"I'm still not comfortable with this, Aria. I know you have basic control over it, but you have no idea what could happen if you slip even for a second. The tiniest spark could set a freakin' house on fire!"

"Right now, all I can get is the tiniest spark."

Alison knew the risk she was taking by even trying to help Aria improve her control, but she would rather Aria practice with her around to supervise than do it in secret. Fire was the most unstable element to control. In order to have a decent flame, you have to harness the anger in your soul, but you have to keep the balance. You need to stay focused. Alison could do it because she had been an angry person since she was a child, but her two years in exile had made her into a kinder, more gentle person. As a result, she had the perfect balance.

"It takes time. You need to be able to feel your anger, control your flame, and stay focused all at the same time."

"Yeah…. Ali?" She figured now was as good a time as any to reveal her true motives for asking Alison to train.

Alison spun around to face her. "Yeah?"

Aria gave her a sheepish look. She hadn't been in the pack for more than two months, she still didn't understand a lot of her new life. She had a lot of questions. "The Alpha's Order, how does it work?"

Alison tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear as she gestured with her head to a nearby rock. She saunters over to it, Aria close behind. They both sit down and Alison quickly places her hand on Aria's knee. "It's main purpose is to keep our existence a secret."

Aria cocked her head to the side, confused. "It's main purpose?"

Alison swallowed thickly. "The first wolf in a town always becomes the Alpha, so that when the rest of the pack undergoes the transformation, they can be kept under control. The transformation is always hardest for the Alpha because they go through it completely alone. I locked myself up in an abandoned basement in Philly for 6 months, practicing shifting over and over and making sure I could control myself."

"Could you?"

"Eventually, but in a state of high distress, it's much harder to control. Like it is with all of us."

"So… The Alpha's Order?"

"Like I said, it's main purpose is to stop any new wolves from losing control and exposing us all. I shift, use my Voice to force them to shift. If I use my Voice on a shifted wolf, they can't disobey it, even if they want to. It's literally impossible."

"You've used it once?"

Alison nodded. "Only once."

"On Brittany?" Aria tried to hide the judgement in her voice. Nobody could hide anything from Alison though.

"Aria… You don't understand. When I found her, she was practically starved to death. The life she came from, is worse than anything we can imagine. That's left scars that run deep. She can't control her emotions and it tires Emily to try and keep her contained all the time. Her flames, could have the potential to burn entire cities down. Not to mention it would kill her. I had no choice."

Aria was horrified that such destruction could be caused by an element she had been experimenting with. "So… she just can't use it?"

"No." Alison shook her head. "She can't even consider using it."

"What does that mean? What's the difference?"

Alison leaned forward, staring Aria in the eyes. "It means she literally can't go down that thought line. She can wish she could use it, but she can't think about trying to use it or control it. Her train of thought will not allow her to go there. I couldn't leave any wriggle room. There has to be no way around it. Too much at risk."

Aria nodded. "I understand, but I still don't like it."

Alison's hand went to her shoulder. "Trust me, neither do I. I hated forcing her to bow down to me, but-"

Alison was cut off by their ears picking up the sound of footsteps speeding towards them, too fast to be human.

"Alison!" Spencer's voice rang through the clearing. Alison and Aria both jumped to their feet as Spencer burst into vision, eyes wide with panic. Alison was immediately on edge.

"Spence, what is it?" Alison's tone was nervous. She knew that whatever had gotten Spencer so worked up, must be serious.

"Hanna's picked up Brittany's scent, it looks like she was on her way here but then suddenly she changed direction. She knocked a tree down in the process and her bag was left near it. Hanna's tracking her with Emily. Whatever's happened, she's pissed."

Alison turned to look at Aria with wide eyes. "Go catch up to them. We'll follow." Aria took off as fast as her legs could carry her without another word.

Alison turned quickly to look at Spencer, who gave her a slight nod, and they took off running also. Alison followed Spencer's scent for a few miles before it was blurred with a much more familiar one. Alison was most in tune with Emily's scent, as the brunette was her mate. She focused on the smell she normally loved to bask in, and followed it. Hoping they were not too late.

They'd lost sight of Aria by now, the little brunette had hopefully caught up with Hanna and Emily. Spencer and Alison were only roughly thirty seconds behind them; but Alison knew that for an angry wolf, that was more than enough.

Her super-hearing picked up the sounds of a fight some few miles ahead. Knowing they were close, she willed her body to go faster, every second could be crucial. Within seconds, she burst into a clearing in the woods; taking a millisecond to assess her surroundings.

Hanna was crouched defensively over a male that Alison did not recognise, but she could see he was bruised, bloody and seemingly unconscious. Emily and Aria were doing their best to restrain Brittany on the other side of the clearing. The younger girl was making sure to keep them at least an arms length away, clearly too angry to be reasoned with.

Her and Spencer arrived just in time to see Emily land a solid kick to Brittany's gut that sent her flying fifteen feet into the air. A horrible shredding sound filled the air, followed by a roar as the golden brown wolf landed on her feet, snapping her canine jaw and growling menacingly in Emily's direction.

Alison didn't even bother to remove her expensive leather jacket, she had to get this situation under control now. She let the tingling feeling that always ran through her spine ripple through her skin, tearing flesh as it went to allow grey and white fur to settle in it's place. She felt her skeleton readjust and she landed on her front paws.

She blinked a couple of times to allow her eyes to adjust to the sharpness that her vision now possessed before dashing to get in between Brittany and Emily, who was still in human form. She stopped right in front of her sister, who didn't seem to have noticed Alison's presence before this moment, and watched as Brittany's eyes narrowed at the sight of Alison.

She didn't need to read Brittany's aura to know she was incensed, but she needed to see how difficult this way going to be. She really didn't want to use The Alpha's Voice, but she knew it might be necessary. Alison's closeness to her pack allowed her to be able to see the detailed elements that make up their general and mood auras.

Brittany's general aura remained as it always was; positive blue, showing her intelligence and trust. Positive pink, showing the love she had for all her sisters .A large amount of negative grey, the scars her previous life had left.

Brittany's mood aura, though, was a different story. It was almost pure negative red, demonstrating her aggression and defiance. Alison was surprised to see that it was also laced with negative yellow, highlighting irrationality.

Alison snarled at her. "Enough."

The voice's echo, that only the Alpha possessed, stopped Brittany in her tracks. She bared her teeth at her sister. Alison could tell from Brittany's erratic thoughts that she was not thinking clearly. Flashes of the events that lead up to this soared through Brittany's mind as she tried to think of a way to get past Alison and finish of the unknown man Hanna was still guarding.

From what Alison could gather, she had been on her way to their house after going to The Brew for coffee when the faint whispers of a person's thoughts caught her attention. He was too far away for her to hear clearly, but she heard enough to be concerned. Based on the recollection that Alison was reliving through their telepathic link, Brittany had caught the words 'alcohol' and 'drugs' and 'party' along with 'teach her to tease me like that' and had abruptly changed course in order to get closer and hear more clearly. After getting close enough to hear the man's intentions, along with his proud recall of performing similar actions in the past, Brittany had snapped.

She arrived just as the man had been placing his fishing gear back into his pickup truck and had dragged him by his shaggy hair into the clearing so as to prevent anyone seeing her, and had proceeded to beat him to a bloody pulp. She was adamant in making sure he would never be able to hurt another person, much less a teenager, ever again.

She was just about to put an end to him when Hanna and Emily had shown up and Emily had tackled her from where she had been on top of the bastard. Alison could tell that Brittany was aware of the repercussions for killing somebody, but in that moment, she did not care.

Brittany snapped her jaw defiantly at Alison. "Get out of my way, Ali. Now!" Brittany wanted nothing more than to snap the sick bastard's neck. She was still so enraged that all rational thought escaped her.

Alison stood to her full height, using her size advantage to look down on Brittany. "I understand, Britt. I do. But think about what you're doing!"

"Oh I know exactly what I'm doing! He's a predator, Ali!" Brittany tried to sidestep her, but Alison had heard her consider it and was ready to move at the same time to block her. Behind her, she could feel the air ripple around her and knew that Emily was doing what she could to help calm Brittany down.

She focused back on her sister. "Yes he is. And he might deserve it. I don't care about what happens to him, I care about what happens to you!" Alison hoped Brittany could feel her desperation, could sense what she was trying to say. "You know what happens to a wolf who kills a human!" She felt a tinge of fear in the back of Brittany's mind, the aura around Brittany started to change. The fiery red lessened and Brittany's senses started to return to her. Emily's skill was to be admired.

Brittany looked at Alison with wide eyes and whined. "We can't let him go, he has no remorse. He will continue to prey on people. We have no choice!" Alison braced herself in case Brittany tried to get past her again, but the other wolf was just staring at her with helpless eyes. Alison could hear, through Brittany, the thought's of the man as Brittany had approached him. His thoughts had been smug about how clever and believable he was and how he had even been able to convince some of his victims that they had just imagined the whole thing.

Alison had to pause for a second and breathe to get her own anger in check. Brittany noticed this and couldn't help but feel a little vindicated.

Alison raised her head once again to look at her. "We are not letting him go. We'll take him to Rosewood PD and hand him over to Toby,"

Brittany growled at this. "The only evidence is in his head, Ali! They can't exactly pick through his brain the way I did!"

"Are his victims local?"

Brittany rapidly began to flip through all the thoughts she had picked up before nearly killing him, looking for anything that could indicate if these attacks had happened in Rosewood. She was flicking through them so fast, Alison couldn't keep up. She suddenly stopped at a particular memory he had been reliving as he packed up his car. The memory formed a picture in Brittany's mind, that Alison could see as well. He was sitting in a diner with a girl, who couldn't be older than 16, thinking about how nice the dress he had bought for her looked. Alison and Brittany both recognised the diner as the Rosewood Grill.

Brittany nodded. "At least one of them is."

"Got a name?"

"Maya St Germain."

"So we give him to Toby, along with the name so they can question her."

Brittany huffed in annoyance, but she had calmed down enough to know better than to argue with Alison. "Fine. But let me take him."

Alison already knew that was a bad idea, but seeing Brittany visualize hitting his head on every tree possible as she carried him on her back just cemented that belief. "Oh no. I don't think so. Emily is going to take you home. We'll talk more when I get back."

"But-"

"Brittany," Alison cut her off firmly. "Emily is taking you home, the rest of us will take him to Toby. End of story. Understand?"

Brittany lowered her head to look at the ground, ashamed. Now that she had calmed down, she was horrified by how badly she had lost control, even if the scumbag had deserved it. "Yes, Alpha."

Alison felt her anguish and padded closer to Brittany, giving her a gentle nudge with her snout. "Hey," Brittany looked up at her, hearing Ali's tone change to be more gentle. "I understand. I know it's hard. But I never want to see you go through the Ritual." Brittany's thoughts turned to dread at the mention of the Ritual. Alison decided to stop the train of thought before it caused Brittany any more despair. "He's alive, Britt. You haven't killed him. I'll make sure he gets put away for what he has done, but he's alive. You're not going to go through the Ritual."

Brittany was only slightly reassured. "You promise Toby will be able to lock him up?"

Alison nodded. "Spencer and I will take care of it. Go home. I'll be there soon." Brittany nodded, and started to walk towards the edge of the clearing.

Alison turned around and gave Emily a pointed look. The brunette knew what that look meant and immediately began to remove her clothes. Nobody batted an eyelid when she was finished, nudity was just a part of pack life. A moment later, the russet brown wolf stood before Alison.

Alison replayed the conversation so that Emily could hear and see what she and Brittany had discussed, she was amazed when Emily's thoughts were ones of disgust as opposed to anger like they had experienced. Then again, Emily had better control over her feelings than any of them.

Alison gave her mate a serious look. "Take her home, make sure she stays calm. This has shaken her a lot."

Emily nodded. "I noticed."

"I'll be back soon, then we can watch a movie and cuddle after the three of us talk. Deal?" Alison cocked her head to the side, ears upright in a playful expression.

She heard Brittany trying to work out if there was a double meaning behind the words 'watch a movie' and wonder if she should sleep outside in her wolf form tonight. She mentally smirked at her sister, pleased that she was calm enough now to be thinking about how to avoid the noises of Alison and Emily's 'bedroom activities'.

Emily's thoughts however, were right up that alley. She began to think about making out with Ali on the couch and was only stopped when Brittany growled lightly at her. Sometimes this hearing-each-other's-thoughts thing really sucked.

Emily blinked a few times before refocusing. "Sure, looking forward to it."

Alison nodded. "Get going, you two. I'll see you at home." With that, Emily and Brittany took off in the direction of their house.

Alison gave a sigh of relief. Crisis over. She pulled herself back together, pulling the ripple back to her spine before standing up, human again, and walking over to the pile of Emily's clothes that had been left behind and began putting them on. They didn't quite fit, but they would have to do seeing as her own clothes got shredded when she shifted. She walked over to the still unconscious man, before unceremoniously dumping him over her shoulder. She turned to face the questioning glances of the rest of her pack, who had not been able to hear the conversation as they had remained in human form. "I'll explain on the way, follow me." They all immediately fell into step behind the Alpha.

-x-

I had to get the plot going before I could get to the Emison goodness! That's coming next chapter! So what do you think so far? Leave me a review with your feedback! Love you guys!