A Birth day

Yu heard Anise and smiled nodding as she said that Mitsuki was trilingual " we are brought up that way in Japan." he said and looked at the little girl " A friend of mine found a small pup with out a mother maybe he would be happy for you to look after it as he is really busy" he told her " or maybe its your cub?" he asked " the cub was injured."

Seeing Edward arrive and hearing the howl Yu looked to him " I should get these two home" he said to him and looked to Anise hoping she would now go with him. " I'm sure Ruby is worried sick about you" he said then looked back to Angus and Edward as they started to walk off " I'll re-join you once these two are safe" he told them and ported first to the camp and them to the duplex.

"My dog is dead," Mitzi told Yu. "That one's not mine..."

"I'll let her have another," Fenrir said to Yu. "If she goes back--now."

"Go home," Angus said to Anise, now relieved enough that she was still alive that all that fatherly fear he felt for her was now turning to anger with her. "Go home right now. Don't go anywhere else. Go home, and if you leave the duplex for any reason whatsoever, i'll change you into a woodlouse and feed you to Fudge. Now, get!" Marcus laid one hand for a moment on Angus's good shoulder to be a gentle reminder not to say anymore.

"Go have Robert or Nigel tend to you, Yu," Edward said. "Drop the girls off and then go to the main house. Thanks for your help. I'm glad you were with us."

Anise looked quiet and unhappy when Yu dropped her off at the duplex. She had wanted to slip back in the way she had slipped out but with Yu there watching, she couldn't very well do that or she'd give away her escape route. She went in the front door, hoping Ruby wouldn't have noticed she'd been gone.

"So," Marcus said, "I'm thinking we might turn these lot to Lucian and his men, and you lot can follow up at the shrieking shack. Clearly, with Suzanne and Tom in the nick, you might not find anyone there at all, or perhaps just thugs. If you're lucky, you might meet Elliot, but he's just a twerp. It's your call, Lucian. What do you think?"

Yu nodded to Mitsuki as Fenrir told her he'd let her have another dog if she went home , taking both girls by the hand he nodded to Angus and ported them both home. Letting Anise enter he saw Ruby walk over and hug her " thank goodness your home" she said " please don't disappear like that again, and you should be with Even." she said softly to her she looked at Yu and smiled " thank you Yu for bringing her back. He simply bowed slightly and headed to the main house.

" Miss Kate are you here of Miss Jess?" he called out not sitting as he entered the house and made his way to the medical bay. Now feeling sever stiffness and pain from the back of his legs. He stepped in and slipped off his trousers placing them in a linin basket as he turned to see a large gash and gravel rash wound down the back of his right leg in the reflection on the cabinets. he sighed as he stood waiting feeling warm liquid run down the back of his legs.

"Evan brought us home this afternoon after our lessons were over. Did you forget?" Anise asked Ruby

"I'm here, but I'm not a healer," Kate said. "You go on downstairs, and I'll try to find Khaat or Robert or Nigel and send someone down." She didn't think Jess was here, but she guessed that either Robert or Nigel were.

"Your shoulder bothering you?" Edward asked Angus.

"I'll ice it when I get home. It'll be fine," Angus said.

"Go home and have Robert or Nigel tend it, and I'll stay a bit, in case Lucian wants one of us to go along," Edward said. "Marcus, take him home. Since they want his corpse, I'd rather they not get another chance."

"But..." Angus began. Edward set off his medallion to bring the others to this spot. That way, there would be plenty of help, and Angus could feel free to go tend to himself."

"Come on. Let's go," Marcus said quietly. "We can make sure Anise got home."

"She was with Yu. Of course she got home," Angus said, as Marcus apparated them home.

"Now, Lucian, do you need us or not?" Edward asked, still wanting an answer.

Lucian looked to Edward as he delt with Angus then once they were gone he nodded " yep" he said " might as well finish this part, because I think this is goanna keep going" he said and looked to Edward " you coming?" he asked " bring your muscle too, might need them at the shrieking shack." he said and motioned to the extra men that had appeared when Edward did something with his necklace.

Ruby breathed out and nodded " yeah I must have blanked out when he told us , but I'm still glad your home and safe" she said to Anise " I think Gingers in your room." she said " and there are cookies and hot chocolate if your cold" she fussed then stepped back " sorry guess I just got worried." Aria walked up to Anise and lay a hand on Ruby.

"go sit, she's home, she's alive and here." she said then looked at Anise " all good , with your pack, I'm guessing that's why you slipped out?" she asked knowing it had to have been important for her to slip out as she had.

"It's all good now," Anise sighed. "Thanks to Dad and Fenrir. no thanks to me. I was no help at all. They just bellowed at me like I was their naughty child."

"Give them just a few more seconds. I think they're nearly all here. Then we can go," Edward said, as the others came to Edward's medallion call.

Marcus and Angus arrived back at the duplex, and they went in quietly, seeing Anise and Aria and Ruby there.

"We've done as much as we can on the estate grounds," Marcus said. "Edward and some of the others are going with Lucian to try to finish this up. I think Angus might have damaged that bad shoulder again, so I brought him home."

"It's fine," Angus said quietly. He saw Anise, looking like she'd lost her best friend. He walked over to Anise, and she looked up at him.

"I had the training! The same training you had! They said I fought better than any of the other trainees. Robert hired me, said I had the right to go on..." She was shouting at him, furious.

"I know," Angus said quietly. "I know all about it. Now you listen. You haven't had all the training I've had...."

"They said..."

"I don't care what they said in Colorado!" Angus shouted at her. "You haven't had all the training I had. Two weeks on Colorado does not add up to sixteen years in the job. I've been doing this longer than you've been breathing air! I gave you a direct order, and you didn't listen. You saw me leave and Marcus and you ran straight up to the longhouse, picked up the scent of those wolves and raced to join them. You deliberately did not obey me...."

"I'm a grown up figh..."

"No," Angus said with iron firmness. "You're not. You're not legal age, and until that happens, I'm responsible. As of now, you're grounded. You go to Evans and straight back home and no place else. You understand me..." She stared up at his, full of rage and she flew downstairs to her room and slammed the door.

He looked at Ruby and Aria.

"She's clearly not had her wolfsbane," he told them. "She was in her pure werewolf form, and she had joined a pack of feral wolves and was in a skirmish. She could have been killed if we hadn't gotten there and taken care of it. I don't know how long she's been off the wolfsbane, but she needs to be here until we're past the full moon because I can't trust her right now. The last of this cycle should be tonight. Hopefully she won't be susceptible after tonight until next month."

Lucian nodded to Edward and waited for the others which he saw arrive not long after Edward had spoken. " can't wait to meet whom ever is behind all of this mess" he said standing with Edward as he readied himself to be ported to the shrieking shack.

Aria saw Angus and Marcus return hearing Marcus mention Angus's had possible damaged his shoulder again Ruby stood up headed to the bathroom and returned with the magic pack for his shoulder and a dose of pain potion. " these should help and I heard the shouting from upstairs, so I staid out of the way." she said to Marcus Aria sighed and nodded as she stood looking at them both.

"rookie move" Aria said softly once Anise was back in her room. " you never go against a superior or go rouge, its one of the unwritten rules, but I can't say we all haven't done it one time or another, not sticking up for her." she said as she sat down. Ruby walked over to Angus and placed the pack under his shirt on his bad shoulder.

"This might help until Nigel or Robert can look at it again" she said and handed him a glass with some of the pain potion mixed with juice in it.

"Thanks," Angus said quietly to Ruby when she brough the magic wrap and the pain potion. "God, I'm a mess with teenagers."

"Everybody's a mess with teenagers," Marcus laughed.

"It was a rookie move," Angus agreed with Aria. "A move we've all done at one point or another, and I'd let it go under normal circumstances, but this one could have killed her. When I saw her, she was one of the smallest ones in that brawl."

"Which was why you jumped in to brawl against those werewolves," Marcus said. "You were trying to protect her."

"Of course I was! What was I supposed to do?" Angus asked. "They were outnumbered and outmatched..."

"Fenrir showed up out of nowhere, saved Angus, and then protected Anise and a smaller werewolf," Marcus told Aria and Ruby. "Without Jack or Jessie there? Fenrir was about the only reasonable chance any of them had."

"They weren't werewolves," Angus said.

"They were there to kill you," Marcus said quietly but forcefully, with purpose. "They intruded through the protection spells, and have been stalking the grounds looking for you. Ten of them. Ten metamorphs that could have changed themselves into anyone or anything, all with the express goal of killing you in order to collect the payoff. And we still don't know who ordered it."

"Of course we do. It was Suzanne," Angus said.

"You're presuming it was. We don't know that for certain. Look, I know my job. We do things the right way because that's who we are. It's what we do. Besides, I'm your friend. I'll follow you straight to hell if that's where you go, not just because it's the job. It's also what I do for my mates," Marcus said. Angus was silent for a moment.

"Yeah. You're right. Thanks," Angus said. He looked at Ruby. "Part of me feels like I should apologize but somehow she has to learn she can't buggar off like that. We tell her no for a reason, not because we're trying to make her unhappy."

Ruby smiled down at him as she placed the magic wrap on his shoulder listening to him as he spoke. Aria nodded as she too listened when Marcus said he would follow him to hell Aria chuckled " yeah and I'll be right on your ass too." she told Marcus lightly poking his chest as she spoke. Ruby gently hugged Angus and smiled.

"I remember when you told Jessie off for doing the same thing and now look at him, she'll get it too" she said then heard about him jumping in to the fight to save her " A small size can be an advantage, but also a disadvantage too" Ruby said softly talking the now empty glass from him and taking it to wash out " I'm sure Ginger will talk to her too."

Yu stood in the med bay waiting to see if Late could find some one to help him as the back of his legs not felt like they were on fire and he just wanted to sit down.

"I'd much rather you be sure that I always have someone to come home to," Marcus told Aria quietly, hoping she understood he really didn't want her taking risks just to follow him.

"You're right. Jessie did get it. She's not stupid. She's far too much like me, and she's not even biologically mine," he sighed. "She followed me because she couldn't resist the temptation of coming along, but then she saw the child trying to fight against what she thought was almost a dozen werewolves, Anise couldn't resist. She did the same thing for that child that I did trying to help her. I honestly hadn't even seen the child, if I'm to be honest about it. But it bothers me more that, after all those promises she made to stay on her wolfsbane, she clearly hadn't had it."

Nigel made his way downstairs after a floo call with a younger healer in New York who had run into a wizard who had checked in with some sort of pox, he thought. Turned him teal with pink spots. Nigel hadn't seen anything like it. He had conferred with Robert who had told him about the whole business with the tampered potions. Somehow, Robert had figured, one or more of those tainted potions had made its way to New York. Nigel had alerted Lee and had relayed the remedy to the junior healer in New York.

"Sorry," Nigel said to Yu as he came into the room downstairs. He came in and immediately started to work on the leg, seeing it was a rather obvious problem. "My clinic in New York believed they had a new pox on their hands. Turns out it's one of Robert's remedies that made its way across the pond. So, this is a rather clever business, isn't it? Someone wanted you to think it was a claw wound. It's not. There's real magic, and then there's illusion. This is a real wound caused by illusion. Idjits."