124

124
Thane's POV

“Six months,” I murmur in awe, watching as our territory begins morphing under my feet, pack lands extending to house the increasing population of supernaturals who have since hoped to make our community their home. Morning sun shines on new houses mid-being built, training fields where species of all types instruct others on what they know as children play in gardens with no fear of their parent's past.

After six months of Liam challenging us we had tripled.
Draco is chattering away in his high chair, his soft hands stained with fruit mush as he tries to spoon-feed himself with the solemn intensity that makes every single thing he does so pathetically adorable. Nine months old and our son is proving to be as intelligent as his powers have always suggested would be the case, although fortunately his reality control seems to have settled down into something a lot more manageable.

Astella reminds me as she enters the dining room with reports from the department heads an hour before our integration committee meeting, her once long brown hair tidily coiffed back into a ponytail that suits her role as Luna of not only Calaspia Bay but now thirty-two other soul families. “Here we have an affirmative action plan for housing, a boundary expansion request from the Northern Territories and that ridiculous proposition from Lady Catherine about making trade formal with her family's textile business.”

“Lady Catherine,” I say with a smile as Mark groans. "You mean Liam's mate? Aren't they together then, are they courting?”

“Last week!” Astella exclaims triumphantly, sliding into the chair beside me as Draco grabs for her with grubby hands and squeals in glee. “Never mind that when the time was right, he'd gone to her parents and asked their permission to court her properly, or that it had so impressed her father that he was now seriously thinking about forming a permanent alliance between Liam's pack.”

To be able to see the change in Liam over the last 6 months has been life changing. The angry, controlling Alpha who showed up looking for payback is replaced by a caring, attentive mate who obviously worships Catherine and works hard to see the world through her eyes and foster her dreams.

This has made their relationship a blueprint for my own expectations of relationships and all other supernatural couples in our community: it's a clear example of relationships taking work, being something you choose, not just initial attraction.

“Transformation, eh," I say with a nod towards the window where Yvonne is training young shifter, vampire and fae in combat techniques, "that sister of yours has really taken to teaching. I have never heard her try to speak so I would have never guessed that she could be a good teacher.”

“Finally found her niche,” Astella agrees, and we look together in the same direction where Yvonne is guiding a group of self-defense students who are somewhere between mid-teen and young adults. “Considering the ride we all just went on, and what they learned about collective empowerment, she wants to teach kids how important it is in life on so many levels to cooperate rather than perpetuate old animosities.”

And underneath that constant low-level of alertness required in managing a community like this, there's the resonant sense of contentment I feel through our mate bond with Astella. There are new challenges on a daily basis — border disputes between different species, miscommunications culturally, resourcing, and the bloody logistics of putting up miracle workers whose needs can be surprisingly escalating. It is true that every day also brings new challenges, but each of those challenges pales in comparison to what might be and not at all as steep as the old world chafing against this burgeoning concept of evolving symbiosis along with everything else.

I quickly cross-reference our itinerary in my head. “The vampire delegation from the Eastern Covens is here this afternoon. Lord Cassius believes they truly wish to set up a permanent embassy in our lands, Prythian, but he cautioned me that some of them still see werewolf-vampire alliances as peculiar....”

“Astella," he says after a pause and I meet his gaze to read in his eyes that same confidence, this time with certitude behind it. “Yeah, eventually we do, once they see how nice and smooth the integration is. Both sides of pureblood ideology are hyper-protective of their secrets until they learn to share them through mixed families, in play groups, invention and creation with mixing magic and knowledge types.”

We rise, talking about the day´s plan when a subtle change in the atmosphere makes us suddenly look towards the windows. And through our augmented pack connections, we could sense the impending arrival of an anomaly; a presence whose weight stretched well beyond that of an ordinary diplomat.
Point, but I can feel Astella's uncle nearby which ignites my protective instincts since he is the reason we are even here to begin with. "Ryan," my voice comes out a low growl. “Ryan Hadrid is arriving here. At least two dozen more werewolves with him, all exuding an air of desperation and determination that uncomfortably remind me of Liam's challenge.”

The announcement turns our house into a world warzone as not only do my personal guards but household members react to the Alpha command in my voice. Draco, finely attuned to alterations in the emotional landscape about him, ceases his idle torment of his dinner and gazes toward the windows with an anxious look that matches to perfection Daddy's alertness when Mom's shamanistic intuition warns her danger is on its way.

"What does he want?" Astella asks, her voice carefully modulated though I feel the jumbled feelings pulsing against our bond. In the world, where Ryan is her family's treason, the seed that weakened my first marriage, their attendant shame and banishment resulted in me. Coming face-to-face with him means moving backward the grief she's struggled to leave behind.

I shake my head. "Honestly, we don't know," I say as I move my hand to grab Draco in case this visit fucking boils down into individual battlequares. “I am not taking any chances, however, as the curveball can arrive from behind us. Alert our security teams and tell the visiting delegations to prepare for emergency protocols.”

I can feel my alert radiating out through these improved pack bonds which now encompass all of our web packs. Werewolf patrollers scout out our borders, vampires get their heightened senses into tip-top shape in anticipation of a threat, witches start stocking up their spells, and faes from the commune go about preparing for whatever nature sets upon us. Instead of panic, instead of chaos - it is simply the still, real-time reaction of a group that has been disciplined at handling pressure together.

Astella, calling on her shaman senses that provide more information on the emotional states of Ryan than they do with normal perception as well. "He feels... smaller somehow. Diminished. As though he has been lugging around shame that sapped his confidence and control right out of him.”

"Good," I replied without sympathy. “Perhaps that guilt will make him more settled than Liam was. Not that I am holding my breath mind you- desperate men are even worse than angry ones.”

However as Ryan materializes over the hill, which marks our new extended boundary line, those changes Astella spoke of seem to manifest themselves within his very flesh. “He is no longer the cocksure, arrogant Beta who believed he could spin his path to leadership; he is a man striding warily under the weight of consequences and lesson-learned.”

“ He wants to say sorry,” Astella breathes in wonder, her channel from the infinite that makes more of us messes than not seeing intentions clearer than the whole of our muddled human languages can. “He's not here to voice a challenge or to take a stand. He's here to make up for what he did, to ask for a forgiveness he probably doesn't believe he deserves.”

“Then what do you want to do? I asked, the human side of me wanting to protect my mate against the animalistic need for control over family relationships.

She finally determines, "I wanna know what he has to say. However, not because I am willing to forgive him, not because I purchase into his bullshit motivations, but now it is maybe realizing if he truly changed or if this was another one of his manipulation attempts.”

“We will want to hear him out, then. Agreed. Even if we do it, we're going to do it on our terms, in our region and with people there who are ready to respond if this thing goes sideways.”

We haven't even reached diplomatic approach territory yet when Draco claps his hands together all delighted and laughing like it's the funnest thing in the world instead of maybe a bad idea. Given the bizarre, knowing gaze that seems to orchestrate our son's response to intricate circumstances, I suspect this standoff will play out differently than any of us anticipate.