Nessy-Candace gave me a smothering hug that lifted me off my feet, then released me and quickly dressed in a set of clean clothes—dark jeans and a black tank top. She looked at Adelle, who was still flicking through TV channels with an air of profound boredom.

"Ads, you're on Alec-tree bodyguard duty," she commanded. "Behave. No chewing Alec without his permission, no punching holes in the walls, no challenging the hotel staff to drinking contests, and no sneaky shadowsteppage into the minibar. Got it?"

"Yeah, yeah," Adelle grumbled, not looking away from the screen where a dramatic cooking show was unfolding with contestants using their tiny dragons to cook things for professional delver judges. "Don't have fun. Got it."

"Good. Unbind Visa from nullspace." She manifested a credit card and slapped it on the beside table. "Here's Candy's card. I'll Voicecast you when I get to the mall so that you can enjoy my singing too. Toodles!" With a final wink at me, the husky pulled the dragonheart lauriel off Candace's head, put it on her own, hiding it between black locks. Then, she was out the door, leaving me alone with the cheetah and the unconscious fox.

An awkward silence settled over the room, broken only by the enthusiastic shouting of pradavarian chefs and squeals of their dragons on the television.

"So," Adelle said, finally turning her attention away from the screen. "Food?"

"Food does sound good," I agreed.

We spent the next ten minutes ordering an absurd amount of takeout from a nearby restaurant using Adelle's phone and Candace's gold visa card.

As we waited, another silence fell, this one feeling heavier. Adelle wasn't looking at the TV anymore. Instead, she was staring at me, a pensive expression on her face. I wasn't sure what to say either.

"Alec," she said finally, "Two days ago. At the gas station. I was a real piece of shit to you, wasn't I?"

"You were... very drunk," I offered diplomatically.

"Drunk isn't an excuse," she muttered. "I… disrespected you. Claimed you like you were some... Uhm. Like a stray I found. And I ordered my entire pack to chase and smack you around. Including Candy who can barely think straight when she's high." She shook her head, a self-deprecating grimace twisting her feline features. "Some Alpha I turned out to be, huh?"

"Yeah," I agreed, deciding honesty was the only way forward. "It was a pretty shit experience for me. But you also made me your Alpha that night, so I have that going for me."

"Because you earned it," she said, looking at me, her violet-blue eyes intense. "You... faced the Butcher of Delvers and lived. You are stronger than me… when it actually matters. That's how it works. The strongest one leads. Slayer, you earned it earlier when I kept hitting you and you kept your eyes up on me, but I was too drunk and prideful to even admit it properly…"

"Hrmm," I mused. "Is that how it is, to you, just a matter of strength? Whoever punches hardest and endures the most punches gets to be the boss?"

"It's... how I've always seen it," she admitted. "How my mom raised our litter. Show no weakness. Dominate or be dominated. Punch your way to the top. The Skid Marks... we weren't just a dungeon delving gang. We were a bunch of fuck-ups who tried to be someone. We banded together because we had nowhere else to go or wanted to get away from our shit fams. I became captain because I was the toughest fuckup. That's how I thought you earned respect in a pack."

She pawed at her face, kneading her cheeks. Then she licked her paw and brushed her red hair aside.

"But now I know that you're strong, so much stronger than me. I admit it now, even if it might be too late. Most of this is my fault, isn't it? If I just explained things to you, if I wasn't piss-drunk because I was afraid of leading my girls into the Superstore again… then you wouldn't have driven to that damned highway's edge, right?"

I nodded.

"I…" she muttered. "I fucked up so bad."

"It's fine," I shrugged. "The Lynx ain't rushing us. She's immortal. She can wait till we get stronger to break her highway loop or whatever. The important thing for me, is whether you've learned something from all of this."

Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

"I am. I'm absolutely trying to learn from you," she muttered, glancing away from me to Candace's sleeping form. "Trying to fix what I fucked up, even tho' I know that I cannot possibly undo that death Quest hanging over you."

Again, I simply nodded.

"I've been watching you, trying to understand. You don't lead by punching. You lead by... listening. By trusting. By being clever. By challenging us to take care of each other. By doing shit like... fusing a dragonheart with our hair n' blood to make a thing that gives everyone extra mana." She huffed a small, humorless laugh. "I probably would've just eaten the heart and hoped it gave me greater powers or sold it and bought an artifact that'd make me tougher or something. Hell, I wouldn't have overcome Fern and her army of Elementals to get that heart to begin with!"

"You know," I said, "when you claimed me... You broke my ribs... And I hated you. A pretty humiliating experience. For a minute there I even considered figuring out how to exterminate all pradavarians."

Adelle flinched, but didn't look away. She just listened, her expression somber.

"But then you told that dumb overexaggerated story about it," I continued, "about how it was this... ancient prad ritual or whatever. And Nessy said you weren't lying about the mana transfer, which did help me a lot yesterday. It didn't make it exactly okay, but... it made it make a little more sense. It wasn't just cruelty for cruelty's sake. You were trying to gauge me, evaluate my strength."

"It was stupid," she said flatly. "I was trying to show you respect in the only way I knew how, but I did it by being a massive ass. I get it. I'm not good at... talking. I'm good at being violent, getting drunk and running away from my problems. I got Shadowstep when mom wouldn't stop hitting me with her bottle, accidentally flashed right to the roof of our trailer."

"You're also good at protecting your pack," I pointed out, considering how we both had parental problems. "You jumped in front of the Wyvern. You fought the TA and shadowstepped effectively to get us out of the maze. You helped get that dragonheart out."

She nodded.

A knock at the door signaled the arrival of our food. The interruption broke the tension, and we spent the next few minutes unpacking containers and laying out a feast on the bed.

We ate dinner in a comfortable silence, the only sounds the clinking of cutlery and more inane chatter from the TV.

After we finished, Adelle stretched out.

"Why didn't you give in?" she asked. "Why didn't you just surrender, ask me to stop?"

"Didn't have anything to lose." I shrugged. "Plus, I've had lots of practice getting the shit kicked out of me. Crying for mercy only made it worse."

"With your brother," she said. "Fire mage, right?"

"Yeah."

"Siblings can be the worst," she sympathized. "I got out of my house as soon as I could 'cus my mom and sisters were driving me nuts. But hrmm… What I'm trying to say is... I respect you. Actually, more than that… I trust you. Which is weird because I don't trust almost anyone except for Loops and even then I only trust her when she's not high."

"Why do you trust me?" I asked.

"Because you had every reason to abandon me and Candy after what we did to you. Instead, you showed me your strength and became our Alpha and gave us direction, purpose." She leaned forward, her expression earnest. "And now you're planning to take on an impossible Quest to save a town full of people who probably don't give two fucks about you."

I considered her words. "It's not about whether they care. It's about what I choose to do."

"Exactly," she said. "That's what makes you different. That's why I'm willing to follow you into whatever crazy shit comes next! The Highway, the Omnithornia field trip, whatevs. Because I know you're not doing it for glory or money or power. You're doing it because it's right. And wherever you go, I'll be by your side as your magisteel fist, your shadow sword."

She smiled, whiskers twitching.

"I trust you more than I've trusted any Alpha before. Even more than I trusted myself when I was in charge."

"Why?"

"Because you're not trying to be something you're not," she replied. "You're just... you. A little human tater who's way out of his depth but keeps swimming anyway. You don't posture. You don't try to dominate. You just... figure shit out. And you care. About all of us. Even when we're being total knobs."

She turned her head to look at me, a soft, vulnerable expression in her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Alpha," she said quietly. "For being a coward, for hurting you… and getting wasted instead of facing my own shit. For everything."

I remained silent, letting her talk it out.

"Do you… still hate me?" A single tear traced a path through the fur on her cheek. She quickly wiped it away with the back of her paw, but not before I saw it.

"No. I… Get that you're a tad rough around the edges, Addie. Just... don't ever do it again," I said.

"Never," she promised, reaching out to wrap her hand around mine. "I swear on my honor as your packmate."

For a minute we just held hands. Then with deliberate and slow movements, she sat up and crawled over the bed, tail swaying.

For a moment I was concerned that she would pounce at me and maul me, but she simply rested her head on my lap, her entire body relaxing. I hesitantly started stroking her orange-red hair. Round ears twitched at my touch.

"You're a good Alpha, Alec," she murmured. "Really… The best I've ever had. I don't feel afraid of the future. I don't feel like running away when I'm with you, because I know that you can beat things that I cannot… Somehow overcome odds that seem wildly insurmountable to me. I don't even give a fuck about being second in command, Candy or Ness can have that spot. I just want to be by your side… with our new pack… our new family."

I gave her more head pats and she started to purr like a small tractor, wrapping her entire body tightly around me.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.