Somehow the blonde child who's name is apparently Zachariah (Zach for short) got to sit up front. I was fine with it, I mean I wanted to sit with Arlis, but it was... not something I was used too.

Zach looked fifteen, younger than Sam but definitely old enough to know what was going on around here. He had soft blue eyes and blonde hair. Quite the opposite of Everly and Constance.

My heart still hurt from my visit with my family, but I knew Chance would take care of them while I was gone. I could trust him. And for some reason Zach reminded me a little bit of my own brother.

"I know you told that guy a different story," Arlis said, looking to me. He didn't seem mad, or perplexed, or even surprised. He seemed more... hateful towards Chance. The way he spat out "that guy" when he spoke.

I rolled my eyes at his overprotectiveness. "'That guy' is Chance, and he knew I was lying." I shot him a small smile. "He would've told our parents something was wrong if I hadn't of reassured him."

Arlis deflated, looking slightly embarrassed. "There isn't a boyfriend I should know about... right?" He asked.

I almost choked on my own spit. He thought Chance was my boyfriend? I burst out laughing, startling everyone. "Uh, no."

I rolled down the window and let air rush through the nice car, whipping my hair around wildly.

"Relationships are gross," Zachariah said, chuckling.

I couldn't help but smile, looking at Zachariah with a newfound respect. "That's very true."

Arlis snapped his head to me. "Excuse me?" He asked, but he was just playing with me. He poked at my side and I squirmed away, giggling.

"So immature for someone who's 295." Connie grumbled, driving faster than she should be.

I widened my eyes at Arlis. "Two hundred... and ninety five?"

He nodded. "I'm actually really young compared to most."

I'm a toddler in this world. I'm a baby. A newborn.

"See, I knew I was a hell of a lot older than you." Connie laughed. "Wait! So when we fought back in 1837 you were only a hundred and fifteen? No wonder you couldn't fight even though your life depended on it."

Arlis ignored her comment and instead looked to Zach. "So, Zach. First time hanging with a were?"

Zach shook his head. "I've met you before, Alpha Arlis."

Connie glared at Zach, suddenly very intrigued in the conversation happening in the car. "You don't call him Alpha." She glanced at Arlis through the mirror, and then turned back to Zach. "You know that Zach. You weren't raised to respect them."

Zach turned to Constance and did something I would never do, something that made me think he was bolder than I ever could be. He flipped her off, shooting her the bird with his middle finger.

She gasped and pulled the car over, stopping on the dirt road near the tree line. She got out and walked over to Zach's side, pulling the door open and all but throwing him out of the passenger's seat.

I tried to get out to help Zach but Arlis stopped me, wrapping a strong hand around my wrist. "He can hold his ground. Plus this is a Dawn thing."

"He's like fifteen!" I exclaimed, gesturing to Zach. "She's gunna kill him."

"Twelve. And no she won't. She's probably done worse to the rest of her family." He says, defending her. "Trust me. It's a Dawn thing."

I scoffed, getting out of the car anyways. But when I reached them I realized there was nothing I could really do.

Zach dodged a couple hits, but she was obviously more experienced than him. She whacked him in the face, and he fell onto his back.

"They are not your kind!" She yelled. "They are Werewolves, mutts, mongrels. He is not your Alpha, or your superior. Do you understand!?" She screamed at him, practically daring him to say something she didn't want to hear.

Zach was crying, blue pools of hurt streaming down his face. But he had more strength than I interpreted. He flipped up and ran at her, trying to hit her, trying to do anything. But she just pushed him down again.

"I'm not fighting a twelve year old." Constance rolled her eyes, bored. "Especially not a weak one."

Zach smirked, still crying, and shut his eyes. I had never seen anyone look so proud and so sad at the same time. "You're right. There's no fight if the weak fight the weak."

She tilted her head at him. "I'm not weak. I'm stronger than you know little boy." She hissed, angry that he called her weak.

He shrugged. "Not what it seems like when Becker is around. Not what it seems like when he talks about how some Hunteds almost killed you."

She took a step towards him, arms crossed over her chest defensively. "That was years ago! Your father was still young."

Zachariah took a step forward against her, and now there was only feet separating them. "Your dad holds you up more than your own two legs!" He yelled and took a shot at her stomach, aiming and hitting just right. "You're only cocky because the rest of the family fights your battles for you!" He kicked the back of her legs and she fell forward. "Remember all the battles Arlis saved you from? All the times your head was on the line and Becker saved you? All the—"

"Shut up!" She screamed and Zachariah smiled with an evil glint.

"Fine. But know that you're not my superior. Know that I wasn't raised to respect you either." He walked back to the car, limping from his falls. He sat in the front seat and buckled up.

I trailed my eyes to Arlis. "What the—"

"Keep watching." He chuckled to himself.

Constance came up to his window and held out her fist. Zachariah smiled and bumped it with his.

"Good job lil cuz." She walked around to the driver's seat.

Arlis laughed at my shocked expression and walked me back to the car.

When we were finally seated the car ride began once more, this time lighter in conversation.

"Wait wait wait... so if you were born in 1682 then you were alive when the Boston Tea Party happened." I said smiling. "Were you there!?"

She raised one eyebrow. "In 1773? Hell no. I was in Ireland hanging with this hunter Feli—" she choked up on his name. She cleared her throat and in a normal manner she said, "Felix."

Oh. The Hunter that died. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—"

She waved me off. "No, no it's fine. Felix was just another Hunter."

I knew she was being undramatic about the whole situation, but I didn't press her any further.

"So if you were born in 1722, and Montana came much later... where were you before then?" I asked Arlis.

Arlis gave me a proud expression. "My girl knows her history. Well, my grandfather was on a boat to America with the people who founded Jamestown back in 1607 with his mate. People started getting diseases and his secret of being a werewolf was getting harder and harder to control so he left with my grandmother, found Montana and just stayed here. My family has been here since 1607."

I shook my head in disbelief, realizing that while he was young compared to others, he was really old in general.

"Your grandad found Montana." I said in a whimsical way, in love with the amount of history he'd be able to tell me.

He, however, seemed upset with my statement. "No. The Indians were here long before us. Montana was inhabited. But unlike the humans," he snarled out, "we peacefully took a plot of land and grew. I was born a hundred years later, granted, but even I know that this land was once not full of buildings and highways but trees and trails."

Humans really did destroy the world. "On behalf of all the humans, I'm sorry."

He shrugged, sighing, and signaling he was fine with the conversation with the change of topic. "Speaking of Species, I wanted to tell you some things before..." He pointed to my side, the side I hadn't thought about.

I was expecting pain and sickness, death if we were being honest. But it seemed like my entire side was numb, coldly numb.

"Like?" I asked.

"It's not all sunshine and rainbows." He said, shaking his head.

I figured it wouldn't be. Although, from the movies' perspective, being a werewolf seems like it would be awesome.

"You gotta be more specific." I laughed nervously, and in response Constance snorted.

He purses his lips and widened his eyes like he was about to break something he's on me. "Well... it's stressful."

I rolled my hand after he was silent for a couple moments. "Even more specific than that."

"He's saying that it fucking sucks. And that the only good point to being a Supernatural is that you're powerful." Constance answered for him. "Listen, Kate, it's a hard life being a Supernatural. Sometimes you kill people, and it hurts. Sometimes, you watch people get killed, and it hurts."

Arlis faced her, glaring. "Yes. Thank you for that Constance." He's all sarcasm with that. He rolls his head back to me and gives me a small smile. "Those are some downsides but those aren't the ones I was talking about."

Great. So there's more downsides besides death? What could possibly be worse than murder and death?

"They say being a werewolf is the most painful of all supernaturals. At least in the beginning. Shifting for the first time is painful, so painful it kills some people, rarely but it does. Plus, we feel deeper. We have heightened strength and sight, hearing too. But we also feel heightened sadness, heightened anger." He looks down. "It's a lot crappier than I'm making it sound.

"Heightened happiness? Heightened love?" I suggested, and Zachariah looked back, twisting in his seat.

"I like her," Zach said, "she's positive."

"That'll go away really fast." Constance mumbled.

Arlis shut his eyes to control his patience, I could only imagine how much he hated Constance.

"Werewolves also can't touch silver, that's a thing. Like at all. Not even silver forks. We also can't touch Lotus Flowers, so mark that off any wedding planning. Also, no matter what you do, on a full moon you'll turn into a werewolf." Arlis notices that none of the cons seem to be affecting me and tilts his head. "We eat raw meat. I've ate an entire horse by myself. I tried eating a piece of broccoli once and threw it up."

I had to control my urge to puke, to not roll down the window and throw up the snickers bar I had yesterday.

When was the last time I slept? My long nap from the attack? "What time is it?" I ask.

"Around eleven thirty, why?" Constance asked.

"I just realized it's been a while since I slept. Kinda trashy. I like sleep." I said.

"Well... you slept for like thirteen hours. On top of that, we had our nap in the office." Arlis winks at me.

Huh. Forgot about that little nap. The best nap of my life and I hardly remember it. What a shame.

"So besides raw meat, which has to be the worst downside by the way, what else is there?" I asked, hoping that there were no more downsides.

"The penalty of breaking the Hunter's law is death." He looked to Constance who... looked guilty? "But under circumstances you can convince the Hunter's to let you live."

Something about that seemed all to familiar. "What are the laws?" I felt like I needed to know this, I mean it was life or death around here.

"Only four laws you have to follow." Constance parked in front of a large house I had never seen, regret covering her features like swirls of shadows and darkness. "Never reveal your true identity to a human unless you plan on killing them or changing them." She looked at Zach. "You wanted to tag along on a Hunt didn't you?"

Zach nodded wildly, looking happier than a child on Christmas. "I can watch!?" He asked excitedly.

Constance smiled at him, ruffling his hair. "You are twelve now, and you made me fall. Yeah."

She looked back to me. "Rule two, never join a school of any sort, unless it is done through the Head Hunter's permission, if over 20."

Well... that's definitely a downside.

She opened her door and got out, unsheathing a blade that had been safely tucked away in the waist of her black jeans, under a dark colored navy shirt.

"Stay in the car." She ordered as a twisting feeling sunk in my stomach. She slammed her door shut and Zachariah followed her, locking the car behind him.

Arlis didn't move, didn't speak, but something about him seemed more powerful at the moment. Something was waving off of him, like power or energy.

It drew me too him at the same time as it pushed me away.

- Stop here and look for the other bolded sentence if you don't wish to read violence-

"What is she doing?" I asked worriedly.

She walked up to the wooden door leading into the house and kicked it in, the loud bang of the door falling could be heard from even inside the car.

"Arlis!" I shouted. "What is she doing!?" I demanded, but also begged for him to tell me.

"I'm sorry." He breathed out. "I want your decision to be final. After everything."

"What's that supposed to mean?" My stomach twisted deeper, ripping and pulling from all angles and directions.

Moments later screaming erupted from the house, followed by cries of pain of a gun going off.

I jumped to run, do something. I don't know what I could do, but I had to do something, literally anything at that moment to not make me feel useless.

"You can't do anything." Arlis held me to him, and I had never felt such hatred towards him. I never felt anything besides at least a liking towards him.

But now the thought of him repulsed me.

A baby's cry erupted from the house and my heart sank into my chest, crashing like the glass in the house.

Finally, Zach came out of the house, bloody but smiling. Smiling. A literal grin was spread across his face. I had a feeling in my stomach that the blood on him wasn't his own.

I tried to look away, I dug my head into Arlis's chest, shielding myself from the view in front of me, but some deep dark part of me told me to watch.

So I did.

Constance came out from the house, her clothes wet but the blood blended in with them. In her hand was a man's head as he thrashed and kicked. She was dragging him by his hair.

Something flashed in his hand, a silver dagger. He threw it back, catching the back of Constance's leg, embedding itself into her skin, but she didn't even seem to notice.

The man's eyes were black and red, black gooey liquid poured from his mouth, and I wanted to gag, everything about this made me sick.

A woman in a white dress, splattered with blood so red lined it like splatters of paint, stumbled out of the house tripping and falling in the grass.

She ran at Constance, but Constance literally kicked the woman back, and I swear from here I could hear the woman's ribs crack.

Constance pulled the man's head back, standing on his legs with imperfect balance, but it was enough to stay standing. She held her knife with one hand.

She slid the blade over the man's neck slowly, and then dropped the body.

Someone was screaming and at this point I couldn't tell if it was me or the woman in the white dress, but I knew from that moment that being a Supernatural wasn't what it was cracked up to be.

Bile rose is my throat and I started to puke, and something was given to me, a bag. I puked into the bag, but there wasn't really anything to throw up except a Snicker's bar.

"You have hereby been pardoned by Constance Dawn for willingly turning your husband in for the crimes he committed." Constance said, looking to the woman.

"But I didn't—" The woman struggled to say.

"Shh. Yeah you did. Run. Take your baby. Don't let me catch you here again." Constance threatened, holding the blade out as blood dripped from it like rain from a cloud.

Someone rubbed my back and I found myself moving away from Arlis's electric touch.

The woman kissed Constance's shoes and then disappeared.

Tears poured from my eyes as both Zach and Constance got back into the car like nothing happened.

-Violence has ended, here's that bold sentence to start again-

"You got stabbed." Arlis said matter-of-factly.

"No I— she looked down and saw the blade. She ripped it out with a grunt, and handed it to Arlis. "Hey wolfie, is it poisoned?"

Arlis held the dagger to his nose and shook his head. "No."

He tossed it out the window and we drove off, the smell of sharp copper and iron flooded the car.

"I'm sorry we—" Arlis started to apologize but I stopped him.

"No. Don't. I get it. You guys kill." I looked out the window, trees blurring past like I wished the memories of that fight would. "You guys are killers."

"We told you we were." Constance used a rag to wipe some blood off of her as she drove. "We're not hiding anything."

Ignorance is bliss, I suppose. "Like that? You made a show of it. She kissed your shoes!"

"It's customary when a Hunter shows mercy. Your boy has kissed my shoes. So has Chleo." She shrugged like it was no big deal.

I looked at Arlis and didn't even make an attempt to speak, I just looked at him. Just watched the memories in his eyes, the ghosts.

He looked away and fidgeted with his fingers, popping them and leaning his head against the window.

I did too, I leaned on the window, trying to fall asleep but all I saw was the man's black eyes and all I could hear was the baby's cries.

"Rule three, never leave a kill where a human could stumble upon it." Constance's voice was void of any emotion. "Rule four... unless out of human civilization, one must move at least once every twenty years."

I finally drifted off, my dreams full of nightmares and a specific Alpha Wolf.

***

"Hey, we're home." Arlis cooed gently, picking me up and carrying me in his arms bridal style, my head laying against his chest that smelled like vanilla.

I squinted my eyes open and saw the sun high in the sky, and instantly closed them again, making Arlis chuckle.

"Is that her! ARLIS!!" A woman's voice yelled and I opened my eyes again as Arlis set me on my feet.

"Shit." Arlis mumbled. "I didn't think about underages. You're about to feel something, please don't jump me." He laughed and something poured over me, making me take a sharp intake of breath.

Energy. Energy like teenage girl hormones and too many shirtless picks of Chris Hemsworth.

I struggled to stand, but Arlis caught me and wrapped my arm around his neck. I was breathing faster than normal and my legs felt weak, I felt... well I haven't felt this since that one heavy make out session with some guy at a party. But this... this was more intense.

I wanted to wrap my legs around me right this moment. But I didn't. I stood my ground as he smirked at me.

The woman had dark skin and pretty hazel eyes, her hair was wound up in a curly ponytail as she jogged over to us.

"You must be the girl everyone is talking about!" She brought me into a hug, and I "oofed" as the air was momentarily taken from my lungs.

I figured I was and shrugged. "I guess, I'm sorry... what's your name?" I asked politely.

The women glared at Arlis. "You didn't even tell her about your adoptive mother! Boy you're lucky I don't slap you. My name is Iris Queens, I helped raise Arlis." She smiles warmly at me and I can't help but like this woman.

"Well you raised quite the boys." I laugh, looking at Arlis.

"Oh, don't I know. They nearly drove me mad!" She laughed. "So where are you from?" She asked.

"Lone Wolf." Arlis answered for me.

She tilts her head at me and frowns. "Oh honey, what happened?"

"My parents died when I was young. Hunters got them. I ran and haven't looked back since. Then... I met Arlis." I looked up a him with a loving gaze, the corners of my lips lifting up into a smile.

Iris's frown bled into a loving gaze as she clapped her hands. I felt bad for lying, but I'd feel even worse if Arlis got in trouble for being with me as a Human.

"Well isn't that cute! Now, I actually came over here for more than just introductions to my daughter in law." She gives Arlis a serious look. "Are you aware of Alpha Rylee and his threats?"

Arlis nodded. "Yes. He thinks she's a human," he gestured to me, "But don't worry, I have it all under control."

Iris looked relieved. "Okay, good. Do you want a tour of the pack, sweetheart?"

I looked to Arlis for permission, not sure why but figured he'd know what was for the best, and he nodded happily.

"Thank you so much, mom." He kissed her cheek and she smiled at him.

"Anything honey." She said to him and then she gave me a pointed look. "Same for you sweetheart, if you need anything I'm here. Along with the rest of the pack. You're one of us now."

I felt all warm inside, all the events of today was washing away like dirt.