When Jaden awoke his nose was inches from an unfamiliar fabric. That was nothing new; waking up in the same place was a novelty in his nomadic life. But the sound of a heartbeat and warm chest beneath him was very different.

Realizing he was on top of somebody woke Jaden up all the way. He quickly tried to get his bearings. He was on a couch, under a blanket, with his head resting – quite comfortably – on someone’s chest. He tried to move and discovered his pants were halfway down his thighs.

Jaden managed to lift his head enough to look around. The sight of the cabin quickly jogged his memory. Oh hell. The dreaded meeting between him and his true mate had occurred. Shit, forget that, he’d had sex with his true mate. A hazy recollection of their final moments of bliss came back to him.

They’d come. Cale had stayed in him, helping to support his weight, until the knot deflated, unlike some horror stories Jaden had heard. Then, Cale had eased himself onto the couch and sprawled on most of it with a contented sigh, leaving Jaden to snuggle in with him. It seemed that he had just crawled on top and flopped down without even bothering to pull up his pants.

Even under the blanket and cuddled with Cale, Jaden could tell the tiny shack was freezing. Each breath he took puffed visibly in front of him and he could see Cale’s breath as well. Part of him wished they could just stay under the blanket and warm all day, but Jaden quickly dismissed the thought.

He shifted his weight again and found himself gazing into a pair of sleepy eyes.

“Morning,” he said awkwardly.

Cale blinked a few times, then the same sheepish expression crossed his face. “Morning.”

The blanket slid off as they sat up and they both shivered.

“Man, it really got cold in here,” Cale said.

Jaden nodded toward the window finally illuminating the cabin. It was a dim, gray light, but at least it was sunlight. “Looks like the storm stopped though.”

“Good.” Cale stood and fixed his pants, flushing slightly as he did. “We should get some firewood and warm up a bit. Get some good food in us and then trek back to the lodge.”

“Sounds good.” Jaden took a deep breath and braced himself for the cold. He flung off the blanket and quickly pulled up his own pants. “I hope our jackets are dry.”

Cale was already at the coat rack, trying his own. “Yeah, they are.”

Shaking off the last numbness of sleep, Jaden crossed the cabin to join him and began to pull his own gear on. They stepped outside into a transformed world. Everything was absolutely coated in white. An icy wind was still blowing. Tree branches, dangerously bowed and loaded with snow, swayed and creaked in the wind.

“I don’t think we should stay out here too long,” Cale said, eyeing the snow-laden trees. Some of those are ready to go over.”

“Some of them have.” Jaden pointed to a snapped pine. Others near it were weighed down by the snow until their tops were actually on the ground. “I’ve never seen snow like this.”

“I’m not sure if I have either,” Cale admitted. “Where did you see the firewood?”

“Over this way.” Jaden left the cabin first, trying to lead the way. The snow was up to his waist and the going was difficult. Cale pushed up next to him, shoveling the snow away with his hands.

“This is way too deep for the snowmobile,” said Cale.

“What snowmobile?” Jaden chuckled.

The alpha cast a look behind them where he had tucked the machine. The snow had drifted so high he couldn’t even see a lump where it was buried.

They were panting from exertion and shivering before they even got halfway to the woodpile.

“I don’t think we’re getting to the lodge today in this,” Jaden said.

“Not as humans.”

“Not as wolves! I don’t know about you, but this would be way over my head once I change. And it’s the wrong consistency for walking on top of.”

Cale had been so focused on the cold snow creeping into cracks in his clothing that he hadn’t taken the depth into consideration. He grunted in agreement, not wanting to admit that he hadn’t thought the wolf option through.

At last, they reached the spot where Jaden was fairly sure the woodpile was. They located it, brushed off a good foot of snow, and each loaded up as much as they could carry. Without their arms for balance, trudging back through the path they made wasn’t nearly as easy as they had expected. The snow was still deep and the wind had already drifted some of it back into place.

“This is ridiculous,” Jaden snarled as he stumbled again.

“You’re right, we’re stuck here for at least another day,” said Cale. And night…

They were exhausted by the time they reached the cabin. They both gratefully let the logs clatter to the ground.

“Let’s get a fire going,” Jaden said, kicking off his boots and stripping out of his clothes as fast as he could. Despite doing his best to bundle up, the snow had found every inch of exposed skin and worked its way under his layers.

“Crap, we didn’t get kindling,” Cale groaned.

“I think we can manage.”

Jaden grabbed a stack of newspapers from by the little wood stove and started balling them up. Cale was no stranger to building fires, but resisted the urge to go help the omega. He had gotten the impression that Jaden had a bit of a dominant streak. It was oddly attractive and not what Cale would have expected.

He watched curiously as Jaden grabbed several tea lights from the cupboard, shook them out of their metal holders, and began to arrange them in the stove in and around the newspaper balls.

“Grab me a couple of logs.”

Holding back a smile, Cale did as he was told. A little voice in the back of his mind wondered if his concern about a dependent omega getting in the way of his pack obligations might not be such a concern after all…

Jaden stuck the logs in, set a couple of tea lights on and under them, and then struck the lighter.

“I don’t think the candles are going to generate much warmth,” Cale felt compelled to say.

“They aren’t for warmth,” Jaden said. “They’ll help dry out the wood, burn longer than the paper, and the ones on top will drip down wax which will heat up and help catch the wood. Otherwise I’m worried it’s too wet to burn.”

With that, he lit the newspapers on fire. Cale watched as some of the candles lit on their own and others did indeed begin to melt, dripping down the wet wood. The logs hissed and steamed from the heat, but Cale didn’t see any flames. The balls of newspaper went out, but several of the tea lights were still merrily flickering. To his surprise, the bottoms of some of the logs were starting to blacken from the flames as some even began to lick up the sides of the bark.

Jaden patiently fed newspaper and candles into the stove until the logs finally began to catch and hold the flames. He retrieved more logs and put them on top of the stove.

“To dry,” he explained in case Cale asked. “Hopefully we’ll have better luck with these once the others make us some embers.”

“Where did you learn to do this? I’ve never seen anyone use candles instead of kindling.”

Jaden shrugged. “We didn’t always have the best living accommodations. Sometimes we had no heat. Sometimes we didn’t have a home at all. We learned to make due.”

Cale’s stomach twisted at the mention of not having a home. He knew Jaden had it rough, but he’d never imagined it was that bad.

“Anyway, we should be able to get some food cooking now.”

“Sounds good to me. Let’s get this place warmed up, eat some food, and… I dunno, maybe it’ll be easier going out there after the sun gets a chance to warm it up and melt some snow.”

“Maybe.”

A crack echoed through the air, followed by a crash. They both jumped in alarm, then laughed.

“One of those trees went,” Jaden said.

“Maybe not a good idea to strike out today. Once the snow starts melting the trees will snap back into place, if they don’t break.”

“Yeah…” Jaden turned his attention to the cupboards, ignoring how torn he was at the idea of another night trapped with his true mate.

* * *

The stove wasn’t quite hot enough for cooking yet, so they settled on a very un-breakfast like meal of chips and salsa. Much to their dismay, the pipes had frozen. Cale made a quick trip outside to collect a couple of pots of snow, which he set near the stove to melt. Cale ate on the couch, while Jaden lingered near the stove, periodically adjusting the logs and prodding at the fire.

Cale was impressed when the fire finally roared to life, shortly after they were done eating. The logs on top of the stove were steaming and growing visibly dryer from the heat. Given how small the building was, it wouldn’t take long to start warming up. Cale thought he might already feel the edge coming off of the chill.

“You should put your mulling spices on there,” Cale suggested.

Jaden looked at him in surprise. “Really?!”

The alpha shrugged. “I thought they smelled good. It’s not like the stove isn’t already hot; might as well use it.”

The omega didn’t argue. He carefully cleared a small space by the logs and set his mulling spices down. He puttered around the kitchen for a couple of minutes, cleaning up what he could without water. It didn’t take long before he was out of reasons to avoid the couch. If he was honest with himself, his legs were still a bit tired from struggling through the snow. He reluctantly headed over to the couch and sat down as far from Cale as possible. The other wolf offered him a small smile, which he returned, before the awkward silence set it.

Cale’s thoughts kept coming back to Jaden’s comment about being homeless at times. He was curious about the omega’s past. And it wasn’t because the man was his true mate; at least that’s what he kept telling himself. Cale doubted that just asking about being homeless would be well received, so he kept quiet until he felt inspired with a better phrased query.

“Sounds like you moved around a lot,” he commented, giving the omega the chance to avoid answering if he wanted to.

“All my life,” Jaden said. “This honestly might be the longest we’ve ever stayed in one place.”

“You’ve only been here a couple of months”

Jaden shrugged. “We never spent more than a week or two in most places. Sometimes we’d hunker down for the winter if we were further north, but never longer than that.”

“Why did you move so much?”

“A combination of looking for my brother and paranoia.”

Cale didn’t miss the hint of annoyance in Jaden’s tone on the last word. “Paranoia?”

“My father spent years worrying that someone from our old pack would track us down and kill us or try to recapture us.”

“I thought the pack was uh… dealt with.” Cale was sure he had been told that the pack had been forcibly disbanded, with quite a bit of violence.

“It was,” Jaden said dryly. “Didn’t stop him from worrying. And then after that he became convinced that someone from one of the packs we stayed with would either never let us leave or would come after us. So, we moved around a lot and never stayed long to keep that from happening.”

“Must have been rough.”

“It was.” Jaden inclined his head toward the roaring fire. “Guess I picked up some useful skills along the way.”

Cale nodded in agreement. “Did you stay with other packs the entire time?”

“No, we stayed all over. Hotels, shelters, the woods, cheap apartments… you name it.”

“How did you afford it?”

“My father worked odd jobs. Usually just enough to get us to our next place. When I got older I started doing it too. I guess that’s part of why I agreed to pledge to this pack…”

Cale silently raised an eyebrow, inviting Jaden to elaborate.

“He’s getting older and doesn’t have any marketable skills. He broke his leg a few years back and I had to take care of him and I realized… well, he can’t keep up this lifestyle forever. He needs a pack.”

“But you don’t want one.”

Jaden smiled grimly. “If I didn’t pledge here, at least for a little while, he’d never agree to stay. I’m glad Niles is here though. If I do decide this isn’t the life for me, I think it’ll be easier to convince my dad to stay without me.”

“Why don’t you want a pack, anyway?” Sure, Cale had been filled in by his brother and mother, but he hoped to get a few more details from the omega.

Jaden sighed and leaned back on the couch. “Why don’t I want a pack… or a true mate?”

Cale shrugged one shoulder. “Either. Neither if you don’t want to tell me. I won’t pry.”

“Not like there’s anything else to talk about,” Jaden said with a grim chuckle. “I suppose it all stems back to before I was born… I don’t know how much you already know…”

“I’d like to hear it from you,” Cale said honestly.

“Okay.” Jaden stretched as he considered where to begin. “Well, my father found his true mate and they were together for only a few weeks. They weren’t in a great pack, but my father’s situation improved quite a bit with an alpha in his life. And then Master – that’s what he made us call him – attacked. He had an army of betas who raided other packs. They killed every alpha, my father’s true mate included, and took the omegas as slaves for breeding. The betas were given a choice to join the ranks or die.”

“Horrible,” Cale said softly.

His mate nodded grimly. “Anyway, before my father was mated, he realized he was pregnant and knew he had to escape. An omega child would just be enslaved like him, while a beta would be taken and forced into training for Master’s army. But an alpha…”

“He’d kill a baby?”

Jaden fixed him with a dark, bitter smile. “He’d enslave or expose one to violence.”

“Fair point.”

“I guess you know the gist of the rest. My father got away, just in time for Niles to be born. But, he was found and returned to the pack. He convinced them Niles had died at birth and left him in the hospital.”

Cale nodded.

“Well, the wolf who found him was a beta from their old pack. Master offered him ‘anything he wanted’ as a reward for returning my father. So, he asked for my father.”

“What?!”

“He knew that getting a runaway back wasn’t enough. Master would have been brutal with my father as an example. Assuming he didn’t kill him outright. Master liked to reward betas with slaves of their own, so he asked for my father, in order to protect him. They had been packmates, after all. From what I understand, he and my father’s true mate had known each other well.”

“I see,” Cale said.

“Master was no fool. He knew what was going on, but didn’t want to go back on his word. He gave the beta my father, with one condition: my father had to be pregnant within six months, or he’d be declared barren. And executed.”

“Holy shit…” Cale shook his head as the pieces fell together. “Your other father…”

Jaden nodded grimly. “Obviously, they succeeded. Not long after I was born that pack was, as you put it, dealt with. And my beta father was killed.” He paused for a moment to sigh. He had long ago gotten over it, as much as one could. Several packs joined together to liberate us. They freed the omegas, killed Master as he deserved, but the betas… Some of them bought into Master’s madness. They attacked willingly. Eager to kill as many as they could. Others were torn between attacking or surrendering. If the packs trying to save us were defeated, then any betas who wouldn’t attack knew they’d be at risk. My beta father was caught up in the chaos and killed. I honestly don’t know if he was actually fighting or not…. I like to think, based on how kindly he treated my father, that he was on the right side.”

“I’m sure he was.”

Jaden smiled sadly in response. He took a moment to collect his thoughts. “So, that was that. Some joined other packs. My father decided he wanted to try and find my brother, if he could. I know he struggled a lot with what to do with me.”

“Do with you?”

“Take me with him or leave me. He was often tempted to find a nice family somewhere in a good pack and let them care for me. Give me a normal life, you know? But he also couldn’t bear the thought of parting with another child, especially since he didn’t even know if Niles was alive. In the end he decided to keep me with him.

“We started at the hospital where Niles was born, then spiraled out slowly from there pack by pack. My father was terrified we’d find a bad pack who would capture us or, like I said, someone from our old pack would have somehow survived and would hunt us. But, he was determined to find some word of an orphaned wolf pup who was the right age. We’d stay with each pack long enough for him to be sure Niles wasn’t there and then we’d go.”

“You must have been an adaptable kid.”

“I think I was a terror,” Jaden admitted with a chuckle. “I’m going to tend the fire…” He stood and crossed the room to the stove.

The logs on top were nice and dry. He tossed a couple into the fire and watched in satisfaction as the splinters on them started to catch. He grabbed a couple more wet ones and put them on the stove before returning to the couch.

“I guess, since you’re here, your father never gave up searching,” Cale said.

“No, he didn’t. A lot of people think it should bother me,” said Jaden. “Being dragged around while he looked for my other sibling. But, it never did. He did his best by me. Taught me to be self-sufficient and never let me doubt he loved me… But, I guess he taught me to be too self-reliant.”

“How so?”

“Because I feel like I don’t need a pack now. Or a true mate,” he added. “My father still mourns his. Not my father, whom he was with significantly longer, but his first mate. His true mate. That never bothered me either, except to make me sad. And scared. I know my parents didn’t exactly choose to be with each other, but my father has been single ever since. He grieves his true mate like it was months ago, not years. Hell, decades. It sort of scared me off of having one, if I’m honest. That and I’ve seen so many cruel alphas. Or just nasty ones. Omegas who are afraid to leave their mates, or are treated like crap. I’ve met omegas who dream about nothing but being claimed by an alpha and living to serve him. Ones who have no clue how to do anything but cook and clean. I never wanted that for me, and my father made sure I had the skills to avoid that fate. I can take care of myself. I’ve never needed a pack or an alpha and I don’t… I honestly don’t know if I want one. I think my father is realizing he’s getting older too though, and as much as I’m trying to get him settled somewhere safe, I think he's trying to get me out of the wandering life as well.”

Cale nodded. “Yeah, my mother was saying he’s worried you’re not doing anything to try and settle down here.”

“She was?” Jaden asked in surprise. Cale winced, and Jaden quickly connected the dots. “He’s the reason your brother came to talk to me, isn’t he?”

“He wants what’s best for you,” Cale said lamely.

Jaden chuckled. “I know. I know.” He tilted his head curiously at the alpha. Your mother talked to you, too?”

“I was supposed to come talk to you…” Cale admitted.

“What?”

“She thought I’d be less threatening. We’re both the younger brother and I’m not the future alpha of this pack… Anyway I got to Omega Row and saw you shoveling the driveway…”

“You knew I was your true mate already.”

“I’m sorry, I did.”

“And you left?”

Cale hung his head. “I got my brother to talk to you instead. I assumed you’d be all excited to meet your true mate and I’d have to let you down. I’m sorry, I should have…”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Jaden said.

Cale looked at him in surprise. “You are?”

“Well, I was worried that you might not be completely honest about not wanting a true mate. You know, just saying it to placate me or something. Knowing that you knew before and did nothing….”

Cale chuckled. “Boy, are we a pair.”

“We sure are.” Jaden’s laugh turned into a yawn. “Ugh, I don’t know why I’m tired. Hey, I bet we can make coffee now. Want some?”

“If you don’t mind.”

Jaden shook his head. Strangely enough, getting a cup of coffee for Cale didn’t seem at all as objectionable as serving him had seemed the day before.

Cale followed him across the room curiously. “But the coffee maker isn’t going to work.”

“I’m resourceful,” Jaden said with a smirk, “remember?”

Cale grinned and leaned against the counter to watch. Jaden put a small pot of water on the stove to boil, which wasn’t much to see. After it finally boiled, Jaden held a coffee filter up over a mug, put in the coffee grounds, and slowly poured the boiling water in.

“That’s…” Cale said, impressed.

“Exactly what happens in the coffee maker,” Jaden finished. “Just minus the coffee maker.” He offered Cale the first mug, then did it again for himself.

They returned to the couch, mugs in hand, and quietly sipped their coffee. When they were done, Cale volunteered to check the conditions outside, while Jaden stoked the fire.

The alpha bundled up quickly and headed out. The sun was high in the sky, but the wind was still blowing and there was no sign the snow had really started to melt. Cale had to re-forge his way through the snow to the woodpile. It was a bit easier to get through the snow than it had been in the morning, but the snow on the sides of their path had collapsed into it, so it was still a struggle.

“I would’ve helped you get wood,” Jaden said, when Cale returned with an armload.

“It’s okay, I figured I’d grab it while I was out.” Cale dumped the wood in the corner by the stove and stopped to admire the roaring fire and warm himself. Once his hands were warm he looked around, taking stock of the remaining logs. “Think I should get more? I’m not sure this will last us through the night.”

“It can’t hurt, want help?”

“Nah, I’ll just make one more trip.”

Determined to be useful Jaden offered to start lunch. Cale ended up making two more trips. Then, they settled down with hot soup, wondering just how close to lunch time they actually were.