Page 11 of The Alpha's Arranged Mate

“The way the workers have been divided is all wrong,” Lyrie said.

“What do you mean? We took pains to ensure that each cottage is being worked on by a team who share a language.” That had been one of the first things he’d decided on, months ago before construction had even started. None of his wolves spoke the old language, and he knew that none of Darion’s would speak English—so they’d developed a system by which small teams worked on each dwelling individually. It meant construction would be slower, but it also ameliorated the communication issues… in theory, at least. In practice, there had been crippling communication problems since day one. He shuddered to think how much worse it could have been without the foresight of organizing the workers by shared language.

“That’s exactly the problem.”

“You’ve lost me. The rosters have been constructed to keep packmates working with packmates. Shared language, shared—cultural practices,” he added, stopping himself from grimacing as he said it.

“The rosters promote division,” Lyrie said blankly, staring at him like he’d just told her the moon was made of cheese. “Our goal is to create a shared bond between the packs, is it not?”

“Of course, but—”

“And how are they supposed to do that when they’re sectioned off from one another, as though they’re working on two totally separate projects?”

“You’re suggesting we should mix the working groups?”

“I’m stunned you haven’t done so already,” Lyrie said, voice snapping with impatience. “It’s so obvious I had to consult with the lorekeepers to make sure there wasn’t something I was missing.”

“They can’t talk to each other,” Reeve objected. “These are complicated tasks, and all due respect to your previous packmates, Lyrie, but they don’t even know what electricity is, let alone how to wire a house. Half of them seem to think it’s demonic.”

“And how are they supposed to learn that it isn’t when you’ve done everything in your power to keep them away from it?” Lyrie asked, raising an eyebrow. “How did you first come to learn how to use all of—this?” Her nose wrinkled as she pointed at his smartphone, which was lying face-down on the table. “Did you have someone who was already knowledgeable following you around to use it for you every time you needed it? Or did you pick it up in your own hands until it wasn’t such a mystery to you?”

He hesitated. “A little of both.”

“Explain.”

He picked his phone up, aware of the instinctive way his fingers moved to key in his passcode, the way his eyes automatically scanned his notifications. “I learned with my hands, and when I was confused, I asked for help. I take your point,” he said sharply, setting the phone down. “But these wolves don’t share a language, and tensions are so high that any misunderstandings could be disastrous.”

Lyrie wrinkled her nose. “You mistrust your pack so deeply that you don’t think they could… learn to communicate with other wolves? How did you learn the human tongue?”

“English,” he said automatically. He hadn’t mentioned that there were hundreds of other human languages to worry about. “I learned it by…” Reeve grimaced. “Alright. I take your point. I learned it because I needed to, because I was surrounded by people who were speaking it.”

“Exactly. You’ve denied both packs the opportunity to learn as you did,” she said primly. Reeve knew it was churlish of him, but he wished very sorely that the points she was making weren’t quite so reasonable. It was making it very, very difficult to justify how annoyed he was by the jabs she was taking at his leadership. He finished the last sip of his coffee, then picked his phone up and got to his feet.

“I have more to say,” Lyrie said calmly.

“I’ll give the matter some thought,” he promised, fighting the urge to storm out of the room. “But I’ve a full day of meetings, so if you’ll excuse me…”

He could tell from the narrow press of her lips and the way her eyes blazed a little that she was less than pleased with this outcome—but she gave him a grudgingly polite little nod regardless before rising to her feet and gliding serenely out of the room. Reeve paced back and forth once she’d gone, his half-eaten breakfast forgotten on the table. He’d always thought that the tensions between the packs would only be worsened by forcing them to work closely with one another. Could Lyrie be right? Could that separation be part of the problem? It would certainly explain why Darion’s wolves were feeling so alienated and uncomfortable about the more high-tech installations. He thought for a moment about his first day in the human world, about how overwhelming the modern conveniences had been, how he’d had to fight the instinct to run and hide in the woods every time he encountered something new. He’d adjusted, though. He’d been forced to by exposure. Was he denying that opportunity to the others?

He was still deep in thought later that evening, when he made the journey to the mainland. Lyrie’s little jab about his reliance on boats came back to him, and he grimaced to himself as he walked past the construction site, headed for the old library in the northernmost part of town. What was he supposed to do, swim back and forth between the yacht and Kurivon like some kind of semi-aquatic freak? She might not have given a damn about her hair, but he preferred to arrive at important events looking poised and fresh, not like he’d been dragged through the ocean on his way to the meeting. Grimacing, he tried to put the thought of her out of his mind as he climbed the library steps.

The Council of Alphas was complete, to Reeve’s surprise. For a moment, the six chairs set out for them looked incongruous—he was so used to Darion missing any meeting he attended that he’d come to think of them as a group of five, not a group of six. But tonight, for the first time in months, Darion was sitting at the table, wearing that stony expression that Reeve was now so used to seeing on the face of his protege. He offered Reeve a nod that, by Darion’s standards, was quite expressive.

“There he is,” Torren said brightly. “How’s that soulmate of yours?”

Trust Torren to blunder right in with the obvious questions, Reeve thought as he slid into the chair next to him. But he could feel Darion’s sharp eyes on him too, and knew he needed to answer the question with due care. “Settling in well, all things considered,” he said. It wasn’t technically a lie, was it? She clearly hated the yacht with everything in her, but it wasn’t like she was chewing up the furniture… unless their conversation that morning had brought her frustration to the breaking point, he thought grimly.

“I’d have thought she might accompany you,” Darion said, his gravelly voice neutral and remote.

“To the Council of Alphas?” He frowned. “Syrra doesn’t join us.”

“Syrra is a Lorekeeper, not an Alpha in her own right,” Darion said. The silence hung awkward and thick in the air, and Reeve felt the weight of worry settling into his gut. Had he made a faux pas by leaving Lyrie behind on the yacht? He hadn’t seen hide nor hair of her all day, not since the conversation about the construction workers, it wasn’t like she’d given him much of an opportunity to invite her along.

“We’ll invite her formally to the next meeting,” Renfrey said finally, and Reeve was relieved by the breaking of the tension. “But as we’re already on the subject, why don’t we start by discussing the Rite of Harmony?”

He’d have given just about anything to start with any other subject, but Reeve took a deep breath and launched into his best attempt at a report on the situation back on his yacht. It was strange to speak about such a fraught political situation in domestic terms… or was it a fraught domestic situation with political ramifications? Maybe a little of both. With Belmont the living lie detector at the table, he forced himself to be at least somewhat honest about the difficulties Lyrie was having adjusting to the boat, but he dwelled at length on positives he didn’t quite believe in to balance the scale. From the way most of the Alphas were nodding at the end of his speech, he could tell he’d spun the situation well. Renfrey had been particularly interested in what Lyrie had had to say about the organization of the construction workers, and there was a reasonable amount of hope in the room that the new strategy might lead to better results. Even Reeve was a little taken in by it. It never failed to amaze him, the way trying to persuade a room full of people that something was true could have the same effect on him.

But one wolf at the table, it seemed, wasn’t taken in to nearly the same extent. After the meeting, he found Darion waiting for him on the steps of the library, a look on his face that sent Reeve straight back to their childhood. It was the look he’d always worn after training, when Reeve had managed to talk his way out of a reprimand or a punishment.

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