19 FEBRUARY, FRIDAY, AFTER DINNER
The rest of dinner went on peacefully now that Bell was out of the picture.
Boo was restless throughout and wanted to seek Bell out, but I didn't think it was appropriate to just get up and leave the table when the other Lorents were here.
As far as I could sense, he was still in the Alpha House - somewhere in the side wing, fuming. If Bell was a mountain, he would be the type that was inhabitable because it was an active volcano that would explode on a near daily basis.
Dessert was macaroons. They were cream in color with with specks of vanilla and gold flakes, and the filling was dark chocolate and caramel.
"This is perfect!" Lady Amber exclaimed after a single bite, "It's not too sweet, and the flavors blend well."
Alpha James ate his in two bites, "Yes, its delicious."
Luna Edith looked surprised, and then amused, "He...he....ate it...so qui-quickly...he w-wolfed it down."
Then she giggled.
Lady Amber laughed, "Brother always does that when he likes something. There were four of us and the one who ate the fastest always got more."
At that, Dad's eyes lit up, "I remembered such a time too."
Alpha James laughed, "Growing up after the Great War, just putting food on the table every evening was a common struggle, from the greatest alpha to the least omega. Now our children don't even know the meaning of hunger!"
Dad nodded, "We live in a land of plenty now."
There was a quiet as both elder alphas paused to reflect.
I ate my macaroon. I wished Mate was here to give me his, but he wasn't, so Ki didn't even bother to place a dessert plate where he had vacated.
I could ask for another, and I would have except I distinctly remembered that good girls didn't ask for seconds and I didn't want Lady Amber or Luna Edith to think I was greedy, even though I was.
Also, I knew that the leftovers would be in the fridge, and I could ask Ki later, when the guests had left. Heh heh heh.
After dinner, we ajourned to the living room. Luna Edith commented about how special this house looked. Mum offered our guest a tour around our home. Ki, our resident tour guide explained how every room was prefabricated, and then shipped over to be assembled together.
Alpha James seemed to find the entire idea fascinating. He kept asking things like if the whole living room was one unit (it was made up of two, joined together), and if the fireplace came with it (it did not, although it did come with the slot where we had installed our gas fireplace). One could also opt for a traditional wood fireplace, it would be cheaper, but Alpha Kingsley preferred gas.
"It is cleaner and more fuel efficient." Ki praised, his ever present smile gracing each morsal of information about our home and family. For some reason, Ki seemed to believe that this was a good time to work his PR magic, "The new Alpha House was built with sustainably sourced material. All appliances are of top rating in electrical and water efficiency too. It's a very environmentally conscious home."
If made it sound like my Mum and Dad were very environmentally conscious too.
Dad shrugged, "I dislike chopping firewood."
Everyone took pause. Maybe they were trying to imagine the Alpha Kingsley of Night Leaf coming home from work, and then heading out to chop firewood. I wondered if Dad had ever considered paying someone to do it for him.
But then Lady Amber clapped her hands together, "That's true. The trees in the Green Packlands are rich with history and beauty. Chopping them down for firewood would be a pity."
"Most of the fireplaces in Night Leaf runs on gas, and is a commonly metered utility along with water and electricity in Night Leaf." Ki continued to explain.
"Impressive." Alpha James nodded.
Uh oh, we just stepped on a Dad topic, so now we all have to hear it all over again (well, just Mum, Savy, and me... Maybe Ki, I suppose it was new to our guests.) All of us smiled politely as Dad explained to our guests how he decided to pipe in gas from the city a few years ago.
"We run in electricity and drinking water, I thought why not gas? It certainly beats chopping our own wood." Dad said.
Dad really hated chopping wood. When I first learned how at camp, I came home and boasted about it and Dad told me how he had to chop wood till his hands were bloodied and blistered when he was a teenager. And not just once or twice, but everyday.
Grandpa Alpha had put him on firewood duty, not just for the Alpha House, but the packhouse too. And everything needed firewood in Night Forest, from the boilers to heat the water, to the fireplaces for warmth, and the stoves and klins for cooking (they still used a klin to make pizza and bake things in their packhouse kitchen today.)
His brothers had to fetch water. Now Night Forest stored water on their rooftops, and there was a system to pump water from a nearby spring, but in the past, they had to collect water manually, and it was stored in huge clay jars... Each one large enough to keep a child in.
I knew because Grandpa Alpha had put me in one - just for fun of course. He had upcycled them into pots, to grow small trees and scrubs in. Grandpa Alpha had very green thumbs. He liked to grow his own vegetables, and roses too. He had a vineyard, and a potato patch... He let me pluck grapes to eat directly from the vine. Sometimes I helped him pull out the potatoes, but I wasn't allowed to eat those. Grandpa Alpha was the one who taught me that potatoes were poisonous unless they were cooked.
Our guests nodded their understanding. Alpha James said, "They say a man of foresight is someone who understands the need to protect our natural world for the sake of our children."
That might be true, but I was sure Dad really just meant he hated chopping firewood.
Anyway, Alpha James sounded very interested in piping gas from Gate City to the Lorent Town too. Dad told him that the Princess Town would need it and Morning Light had also requested for it, so upgrading the pipes under the VIP lane of the road home was under consideration.
"We can talk more another time." Dad offered, "My Beta would have the details."
"Yes, yes." Alpha James looked extremely pleased, "I would appreciate it if you could include the Lorent Pack in this project."
Ki led us along the hallways. Alpha James wanted to know if the hallways were also prefabricated units.
Apparently, they were. Although not in all cases, but our Alpha House was designed this way so that additional soundproofing material could be inserted between the walls of each unit, providing privacy for our wolf family to converse comfortably without disturbing other family members.
It certainly explained why I didn't hear Savy's music in the morning now (although Mum and Dad's room apparently didn't share the same level of insulation.)
Ki opened the door to show us the kitchen, proving how sound proof the walls were: The moment the kitchen door opened, Harvey and Ben who were hunched over laptops and coffees in the breakfast nook looked up surprised at our arrival.
They stood up quickly and bowed and then they had to stand there awkwardly till we left. I grinned at them. Harvey nodded a small bow to me. Ben raised a brow in defiance.
"Is this one unit?" Alpha James asked, "Does it come with the kitchenette?"
Ki explained that the kitchen was one of the most customized room in the Alpha house, made of 3 units - which were now the main kitchen, kitchen island, and breakfast nook.
I forgot about my betas and looked around where Ki pointed, looking for the seams in the ceiling where the units were supposed to have been joined, but of course there were none visible.
Due to the practical demands of the room, the cabinets and layout were were custom designed, and of course only used high grade sustainably sourced material.
Our kitchen was also equipped with dishwashers - the Night Leaf Alpha house employed technology instead of live in servants. Not just for dishwashing, we also had washer-dryers for our laundry, and robo vacuums that also mopped in various sections of the home.
All of these, including the TVs and blinds in the common areas of the house were programmed to run automatically on a timer and could also be controlled remotely through an app on our phones.
Wow. I had no idea... Actually, I didn't even know our windows had blinds. Why did we even have curtains AND blinds? That was kinda OP (over powered) right?
Anyway, on with the tour. Ki led us to Mum's favourite room in the house, the glass room. Everyone admired the plants growing, particularly the pot of red tulips which I had never seen before in my life.
Mum admitted she only just received it as a gift earlier today. An old wolf had come to drop it off today.
"It was really a surprise!" Mum said, "I was just planning on planting red tulips this spring. I had no idea it could be bloomed indoors in the middle of February."
Dad raised a brow at it, "An old wolf?"
Mum! Don't accept gifts from strange old wolves!
"Yes." Mum nodded, "A Mr Greene from Morning Light. He said Sam and her betas had helped him earlier with his firewood..."
Eh? Him?
"Mr Greene from Morning Light?" Dad repeated, now he looked to Harvey.
"Yes, Alpha." Harvey answered, but his tone was measured, "He is an old wolf living by lullaby route. Sam helped him chop a supply of firewood. Mr Greene is the business owner of the local Gardening Supply Store in Morning Light Town."
I would have introduced him as "Mr Greene is an old grouchy man who lived in a house with termites and walked with a limp" but I guess Harvey's introduction was better.
Mum smiled, "It was very good of you to help him. The cold was making an old injury flare up badly, and he could hardly walk - much less chop wood. He had to bear with the cold for a full week before anyone was willing to make time to help him."
Well, if he wasn't such a grouch to the other kids, I was sure he would've gotten help sooner.
I shook my head, "Actually, Ben and Harvey did all the work. I just poked around." (And found a secret path to the warlock's romance tree and stole a couple of his crystals - but of course I didn't say that part aloud.)
But I was glad I helped him too. I didn't know he was hurting. Maybe what the ancient lycans said was true, "Under every angry wolf is a hurting wolf."