* * *

"I can't have my pups back..."

Hayes instantly threw his hands into a calming matter, saying the words she wanted to hear. But she shook her head, denying his comfort. "You're lying! Ronan is the next Alpha and he needs to live in Crescent Moon." Sage shouted to both her father and brother, Andrew's hold growing tighter which each passing moment.

"As his father figure, I agree, but—" Harlow attempted, but was quickly shut down by Andy. "But nothing. Even I know that the future Alpha has to live at least ten years of their life on the land they're meant to lead. And we know he isn't going to be Mystic Grimm's next Alpha." Hayes had let out a growl, and Andrew smirked.

"We're not finished with you, Clark."

"And who do you think she's inclined to help right now?... Goddess, Grey go get Torin. I can't keep holding her back." Grey had followed with a quick 'yes sir' before an even larger fellow than Severin had surveyed the room.

"Salvie, my dear...What's the matter?" Oh, that was certainly a loaded question, and she slashed out of Andrew's hold and turned off towards her blood relatives. "You didn't help Remus, you just took. But did you help?" "We helped by—" "By taking his wolf?! I couldn't feel his wolf anymore and I thought he was dead! That's why you can't feel mama, because she doesn't have her wolf anymore. No wolf needs to feel that. Give him his wolf back!" Torin scoffed at the idea that Sage revealed happened to her male. And while the foreigner's eyes flickered between the two, he shook his head.

Completely disgusted by the punishment inflicted on the Alpha.

"And who...By the goddess herself, dared take a man his wolf away?" Hayes had puffed his chest and tilted his head towards the Viking.

"Me, on the course that the wolf endangered his pups." "You cannot judge a male by their situation if you aren't in his skin or fur. I realize you've lost your mate, but not when your children were hardly a year old. I pray the goddess has mercy on you. That isn't a punishment worth any crime." Torin differed as he approached Remus, taking a small bit of soot that caught Sage's attention. It smelled like any sort of burnt wood, but there wasn't something oddly satsifying about it's scent. As if it was...Other.

Torin, without hesitation, pressed his coated thumb against Remus' forehead and began drawing a sigil that would right the wrongs created by the Mystic family.

But Remus, unsure of what was happening, had almost been blinded by the rush of adrenaline. His eyes rolled back to his skull as a small chant had filled the room. Yet seeing the pure whites take over, Sage flinched in worry, her body slowly going slack in Blake's hold until it reverted back to the solid black.

Paired with heavy breathing that filled the silent room with ease.

In no more than a few quick heartbeats, Remus' scent and built begin to slowly return, but not what it once was. He was still lean, though it was clear he wasn't as sickly as appeared before.

"I would never wish this punishment on the cruelest man on this planet, that is reserved for the Moon Goddess and her alone." Torin claimed with a warning tacked onto his pointed glare. However, it had been all to deaf ears as Sage had caught wind of her mate—Her male.

With a long inhale, her eyes began to close as she let out a subtle sigh, one of pleasure in content as it felt like home.

Which Remus responded with his own growl of approval.

"I suppose we need to take this as if Sage and Alpha Remus have met for the first time..." Torin dwelled, and while he had been kind to Sage, their relationship did not save Remus.

Torin didn't care if he was the Alpha or healing from an unsanctioned wound. He pulled Remus up by the collar of his shirt, meeting him at eye level. "...If you hurt those pups, though...I can promise you that you'll be beaten from an inch of your life. Is that understood?" Remus and his beast nodded to this large male.

There was no use arguing, not when he agreed.

"And in any culture, direct blood overrules these bullshit parental rights you've pulled out of your ass," Torin continued, throwing his arm in the air, "You violate a wolf's most sacred law. Pups need their mothers."

"We've taken care of the twins for months!" Jade called out.

"But you ditched Remus?" Andy said with a scoff, "You took the pups and then left him with nothing? Not even a fucking holiday card to enjoy or bring them over for Christmas?" Andy returned, fighting back to what Jade had tried to defend, but alas, Harlow stepped forward now.

Not liking that his Mate was being targeted. "I won't be lectured by a Rogue who rose from the grave."

"Really? Because that's what your sister's done. And she isn't your biggest fan right now. Better choose your words more carefully." Andy smirked, and that certainly didn't bode well.

As Harlow didn't respond to threats. "Sage wouldn't hurt a fly."

"That's before she returned to that vampire and lived life as an Alpha away from politics...Besides, Torin has claimed that the Draugr are headed your way now." That word confused the entirety of the other side, and thus Torin laughed.

"And in the event that Mystic Grimm isn't the safest anymore, I think that is a plausible cause for the twins to move. Wouldn't you say, Sage?" Sage tried to rally her thoughts, forcing her eyes to squeeze shut, yet after a second passed, she began to sway for a moment as the idea of suppressing her admission of power set her back a few beats.

But thankfully, Blake and Andrew had been near her.

"Great. You guys stressed her out, and she defused. Congratulations." Blake declared.

"Defused? What the hell is that?" Harlow beckoned and Blake gritted his teeth.

"She didn't want to hurt anyone, and so she held herself back, " he explained, and thus, the room took a cautious step back, realizing that this was becoming a difficult mess to manage. And even with the heated stares from every angle, sourcing from the Mystics to the Crescent Moon residents, Sage had broken the silence with a pain lacing every word—"I just want my pups."

"And you're getting them back, just not now," Harlow claimed, and Andrew recoiled in disbelief.

"'Just not now,' and when do you think 'now' implies as?" He shot forward.

"When she has control of her wolf and powers and Crescent Moon isn't in a power struggle. Remus still hasn't improved, and Sage can't control herself." Harlow's explanation of what needed to happen to earn back the pups had infuriated Sage further.

And as Harlow tried to escape the hatred now focused on him, Sage stepped forward to block him. "I can control myself, brother. That's why you don't fly out my window." She challenged.

"We took care of your pups for months, and we don't even get a thank you, " was all her brother responded, and thus, Hayes finally interjected.

"Sage, you can't come back and expect changes like this all of a sudden. The pups are used to their life in Mystic Grimm," Hayes stated, and that surely caused her to snap, shrugging her shoulders and jerking her hand towards the door. "Then you don't need to know about Dragur because you can't change quickly. You can all go home then, " she decreed, going forward to the back door as she needed to breathe.

The air was too toxic for her.

"Sage! Don't you dare walk out that door! We're not finished here!" Her father ordered, his yell surpassing the static in her mind.

Yet she stalled her next step, her handly tightly rapped on the doorhandle, "And I told you...We would not make it to Mystic Grimm..." Sage said, her back turned to everyone in the room, but she came to a full stop and did not turn.

Not until the fury started to simmer off her shoulders, and once she turned, it had been directed to her father.

"I told you...I told you both..." Sage spat, pointing to her father and Remus combined, hating that she had to say this out loud.

Hating the fact that she had been right since the start. "I told you I didn't want to go to Mystic Grimm because I said it was a bad idea. I say all these things, and nobody listens to me, and again, nobody listens to me. You know who listens...? The Witches and Wolves outside listen, because you don't see me as Alpha. You see me as a pup. I'm not a pup. I've never been a pup!" She shouted, but when Harlow had taken the first approach she did exactly as she mentioned prior.

Sticking to her choice of words, Harlow had been thrown through the window, and a quick whisper had been sent to fix it up.

"If you aren't a pup you wouldn't be acting like this." Jade threw into the mix and that caused Sage to forward again.

"And you would do anything for Hardin like I would my pups." She dictated, but the smile on Hayes' face couldn't grow anymore than it had. He came forward and pulled Sage in for a hug, he could admit defeat in an argument.

If someone had taken his pups, he knew Willow would do everything in her power to take them back. To claim them back from whoever was caring for them. Harlow had simply gotten attached, and everyone had—Especially since it was the last piece of Sage and Willow.

Little Rue looked exactly like her mother and grandmother, leaving the rest of the family to think it was their last connection to either.

"We won't be taking the pups back, hun," Hayes whispered, "They're yours." Jade looked as though she wanted to argue with Harlow, but the male simply laughed. "Yeah, that's Sage, for sure."

Andrew gawked at the others in the room. Though there was still a level of anger between them, it was certainly a test to prove that she wasn't replaced or changed.

"Pups are staying here," Sage demanded, and Hayes had given his daughter a solid nod. "Of course, of course they are. We just needed to make sure, sweetheart. Blake was worried that you could've been possessed." That certainly caught Sage's attention, and the former Rogue-turned-coven member had let out an awkward wave.

"I love you, hun, but there's a whole lot of shit on the witch side of it all that we have to worry about too. They're being targeted." This was not at all what Sage was expecting, and perhaps Blake's warning had met everyone, considering Jade's disappointed huff had been the gateway for her last stance—

"That wasn't the reaction I was prepared for, she needs to—"

"Nothing, Jade. Don't start," Drake intervened, "I probably only saw a fraction of what happened in those nine months, but she has all the right to react that way. The pups and Remus were the biggest part that motivated her to come back. We're in the way of that right now." He still felt the daze of Sage's transfer of what happened in the facility. Instead, he came straight over and hugged her—Something they had failed to do before.

"You did all you could. It's alright..." He claimed, and it meant the world to Sage, to be defended—For someone to see and feel exactly what she felt during that time. Not to mention it certainly calmed down Haylee from the idea that all the effort had been made.

Even if it was for a moment. But realistically there was little to be done, Willow sacrifice had managed to get the word out that she is alive.

"So...This bad vampire man, he has my Willow?" Hayes questioned, his eyes offering more than just determination. He was out for pure blood.

"Yes. He has symbol on Draugr, and has same symbol from letters in the mountain." Andrew groaned out loud after Sage's offer of explanation."I'm so fucking dumb, that's why it looked so familiar!" He cheered, and Sage nodded quickly.

"It's probably how Randal so easily sold you off, son. We'll need to be careful from here on out." Hayes offered, and the entire room agreed.

"So this bad vampire have a name, or are we calling him 'A' for the rest of our lives?" Jackson questioned and those in Half Crescent were the ones to still at the thought.

"You can't say his name," Sage whispered out, pure terror written on her face. But the entire room had thought this for a different reason, that he was the male behind her life of torment.

When in reality, it was so much more than the past haunting them.

"I'm not afraid of some lowlife that thrives on having played with the threads of our lives," Hayes grumbled, but Sage stood her ground and proceeded with cation as she spoke, trying to remain clear for others to heed her warning.

"I'm not scared. The name is cursed," Sage said toward her father, but her words were directed to everyone in the room listening, which certainly caused the wolves to tilt their heads but left Blake to frown.

"Cursed as in you say his name a clap of thunder happens?" Sage nodded instantly, but Andrew waved a hand towards Blake's tease.

"It's a little more than that. It's why we said the Draugr were targeting after Sage and maybe even the other escaped females. It makes sense if you're claiming that witches are being targeted." His explanation didn't render anyone as understanding as he hoped. So Sage caught the house phone still on the counter and hurried off towards the notepad and quickly wrote the name.

Though it took a second to sound it out.

"Ar-mond—Armond? Really, that's the name we need to be scared of? It's—" Jackson had failed to see Torin cross the room in record time and lift him by his shirt.

"You were warned twice, do you think this is a joke, male?" Jack bit back a snarky comment, yet he was saved by the fact that the Viking had made his way toward the door following the rest.

Sage was a step behind with the sword in her hand, Andrew very close to the existing line of Half Crescent. "Wait! Wait! What the hell is—" Remus shouted after them, but was interrupted by Sage's authority.

"Usque ad circum argentum, et ecce venient Draugr!" [Round up the silver, the Draugr are coming!] The order hardly took a few seconds to enact to the lounging group. But the party inside the Moon residence watched in awe as Sage took charge of the surrounding wolves and witches.

It was clear that they weren't switching, and so Sage turned back. "Pack stays inside, link Elwoods. Tell them get silver bullets for the guns." Sage ordered the others, and that was certainly on Jackson and Aurora's effort as their link with them and the pack hadn't been severed.

"This is a code Blue, Remus." That certainly rang a bit of familiarity, one that drained any remaining color from Remus' face. "What the fuck—Drew, what's happening?"

"Draugr likes the name. They can hear it...I don't know, but they're coming." Sage said, grabbing onto her duel swords that were offered by another pack member, while Andrew unsettled his and did a little twist of his wrist to ready himself.

"Remus, where are your firearms?" They were in the basement and the code had called out into Sage's mind. But when she caught Remus attempting to make it down the stairs, she shook her head.

"If you get bit, it makes you sick. You're too sick already. Please, stay with the pups." She said, her hands on his chest as she docked her sword off behind her.

The mere touch now had caused the familiar sparks to course through the two of them that it enacted a flinch, no doubt in surprise.

It was then that it all made sense, that it was all in the effort of the Moon Goddess to bring Andrew back to Crescent Moon and reunite the couple.

A very deepened growl had emerged, and thus, she jumped back fully. Of course, she felt the intent and the quickened beat of her heart, but there was still a lingering sense of fear and betrayal in the back of Sage's mind.

How dare he lose the pups, after everything she fought for and protected. And he

"You're lucky you have a pack at your side hun, otherwise I'd follow." She smirked and nodded, taking a small squeeze of his hand before following after the given few who already spread out in terms of preparing for the attack.

"You know, Moonlight, I wouldn't mind taking orders from you if you decide to stay as Alpha."

"Shut up, Andrew."

______

Date: 12/16/24

Time: 10:23 PM

Words: 2984

Author's Note:

This chapter is so late, I apologize! I completely forgot I only managed to schedule a few chapters in advance and I've completely run out!

Anywho, I should've mentioned this prior as well, Sage's nickname is changing to Moonlight, and the pack that was originally planned to as being Moonlight has changed into the Redwell pack!

And to add to it all, I will be uploading the map I had commissioned, just so it's easier for readers to know where everything is (Mindful of the Canadian Conclave, since it's not that important, or at least not for the first few books). I think it came out amazing!

Let me know what you guys think, I had so much working with the artist to construct it!

Now then, I hope you guys are staying warm! I woke up to a little bit of snow this morning, a nice little surprise!

See you in the next chapter!