Several days later, after lunch, Anna took the cubs, including Tanya, who still wasn't all that comfortable with her, and Kat to go visit the Hot Springs while I sat in my office and contemplated the phone in front of me. I knew that I had to make these phone calls, but I wasn't, by any stretch of the imagination, looking forwards to them. The first call that I had to make was to my cousin Alexander at Ice Lake. While he wasn't Alpha, but instead a Second, his mother had informed me that I was now responsible for what happened to him, and with his Alpha gone for the time being I knew he needed some oversight and assistance.

"Mark? To what do I owe the pleasure of a phone call?" He asked, and I could easily tell that his voice had some degree of stress in it.

"I'm just checking up on you Alex, I know you're a grown man but you know you mother feels about this move? How are you doing? You sound a bit stressed." I replied to his question by asking one of my own.

"Why in the name of the Goddess would I be stressed? My Alpha's down south playing around at our main pack. I've had to get my bonds to Westbank released, something I'm really not too happy about, though I do have to admit that my wolf likes this new challenge. My training for this is nowhere near complete, and I have a mate that I'm only just starting to get to know." He told me roughly.

"Alex, you know that Zane is still Second of Wild Valley, and he's not going to give that up, indeed I expect him to do precisely what he's doing right now by making you his new Second. When you are sufficiently trained, he will probably leave you as Alpha to Ice Lake, though I do suspect that will be a fair ways into the future."

He growled slightly before another voice came onto the line, and I could tell that she was still learning English. "You are Alexander Cousin?"

I spoke slowly, though I suspect that Alex was helping her understand by translating what I was saying, either by speaking to her, or by mind speak. "Yes, though technically I am his mother's cousin. His grandfather is my father's older brother." I told her, "I am of Silver Peak, formally Blackwater." I said, glancing down at my phone to double check and confirm that this call was indeed unsecured hence my discretion at not saying too many things that could be construed as revealing what we were if this call was intercepted.

"How are you what you are an not one of us?" She asked, probably having been warned by her mate to speak in generalities instead of specifics.

"That's easy," I replied, "Alex was the only one of our family up until eleven years ago, that was different. The rest of us were born human, and had no knowledge of the truth of myths however that changed when I was attacked and turned." I told her, letting Alex fill her in on the rest, since I'd told him a good deal about my turn and most of the rest was common knowledge among the more up to date Packs and Prides.

Alex spoke up after a few moments, "Song still doesn't fully understand Mark, it will take time but I will make sure that she does. Like most of the wolves here she still doesn't like or trust cats, I think it will be a long time before that will have any chance of changing."

"I understand Alex. The old Alpha of Ice Lake had a long time to make sure that almost all of his people viewed us the way he wanted to." I replied, leaning back in my chair to take a sip of my drink. Ever since I'd become a cat I'd learned to appreciate a smooth vodka, but I still had a marked preference for a full-bodied whiskey.

"That isn't everything Mark, I have a note here on my desk from Midnight Forest... it is asking for money... money that we don't have as well as territorial concessions for the sacrifices that they made in that attack on Blackwater three months ago." He told me grimly.

I placed my fingers on the bridge of my nose and gently massaged myself between my eyes. "For fuck's sakes..." I exclaimed with a bit of a growl. "They gambled and lost and now they want you to pay for their bad play? What about the other group that was involved?" I asked.

"So far, I haven't heard anything from Forest Depths, but I can't discount them completely since they also suffered casualties at the Battle of Blackwater." He admitted to me. "We have enough people here to keep Midnight Forest from making a play on us, but the fact of the matter is that I would rather have the Alpha here to deal with this."

"I can understand your trepidation Alex; indeed, I would feel about the same given the circumstances, however as much as I would love to lend you some assistance I can't because of that damned indoctrination that the previous leader of your group has instilled in your people." I growled, I hated the idea that I really couldn't do much but right now with the way that Alex's wolves felt about felines I knew that providing any kind of material or physical assistance would frowned on by his people. "I can provide some monetary assistance, but I have a feeling that conceding the funds to Midnight Forest may not be in your best interest."

"I agree, and talking to Alpha Zane he also agrees on that point Mark, but he isn't here right now." Alex reminded me. "I mean in the last three months he's been trying to work with us to change the attitudes of those most ingrained with the Old Alpha's point of view, but it will take some time."

"Alex, I have a feeling that soon your Alpha will be coming down, and I'm not talking about Zane, instead I'm talking about Adam. He's the Alpha of Wild Valley, and by extension, Ice Lake, be honest with him and explain the situation to him." I told him, taking another sip of my drink.

"I will do that, but can you please call them and tell either Zane or his Alpha to come here soon, I am holding on by the skin of my teeth, and I do need one of them to consult with me on some decisions that need to be made regarding the current situation." He asked me, a slight hint of desperation in his voice.

"Of course, Alex, I can make sure to pass this information on to Adam the next time I talk to him, but perhaps a better idea would be to call the Alpha yourself, after all that is why he's left you there in charge eh? Now you go and work with your people... I know there is a lot of work for you to do, and thank you for finding those remains for us, we gave all of them a decent cremation as they deserved." I told him as I recalled the small ceremony that we'd held for the six cats that had died at the hands of the previous Alpha of Ice Lake. The sheer indignity of having their heads mounted on the wall was wrong. Everyone deserved a proper funeral, be it a burial or cremation it was the right way to deal with it. The poor cougar who'd died defending her cubs, and even worse her cubs she died defending showed what a shit head the Alpha had been. The little skeletons of her cubs who had never done anything wrong to earn the fate that they'd been given showed it. When I saw those damned heads on their mountings I knew in that moment that it was a very good thing that Zane had handled Ice Lake for me because if I'd seen those things in his office I would have torn the Alpha apart with my own bare hands. I knew it was wrong to think that but in a way Zane was nicer yet also meaner than I was.

I knew that Zane tended to be a very abrupt individual. He would kill though he didn't like it. When he did it was a quick death for those who deserved it. I tended to be more emotional and had the urge to rip the offending party apart. Chances were it was probably due to how Zane had been changed.

"They didn't deserve that Mark, they may not have been wolves, but nobody deserves what he did to them." Alex said, and I could hear the sorrow in his voice. "Pulling those cubs from the ground..." He broke off, and I could hear the sadness in his voice before his mate spoke up.

"Nobody, deserve what he did to them. They were innocents" Summer Song said and I could tell that she was hugging her mate tightly as he grieved for those three cubs that never had a chance. The youngest had only been a baby, while the oldest had been a sub-adult, perhaps thirteen or fourteen, not yet old enough to shift to a Were-Form yet.

"That's for sure," I growled, "I hope that your people find a suitable way to ensure that he won't come back anytime soon."

"Yes, though we are currently working on freeze drying him, doesn't help that some of the females have taken to visiting the freezer and urinating on his corpse... he's covered in yellow ice." Alex stated with an amused growling chuckle.

I had to laugh at that since that was fitting, even if it did slow down the process of drying the damned corpse out. "It is better than he deserves Alex." I stated.

"Well unlike you we don't have access to a mountain-top tomb to shove him into, and I don't expect you to cram him into that one that your people built for you monsters." Alex stated before his mate said something to him,

"Anyways as I was saying before I have some things that I must attend to, and I really should get going. Please tell the Alpha that we need his assistance here soon." He said before hanging up.

I'd just put the phone down on it's base when there was a knock on the door frame and I looked up to see Ilya standing there with a soft leather briefcase in his hand. "Come on in Ilya, what can I do for you?" I asked.

Ilya, who had, prior to the move to Silver Peak, been one of the younger House Lords of the Pride, walked in and smiled. With the dissolution of the House system Anna and I had found a new use for his talents. He was a capable and resourceful financial manager, though most of the larger transactions were still handled by Max over at West Caledonia. "Sir, I just wanted to come by to give you a report on our finances, since the renovations are finally complete." He replied dodging around the large smart-table in the middle of the office before taking a seat in one of the chairs in front of my desk.

I nodded and picked up the folder than he pulled from his briefcase and slid across my desk to me before opening it and glancing at the contents. I had to smile slightly at the balance that was shown at the top. After burning through several million for the renovations the balance was still fairly healthy, though the number was much smaller than it had been before. However, prior to our accessing Vladimir's accounts we'd had a much less healthy account balance, and the work that we'd done to the Pride House would have left us drowning in red ink. "Is there anything here that I should be worried about Ilya?" I asked while looking over the lines and figures.

He nodded slightly, "Mark, the balance is healthy, for the moment, but I am worried about the fact that we currently don't have any major source of income, other than the restaurant that we're maintaining in Prince George. Otherwise we only have a few Juniors that have found service level employment in McBride, but we can't ask them to give up more of their income than they already do."

I nodded, and I had to admit, that by in large, Ilya was correct. The truth of the matter that like any Pack or Pride we had a significant line of expenses for everything that we needed to keep our members happy and healthy. "Do you have any recommendations that won't cause serious or irreparable damage to our territory or members?" I asked, interested in what Ilya thought we could do to bring money into our accounts.

Ilya nodded before looking up at me, "Sir our most marketable resource are the arts of our craftspeople, the jewellers and woodworkers." He nodded at the extension to the desk that I was sitting at. The extension had been made, in the same style and colour as the older part of the desk, which had belonged to Vladimir before I killed him. The extension had been built by one of our furniture makers to house my work computer and all of the attendant wires as well as my printer. "Our furniture is of the old-style sir; solid wood furniture usually fetches premium prices compared to the modern Ikea style pressboard crap that most people these days buy." He paused for breath and glanced over at an ornate piece of jewelry on the desk. It was a modern recreation of an Imperial Faberge Egg, which had been carefully crafted by the most skilled of our Pride's Jewellers. "Prior to the move, we already had a reputation for making some of the most intricate, and desirable custom made jewellery in western Canada."

I nodded glancing at the egg as well, it was an excellent example of the jeweller's craft and the details were both intricate and gorgeous to behold. "If we put this egg up for sale on the common market I have every confidence that it would fetch between ten and twenty thousand alone." I commented as I gently opened it to reveal the true mastery that it represented. "However, this egg is special to myself and Anna and I could never sell it." I continued. It had been a wedding present from Shanna and Olaf to Anna and myself when we'd gotten married, in the eyes of the humans, a year and a half after I'd arrived at the Pride. The marriage itself was little more than something done to give some kind of official recognition to our status as mates. For those few human members of our family that we'd invited it had been difficult to explain what we were without revealing the truth of our nature. However, as awkward as the wedding had been, both my parents and I had felt that it was necessary for our human relatives.

"That is correct sir, and that is part of what I'm talking about. If we could get those craftspeople back to work on commissioned objects we could probably significantly increase our Pride income." He stated while looking at the desk. What he was saying was true, but there was a bit more to it than he liked to admit, since at the current time both the jewellers and the woodworkers were still hard at work modifying or making new items for the Pride. Though the renovations were complete there was still a lot that needed to be done, we had a critical shortage of good furniture and almost all of our Pride jewellery was still in need of modification to reflect our new location and Pride Identity.

"You, are right of course Ilya, and I can see the wisdom of getting ourselves back to making commissioned pieces, though there is still a lot of work that needs to be done for the Pride as well." I reminded him.

He laughed lightly. "I'm not advising that we entirely quit with our own work, but rather I feel that we should devote some of our craftspeople on outside projects. It may reduce the speed at which the work for the Pride gets done, but it will give us some income, reducing the strain on the savings accounts. After all I don't think that we want to risk our other accounts yet." He winked at me since I had already informed him of the Swiss accounts.

I winked back at him, yes those are our emergency accounts for if things really do get out of hand, though I hoped that we wouldn't have to resort to that." I confirmed to him. "Have you had a chance to talk to Max recently about our investments?" I continued while finishing off the glass of rye in front of me, it had been sitting on my desk, slowly getting warm and now the alcohol had a sharp stinging bite to it.

"Right now, are you kidding me?" He laughed gruffly, "He's too enamoured of his new mate to pay any attention to anybody, even if they are asking him questions. Though when him and his mate get back on track I know that together they are going to wreck unholy havoc on anyone who gets in their way." He laughed and I had to join his laugh.

Max's mate had come from the McBride Pack, and from what Gustaf had told me she'd only recently graduated from UBC with her MBA and when they first met you couldn't pry them apart.

After sharing a healthy laugh with Ilya, I leaned back in my chair, "I am sure that those two will ensure that we will always have some kind of fall-back income if we need it, though I would prefer to leave those funds alone and let them grow. I'd rather leave them where they are for the time being, since we will never know when we'll need them."

Ilya nodded, conceding the point, "I can't help but agree with you there Mark," He said, "The best solution is the one that I've already mentioned, getting our people back to work on outside projects for human consumption."

I nodded slightly, "I agree, I am going to stop by the upstairs workshops and talk to Master Ivan Sergeyevich about opening his people up to accepting commissions again. After all the furniture shop on the other side of the yard isn't yet ready for full production yet, never mind the fact that we don't yet have a good supply of the kind of woods that Master Boris Nikolayevich prefers." I replied looking into the low building that was located near the entrance to the garage. Inside the building, Master Nikolayevich was still getting his people sorted out. The building housed both the wood shops, as well as the metal foundry that had been constructed by the previous administration. Prior to our taking over the territory they'd been virtually idle since most of the cats that had previously operated them had been executed by Vladimir and his followers on the flimsiest of grounds. The metal shop was still short-staffed and we were short a true Master to run the shop and guide the workers.

I leaned back and mused, "What would be best for our metal shop would be if we could get a properly trained master in there. Somebody like Siegward... though I know he loves his home over at Wild Valley."

Ilya glanced over at my sword, which was hanging on pair of hooks on the mantle piece in the office, opposite the windows. "Is he the one that made your sword Mark?"

I shook my head, "No, that was his former Master, Gunther Sien of Sigibert Pack in Germany." I told him, looking over at my sword as well. So far, the weapon had served me well and I'd only had to use it to kill a few times.

I thought about the issue a bit more as I recalled that though we'd not had a true master-smith in a long time we did have more than one likely apprentice. Though, I wasn't sure if Siegward would willingly train somebody like one of our cats in his ancient craft.

Ilya broke my train of thought, "Anyways Mark, I think I've kept you long enough. We both have things to attend to, after all work can't consume our lives completely." He stood, picking up his briefcase, leaving the folder on my desk, before leaving the office rapidly.

From where he was perched, near the fireplace, Caspian offered a soft croak at Ilya before taking off for the short glide to my shoulder where he snuggled his head against mine and began making gentle crooning sounds of affection to me.

"Silly bird," I told him, though that didn't stop me from gently reaching up and giving the back of his head a soft scratch.

In the eleven years since he'd chosen me to be his Companion I'd come to appreciate and treasure Caspian for all that he could do for me. Around the Pride he'd proven his worth multiple times and I'd come to rely on him for various odd-jobs which were within his ability to perform. There were times, of course, when he got bored, and a bored raven is trouble. That had been made worse when Altair had also chosen me, since the two of them together were capable of all kinds of chaos when they combined their abilities, and intellects on something.

I heard a soft sound in front of my chair and looked down, leaning slightly forwards to give Altair a gentle scratch around his upstanding ears as he looked up at me with his golden wolf-like eyes. "Yes, you too