Bonnie called many of the pack’s more maternal members and asked them to meet with Jessie later this morning. It was a hard night to sleep for Jessie, and she kept. Waking Alrick up with her, tossing and turning. Now tired as she was, Jessie waited for help to arrive. If they arrived.
Bonnie sat with Jessie as she waited. “If they don’t come, then we’ll do this ourselves. When they come around, they’ll regret their decision when they can’t benefit from our work.”
“That sounds drastic, and it goes against what Alrick said. No, we’ll do what we can and leave it like that. I won’t put an entitlement barrier up between the groups. It wouldn’t be right or fair to anyone.’
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Ashley and Sal left Rachel’s cabin to return to what Ashley realized was their home currently. She realized she felt numb. Numb from shock because she didn’t have anywhere to turn. Everyone abandoned her, even her father left her to her own devices. What was she going to do? She couldn’t believe this was happening. She either accepted Sal or abandon her life. Meaning she’d have to find a new pack. Either way, she’d be walking away from her life. That was terrifying to her. Inside again, with coats off, Sal moved into the kitchen and Ashley settled onto a sofa. She contemplated what to do. With a staggeringly larger number of confusing and conflicting things floating in her head, she watched Sal moved through the kitchen. Curiously, she watched him for the first time move about in the kitchen. It wasn&r
Rachel sat back after closing the last file and looked at Davie. “Well dear. I think we need to interrogate Hector Kilian. I can’t hand over this case to the council with these gaping holes.” Davie shifted in his seat and looked at her in all seriousness. “I agree. We may have the head of the monster dealt with, and one of its claws. But there’s still the arm of the problem we need to annex. Someone is pulling Kilian’s strings and receiving these shipments. I suspect person is the one tampering with the facts we’ve been receiving.” “I suspect it’s a local, but I can’t be sure if we’ve encountered them or not. Things appear very well buried. It’s someone the Alpha doesn’t
The last of the decorations finally arrived. Jessie found the delivery room in chaos as people tried valiantly to organize it, and handle the influx of deliveries. The older pups were hauling out abandoned packages. It was their job to figure out who the package was for and then deliver it. They added the new packages to the new system, and they sent the package owner’s notification to pick them up. Some packages were so old no one knew the names on the packages, or the owners were no longer living. They placed them on a shelf to be dealt with later. Jessie took possession of the decorative greenery baskets. With them in hand, she left them in the dining room. “Bonnie, the greenery is in the dining room ready for the volunteers. I need to get over to the Iron Hill packhouse and check how things have started there. Now, are you sure you have this managed?” “Yes, Luna. We’ll be ready for t
Alrick tried to keep his mind on the work he was overseeing. There were so many sites. From foundations, that was complicated, as they needed to thaw the ground and pray that the concrete hardened. Thank heavens none of these new buildings needed a basement. Then there was the cleanup of the old buildings. Most were being torn down, but they could save and dedicate three to storage. The mine was close by, so they’d build a smaller medical centre between the mine and this community. After the refugees settled, the additions to the original medical centre would start construction. Alrick
Jessie finally returned from her day. Tomorrow was the New Year’s Eve event. Once that was over, it would move all available hands to get the cleanup done and everything as close to readiness as possible for the refugees. January third would see NARC workers coming in to help speed things up. There weren’t many because many of the supernatural factions were dealing with similar issues. However, it was the shifter and the vampire communities that were hit the hardest. Within the shifters, the worst hit was in fact not the Wolves, but the Beard. All over North America, the Bear Communities were choosing to change the fundamental way they lived. Choosing to leave the isolated family homesteads to live similarly to the Wolf Communities in enclaves could promote communication and provide better security. Silver Ridge was lu
Jessie was focusing on the Refugees. How’re they to interact with the people themselves? How would they explain the history of the land? Those from Iron Hill wouldn’t return because of their memories. The land wasn’t bad. The new homes were going in closer to the Silver Ridge property line so they wouldn’t feel so isolated. They would form the old packhouse into a second hub. Specifically, for those who’d work there. They planned other building construction for the future. The pack would span two towns soon. This would open places inside the pack for those entering the pack. The miners would have needed services. The sheep and chickens would have workers and guardians. “We’ll tell them the truth. At least, the adults. We’ll add in the planned improvements, as well. Then they’ll h
Finally, the meeting ended with promises that they’d come back for the start of the celebrations at noon. “I’ll go finish up figuring out when we have time for any of this and attempt to prioritize it all.” Alrick closed the door behind the NARC investigators and looked at his mate. “I wish we knew something of the timeline of how events will play out. I’ll keep you company while you work. I’m tired but I don’t want to have another trip into the Dream Realm again.” Alrick frowned. “You might get more clarity.” “What if cl
The morning came to early Jessie woke up to music playing outside. Just as the music got started, it would stop and start again. Someone was setting up the sound system. A peek outside the window showed Jessie that the front lawn was bustling with people. The last steps for the New Year’s Eve Event. She couldn’t believe that things have come so far, so fast, yet there was so much more that need to be done. Jessie needed to remember that there was so much more they’d need to accomplish in the coming days. But today would be for the pack one last hurrah before their expansion would happen. Alrick Came out of the bathroom having just finished showering and stepped into his closet. She figured now was her turn to get her day sta
Three months since the mine returned to the Silver Ridge Pack’s control. It’d been out of their hands for almost six months in total. The miners could finally return to the mine safely. Oddly, the Fae never returned to the region. Perhaps the Fae thought better of returning for some unknown reason? Either way, the pack now settled into their new way of life. Everyone lived more closely together and now grew closer to each other every day. Kelly and Kyle focused on themselves and the things going on in the tavern. Making changes where needed to make life easier for the suddenly overflowing pack living and working under the tavern’s roof. Not everyone initially was a pack member, which meant there were strangers among them, but they were in the same position as the pack. They would come to find their places in the pack. It wasn’t smo
Kyle left Craig’s office and went back to the tavern. The changes around here didn’t sit well with him. He didn’t know how he’d tell Kelly the truth about him. He’d told Alpha Alrick when he approached him to ask for membership, and they both agreed that they would take it easy and not tell anyone about it. He entered the warmth of the tavern and went in search of Kelly. There were more people staying here. Kyle would need to get used to it. On a good note, someone started preparing the bar for tonight. He wondered who that was. He’d need to find out and see what he could arrange. It would be nice to have someone else behind the bar a few nights per week. He’d have time to focus on Kelly and Eddie. Here’s hoping it wasn’t Kelly. She would have so much on her hands right now. He w
In the Chamber, Dean found his people working hard to document everything they could. He thought of the worst-case scenario. His mind worked out vague plans on how they’d evacuate the entire pack or packs. He didn’t know where the blast radius would be. If they could use this magical leak to their advantage, they could use it to attract the magically starved Fae here. Because they’d attacked several wells of power in Europe. Well, ancient wells, wells that ran dry over a thousand years ago of their magic. “Sir! I think you need to see this.” One of the portal experts brought in to review what they’d found. “I need to show you what we have. Though I think we just might have a weapon on our hands that we can use.&r
Dean left the Alpha’s office and moved towards the vehicle that would take him to the mine. His heart sank. Because of the lies he must tell these shifters. But the mage’s council ordered the information with a need to know thing. Those runes weren’t the mystery. It’s the placement of them. Dates and times didn’t add up for them. The meaning of the runes was what they wanted, kept quiet. Mages or even druids opened these portals. It’d been the humans, but that wasn’t the shocking thing. Humans didn’t possess magic, meaning someone was powering them. Someone supernatural, and the traces of power he’d found at the other site told him far too much. It took him several weeks to discover what supern
Alrick sat back in his chair as he watched Jessie walk from the room. He hated doing that, but the future didn’t look like it would be any easier. If Kelly and Kyle possessed any chance at happiness, they must work things out by themselves. Interfering with any part of the process would cause complications and all involved would suffer for it. He couldn’t stand for that. Now he needed to focus on the issues at hand and put out as many of the dumpster fires as possible. Craig found three incidents already where he’d forced wolves into time out, meaning they’d locked them away for a time to cool off. To wolves, this was like putting a drunk into a drunk tank to sober up. Territorial instinct still lingered within wolf shifter’s minds.&nbs
Jessie now sat in Alrick’s office again. Alrick returned to the office and instantly went to his computer and copying something to everyone. There were two mages in there with them and they were watching a video Alrick took of the portal. “Well, it’s definitely not natural, and whatever is trapped inside the crystal isn’t as secure as we hoped. Look at this crack here. When the wall came down, it must have damaged it. We’ll get it secured as soon as we’re done here. But the runes are fascinating. I’ve not seen anything similar to this. We need to get copies of them. Then we’ll get people in translating them. But I know these aren’t from the local area. They didn’t have a written language when these runes appeared, that’s for sure. Someone came here and did this long
Kyle couldn’t believe this. It took him several attempts to discover why this summons came so suddenly. When the enforcers first entered the tavern, he thought they were there to take him away from everything and everyone that he’d grown to love within the last few years. Now, with Kelly so close all the time, he didn’t want to deal with this. He just wanted to live a quiet life. Thank the gods he didn’t go off on them. Because what they called them in for was far more unbelievable. The Fae were back. Gods, the Fae. Now here they were setting up people to stay above the tavern. Several would stay in the restaurant, studying the human media for mentions of their actions. Others looked after the cattle. The mine would one day return to the pack, and only the gods knew when it would happen. NARC sent a motley cr
Kelly couldn’t believe what was going on. Her heart pounded as they escorted everyone to the Audience Chamber. Her confusion increased when she saw everyone entering at the same time. Was there something wrong with the refugees? Before entering she asked several people but all she learnt was, it was an emergency. Once inside, though, she learnt quickly about some very unbelievable things. The Fae were back and roaming the world again. How could that happen? No one was aware of that. They could only find out that one enforcer on duty at the mine experienced an attack by an unknown Fae. Where and why were both great mysteries? Kelly quickly found Petra and retriev
Alrick sent the first force back to the Audience Chamber to help with organizing nearly three hundred shifters. They would fan out throughout the emergency land. When this pack first settled here, they laid out the main buildings in such a way that they could guard them easier, and the pack could monitor each others’ safety. The issue with this is it didn’t take into the changes within fighting over time. With machine flight, and now Fae using the Dream Realm as their public transit. They literally popped in and out at will. But at least it gave protection from physical attack and a false belief that everything would be okay. He prepared to go with his second set of forces for a short time. He needed to assess what truly was there. Not that he didn’t believe Herald. If Herald said he saw this, then Alrick believed