Chapter Six #2
“Watch him for me, will you?” I hated bringing humans in on potential problems, but in this case, the problem was a human who was under the direct supervision of the one I was talking to.
“Something felt off with those questions of his. Maybe it’s just stress and lack of caffeine on my part, but I’m concerned. ”
“I saw it,” she said. “I’ll stick close.”
“Thanks.” I took the first sip of my blessedly still hot coffee. “I’m going to give Seth a heads-up too. If you see anything about Dorney that you think needs to be addressed, find one of the guards.”
“Got it.” She glanced over her shoulder. “We need this to go well.”
“Yes. We do.”
“I’ll stay on top of things.” She looked toward the kitchen again. “Which means I need to get back in there, if you’re all set, Anax?”
“Yes. Thank you.” Chloe rarely called me by title anymore, but I didn’t correct her. From now until Saturday when everyone except the invited wedding guests departed, I was the Anax, and I was going to have to get used to hearing it.
I had a brief period of silence, broken only by noises from the kitchen, which I greatly appreciated. Gradually, as the sun rose and the day truly started, Kyle, the guards, and our guests joined me in the dining room in time for Chloe to put breakfast on the table.
After that, the night guards went to their rooms and the day guards took up whatever roles Seth assigned them.
Mandeep would be responsible for ensuring that all of the guests and their belongings were put in the proper places.
Although it had taken forever, I’d spent time the previous week diagramming the bedrooms and assigning them in writing to make sure that any guests who had conflicts with one another were separated.
Over the next several hours, the ridiculously loud noise of plane engines occasionally filled the air as the rest of the arkhons arrived.
For the most part, they would show up before the alphas, since the arkhons could come here directly and all of them wanted to appear dominant and in charge of the alphas under their rules.
With Kyle by my side and Mandeep close behind us, I did the ceremonial greeting to every single one of them as they disembarked from their planes.
Mandeep ferried some to the house by golf cart, along with everyone’s luggage since even the ones who didn’t mind walking were too important to carry their own bags.
By early afternoon, all twelve of the arkhons were on site along with their sparse handful of guests.
Only four of the arkhons had mates. Four others, besides Zane, had chosen women from their territories to bring as companions, and a few had brought their guards and/or members of packs in their region just to keep them company.
None of it was a problem; other than Zane surprising me with Lara, the arkhons had made their guest lists known to me at least a month earlier so my staff could plan accordingly.
All of them showed me the proper respect, but Davis Gray and Robert Greenlea, the Arkhon of the Midatlantic Region, gave me the impression that they were just performing deference.
No surprise there, given Paul’s warning about Davis and the fact that Robert had never been one of my biggest fans, even when I was still just Alpha of Boston North and he barely knew me.
Davis was one of the last to arrive, with only Matt Hayakawa, Arkhon of the Hawaii Region, showing up after him. Once Mandeep had driven Matt away in the golf cart, I turned to Kyle. “Any insights?”
“Aside from the fact that you’re Anax-ing at me instead of being my mate?” He leaned over and kissed my cheek. “I know. You have to be the Anax right now, and you want me around because you value my input.”
“And because I love you.” Irritation tensed my muscles, and I took a deep breath. He wasn’t avoiding the question. He had a right to be irritated too; I was using him for his abilities to pick up things about others that I might miss.
And, if it came to it, his ability to tap into what he called a “universal well of werewolf knowledge.” Since the day he woke from his first change, he had somehow known things about werewolves and our world.
Sometimes even things that those of us who had been werewolves for decades weren’t aware of.
While I didn’t actually want to use Kyle as an info dispenser, during this gathering I might need him to be exactly that.
“Easy.” He squeezed my hand. “I know you love me. Even if you’re careful about showing it in front of some of these homophobic wank-masters. Davis being one of them. He looked completely disgusted when he got off the plane and saw me standing with you.”
“Love is weakness,” I muttered. Something that had been drilled into my head for years.
Some werewolves had mates. Some had partners.
I knew at least two who had both, by full consent of all involved.
At the lower ranks, however people felt about their mates or partners was acceptable.
Those in the three highest ranks of a pack, and of course arkhons and the Anax, were discouraged from loving, or at least admitting they loved, anyone they were involved with.
Love was weakness, and a high-ranked werewolf had to appear strong.
Worse, love could be used against you. As Hezekiah had tried to do by imprisoning Kyle the day we arrived at last year’s national gathering.
He’d claimed it was punishment for Kyle ending the life of the human who tried to shoot me, but I’d known better.
He couldn’t go against me directly, so he’d tried to get to me through my mate.
“You don’t believe that,” he said.
“Of course not.” I’d bought into the no-love hype for years, until I met Kyle.
Even before he was changed, when he first moved into the building opposite mine in the small three-building complex Boston North Pack called home, something had drawn me to him.
I’d fought it at first, not willing to risk my rank and the respect of my pack over a silly crush on a human man.
Not to mention that being attracted to a man terrified me more than a little given the circumstances of my change.
But gradually, I’d realized Kyle belonged in my life.
Of course, after he was changed and I recognized him as my mate, I gave up resisting being with him. He was mine. Whatever had brought us together, we belonged in each other’s life, and I didn’t want to fight it anymore.
“Some of the others don’t know better, though.” He glanced toward the house. “Maybe they’re just jealous that they never found their mates.”
“I’m sure that’s it,” I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm.
He snorted. “Anyway, yeah, Davis took your side last year against Hezekiah because Hezekiah literally told him to kill one of the Pacific Region alphas. You weren’t who Davis wanted in this rank, but you were better than the senile old dude.
He isn’t on your side now, and he isn’t the only one. But I don’t know much more than that.”
“Thank you.” I put my arm around him and pulled him closer. Right then, I just needed a moment to feel the comfort of his body against mine before I had to get back to being in charge of everything.
A little later that afternoon, friends started to show up. First came Kirk McCoy, Alpha of Boston North, who had served as my Beta for my entire run as that pack’s Alpha and had always insisted that he didn’t want to rise higher than the Beta rank.
When I took over as Arkhon of the Northeast Region, Kirk had automatically become Boston North Alpha.
Knowing he would refuse the rank, and that his resistance to holding it might cause problems, I’d performed a few machinations to enable Zane to challenge him and Kirk to cede rather than fighting.
That was how Zane had ended up as Boston North Alpha for a few months.
After I became Anax and reinstated Zane as Northeast Region Arkhon, we’d convinced Kirk that he didn’t have a choice anymore.
He was Boston North Alpha as soon as I removed Zane from that rank, and I couldn’t keep performing hierarchical gymnastics to bump Kirk back to Beta.
Fortunately, he’d settled in as Alpha and was every bit as competent as I’d known he would be.
He greeted Kyle and me with a smile and a back-clap man hug for each of us after we got the ceremonial words out of the way. “Ready for your first national gathering as the guy in charge, Tobias?” he asked.
“About as ready as you are for your first gathering as Alpha.” As far as I knew, this was the first gathering Kirk had attended at all. When alphas left their territories, their betas typically stayed behind to run the pack. “How are you feeling about it, old friend?”
He shrugged. “It is what it is. I won’t be the only first-time Alpha here, so at least I’ll have some company.”
“True enough.” Several other packs had new alphas since the previous year’s gathering, and that didn’t take into account any that I was unaware of.
If a Beta wanted to challenge an Alpha, they were expected to get permission from their region’s Arkhon to issue the challenge.
Most of the time, the Anax was contacted when a pack gained a new Alpha, but informing me wasn’t required.
Some of those I knew about in addition to Kirk, I’d directly installed in the rank.
“I’ll introduce you to the others as they arrive. ”
“That’s a good idea,” Kyle said. “Maybe you can have a support group meeting for new alphas or something.”
Kirk laughed. “Sure, because werewolves are all about getting help and support. Isn’t the absence of willingness to do that one of the reasons things get so bunged up sometimes?”