Chapter Text
She wasn’t supposed to be here.
Not near the old creaky ports Vander and Vi had warned her about a hundred times before. Not close to the murky, polluted waters with the filthy runoff from overused factories or the big walls painted with territorial markings indicating that she had long since passed a safe haven for someone like her. This wasn’t her land; she had no right to be here. She knew that.
She was Vander’s stupid pup, with his name and everything. What a blessing that had turned out to be for young Powder. She was tied to the brawly alpha who demanded adherence to old traditions and even older rules with his strictness.
But she wasn’t on his land anymore.
Somewhere along her little run away from the danger of a home she had begun to hate, her tiny feet moving fast in the stormy night, she had crossed a border. Intentional or not. Visible or not.
Now, she was in Silco’s territory.
Every single scent marker, piss stain and puddle could tell the shaking child that much. Each building, each billow of smoke. Each foreign clank of machinery working overtime to produce the exports considered illegal in Vander’s land. Not an ounce of it was familiar to her anymore.
Yet all of it was marked with ownership by the “All-Seeing Eye’. A man who raged a personalized vendetta against the man who marked her as his own flesh when she could barely walk.
Loud spray paint was littered on half the free surfaces she passed, mixing with the neon lights to make the cold, dark streets seem even more frightening. The heavy scent of grease, chemicals and oddly enough, bouquets of freshly bloomed flowers, seemed to be engraved into the shadows of places Powder didn’t recognize from memories, just warnings.
She was young.
Twelve going on twenty if you asked Vander after one of her outbursts. Her strong reputation for trouble followed her small frame around the Lanes that her alpha claimed as his. Trailing her like a sour smell.
But she was also still young enough that the main note of a helpless pup was the first thing wafting from her potent scent – far stronger than the undertones of an alpha who adopted her. Milky, dependent, untouchable. Like a crying baby.
It was nature's evolving attempt at trying to keep young wolf children safe from turf wars between men like Vander and Silco.
But Powder knew, that if somebody, anybody, from Silco’s pack stopped her and gave her a sniff - then she would be done for. Danger alerts of an intruder trespassing lit inside their head before they would drag her to her death for stepping onto the wrong side of town.
Never enter another Alphas territory without permission.
Simple. Understandable. The first rule of the whole pack thing besides listening to your alpha. The kind of thing that a dam teaches their pup just after walking Go far, but not far enough that you wind up in trouble.
But apparently, Powder and her little blue head of hair were incapable of listening to any kind of rule. Following any guide or instructions besides the innate will inside her distraught chest that kept pushing her little legs to keep running through the streets, she didn’t know.
She was like a dog set free from the pound, running for one reason only – to get away. She intended to achieve her freedom or was prepared to get mangled by a goon while trying.
She had already crossed a border. So, half the battle was done, all she had to do now was keep pushing herself until she could find a place to hide, far enough away from anybody else so that she wouldn’t hurt them, or herself.
Somehow, Powder was always an afterthought, even in her mind.
The invisible line between the docks and the more bustling city streets of the territory her adoptive father owned were clearly divided by colours and smells. But it was obvious that the consequences of being caught were another distinction.
On one hand, there was an enemy she was imposing herself on with her unwelcome presence. A rival ready to kill her for her misstep, according to rumour. Or she could admit she was a jinx and head home with her tail between her legs and face the worried father who would be utterly ashamed of what she was doing and demand penance for her tradition-breaking.
But she had little respect for the family she had been forced to care for right now.
As long as Vander marked her as his child, forcing her to have siblings who despised her, she knew she wasn’t welcome here on the one-eyed man’s land. But that wouldn’t stop her from keeping both of her feet planted firmly on his ground.
As planted as they could be her feet made sloshed heavy steps as she ran through the dirty puddles of another side alley.
She was quick, her speed being one of the strongest assets amongst the hoard of children Vander chose to adopt. But like all quick things running at an unsustainable pace, colliding with a solid object acted as a quick stop to whatever progress she was making toward her goals.
With a loud thump, Powder’s child frame hit against something solid and large – causing her to stumble backwards. Without thinking, a list of swear tripped out of her mouth as she shook her head and blinked a few times. Expecting to see a surprise wall or a scrap of debris, her little cornflower blue eyes looked up and connected with a pair of shocked, mismatched eyes.
“What are you doing here pup?” The voice was low with authority, never raising above an average conversational volume. He didn’t need to boom his voice or yell; this man radiated an aura of influence and his presence simply demanded respect.
Powder’s heart began to pound in her chest as she stared up at the alpha standing before her, making her knees wobble and her mouth open and close as she tried to form even a single word to answer him. Silco wasn’t like anyone she had ever seen before and the shivers down her spine were proving that much to her.
She tried to open her mouth but found little, but the air was escaping, her voice trapped inside her throat. The same throat he would probably sink his teeth into and thrash around before leaving her bloody body on the borderline as a message.
Her eyes quickly scanned behind him to see that the man wasn’t alone, a handful of pack members standing behind him and watching the scene unfold like it was high-class television. Nothing like inter-pack drama to spark the explosive thread of gossip between pack mates.
“I asked you, what are you doing here pup?” Silco repeated slower, his tone unwavering as he crouched down to her level this time. Balancing his tall frame as he bent his knees.
He recognized this little thing. That unkempt blue hair in a dripping wet braid. This was one of his former brother’s little children. The youngest if he wasn’t mistaken.
He didn’t exactly keep in touch with the man who stabbed him in the back many moons ago but he heard enough about him and the four cubs he let play at his feet, to recognize the young girl before him was probably a runaway of his.
One big sniff confirmed it beyond a shadow of a doubt.
She reeked like the ‘Last Drop’ underneath that pure pup scent, milky and child-like despite her dam long having stopped feeding her by a tit. Hints of leather, spiced bourbon, and smoky amber reached his long thin nose and reminding him of days spent alongside Vander in his youth.
Definitely one of his mangy mutts.
Mangy was right. The poor thing trembling before him was hardly clothed for the wet weather of fall. What a failure of a Father Vander was summing up to be. She might be mute in the face of danger, but she probably wasn’t that much of an idiot to come blindly running to his land without reason. Something had scared her into coming, something she was genuinely fearing, and, in that fear, she had chosen to flee to his enemy of all people.
Powder finally managed to swallow the lump in her throat and speak but her little voice was trembling.
“I-I got away…I messed up and I ruined everything.” She cried loudly. “I always do. They hate me. Said I’m useless. A scared waste of good food and clothes. I had to leave…I-I didn’t know where to go.”
She was a runaway. It was an observation now more than an accusation.
She was scampering away from the people she was supposed to call a family before they could give her matching flesh wounds to the big feelings she was crying about.
Why did this anger him so much?
This one didn’t belong to him or any of his followers he was forced to care about it for logistical reasons. His heart didn’t have to bleed for her, and he notoriously hated pups. Everybody knew that.
Sticky, messy, annoying little children with their paws always in more mess than they could handle. Always needing their Dam or Sire to drag them out of the trouble they created.
So why in the Moon's name did his gaze start to soften and the sternness he was known for start to slip away from his face in place of sympathy for the shivering little girl before him?
Maybe it was the surge of paternal instinct all alphas had when they saw a helpless pup. Maybe he just saw himself in the scrawny twig of a girl trying valiantly to stand eye-to-eye with the crouched alpha before her. He couldn’t explain it. He wouldn’t even try.
He just knew, that for whatever unknown reasons, his wolf had decided he was going to give this girl more grace than he had ever warned an intruder they would receive from crossing the border fences illegally.
“I can assure you that you’re not Little One.” He said, taking a few steps forward to close his arms around her and wrap her trembling frame in his warmth. The completely opposing scent of spiced smoke, bitter citrus and black orchid filled her own nostrils and senses, in an attempt to try and calm her by enveloping her in the safety of a new pack. “You’ve ruined nothing.”
She sobbed into his chest violently, staining his expensive suit in all her childish fluids and pushing her entire weight against him.
“I didn’t mean to intrude. I just wanted to get away. Please don’t hurt me, Alpha. I can leave, I promise. I won’t come back; I won’t jinx it. Won’t cause any problems.” Her quivering voice made Silco’s stomach sink. He usually relished in the sound of an enemy wolf babbling their way through a beg, pleading for his forgiveness or even daring to barter for their safety.
Now it twisted his gut in disgust and anger. This pup didn’t have to beg. Not as she sobbed into his arms with all of her weight. Which was absolutely nothing. It was easier to tell how mistreated she was as he cradled her sobbing, shivering, frame against his.
Vander fed this little one nothing. She was a bag of skin, holding in a bundle of shaking bones. As Silco held her protectively, his arms offered Powder a welcome shield from the eyes of curious pack members gawking at the scene in front of them. Silco was never considered a kind man.
He prided himself on his ruthless efficiency and almost industrial lack of sentimentality. Yet here he was, cradling a child like it was what he had been designed to do. His wolf urged him to parent the child beneath him that had lived on a diet of bite, spite, and grit. She would do well in his territory. She could be his exception.
It stirred something deep within him. A mixture of emotions that were uncomfortable and unfamiliar. Was this what choosing to be a sire felt like?
“No one will hurt you here.” He assured her, his soft voice feeling foreign in his throat compared to the usual authoritative growls he used to command his pack. Gently, he used his hand to brush some of her wet blue hair away from her crying face, so he could see her tear-filled eyes.
Her tiny little hands found their way into his usual evening shirt, ruined by the rain and her tears but he couldn’t care less. Feeling his weight against her his soothing words seemed to do the trick to gradually calm her sobs.
Silco’s mind began to race with the obvious decision he had to make as the Alpha of his territory.
He technically didn’t owe the girl in his arms the understanding he had given her. According to the treaties and laws, he could have let his pack rip her limb from limb. Scattering her pieces like a warning for the search party they might come searching. Obviously, he wouldn’t.
He could however send her away. She wasn’t his responsibility, but he couldn’t. Even if Sevika had been there and growling her opinion as his beta in his ear. He simply couldn’t. She was seeking refuge against his chest and in his heart and her scared little cries tugged at something primal inside of him.
“Come. Let’s get you warm and dry and you can tell me the rest of your story.” He whispered into her hair. Slowly rising from the ground and still holding her close enough to give just the right amount of pressure to keep her feeling secure.
“Y-you’re not going to kill me?” Powder asked with those big blue eyes.
She was going to leave him weak, he could tell. She would have him doing anything she asked with those puppy dog eyes and milk and gunpowder scent. A hint of the scent she would grow into peaking through in the rain as she sat under his nose.
“No, Little One.” He confirmed, letting a hint of reassurance flash through in a small smile. “I won’t hurt you. An outcast of Vander’s is always a welcome member of my pack. You can stay the night at the least. We’ll figure the rest out tomorrow.”
He made it sound like she had the option to go back in the morning. She didn’t. Silco will make that clearer tomorrow. But for now, he could quell her fears and hold her as tight as she needed. Provide her with the hope that she could escape Vander and her siblings to find solace in his arms.
She nodded her head like she was bobbing for apples, her tear-stained face pressed into the warmth of Silco’s chest as he started the journey back to his apartment for the night. Silco’s footsteps splashed the puddles on the dimly lit street as he began to walk back to the towering buildings of iron and glass decorating his territory.
“Tell me your name, Little One.” He demanded politely. More out of curiosity than cruelty.
Powder hesitated for a moment. She had always been Powder. It was the name they called her by to come play or eat dinner. The name that followed her sister's rare ‘I love you’ comments and the name Vander would scold her with in front of her former pack. The name that led her to crawl directly into this strange Alpha’s arms. The name that even she at twelve, realized was associated with worthlessness and failure.
It wasn’t her anymore. She was welcome here. She wasn’t jinxing it anymore. She wasn’t a jinx. She could be his Jinx now.
“Jinx.” She whispered back, her little voice still quivering but with a newfound determination behind it. “Thank you, Alpha.”
Silco nodded in understanding. Reinvention was a masterful way to success and once again the small girl in his arms sparked pride to well in his chest.
“Call me Silco.” He told her, his grip never wavering. “Don’t worry, we’ll show them your place, Little One. Welcome to your new pack Jinx.”