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“Am I the first mate in your family who’s shown up with a pup?” Logan asked.
“You’re not even the third,” Roark explained. “When my dad met my mother, she was raising her sister’s pup. Mom loves to tell the story about how he didn’t even blink when the bondmark appeared, he just scooped Byron up, cuddled him, and thanked her for giving him a son.”
Logan’s eyes-tearing up were the last thing he expected.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to wreck the mood,” Roark muttered as he watched Wren playing tag with the other wolves, fully immersed in their game now.
“You didn’t,” Logan replied, gripping his hand. “You enhanced it. Seriously, I was just touched by the story. One of my biggest fears was meeting a mate and having them reject Wren.”
“My old man would go upside my head with a cast-iron skillet,” Roark admitted. “Then he’d get serious and kick my rear.”
“Hearing you talk about him and the other folks here, I think I know the answer to this question, but for Lysander’s sake, I feel the need to ask anyway,” Logan began. “Does this pack forbid wolves with disabilities from mating the way some other packs do?”
Bristling, Roark wrinkled his nose. “Oh, fudge, no!”
“Good to know.”
“To reject a mate for a disability, or for bringing a pup into a mating, will get a wolf shunned around here,” Roark explained.
“Keep it up and you’ll have me convinced that I’ve landed in a literal utopia.”
Snorting, Roark chuckled as he thought back on all the mayhem and mishaps that had gone on at Comet Lake over the years.
“Wolves clash here the same as everywhere else. They feud, they hold grudges, but they do it within the core regulations of pack law, for the most part. When lines are crossed, wolves find themselves in front of the council. We have a prison here, six cells, none currently occupied now that our last batch of traffickers was delivered to the high council. Well, the ones that weren’t swiftly rendered fuel for the pyre.”
“Why dispatch some and send the others along with the high council to deal with?” Logan asked.
“Because they didn’t belong to us,” Roark explained.
He could see when realization hit, as Logan’s lips flattened into a grim line and he nodded.
“Understood.”
“Our laws are meant to protect everyone who lives on Comet Lake lands. Period. No exceptions. Break one and the council deals with it based on the guidelines they’ve set forth. When wolves have a problem they need to settle with their fists and claws, they issue a formal challenge and take it to the circle in the council building, where it’s properly officiated. Violence outside of the circle is dealt with swiftly and decisively.
“Acting as a deterrent in the process,” Logan said.
“In the past two decades, more mates have chosen to relocate here than we’ve had wolves leave Comet Lake and move with their mates to other packs. It’s become a major source of irritation with some of the other packs, and as a result, they’ve started not showing up for any gatherings we host.”
“Sounds like the folks here might be better off with them steering clear.”
“I agree,” Roark admitted. “And I know a lot of others who do too, though there are just as many who wonder if that isn’t the reason they haven’t found their mates yet.”
“I sympathize with them.”
“Same,” Roark replied. “I just hope the High Council of Shifters feels the same way when the evidence is presented to them and will step in and deal with the injustices that have taken place, once and for all.”
“You and me both.”
Roark finished half the thermos, with Logan taking a few sips here and there before Wren joined them and drained the rest, then ran back to play with their new friends for another hour before several of them had to leave. Wren returned to them, all smiles, chatting excitedly about the pups they’d played with, all the way to their first official shop.
The clothing store.
“Look at you all bright and cheery in your coat and boots,” Gina said to Wren when they entered the store. “You were right to go with the aqua instead of the red.”
“It’s my favorite color,” Wren declared.
“What are we shopping for today?” Gina asked.
