The subs and Karliah lounged around an empty classroom devouring their lunches, Karliah and Cassie’s salads were identical, both prepared by the alpha herself and accompanied by fruit juices. Karliah wasn’t going to have her mate running on junk and Cassie seemed excited at the thought of having abs like hers one day. Maybe she would have to throw in the occasional candy bar in Cassie’s to stop that from happening…

“I got my invitation to your bonding ceremony.” Said Hanmi to Cassie. “They’re beautiful!”

“Thanks! It took a while to pick them out but I think they’re perfect.” Karliah trailed her hand along Cassie’s back, her baby looked so happy, she wanted that expression glued to her face.

“They are, I got mine too!” Jasper added. Aminali nodded in agreement, her mouth full of PB&J.

“So, you guys can come?”

“Of course!” Aminali beamed. “I can’t believe you’re having your bonding ceremony in your first year at the academy!”

“Well, technically it’ll be between years.” Karliah clarified, “I can’t believe how quickly summer has come…” The ceremony felt like it was hurtling towards them. Of course, there was no chance of getting cold feet, they were already marked, but the pressure was going to be on her on the day as it would be her first event containing multiple pack leaders where she was the lead, it was her ceremony, she was the one who had to make the solid and strong impression.

Cassie would be under a microscope too but her role was that of the charming alpha female, she just needed to swan through smiling and looking beautiful - something she was already perfect at. She did it every day in her new pack, they were all charmed by her from day one - especially Karliah’s mother, you’d think she had birthed a gremlin the way she described Karliah growing up.

“Always so muddy! Always so rough!” Her mother exclaimed, tickling laughs from Cassie with her anecdotes. “Do you know how excited I was to find out I had a daughter instead of a son only for that daughter to run wild like a wilder-beast?” Karliah had rolled her eyes at that, her mother had plenty of daughters now - not just biological but in-law as well! She hoped it would be enough, finally having someone to play dress-up with that didn’t wear huggies, a ‘girly-girl’ to chat to and exchange make-up tips with. Karliah never liked her mother messing with her hair, always afraid she would cut it short, make her look like a boy, but she had found Cassie sitting on the floor of her mother’s en suite on numerous occasions since she moved in, her hair gleaming with smelly oils and pastes, being braided into extravagant styles and adorned with silver charms and hoops. If it kept her mother out her own hair, metaphorically and literally, then that was fine with her.

Karliah didn’t find it as easy as her teeny mate did to assimilate herself into new groups, new environments. If things had been the other way round, if she would have had to move into Scarlett Moon at such short notice, she didn’t think she would have melted in as easily as Cassie had in her own pack. That was part of the reason she kept letting Cassie win their arguments about her staying away from her old pack house, because she knew that if it were her she would find it heartbreakingly hard to leave her family and friends like that.

“I hope we get to attend lots more bonding ceremonies in our second year.” Aminali’s booming voice cut through her thoughts like soft cheese. “it’s sad that so many packs don’t practice the tradition any more!” Karliah blinked for a moment as she caught up and then went back to eating her salad.

“You just love an excuse to dress up and act a fool.” Jasper laughed.

“Speaking of mates,” Aminali rounded on him like a fox that had cornered its hen. “how’s Miss USA?” She raised her brows teasingly at him but his happy-go-lucky attitude seemed to shrivel away at the mention of Alexa.

Jasper shrugged, “She’s fine.” he said.

“Oof, that’s not good.” Cassie muttered.

“I mean, I suspected things would go awry,” Aminali announced to no one in particular, “they have the exact same hair, that’s not normal.” her wisdom was swiftly ignored, although Karliah realised she had never noticed before that both Alexa and Jasper had short blonde hair… Alexa’s was lighter though… So there was a slight difference.

“What? Things are normal… boring…”

“Would Alexa say the same?” Cassie looked to Karliah as she asked the question but the alpha slurped on her juice, making it clear she didn’t plan to comment on her friend’s love life. Jasper sighed.

“No, she would say I’m a brat.”

“But you are a brat?” Aminali said, waving a candy bar around dramatically.

“Yeah, but I think it bothers her.”

“Cassie’s kinda bratty too, right Karliah?” This time the alpha had been openly addressed and couldn’t feign indifference. They were all waiting for her answer, watching her curiously, even Cassie. She swallowed her pineapple juice and frowned.

“Yes,” She hesitated, “but there’s a slight… difference between them.”

“That being?” Aminali prompted.

“She knows when to quit it, I like to think she has respect for me as her dominant.” She turned to Jasper and pointed her bottle at him. “You show zero respect to anyone, including Alexa.” Jasper blinked and his cheeks tinted with just a little pink. “You’re a submissive, that means you are actually supposed to submit - even if only to your mate.” This rubbed some of the subs in the room up the wrong way, visibly. Aminali and Jasper both pulled looks of disgust, while Sam and Hanmi both nodded, Sam much more enthusiastically.

“She’s supposed to be my soul mate,” Jasper grumbled. “not my superior officer!”

“Right,” Karliah said carefully. “but that doesn’t mean you have to go out of your way to undermine her.”

“Why do you dominants care so much about respect and authority?” He rolled his eyes and Aminali did the same, Cassie, Sam and Hanmi looked away awkwardly. “There are more important things in this world than whether or not people obey you.”

“It’s hard-wired into us, I suppose, an innate need.” Karliah answered, trying to keep her cool. Submissives could never understand the urges dominants felt.

“Can we just stop talking about it now,” He huffed. “I think this should be something I duke out with Alexa.”

“Agreed. Although if I were you I wouldn’t ‘duke’ anything out with Alexa, she’s kind of a bad ass.”

“Noted.” Jasper smiled softly.

~

“I understand your frustrations, ma’am, but your son’s death is not our top priority at this moment in time - you are aware we have rogue vampires roaming our lands at the moment, aren’t you?”

“My son died in your custody, Alpha Murphy.” The woman was shaking with rage. “And it has been weeks I have been left with no word of how or why or who.”

“His death could be connected to the vampire situation, did you ever think of that?”

“There are many others I would consider suspects first, sir.” She spat. “Like the Lunar Warriors alpha, it was her mate he attacked.”

“In which case I wouldn’t blame her if she did do it, I would do the same.” Markus’ father answered sternly. “But not only does she have an alibi, I doubt she would use a knife to take your son’s life. You wouldn’t understand, not being a dominant yourself, but if my mate were attacked as savagely as Miss Linette was, I would kill their attacker with my bare hands. Slowly. As painfully as possible.”

“Are you saying I should be grateful that my son died quickly?”

“I’m saying that the way he died makes it harder to gain insight on who we can consider a suspect - we believe the killer to be either a weak dominant or, possibly, a submissive. However, we can’t pursue this case fully while we are fearing for our pack member’s lives.”

“You have a son,” She whispered. “only one, just like I did. Can you not find an ounce of sympathy in your heart for his lost life?”

“If my son committed the type of crime yours did, I would kill him myself.” His father replied coldly, glaring at the visibly shocked woman. “Good day to you, ma’am.” He nodded and returned to his work without another look in her direction.

“Allow me to walk you out.” Markus offered, stepping forward with an outstretched arm. She huffed and shrugged him off, marching out and slamming the door behind her.

“Nice to know there are circumstances where you would happily consider executing me.” Markus grumbled, quickly tacking on ‘sir’ after a pause.

“Are there circumstances where you would happily consider rape and assault?” He asked, never looking up from his paperwork.

“Of course not, sir.”

“Then I don’t need to worry about your demise.”

“Yes, sir.” Markus bobbed his head and left, closing the door shut carefully behind him. He never did think he would figure his father out.