll make my own fortune one way or another. No one will stand in my way.

However, as luck would have it, my new sparring partner is even fiercer than the last one. Except he actually fights to train, not to take pleasure in overpowering the chief's son.

He was actually nice to me, giving me tips on where I could improve my skills. It was kind of a pleasant surprise and a good change of pace for me.

At least now I don't have to worry if I'm gonna survive practice. Or so I hope.

In the days that followed, my parents' relationship did not improve. My mother begged my father to release me from training.

She knows I hate this, but my father argued that I was getting much better. He said I was turning into a fearsome warrior. He just didn't care that I didn't want to fight.

He said that our family needed to project strength to the tribe, to what my mother told him: strength is more than simple brute force. There are several ways to be helpful to the tribe, not just taking up arms for a war that might never come.

My father scoffed. Somehow he thinks we're gonna get raided at any moment by a rival pack - not that we have any rivals, as far I know.

This constant struggle inside my home was bad enough when it was just me and him. Now that my mother has intervened, it made everything that much worse.

I don't mean that in the sense that I blame her, of course I don't. On the contrary, if it wasn't up to her, Goddess only knows what my father would've put me through already.

Ironically, he's making me miss school. The summer I had envisioned for myself is far from coming to pass. I'm busier now than I was when I had classes all day.

With this constant struggle and that much pressure, it's getting harder and harder to breathe.

A|N: I have long thought of including this song in one of my books, but it never came together until now.

It's also my first Maroon Five song ever. I love how it can relate to his struggles both physically and emotionally. It literally got difficult to breathe at one point or another...

Love,

Léo.