christmas eve.

Lukas

When they wake up, it's Christmas Eve.

And it's sort of another busy day, and to be honest tomorrow Lukas will be very glad to have a day just with the family, just at home, not doing anything other than being with each other, opening presents, being warm and close and safe and all those good things that make his heart swell.

Today, though; today, it's Christmas Eve, and already he can hear activity downstairs as the kids start preparing their presents. His parents will be coming over later, as well as Sarka and Miloslav. He suspects his sister and her boyfriend are going into town, though, and will stay there until the evening when they meet up and go to Kate's. Somehow he's a little glad of that. Anezka can make any gathering more fun, but she can also make any gathering more exhausting.

So: he stays in bed a little longer. He stretches, slowly, luxuriously, pulling every muscle taut until his mate-wife is stirring beside him, turning over to smile sleepily at him, flopping onto his body as he relaxes. They greet each other with whispers and nuzzles. They stay in bed a little longer.

Danicka goes down first to make coffee. When he drifts down, Lukas is in boxer briefs and a pajama tshirt. He's wearing his bathrobe for warmth as well, unsashed, and when Danicka sees him she teases him for being a slob. He wraps his arms around her and walks her over to the fridge, where he holds her while peering in at the offerings.

"Have the kids eaten?" he asks, and it turns out they have, but it was just cereal, so Lukas decides to make omelettes. And he takes his time with it; is practiced at this simple meal. Milos comes see what's up and gets assigned the task of mincing multicolored peppers, tomatoes, and mushrooms. Meanwhile Lukas crumbles sausage into a pan, fries up some bacon, and sets it all aside. Eggs in hand, still yawning and lazy, he asks the kids and Danicka one by one what they want; makes their omelettes one by one. His own comes last, and unsurprisingly, he wants everything in his. Joins them at the table with coffee and milk when he's done, setting the pans in the sink to cool before they get put in the dishwasher later.

After breakfast, there's not too much to do. The kids won't let Lukas in their room because the presents are surprises. So Lukas calls Kate up and confirms for tonight, lets her know that yes, the whole clan is coming, then calls his sister to make sure she knows where Kate's is. Some time in the late morning, the older adults show up, and it's decided they'll just have a simple lunch at home today, which of course makes Lukas very proud that he bought so many groceries the other night. They lounge around the small living room, the grey light of a snowy day warmed by the lamps inside, and they talk about

everything, really. New York and Chicago, the Czech Republic, the secret to good kolaches. The Help, which was a great movie, and Contagion, which was something of a letdown. They talk about the yard and maybe expanding the garden a little in the spring; Lukas says maybe they should put in a fireplace. When the kids are done with present-making and present-wrapping, they join the adults, Irena crawling into Lukas's lap to just chill; Emanek lying on the floor surrounded by his adults, eyes closed, delighting in the primordial sense of safety. They talk about the whole Occupy movement a bit too, since New York was such an epicenter, but none of them really care all that much about politics, and pretty soon the conversation drifts on.

For a while, Milos and Irena talk to Lukas about what it's like to be a Garou. It's perhaps the first time anyone's been utterly, baldly honest with them about this. And Lukas can tell they want to hear more, they want to understand, but

their family is here, too, and some of it is a little painful to say and hear, even if the kin know already. So perhaps they don't talk about that for very long, either.

Danicka

For Danicka -- and for the kids downstairs -- today is the sort of day you get up early and you open presents with everyone and it's the day of family and staying in pajamas forever and playing with new toys, reading new books. That's the tradition they know. Lukas isn't the only one who wakes and thinks, for a moment, of how nice it would be if that sort of day were today. But it's all right. When he opens his eyes he can hear them downstairs. It's late in the morning, so even the little ones must have slept in, and there's a text from Anezka on his phone from an hour or two ago letting him know she and Daniel went into the city to do some sightseeing on their own.

His wife is still asleep, still naked from last night's lovemaking, golden hair askew all over her face and pillow, lying mostly on her stomach now. She isn't waking to the sounds downstairs, the kids in the kitchen, just as she didn't wake to the faint chime from Lukas's phone. That means something -- just like it means something when she is relaxed enough to eat until she's stuffed full. Danicka is usually so hypervigilant, so ready to react, the single most glaring marker of what her childhood and adolescence were really like. The edge is off -- she doesn't startle as easily anymore -- but she'll never be obtuse. She'll never be blissfully ignorant. She hasn't been innocent for most of her life.

Right now, though, she is completely worn out from a few days of running all over town and taking care of kids and family and still trying to make the most out of what time she has alone with her mate. The morning sun is surprisingly warm through the window, the furnace is going, family is downstairs, and she is zonked completely out. For a little longer, at least.

So he stays there, listening for anything like fires or shouting downstairs, mostly just lazing in bed until Danicka begins to stretch and stir, absently brushing her hair off her face as she rolls onto her back and dozes awhile longer. The twist of the sheets around her middle bares her breasts, but she isn't cold, and bats sleepily at him when he tries to cover her up, rolling with her back to his ribcage for awhile. She very slowly wakes up, and rolls over again, draping arm and leg over his body and using his arm and chest as a pillow, fighting the encroaching daytime and wakefulness. He starts to nuzzle her, whisper to her, but she flops her hand over his mouth and shushes him in a slur, til a pan bangs downstairs and she opens her eyes.

"I hope they didn't just squish my cat," she mumbles.

A little while later she does drag herself out of bed, taking a rapid five-minute shower and braiding her hair instead of drying it, putting on one of her more worn-in, relaxed pairs of jeans and a t-shirt, putting one of her college's hoodies on over that. She kisses Lukas, calling him lazy in affectionate teasing, and goes downstairs. It turns out the kids aren't working on presents yet, just making breakfast. A real breakfast. Milos and Renata are both up, and they have made coffee, they have made eggs and toast and are supervising Irena at the griddle as she makes pancakes. She's burnt several and undercooked a few, but she's getting the hang of it. She wants to try flipping them with the pan. This is vetoed.

By the time Lukas comes down, they're gathered around the table eating, and it's really nothing special that the kids cooked, as they are accustomed to helping around the house more than, say, children who grow up with only one or two siblings. When there are six of you, your father has died, and your mother is ill, you learn how to do laundry and wash dishes and make your own food. You learn how to take care of yourself and your siblings and your family. They are a tightly bonded family-pack, anyone can see that. And even if Irena's pancakes are a little iffy, Milos can scramble an egg with the best of them and Emanek really enjoys peeling clementines for everyone. Renata's coffee is smooth and incredibly strong.

Lukas adds omelettes to the mix, setting the kids to chopping and helping. They eat as they go, and Danicka curls up in her chair at the table and drinks her coffee and watches them all, until the other adults -- the four older ones, at least -- show up, and they get omelettes too, since their bellies aren't already half full of pancakes and toast and fruit. When Lukas finally sits down to eat, Emanek has crawled into his mother's lap and so Irena senses she can get away with it and climbs onto Lukas's, making him hold her on one leg while he eats with his free hand. She doesn't wiggle or poke him, she just seems to want to be near. She tucks her feet under the edge of his bathrobe for warmth and watches him eat like this is interesting to her. Over at the end of the table, Danicka talks with Marjeta about the kids.

Marjeta asks if Danicka wants to have as many as her sister. Four is so many, she says. Sarka just laughs and Danicka says that Sarka actually has six, and that, actually, four seems like a perfect number to her. Marjeta is well-pleased.

The adults, today, clean up. After all, the kids cooked. So Jaroslav and Miloslav and Sarka do dishes, but Milos can't stand this so he ends up helping, and Danicka keeps trying to tell them it's okay, they don't have to, and Marjeta goes to the living room with Renata and the little ones and chats with them, trying to guess what they're doing for everyone for Christmas. Emanek is convinced she's a mind reader, when actually he's just horrible at keeping secrets.

Later on, after Lukas has called Kate and gone upstairs to wash, he sees a flash of his mate in her niece as Renata gets up and claps lightly. "We have to make presents," she says to her siblings, and her mother as well, in fact. So they start getting up, heading back to the kitchen. Emanek stands at the door and points at everyone else. "If you are not named Musil, you have to stay out," he says, "or you'll ruin Christmas."

"Eman!" Milos says, and half-drags him into the kitchen. Emanek just grins and dashes inside. Pots and pans bang again. They keep hushing each other. Something smells incredible in there after awhile, and it's obvious the oven is on. They drift in and out, taking turns checking on whatever they're making, taking turns helping. Near the end they're spending more and more time back in the living room, where everyone is just talking.

"If you put in a fireplace the furnace will never go back to sleep," Danicka laughs, and she's not talking about keeping the fireplace on, she's talking about spirits, and he knows it. Irena has come out again and, yes, is curled up on Lukas's lap again, her back to his front, her head leaning against his shoulder, watching and listening. Emanek is already tired again and has closed his eyes as he lays his head on his sister's lap. She just drops a blanket on him and lets him doze, hand on his back. Sarka and Milos, at that point, are the ones who do the rest of the work in the kitchen, until they peek out and say it's ready. Emanek actually perks awake because this is the fun part, so he dashes into the kitchen with Irena and Renata. They're in there for awhile, laughing, the sounds of cellophane crackling from under the door.

Danicka comes sit by Lukas again, tucking herself up close to him now that Irena has gone, smiling at him. When the most recent Americans in the lot come back from the kitchen, they're carrying lots of little bags and tiny boxes all wrapped in colored tissue paper or cellophane, and they pile more presents under the tree than were already there, tuck some in amidst the branches. Danicka muses aloud: "I'll have to remember to put the stockings up tonight when we get home from Kate's. Daniel said he had some little things for everyone. He was very hush-hush, though."

Tasks done, Irena comes galumphing back up into Lukas's arms, nevermind Danicka against his side, and Marjeta observes gently that she seems to like her uncle. Irena, true to form, just nods. "He's going to teach me when to kill when I'm bigger."

The room is quiet for a moment then. She doesn't think she said anything quite that bad, and gets visibly and tangibly nervous, but the Kvasnickas simply didn't know that she's an Ahroun. When that's explained, Sarka is the one to say: "Lukas has offered to foster Irena when she changes. He also found a mentor for Milos. He's a Theurge."

Milos reddens a little at being spoken of, unlike his little bald-faced sister. "I'm very grateful."

"I'm glad I'm going to go to Chicago instead of Stark Falls," Irena chimes in. "Milos says he has to share a cabin with girls and I don't want to share one with boys."

"And there's no t.v.," Emanek mentions, with the tone of someone to whom this is gravely important. "And they don't let you have any toys."

Milos is pink. "It's like that because you're training," he says. "It's not supposed to be just like home," he adds, and looks at Lukas imploringly. "Tell her."

Lukas

There's a brief, awkward silence after Irena's little proclamation. The Kvanisckas are not entirely unaware of what Irena is, though. Lukas, after all, writes them more now. Calls more. He's closer to his family than he was, the same way he's closer to all his life outside the war than he was. That's another thing Danicka gave him, or at least brought into his life. A gift, really, though neither of them see it quite that way.

So: his parents know about Irena. And they know she's destined to become an Ahroun, and that Lukas is not only her uncle but her future mentor. That's part of the silence, though - the stark, sudden awareness that this little girl, this energetic, perpetually-in-motion little girl is not a girl at all but a cub. That one day she will follow her large, dark uncle on hunts. That one day they will hunt together, bring down prey

and enemies

together, and be linked powerfully and esoterically by bonds of blood and tribe, tradition and honor.

Jaroslav looks at the girl and thinks in a flash of his own son at age ten: just getting to know Istok, wilder than ever, with a new, genuinely savage streak that he himself barely knew how to control, and was afraid of. He feels a great wave of sympathy for her; though never empathy. Not that. That is not possible, for him. He will never know quite how it feels to be Garou.

And perhaps that's the root of the silence. The sudden awareness of that wall between Garou and cub, cub and kin. Milos feels it too; he looks at Lukas, imploringly. Tell her: because Irena, at least for another few years, does not know what it's like on the other side of the Change.

Lukas is quiet a moment. Then, with characteristic honesty, and gently:

"It will be different when you're in training. We will be different. And it will be harder in many ways, and probably not very much fun. But it's important, because that's how you'll learn how to be...

"How to be a good Garou, I suppose."

Danicka

She's such an honest child. If Lukas knew Danicka's other niece and nephew, the ones who are nearly her own age, he would see a descending level of manipulation in each one, a gradual slope from the most traditional of Shadow Lord traits -- the ability to dissemble is a tool, nothing more or less, to the tribe -- from Tadeus to Emanek. Not to say that the two eldest are liars, but they would never speak as openly or as boldly as Irena and Emanek. It isn't just age. He can see Renata's quiet, see a bright intelligence in her eyes. She's not a hard or vicious person, but she is hard to read. Milos, down a different path, could have become ten times worse than his other uncle because he is just so naturally perceptive, so aware of the workings of the world. Then there's Irena, and Emanek, and with each successive child there is more and more honesty, more and more open truth.

Irena looks at Lukas, twisting around a bit, and frowns at him like this will make him realize his mistake. Even now there is something animalistic about the way her neck moves, the sharpness of her eyes. It's like that with Milos, too, who has a sort of sinister grace sometimes when he moves, a loping gait when he runs, like he's beginning to forget what it's like to get tired from physical exertion, like he is always hunting something in his mind. Irena is going to be a good hunter, Lukas can see that in an instant. Milos can see that when she changes she'll be even better than him in that area, faster and stronger and more tuned in to the movements of prey just as he is always going to be more tuned in to the whims of spirits.

"Why can't it be like this?" she says to him, a little affronted,

and even then, it's heartrending.

Lukas

Lukas is so very aware of his family around him right now, almost all of them kin, all of them - at least on some level - listening. He wants very much to be right, to be knowledgeable, to say something at once wise and comforting, but

he wants, even more, not to say something pithy and untrue for the sake of sounding wise.

So there is that silence, and that hesitation, and in the end he says - "I don't know, mlád . Maybe because we are animals under the skin. Maybe because there's always order in the pack. And maybe it's only like this because you are a very young cub right now, so you're outside that order, protected, with nothing expected of you except to grow and learn. But one day you will begin growing up, and then you'll have to take your place in the order, and pull your weight, and learn to be strong and respect those stronger than you. Because one day, you'll be the one expected to protect others."

A small pause, and then he combs his fingers gently through Irena's hair. An animal, he called himself, but he is half-human as well. He gives comfort in the oldest, most thoughtless way of primates: by grooming, by touch.

"You'll always be my niece," he says. "And I'll always love you very, very much. That won't change, Irca."

Danicka

He's seen this, felt this so many times, what he does now. When he'd stand there very still and his mother would clean out his ears after a bath, never knowing how much trust it took because... he was a cub, and she was his dam, and it never crossed his mind that she would be uncareful, or that she would hurt him while he stood there dripping wet and wrapped in a towel. Then there's Danicka brushing Irena's hair the other night before bed, gently working out a knot that had formed and tightened throughout the day. There's Sarka coming out of the kitchen a little while ago, pausing to brush some powdery substance off of Emanek's cheek. Daniel moving a hair off of Anezka's forehead last night, thoughtlessly but tender.

On some level they are all primates as well as wolves, using their long fingers to take care of each other, feed each other, clean each other. It is deeply primal and, among each other, not a source of embarassment or shame. Among family, they do these things without even thinking about them, just as Lukas touches Irena's hair like she's... well. Like she's a cub in his family-pack, not his own blood but still important, still needing to be protected.

Which is what he tells her. She's protected now, because she isn't changed yet, she is too little to be killing anything or fighting for her place in the order. And if she were, say, Emanek or Renata, she wouldn't understand even now. She would not want to fight in order to find her place. Irena, however, is young -- and being so young, she is also only barely learning to be afraid of her own instincts. She leans into the hand on her head, thinking hard.

The adults are quiet. Danicka is the first to speak, and she does so with a little reaching out, touching Irena's hand. "We don't want you to be weak," she says quietly. "But you'll still have your kin. It will be different than being with other Garou. But you need both."

"Yes." That's Milos, almost bursting out of him, because that's it, that's what he wants them all to hear, even if all this time he's been quiet, not sure what to say with his mother there, and Lukas's parents, and his grandfather even. "Yes," he says again, and exhales.

Irena is still frowning, and gives Lukas a hug around his middle, but after that she's slipping off his lap and going over to her mother, curling up against her side, and Emanek is jealous so he goes to Sarka's other side, and Danicka compensates for the loss of the cub's warmth on his lap by wrapping her arms around Lukas's torso. No, they can't talk about this for long. It does hurt, and it hurts all of them in different ways. Milos remembers how not so long ago he was still a very young cub, and no one was demanding that he get up from a sparring match while bleeding and stand on a broken leg and snarl in the face of his partner while the leg knit itself back together. He remembers how it was to curl up against his mother's side, and how even his closeness with Renata has changed so much since he was ten, eleven, twelve, closer and closer to his change. He glances at her now, and she looks at him, and if they were alone she might hug him, but she's so private with things like that, and she wouldn't want to shame him in front of family.

Miloslav aches. His second mate was Ahroun, his only son is a monstrous Theurge who would not understand the goodness in Milos's heart even if he was exposed to it every day. He wants to hold his granddaughter right now, wordless, but he, too, cannot, not in a group this large. Nor can he handle all the emotions rising in him, threatening to erupt when he knows he has so little control over his own thoughts, his memories, his words.

God only knows what Sarka feels right now, holding the little girl who is going to turn into a beast in two, three years. Sitting in the same room with the man who will be responsible for making sure that Irena does not grow up coddled, spoiled, broken, weak in a tribe that does not tolerate it, fighting a war that kills more Ahrouns than any other auspice. She's lost her mother and her mate to this war. She knows how many children her sister has miscarried because the war would not wait, even when Sabina's own husband does not know the true count. Sarka presses her lips to the top of Irena's head, and she exhales, breathing warm into the little girl's hair.

And then Emanek looks like he's going to cry. His breathing is a little wonky, and suddenly it's on him like a wave, blubbering out in half-words, all in Czech. The universe was cruel; he was old enough when his father died to carry dim memories of him, old enough to remember when he first really really understood what death was, that it was forever, that his tatinek was gone. And he is old enough to miss his brother and sister in the Czech Republic. He is not old enough to be able to fight it off, on these rare occasions when he remembers all of it, crashing down on him just as hard as it does on all the adults in the room, except

he's eight.

"Shh. Oh, Eman, shh," Sarka says, pulling him into her arms. She stands, carrying him even though he's so big now, and simply walks down the hall to the bedroom Renata and Irena are sharing, closing the door. She doesn't apologize to anyone. She doesn't make him cry in front of the family. Irena looks distressed, like it's her fault, but after a moment, Milos just nods to her, and she gets up and shuffles quickly after her mother and brother, because

she's only ten. The door down the hall opens again, closes again softly. Milos and Renata are uneasy, all of this vaguely embarassing. Renata looks at the Kvasnickas and says quietly: "Our father..."

She just shrugs thinly then, shaking her head. Danicka is holding Lukas, her hand covering his heart, as though to try and comfort him, even if he doesn't say anything about what he feels right now. "It's okay, Renka," she murmurs. "We all understand." She takes a deep breath. "You know, why don't we get started on some sandwiches and things for lunch? We should find A Christmas Story on t.v., too."

And the kids don't know what that is, so Danicka picks up the remote and hands it to Jaroslav, kissing Lukas on the cheek and taking Renata to the kitchen. Milos, as though resolute to prove that he's capable of handling all this without going into a tailspin, stays in the living room. He asks Jaroslav and Marjeta for more stories about Lukas and Anezka as kids. Down the hall, the muffled sobs have already quieted a bit. In the kitchen, Danicka thinks about the open pain and how scared it makes her feel. She thinks about why that is.

She thinks about how good it is, even as it hurts, that Emanek and Irena can cry in her home, and cry even with Jaroslav and Marjeta here, that they have Sarka to hold them, that they are not afraid. She and Renata make sandwiches from leftover roast beef.

"We're never going to eat all this food," she sighs, half amused, every time she opens the fridge.

Lukas

The truth is, Lukas feels a little like he's Ruined Christmas when Irena gives him a hug and then flees to the shelter of her mother's arms. He gets it. He gets that it's not really a rejection, and it's certainly not meant to be hurtful. But he also feels, distinctly, that before they had this talk Irena was happy and so was everyone else,

and afterward Emanek is sobbing in his room and Irena and Sarka are in there with him.

Renata and Danicka go to make sandwiches. And Milos tries to crank through the situation, and after a while it's no longer forced, he really is having a conversation about how Lukas was as a child - though the stories are quieter now, with a sort of warm nostalgia that, as much as anything else, makes Lukas ache.

So it is that after a while he wanders into the kitchen where Danicka and her eldest (present) niece are. They're making sandwiches, and without being asked, and without asking, Lukas begins to help. He makes some toast. Then he carves the beef, quiet, concentrating, his back a little bent to the task. After a while he says - as though he'd been dwelling on this all along - "Maybe I shouldn't have told her so bluntly, so soon. Or maybe we shouldn't have talked about that at all. It just upset the children."

Danicka

In the little room down the hall, Sarka is sitting on Irena's air mattress with her two youngest around her, getting over their tears, holding them the way that...well, the way mothers are able to hold their youngest children. She knows from experience how short this time is, and is grateful that she's still here, that they can still come to her, that there's something for them in simply being held until confusion and sadness passes. She's grateful that she can tell them it will be okay. No one in the living room or kitchen knows what Sarka tells them in there, what lessons she can give them right now about what it means to be Garou and what it is to be Kin.

They are, right then, living it. Lukas's crest has fallen and his mate is holding him, trying to wordlessly tell him it's okay before she, too, gets up to try and help them all move on from a painful, awkward moment. Milos does, too, but he's not as smooth at it as Danicka is. Eventually, though, the conversation carries on. Marjeta has a story for them, but it makes Lukas pang inside, remembering how hard it was when he changed, when his family began to treat him like a superior, how long it was before he was their son again.

In the kitchen, Danicka is taking out some chips and some pickles, some condiments and fruit, trying to impart some kind of nutrition for those of them that don't claim vegetables are unimportant. Renata is quiet, but she smiles at Lukas when he comes in. So does Danicka, turning to him and touching his arm, kissing his cheek. They work in silence for awhile, then Lukas speaks up.

And it's Renata, surprisingly, who answers him. Her brow wrinkles a little. She's quite tall for her age, almost as tall as Danicka. All the children have those long limbs and lean waists, like Sarka. The man in the photograph Lukas saw last year was tall, too. Runs in their family. Her hair is braided back today, like Danicka's is, her eyes a warmer and more golden-hazel shade of green. The resemblance is almost unsettling.

"Milos brought it up," she says, her voice clear but soft, reminding him. "She shouldn't go around thinking it will be like Christmas all the time when she comes here," the girl goes on, spreading some mustard on a slice of toasted bread. "And Emanek didn't cry because of anything you said."

Danicka's hand is warm then on his back, her palm smoothing over his lumbar region through his shirt. The touch is reassurance, even though she voices nothing.

Lukas

Lukas left his family when he was thirteen. For years after, it was like he had died altogether and been replaced by a stranger - a Garou, a Shadow Lord, a superior being. And though the way his parents began to treat him after his First Change was the outcome of a lifetime of indoctrination, the way he and his parents drifted apart was as much his responsibility as theirs. He hated the way they deferred to him now, but he was the one who stopped calling. Who stopped visiting. Who convinced himself the war left no room for anything else, and

perhaps, just perhaps,

the one who, out of anger at his parents - for treating him like a Garou, a Shadow Lord, and a superior beings, and perhaps also for not preparing him better, telling him earlier, what it would be like to be Garou - turned his back on them.

It was years before he slowly learned that yes, there was room in his life for things other than war. There was room, and necessity, for such things as family and warmth and joy and love. And it was years before he came to terms with the fact that, no. His parents couldn't have told him what they never knew themselves. And his parents would never, ever stop treating him like a superior being if he didn't simply talk to them, open those lines of communication again, and show him that he was still their son.

This is something so personal, so subconscious, that he never even talked to Danicka about this. But she's seen over the months and years how he writes his parents more now. How, after those visits to New York City in the summer and especially over Thanksgiving, he began to call his parents more. Talk to them. Tell them things.

Tell them - with little comments, asides, and remarks that eventually grew to a long conversation one night not too long before he married Danicka - that in fact, he didn't want them to treat him like he was somehow their overlord. He wanted them to treat him like who he is. Their adult son, who had grown up responsible and strong; who was doing pretty well for himself. Who had a lot of good things in his life. Who was happy, and content, and wanted them to share these things with him.

The thawing was slow, and it took work. Even now, sometimes, it hurts to look past the rift of those cold years and see how much his relationship with his parents has changed. But then, not all of that is the Nation and the status shift between them. So much of that is simply because

he is an adult, and no longer a coddled cub. He is responsible for himself now, and for others.

So: Renata answers him, and he listens. He passes her a plateful of thinly sliced roast beef, then starts slicing more. She points out that Milos brought it up in the first place. And that it's not always going to be like Christmas when she comes here, which makes Lukas smile a little because, yes. Some of that shift in their relationship, that shift which looms on the horizon, will be because of the Nation and the status shift between them. But not all. Some of that, too, will be simply because it will not always be Christmas. And Irena will not always be a small cub.

"It must have been hard," Lukas says quieter, careful because he has no experience in this area, no wound carved in his heart where both Danicka and Renata bear scars, "to have lost a parent so young. If ... there's a way I can address it to make it less painful, or if I just shouldn't mention it at all, please tell me."

Danicka

That line that was drawn between Lukas and his family was really drawn between Lukas and everyone, Lukas and all kin. Then he met Danicka and still held that line between them for a long time, kept the war and himself as far away from what he had with her, even though he could never make it formal, could never make it as empty, as so many other interactions with the kin of Thunder. Eventually the line had to be crossed, dust kicked over it to nearly erase it, or else he was going to lose her.

Then the Underworld showed him a house like this one, with human-formed cubs inside, his mate a gatekeeper, and the world down there so different from the life Danicka grew up with, so different from his own childhood, the lines between Kin and Garou stripped down to the barest and only most necessary boundaries rather than built up into great stone walls.

Now he stands in his kitchen talking to a teenaged kinswoman who, three years ago, would have been little more than a shadow in his peripheral vision, a non-entity, something only to be protected, something that would not dare ask for his attention. Now she speaks, and he listens, attending to her words and serving alongside her. To feed his family. To keep them warm. To keep their hearts and souls as protected as their bodies.

Renata looks down as he embarks on those next careful words, laying a leaf of lettuce down atop a bed of meat. Something flickers in Danicka's eyes as she steps aside to pull some drinks from the fridge, the sort of faint hint of emotion he would have missed years ago, the sort of thing he can't help but sense now. Renata's forehead knits.

"You can not be her papa," Renata says very quietly, aware that they could be overheard. "I think she ...sees you that way."

"It isn't your fault," Danicka breaks in, also keeping her voice down. "But that's why it wasn't a bad thing when she got off your lap and went to Sarka." She seems like she's about to say more, but she doesn't. Instead she leans over, kissing his cheek, and handing him some food. "We can talk a little more about it later, baby," she whispers. "For now let's just all be together. The little ones will be okay; we'll watch a movie and get all fancy to go to Kate's, and they'll forget all about it."

Lukas

A faint ache goes through Lukas as Renata tells him a very simple, very profound truth. He cannot be Irena's father. Even if Irena is beginning to look at him that way, even if she wants a father figure, one who understands what she's going through right now; even if some part of Lukas would like very much to fill those shoes: she is not his daughter, his cub. He is her uncle and her future mentor, but there is a difference there.

"I know," he says quietly. And Danicka breaks in. They'll talk later, she says, and he looks at her, blue eyes catching the light, throwing it back. She kisses his cheek and he closes his eyes for a moment, leaning into it. Opens them again.

Nods. "Okay," he says, and smiles a little, taking the plate she hands him. The meat and the toast and the lettuce and the condiments have magically arranged themselves into sandwiches. He kisses Danicka back, his lips to her temple, and the smile grows a little more as she talks about getting fancy to go to Kate's.

"Let's watch something the kids will like," he's suggesting as they're heading back to the living room. "Not Twilight."

Danicka

All of that is too complicated for Renata to discuss with him, too close to home, and Danicka is the one who sees it. Who, frankly, understands better than Lukas ever could. She nudges them both with words and action both: enough of this. No more dwelling on it. At the same time: we'll talk about it more later. It's a promise as well as a request.

Renata looks vaguely relieved, these moments of baring anything, anything at all of herself difficult at best. She isn't traumatized, isn't damaged by anything but more than her fair share of grief and loss, but simply an introverted and private person, as much as Emanek and Irena are outgoing and open. She lifts a large plate of sandwiches and grabs some napkins and goes to the other room ahead of the two adults, and from the voices out there they can hear that Emanek has come back at least, is so hungry!, as though he didn't just eat half his weight a few hours ago.

Danicka holds Lukas back a moment. She puts her arms around him and holds him, some ache in her that she hasn't been able to voice and can't address right now urging her into his arms. Later, later. They'll talk more later: about cubs looking for fathers, about children mourning parents, about the longing for his own suddenly rising up in him and tearing away from him before he can help himself, about what it will be like when, in just a few short years, they have a teenager and cub coming to them for fosterage -- his to train as a wolf, hers to keep somewhat human.

All she can do now is give him a hug, and then let him go after several very long moments, before they walk into the living room laden with food to join their family again. They really do need another couch -- the most comfortable seats are for the eldest, and then most everyone else is on the floor. Emanek is there, his face still puffy and his eyes still red, but he's quite contentedly stuffing his face with chips and sandwich and asking if he can have a soda, please, please, til Renata says he can share one with Irena.

"Irca's taking a little nap," Sarka interjects, when she comes back a few minutes later and Emanek pleads again for a soda, please please, he'll share with Irena. She lowers herself down and takes a sandwich, smiling. "You can share one with me."

They put on -- not A Christmas Story, definitely not Twilight, but one of those stop-motion specials about Rudolph or the origins of Saint Nick, and about a third of the way into it Irena wakes up and comes out, going for the food. She's quieter than before, and she doesn't try to climb up in Lukas's lap again, but she does sit between him and Sarka. She has a good appetite and her attention is just as fixed on the t.v. screen as her little brother's, chuckling at various parts. It is as Danicka promised: they do forget. Or, if not forget, they are able to let go easily. Move on. They do not hold grudges or feel a terrible amount of embarassment or shame. They do not worry so much as the adults.

Because they are very young cubs. It is not their job to worry.

"Oh, wow," Danicka says when the movie is over, looking at the clock. "Where did the day go? We have to start getting ready for Kate's." AWWWW comes the chorus from the two little ones. Danicka laughs. "You'll have fun. Her house is huge and she's a little bit crazy and Lukas's other packmate has a spirit-friend who is a robot."

Irena and Emanek whip their heads around -- to be fair, so does Milos -- at that, staring at Lukas for confirmation.

Lukas

"Well actually," Lukas - not one to convince kids that spirits are robots, or that stomachs can turn into black holes under conditions of extreme hunger - just has to go and pop the bubble, "he's just a spirit, not a robot. A little metal spirit. He was very young when my packmate rescued him, and he's been following her around ever since.

"He does look a little like a robot, though." Lukas thinks a minute. "I bet if you brought some aluminum cans and stuff for him to play with, he'll adore you."

Danicka

Of course Lukas wouldn't mislead them. Even when it's painful, even when it's hard, he's honest. It drew Danicka to him, the way he never promised that he could keep her safe or that he'd never hurt her, the way so many would-be lovers among the Garou had attempted in the past. They pretended to be human; he never lied about being a monster. He doesn't lie to the kids now, explaining that Tripoli is not a robot, but a spirit. Irena's eyes narrow; Emanek's become vaguely disinterested. Milos's only widen.

There are Garou at Stark Falls who have numen, but just one or two. He knows it's a rare thing, especially in this day and age. And suddenly he's filled with questions about this packmate of Lukas's, about the spirit itself, about how he should act, but Danicka is getting up and she's getting that look on her face, that 5-star-general look that says they are all going to be dressed and ready to go in thirty minutes or there will be hell to pay.

Irena peers at the can she's holding, her 'half' of the soda that 'mom' was sharing with Emanek, and gulps the last from it. Danicka starts to take it for her, but Irena clutches it back, saying, "Nooo! I'm giving it to the spirit. Lukas just said --"

"Okay, okay," Danicka says, putting her hands up in surrender. "Just rinse it out first. Come on," she tells Emanek, who has no idea how cool Tripoli is because it's not right in front of him zooming around on one wheel. "Renata and I have curlers to deal with, you need to go change."

Him first. Because he will take the longest.

Given her generation and the fact that they knew they'd be coming here before going to Kate's, Marjeta is already well-coiffed, dressed for a nice dinner, her hair and makeup done. She's made sure Jaroslav is well put-together also. Miloslav is dressed as he often is, in simple slacks and a button-down shirt with a blazer, but he has a tie in his coat pocket to put on later. Whatever else he's losing, he hasn't forgotten how to do that for himself, and his hands have not forgotten, either. They will not shake. His body does not often betray what is happening to his mind. He stays where he is, chatting with the Kvasnickas, because all he has to do is roll down his sleeves, put on his tie, and shrug back into his jacket to be ready for Kate's.

Sarka has brought a change, however, and she and Danicka and the kids have a lot to do to be presentable for a Nice Christmas Eve Dinner. For awhile, there are two of Danicka's curling irons and her straightening iron going upstairs, the full bathroom overtaken by Danicka, Renata, Sarka, and Irena -- who is vocal about her disapproval of frying all her hair off. "It's not going to fry it off," Danicka says patiently. "We put goo on it. Your head is not going to catch fire."

"You put goo on my hair and that's better?" Irena huffs, glaring into the mirror.

Emanek is doing no better downstairs with Milos. He keeps running out of the bedroom and downstairs bath to Lukas and the grandparents, saying Milos is torturing him, really, his eyes wide and his head nodding up and down like the more he nods the more likely it is that they'll believe him. Eventually Lukas has to get up and help haul him back to actually get his hair combed and his clothes on, be glad you're not a girl. He does this partly because if Sarka knew that Emanek was running around the house in his little boxer-briefs and socks, she might have a fit. Emanek, to his credit, does not have a fit, but he does loiter so much that the girls are half done before Milos can get him into his little black slacks without wrestling him down and forcing them on.

Somewhere in there, Lukas gets a chance to go wash up and change into his dinner clothes, do whatever preparations he might be doing so that Kate is not mortally offended by a sloppy appearance. Not that she'd ever show it. Not while hostessing. She might tease him a little about it in private though, scoff at him among packmates, sniff at the air at his low manners. And he would laugh at her. But still. She is taking his entire clan in for dinner, however delighted she may be about it, and Shadow Lords do not ignore hospitality. They would never let the Fianna get the better of them like that, for one thing.

In the end, there are three people in their later years dressed quite well, mostly dark colors, conservative and sedate. There's Sarka in a pencil skirt and sleeveless top and heels, all earth tones with a sort of sparkly cardigan, her short hair done just so, with a jeweled clip hidden amongst the faintly graying, light brown locks. She says she never gets a chance to dress up. Frankly, she looks nearly unrecognizable, wearing makeup for just about the first time Lukas has ever seen. Renata is in a royal purple party dress with a dropped waist, her long hair pin-straight down her back, in the low and demure heels that her mother allows her these days.

Milos and Emanek are both in black slacks, black shoes, the elder in a sapphire-colored dress shirt, the younger in a white one with a green vest. The vest, Renata whispers to Lukas, is because when Emanek wears white it usually gets everything he touches all over it. Soda, dirty snow, sauce...

"I know you're talking about me," huffs the ever-observant Eman at them, pretending to be above it all as he perches on the arm of a chair, arms crossed over his chest.

Irena is the second-to-last to be done, and she's a completely different child...almost. Her dress is black, a simple A-line shift with white tights underneath that are fair plainer than Renata's silvery hose. Around her middle is a deep red sash, the ends of the bow hanging down behind her. Her shoes are patent and black, polished but probably a hand-me-down. Danicka has managed to put the ends of her hair into a few thick ringlets, drawing the top half of her hair up in a red ribbon and curling those ends, as well. Surprisingly, she has on a little bit of lip gloss, some light color with a tiny bit of shine. Having not been upstairs, Lukas can't guess that Irena was watching Danicka and Renata and Sarka put various colors on, was focused for so long that someone finally asked:

"Do you want some?"

and applied a little for her, showing her how to press her lips together to evenly distribute the color, showing her how to blot with a little bit of tissue, then putting a little bit more on to smooth it all out. It's nothing much -- she's only ten, after all -- but it's a hint of what's to come over the next few years, in a way.

She stomps down the stairs, though, and orders Emanek to come to the kitchen to help her find cans and stuff. Milos blinks and darts into the kitchen with them, both to make sure they stay clean and not cut by ragged edges and that they don't get anything that will offend the spirit.

Danicka is down a few minutes after that, white chiffon skirt swirling around her knees, cherry-red heels with a thin strap around her ankles tapping the steps, a slinky silver top hugging her middle and draped over her breasts making her shine a bit. For a dinner at Kate's, truthfully, all of this is rather casual. For them, this week, it's downright formal. Her hair bounces on her shoulders in those thick curls that look almost like natural waves, and then everyone is rousing themselves to go, pulling on coats and putting tin cans and aluminum ones in one of Danicka's washable grocery bags, ushering Kandovany into her crate, running a lint roller here and there. Voices are calling to watch out for ice here and there as they're all piling into the van out front, double-checks are being done to make sure no one has to go, and in, you know, go.

But Emanek does, so Lukas leaves the car warming up while he goes to unlock the door and let Emanek go up, but Emanek is sort of scared of the dark, empty house, so Lukas has to tromp all the way up to turn on the light and wait for him to go, and then

"Did you wash your hands?" (he hadn't, and dashes back into the bathroom to do so), and then

back out, re-locking everything, piling back in the car in the early darkness outside, and at this rate they're totally going to be late, and Danicka is on the phone with Anezka telling her directions to Kate's loft, and then

away they go.

Lukas

It's a little ridiculous to be driving to Kate's Christmas Eve dinner in the huge twelve-passenger van, but that's exactly what they do. Sitting in the back, Lukas's father joins Miloslav in his tie-wearing, clipping it to his shirt as they're pulling out of the driveway. Jaroslav looks more quintessentially Shadow Lord than his son does. His suit is dark and classically cut, his dark blue tie knotted large and square, his shirt pressed, his almost uniformly gray hair combed straight back from his brow and temples. He plays with his wedding ring along the way, turning it around and around his finger, wondering what sort of person this Silver Fang packmate of his son's is.

Beside him, Marjeta wears one of her nicest dresses. It covers her upper arms, which she's grown somewhat self-conscious of as she ages, and doesn't have a neckline that swoops too low or a hem that flirts too high. Its color - a faintly sheening dark blue - is most likely not a coincidence. Of the entire vanload, she perhaps most excited about the evening. It's been a long time since Marjeta was invited to a Fancy Event, and at any rate, Jaroslav usually hates these things, refuses to go. She asks questions about Katherine Bellamonte and her house, her family, if she does this sort of thing often, until Jaroslav grumps that perhaps she should simply wait and see.

"Oh, stop acting as though you were being dragged to the lair of the enemy," Marjeta chides. "Try and enjoy yourself tonight."

The drive is quite far, coming from the southwest as they are. Some forty-five minutes later they find themselves on the North Shore, in one of those million-dollar enclaves where the wealthy and relatively young lived in their condos, and where the very wealthy kept town homes. The van stands out on that street. It's one of the only cars parked at the curb, and the only one of its kind. The last time Lukas brought Danicka to one of Kate's events, they stepped out of his coupe, just the two of them, and her dress was vivid, headturning, eyecatching. She was vivid, headturning, eyecatching, every inch the mate of an Alpha, her jewelry matching his cufflinks and tie clips.

Compared to that, the two of them are rather casual tonight. She is in silver and white touched in red, colored like winter, with an airiness to her attire that makes Lukas think of spring. He always thinks of spring, when he looks at her. He's in dark slacks himself, but he's decided to forgo the jacket altogether tonight in favor of a matching vest. And under that, a crisp white shirt; no tie. A pocket square in the vest, though. It's red.

They gather on Kate's doorstep: the entire clan, Kvasnickas and Musils, a veritable rainbow of colors. The doorbell is, unsurprisingly, a four-part harmony of bells that chime through the Loft. Mere seconds later, dour-faced Lucille opens the door.

Danicka

It takes forever, it seems, to drive out to Kate's. They turn on the radio and Emanek dozes against his mother's side. Milos reads, and Renata fiddles with her phone. Irena mostly tries to get people to talk to her, asking a dozen questions. She's as curious about Lukas's slightly-crazy-Silver-Fang packmate as Marjeta is, but it's Marjeta who ends up cautioning her about her manners. The conversation in the van gets a little awkward briefly, because no one will explain to Irena why Silver Fangs are slightly crazy as a rule, til Milos gets fed up with the adults dancing around it and says:

"Irca, some Silver Fangs used to marry and have babies with their cousins and brothers and sisters and things like that. Some still do."

Her eyes pop. "That is disgusting." Milos starts to tell her that if she knows what's good for her she will be polite and not talk about that, but Irena just ignores him and asks Lukas: "Is Kate married to her brother?"

"No," say several adults at once, which startles Emanek awake. He wants to know what they're talking about.

"Babies," Irena says, and he makes a face and closes his eyes again. The next thing anyone knows, Sarka is quietly warning her youngest female of all the punishments that will be heaped upon her if she is rude to their hostess, if she so much as thinks about asking Katherine any such questions, if she insults the Silver Fang tribe, if she is not the very portrait of politeness. These warnings come in Czech. Somehow that makes them seem more dire. Irena settles, even if her brain is going a mile a minute trying to figure out Silver Fangs and inbred babies. It's difficult to think about. Every time she starts to figure something out, the grossness of it makes her brain run the other way. So she talks to Marjeta again.

"How do you be very, very, very polite?" she asks, folding her hands on her lap, because surely Marjeta knows.

And oh. Marjeta does.

The area Kate lives in is...well. Back up. They drive through the wealthy enclaves, the mini-mansions and the half-hidden estates, but gradually the area gets less and less obviously wealthy. It's hard to imagine Kate living somewhere like this, in fact, until they pull up in front of a building that looks almost industrial from the front. It is a ruse. It is not what anyone, even the original Unbroken Circle, would have expected from Katherine Bellamonte. She gutted the buliding once upon a time, turned it into the most elegant, hip, glass and blondewood home you could ever imagine, but from without, it looks almost run-down. The van outside very nearly blends in.

Irena and Emanek -- and, frankly, everyone else -- is so eager to get out of the car they're nearly tumbling over each other. Most of them are in black coats, the rainbow of colors they're dressed in briefly hidden. All the same, they look quite nice. Milos looks at Lukas and Eman and wonders if he should have worn a vest, but it's too late now. He smooths his deep blue shirt and -- out of nowhere -- thinks of a certain Adren Theurge who comes to pay his respects at Stark Falls every solstice, twice a year.

Your eyes are blue! the Theurge had said, looking positively delighted upon being introduced to him via Istok. Milos had been caught off guard; for an Adren, Rolf History of Stars-rhya had seemed kind of...addle-pated. He'd talked about the various colors of blue in the night sky in different places and at different times of year for a solid ten minutes before being pulled away to talk to someone else, who he had greeted with the words: You're so tall!

Sarka fusses over her children for a moment, who bear it diligently, as the doorbell is rung. As though waiting by the door, Lucille opens it to them, showing the a veritable world of light within the loft, which looks so dull from outside. There are candles twinkling in tealight holders just about everywhere, and carefully placed eruptions of greenery. The decor is tasteful, emphasizing green and silver with mere splashes of red, all focus drawn to the various forms of light. Lucille is dressed in gray tonight, her apron crisp and white. But she barely opens her mouth to greet them and let them in when pounding feet come barreling down the staircase and then around the corner.

"MOVE, BITCH, GET OUT THE WAY, GET OUT THE WAY, BITCH, GET OUT THE -- oooooh there's kids," Sinclair says, skidding to a stop and staring at Irena and Emanek, who stare back at her with wide eyes. Irena has moved, ever so slightly, in front of her little brother and her mother, sensing a large, powerful predator coming their way. Her eyes, however childlike, are pinned on the Galliard, very close to the verge of initiating a staredown. And this is Sinclair. She cocks her head, nailing with her eyes the small one that wants to challenge her.

Then, with a blink that briefly erases the wolflike look to her face, the freckled blonde shakes it off and decides the best way to handle this is to completely ignore the child because she's like ten. She glomps onto Lukas, dressed in nothing more elaborate than some skinny jeans and a red long-sleeved shirt with a glitter snowflake on the front. Her hair is down and wavy and her feet are bare, her toenails painted gold. Irena is ruffled and uneasy, but Milos puts his hand on her shoulder and murmurs something in her ear, and she takes a deep breath. Sinclair has not seemed to notice that it is both freezing and that she is blocking the entryway while hugging Lukas, all but cackling in his ear.

"I've had so much eggnog, Lukas, you don't even know," she says, and when someone -- Lucille, or Lukas perhaps -- clears their throat, she says: "Oh, sh-- sherpa. Sorry, everyone. Just. Been awhile. Come on. It's freezing. Chicago is ridiculous."

So in they go, Lukas brushing glitter off of his vest from Sinclair's shirt. Maddox is in the living room, and can't seem to be fucked to get out of his armchair, drinking something that does not look like eggnog and is probably scotch. He's got his guitar, and though he's dressed all in black, he's not being any more formal than Sinclair is. The deal that has been made, Lukas will find out later, is that Katherine can help Sinclair plan her (eventual) wedding if she does not ask Sinclair to dress fancy for any other event. This, to Katherine, is more than fair. This, to Sinclair, has been seeming more and more lately like a devil's bargain.

Lucille is taking their coats, at least the ones that the Kvasnickas and Musils don't insist on hanging up for themselves, and they are pouring into the living room when Katherine comes out of her room, apologizing profusely about being on the phone with her brother's mate, the baby was talking to her, and she's just... glowing. She's less a virgin princess these days and more an heir apparent, a strong Philodox in a strong tribe. She greets them all with embraces and light kisses on the cheeks, beginning with Lukas and going to Danicka, then the Kvasnickas and Miloslav, clasping hands with both of her own, glittering in a golden and white dress tonight. She has some little, complimentary thing to say to all of them, and in her mind she's building comraderie with some of her teasing comments or the like, but occasionally it just comes off awkward -- her training is for the court, where everything is double-edged. Miloslav simply blinks at her.

Then she gets to the children, and the gushing begins. Renata is so beautiful, such a lovely young woman, turn around, turn around, oh, I can see Danicka's hand in your look tonight, tres chic! Milos is so very handsome, his eyes so clear, he'll make a fine Theurge, obviously. She's nearly squealing by the time she gets to Irena and Emanek, cooing over their outfits and their faces, how much they resemble their mother,

and all the while there is some memory in the back of her mind, the Underworld where she watched Lukas encounter the children that even she had not known he wanted so badly, that makes her glance at her Alpha, a pulse of that shared memory going between them.

Irena is a bit overwhelmed. Finally she just does what Marjeta suggested: "What a lovely gown you're wearing this evening you have a beautiful home thank you for inviting us to dinner my family and I are so grateful for your hospitality."

Katherine nearly dies from pleasure.

Emanek has been looking everywhere, then blurts out: "Can we see the robot?"

Lukas

"Oof," Lukas says, happily, as Sinclair all but tackles him. His arms wrap around her and he gives her a squeeze, and then she's bouncing on and Kate is coming in for a much more restrained, graceful - though no less warm - hug.

And then he's stepping back and letting his extended family come forward, letting his packmates meet them. All of them, even the youngest, can introduce themselves just fine, but Lukas introduces them anyway, and they are all my parents, my sister-in-law, my niece, my nephew, all his family, his blood, his other-pack. It's almost comical: he is so very obviously happy to be introducing one pack to the other. In the end everyone has to introduce themselves anyway, because Kate and Sinclair can't very well go all night calling them Lukas's nephew, Lukas's sister-in-law.

When Irena, overwhelmed by the people and the gushing and the praise and the totally different way a Fang born and bred in a Fang King's court behaves, blurts out all her compliments at once, Marjeta's smile looks a little mortified. Lukas laughs aloud. Kate flushes with pleasure, looking positively delighted before she very graciously thanks Irena. And then she's clapping her hands together lightly, clasping them the second time they meet, and asking if anyone wants refreshments when

Emanek asks to see the robot.

Katherine looks bewildered. Sinclair likely knows exactly what Emanek is talking about. Sarka is probably going through a bout of regret for not drilling the necessity of politeness into her youngest child as well as her second-youngest, but then -

- then there's a thunder of feet down the stairs, the last two or three jumped with a loud THUD. Eee! something small and metallic says, riding on the shoulder of a ripped, tanned, unadulteratedly athletic Glass Walker kinsman. In a red muscle shirt. And cargo shorts.

"Hey guys," Alex says. He looks at all of them; sizes Lukas up for a second, decides that yeah, he could take that one too in a fair fight, and waves. "I'm Alex. This is Tripoli. And he's not a robot, he's a gaffling."

EEE, Tripoli protests.

"Sorry. Jaggling. Minor jaggling."

Jaroslav, sensing this will not, in fact, be a Very Fancy Function, is beginning to relax and enjoy himself. Marjeta might be a little disappointed, except she's staring at Tripoli. She thought they were kidding in the car. They weren't.

Danicka

Of course he introduces them all. He even re-introduces Danicka with a you know Danicka, then gleefully going from relative to relative. My niece. My nephew. My other niece. My other nephew. My father-in-law. Danicka is going with him, helpfully adding names. Actual names. Maddox doesn't call them by those names anyway. It's 'chap', 'luv', things like that. The kids are quite understandably bowled over by the noise and light and multitude of people, despite the fact that their family comprises most of that multitude. So one blurts out a bunch of compliments at once and the other just flat-out demands to see a robot. He was promised robots.

Sinclair starts laughing and yells ALEX. ALEX. AAA-LEX. up the stairway, but he's thundering down and Tripoli is clinging to his ear for dear life, eeeeing away. Then aaaing, as though nagging Alex by name, snapping at him for the thoroughly unnecessary wildness of his descent.

The kinsman looks Lukas up and down, dismissing Milos as too young and Miloslav and Jaroslav as too told and everyone else as too female. Danicka stares at him, trying to remember when she's met this guy, because he looks damnedly familiar, but she doesn't blurt out in the middle of Christmas Eve that she's fought bony dinosaur-like things with him (he broke her Williams-Sonoma knives) or competed in a corrupt video game tournament with him (he was sick from caffeine overload), or killed zombies with him (he called her a Fang, and then he called her a Fenrir and she's never enjoyed giving someone the finger quite so much). So that's 'Alex', Lukas's packmate's boyfriend. If he meets her eyes she simply gives him a quirk of her brows, a vague statement of oh, hello again.

"Who told you he was a robot?" Sinclair wants to know, and Emanek quite easily points at Danicka, who just laughs and shakes her head.

"It got him dressed and ready to go, didn't it?" she tosses back, and no one can quite argue with that.

The minor jaggling zips over from person to person as soon as Alex lets him down, inspecting their shoes, batting at their legs to see if they're made of metal or flesh, and quite disappointedly discovering that they are all wolves and wolf-kin. Typical. He pauses at Marjeta, who stares down at him as he stares up at her, and he points to where his ears would be if he had them. "eeeeh-eeeee," he says, and it takes a moment but Sinclair is about to translate when Milos just says:

"He thinks your earrings are pretty."

Maddox, who can also understand Tripoli without needing to base it on intuition, chuckles to himself and plucks a few strings on the guitar. Tripoli claps excitedly for Milos, smacking his little metallic hands together. Irena and Emanek, not to be outdone, go over to Lukas and tug on his sleeve til he leans over so they can whisper in his ear. Katherine, right about now, is nearly catatonic with delight because the children are so cute and so fancily dressed and being so polite and everyone is going to love her centerpieces.

They want to go out to the car to get the bag of cans for Tripoli, please, please, please.

It does make sense: the kids aren't exactly going to be interested in the flutes of champagne and miniature mugs of eggnog that Katherine's hired butler is now serving on a mirrored tray or the canapes that are being served by a young maid. Sinclair is half-dragging Alex to a couch to curl up with him much like they were upstairs in the rumpus room while playing video games, Renata is turning bright red while Maddox teasingly 'flirts' with her, Sarka is leveling a Look at Maddox that one has to hope he notices before his head comes off, Danicka is chatting with Katherine over a glass of champagne, and Milos looks about as nervous with Tripoli as if he were about to talk to a pretty girl.

Actually, the other day he was talking to a pretty girl and he wasn't half this nervous. Irena and Emanek look up at Lukas, as though begging for the keys to the van to get the bag of recyclables would be worth every Christmas ever times ten.

Lukas

Kate's loft was full of people even before they arrived. With their revival, it's downright hectic in here, and it rapidly becomes impossible to keep everyone in the same conversation. So people drift into little clusters of two or three or four, and there are a half-dozen little conversations going on, and Lukas is thinking about raiding Kate's fridge for some real food when the kids tug on him and get him to lean over. He hasn't even taken his coat off yet.

Which is just as well, because they want to go out again. Not to play in the snow, not to make snow angels or build snowmen or any of that -- but to get toys for Tripoli. And Lukas laughs, pats them gently on the back as he straightens, and calls to Kate:

"Do you mind if we bring some cans in for Tripoli to play with?"

and Kate replies no, no, of course not, though Lucille looks like she might blow a capillary at the thought of more noise and chaos, but then Alex says he can run out and go get the 'playpen' from their rental car, whatever that might be, so they don't have cans rolling around everywhere. This sounds like a great idea to Kate. So when Lukas heads out, Alex goes with him, and as the door shuts behind them they can hear Alex saying,

So you're dating the blonde?

And Lukas replying that he's not dating her, he's married to her, and:

Is she really a Shadow Lord, or is that just by association?

As they're coming back in - Lukas carrying Danicka's reusable bag full of cans, Alex, determinedly not shivering in his summery clothes with a collapsible Ikea laundry basket under his arm - headlights wash over them, a car pulls into the drive, and before it's even come to a stop the passenger side door is swinging open and high heels and tap-tapping their way up the walk. Sorry we're late! Even inside, they can hear Anezka. Hi! Hi, I'm Anezka. Then the door is bursting open and Lukas is saying this is my sister and my sister's boyfriend, and Anezka is saying Hi, I'm Anezka and this is Daniel and Alex is sizing Daniel up and deciding he's not even going to bother and

Emanek is squeezing through the adults and the fresh round of introductions to grab the bag of cans from Lukas. "Here!" he shouts, and is promptly shushed, "here, robot toys!"

Danicka

Lukas hasn't spent much time -- any time, really -- around the kinsman whose departure sent his packmate into an emotional tailspin that seemed to teeter on the edge of harano at times, just as Danicka has never really had an opportunity to talk to the Galliard who is now as close to Lukas as Katherine is. Alex bounds -- because that is the way Alex moves, it seems -- out to the car with two excited children who are having coats shoved onto them even as they're scurrying to the door and a very tall Ahroun, and Danicka finds herself face-to-face with a very curious wolf with metal all up and down her ears.

The grandparents end up going to sit with Sarka and Maddox and Renata, and once Maddox settles down a bit and realizes that the teenager's mother is going to kill him if he doesn't stop teasing, he begins playing for them. Milos seems a bit awkward, then heads off to help the kids with adding to the 'playpen'.

They can hear Alex asking Lukas about Danicka, if she's really a Shadow Lord, and Lukas and Alex can hear Sinclair saying to Danicka: "So we've been wondering," and the 'we' seems to be her and Kate, "was it your idea or Lukas's idea to not invite any of us to your wedding?" Danicka, for the first time in a long time, stammers. And Sinclair just cackles, throwing her arms around Danicka in a quick hug. "I don't even care. I mean, Kate's probably going to hold that over Lukas's head forever, but whatever, you know? You're coming to mine though, right? I mean it'll probably be in California but you guys will both come, right?"

It doesn't really sound like a request.

"When is it?" Danicka asks, regaining her composure.

"Oh, I have no idea, the meathead in the muscle shirt hasn't asked me yet," Sinclair says, this last part a little too loudly, because Alex and Lukas have just walked back inside with the kids. Snow is tromped off of shoes again, coats are shed, and two new people come inside behind them. Danicka waves to Daniel and Anezka, beckoning them over. "Come meet the pack!"

Katherine, of course, sweeps off to introduce herself and welcome them, even though she's met Anezka before. She is ever so effervescent, offering them champagne, eggnog, hors d'oeurvres, instructing Lucille to take their coats, and so on. She teases Lukas after meeting Daniel: "Your family does seem to have a fascination with fair-haired folk, don't you?"

Emanek shoves through, shaking the bag. He and Irena take off after Alex, hurrying him to open the playpen. Tripoli comes to inspect it, and Milos tries to get Emanek and Irena to calm down, and it doesn't take a genius to see that the youngest, in particular, is in a state of pure overexcitement that verges on panic. Renata is on edge, Irena looks like she's almost as torn as her brother between delight and frenzy, and every adult in the room can guess why.

Living with one Ahroun and one Theurge cub and one pre-changed child is one thing. Mingling with a fully-grown wolf pack is something else entirely.

Danicka excuses herself from Sinclair and makes her way over to Alex, who is setting up the playpen. She says, her voice low and quite casual, "Maybe upstairs?"

Renata, hearing this, says: "I can watch them!"

Lukas

"Sure. I got it!" Alex grabs up the playpen like he thinks maybe someone else will take the honor from him - grabs it, hoists it on one shoulder, and bounds out of the living area. The cans clatter in the playpen all the way up the stairs, Tripoli whizzing along behind him, a little annoyed because why are the toys moving away. And yes, bounding is how Alex moves: athletic, tight, like he has titanium pylons and high-tensile springs instead of bones and muscles. Even though those bones and muscles are rather deliberately conspicuous.

Renata and the kids follow, some more sedately than others. Meanwhile, Lukas is getting out of his coat for the first time, and Anezka is ribbing him for looking like you stepped out of a GQ photoshoot, and he's grabbing her in the crook of his elbow and giving her a noogie that makes her shriek and makes Marjeta look completely mortified. When Anezka wriggles free, Daniel, chewing on a mouthful of hors d'oeuvres, gently and quite matter of factly helps her straighten her hair.

Meanwhile, Lukas drifts over to the last remaining cub. "By the way," he says, "there's a pretty cool game room upstairs if you get bored. Just so you don't think it's all robots and cans up there."

Overwhelmed, if what he actually means.

Danicka

Tripoli, as a matter of fact, is quite good on stairs. He could poof out of existence and just show up in another spot, but he doesn't do that. What he does is elongate his arms and grab one step at a time, rolling his wheel up. Over and over, practiced enough that he can do this quite fast. Not as fast as any of the homid-formed flesh-creatures, but still. He is not a gaffling, after all. Milos just stares, somewhat awestruck. Emanek and Irena don't understand that they're being catered to, that this suggestion was made so that they wouldn't have a meltdown, they just like the idea of getting to go play. Renata excuses herself, too, ostensibly because the kids need to be watched.

They do need to be watched. But she can only just handle Lukas and Milos and Irena all at once; a room full of strangers, most of them Garou, is a little draining. She follows them up, and they can hear the squeals downstairs of the kids discovering television and video games and room to play in with their robot and and and and AND! A door closes, and the noise gets a little muffled, but occasionally they can still hear the thumping of feet overhead, the clanging of metal while Tripoli splashes in his toys.

Milos remains downstairs, greeting Anezka and Daniel. He likes Daniel. He doesn't quite grasp that this is partly because Daniel is sort of like Renata, or because Daniel so easily handles all the wildness and insanity around him. But he looks up as Lukas mentions the game room to him. A flash of a smile flickers over the young Crescent-Moon's face, gratitude and amusement both. "I am all right," he says, no less thankfully. "I prefer it here."

And that, interestingly, is true. Renata is older, but she's not the one who has been separated from her family. She's not the one in the process of becoming a Cliath, not the one who in a year or two will have his own name, likely his own pack, will be fighting to the death. He seems shockingly young, when one thinks of that. He's only fifteen. Then again, he's fifteen and he's already showing the chops of a capable, clever, and forceful Theurge. Maybe he'll be okay.

But not if he stays a boy. So he remains downstairs with the adults, with the Garou and the veteran kin, and goes talk to Sinclair. About Tripoli, which makes her open up into that story. She seems happy with that: she's talking to another Garou, doesn't have to worry about staying polite or careful with the kin. She tells him about the fight, about her fallen packmate, and she doesn't apologize for the dark tones of the story. Of course not; Sinclair never would.

As Anezka and Daniel get settled and the adults settle into light drinks and refreshments before dinner, Danicka drifts over occasionally to Lukas and touches him here or there, kisses him. It's all soft, and discreet, because she's not one for an overabundance of PDA, but she finds him every so often, comes near to him in between other conversations.

After awhile, a butler enters and mentions something quietly to Katherine, who claps her hands lightly, beaming, and invites them all to the dining room for supper. She sends Lucille upstairs to gather Renata and the little ones and that boisterous young man of Sinclair's, nevermind that he's quite a bit older than Kate herself, and they begin to rouse themselves to go to the long dining table. Katherine has not set up a 'kiddie table' of any kind, though her seating arrangement has been careful to place the little ones so that they are both flanked by adults -- kin adults -- and separated from each other by at least one body. They are buffered considerably from Garou and strangers, with no wine glasses at their place settings, their water glasses slightly smaller than everyone else's. Even their chairs are different, the seats slightly higher so that they will not be tempted to sit on their knees or -- heaven forbid -- stand up in their chairs to reach for anything.

It's entirely possible she had them custom-made for this evening. She would.

Couples are, of course, separated to keep conversation interesting. She actually has Miloslav sitting close to her, which is a spot of deference to his age and his status as the father of two Garou. Lukas, of course, occupies one end of the table, the seat of honor, and from there he can see all of them. Two long sides, every seat full of someone who is blood to him, spirit to him, or kin to his spirit and blood. Maddox and Kate have no mates, no family members with them tonight, but neither seems sorrowful this evening.

Katherine is brightly engaged with Miloslav, and he is flattered enough that a beautiful young woman who glitters in the candlelight is paying him so much attention that he is quite cheerful. And more to the better: when he falters, when his own dismay darkens his eyes, Katherine more than anyone at the table understands. Katherine, not surprisingly, knows what it is like to feel one's mind get away from oneself, and she handles it smoothly, charmingly, with more patience and gentleness than her detractors would offer her in description.

Maddox is talking to Milos about the rite he does all the time, Feast for the Spirits, and everyone can tell that Milos is taking mental notes, is questioning the ways that Fianna Theurges deal with spirits as opposed to the ways that Shadow Lords use. It might be a faux pas to let him have this conversation, but they can let it slide: his mentor can get over it. It is not a bad thing for him to learn, to learn everything he can from everyone he can.

There is Alex talking to Danicka, and weirdly enough, they're discussing video and computer games, and laughing about the fact that he once thought she was a Fang or a Fenrir, he didn't know they made blonde Shadow Lords. She just huffs and says there are more blonde Lords than black-haired ones at this table, thank you very much. She didn't know they made Glass Walkers who weren't 90-pound computer nerds, she adds, shooting back as good as she gets.

Sinclair is, surprisingly, not incensed. She just laughs, maybe because of the good nature of everyone tonight or the eggnog or simply because she can tell that Danicka and Alex are getting along and this is a good thing. She refused to sit anywhere but beside Alex, which annoyed Kate at first, but at least she doesn't glomp all over him the entire dinner. Mostly, she chats with Marjeta and Anezka, saying she wants every single embarassing story ever about Lukas, and they are only too happy to oblige. Jaroslav and Daniel are entertaining the kids along with Sarka and Renata.

Danicka catches Lukas's eye a few times during the different courses of dinner, smiling at him as the conversations around the table shift and weave, as laughter peaks and then fades, as the two 'packs' get to know one another. She winks at him, and then they're serving the second of three palate-cleansing mini-courses, a crisp and dry sorbet of white grape. Kate has gone all-out, and they were warned beforehand to expect a minimum of ten courses. Thankfully, they've had the first before they even get to the table, but around the fifth course (composed of choices of lamb with mint sauce, roast duckling, sirloin of beef and chateau potatoes), the less gastonomically advanced of them are looking rather full. On the upside, Katherine's servers are on a strict schedule, and some of the courses are clearly only meant to be tasted before they are removed, the plates not laden and piled with food but artfully arranged.

"I liked that," Emanek says, as they take away the roast squab. And: "I didn't like that," of the cold asparagus vinaigrette. And simply: "Ew," when the pate of foie gras with celery is handed to him, which Sarka shushes.

"I think it's good," counters Irena, eating the pate on the celery like it's peanut butter, but then, she's liked every course that involved some kind of meat. Somewhere around the third course their mother and Jaroslav gave them portions of their own wine, just to help settle them down. No more than they've ever had with a dinner, of course, but it does have the usual effect of alcohol, and their incessant chattering is a little less loud, a little less incessant.

Tripoli, of course, is flirting with a silver spoon at one end of the table, having been strictly forbidden from zooming around the centerpieces.

Lukas

Down at the end of the table, Lukas has Renata to one side, Sarka to the other - Kate's seating intermingling the packs as thoroughly as possible. And really, in a way, there are three packs here, three clans: the Unbroken, the Musils, and the Kvanisckas: sixteen wolves and kin gathered around a glittering table with its fancy centerpieces, its decadent, scrumptious courses.

And there are so very many of them. And the kids are enjoying themselves, trying a little of everything, and over somewhere in the middle of the table Anezka is eating with surprisingly delicate manners even while she spills story after embarrassing story about Lukas, while down at the far end Lukas's father sips his wine, tastes his food, and - sometime after growing bored of entertaining the children - discovers that Danicka like math. And physics. And engineering. And then he talks to her so much that eventually Marjeta breaks in a few times, chats with Danicka or leads her into conversations with others at the table until Jaroslav realizes he's hogging Danicka.

Lukas, meanwhile, joins with the stories at first; demands a few out of Sinclair in return. But as food and wine begin to harmonize ever so soothingly in his stomach he grows lazier, more relaxed, eventually all but slouching in his chair. He listens to the others, smiling often, laughing occasionally. Once or twice, he stops the servers as they try to clear his plate, and at one point he even asks for a second helping of the lamb. These are all things he would have never done when he first met the Bellamontes, or perhaps even a year or two ago. Once upon a time, without quite realizing it himself, Lukas quite idolized Edward Bellamonte, and through him, the Silver Fang tribe. Once upon a time, he was much more determined to be just as courteous, just as polite, just as well-mannered, just as elite, just as good as they were - or anyone else. Once upon a time, Lukas was so very determined to be the best that he was, in fact, quite stiff and stilted.

Then he grew up a little more. Gained some maturity, and some understanding. Lost some misplaced idealism. Gained - as strange as it might sound, given how determinedly self-possessed Lukas Wyrmbreaker has always been - a deeper, truer sense of confidence.

And now he lounges at the end of Kate's beautiful table, surrounded by those linked to him by blood and promise and spirit: unafraid to let his guard down, unafraid to be a little less than perfect. As dinner begins to wind down toward to its final, light courses, Lukas has a last glass of wine and waves off further refills. And a little later, eating his dessert in small, lazy spoonfuls over after-dinner coffee,

he begins to ask Sarka about the rest of her family. Her adult children, who were still back in the Czech Republic. And, yes: her mate - gently curious, never prying too deep.

Eventually, the last course is cleared away, and Katherine stands. She announces there will be 'parlor games' and after-dinner spirits, which the children are disinterested in until they realize she just means party games and drinks. And Anezka perks up, interested, and Alex decides to give it a shot so long as they play Charades too because he rocks at Charades, which Jaroslav seconds because - he says modestly - he's been told he's rather good himself. Alex's eyes gleam as he sizes up this unexpected new rival: sheer competitive glee.

Soon enough the table begins to clear. Lukas stays, though, too relaxed in his chair to move, talking to Sarka. And Daniel too, twirling a wineglass slowly, contemplating the two or three fingerbreadths of wine left. Listening more than he speaks.

Danicka

The serving staff is, naturally, all kinfolk. All Silver Fang kinfolk, in point of fact. They are not terribly useful for breeding, given their impure blood, but they are all quite lovely to look at and their deference is well-paid. In another life they might have been slaves, but then: in another life, they might also have been garou. One never really knows; those who hear the voices of their ancestors quite often go quickly mad from it and cannot give reliable testimony about life after life after life.

These kin, at least, are wise enough not to take food from wolves when the wolves have not nudged the plate away from themselves. They let Lukas finish everything he likes, even as Katherine teases him and regales the table with tales of how Lukas became addicted to lamb shortly after she met him. He counters that he was always addicted to lamb, and she trumps him by saying that's hardly true, as she distinctly remembers him saying 'what is this?' as he devoured delicate rib after delicate rib the first them it was served in the Bellamonte house.

As he grows more relaxed tonight, with the stories and the laughter and the food and the wine, he talks to Sarka about life in the country he was born in and hardly remembers. She tells him all about Tadeus and Zdenka, even excusing herself from the table to go get her purse and show him a more recent photograph of the two of them than he saw in her house in New York, where Emanek was a chubby baby and Irena was a four-year-old stiffly proud of her new dress and their father was alive, stern, and protective.

They are both tall, as so many of this branch of Musils are. They both look college-aged -- in fact, Sarka says that they are both attending school in Prague on multiple scholarships. Tadeas has vividly blue eyes, darker than Milos's and more intense, his hair dark, his expression the sort of amused patience of someone normally serious who is allowing himself to be provoked into smiles. Zdenka has her golden hair in a razored, chic cut that skims her jawline, her mouth open with laughter, her lips painted red, her arms thrown around her brother's neck. It doesn't take more than a glance to know that Milos and Renata learned so much of their seriousness from his brother, that Zdenka understands Irena and Emanek way better than anyone else and is probably raising hell in Prague on a weekly basis. Her eyes are tawny, and they twinkle with mischief.

Her mate was an Ahroun. He was honored with a few names, Sarka says, her tone quieting as she sets her chin on her hand and speaks of him, her eyes a little faraway, but the one he went by most often was Rival of Fire, the first name he earned. He was, she says, a twin himself, but his brother Emil had died in adolescence. To this day they do not know if Emil was born to be garou or not. Rival of Fire was an Athro when he died, renowned not only for leadership in battle but for adding so greatly to the Nation. He was named an Elder when he died, she says, but all of this is with humility. One does not have to look far to see the similarity between Emil's name and Emanuel's, or the irony in naming the Ahroun daughter of an Ahroun Irena, which means 'peace'.

"I think Ignac was getting tired," Sarka says softly to Lukas as she explains that, "near the end." Her grief is not fresh. The ache is still deep, though, and she keeps her voice down to not disturb most of the people at the table, who go on with their own conversations.

"Doesn't ...Ignac mean 'fire'?" interjects Sinclair, her tone low. She's been listening, too. Sarka just nods.

"And Emil means 'rival'," she answers.

They move on later. The children are not sleepy, not yet, but they itch to get up and play some more. Upstairs Irena had taken off her shoes and had to be urged back into them in order to come down for dinner, but as they move to the sitting room again, she takes a long hard look at Sinclair's bare feet and quite defiantly takes off her Mary Janes, sets them neatly with their toes against the wall, and flops down on the carpet for games. Emanek, not to be outdone, wiggles out of his shoes and sets them -- a little more messily -- next to Irena's, and then it's Anezka and adult after adult who just gives up. The grandparents, of course, refuse to be swayed, but soon enough almost everyone is in hose or bare feet or socks, Lukas's vest buttons are undone, Eman's vest is completely off, and Katherine is just... well, tolerating it. She keeps her heels on, naturally.

And they play charades, splitting up couples so they can't be on each other's teams because, well, it's thought that the better you know your team, the easier it is to guess the clues. Marjeta is horrible at acting out clues, because she hates making a fool of herself, but she's an excellent guesser. Danicka is much the same: she hates everyone looking at her like that, but she can nail a clue within a minute, usually. Alex, Sinclair, and Anezka -- and, surprisingly, Jaroslav -- all have no qualms once they've taken a clue, and come up with clever motions. Katherine, who is in charge of handing people their clues from the bowl, somehow manages to pick very easy ones for Irena and Emanek to act out.

When all the clues have run out they play Two Truths and a Lie, which Danicka is profoundly tickled with because she dominates this game. Lukas accuses Katherine more than once of using her Gift on the room, but she laughs like tinkling bells and says non, non!. The lawyer, too, is very good at Two Truths and a Lie, but Emanek is quickly bored with it and Irena follows soon after. They ask if they can go back upstairs to play with Tripoli, and are granted this. This time, Renata stays downstairs, emboldened by food and drink and the general tone of the everything.

As the games begin to die down, they swirl their spirits around a bit, going slow on these because some of them have to drive and aren't Garou. Sinclair is curled up against Alex's shoulder, nearly asleep, and Maddox has his guitar out, strumming idle tunes, til Lukas says someone should sing. Sinclair grumbles, her eyes closed: I'm sleeping. And he mutters back: Well not you then, and Sarka does what proud parents always do and says her children should. They resist, but only for so long, which tells the group something about the two of them: they don't actually mind.

Milos, who up til now Lukas didn't know could play, goes over to the baby grand in Katherine's parlor and warms up gently, while Renata goes to stand. And it's a little concert, even though she seems so shy on the surface, but: she has a beautiful voice, warm and agile, and seems familiar with singing as her brother plays. The song is one that sounds intimately familiar to Lukas, that Anezka sort of remembers, that Marjeta and Miloslav and Jaroslav know, one Danicka could sing along to but chooses not to. They are the only ones in the room who understand it, moreoever, as the plaintive love song it is: te
e voda te
e, it begins, waters ripple and flow. A few bars in, Maddox adds a gentle touch of guitar to the rendition, which startles Renata at first, but she doesn't falter.

Katherine, of course, is the first one to begin her light, indoor-polite applause after the two teenagers finish, encore, encore. Renata blushes, and demures, so Maddox fills in with Siúil a Rún -- since they appear to be doing regional music, he says. And Sinclair isn't asleep after all, so she sings a soft rendition of Red River Valley, and near the end everyone is so warm, so soothed, that Danicka is sitting on the arm of Lukas's chair and touching his hair, leaning to his side. Milos and Sarka are flanking their mother the way their younger siblings so often do.

That's when someone -- Jaroslav, in fact -- notices that it has gotten suspiciously quiet upstairs.

Danicka

[the czech got screwed up! tece voda tece, then! fine, newjove, BE RACIST THEN.]

Lukas

Listening to Sarka speak of her deceased mate, Alex is perhaps the one to most easily intuit what it meant for Ignac to bear the name Rival of Fire. The kinsman - so abrasive, so boisterous - glances at Sarka in quick startlement, quicker understanding. He swallows, says nothing, but

later on, when they've retreated to their motel or guest room for the night, he'll give Sinclair a long, long hug, holding her against his body under some old remembered ache goes out of him again. And in the morning, Christmas Day, he'll call his brother just to. Y'know.

Say hi.

There's an ache in Lukas too, though. It's born of a different source, a different connection: Ignac's auspice, which is his own; Ignac's rank, which does not seem so far away these days. Ignac, tired at the end, tired of the war, tired of the pain, tired of always being strong, always protecting, always warding, always fighting.

Sarka, still fighting. Recovered from the loss of a mate and the near-loss of her own life. Still raising her children, still holding on for their sake if nothing else, and for an improbable love for life despite everything life has already thrown at her.

As they drift on to play games, Lukas drifts closer to Danicka. And as they're going into the living room to sit on the couch and the rich rug, he wraps his arm around her from behind, lowers his mouth to her shoulder, and just holds her a moment.

"Love you," he whispers in her ear. And softer, the same, in Czech. Miluje te.

And soon after he's laughing again, laughing while Anezka tries to guess what Danicka is trying to mime with that bizarre little jerk of her head, that funny way she's stepping. Seizure? Epilepsy? Drunk guy? Um... um... leg cramps? Walk it off? I don't know! It turns out to be chicken. Couldn't you have just tucked your hands under your armpits and clucked like a normal person?

They're both better at Two Truths and a Lie, Danicka and Anezka. Danicka owns, and Anezka mostly owns, except - against all odds - Lukas seems able to trick her again and again, until Anezka suddenly bursts out with

If you keep using that I'm Being Serious tone I am NEVER EVER going to trust you EVER again.

It's not fooling me, Kate preens, and this is what leads to the first accusation of cheating, which she laughs off because no, of course she's not cheating, she's not cheating until Danicka starts tricking her again and again and again, and really, that is just shameful. So maybe she'll just take a peek, she'll just look once, and

of course the packmates feel that shift and this time it's Maddox that all but leaps off the couch: j'accuse!

Much later: they are quiet now, and the servants, sensing the mood, have turned down the lights, lit the fireplace. They are sprawled around on couches and on rugs, and the couples and families that have separated for the sake of social interaction have drifted close again. Danicka is leaning against Lukas's side, and his arm is loosely around her lower back; her fingers drift through his hair and make his eyes want to close. Make him want to sleep. Conversation begins to wind down, and no one rushes to fill the silence. It's nice, that silence: interrupted here and there by a stray chord on the guitar, a pop of wood in the fire.

That's when Jaroslav turns to Sarka with a smile. "Your children," he says, "are being very quiet now."

And everyone realizes that yes, indeed, they are. Milos yawns, and Renata says perhaps they're asleep. There's that slow, gathering stirring - that general subdued rustling at the tail end of a party when the guests realize that yes, it's late. The children are tired. Perhaps it's time to go.

"I can go check on them," Lukas volunteers. He doesn't move just yet, though. He turns his head into Danicka's touch, nudging rather shamelessly against her palm like an animal, like some large and affectionate and mostly-wild mammal.

Danicka

That story is how Alex learns that Sarka has a twin sister, and how could he not feel a sudden kinship with her? Both of them have a twin who was born garou. Both of them, in fact, have a twin who is a Philodox. And Sarka's late husband lost his brother -- the way Alex has so many times nearly lost his own. He doesn't mention any of it, of course, doesn't suddenly delve into a deep friendship with his girlfriend's packmate's wife's half-sister, but it's there.

And Sinclair is there, too, curled up in 'her' room upstairs, the two of them squished on the little full mattress so like the one they share anyway, looking at him in faint concern when he holds her a little tighter. They don't speak, but something tells her what it's about, and she holds him back, closing her eyes.

That story is Lukas's own, in a way. He can see so clearly the children -- six of them -- left behind when Ignac died, each one a mark of honor to his name, particularly the young man who very nearly was given into the hands of a monster, particularly the little girl who he named for a wish that would never, ever be fulfilled. A wish that was counter to his own existence. Counter to her own. That story throws into stark relief the knowledge that Danicka is so much more frail, that she could fall prey to cancer like her sister, that her mind could disintegrate like her father's, that something as simple as a bullet could end her, and nearly has. That story is not his own, not really, but it is so close. It is so very close.

In the parlor later, he holds his wife and does not bite her shoulder the way he does when he sleeps with her or mates with her sometimes, but his mouth against that part of her body is a signal she can't help but notice. She turns her head toward him a bit, resting her brow against his temple, and he murmurs that he loves her, twice. And she smiles, whispers, calls him her mate in that deeply affectionate, naming way they have. Kisses his cheek.

She's horrible at charades. She hates getting up there, being stared at, unable to communicate by being a total fool, and she's laughing at Anezka's guesses, but throws up her hands and rolls her eyes at the last comment. Lukas gets it instantly, how the criticism doesn't help Danicka want to play charades any more than she did before, how his sister is still figuring out where those tender spots are on Danicka, how words that are offhand to her can wound the other woman. Truth be told, Anezka's in a bit of a bind when it comes to her brother's wife sometimes. She doesn't know her. She doesn't begin to imagine what Danicka has been through, and yet: there's this woman, who so often seems a little sensitive, a little too easy to upset, by things Anezka doesn't mean to be hurtful at all.

But she doesn't know, does she. Her brother, even though he's younger, would never hurt her the way Vladislav hurt Danicka. Just like Lukas, she can't imagine someone that close doing something that horrific. She would have as hard a time wrapping her mind around it as Lukas did. It would take her as long, if not longer, to understand the connection between being abused and being afraid that you aren't normal, you aren't okay, there's something wrong with you.

For tonight, it's a small thing, the sort of friction that makes utter sense between a sibling and a significant other. Danicka just huffs a little as she sits down, annoyed at the comment, and Lukas makes some crack at Anezka that just because she's a bad guesser...

which lightens the mood. The next time Danicka gets up for charades she goes and sits down in a corner, is quite still for a long time, then sneezes shrilly, jumping. And it's Anezka who cracks up laughing, yelling: "Panda! Oh god. Panda!" as Sinclair and Alex are crowing it, too. And Danicka who laughs, too, clapping for her sister in law, while Katherine huffs quietly that she doesn't get it. She thought that was a very hard clue to put in the bowl, really.

Two Truths and a Lie is when the kids head upstairs, bored with a game that is more about subtlety than they're interested in right now. Renata and Milos are charged for it, though, keeping a steady pace with the adults. Danicka, who knows that Katherine has always misread her, begins to look a little suspicious when Kate starts guessing all of her lies, and then guessing all of Lukas's, and narrows her eyes at the Fang. But before she might say anything, all the packmates of the Unbroken are turning their eyes on Kate, and Maddox just lets go, pointing and yelling at her in French.

Katherine's hand flutters to her chest, but she can't even begin the lie: she laughs, clapping her hands, and claims it was all a test.

There is singing later, and the mood gradually gets softer after the last gentle and the cowboy who loves you so true from Sinclair, the last plucked notes from Maddox's awakened guitar. It's as though the spirit within that instrument has added to the reception of the songs, mulling every mind in thoughts of love and love lost and lullabyes. He strums idly now, softly, and the fire crackles down to embers. Of course, then, it's a parent -- and a parent of two rowdy children -- who notices first that it's very quiet upstairs. Sarka is nearly asleep, and stirs when he mentions it, breathing in and listening, her eyes opening. A few others perk up slightly, noticing that the laughter and squeals that punctuated their games have died down.

This is when the line between those who have raised children and those who have not is drawn: Milos and Renata just look at each other with a slight oh, crap look, while Daniel and Anezka glance at the clock and Sinclair yawns openly against her mate. And Lukas nudges and nuzzles Danicka, murmuring that he'll go check on them even as his eyes close. Jaroslav and Marjeta chuckle with Miloslav; Sarka just shakes her head at them. "Even if I did not know, I could tell you do not have children," she says, and levers herself up out of her chair, heading for the stairs.

Danicka smiles, stroking Lukas's hair still. A few moments later, Sarka does walk just as softly back down the stairs, nodding to the others: "They're just asleep." Which means they could easily go back to idle chatting and singing if they like, but all of them seem so relaxed now that they don't want to contemplate the inevitable separation, the long drive back to Stickney, except: it is Christmas Eve. Lukas will be with his family opening gifts under the tree, and Sinclair and Maddox and Kate and Alex will be opening gifts here, which is okay since the Sinclairs in Kansas are going to have their Christmas morning on Monday anyway, after Alex and Sinclair get back.

The adults are going to get precious little sleep tonight before they all need to be at the den together, so, as difficult as it is to think of bringing all this to a close, they begin to stir. They start rustling. People start getting shoes on. Sarka goes upstairs to wake the ten year old and the eight year old, carrying their shoes with her and then leading them downstairs. Irena's curls are rumpled, flattened on one side, and Emanek is rubbing his eyes, and they finally look exhausted, but they are very polite with their thank-yous and their good-byes to everyone, including Sinclair and Alex for 'letting us play with your friend'. Katherine, of course, has little favors for everyone, little boxes of custom-made chocolates with the Bellamonte crest stamped into the confections and the middles filled with raspberry and vanilla creme. The pack has never really exchanged gifts on birthdays or holidays, not as a rule, but she sends two servants out to the van with him with stacks of boxes wrapped in silver paper with white chiffon ribbons.

It's too much. But it makes her happy to do so. Emanek notices that one of the boxes has his name on it, another Irena's. He's in shock. "But you don't even know us! We didn't get you anything," he adds, looking distressed. Looking, in fact, all around as though he could find something to give back just out of thin air.

True to form, Katherine just smiles winningly, tossing her hair from her shoulder. "Incorrect, mon petit. I do now. And you surely did." She plants a very embarassing kiss on his head, and Milos stammers out a slightly overwhelmed thanks, but she waves it off, saying goodbye much the way she said hello: with grace and courtesy, embraces and little kisses.

Sinclair squeezes Lukas about as hard as he can stand, and hugs Danicka as well, shaking people's hands and saying how good it was to meet them, and how she didn't get anyone anything because Kate didn't tell her they were doing gifts -- this said with a sharp, hard look at the Philodox -- but y'know, it's cool and all, it was awesome seeing you guys, I miss you, with an ache that Alex can't help but notice.

Soon enough they're all piling back into the van and into Danicka's car. Anezka drank almost nothing because it's her turn to drive back; Lukas overcomes it in an eyeblink. Soon enough they're shivering in their coats in the icy van, and he's cranking the heater up. Marjeta and Jaroslav choose to go with their daughter and her man, straight back to the hotel, because it really is very late and there's just barely enough room in the Infiniti. In the van ride home, the little ones only stay awake for another five or ten minutes before drifting off again, laying down on laps and breathing steadily, heavily in the background.

"Look," Danicka says to Lukas, as they're leaving Chicago. "Oh, look," she says, and so they do, and Sarka wakes the little ones up to peer out the window, wiping away the fog, watching a fully-lit and sparkling Chicago recede from them, glowing a multitude of colors as they leave it behind.

Lukas

"You should come back more often," Lukas says as he's parting from his errant packmate, disentangling from her supertight squeeze. And, with only a little bit of wryness: "We're just a phone call away."

And then Kate is fluttering her way down the line to him, and Lukas bows over her hand, kissing her knuckles in an exaggerated simulacrum of Fang courtly behavior, and even though he's obviously joking Kate is absolutely delighted. The curtsey she sinks into is unerring and natural, and makes Lukas burst into laughter because you look like a Jane Austen character.

Then they're parting ways: the family-pack from the spirit-pack first, and then Anezka and Daniel from the rest. Bye! Anezka calls, waving as she's getting into the Infiniti they've borrowed from Danicka, bye, bye! Meanwhile, Lukas is helping Sarka load her kids into the van, helping his parents and Miloslav up into the van, and when Danicka comes around her picks her up around her waist, impromptu, whirls her around once before lifting her up as well.

When he comes around and climbs into the driver's seat, the interior of the van seems warmer and smaller for his presence. He backs out of Kate's well-lit driveway, and the kids take one more look at Kate's awesome loft with its industro-minimalist facade that hides such wonders. They drive away, and along the way the littlest ones fall asleep, and Milos leans his head against the cool window and looks at the stars, and Renata, because she can, and because she feels a little closer to this newly enlarged family of hers, sings a little. Something old; something passed down through the generations, unfamiliar to the Kvanisckas, unmistakable to the Musils.

When they get back to the den, Emanek needs to be carried in. It's his older brother that does this. Irena is awake, though, and Lukas holds her hand so she doesn't slip on iced-over puddles. It is very late, past midnight, and so

they're each allowed to open one gift.

Danicka

[EDIT: AKSHULLY, DANIEL AND ANEZKA AND MARJETA AND JAROSLAV AREN'T GOING STRAIGHT TO THE HOTEL. FYI. BTW.]

Lukas

"You should come back more often," Lukas says as he's parting from his errant packmate, disentangling from her supertight squeeze. And, with only a little bit of wryness: "We're just a phone call away."

And then Kate is fluttering her way down the line to him, and Lukas bows over her hand, kissing her knuckles in an exaggerated simulacrum of Fang courtly behavior, and even though he's obviously joking Kate is absolutely delighted. The curtsey she sinks into is unerring and natural, and makes Lukas burst into laughter because you look like a Jane Austen character.

Then they're parting ways: the family-pack from the spirit-pack first, and then Anezka and Daniel from the rest - if only for a while, if only until they all reconvene at the den. Meanwhile, Lukas is helping Sarka load her kids into the van, helping his parents and Miloslav up into the van, and when Danicka comes around her picks her up around her waist, impromptu, whirls her around once before lifting her up as well.

When he comes around and climbs into the driver's seat, the interior of the van seems warmer and smaller for his presence. He backs out of Kate's well-lit driveway, and the kids take one more look at Kate's awesome loft with its industro-minimalist facade that hides such wonders. They drive away, and along the way the littlest ones fall asleep, and Milos leans his head against the cool window and looks at the stars, and Renata, because she can, and because she feels a little closer to this newly enlarged family of hers, sings a little. Something old; something passed down through the generations, unfamiliar to the Kvanisckas, unmistakable to the Musils.

When they get back to the den, Danicka's Infiniti is already there, Daniel and Anezka sitting inside to stay warm. They get out when they see the van pull up, Daniel waving at them. Emanek needs to be carried in. It's his older brother that does this. Irena is awake, though, and Lukas holds her hand so she doesn't slip on iced-over puddles. It is very late, past midnight, and so

they're each allowed to open one gift.

Danicka

It's snowy outside. Not snowing, not yet, but the forecast has called for a White Christmas. The weather reporters are even making jokes about fog lights on Santa's sleigh, things like that. Anezka thinks they're going back to the hotel til Daniel reminds her, grinning, that they have one present to open. She smacks her head in jest and they drive, a little faster than a twelve-passenger van, back to Stickney. Danicka gets twirled and laughs, her breath steaming, holding onto him as he sets her down so her heels don't slip on the ice.

The drive home is a quiet one, the kids falling asleep once again and waking only to look back at the city and its glittering lights. Renata sings folk songs, even a couple of pop songs that no one who has been in the States for more than five years has ever heard of. During one of the folk tunes, Irena actually joins in, because there's an echo part that she does a little too loud, a little too excitedly, laughing because the words are ridiculous. It's something about all the things they bought for their pony, which starts with a saddle and blanket and harness and then goes into -- well, it sounds like anything the car's passengers can come up with.

then for my pony I bought --

some LEGOS! which is Emanek's contribution, and Renata laughs and sings: some Legos, some Legos I bought for my po-o-ny, and we rode through town with our Le-e-gos, my beautiful pony and me.

Kolaches, says Lukas. And 'a laptop', says Danicka, til the entire van is laughing and trying to one-up each other in pure silliness. The song can, this way, go on for as long as anyone likes, but they're still tired, and the girls keep yawning as they sing. Slowly it gets quiet again, peaceful again, til Emanek really does fall asleep again on his mother's side, slumped in his seat. No one wakes him up when they get home, not right away. Sarka starts to heft him into her arms but Milos shakes his head, taking the boy himself. He's stronger than he looks, especially these days. Emanek is no scrawny five year old anymore, but Milos has no trouble with him, placing his feet carefully on the walkway.

Danicka helps her father walk to the door, and Lukas helps Irena hop out of the van. He can tell she wants to be carried, is sleepy, and it's not fair, she's only two years older than Emanek, but she doesn't whine. It is still special that her uncle holds her hand, even as she decides to go ahead and 'skate' her Mary Janes across a puddle. He keeps her steady, chuckling in the icy air, and urges her inside, inside. Come on. The truth is that it's way, way past their bedtime. They didn't even leave Kate's til almost ten, which was early for the adults but far past bedtime for Emanek and Irena. It's nearly eleven now and chances are they're going to be up by seven or eight and no one is going to get quite enough sleep, but that's okay.

The all tromp inside, most coats staying on. The kids are ordered to change into their pajamas and brush their teeth before they can open a present, because it's the only way they'll do it all quickly. And they do, hurrying through the motions of PJs and washing up. Renata helps Irena get her bow out of her hair and brushes the curls out a little, but then they all head back to the living room, where Danicka and Sarka have put the gifts from Katherine into the pile.

It's time to open one gift each. And the kids can't choose, and Lukas wants to open the one from Irena but she wails NOOO THAT'S FOR TOMORROW in such distress that he relents, and Emanek is getting antsy and tired, so finally:

"Why don't we all open the one from Kate tonight?" Danicka suggests. "And we'll save the ones from each other for tomorrow morning, all right?"

This suits everyone just fine. So soon they hand out the perfectly-wrapped boxes in their chiffon ribbons and silver paper to everyone, turning little gift tags over to read calligraphied names. Everyone is opening at once, eager despite their ages, and find:

cashmere. Everything is cashmere. Mostly sweaters, in red or black or white depending on the recepient, but the grandparents are given sets of gloves and a scarf, and Sarka and Anezka and Renata receive shawls instead. Irena's is a cardigan and Emanek's is a hat and scarf, but their appreciation of cashmere goes only as far as 'that's soft', because their mother taught them not to say clothes are BORING. It's CHRISTMAS like they did that one year. Still: they are fine gifts, all quite warm and very nice, and Danicka is just smiling with a twinkle in her eye like she knows something they don't. Lukas notices and mentions it; she just grins and says that Kate was helping her with something with these gifts. She winks; he remembers. Oh right. That, he says, and grins, and then everyone is curious and excited

and exhausted, too. So they say goodnight to the grandparents and Daniel and Anezka. Sarka helps tuck her children in, kissing their foreheads and their cheeks before she heads out again. Danicka picks up the torn silver paper and chiffon ribbons, setting aside what can be saved, putting in recycling what can be recycled, til Lukas takes her away, pulls her to himself, says to leave it, it's okay, it's Christmas Eve, and guides her to the stairs. She whispers that she has to put up stockings, so they linger downstairs and do that as well, tucking in tiny items that were handed over earlier by the other adults, hanging those stockings along the stairway since they have no fireplace.

When they do finally check the locks on the doors and turn down the thermostat, it well and truly is past midnight, and Danicka takes Lukas's hand, and they turn out all the lights, and they walk up the stairs as softly as they can. When they close the door to their bedroom, finally, she exhales and turns to him, wrapping her arms around his neck, still wearing her stockings and her skirt from tonight, breathing against him for a moment in the dark.

"Happy Birthday, baby." she whispers, after several long, silent moments.

Lukas

Here in the very first moments of Christmas Day, in a quiet little house on their quiet little street where their kin sleep safe downstairs, Lukas slips his arms around Danicka's waist as she wraps hers around his neck.

Their first Christmas together, she filled the tree with presents for him - one for every year of his life, every year she hadn't had the chance, before. Last year, it was just them in bed on Christmas morning, opening presents. The memberships to all those museums. The tiny magnolia tree, which was now growing in a pot in tree living room, waiting to be bug enough to survive a Chicago winter.

This year, Lukas holds his mate for a long time. Her body is slim and warm against his. They are still wearing the remains of the clothes they put on to go to Kate's - his shirt sleeves rolled up and his best unbuttoned, his belt already hung up in the closet and his slacks riding low on his hips. After a while he lowers his mouth to her shoulder, and this time he does bite her, very gently, holding her like that for a few seconds.

"Thank you," he whispers. "For everything."

Danicka

The little ones were stirred up again after present-opening, especially knowing they were going to get to dive into that enormous pile of gifts in the morning, but their pajamas and blankets were warm and their mother was there to tuck them in this time, shushing their chattering and telling them she'd see them in the morning. It felt like hours to them before they finally fell asleep, but in truth it was mere moments. Milos and Renata sleep faster, harder, because they are teenagers and their abnormal circadian rhythms have them in heavy, deep sleep no sooner than they lie down.

Fifteen minutes away, Miloslav stays up awhile, reading. Sleep is hard for him lately, broken up often through the night. Sarka finds her body shutting down as soon as she lets it relax, and wonders if she'll ever have the energy she did before cancer became a reality in her life. Daniel and Anezka are up late too, snuggling and talking and thinking about that house they want to get. Marjeta and Jaroslav have a routine, the same routine they've been following for decades now, and they sleep the way they have for decades now, mostly apart, but some part of their bodies always in contact: a foot touching a shin, a hand on a waist, something.

Upstairs in the little den that Lukas found and that Danicka made warm, he holds her and she holds him, disheveled from a long evening and then the time spent filling and hanging stockings. There's one for everyone, even a miniature one for Kandovany. Lukas was very excited to buy her some heavy cream for tomorrow, because already this is a tradition for them, the once-a-year special treat and once-a-year chance for him to spoil Danicka's cat.

To spoil all of them, really. The trip to the toy store they took was as much a nightmare for Danicka as if she'd taken the children themselves, because Lukas could not go three steps without finding something that lit his face up because they could get that for Emanek, they could get this for Irena, would Renata like that? Does Milos like science? She kept having to put things away. Not because they can't afford it. Truthfully, they could be living in a much larger, much nicer house than this. She pays rent on an enormous two-bedroom, two-bath apartment in the River North district, he's still giving a bit of money to the kin who have lent him a room since he first came to Chicago --

a different name for a similar pub, a different location that's closer to the caern that exists where Maelstrom does not, a room that's a different shape. He has both in his memory. He hasn't spoken much of it to Danicka. One version of events is laid over another like a transparency, and he knows she only sees one. He knows her well enough now to know how much it would terrify her, how much it would distress her, how distanced she would feel from him, if he tried to explain it all. If he tried to tell her about the Brotherhood of Thieves, which is so similar to the place she knows but not the same, not the same at all. She knows he went to the past, that before he and his pack did there was a Hive to the north that was never raised, and she held him tightly when he spoke of the battle that sent them back, but he could feel her shaking, shaken, by the thought of another life he lived

that she only remembers in part.

-- and they have two cars and this house and she has tuition to pay, but they are still more than comfortable, even in the current economy. They could afford to fill the entire basement with gifts if they really wanted to, and this was Lukas's argument. It's not about that, she told him. Other people are giving them gifts, did he want to show them up or shame them? What about spoiling the children, teaching them that Christmas meant thousands of dollars spent on their behalf? What happens when a special gift isn't special anymore because it is only one of a dozen?

He got more choosy after that. Still. They spent a ridiculous amount of money on the four children and the rest of their family, and that's not even touching the help they gave everyone just to get out here and stay in that hotel. And it isn't that Danicka doesn't feel that urge, too. She simply reins it in more easily, thinking -- always thinking, always analyzing -- with a mind that understands computers just as well as she understands people, only -- strangely -- more intuitively.

She sways with him upstairs, closing her eyes, laying her head down on his shoulder as he rests his teeth on her flesh for a moment. She's drowsy with sleepiness now. "Oh, baby," she murmurs, at his thank-you, "I haven't done anything that you haven't done for me, just as much."

Danicka stays like that a moment, then slips her arms down to his waist, closing her eyes as she listens to his heartbeat. She's no longer stretched up against him, arms around his shoulders, but more tucked close, protected, smaller than he is. "Can I tell you something? And... we don't have to talk about it or work through it or anything, I just... need someone to hear it." She sounds sad. Aching. Not enough to break the goodness of the visit, or the day, or this moment itself, but something she's been holding onto. Probably ever since that brief conversation in the kitchen with Renata, which was the last time he heard that ache in her voice.

Lukas

Lukas himself rarely speaks of that strange quest. In truth, he's as terrified of the entire experience as Danicka would be. While he was there, time was so short and his task so urgent that there was no room for fear, less for doubt. He had to alter the past. He had to save the future. He couldn't let the Caern fall, his friends die; couldn't, most of all, leave his mate bereft and unprotected, forced to flee the city she had grown to love,

or worse, to stay behind in a blight crawling with Dancers.

But when it was over, when it was done and the past utterably altered, he was so afraid of what he might have done. So afraid of the power he'd exercised that he had no real right to. So afraid that somehow he'd obliterated or changed beyond recognition everything he loved and cared for.

But somehow, he hadn't. Locations had changed. The caern he knew and guarded was gone, had never been; the people that had been there are elsewhere. Yet events mirrored themselves curiously in his dual memories, and even as one set grows progressively dimmer with each passing day, even as the memories of that past that never was blends into the new history of his life, Lukas sometimes thinks of what Danicka said to him so long ago -

where they are doesn't matter. Who they are, he supposes, makes all the difference.

So maybe that's what he really wants to thank her for. For being who she is. For being here with him. But she's right, and none of this is anything he hasn't done for her or given her in return. And he closes his eyes, holding her tightly, and when she asks what she does his chest rises against hers. His eyes open.

"Of course," he whispers.

Danicka

Her eyes are closed, her head resting against his chest in such a way that she can smell him, hear his heart beating, and feel the slow, steady lift and fall of his breathing. Danicka holds him around his waist, simultaneously seeking comfort in his arms and luxuriating in the feel of his body against hers.

That ache makes her voice soft. Small. "I miss my mom," she whispers, and now he surely understands why she said they didn't have to talk about it, analyze it, break it down. She could tell him that she lost her mother to the war long, long before Night Warder's death, that she felt like her mother was replaced by a beast...

but she doesn't.

She could tell him that when they have children, she won't fight anymore. Not to save him, not in anger, not at all unless it's for tter lives. She'll run. She'll always run, because she knows they are doomed to lose their father before they are remotely ready. She won't let them lose their mother, too. She could tell him that...

but she doesn't. Danicka doesn't explain anything. The kids with Sarka, Lukas with his sister and their parents, all their family gathered together...and suddenly, profoundly, perhaps even shockingly, she misses her mom. The mom she had and loved when she was too young to understand. The mom she lost when she was too old to forget.

Danicka says nothing more. She ducks her head, curling against Lukas's chest, finding comfort in him

as she always does.

Lukas

"Oh, baby."

There's infinite tenderness and ache in the way Lukas says that. His arms wrap closer, holding her against the shelter of his body. Never in all the time he's known her has Lukas ever heard Danicka speak openly of her mother with longing or love. Yet all this time he's intuited it nonetheless - the tragic, painful love of a child who has, in a very real way, watched the monsters under the bed and out in the dark swallow her mother whole.

"It's okay," he whispers. Holds her, rubs her back as she curls into him. "I know, and it'll be okay."

Danicka

It's rare that Danicka allows him to comfort her like this. It's rare that she seeks comfort at all. Maybe it's the inherent vulnerability of it, or maybe she just doesn't want him to worry any more than he already does. Maybe it's a perverse refusal to let Lukas do one of the things he's built to do, dedicated to do, simply because... Danicka is perverse. She's like the cat who seeks out the one person in the room with an allergy, who caterwauls to be let out and then steadfastly will not cross the threshhold once the door's open. Maybe it simply hurts too much, sometimes, to admit that she has enough pain that she wants someone else to help her carry it. It's not hard to imagine why relying on anyone else would be uncomfortable for her.

Right now, though, after days now with their parents, their siblings, a handful of children, everyone close and warm and eating together, laughing together, Danicka curls into Lukas's chest and wants nothing but for him to hold her. Not to ask her any questions, not to wonder at why she's voicing this now, not to try and say he understands or that he's always known, just... to hold her. And that is what he does. Truth be told, he doesn't need to tell her that it'll be okay. There's really nothing that's happened that needs to be resolved, and there's no problem that she's worried might not go away. But he does, because the word okay feels right to him, because it's something to say when most of what needs to be said is in his voice, not the words.

There is nothing more to say after that. It was a good day. Painful, at moments, but pain brings people closer together, gives them something to share, like cutting a wound to intermingle one's blood. Ludicrously happy at other moments, exhausting, awkward, hilarious. A part of her wants to make love to him tonight, simply to be near to him, simply to feel him holding her there on earth when she lets go completely. More of her wants to sleep, though, because it is so very late and she is so very tired. Then there's the practical reason: she has reason to suspect that their bedroom is going to be bombarded tomorrow.

So they undress, and they do this slowly and tenderly for each other. As much as he literally tears clothes off of her when he wants her and she has no patience to take them off, Lukas's large hands can be so deft and so careful with her fine things, as they are now. He draws her top up, feeling it turn to warm, slinky nothing in his hands as it leaves her form and loses its shape. She unbuttons his shirt, unrolls the sleeves, and takes it off of him as he unclasps her bra, kissing her mouth softly. For a moment she stirs, with nothing more than the warmth of his lips on her own, but she relaxes a second later, the urge to curl against his chest rising up even more strongly than the desire to make love.

Then his slacks, and then her skirt, and he leaves his boxer-briefs on and she leaves on her underwear, and she puts on a tank top to wear to bed. When they do toss their clothes in the hamper and crawl into bed, Danicka does not -- perhaps surprisingly -- want him to hold her the way he usually does. She crawls in behind him, wraps herself around him, her chest to his back, her arm around his ribs, her hand covering his heart. She rests her brow between his shoulderblades, sleeping like that tonight, the way she did the very first time they slept in the same bed together.

Lukas has no idea how much she thinks about losing him. When he came to her because he didn't know what was going to happen when he went off to avenge Mrena. When he came back from the underworld and handed her a small knitted glove. When he came back and told her about the past he'd changed, the battle he'd averted. There was the time they were held underground and he was put in a silver collar and she had to leave him alone. A huntsman and his hounds. It was before he knew her, but he's told her about how he got the scar across his abdomen. It was the closest he's come to truly dying, and she never would have found him again, she never would have had any of this.

More than many people, Danicka needs no reminders of how easily Ahrouns can die. Sarka was mated to one. Her father was mated to one. She's mated to one now. There is a very young one downstairs who, if things keep going the way they are, may not live to see the rank Lukas is now, just as he knows he may not live to see the rank that Sarka's husband and Miloslav's wife attained. No one needs to tell Danicka that the life she has chosen, the life that gives her so much joy she never would have known otherwise, is also rife with opportunities for visceral, agonizing loss.

So she holds him. Wraps herself around him when she is missing her mother and simultaneously looking forward to being with the family tomorrow, covering his heart with her hand even as she shields his back with her entire body. It is intrinsically protective. Inherently possessive. Mine. My mate. Mine. Mine.