Mere moments after announcing my arrival, Pan emerged from his den and looked at me with intelligent eyes that immediately traced the curvature of my abdomen. Though I had been keeping to myself more often than not in the past couple of weeks, I had not let my duties slip, and I knew that anyone with a keen eye would easily recognize the ever extending growth of my belly. It was not as if I wanted to keep such a thing a secret from my pack. I knew many of them would be happy for me. Those born to Natu and Church would have playmates, and the thought drew my brows together in a worried fashion. But what if that did not end up being the case? I suddenly felt an overwhelming desire to seek out my Spider, to ensure she knew how much she meant to me, to the pack. The last thing I wanted was to lose her trusted guidance because of the obsidian wolf who had fathered pups with her. Even as my emotions swooped into a great sadness at the possibility of losing her, a heightened anger with Fenrir flared in my chest. My emotions could not be trusted on the matter, and thus I stood before Pan as he spoke approvingly of the whelps that developed within my womb.

A small smile pulled at my lips, slightly amused and yet at the same time somewhat embarrassed by his words. It was not as if I had gone out and sought Leonidas for the pure intention of planting an heir in my womb. The possibility of pups had never even crossed my mind. But I suppose it was possible that the heir to Spirane was slowly developing within me even now, a beautiful daughter to someday assume the throne. How peculiar it was to think so far into the future, imagining what she might look like and if she would have her father’s ice and my fire. “Thank you, Pan. I am sure they will do the pack proud.” Would they? Would I? Did I have the stuff of a good mother? Desperately I wished that MoonGlow was here, that I could seek her guidance in all that was to come.

As ever, Pan wasted little time on pleasantries, almost immediately launching into a punctilious discussion of how I really should just come out with whatever question it was that I intended to present to him this day. My brows lifted a fraction, and his final words about using the moniker ‘friend’ for more of the pack had a smile pulling at my features once more. When he was finished, I left no more than a breath between his words and mine, cutting straight to the chase. Long winded as he was, I knew that if I laid all of the issues out before him from the start, Pan would give me a plethora of options on ways to proceed. Of course I was sure there would be many dustings of extra information perhaps not entirely pertinent to the topic, but that was just the way Pan’s mind worked. And Pan’s mind was what had convinced me he was the most suitable wolf to serve as my highest advisor.

“Our dear Spider, Natu, is also with child this winter. It is the matter of her litter’s father that I seek your advice upon. Fenrir is a loner, though he moves with a band of brothers that has taken residence just outside of Asteraia’s borders. He has wronged my brother Taliesin – fathering him and then abandoning him when he was born, leaving him behind to return to another land with Taliesin’s mother. But I would not lose Natu, she is a valuable member of this pack, and I do not think she would be easily replaced. While I know Taliesin feels rather vehemently against Fenrir’s overall…presence…I also know that Natu values family above all else. I doubt she would remain in Spirane if Fenrir was not here. I do not wish to have some rogue traipsing in and out of my pack lands at his own leisure, but I do not want to effectively chase Natu from the pack by closing my borders to him. Tell me Pan…what are my options?”

With such a vast working knowledge of the packs of Moladion, present and past, I knew his historical understanding of what has and has not worked for packs in the past would give him the tools to lay my options plainly before me. He would not dapple them with niceties; he would give me the harsh and honest truth. It was one of the many reasons I so valued his opinion on almost any matter. Once I had given him all the facts, I shifted my weight and allowed my hindquarters to descent to the earth, sitting opposite him and waiting for the lecture that was to ensue.