As soon as I give him the go ahead, Dante rushes over to check on me and even Hazel. He has heard me speak of her often enough to know that she means something to me. Hazel was slightly taken aback by the Alpha of the pack coming to check on her. Still, she takes it in stride as she finishes calming down. I create another bed for her in one of the spare rooms so that she can sleep up here and away from everyone for a couple of nights. I even went so far as to add her specific signature to the door so she will not need me to get in.Once she settles herself in her temporary room, Dante and I find ourselves alone. It has been such a stressful day that I do not even know how to unwind from it. My witches were attacked in their own home. That is not something that can be taken lightly. They might be the Council but I am not going to allow this to happen again.I walk up to him and just collapse in his arms. He winds his arms around me as I bury my face into his chest. This is not how I ex
How can my father possibly be alive after all of these years? There is no way that he would not come to find me after everything that happened. He would have made sure that I was okay all of these years and felt loved. Everything would have been so different!"Laina, are you okay? I know that this is quite the bombshell but I could never tell you before." Elle says to me sounding panicked.Shifting my eyes to her, I look at her anew. How could she know this all of this time and never say anything to me before now? If she knew that he was alive then why did she not help him find me? Is he hurt? What could possibly keep him from me?"He can't be alive." I say softly. I am close to tears but there is no way that I am going to let her see them now. "Why do you say that? Do you really think that I would lie to you about something like that?" She asks me incredulously."Of course I have to believe that you would lie to me about that. If not then you have been lying to me all along about hi
"Get out of my room. I will talk to you some more tomorrow. I need some space for now." I tell Elle angrily.WIthout another word, she backs out of my room with her hands up. She must be able to tell just how upset I am with her right now. That is not just some small secret to keep. That is something major. "Are you alright?" Dante asks me."I feel like you have been saying that a lot today." I joke halfheartedly."Yes, well, you have had one heck of a day. For a minute there I was not sure that you were even going to respond." He says sounding extremely concerned.He grabs one of my hands again and begins to rub the back of it with his thumb. I slowly start to relax as I focus on the feeling of his finger drawing circles on my had. No matter how bad or crazy my day is, he somehow always finds a way to calm me down. Even if it is just by rubbing the back of my hand."For a moment I did not think I could respond. My mind went blank. It was impossible for me to think or even focus on w
I ended up crying myself to sleep for the first time as an adult. I alternated between being excited about the possibility of seeing my father and unable to wait to go get him, to being terrified that no matter what he will not remember me, to crying again because my entire day was just too much. I have prided myself on keeping my cool up since being mated to Dante but today was just too much. Finally, I have reached my breaking point.Now, I am trying to figure out how to go down to breakfast and face the Council again. I am not quite sure that I am ready to see Simonetta's face again. It will be interesting to hear if anything else happened after I brought Hazel up here. I just happen to know that with everything that happened last night, I am a little surprised that the house is even still standing."You are not really going to let them get to you are you? You are better than all of them. It is not like you really need their approval." Dante says to me when he looks at my face.My
Even though the Council members were quiet during breakfast, there is no way that it could last all day. I am honestly a little shocked when we finish breakfast and nobody has said a word. What could be keeping them so quiet? I know that they have plenty to say.I do not have to wait long to hear them start bringing up last night though. As I walk out of the dining area, Safiya rushes up to me. "Laina, the Council wishes to speak to you." She tells me simply before walking towards their quarters once again.Does that mean that she considers herself a part of the Council still? It seemed like she was drifiting away from it but maybe they do not have any other options to fill her spot? I believe that she said that only family members can take a role on the Council but there has to be some type of fail safe in case something like this happens. Might as well get this over with I guess. I already proved to them and myself that there is not much they can do to harm me. Thanks to the Moon
Safiya is looking more and more please as I continue on with my tirade. I knew that she did not agree with what she was saying. I am going to have to find out how they made her say those things. She was definitely on my side last night. "This is not how things are going to go anymore. You might run this Coven but we are above all of the Covens. You are going to take this punishment as nobody is above punishment from us. Not even Safiya here." Simonetta says with a smirk.She must be getting some of her snarkiness back finally. Good, I was starting to think that this was going to be a boring meeting. It is no fun when they do not fight back. It was almost too easy."I will agree to your punishments when you can prove that it is something that the Moon Goddess wishes. She is the only authority that I see. The rest of you are just some witches that were born into a role that has lost its way. This Council was not created to lord over all of the witch Covens. It was made to keep them all
I avoid Elle for most of the day after dealing with the Council. I can feel her eyes on me while I work with some of the novices on plans for next weekend's dance. After all of the drama with the Council and Hazel we decided to give it another week. Hopefully, this will help to draw the witches back together after last night's incident.As I gather some of the novices together to begin working on their dance, I notice that they all seem particularly quiet. This group that consists of Jade, Hazel, Blair and Sage are never quiet. They normally joke around non stop and in general act like teenagers. Today, they are all rather quiet but I constantly catch them staring at me. After a while, I finally snap."What is going on with you four today? Normally I cannot get you to shut up but today you will not even talk. What is going on?" I say exasperatedly."I think that they are all rather shocked after last night. You were a little scary." Hazel admits.Each of the other girls nods enthusias
Safiya finally comes walking out of their quarters and stops when she sees me. Is she worried that she will get into more trouble by hanging out with me and the Novices or something? Before she continues this way, Viola walks back out and joins Safiya on her walk over.When they reach my, I raise an eyebrow at Safiya and the fact that she has a babysitter. I knew that they were upset with her and did not trust her after last night but leaving her with a babysitter is just degrading. What do they think that they are accomplishing with all of this?She just gives me an annoyed look as she pulls out her notes for the dance that we are trying to learn. Even though we had not really talked much about which one we are going to do we seem to be on the same page. She looks at my choices of which Novices are going to be moving up and gives a nod of approval. I guess that is as much as I can get from her now.Elle is watching from the doorway into the kitchen as we set the girls up in pairs an
"Wait, you can do that?" Frank asks shocked. "Yes, of course I can. It is not something that I have done often, actually only one other time but it is an option. It is one that terrifies her." I admit. "Who did you do it to before?" Rand asks me. "I did it to Morden. There was no other way to stop her from coming after my pack or my family." I answer simply. "Your grandmother said that Simonetta was behind that the entire time. That only makes it right that she gets the same punishment if not worse than what Morden received." Rand points out. I had not thought of it that way but it is true. Still, we need to have a system set up for something like this. Otherwise, there will always be somebody that takes advantage of the power and that is not something that I can condone. "That is very true. I had not thought of that but this is not a decision to be made lightly. There might be longer reaching consequences that even I am not aware of by using this ability. Still, I see no other o
It did not take long at all for the Hybrid Council to arrive. They all file in looking a little shocked to see Simonetta there, unable to use her magic as she floats slightly in the air. Quickly, they find their seats. Then, both Rand and Frank walk in as well. I had not thought of inviting them but I am glad that Dante did. With how long she terrorized their pack it is only fitting that they are here for this as well.I smile at them all as they whisper among themselves for a few moments. This is a bit of a shock for those that were not here to see Simonetta arrive. For Frank and Rand, they finally see their enemy tied up and floating in the air. They are not aware that I can take away her ability to use magic so this is going to be a shock to them when the meeting starts. "I take it you called us all here for a reason?" Elle says once everyone starts to calm down."Yes, I did. As everybody here knows, Simonetta has caused quite a few problems for us. She has terrorized werewolves,
Simonetta rushes towards me using wind to guide her speed. It is not enough to throw me off guard though and I shove a wall of dirt up in front of me. She almost crashes into it before she is able to skid to a stop at the last second. If she had prepared then she might have been able to use the air that was helping her speed up to me to jump over the wall but instead, she is used to using her other powers for combat and did not make the decision in time.As soon as she begins to stop, I tear down the wall and shift into werewolf form quickly to land on top of her with my teeth to her neck. Out of all of the forms that I could have turned into this was the only one that registered as an option. I would like for her to see the one thing that she thinks is beneath her be the thing that brings her down. For once, she surprises me when she throws me off of her with some air. I quickly flip over and land on my paws. I shift back and face her again. She is breathing hard and I find myself a
As soon as my illsuion drops I see Simonetta's face blanche. Chelsea drops to the ground and has it swallow her up as she falls through it to meet the others. I send her a brief thank you as she helps to keep them all safe from whatever back up plan Simonetta could have.She sends me a sad farewell. Apparently she is worried about whether or not I am going to make it out of this one. I might not have used much magic recently but I guarantee that there is no way I will let her get away with this threat. Today, she is going to go down and she is not going to be a threat to anybody with werewolf blood ever again."Wait, you had the baby? No! You can't have had it already!" She screams in rage."Actually, I can. There was nothing stopping me from having it. There is also nothing in the way of me putting a stop to you and your bullying once and for all" I say. She takes a few steps back as she steels herself for what we bothk now is going to happen next. It is a shame that the rest of the
"Why would she ever want to go with you?" I ask Simonetta in shock."I am sure that she can see the benefits when she realizes that if she doesn't then she will never get to meet the bundle of joy in your stomach. I will personally make sure that you are unable to deliever them. After all, the more powerful the babes the less the mother can use magic so I am sure that you are not able to defend yourself very well." Simonetta says triumphantly.I try my best to look worried. I really do. I find that it is difficult to be worried about her though. She has never really had a lot of sway over me. Even when I first realized how much stronger than her I am I had found it difficult to be scared of her. "You really think that I am afraid of you? Even without being able to use my powers you do not worry me. I have plenty of other witches that are able to come and help me." I say."Not before something bad happens to you. Chelsea, I would hate to see for anything bad to happen to Laina. I just
Each team splits up and gets ready to make their way through the obstacle course. They are all going to have to take turns trying to make it through safely. Each team has a designated amount of time before they get elminated. The one that makes it through the fastest and with the least amount of mistakes, will be the ones to win the competition. The course is very similar to the one that we did with the entire pack when we first started training. The one that really got the women moving faster as they fought to make good time through the course to beat the men. This one is just a little more geared towards children and not fully grown adults.Some of the obstacles are smaller to better accomodate their size, some things are closer together and they have even added some new obstacles that would have been difficult for the adults. There are also some obstacles that are going to require teamwork to make it through. If they do not work together then they have no hope of making it to the
It takes much longer than planned to get the babies ready for travel. I have never packed a diaper bag before but luckily Scarlett shows up to help me get them ready and squeal over the twins for a minute. Or more precisely, several minutes."I can't believe that they are finally here! I swear it felt like your pregnancy was never going to end. Every time that I thought you were going into labor and you never did. Yesterday, I had no idea that you were going into labor. How did you keep that from me?!" She says to me."It was not exactly on purpose. I did not even know that I was in labor until I spoke to Dante and then Elle confirmed it. It was a really odd day. We had a lot that happened that day so I thought that everything I was feeling was just from stress." I admit to her."Ha! For once, I could have answered that if you had just talked to me. Instead, you have me doing made up jobs with you to help me out." She says excitedly.I shake my head as she begins showing me exactly h
The first night with the babies was quite a bit of a learning curve. Whenever we put them in their bassinets they just started to cry nonstop until we picked them up again. It took a couple of hours to find out that if we put them into the same bassinet they were able to sleep peacefully and not wake us up. By the time we managed learning that, I was beyond exhausted and ready to sleep. Thankfully, there was more than enough people in the house to help us out throughout the night.When I wake up I find that Dante is already standing over their bassinet watching them sleep. They have managed a few hours of sleep straight which for me was quite shocking considering that they are newborns. "How are they?" I ask him sleepily.Chelsea decided to sleep on one of the loveseats last night as well. She was just too excited to go to sleep in her bedroom after I had the babies. I do not blame her but as she shifts when I start talking I do realize that that might have been a mistake. She is goi
Chelsea comes running in once the babies start to cry for food. Her face is filled with excitement as she rushes over to me. Even though they are hungry, I allow her to hold and rock Caterine while I first feed Archer. I might get good enough to be able to feed them both at once in the future but for now feeding just one is tricky. I never knew that it could be this hard to feed a baby."Hi Caterine, I am your Aunt Chelsea. We are going to be best friends. You are going to get to go to school with werewolf pups and use magic. It is going to be wonderful. I can't wait to teach you everything that I know." Chelsea coos to the baby making all of us smile.It is a good thing that she already has so much experience being around babies because she does a great job holding Caterine while Archer is feeding. She does sit down though as she looks at her. Even though Caterine was crying just a moment ago from hunger, she is now looking at Chelsea with wide eyes. Werewolf pups have much better ey