Chapter 111 Queen of the Hive
They walked back from the greenhouse, the air cooling rapidly as the sun dipped below the tree line, painting the sky in bruises of purple and gold. Leela held the jars of Iron Root and Jasmine against her chest like a shield, the glass cool against her palms.
Instead of heading straight for the back door of the manor, Leela took a sharp left, her boots crunching on the gravel path.
"This way, Elder," she said, nodding her head toward the sounds of shouting drifting on the wind.
Elder Thorpe adjusted his coat, shivering slightly more from the atmosphere than the cold. He followed her toward the training grounds. The sounds of exertion—grunts, thuds, and raucous laughter—grew louder as they approached the wooden fence.
Leela stopped at the edge of the pitch, resting her elbows on the rough rail, still clutching the jars. Thorpe stood beside her, stiff and formal, watching a group of young wolves running drills. They were teenagers, mostly—lanky, uncoordinated, and full of boundless, chaotic energy. They were tackled, they rolled in the mud, and they popped back up like rubber bands.
One of the boys, a seventeen-year-old named Toby with messy hair and mud smeared across his cheek, jogged past to retrieve a wayward sparring pad. He looked up, saw the Luna standing there, and didn't freeze. He didn't drop to his knees. He didn't avert his eyes in submission.
He grinned, wiping sweat from his forehead.
"Evening, Leela!" Toby called out, breathless. "Tell Fenn I finally nailed that takedown! Jax said it was 'barely passable,' which means it was awesome!"
"I'll tell him, Toby!" Leela called back, a genuine smile breaking through the exhaustion etched on her face. "But if you track that mud into the dining hall again, you're scrubbing the floors with a toothbrush. I mean it!"
"Yes, ma'am!" he laughed, offering her a sloppy salute before jogging back to the fray.
Thorpe stood in stunned silence. His mouth opened and closed.
"He... he waved at you," Thorpe stammered, his brow furrowing as if he were trying to translate a foreign language. "He called you by your given name. No head bow? No silence? You are the Luna of the strongest pack in the territories."
Before Leela could answer, a girl named Sarah—the one who had held Caspian at breakfast—trotted over to the fence. She was panting, her knuckles taped up.
"Hey, Leela," Sarah said, leaning casually against the post right next to the Elder, ignoring his suit entirely. "You okay? You look kinda pale. Do you need me to run and get you water? Or maybe steal you a chair?"
"I'm okay, Sarah," Leela said softly, shifting the heavy jars. "Just a long day with the books. How’s the ankle?"
"Better," Sarah said, rotating her foot. "The poultice you made worked like magic. Thanks." She glanced at Leela’s belly. "Little spark behaving?"
"He's kicking up a storm," Leela laughed.
"Good. We need another striker," Sarah winked, then pushed off the fence. "See ya at dinner!"
Thorpe watched Sarah run off, completely bewildered. In the High Council courts, a subordinate speaking so casually to a Matriarch would be grounds for a flogging. Here, it was... warm.
Leela looked at the Elder, her expression softening as she watched the pack members pile onto each other in a heap of limbs and fur.
"I know how it works in other packs, Elder," she said quietly. "I know the Luna is supposed to be a statue. A figurehead on a pedestal that you walk past with your head down. She is the 'Mother,' but she is distant. She is authority. She is fear."
She shook her head, the wind catching the loose strands of her hair.
"But here? I am not a statue. I am the soil."
She nodded toward the group of trainees, who were now pushing each other and laughing, completely unbothered by her presence. They didn't lower their voices because they didn't think they had anything to hide from her.
"I stood here earlier today," Leela confessed, her voice thick with emotion, her knuckles white around the jar of Iron Root. "Right after I saw the books. Right after I saw the cages. I watched them. They are so young, Thorpe. They trip over their own paws. They get distracted by butterflies. They are clumsy and loud and messy."
She turned to him, her eyes fierce and wet.
"When they look at me, they don't see the 'Strongest Elemental in History.' They don't see a political asset or a weapon to be used in a border dispute. They see a friend. They see the woman who scolds them for muddy boots and sneaks them extra dessert. They see home."
Thorpe looked at the young wolves again. He saw the easy camaraderie, the lack of fear. In most High Council territories, the presence of leadership meant the death of joy. Here, the presence of the Luna just meant someone else was watching the game.
"Vane looks at them and sees batteries," Leela whispered, the anger simmering under her words like lava. "He sees bones to be harvested. The Council looks at them and sees numbers. You see soldiers."
She took a deep breath, the sweet scent of the Jasmine jar mingling with the earthy smell of sweat and dirt from the field.
"But when I look at them, I don't see subordinates. I see my family. Every single one of them. And I will not have them bowing to me in silence, terrified of the world we built for them. I want them waving, Elder. I want them loud. I want them safe enough to be disrespectful."
Thorpe looked at her, really looked at her, for the first time. He realized then that Vane had made a catastrophic error. He hadn't just angered a powerful magic user. He had threatened a mother who considered an entire army her children. He realized that this wasn't a kingdom; it was a hive, and Leela was the queen.
"They are the heart of this pack," Leela finished, turning back toward the house where the war room waited. "And I'm going to make sure they keep beating."