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‘Then reject her.’

Galen’s words continued to echo in Caleb’s mind the next morning.

Caleb hadn’t followed his friend, he needed time, they both did. But as he sat at his desk, staring at the brand-new laptop that had appeared overnight. Those words just kept repeating.

He sat back in his chair with a heavy sigh.

If he rejected her, and she accepted the rejection, their bond would be severed. They would feel the loss and potentially get sick for a time. But because they had not marked each other, the sickness would not be severe.

But their connection would be gone. No more feeling drawn to each other, no more longing. The awkwardness, the desire, it would just go away as though it had never existed.

He felt a weight on his chest at the thought.

For Ashleigh, it would solve her problem, she would be left with the mate she wanted. For Caleb, he would lose his one and only mate.

Caleb knew he should, there was no reason to hold on. She wasn’t his, she didn’t want to be. No matter what he did he was going to lose her.

“But not yet,” he whispered to himself, feeling a hot tear escape his eye.

***

For three days Caleb had avoided her, he had ignored her. But on the fourth day, everything suddenly changed. He came to their scheduled training, he took her on runs along the borders, he focused on talking to her about defense tactics.

Galen and the other representatives no longer joined their sessions. It was back to just the two of them. Ashleigh was surprised to find herself relieved.

They spent less time in the simulations and obstacle courses, but that wasn’t a problem.

Ashleigh had started to feel strange about training in the arena, preferring the sparring rooms or open wild. She wasn’t sure if it was the other wolves’ judgmental glances that made her feel uncomfortable, or that this way felt more like Winter.

Today they were back in the sparring room. It was an intense session, each of them coming at the other with fierce aggression.

“You are an aggressive fighter, hard and fast strikes intended to take down your opponent quickly. You don’t really hold back.” Caleb observed while they were taking a break._.

“Is there something wrong with that?” Ashleigh asked, her eyebrow raised suspiciously. She took a drink from her water bottle.

“No, it’s a style choice. I am just observing,” he smiled. “Do you have a preferred weapon?”

Ashleigh thought about it for a few moments before shaking her head.

“I have trained with different weapons, knives, swords, axes. I am no good at ranged weapons, bow and arrows are not my forte,” she laughed.

“Well, you aren’t a ranged fighter, so it makes sense.” Caleb’s smile faltered at the mention of the bow, thinking back to her engagement.

“True,” she smiled.

An idea struck him then.

“Come with me,” Caleb said excitedly.

“Where are we going?” she asked, curious about the shift in his mood.

“Just come with me,” he laughed, grabbing her hand, and pulling her along.

She laughed at his childlike enthusiasm and allowed him to pull her. They ran out of the sparring rooms and down a few halls. They reached a set of elevators; he directed the elevator downward. They giggled like children.

The doors opened on the next floor. Two others got on, Caleb and Ashleigh quietened down.

“Alpha,” both wolves said as they greeted Caleb with a salute.

Ashleigh noticed that one of the wolves hadn’t quite lifted his head from the bow. He was staring down where Ashleigh and Caleb’s hands were still interlocked.

She quickly pulled her hand away from Caleb.

Caleb looked down as she pulled away, he lifted his eyes to see her turning away from him. He was about to speak when he felt the other eyes on him. He had forgotten, just for a few moments.

He had forgotten about their reality.

He straightened up and turned to the doors, waiting for their stop.

A few minutes later Ashleigh followed behind Caleb as they walked down another hall.

“It’s in here,” he said as they approached a large grey door.

Caleb placed his hand on a scanner, a green light passed over it. He then entered a code and then a loud buzz opened the door.

Ashleigh watched with fascination and confusion, she had seen things like this on the shows and movies from the human world. But here in Summer, so many of the things she had seen as imaginary were very much real.

Winter and Summer were two different worlds.

The heavy feeling in her stomach was back. The one that had made it hard to keep running simulations, that made her think of wooden posts used to fence off the borders of Winter, rather than the electrified fences of Summer.

She shook her head, pushing away her concerns as she followed Caleb into the room. As she entered the room, she was blown away.

The walls were lined with all kinds of weapons. Swords, knives, batons, axes, some she didn’t recognize. Some that were attached to outlets, charging some kind of effect.

Ashleigh reached out to one of the small knives. She held it in her hand, turning it over and looking carefully. It looked strange.

“These are the practice weapons,” Caleb said, reaching over and wrapping his hand around the blade of the knife and squeezing.

Ashleigh gasped, dropping the knife and grabbing at his hand to treat the wound. But there was nothing to treat, his hand was fine. She turned his hand over on her own, there were old scars, but no blood, no wound.

She looked up at him, he was smiling.

“All the weapons in this room are for practice. All dull blades. The tasers will give a nasty sting, but not much else.”

He pulled her forward toward another door, once more his hand was scanned, a code was entered, and a loud buzz opened the door. He turned to her with a smile.

“Wait here,” Caleb said excitedly, before going through the door and letting it close behind him.

Ashleigh stared at the door quietly wondering how long he would be gone. She knew it would be at least a few minutes, so she turned back to the room filled with practice weapons. She walked around, picking one up and examining it.

It was a small ax; the weight was good. She wondered if it would fly well. Ashleigh might not have been any good with a bow and arrow, but throwing weapons she had some skill in.

A door on the other side of the room caught her attention. Putting the ax away she went over and examined it. There was no scanner, no code to be entered. Reaching the handle, she was surprised to find that it was unlocked.

She entered the room, where she found a series of drawers with numbers written on them. Ashleigh opened the first drawer, inside found what looked like a bodysuit. One-piece, it had a high collar, arms, legs, it ended at the ankle.

Putting it back in the drawer, she tried the drawer just below, here she found what appeared to be matching boots. They were made of the same material as the suit she had found. A soft stretchy material. Impractical for footwear.

She wondered if these were meant for sparring. But she didn’t understand why there were so many of them.

Ashleigh left the small room, going back to the practice weapons just as Caleb reentered the room. He smiled at her, holding a box in his hands.

“What are the suits for?” she asked, pointing her thumb over her shoulder.

Caleb looked past her at the small room she had just left.

“They are the mesh base for our armor. It was the previous evolution of the skin mesh. They allowed for shifting but also provided a thicker layer of protection against teeth, knives, even some poisons have a harder time penetrating.” Caleb answered. “Those are waiting to be repurposed.”

“You don’t use them?” Ashleigh asked, looking back into the room at the rows of unused armor.

“As I said, they are the previous model. We have developed a stronger base now.”

She thought back to the day the rogue wolves had attacked, was this how Caleb’s people had survived without any losses to the wolfsbane?

“Here, this is for you,” he offered, holding the box out drawing her attention back to him.

Ashleigh hesitated. She looked around the room, then back at Caleb.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Open it,” he encouraged.

She hesitated once more, she suspected what was inside the box. If she was right, she couldn’t accept it.

“What is it, Caleb?” she asked seriously.

Ashleigh saw the hurt in his eyes, his smile wavered.

“What? Do you think it’s a bomb or something?” he asked sarcastically.

“No,” she answered, “but I can’t just accept something without knowing what it is.”

“Have you never received a gift?” he sighed.

“Caleb,” she said.

He set the box down on a table.

“It’s a gift, Ashleigh. There is no meaning to it,” he didn’t bother to hide his irritation at her hesitance.

“What is it?” she insisted.

He looked at her, then took an exasperated breath.

“It’s a weapon,” he replied.

She sighed.

“Caleb, you know that I can’t accept this from you,”

“Why not?” he huffed.

“I cannot accept a weapon from you,”

He met her eyes, and in those eyes, there was a silent dialogue. She knew the words they didn’t say out loud, the words that made her heart skip.

‘A weapon can only be shared between mates.’

‘We ARE mates.’

He looked away letting out another frustrated sigh.

“That is not what this is, it’s not even a real weapon, it’s one of the practice weapons.”

“Still,” she replied softly, “I honor the traditions of my people.”

“Don’t your traditions say the weapon must be handmade? I didn’t make it by hand. I used a machine to build it,” he grumbled.

Ashleigh looked at him carefully. She was torn between being angry at him for the way he tried to sidestep her traditions, treating them as something trivial; and wanting to ask how he had made the weapon.

“You just made this?” she asked, her curiosity winning out in the end.

“I said I didn’t make it,” he replied.

“A machine did, right. But you didn’t just go into that room and find a pre-made weapon, did you?” she clarified.

“No,” he answered, “we use a special kind of printer for the practice weapons. I just went into the design files and found what I had in mind, I made some tweaks and printed it.”

Ashleigh scoffed.

“Do you think of Winter as a joke?” she demanded with resentment. “Our traditions, our way of life? Are we just some pathetic cave tribe poking the fire with our sticks?!”