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The captives that Jesse and Kaiden retrieved from the Ladybird Room’s staff area seemed healthy, but were dazed and confused from the drugs that they were forced to take. They were gently coaxed out of the casino and to Ely’s police station.

In the Ladybird room, as David was forced to help Donald dispose of the bodies, Lucas noticed that the Gauntlet was unusually thick. Thicker than what the Azlu were capable of doing.

Morrison found that they had also somehow crossed the Gauntlet without even knowing. They looted Gustavas’ office to see if there was any explanation as to how that was possible. They found that the whole casino didn’t exist at all in the Mundane World except for nights of the Half Moon. During any other phase of the moon, it was just a derelict bunker with abandoned telecommunications equipment. It was a Place That Isn’t.

It was clear that such a supernatural place couldn’t be left by itself. Ely was so far from their regular territory borders and they were already feeling the strain from claiming the nearby Panaca. Ely would have been biting off more than they could chew if they were to try to claim it as an expansion of their territory. They couldn't even rest after taking out the Azlu nest by taking the next day off. They rarely ever had a day where they could just sit back and relax, at least one of them was always on patrol.

It was usually David and Morrison that did the territorial patrols, being able to do so while on duty as sheriff’s deputies. But that same duty often had them leaving the pack’s territory to other places in Lincoln County, so the others had to do so in their stead. But they also had their own jobs in order to fit in with their territory’s community. So it often fell to Jesse to patrol on their own when David and Morrison couldn’t since he was the only one with enough free time to do so because of them streaming as their regular work.

He was the one currently on patrol in their territory as David and Morrison were on their way to Alamo, with Matt Dane having called them. Having asked for David’s help as part of his apprenticeship to become a fetish crafter.

David gripped the steering wheel with a white knuckle grip. He had just gotten his learner’s permit and it was his first time driving since then.

“Careful,” growled Morrison from the passenger seat. “You’re gonna snap the steering wheel doing that.”

David only marginally relaxed his grip on the wheel, and only fully relaxed after they pulled up into Alamo’s Sinclair gas station and he saw Matt waiting by his truck.

Matt gave Morrison and David a nod each when they got out of the SUV, “Old Man. Madhouse. How’s it been?”

David glowered at the use of his deed name and Morrison leant into the SUV to turn the dashcam off before he answered, “We weren’t able to properly claim Ely. Spread thin enough as is, so we put the leech in charge of the place.”

“Yeah, I’d rather not lose my apprentice just as I got him because he’s too busy,” said Matt. He knocked the bonnet of his truck. “Come on. Let’s go, Madhouse. Got a fun task I need done.”

“I feel like I’m part of a trade,” grumbled David as he climbed into Matt’s truck.

“You are,” grumbled Morrison. He walked up to the driver side window after Matt climbed in. “Where’s Sam? I need to have a chat with them.”

“At work,” answered Matt.

Morrison nodded and stepped away to let Matt start his truck. He turned the truck around and drove South.

“What are we doing?” asked David as he wiped and scratched his nose. The passenger seat smelled strongly of Matt’s daughter, Jessica.

“What YOU are doing,” said Matt, “Is hunting some toads down at the Upper Pahranagat Lake. The Amargosa Toad to be precise.”

“Why?” asked David.

“The Amargosa Toad hunts spiders and I need them for components to create a fetish for a pack in Vegas,” explained Matt. “They think they’re dealing with Azlu in their territory.”

“Azlu?!” asked David, shocked. “We could’ve used that last night.”

“Yeah,” said Matt. “You lot discovering them is what got that pack knocking on my door about it. Good job dealing with them by the way.”

“They’re not Azlu by the way,” assured Matt. “They’d just be regular spider spirits. The Azlu aren’t stupid enough to be in a Uratha protectorate. Their pack leader is just a paranoid member of the Hunters in Darkness.”

“Then why didn’t you tell them that?” asked David.

Matt shrugged, “A favor’s a favor and they’re giving me a big one for making this fetish for them”

“Can I be there when it’s made?” asked David.

Matt shook his head, “Not yet.”

He chuckled when David groaned. “Patience, pup. I’ll let you sit in on a rite eventually. Just not yet”

David stewed in his annoyed impatience as he was driven to the lake.

During the drive, Matt asked, “Why do you hate your deed name so much?”

David crossed his arms and glowered, refusing to answer his mentor.

“I’m going to keep asking you,” said Matt after a few minutes of silence. “So you may as well tell me.”

David glowered more before he finally answered, “I hate getting reminded about being committed. It makes people think I’m insane.”

“I don’t see it that way,” said Matt.

David gave his mentor a confused and insulted look.

Matt saw David’s look and elaborated, “You spent how many years institutionalised?”

“Fifteen in and out of them,” David said with a growl.

“You spent sixteen years, _sixteen whole years, _where people kept telling you that you were insane,” said Matt, slapping the steering wheel with his hand when he repeated himself. “People get gaslit into believing things that aren’t true in a fraction of that time. Yet here you were, digging your heels in and standing by the Truth.”

David stayed silent and Matt continued, “Most people who saw what you saw would go actually insane. Lunacy alone completely breaks human minds, shatters them and grinds them into dust. Leaving them catatonic shadows of their former selves. Yet here you are, having gone through all that and being one of the few to be able to put all those pieces back together.”

“Most people who suddenly constantly saw spirits would think they became a schizo,” said Matt, making David growl. Matt rolled his eyes and continued, “They would become terrified, try and avoid them whenever he could. But here you were trying to fight them. You would stand your ground and stare them down. I only knew of one other person who did that when she was a Wolf-Blood.”

He then drummed his fingers as he said, “I don’t remember her name. She was a tribemate and a part of your Protectorate.”

David suspected who it was and took a shot in the dark, saying, “Rachel.”

Matt slapped the steering wheel, “Rachel! That’s it. You knew her?”

“No,” answered David. “She was Colin’s mother.”

“She was one of the Campbells?” Matt asked before shaking his head and saying, “Damn.”

There was an awkward tension in the truck as the spectre of Colin’s family’s death hung in the air. To break it, Matt changed the subject back to David. “You didn’t just piece yourself back together. There’s something more to you. There’s something about you and death. How it sticks to you.”

“Sticks to me?” asked David.

Matt nodded, “It seems to permeate every part of you. Even your scent.”

David sniffed himself but couldn’t detect what Matt was talking about. He didn’t smell anything resembling the smell of the locus at the graveyard.

Matt saw his confusion and said, “It’s slight, and I’d say only more experienced Uratha would notice it right now but it’s there. It’s fitting too, being a part of Death Wolf’s tribe. I, myself, think that, even though you prefer using your Tongue of Flame Gift, that you show more promise expanding on the Gift of Death than the Elemental. You could end up being the very embodiment of one of the Firstborn.”

“Though I have to warn you,” said Matt. “That if you do decide to do what I suggest, it could end up having old spirits with grudges against Kamduis-Ur to try and take them out on you.”

They were silent for the rest of the drive to the lake. Matt drove up to a park area of the lake and parked by the shore of the lake, right next to a covered picnic table.

“Come on,” said Matt as he turned the car off and got out, gravel crunching underfoot. “Out you get. I need the toads today if I’m gonna get the fetish done in time.”

David got out and looked around. He didn’t know where to find the toads. He didn’t even know what they looked like. He took his phone out and searched for what they looked like.

“They’re nocturnal,” said Matt as David looked at a picture of the toad Matt wanted. “So they’ll be in their burrows. You’ll find them under vegetation and debris. Close to the water, not in it.”

“They’re endangered too,” added Matt as David walked off towards the tall green grass and reeds that lined the shoreline. “So be careful with them. I’d prefer if they’re kept alive.”

David groaned. That ruled out using Urhan to track them down which would’ve been easier for him but would have likely left the toads dead. He’d have to stay in Hishu. He controlled his steps, avoiding stomping off in a huff so he wouldn’t scare away the toads and got to searching.

It took a long while to search among the dense, wet vegetation that lined the lake’s shoreline. His senses, while stronger than a human's, were much duller compared to his Urhan form. He understood why Colin liked transforming into his own Urhan form even when his Tell didn’t force him to transform, since he could only go a week before his hide forced him to transform.

He dug through the grass and reeds, under rocks and logs for well over an hour before he found a single toad. He held the chirping amphibian caged in his hands and brought it over to Matt, who was sitting at the covered picnic table drinking a beer.

“This would go faster if you helped,” grumbled David as he put the small olive coloured and dark spotted toad in a box on the picnic table.

“Your task, not mine, Apprentice,” said Matt with a grin before taking another swig of his beer.

David groaned and stormed off back towards the greenery to track down more of the rare, endangered toads.

It wasn’t until the sun was low in the sky that he had finally found enough toads to satisfy his mentor. He dropped the last toad in the box and looked for Matt who was talking on his phone by his truck. He looked upset about something.

“Why didn’t you run it past me first?” he growled into the phone.

A male voice on the other end answered, “He said you were fine with it.”

“No, I’m not fine with it!” Matt snarled into his phone. “He’s my fucking apprentice!”

“I’m sorry,” said the voice. “I’ve already made the ruling. I’m going over there tomorrow to tell them.”

Matt hung up and threw his phone in the truck. “Damn it!”

“What is it?” asked David, concerned about whatever his mentor was talking about that concerned him.

Matt had his hands against the door of his truck and was breathing deeply, trying to keep his anger under control. Eventually he said, “The Old Man had a talk with my packmate, Sam. He agrees that you and Colin shouldn’t be mates.”

David inhaled sharply and said, “Well too fucking bad.”

Matt turned away from his truck and looked at David with a sorrowful look, “He’s an Elodoth.”

David didn’t hear what else Matt said. His blood ran cold. He could barely breathe. He turned away from Matt and caught himself on the edge of the truck’s tray to keep from stumbling. Elodoth’s were the lawmakers of the Forsaken. When they made a ruling on something, it had to be respected. Even elders do. To have an Elodoth from his own tribe rule that he and Colin couldn’t be together, there was nothing David could do.

Matt put a hand on David’s shoulder, “I’m sorry.”

David let out a yell and punched the side of the truck, deeply denting it. Before Matt could say and do anything about it David leapt away, shifting to Urhan, and ran off.

He raced across the desert from Alamo back to Pioche, skirting around Caliente and never stopping. The ground flew underneath him, and he crashed through brush and leaped over rocks. He ran into the night and didn’t stop until he burst through The Den’s dog door.

Everyone was gathered around the dining table getting ready for dinner.

David didn’t even give them time to say anything as he shifted to Dalu and roared at Morrison, “WHY WOULD YOU THAT?!”

The elder snarled at David and stood up from the table, shifting to Dalu as well. He snarled back, “Watch your tone, Pup.”

“What happened?” asked Colin from behind Tsu’mara, who had put herself between him and the two werewolves standing off.

David pointed a clawed finger at Morrison, “He had Dane’s Elodoth rule against us!”

The others at the table were shocked, and stood silent around the table. Colin paled and looked to Morrison with a begging look.

“We’re packmates!” yelled David. “Why would you do that to us?!”

“I don’t have to explain myself to you, Pup,” snarled Morrison. “Sih Sehe Mak.”

The Low Honour the High. A part of the oath of the Moon.

“Mak Ne Sih,” David snarled back. The High Respect the Low. The other half of that particular oath. He walked up to Morrison and snarled in his face, “It’s a two-way street, Old Man.”

A deep feral growl rolled out the elder’s chest as the younger one snarled in his face. David continued, “You told us to endear ourselves to the community. How are they going to react to you going out of your way to break us up when they already know you don’t support us?”

Morrison struck David across the face and throat with his claws. David dropped to the ground clutching his throat, coughing as he choked on his own blood.

“The Elodoth’s ruling is final,” Morrison snarled to the choking werewolf before storming off, deciding to skip dinner with the others and slamming the door behind him.

After the slash to his throat healed, David shifted to Hishu. Despite his throat being fully healed, he still struggled to breathe. He only started again after Colin knelt down next to him. His breaths came as deep, racking sobs.

***

He was awoken by a cold wet nose nudging the side of his muzzle. He opened his eyes to see who it was, but didn’t see anything and decided to go back to sleep. He was woken by the nose again, but more insistantly. He opened eyes just in time to the see the tail of a red wolf leaving the bedroom

He got up to investigate what Colin was up to, making sure not to wake the others as they slept in a pile of fur and limbs.

He entered the Den’s living room. The only evidence of Colin’s presence, aside from his familiar fruity scent, was the dog door gently swinging.

He followed the trail outside and still didn’t see hide nor hair of the Wolf-blood. He put his nose to the ground and followed Colin’s scent from the back of the house and East out into the desert.

Colin’s trail didn’t meander at all. Wherever it was that he was going, he knew exactly where to go and a part of David, deep down, knew as well. He followed the trail further into the desert, wanting to know what it was that Colin woke him up for.

As he followed the trail, the immediate surroundings started to look familiar to David. Specific rocks, bushes, and Joshua Trees that he had come across so often that he was able to recognise them. The trail led him to a specific trail of snapped branches and trampled bushes. A trail that was a few months old.

He followed that trail, no longer needing to follow Colin’s. He followed until he found Colin back in Hishu in a familiar sheltered creek, sitting naked by the now dry creekbed. He was grooming his hide by running his fingers through its fur, picking out small twigs and leaves that he found stuck in it.

David shifted back to Hishu himself and slid down into the creek. He’d only ever been in the creek while in Urhan and was a bit surprised to see just how small it really was.

Colin looked up from his hide when he heard David drop down into the creek. His face was flat and hard to read. He gently set his hide to the side and stood up.

David’s heart lept up into throat when Colin started slowly walking up to him. He knew what the wolf-blood wanted as they started walking a circuit around him. They couldn’t do it, it’d just make it worse for the both of them in the morning when Sam visited.

His heart pounded against his ribs as Colin continued to walk around him. Their eyes roamed up and down David’s body, appraising him like a cut of prime steak. He shook his head, they couldn’t do this.

Colin stopped in front of him. They reached up and started slowly unbuttoning David’s flannel. He grabbed their hands to stop them. They looked up to him questioning.

He leant his head down in order to tell them to stop, but Colin misinterpreted what David was doing and they craned their head to meet his and kissed him.

David stiffened as their lips connected. Colin’s hands squeezed his and they tilted their head into the kiss. They couldn’t do this, thought David in a panic. Matt Dane’s Elodoth had made their ruling. David was trying to get the Wolf-blood to stop. They couldn’t-

Who was he kidding? He knew exactly what was going to happen when he followed Colin out of the house and into the desert.

He relaxed into the kiss and loosened his grip on Colin’s hands, allowing them to continue unbuttoning his shirt. He slid his hands up along Colin's arms before putting his hands around Colin’s back, one on their lower back and the other their upper back. Once the last button was undone he shucked his shirt letting it fall to the ground, and pulled Colin close to him, chest to chest.

He moaned into the kiss as he took in his mate’s scent. Once overly strong and artificial, now oh so alluring to him. He rubbed his hands along their back and Colin pressed himself tighter into David in response.

Colin moaned into the kiss as well, and clung tighter to David as one of David’s hands drifted down and grabbed his rear.

David broke the kiss and crouched down, bringing Colin down with him. He reached behind himself and spread out his discarded shirt so he lay down on it to keep the stones in the ground from digging too roughly into his back. Once he laid down he returned his hands to Colin, grabbing them around the waist and pulling them onto him so that they were straddling him.

David let out a small gasp of surprise when Colin darted down and reinitiated the kiss. It was with such a demanding hunger that David was left stunned for a moment, unsure of what to do. This was unlike Colin, they preferred mating while in Urhan and David in Hishu. But they didn’t mate often in Hishu due to not finding a private place to do it in the refurbished cabin without Morrison interrupting them, and Colin deliberately riling David up until he shifted to Urhan.

It was intense, extremely intense, mating in Urhan. The scents, the sensations, the primality, all of it. But David found it so very embarrassing afterwards, mating in the form of a regular wolf. Even more so when he got locked inside Colin. He would try to avoid knotting, as much as he admitted, deep down, that he liked the feeling of it. But Colin would always, without fail, rile him up pushing exactly the right buttons and encouraging him to do so. Next thing he knew, they were rear to rear, locked together with Colin smugly cleaning himself and David embarrassed and resisting the urge to go again as soon as they were able to pull apart. He failed each time, Colin made sure of it.

He much preferred mating in Hishu. It wasn’t as physically intense as in Urhan, but it felt more personal. More intimate. Letting them mate face to face as they were now. It let him touch Colin, feel them with sensitive and dextrous hands instead of with stiff, unusable paws. Just as he was now as he slid one hand up Colin’s side, moving up and up until he reached the back of Colin’s head. He grabbed a handful of the redhead’s fluffy hair with a gentle but firm grip and pulled them tighter into the kiss.

Mating in Hishu allowed him more control. Just as it did now as his other hand went down to his belt and undid it. He undid the fly of his jeans and boxers and pulled himself out through them. He rubbed his member against Colin’s rear.

Colin broke off the kiss and panted as he felt David prod his rear entrance. He reached back and guided them in. He hissed in discomfort as David penetrated him.

David rubbed Colin’s thighs to help soothe them. When Colin’s breathing steadied, and they gave a nod, David’s hands slid up to their waist. He gripped their waist and slowly pulled them down until they bottomed out.

He slowly slid a light hand up Colin’s back, making them shiver from the light touch, and pulled them down so he could start kissing his collar bone. As the kisses moved up Colin’s neck, it made them moan and start rolling their hips on David. Which made David grunt and give the wolf-blood a love bite at the base of their neck.

His other hand reached down to Colin’s rear and lifted them up slightly so he could start thrusting up into them. Colin moaned as he did and tried to move back harder into his thrusts but was stopped by the hand on their rear.

“Not fair,” Colin panted.

“My pace in Hishu,” David said between kisses on Colin’s neck. He gave them another love bite on the neck which made Colin try and thrust back. He gave a growling chuckle when his hand on their rear kept them going at his pace.

Colin whimpered at the slower, tender pace. They tried to rile David up but he ignored it. If this was going to be their last time together then he wanted it slow and special. Not fast and primal.

Eventually Colin warmed up to the slower pace, leaning into and exposing his neck to the tender kisses. They coupled together on the ground under the silver light of the half moon for several minutes. It wasn’t until he approached climax that he finally acquiesced and started getting rougher with his mate.

Colin broke away for the kisses and arched his back into the harder thrusts. He leaned back and moaned, keeping one hand behind him to keep him from falling as his other hand started stroking his member in time with David’s thrusts.

David was on the razor’s edge, his hips clapping against Colin. He grabbed Colin by the arm and yanked him down, who gasped in surprise. He pinned Colin to his chest and kissed him deeply. He slipped his hand between them and started stroking Colin’s member.

Colin moaned into the kiss as he came and was followed quickly by David. He growled into the kiss and thrusted a few more times before he relaxed. He slowly pulled out, but Colin stayed where he was, lying on top of him.

They basked in the afterglow of their coupling for several minutes before David asked softly, “Why’s he so dead set on keeping us apart?”

Colin shifted on top of David, bringing his hands up so he could rest his chin on top of them. He answered, “My blood line.”

“What about it?” asked David.

Colin answered, “You’re not guaranteed to be born a Wolf-blood. Wolf-bloods are rare. An Uratha and a Wolf-blood, or two Wolf-bloods could have several kids and not a single one would be a Wolf-blood. So when there’s a blood line where every single person born in it is a Wolf-blood, it's a rare treasure that has to be protected. It’s why Lucas and I always get pestered to have kids.”

“Lucas?” asked David.

Colin nodded, “He comes from a line of two strong wolf-blood families. One from Italy on his Mother’s side, the other Ukranian on his Father’s side.”

He continued, “But even if you’re born a Wolf-blood that doesn’t mean you’ll ever have the First Change. Most actually don’t. So when you have a bloodline that’s not only all Wolf-Bloods, but each and every single one of them had their First Change. It’s such a rarity that it’s practically unheard of.”

“And that’s yours,” said David.

Colin nodded, “With such a valuable bloodline, the Protectorate would have preferred to keep the Wolf-Blood members of my family in the dark about the Truth like Lucas’ family was, and still partially is.”

He saw the questions look in David’s face and answered before they could ask, “A Wolf-blood’s risk of dying increases just by knowing the Truth. Think of it like poker. If you don’t know that you have a winning hand, then neither does your opponent. That ignorance protects them.”

“Why didn’t they keep your brother and sister before their First Change, and you in the dark?”

“Becuase we all had Tells that make it hard to keep us ignorant. You already know mine, and what Douglas’ was,” said Colin. “And Moira’s was her temper.”

“Temper?” asked David. “How the hell is temper a Tell?”

Colin answered, “The Anger Issues Tell makes the Wolf-blood have such intense anger problems that they can actually fall into Kuruth. But unlike Uratha, they can only shift into Dalu. So, since they deemed it necessary to inform my mother, and that my siblings and I had such painfully obvious tells. They just didn’t bother keeping us in the dark.”

“Why didn’t they pester Moira and Douglas to have kids?” asked David.

“Oh, they did,” said Colin. “Though they only asked Moira once.”

“Why only once for her?”

“Because a male Uratha just needs to knock up a female Wolf-Blood. But a female Uratha has to carry the pup. So that leaves them unable to perform their duties for a whole nine months,” said Colin before smirking and adding, “So combine that with Moira’s, uh, notorious temper. They only tried it once.”

Colin chuckled, “They had Dad be the one to try to convince her.”

“Your dad?” asked David. “When you told me how your parents met, he was annoyed by the Protectorate constantly trying to get him to take a mate.”

“He was, yeah,” said Colin. “But when he met my mom and got her pregnant, it flicked some switch in his head and he was suddenly all for it. He was really happy when Mom was pregnant with me.”

“Why you specifically?”

Colin explained, “Because of my Tell, the first ultrasound originally showed two. So he thought he was gonna have twins. So you can imagine his and Mom’s surprise when the next ultrasound showed a single wolf pup instead of two human foetuses. And he was disappointed that he couldn’t have anymore after me cause of Mum’s First Change while she had me.”

“Cause it would’ve created an Unihar,” said David

Colin nodded, “Though that didn’t stop one Elder from telling him just to sleep with another Wolf-blood.”

“How’d that go?” asked David. Though he already suspected the answer.

“Mom tore into him. Literally,” said Colin. “She said he always walked with a limp after that.”

“She was able to savage an Elder and get away with it?” asked David, shocked.

Colin nodded, “It was because he broke the Oath of the Moon by suggesting it. Especially by doing it in front of her.”

“How?” asked David.

“Sih Sehe Mak; Mak Ne Sih,” said Colin in heavily accented First Tongue. The Low Honour the High; the High Honour the Low. “He dishonored my mom and dad by suggesting that.”

“Just like the Old Man broke the Oath with us,” said David, remembering back to his fight with the elder earlier.

Colin nodded, “He would have phrased it to Matt’s Elodoth in a way so they didn’t think he did.”

David then noticed, during the entire conversation, that his fingers had been idly playing with Colin’s hair. He forced himself to stop and said, “We can’t do this anymore. But I don’t want to stop.”

He took a deep breath and added in defeat, “But the Elodoth’s ruling is final.”

Colin took his hands from under his chin and hugged David tight. Then something in his scent changed. David smelled a sudden spike of fear, nervousness, but also excitement.

“What is it?” asked David.

“There’s one way we could get around their ruling,” said Colin, his heart rate increased until David would have been able to detect it even without his enhanced senses.

David sat up, forcing Colin to do the same. He asked, hopeful, “What is it?”

“We petition the Lunes,” answered Colin.

“How would they be able to help?” he asked.

“You remember a couple months ago when I helped you train with Tongue of Flame?” asked Colin. “How you can increase your spiritual purity to increase its power?”

David thought for a moment, remembering back to the lesson. “By making a sacrifice to uphold the Oath of the Moon, or losing face in order to uphold my tribal oath.”

“Or by taking a mate,” added Colin. “If you petition the Lunes to increase your purity, we’d be recognized as mates by Mother Luna herself. Matt’s Elodoth won’t be able to do anything about it. Not even an elder Elodoth from the Bone Shadows could overrule it.”

David’s face flushed and he stammered, “To go to the Lunes about that. To be recognized by Mother Luna. It sounds an awful lot like…”

He couldn’t bring himself to say the final word so Colin said it for him. “Marriage?”

David meekly nodded.

It was Colin’s turn to blush. He avoided David’s eyes and stammered, “We, uh, we’re kinda already are.”

“WHAT?!” snapped David.

Colin stammered more as he wrung his hands, “Because most Uratha live such short, violent lives, with most not living long enough to become an elder, Uratha culture never bothered with the luxuries of the long, drawn out mating rituals that humans have. The dating process, the proposal process, and marriage ceremonies. When it's someone the Uratha wants to take on as their actual, proper mate they usually, uh, they…”

“They what?” asked David with an accusatory tone.

Colin said, with a very soft and embarrassed voice, “They tie the knot.”

David’s face burned furiously bright with a blush as he remembered their first night together. “You tricked me into marrying you?!”

Colin wrung his hands harder and mumbled, “Maybe…”

David put his head into his hands and struggled to keep himself from hyperventilating, “My parents would kill me if they were still here.”

Colin took David’s hands and gently coaxed them away from their head. He said, “If we’re gonna petition the Lunes, it has to be done before tomorrow morning.”

David looked up to Colin and asked, “We need to be in the Spirit World for that. But you’re not able to cross the Gauntlet. How would we even get you across?”

Colin thought for a moment before suggesting, “Ask Lucas? He’s the more experienced Ithaeur. He might know a way..”

“It’ll be dangerous,” warned David. “If you die, your bloodline comes to an end.”

“My family dates back to the creation of the Gauntlet,” said Colin. “With a family tree that old, my specific bloodline will be just one singular branch in a very large tree. And I’m gay, so it ended with me anyway.”

“Okay,” said David.

They cleaned up as best they could before shifting to Urshal and running back to the Den. They made sure they were as quiet as possible when they approached, to make sure they didn’t wake the Old Man in his cabin.

David shifted back to Hishu and rudely jabbed Lucas in his ribs. He hissed in a whisper, “Wake up!”

“Huh? Wha?” said the black wolf in a tired daze before he was woken up fully with another rude jab.

“Fucking asshole,” growled Lucas and Colin batted him on the nose for swearing.

Lucas shifted to Hishu and asked, “What the hell is it?”

“Colin found a way to get around the Elodoth’s ruling and we need to go into the Spirit World for it,” said David.

Lucas looked over to the rest of the pack who were still sleeping and asked, “Is it a secret or can everyone be in on it?”

“Just not the Old Man,” answered David.

“Fine,” said Lucas reached over to shove Jesse who grumbled in his sleep and turned away from the packmate trying to wake him up. The maned wolf’s long legs swung over and slapped Kaiden in the face.

“Huh? Wha?” asked the Golden Jackal in the First Tongue. “What time is it?”

“It’s ‘round three in the morning,” said Lucas as he shifted down to Urhan and reached over and grabbed Jesse by the scruff and started dragging them, still sleeping, out of the bedroom.

“We’ll need your help too,” said David.curtly.

Kaiden raised an eyebrow, surprised to see David of all people asking, somewhat, nicely.

He opened his mouth to press for details when Colin added, “Please?”

Kaiden shut his mouth at that and nodded. He’d normally press for more details if it was just David asking for help, but with Colin asking alongside him? He knew at that point it was important enough to the both of them that he decided to forgo his usual questions for the moment.

“Alright then,” he said in the First Tongue with a shrug and turned to nudge Tsu’mara awake.

Or at least, he tried. The slight nudging was completely ineffective and it would have been more effective to nudge a mountain awake than the slumbering African Wild Dog. He shoved her hard, but all that accomplished was making her roll over onto the jackal.

Lucas, still dragging the sleeping Jesse across the living room, growled, “I’ll piss on you if you don’t wake up.”

That woke Jesse up and the maned wolf grabbed onto Lucas in a very private area. He growled, “Do that, and I’ll make you a woman.”

Lucas snarled and bit the Irraka on the flank, forcing them to let him go.

Jesse shifted to Hishu and rubbed his side while saying, “You’re gonna need a good reason to have woken me up. I had great dreams of violence and murder.”

“I don’t know why it has to be tonight,” said Lucas looking over to the bedroom where Colin and David were discussing how to wake up Tsu’mara. “But Colin apparently found a way to get around Howlmore trying to break him and David up and they need something from the Shadow in order to do it.”

It was then when Colin scrambled out of the bedroom followed right after by the sound water splashing onto the bed.

A groan of annoyance came from David in the room and he said, “How the fuck didn’t that work? You’d think a soldier would be a light sleeper cause they need to be on alert at a moment’s notice.”

Kaiden walked out of the room in Hishu, wet as well, and shook water from his hair like a dog. He said, “You’d be surprised. A soldier could sleep through artillery strikes and often do.”

David came out of the bedroom a moment later and asked, “What about playing a recording of that morning trumpet song? That should work.”

“Sounds like a great idea,” said Jesse before adding, “If you want to wake her up angry and let Elder Morrison know you’re trying to sneak around behind his back.”

They all, minus the still sleeping Tsu’mara, snuck out of the house. It wasn’t until the Den was out of sight that Lucas asked David, “Okay. We’re far enough away from the Den that Howlmore won’t find out anytime soon. What do you plan on doing to defy him and Dane’s Elodoth?”

“Summon the Lunes,” answered David.

Lucas gave a single surprised nod. “Yeah, that’ll do it.”

Colin nodded and added, “Not even an elder Elodoth can defy someone whose mate is recognised by Mother Luna.”

Jesse cackled and started singing ‘Here Comes the Bride’.

Kaiden rolled his eyes and asked, “Wouldn’t Colin have to be there? How? He can’t use Essence so he can’t cross the Gauntlet.”

David shrugged, “I don’t know. I hoped that Lucas would know.”

Lucas groaned and pulled his phone out and called someone. “Hey, it’s Lucas. Yeah, sorry about calling at this time of night. I need to borrow you for a moment to open a portal. Can you meet us in the cemetery in half an hour?”

He then hung up and looked at David. He growled, “You owe me.”

The awake pack members made their way to the Boot Hill Cemetery where an extremely drowsy looking Alice was waiting holding a cup of coffee.

“What’s this about needing a portal?” she asked.

David went to talk but was cut off by Colin with a warning glare. Colin spoke up instead, saying, “We need to get me across the Gauntlet for something important and you’re the only safe way we know of doing that.”

Alice nodded and looked to Jesse, Lucas, David, and Kaiden saying, “Okay, but in order to do that in accordance with the Laws of Vegas I need Uratha permission. Do all four of you consent?”

Kaiden answered, “This would be pointless otherwise.”

Alice shrugged, “Let it be known that I got consent.”

She turned away from and started speaking in the disconcerting, and unnaturally robotic static sound tongue. Reality rippled in front of her as it was rewritten and an image of Boothill Cemetery revealed itself to them. Same but different than the version of it they were standing in, where grave markers and headstones traveled off into the distance and ephemeral spectres drifted in and out of view.

They all stepped through the portal into the Hisil but when Colin did, he stumbled and fell to his knees.

“Colin!” cried out David in concern, catching him. The wolf-blood was far too pale and his scent was suddenly wrong.

A wet gurgle was all the warning David got to jump away before Colin suddenly vomited. He threw up his dinner on the ground but also on himself.

“Oh yeah,” said Lucas calmly as he watched Colin be sick. “This is your first time in the Shadow.”

He looked around as Colin dry heaved on the ground, with David rubbing his back and giving small, sympathetic whines. Lucas said, “Now we just need Keeper to show up to give you a scare.”

Colin wiped his mouth and groaned, “I’d rather avoid that.”

He looked down at his soiled clothes and moaned, “I can’t be seen by the Lunes like this.”

Lucas patted Colin on the shoulder and said, “It’ll be fine. They’ll be paying more attention to David.”

He turned his attention to David, “Since you’ve never met the lunes, I’ll take it you don’t know how to summon them?”

David shrugged and said, “I don’t know. Howl at the moon?”

Lucas shook his head and sighed, “That’s one way to do it.”

He guided the pack into a circle, with Alice and Colin standing to the side, and they started howling up towards the moon. The howls they were giving didn’t feel significant enough to David and Lucas, so they shifted to Urshal. Kaiden joined with them and shifted to Urshal as well, feeling stupid howling in Hishu. The howls then changed, becoming the mournful howls of children crying for their absent mother.

And their cries were answered.

There was a faint blink in the moonlight. Everyone looked up to see a thin streak of light in the sky, like a shooting star or a satellite in the Mundane sky. It arced across the sky before changing course and rocketing towards the pack.

It impacted at the edge of the cemetery with a flurry of dust and dirt, reminding the pack a lot of how Fireball would land and crash into things.

Out of the cloud of dust and debris, something walked towards them. A tall woman with marble features. One half of her, from her head to her groin, was blindingly white. The other black as night. In one hand she held a set of scales, the other a whip. Her skin was the texture of an ancient Greek marble statue.

She spoke to them in a resonating, almost hollow, echoing voice. Almost like two voices speaking at once, “Uratha of this territory. You have called and I have come. I am Ellisania the Balanced Scales. You have my attention.”

She looked at the group almost like was looking directly through them and narrowed in on David as he stepped forward. He made sure to be between the Lune and Colin.

He said, “I ask you to recognise my Purity as I’ve taken a mate.”

Ellisania turned to the rest of the pack and asked, “Do you have an Elodoth to speak on behalf of your packmate’s balanced harmony?”

Colin poked his head around David and answered in his regular, heavily accented, First Tongue, “Sorry. No, we do not.”

“Do you have a Cahalith to speak on behalf of their packmate? To sing their praises to Mother Luna?”

Lucas leaned over to Kaiden and said from the side of his muzzle, “She’s got aspects of a law spirit, she’s looking for a lawyer to represent David’s case. I think.”

Kaiden raised an eyebrow. He told the Lune, who was patiently waiting, “We would like a moment to discuss the case.”

The Lune nodded in acknowledgement and Kaiden turned his back to her. He huddled up with the others, gesturing for David to join. He snapped at them, “What the hell did you drag me into?”

Lucas answered, gesturing to David and Colin with his snout, “These two idiots got the bright idea to go over Howlmore’s head and be recognised as mates in Luna’s eyes.”

“Okay,” said Kaiden. “How do we get them to acknowledge them as mates?”

David turned to Colin. It was his idea after all, and was his tutor too, so he assumed that the wolf-blood would know how.

Colin wrung his hands nervously and admitted, “I don’t know the specifics on how you get Lunes to recognise your renown.”

Lucas groaned at Colin’s admission. “And we don’t have an Elodoth which would be best to talk with Ellisania since she’s an Eluminium. A Cahalith is the next best thing. From what I know, it varies by lune if they need a lot of convincing or not. She seems pretty specific in her aspect as a balance keeper. Present it as a legal case.”

Kaiden shrugged his shoulders, “He wants to increase his spiritual purity.”

David nodded, “Taking a mate increases it.”

“Okay then,” nodded Kaiden, “I can present it to her that their bond strengthens the pack.”

They all looked to Jesse, seeing if he had something he could add to help.

“I’m just here for the shitshow and I’m not gonna try and bail you out,” said Jesse. He then gave them a double thumbs up. “You got this!”

Kaiden shook his head, “Morrison’s gonna skin all of us for this.”

“Don’t say that to the lune,” said David.

“We need as many of the pack here as possible in solidarity if we’re gonna sell this,” said Kaiden.

“We have as many as we can,” said David. “Can’t have the Old Man here, and I tried to wake Tsu’mara.”

During the entire drawn out huddled conversation, of which Ellisania had the patience of a saint as the squabbling extended for several long minutes, Alice took the opportunity to walk around the lune taking notes. She never went closer than the distance that pack stood away from spirit.

Finally, after several more minutes of squabbling, Kaiden spoke up. “I have no idea what to do, and we’re not ready.”

“We’re on a bit of a time crunch here,” snapped David. “He’ll be up in a few hours.”

“Fine. FINE,” Kaiden snapped back. “I’ll have to wing it.”

The Cahalith stepped forward and made his plea. “I didn’t join this pack until later, so I don’t know what he was like when he joined it but when I joined he was rude, combative, and would rage at the smallest perceived slight.”

He then gestured to Colin with his head, “But after he mated our packmate here, he’s softened. For instance, he doesn’t quarrel as much with his fellow Ithaeur like he did before taking a mate. His commitment and bond to the pack has improved because of taking him as a mate and the entire pack functions better for it.”

The lune nodded as asked, “Will anyone else like to speak on this wolf’s behalf?”

Colin stepped forward around David, ignoring their attempts to keep him behind them.

He said, in his natural thick First Tongue accent, “Since he took me as his mate, he has only improved as a person. Before we mated, he never would have asked them for our help to petition you like he did tonight. He still has many rough edges, of which likely will never be fully smoothed over but he is nowhere near as harsh of a person than before we met.”

Ellisania nodded and then held out her scales. In one scale an orb of the darkest black either of them had ever seen formed, in the other an orb of gleaming silver so radiant it hurt to look directly upon. And like Anubis weighing the heart of the deceased against the Feather of Ma’at, the scales started to shift. Teetering from one orb to the other until, after many a close call, it stopped with the black orb being the heaviest.

Elisania looked from the scales to David, “Mother Luna acknowledges your act of taking a mate and recognises your Purity.”

She then turned to Lucas and asked, “Does any other wolf require adjudication?”

Lucas answered, “I would like to speak on my own behalf about a deed of great honor I did some weeks ago.”

Ellisania nodded in acknowledgement and waited for Lucas to continue.

“In a pitched battle against heavily armed dangerous humans, I restrained my abilities to engage them on even ground using a weapon of human creation to combat the humans, to give my prey a fair chance of besting their hunter. They were unsuccessful of course.”

David slowly turned his head as Lucas made his case to the Lune. He realised that his packmate was talking about their slaughter of the biker gang The Princes of the Phalt. If he remembered correctly, Lucas was actually in Dalu that entire time instead of Hishu. Not exactly something he would describe as ‘restraining his abilities’.Perhaps he was meaning their height, though he wasn’t sure.

Lucas could tell what David was thinking and his snout twitched in a silent snarl. A warning to David to keep their mouth shut.

The scales began to move again, teetering to and from the silver orb and black orb, and just like David it settled on the black orb.

Ellisania looked to Lucas and said, “Mother Luna acknowledges your act of restraint and recognises your Honor.”

She then addressed the pack, “Does any other wolf need adjudication?”

Jesse and Kaiden shook their heads.

Ellisania said, “Will both supplicants step forward?”

David and Lucas stepped forward.

“She’s going to apply the spirit brand now,” Lucas muttered to David.

David grimaced at the memory of the spirit brand he got during his initiation. He tentatively presented his right shoulder to the Lune.

Lucas did the same and said warily, “This is what the whip’s for…”

Ellisania pulled back her arm and then snapped the whip at David. The end of the whip connected with David’s hide with an ear piercing crack. A ring of silver fire erupted from where the whip connected. It burned, but not physically. Its fire scorched David’s very soul. It was horrifically painful and he snarled as the radiant flame solidified into a stylized full moon. Then, inside the moon, a brief passage in the First Tongue that dictated how David was renowned for his Purity etched itself into his skin.

She then did the same to Lucas, but instead of a full moon, it was a half moon and the First Tongue dictated his act of honour.

She then rolled her whip back up and asked, “Are there any outstanding issues to approach the bench with?”

Lucas shook his head, “No, Ma’am. We appreciate your time and thank you for meeting our summons.”

He shot a side eye at David who was struggling to keep his snout shut to keep from cursing the Lune out from the pain of the brand.

Lucas bit his paw and spread blood in the dirt, “Please take this offering of Essence to the Divine Mother as thanks.”

Ellisania wordless waved a hand over the streak of blood, making the blood float up into the scales. She then started to slowly float upwards into the sky. Once she reached several stories into the sky, she rocketed back up into the starry sky in a streak of silver light.

David watched her leave while rubbing his teeth with his tongue. He felt a strange urge to gnaw on some old bones, and he knew, somehow, that if he did that he’d learn from them. He realised that it was a Shadow Gift and remembered that Jesse and Tsu’mara got one when they petitioned the lunes. He wondered what Gift Lucas got.

“Now what?” he asked.

Lucas shrugged before shifting to Hishu. Kaiden and David did the same. “Go home? That was actually pretty quick and we were successful. I’ve heard tales where it could take hours to petition them and not even be successful with it. Since the Lunes and Mother Luna acknowledge you two as mates-”

“Not even an elder can argue against us,” finished Colin excitedly.

Kaiden deflated Colin’s excitement, “You realise Morrison will kill us when we get back, right?”

Lucas held his hands up in a show of innocence, “I was blackmailed into this.”

Jesse chuckled, “I’m just here for vibes.”

Kaiden said, “I didn’t know until it was brought up.”

“Hang on,” said Alice, walking up to them concerned. “Morrison doesn’t know?”

Kaiden leaned over to her and said, “Yeah, you’re gonna want to lay low with the other mages for a while.”

Lucas put both hands gently on her shoulders, “It’s fine. We’ll figure things out.”

Alice let Lucas’s words settle for a bit before nodding, “I’ll trust you on this.”

She turned away and opened a portal back to the Mundane. They all stepped through with Colin falling to his knees afterwards feeling sick again. This time he only dry heaved.

Alice then quickly opened another portal which she dashed through, telling someone on the other side, “Do NOT go to Pioche for a while.”

A female voice, that sounded like Annabelle’s, answered, “What the hell happ-?!”

The rest of her sentence was cut off by the portal closing behind Alice.

“Well,” said Kaiden, “I’m not gonna be there when Morrison skins your hides. I’m gonna find a shrub or something to sleep under.”

He then shifted to Urhan and trotted out into the desert, calling out in the First Tongue, “Best of luck.”

The rest head back to the Den, sneaking in order not to wake Morrison from whatever bender he was on in his cabin, and not to wake Tsu’mara. If that were even possible.

Lucas and Jesse decided to sleep on the couch in the library. Colin and David shifted to Urhan and curled up together in the corner of the bed.

***

In the morning Morrison stumbled into the Den, like any good father figure, reeking of alcohol and saw Tsu’mara awake making coffee.

“Add whiskey to mine,” he growled.

Tsu’mara searched the kitchen cabinets for a bit before saying, “I think you drank the last of it. We still have some rum though.”

“I’m not picky,” said Morrison, sitting at the head of the table. “Have the half-blood go on a grocery run later.”

Tsu’mara handed him an overly large coffee that had ‘Elder’ written in it. “Here you go, sir.”

“Where the fuck is everyone else?” asked Morrison.

Tsu’mara sat down at the table with her own coffee and shrugged, “Don’t know. David and Colin are acting weird, Lucas and Jesse are asleep in the library, and Kaiden? I have no fucking clue. Outside somewhere.”

Morrison turned towards the library door and shouted, “You two better not be fucking in there!”

A series of tired grunts and snorts from the library were followed by Lucas saying in English, “We’re not doing anything. Just sleeping on the couch. David, uh…”

He trailed off, apparently thinking of something, “He poured water on the bed. So I’m sleeping out here.”

“So that’s why I woke up wet,” muttered Tsu’mara.

Morrison looked at Tsu’mara and rolled his eyes. He downed half his cup and then stood up, making his way to the bedroom.

He slammed the door open and threw his cup of coffee inside. David and Colin woke up yelping in pain as the scalding hot coffee splashed onto them.

“What the hell are you doing dumping water on the bed?” demanded Morrison. “You’re doing the sheets, Boy.”

Colin slinked out of the room soon after in Hishu, hopping as he tried to get on a pair of pants and avoid Morrison’s gaze.

Jesse was already sitting at the table with a bag of popcorn and drinking an entire pot of coffee. He watched Lucas and David slink out of their respective rooms with a mischievous grin.

Morrison looked at his now empty mug and said, “I need more coffee.”

“I’m getting more later,” said Lucas before he went into the bathroom for a shower.

Tsu’mara saw how much Jesse was drinking and sarcastically asked, “Do you need more coffee? How much do you need? Damn, hon.”

Jesse shrugged and said, “It’s been a long night.”

“What do you mean it’s been a long night?” asked Morrison, suddenly far more sober.

“I was doing a sub-athon last night,” lied Jesse.

Morrison looked at Jesse and asked, “What was everyone else doing last night?”

Jesse shrugged, “I don’t know. My streams are private.”

“Thank Luna for that,” said Morrison.

“It brings income,” said Jesse.

Morrison nodded, “Good that you support the pack somehow.”

“I have no other way to support aside from murder,” said Jesse. “Did I say that last part out loud?”

Morrison rolled his eyes and asked, “How much did you make last night?”

“Two thousand,” answered Jesse.

Morrison gave a curt nod, “Good, you’re paying the mortgage this month.”

Jesse’s head perked up as he heard something come from the bathroom and smirked.

Morrison nor David and Colin noticed whatever it was and Morrison turned to them and asked, “What were you two doing last night?”

Jesse’s smirk became a massive grin.

David didn’t say anything, and Colin stuttered, avoiding the elder’s eyes, “Nothing, Elder Morrison.”

Morrison leaned in, “I know you two aren’t being cagey about fucking. What has me concerned is why Jesse is lying about something.”

There was a rustle of a bag. Jesse had opened another bag of popcorn and was eating it with a huge grin.

“Clearly our Irraka is expecting someone to be killed,” said Morrison, not taking his eyes off the suspiciously acting couple. “And the two smart ones have left.”

He leaned further over the table and growled, “What did you two do?”

Colin trembled like a leaf. The excitement and adrenaline of rebellion had long since faded, and the reality that he had defied an elder’s command so brazenly settled in. He had, of course, defied them in the past. Everyone had. He cheated at the casinos when he knew he shouldn’t, teenage rebellion when he was younger, going out for hunts when he was supposed to be doing research or other tasks for his family’s territory. But he had never done something so flagrant.

So he cracked under the elder’s intense, scrutinising gaze. Like a poker player letting their mask briefly slip when they realise they have a bad hand. His eyes flicked to David’s shoulder where he was branded by the Lune the previous night. It was just for a fraction of a fraction of a second but it was enough.

Morrison grabbed David and dragged him over the table. He ripped open David’s flannel shirt.

“So you went and visited the Lunes,” Morrison said, seeing the brand on David’s shoulder. “Why were you two being so cagey about it? Why didn’t you invite me?”

His face hardened when he read what David was acknowledged for.

“You didn’t,” he muttered then growled, “You two fuckers didn’t.”

He then threw David off the table and towards the wall. He pointed at David as they started getting up, “Stay!”

Morrison grabbed Colin, Tsu’mara, and Jesse, putting them up against the wall with David. He went to retrieve Lucas from the shower, naked or not, but found the bathroom empty with the shower running and the window open.

He came back into the living room and growled, “So the two smart ones did run off. They were both in on it.”

He stormed up to Tsu’mara who looked both surprised and extremely confused. He demanded, “You involved in this?”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

Morrison shook his head, “Fucking crayon eater.”

He waved towards the front door, “Be useful and go find the other two.”

She gave a wordless salute and quickly left the den.

Morrison went up to Jesse, who was still grinning. He jabbed them in the chest, “You. Spill everything.”

“Let’s see…” said Jesse, making a show of thinking, taking too much joy in the situation, “I got dragged out in the middle of the night by these two chucklefucks. Dragged me out to officiate a wedding? I don’t know the specifics, just that you’d be pissed and only stayed cause I thought it’d be funny.”

Colin and David were completely mortified at Jesse's gross oversimplification of the prior night’s events.

Morrison turned away from Jesse and faced David. His jaw worked, making his scar stand out on his neck as he prepared the verbal lashing against the rebellious Ithaeur. But his words froze on his tongue as he realised something.

He then slowly turned his head to look down at Colin, who was trembling in fear.

“It was your idea,” stated Morrison, nothing else was even remotely a possibility in his mind. He leaned further to growl in the wolf-blood’s face, “He’s not smart enough to think of going to the Lunes.”

Something else caught the elder’s attention, and he sniffed Colin. Each sniff making Colin flinch. “No. You didn’t.”

He sniffed Colin again, making them instinctively back up further against the wall. “How’d you cross-”

He then stood up and looked away, towards Pioche proper. He growled, “Those fucking mages.”

“Jesse,” snapped Morrison. “Get the fuck out of here if you’re still here.”

The Irraka was gone long ago, the moment eyes were off him.

Morrison walked over to the kitchen counter and grabbed more coffee before downing the rest of the rum Tsu’mara had gotten out. He looked to David and Colin, “You two idiots are going to get the both of yourselves killed. Do either of you understand the meaning of Uratha safil thil lu’u?”

The Uratha shall cleave to the human. Both David and Colin knew it well.

“It wasn’t rhetorical!” snapped Morrison and both Colin and David mumbled the translation.

Morrison looked at Colin and asked, “Do you know why that tenet’s in place?”

“Because of the Unihar,” mumbled Colin. He then said more clearly, “But we’re both males.”

“Yes, because of the Unihar,” said Morrison. He turned to David and asked, “You were taught about the ghost-children?”

David nodded, “Yeah.”

Morrison said, “It doesn’t matter that you’re both males. What spirit have you seen that obeys Mundane biology?”

No one answered.

“None, that’s right,” snapped Morrison. He pointed harshly at the pair with the empty rum bottle. “It could be possible to create an Unihar cause you two fucking is a powerful ritual.”

“Only if he has the First Change,” said David

“And it’s highly likely that he will,” said Morrison. “Even the Council is under the assumption that he’ll have it soon. Why else would they have sent him with you?”

“I needed a tutor,” said David.

“They could’ve sent anyone associated with your tribe,” said Morrison. “Or had you get a mentor with Dane’s pack. Which you already did. There’s no other reason they’d willingly send a wolf-blood with as valuable a bloodline as his if he wasn’t going to have it soon.”

“Will you two stop fucking and call off the relationship when he does?” asked Morrison

“Only if he has the First Change,” said David.

“It doesn’t matter what you think now,” said Morrison. “It’s going to be very hard to break off your relationship if it comes to it. It’s easy to say yes or no now, not when it actually happens.”

Morrison continued, “I suppose I could recite some parable about how many times romance between two Uratha has gone horribly wrong.”

He walked back up to them, “I will however share this. This story is true. I know cause I personally witnessed it sixty years ago. I was just a pup visiting some distant family on the east coast. One of the pack members was older. The woman, she was in her seventies, even with our longer lifespans, wasn’t fertile anymore, thought she could have a fling with a packmate she loved. It didn’t work, a month later the woman, even in her seventies, started getting round in the waist. Everyone thought it absolutely wasn’t possible. Let alone who the father was. I came back to Pioche a month after that. I got a call eight months after that. Half the pack was killed, including both parents. That’s when I learned that it doesn’t fucking matter whether you can have kids or not. Fertility and biology shit doesn’t matter when it comes to spirits.”

“I have no idea if it applies to two males but I really don’t want to fucking find out,” said Morrison. “You’ll get both of yourselves killed and possibly the rest of the pack. It’s selfish, self destructive, and you’re only setting yourselves up for failure.”

His voice then cracked, surprising both David and Colin. “I don’t want you two to do something to get both of yourselves killed.”

He then said more to himself than the others, “I can’t go through that again.”

David hugged his arms. He had expected a beating like every other time he got in trouble with the elder, not a verbal lashing. He found that it hurt far more than any beating.

“It’s not going to happen,” he said again.

Colin joined in, “If it was possible, then we wouldn’t have been recognised by the lunes.”

“Got them boss!” Tsu’mara called from outside.

“Good,” replied Morrison. “Keep them out there.”

He turned to Colin, “You really think the Lunes would care if you did something suicidal or not?”

“Mother Luna created the Oath,” replied Colin. “If there was even the slightest chance of it happening, we wouldn’t have been recognised.”

Morrison shook his head, “The goddess of insanity doesn’t care if you do something insane. You’re gonna get recognised regardless. She doesn’t care. You can get renown for doing something suicidal. Usually for something suicidally brave. But suicidally dumb is a side of the same coin.”

“Not if it breaks the Oath of the Moon,” shot back Colin.

Morrison tilted his head and asked, “Are you debating theology with an elder?”

Colin stammered, unable to spit out a reply as his brain short circuited from backtalking the elder.

Morrison continued, “I can personally assure you that Luna doesn’t care if you tie your own noose and jump off a bridge with it. You’re assuming that Luna wouldn’t just find that interesting. You’re applying too much rationality to the goddess of fickleness and madness. She upholds the rules, ignores the rules, and even breaks them herself. She is crazy.”

He sighed, “Look. I’ve got no problem with the gay shit. It’s the possibility that it could get us all killed. Yes it’s probably more common nowadays but that doesn’t mean anyone knows what will happen. Cause we know so little about our own damn biology. Like how long can an Uratha live? There’s been some that lived for over a thousand years.”

Jesse opened the front door and asked, “How long have you been alive, Old Man?”

Morrison pulled out his silver throwing knife and threw it at Jesse, imbedding it in the doorjamb just by his head, “Ninety-nine and still sharp enough to kill even an Irraka.”

He turned his attention to the rebellious couple, “Alright, do you two even understand what a serious clusterfuck that you can get us into?”

He dug his finger into Colin’s chest, “If this one has his First Change. The only solution is to split you up into different packs. Better yet, one shipped off to the other side of the country. The temptation would be too damn great.”

He went to the kitchen and got another bottle of rum. He took a swig and said, “I will not have two of my pups be responsible for making an Unihar.”

Neither David nor Colin knew if Morrison meant pups as in under his care or as his own children.

Morrison sat down at the table and started nursing the bottle of rum. It seemed clear to everyone that the elder had stopped verbally tearing into the couple and the other members of the pack started slinking in to get food and coffee.

Lucas took a seat and said, “Wow, Morrison. I’m glad you care about us so much. David was convinced you were just homophobic.”

Morrison gave a snort and took another swig of rum, “Yeah, I realised that you two idiots thought that when the half-blood started spreading rumours about me.”

He turned to Colin and growled, “Yes, I know that was your idea too.”

Colin avoided the elders gaze and David mumbled a barely audible apology.

Jesse asked, “Do I really have to pay the mor-?”

“Yes,” Morrison said curtly.

“Damn,” swore Jesse.