Notwithstanding the warm welcome Lou had recieved from Luna Marisa, as well as the open admiration from the Luna's daughter, Cadence, Lou found she wasn't nearly so well recieved by the other party goers. The social seclusion coupled with Draven's push to memorize the names and faces of every Alpha and Luna in the thirteen packs had led to a rough experience. She had been more than ready to hit the hay at the end of the miserable night. Unfortunately, it seemed she was one of few.
"Do we have to be up so early?" Maud groaned as the two of them made their way through the hall following the staff designated as their guide. "This headache is killing me!"
"That's what you get for knocking back so much booze," Lou replied without the slightest trace of sympathy, "especially since you're still technically underage."
"So are you!" Maud exclaimed.
"I wasn't drinking," Lou pointed out.
"Stop being so judgey," Maud huffed. "The human laws don't apply to us in Astrea City! According to the law here, I am just fine drinking whatever whenever!"
"Whatever Maud," Lou sighed. "You do you."
"By the way, where are Draven and Azreal?" Maud wondered.
"They're probably waiting for us at the entrance of the meeting room," Lou replied. "Unlike you, they're typically pretty good about waking up with their alarm and getting dressed quickly."
"Why are you picking on me so much Lou?" Maud sulked.
Lou glanced at her practiced poise as she puckered her lips and wriggled in a way that flaunted her rather large and bouncy assets. The alpha immediately rolled her eyes at her antics. Today, there was too much at stake to allow such silly little things to get the better of her.
"It's about time!" Draven hissed as Lou and Maud arrived at the door to the meeting hall.
"Sorry, we got held up," Lou replied with a pointed glare at Maud. "Am I the last to arrive then?"
"Be prepared for a dramatic entrance," Draven replied with a nod and a sigh.
Squaring her shoulders, Lou took a deep breath, threw the door open, then strode confidently through, her betas falling in line behind her. Sure enough, every other Alpha was present and waiting, as were their sons and betas.
"Good morning Alpha Lou, so glad you could join us!" Abram sneered. Behind him, his six sons chuckled. She took it as a good sign that most of the other alphas either rolled their eyes or shook their heads at his antics. It was gratifying to know that she wasn't the only one who found him irritating.
"So who exactly do you want me to marry?" Lou asked, completely ignoring Abram, as she found her position at the circular table.
Instead of taking a seat, she remained standing, though she leaned forward to rest her hands on the table. Thanks to her black dress shirt who's top few buttons remained undone, this gave them a nice view of her cleavage, as well as the elaborate tattoo decorating her neck down to the collar bone which also extended down one side and arm.
Her raven hair was gelled and slicked back, which revealed the numerous piercings in her ears. Her leather pants where tight and emphasized the curve of her hips, but were also flexible enough to allow a decent range of movement. As Lou stared at the sea of shocked, repulsed, and at the same time lustful expressions of the males at the table, she inwardly thanked Draven for his sense of style and foresight.
What better way to capitalize on both her masculinity and her femininity than to wear the Jeff Goldblum Jurassic park getup? Though Maud had insisted that she looked like some character named Geralt off of a Netflix show she had seen. She'd completely ignored the insistance of Azreal that she looked like Ross from "Friends." She still didn't get what he saw in that show.
"You will choose one of my sons to marry," Abram replied, gesturing to the six goons she'd had the misfortune of meeting the prior night. For close to an hour, she had been forced to sit through lengthy introductions to each of them.
"Yeah, I am going to pass," Lou replied with a frown. "From what I was told, the whole point of this 'mate' nonesense was that I was supposed to select a partner who would strengthen my pack, not drag it further into the gutter."
"You don't have a choice in the matter!" Abram snarled. Go figure, he was acting like hot shit in the absence of the real person who wore the pants in his pack. Not for the first time, she felt sorry for the Luna and what she must've had to put up with on a regular basis.
"Alpha Armstrong of Ironfang," Lou completely ignored Abram a second time and turned her attention to where the oldest, and most powerful among them sat at the head of the room. "Could you tell me the requirements for this mate business?"
"Per the agreement drafted by the packs to allow readdmittance of your pack at the council, you are required to select an elegible son from among the alphas sitting at this table to strengthen relations between your pack and others as well as to preserve your lineage," Joe replied in a bored tone. "All bullshit excuses for the fact that certain bastards at this table are totally hoping to take control of your pack, but I'm sure you guessed that already. Choose wisely girl."
"Who are the eligible males?" Lou questioned. She was dismayed when all fingers pointed back to the six goons she wanted to have nothing to do with. "Seriously?! There aren't any others?!"
"My apologies, Alpha Lou," Alpha Julian of the Goldmane pack, spoke up with a sad smile. "My son is already engaged and will be taking control of the pack within the next few years."
"My sons are still children, one of them in Diapers," Alpha Knox of the New Moon pack, the closest to Lou in age, replied.
A chorus of other excuses poured from the rest and Lou felt her blood begining to boil. It seemed the only reason she had any options was that the six brothers of the Blue Crescent pack were so hopeless that it had been impossible to match them with any of the shewolves. How else was it possible that all of the options that were close to her age where engaged or married?
"A word, Alpha," Draven whispered into her ear, but was careful to not to draw attention to himself as the other Alphas began going off on various tangents with each other.
"What is it?" Lou growled from the corner of her mouth.
"I only see six sons present, but I am certain there is a seventh," Draven commented.
"So?" Lou growled. "What's one more in a line of losers? and what makes you so sure?"
"The Winters men are cursed," Draven whispered. "Until seven sons have been born, it is not possible for them to conceive a daughter. He has a daughter, therefore there's a son we have not yet met. Since he's trying to hide this seventh son, there's a good chance that's the one we'll actually want."
"What makes you so sure?" Lou questioned.
"Luna Marisa and Alpha Abram have been at odds for years. There's a good chance the mystery son takes after her," Draven replied.
The chatter in the room died out and all eyes returned to Lou. Draven melted into the background as Lou contemplated what to do.
"Enough dawdling," Abram barked. "Make your selection and be done with it! We have other affairs to see to."
"Alpha Armstrong," Lou returned her attention to the head. "Could I test these males in combat?"
"I think that's a reasonable request." Joe replied. "What about the rest of you? Abram, don't bother answering, we have a pretty good idea what you think."
"It would be more entertaining than anything else happening here," Alpha Bane of the Grimfalls pack answered. "I'm fine with it."
"The best place to find love is through battle," Alpha Dax of the Darkpaw pack added.
"It is a waste of time," Alpha Ariel of the Silkwood pack scoffed. "It's easy enough to know how it will end, and it doesn't change the fact she must make a choice."
"Perhaps one will suit her better than his brothers," Julian disagreed. "Technically not all of her options are currently present-"
"There are no other options!" Abram shouted. "She will marry one of my sons, or she and her mongrels will be turned out of the city! That was the agreement!"
"The agreement was that she take a mate!" Alpha Keith of the Green Lake pack snapped.
"Those two have a long history of bad blood," Draven explained as the men at the table argued back and forth. "Rumor has it that Alpha Keith was sweet on Luna Marisa back in the day. Might still be. He was crushed when her parents arranged a marriage between her and Abram. Things have only grown more bitter and tense between them ever since."
"Enough!" Joe pounded the table and silence fell swiftly. "Fuck, you guys know how to give an old man a headache. A vote. We'll settle this with a vote. All in favor for a fight?" The majority of the alphas rose their hands. "Good, we have a majority. To the ring!"
Without another word, everybody shuffled through a side door that led to a room which conveniently contained a boxing ring. Lou wondered if this meant that fights occured often during diplomatic meetings. It was also possible that Alpha Abram was just that eccentric.
"I shouldn't need to, but I will remind you anyway," Joe stared them down, particularly Lou. "No death matches, got it. Strictly boxing, no moves that will maim or kill your opponent. Got it? Good."
"No need to be so worried old man," Basil let out a confident laugh. "We'll go easy on her, I promise."
"It's not her I'm worried about," Joe shook his head. "Whatever. Keep running your mouth, see what it gets you."
Basil was still running his mouth and neglected to hear what Joe was saying. His other brothers weren't behaving much better. Lou knew at once the task of not killing them would be very difficult for her to complete, especially given her intense bloodlust in battle coupled with their obnoxiousness. It probably didn't help she had been trained to use a deadly combination of capoeira and muay thai either.
"I tell you what," Lou was all but snarling through a forced smile as she hopped into the ring and started taking small warm-up movements to loosen her limbs, "If any of you can last longer than three minutes in the ring with me, I'll agree to marry you."
"Don't make it too easy," the first brother up to bat, Elroy she believed his name was, hopped confidently into the ring.
Lou took her stance and watched him intently. She wasn't as familiar with traditional boxing, and it would be difficult not to use moves that would be considered illegal for this match, so her opponents who had allegedly been born and bred to box had something of an advantage. She was still confident she could lay him out easily, but it was better to be somewhat cautious until she knew for sure what she was dealing with.
"Let the match begin," Joe hailed the start by smacking a large gong. What kind of self-important asshole kept a gong instead of a bell for sports like boxing? Especially one so ornate? More and more, Lou was convinced Abram was far too wasteful with his money.
The match ended faster than Lou expected. Elroy started off strong with a relentless assault, which caught Lou off guard so much so that she threw a punch around his guard and knocked him out in a single hit. She was grateful to see the foolish male still breathing on the mat. Abram looked furious as she turned to Joe who hit the gong a second time to signal the end of the match.
"She cheated!" Abram insisted.
"Shut up," Joe replied. "Next candidate."
The next four matches were over nearly as quickly as the first. Lou almost felt bad for the brothers as she laid them out one after the other. Idly, she wondered if this was how Saitoma off of One Punch Man felt. Finally, only Basil was left.
"Don't think I'll go down as easily as my brothers, bitch," Basil snarled as he sprang into the ring.
"Strong words for the coward who waited to go last in hopes I'd be tired," Lou snapped.
"Don't worry, after I beat you, I'll make sure to make it up to you when I fuck you later," Basil sneered.
Lou saw red. She barely heard the sound of the gong as she lunged for him. Realizing, in the last second before her elbow would've made impact with his face that she would kill him, Lou managed to redirect her blow just enough that she merely grazed him, clipping his ear. Panicked, Basil returned a punch straight to her face, catching her in the cheek as she moved her head in an effort to dodge the brunt of the blow. Furious, she hit him in the face with enough force to break his nose, then stepped to the side to watch with satisfaction as he kealed over and his nose was further smashed by the floor of the ring. Not a single brother had made it to the thirty second mark.
"Well, that was... something," Keith snickered as Abram fumed about the state of his sons. "I would be ashamed if my sons were so easily taken down."
"I'm not stupid enough to get in the ring with her," Keith's elder son, Kade, replied.
"Alright, back to the table everyone," Joe said with a clap of his hands. "The girl made her point. Let's go over what happens next."
"What happens next is she marries one of my sons!" Abram shouted. "Never mind the fact that she owes me and my sons an apology for her blatant cheating!"
"Is that what you calling 'winning' now days?" Keith wondered. "We all saw what happened. Joe would've intervened if there were fowl play. Your sons really are just that much weaker than her. That, or their father is far too pathetic to give them proper instruction."
Lou ignored the men, particularly Abram as he continued to argue and protest the whole way back to the table. By the time everyone was seated once more and Joe had finally gotten Abram to shut up, Lou was at the end of her rope.
"I will not marry any one of those six fools," Lou announced as soon as she had their attention.
"You don't have a choice!" Abram replied. Something about the smugness in his smile drove her insane. "Like it or not, you there aren't any other options. If you remain obstinent, you'll find yourself crawling back to thos quaint little tents your call 'home.' A failure. But then, what more could we expect from a little girl trying to play alpha?"
"Do you take me for a fool Alpha Winters?" Alpha Lou snarled, eyes flashing amber in her anger. "Do you think I'm weak? I'd be too happy to prove you wrong."
The indomitable she-wolf loomed over the neatly groomed gentlemen across the table from her. In a room of pack leaders, she was the only female. Naturally she was forced to work twice as hard for half the acknowledgement, but that wasn't new. Wether or not the fossils before her acknowledged her, she knew she was a badass. How many wolves could successfully take over a pack at the tender age of sixteen? For that matter, how many wolves could literally pull their pack out of the gutter and not only take them out of the red, but raise them to be the strongest in the region in a little over three years?
"I'll remind you, young lady," Alpha Winters, better known as 'Icy Abram,' growled, "We are conducting negotiations to end a conflict that has existed between our packs for generations. Threatening me is hardly conducive to that goal."
"What you are asking for is unreasonable," Lou snapped. "I would sooner die than take one of your sons as my mate, let alone allowing to them to take over my pack! IF I take a mate, he will fill the role of luna."
"That is the condition, young lady," Abram replied cooly. "You may feel free to refuse, but if you do I assure you we will continue to press the boundaries of your dwindling territory."
"How dare you-"
Lou was cut off as the door to the meeting room opened unexpectedly. All eyes turned to the new comer, a young man more brilliant and dainty than any other male Lou had ever seen before in her life. His frame was so slim and his movements so elegant, he reminded her of a princess from a fairtale, though he was wearing a suit.
"Forgive my interruption, alphas," He bowed his head and took a submissive posture as he extended an envelope. "Alpha Winters, the luna requested I deliver this."
An idea took hold in Lou's mind as she stared at that delightfully submissive and delicate male. The icy blue eyes and platinum hair was unmistakeable, as was his scent of pine and peppermint, this was a son of Alpha Abram Winters, one that he'd conveniently neglected to introduce her to upon her arrival.
"It couldn't wait?" Abram hissed, eyes flitting nervously to Lou.
"Him," Lou, announced with a smirk. "I choose him."