Chapter 92
"Hello, Vale."
I had to bite back a growl. “What do you want, Dad?”
"Can I not call my pup? I haven't spoken to you in years. Is that really the tone you want to take with me?"
Rolling my eyes, I stood up from the picnic and started to pace just behind the blanket. I felt Zeke's eyes on me, watching me but he didn't say anything.
"You could have called sooner to check up on me. Hell, I've talk to Týr more lately than you. Not that you would feel any sort of attachment for me." He sighed. "Vale, I'm not calling to argue."
"I don't know where she is. I've given up trying to find her."
“I'm not asking where your mother is either. I don't care. She will come to me when she realizes she needs me.”
I scoffed, shaking my head. "Then what do you want?"
There was a moment of silence and I stopped pacing, waiting for him to answer.
"Some of the Alphas are gathering for a meeting together. A lot actually, including Týr."
"What do you mean? I haven't heard..."
My father interrupted me. "I know. You've been playing the middle. Helping out everyone but in doing so, you've let your own race down. The Alphas don't think they can rely on you."
My mouth opened to argue, but I shut it. He was right. We'd done our best to still uphold the alliances we fought so hard to build. Trying to help put out fires of skirmishes between wolves, fey, vampires, witches, all of them. I'd stopped running around for the High Council, started working on my own, with my pack. It was a lot to deal with but I thought we were doing well considering. Looking at Zeke, seeing his eyes on me but catching a glimpse the deep exhaustion, I was starting to wonder if we were. Or if I was still asking too much of him.
"Look, Vale, I know you're trying to follow in your mother's footsteps. She was an exceptional person. Somehow she was able to forge bonds no matter where she went. Easily understanding the plight of others, while finding the right solution for the situation." My father to a breath. "But you are not your mother."
I growled. "I know I'm not but I'm..."This is property © NôvelDrama.Org.
"Vale, please, just listen to me. Your mother was...is one of a kind. Auri had an ability that extended further that just politics. Her past and her disability helped in how she related and moved within the different races. Especially, after she became the Alpha King. But she also had me."
My initial reaction was to snort but my father sighed on the other end.
"I won't deny I wasn't a good mate."
"It's a little late for apologies, don't you think? Especially when you can't actually feel apologetic."
He growled on the other end. "I'm not apologizing, Vale. I'm acknowledging I wasn't the best. That's a fact. I get it. I'm sure your mother told you all me shortcomings."
"That's the thing, Dad. She didn't! She refused to talk bad about you. Didn't allow anyone else to talk bad about you either. She loved you. Mom loved you. I never heard a single thing bad about you out of her mouth. Sometimes she would tell us something and she would be sad or frustrated that it happened but she never talked bad of you."
There was a quiet moment. "She was a better wolf than I ever deserved."
"You got that right. You blew your chance with her."
"You don't know that. I intend to bring her back. Have her come back to our pack when she shows up. Reconnect her with her home. I've already talked to Týr about it, even with the other Alphas not approving. They don't like her considering her actions lately but they are leaving her to us."
I pinched the bridge of my nose. This was going nowhere. "What do you want?"
"Look, despite my issues, I was there for your mother. I decided it was best to keep her title as Alpha King under wraps. So, I posed at the Alpha King. I did my duties to the High Council and I helped the werewolf packs with any and all issues that we had. While your mother handed pretty much all the other races and some packs as well."
"Is there a point to this?"
He sighed. "You don't have me. Your mate can't pose as king for you and he doesn't have the connections Auri does to the supernatural community. You aren't your mother. You can't do all the things she could with the power she had. I'm not insulting you. It's just a fact that you don't have her and that puts a strain on everything you do. You're stretched too thin and you've lost sight of your own race and taking care of their needs."
My father wasn't wrong. We were stretched thin. Skirmishes popping up all over, trying to appease both sides. It had become a nightmare if negotiations with neither one budging on what they wanted. A lot of them, the fey of vampires or witches, called for the pack to remove any and all Nova 2.0 users in the leadership to step down. Which didn't not go over well and was seen as a threat because the other races were scared of their power. Rarely was that the case. It wasn't the power but the lack of feeling that the other races felt had threatened their alliances previously built between them.
"Vale, you need to come back your people, your race. You need to be the Alpha King. You can't be your mother. She was one of a kind but you can be the best Alpha King that you can be. That involves you taking care of your people, your subjects. Stepping into your role and stop putting fires out like you have been doing. Take up your place as the figurehead of the werewolves; the Alpha of Alphas. Come to the meeting. Come and listen to the Alphas. Help us defend and negotiate. Become the leader I know you are."
I shook my head. "How would you know?"
"Because your mother raised you. I have faith she did a damn good job. I'm willing to risk the other Alphas being pissed that I said something to you to prove to them that you are our King."
Goddess, I didn't need this today. I watched as our pups frolicked in the grass. Laughing and smiling, free to run about with the safe walls of our territory. Sadly, not all territories felt this safe and I knew that. Back when I had fights with my mother over my position as Alpha King, she had pushed how she had been Alpha King. How she managed to create the peace for so many years.
The problem now is that all crumbled. It crumbled and she wasn't here to fix it. Hell, she was making it far worse by attacking and stacking up a body count. Not that she had done it in a while, it was eerily quiet for the past months. Camilla might have been right, she might have just slipped away, tired of fighting. I'd moved forward with what she had drilled into me. Help everyone, look for the right and wrong, don't just focus on our kind because our kind might be in the wrong. She had been proven right but we still were no closer to peace than when we started.
"When is it?"
"In two weeks, on a Saturday. We are meeting in the neutral zone East of the pack. Come, Vale. Come take your place. We need you. Need our King. Otherwise far worse is going to happen, and I think lives will be lost that could be avoided if we have our King at the helm."
Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes for a moment. "I'll talk to Ezekiel about it. I'm not promising anything. And even if I come, I'm not promising..." "I know, Vale. I just think it's about time we refocus on what's important."
"And what's that?"
He snorted. “Our kind, not being destroyed or taken for granted. That we take the next step and protect our future generation."
"From the older generation losing their emotions? Their idiotic race to power that now has rid themselves of all that has made them werewolves and the chosen ones of the Moon Goddess?"
My father was quiet for a moment. "Just try. That's all I ask. I hope to see you there."
I opened my mouth but the call already dropped. Tossing my phone on the blanket, I ran my hands through my hair a couple times before plopping back down on the blanket, laying out fully with my head resting on Zeke's shins.
"I hate him."
Zeke chuckled. "You don't hate him."
"I want to hate him."
"That I can believe. But just like Auri, you can't bring yourself to do it." He paused for a second. "You should go."
I rolled to my side, propping my head up on my hand. Looking at Zeke, trying to see if he actually meant it. "Really?"
He nodded. "I think it would be good. If only for understand where the Alphas are coming from and what their next move it. But I...I'm not going to tell you how you should be King, Vale."
"You've been telling me how to be King this whole time!" I let more irritation than I meant to seep into my words. "You have been helping..." Stopping, I furrowed my brow. "You've been helping me...when I made decisions or giving your input when I ask..."
Zeke smiled, leaning forward and brushing a strand of white hair that slipped so it was behind my ear. "I have my own thoughts and processes. I will give you my honest opinion on the matter, but you are the King. You are still my King, even if you are my mate as well. I'm really your Luna, I just happen to be an Alpha. It puts me in a unique position but my job is that of a Luna. So I will support you in anything and everything, whether or not I agree with it."
"I keep thinking if we hang on a little longer, something has to tip. We have to be making a difference. But everything keeps just getting worse. How am I supposed to move forward?"
He shrugged. "I honestly don't know. But it may be time to change tactics. I think your Dad is partially right. You are not your mother but you were raised by her. So now it's becoming what you think makes a good King and use what you have at your disposal to move forward."
"What about you?"
Slipping his feet out from under me, Zeke came over and pushed me gently back down against the blanket. Climbing on top, his ass settled on my hips, just above my dick. My hands grabbed his hips. Leaning down, he kissed me. It wasn't forceful or hard, as it had been before. It was just fill of love and tasted a bit of sadness as well. He pulled away and smiled at me.
"I will support you in any and all ways. If it means we relocate, then we do it. If it means you relocate, then we will make it work. I was wrong to be angry with that you were running around. I made you feel guilty when I should have been supporting you far more. And I'm sorry for that."
Looking at him, I tried blinking through the shock of him apologizing. "Zeke, that's..."
Suddenly, we were attacked by two pups. One taking out Zeke as he fell to the side, Reagan in a fit of giggles as she fell on top of him. However, Rowan was behind her and just fell on top of me. I curled up for a second, his body knocking the wind out of me. Grabbing him, I started to tickle him incessantly, making him scream for mercy and squirm out of my grip. Zeke was doing the same with Reagan, who already had tears in her eyes from laughing.
"You're gonna get it now."
Reagan got away and grabbed Rowan, disappearing into the grass. Zeke jumped up and ran after them, their screams and laughter the only indication of whether or not he was getting close. I laughed, smiling wide. I didn't know if I could leave this; leave them anymore. We needed to do something different though. We needed to have a plan and work through it to a better future of other packs pups, not just ours.