A Pack of Tales
Copyright © 2013 Naoko Smith
Thank you so much to Bramblethorn for continuing to support my writing in spite of the many demands on your time.
Please leave comments and feedback for me so I know what works and what doesn't as I write up the rest of this story.
This series will include two kinds of chapters: story chapters, called '(story)' in the blurb and sex scenes, called '(scene)' in the blurb. The sex scenes will be diverse. You can choose to read them all or, if e.g. hetero sex isn't your thing, to skip some and only read the story chapters and e.g. lesbian sex scenes. (You can identify which scenes are what kind of sex from the tags, the category the chapter is uploaded into and description at the start of the scene.)
All characters in this story are fictional. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
This scene contains an account of a rape. I hope I have made clear in this account how disgusting a crime rape is and how angry it makes me to see how little support is offered to victims of rape, although I do believe things are getting better.
A Pack of Tales Ch. 10 – Red/Christa
Red turns (scene)
The breath was catching in Red's throat and she was bristling, choking against her collar. Max had come to a halt in front of her and was turning not to her but to Col, as if in supplication on Red's behalf.
But Col had called her. He was the upcoming Alpha and he had called her name. She would have to answer.
Col had put his hand on her shoulder. He gripped it and pushed her, gently but firmly, to the armchair nearest the door where she usually sat.
They were all there: the cubs sprawled on the sofa and chairs, Rex in his armchair by the fireplace, Jenks and Nye had come to hear how Red's interview had gone. Only Christa was absent – in the kitchen getting tea.
Col pushed Red to the chair and then went to sit on the end of the sofa by Rex's armchair. Max went slowly across and sat on the sofa between Col and Rob.
Red sat catching her breath and sliding her eyes around the room at them all: Rikki and Rob turning puzzled curious faces to her, Nye and Jenks waiting patiently, Max folding his long lean body onto the sofa, his face cold and reserved. Col and Rex also looked at her with the whites of their eyes showing, their expressions telling her they already knew it must be bad.
"I ... I," Red stuttered. Finally she took a deep breath and turned her yellowing eyes to stare out of the window. She slid a finger inside the collar of her silk shirt around the red leather collar hidden underneath. She sat up straight in the armchair, the strength and character of her muscular body made apparent in the clothes Max had selected for her, her feet resting squarely on the floor in her elegant court shoes. The short wings of hair brushed her cheekbones, sweet strawberry blonde, appealingly boyish.
"It was when I started college," Red said in a monotone. "There was a bus to get us there, an hour's journey. I met her on the bus."
Clare. The same age but seemingly worlds wiser. Red knew now that it was just an act but to a shy girl who had never made many friends, Clare seemed like the fount of all knowledge. She was a dark-haired siren with a catch in her laugh. She said she was a witch: "I'm a witch, you know," looking deep into people's eyes and making that catchy laugh. They were not quite sure if she was joking.
Why did she pick Red? Looking back with the perspective gained by the time that had passed since, and with the confidence of having a pack at her back, Red said: "She liked me. She liked ... girls like me. We were the same."
Except that Clare was popular, with her long dark hair, catchy laugh and the hint of the mystic about her. When the friendships from school shook up and people discovered new friends, Clare picked Red.
Red knew better than to obtrude her clumsy person into the circle of people with whom Clare socialised at college, of course. They were on different courses. But on the bus home they would sit together until Clare's stop – which was before Red's - and then Red would sit staring out of the window not daring to question how incredibly happy she felt.
They kissed. Lightly, quickly on saying goodbye. Clare would put her mouth to Red's cheek by her ear. Red would feel the blood suddenly thundering in her veins, her heart thumping in her chest, her thighs loosening and she would smile. She hardly knew what this might mean until Clare carefully carelessly started showing her magazine pictures.
"Christ, look at this, Red. How do you think they can?" She looked deep into Red's eyes and laughed her catchy laugh, pointing at two women entwined in the glossy paper of a men's magazine. "Would you like to come to my house for tea next week?"
The night Red went to Clare's house for tea they were silent on the bus. It was a dark autumnal night, the air heavy with rain. Clare had a hand on Red's leg, holding it gently while she stared out of the window. Her dark eyes were sparkling.
They got off the bus with the jostling crowd of other college kids. Red couldn't remember now if she'd spoken to any of the others. Clare dawdled by the roadside, holding Red back by the sleeve until the others had cleared off down the hill, disappearing in the damp dark November night. Clare pulled Red back into the bus shelter by the roadside, a concrete hut with a bench built into it.
It smelt of stale piss and stubbed out cigarettes. Clare moved into Red's arms and they began to kiss – tentatively at first, their mouths touching then lingering and pressing wet and warm to each other's mouth. Red started panting and pressing into Clare's body as well as her kiss, the blood running in her veins so hot that she thought nothing of the damp autumnal chill. Her senses were full of woman: the soft soapy smell of Clare drifting on that stale bus shelter stench, the wet kiss of her mouth, the sucking sound she made on Red's lip, the fingers Clare was pushing into the waistband of her jeans, the feel of Clare's ribs to her own fingers groping under Clare's top.
"What the fuck is this?!" The furious voice crashed suddenly in their ears.
Red sprang away from Clare, her heart thumping now with shock. She could feel that curious bristling feeling she would get in moments of high emotion intensifying.
There were five of them. She knew that one was Clare's brother, the others his mates.
"You fucking slag!" His words were addressed to Clare but his eyes were on Red. He was livid with fury. The emotions coming off his mates were more complex but their titillated sniggers did nothing to soften his mood.
Clare gave a shrill hysterical giggle. She was trembling and Red saw a flash of the whites of her eyes.
"Get out of here!" Clare's brother said in a low intensely angry voice. "I told you. If I ever catch you at this again, I'll fucking do you!"
Clare was out of the bus shelter and running before he'd finished speaking. Red made a step to follow but he said: "Oh no. I don't think so. I think you need a lesson."
Red sat straight in the armchair in the farmhouse sitting-room, staring out of the window. The cubs were no longer curious, they didn't want to know. Rob was whimpering and fidgeting but nobody told him to shut up. Rikki sat staring at the floor with his gorgeous golden features stricken. Rex had turned his head aside so you couldn't see his face, Nye and Jenks sat with their shoulders hunched in an identical misery. Only Col and Max continued to look at Red, Col with the concentrated frown etched into his brow, Max's face cold and reserved.
She tried to hold up the rucksack of college papers and books to shield herself. It was snatched from her hands and chucked in the road outside. When she tried to punch them, they twisted her arms back – there were five of them. The violent stripping of her clothes from her, tearing them off if they would not come easily away. Sometimes she used to wonder if her struggling had excited them more. Perhaps if she'd passively submitted to this fate .... She knew that nothing she could have done would have made any difference. They were a bunch of wild beasts, driven mad by collective lust.
