“That doesn’t sound so bad,” John says.
Chase jerks upright out of his father’s arms, flailing a little. “No, it’s great, right? Except now that power is living in me and I’m not a neutral sentient Stone, Dad. I’m—I’m me, and I want to be good, I want to do the right thing like you and like Tyler, but I get it when Lucas kills people. I understand the practicality of it. And I think, if anything threatened you or the Pack? I try to think about what I wouldn’t do, and I can’t. Do you get that? There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to protect you.”
He sounds hysterical, terrified, and John wants to shake him as much as he wants to drag him close and protect him from the rest of the world. Neither are really an option.
He sits up and says, “I think about what I’d do to protect you, and I scare myself, Chase. I bet that if you ask, Tyler would say the same. That’s what love is, kiddo. And you’ve always loved deeply, to the point of obsession, and it’s scary. But you—you’re a good person. You might be feral and vicious when threatened, but you’re still a good person.” He pauses and adds carefully, “I think it’s what makes you a good Alpha.”
“What if I can’t do this?” Chase whispers.
John squeezes his shoulder. “You can. You can do anything your Pack needs. You’ve always been able to do anything they need.”
~*~
He can feel them, the familiar golden bonds that tie him to his Pack, the ones he created for the betas and Aurora, the ones that bind him to Lucas and Tyler that he never meant to create but that are there, thick, strong, and unbreakable.
They’re dim and heavy with sorrow, anxious and tense.
That, more than anything else, is what pulls him from his bed.
~*~
The Pack is in the living room when he steps into the den, and something tight and aching in his chest eases when he sees them.
He twists his fingers together and says, “Uh... So... I’m sorry—I just needed a second to get my head wrapped around everything.”
“Did you?” Aurora asks sharply.
Chase nods. “I know I’m new to this—the whole kitsune thing is, uh, a lot? And I’m sorry, for what it’s worth. I know that—”
“Don’t you dare,” Aurora snarls, pushing past the betas to stand in front of Chase.
He flinches, but doesn’t back away.
She glares at him. “Did you go there planning on killing Chelsea?”
Lucas makes a low noise and Chase’s eyes flick to Tyler, who’s watching with narrow eyes, but keeps quiet.
“Of course not,” Chase says stiffly.
“Then why did you?”
He stares at her, startled. “Because she was going to kill Lucas.”
“You did it to protect him. You did that. Don’t you dare apologize for that. You’re the perfect Alpha for this Pack, Chase. You always have been.”
He blinks at her. He looks around the den, at the betas watching him with hopeful eyes, at Lucas who’s got a small pleased smile on his lips while he watches Aurora and shrugs when he finally meets Chase’s gaze. He looks to Tyler last and the werewolf nods, still silent, tilting his head to bare his throat, just barely.
“Don’t leave again,” Joseph says quietly.
“I won’t,” Chase says, and he knows it’s a promise.
~*~
He wants to go to Tyler, crawl into bed and sleep in his arms for three days straight. The magic he used against the Cahils hasn’t drained him the way it has in the past, something he wants to investigate at some point, but he’s still exhausted, feels like he’s stretched thin.
But Lucas is waiting, and he’s the Alpha now. He’s responsible.
He nods toward his room, the one Tyler built for him that he never sleeps in but still feels like his. Lucas watches as Chase slumps on his couch and scrubs a hand through his hair, fighting the urge to yawn.
“It can wait, Alpha,” Lucas says.
Chase shakes his head. “No,” he says, voice raw. “Just tell me.”
“Tripp was an outlier. He acted without his Alpha’s knowledge or blessing.”
Chase cocks his head. “Do we believe that?”
“Yes. I might not have if it had come from Stephen’s Left, but the Alpha is an old man who led his Pack through peace bought with his father’s generation—he doesn’t have the sense or the skill to lie to me.”
“What do they want for killing their ‘wolves?”
Lucas shrugs. “Our silence. Cahil doesn’t want word of his Pack’s treachery to spread. And they want our assurance we won’t move against them.”
Chase frowns. “That seems a little too easy.”
“We killed ten of their Pack, and if we broadcast that, it will cause distrust and packs to rally against us. But if it gets out that Cahil couldn’t control his son, that they welcomed an Alpha and treated her like an omega? That they attacked a pack without provocation? They’ll lose any standing and allies they have. Neither of us stands to gain by airing our dirty laundry.”
“So what do we do now?”
Lucas shrugs. “We have allies and we have a secure territory. We don’t need to do anything. We can take this time to be Pack.”
Chase cocks his head, grinning. “Peace, big bad? Is that what you’re advocating?”
Lucas bares his fangs. “Behave, pup. We’ve earned our peace.”
He nods, sighing. “Yeah. We have.”
~*~
Tyler is sitting on the porch when Chase finds him. He hesitates in the doorway, the Pack noisy behind him and the beckoning night quiet in front, and Tyler balanced between.
“Come here,” Tyler murmurs, and he moves in a rush of flailing limbs and relief as Tyler catches him, drawing Chase down into his lap, and he curls there.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, pressing his face into Tyler’s chest, listening to the steady thump of his heartbeat, picking out the intricacies of his scent. He shudders and presses that tiny bit closer as his scent
