A Birth day

Marcus arrived after seeing Vasil and his family off. He came in and poured himself some coffee while Angus headed to the kitchen to put away the breakfast leftovers.

"Well, it sounded like Robert was willing to help is either resolve it if we wanted or to let him go do a little time in the nick," Angus said as he worked. "It all started when Sam got really angry with how he thought I was helping Anise polish her skills for the tournament. He blames me that she got hurt, and he thinks he could do a better job."

"Well, he can't do a better job than you because he's just about as new at it as Anise is," Marcus said. "He is not all that and a bag of chips, not anytime, and not with a wand either. He's become more than a little arrogant, in my opinion, and he's gotten way out of hand now. He should have just brawled with you and gotten it overwith. You'd have trounced him, he'd have sulked for a bit and that would have been that. But that isn't how it went."

"No, it isn't. And now, with some broken ribs and possibly a concussion, brawling isn't going to be in his plans for a bit," Angus said. "Personally, I really would rather wait and see how he is once he sobers up. Sam may make some foolish decisions at times but he isn't stupid. I'm hoping that losing a brawl with the sorts of seedy characters that go to the Hogs Head might wise him up a little."

"Hopefully," Marcus nodded. "Did you ever have a brawl teach you anything?"

"Yeah," Angus laughed. "That I needed to get better at brawling." That made Marcus laugh.

"Well, yeah," Marcus said. "I had the same lesson. My first brawl ended when I got thrown out of the pub--through the front glass window."

"Oh. Ouch," Angus winced. "That would have definitely hurt."

"It did," Marcus laughed. "You asked if Angus was going to let Sam come home, though, Aria. If you think about it, Angus has never once told Sam he couldn't come home. The only thing he's ever said is that if Sam wanted to live here, he had to continue to follow the same rules that this house has always had. After that, the choices are up to Sam."

"Our door will always be open for our children," Angus said, "but if they intend to stay here, they know what the rules are. Sam is very capable of following them because he's done it up til now. If he chooses not to, then he's choosing not to stay here, and I've told him that."

He headed to the kitchen, took a basket to the pantry and gathered up a lot of ingredients and came back to the workbench to start prepping vegetables for a Scotch broth. He liked his to be chock full of vegetables and nutrition, so he was sure he was going to be adding more vegetables than most. He had carrots, celery, onion, garlic, turnip, rutabaga, cabbage, potatoes, a nice big leek, barley, parsley, and thyme. He got out some frozen peas and some chicken out of the fridge. He cut the chicken into pieces and put it into a big stock pot with the carrots, onion, garlic and started to saute it in butter and a little oil. He added some salt and pepper, and when he was satisfied, he added some firewhiskey to deglaze the pot, and then added water to create a lovely flavorful stock with some hearty vegetables. When that was all cooking, he added the turnip, cabbage, leeks, potatoes, the barley and all the rest of it to cook in the chicken and the stock.

When he was able to turn the heat back to a simmer, he got out oats, flour and the rest of it to make his own homemade oatcakes, and then got out some more ingredients to make a pasty crust. When that was all assembled and the oatcakes were in the oven, he got out crab and made a deviled crab filling for the pasties. He wanted to be busy. For dessert, he made a large batch of millionaires shortbread. And in between it, he did his best to keep an eye on Anise's ice pack on her knee, made sure she had her pain potion and then let her sleep while he continued to be busy in the kitchen.

"You're making it smell insanely good. What are you making?" Marcus finally asked.

"Scotch broth with chicken instead of lamb, homemade oatcakes to go with the broth, deviled crab pasties, and some millionaire shortbread for a simple dessert," Angus said. "The soup is just simmering, and the oatcakes, pasties and the shortbread is all in the oven. The caramel and the ganache are heating slowly on the stove, so I think I'm in good shape."

"That is a very ambitious lunch," Marcus said.

"Anise needs the extra nutrition in order for her surgery to heal, so I'm packing a lot into what we're eating for the next few days. And if Sam decides to come home, he will need some extra nutrition too with his broken bones--if he comes home, that is, and I'm not really sure I have any particular feeling about it one way or another."

Angus didn't respond to Ruby's comment that Sam was welcome anytime, but Angus quietly believed that Sam was only welcome if he followed the rules--period. If he wasn't willing to do that, then, no, Angus would not welcome him. But that was not a discussion for the moment, and that was why he held his tongue. He was hoping Sam didn't keep pushing Angus to stand firm.

He set up the sideboard for soup and pasties. He added a tureen of soup to the sideboard, a platter of the deviled crab pasties, a basket with his warm homemade oatcakes, some bottles of ale, and a plate of the finished millionaires shortbread. He had some new extra large pottery soup mugs from Kate in the same bright colors the rest of the dishes were in. Each mug comfortably held a full 16 ounces of soup and their strong pottery handles made the mugs easy to carry to the table. He had also added some dessert plates--some for holding pasties and oatcakes, and more to hold pieces of shortbread. He'd also added some mugs for coffee for after the soup and pasties. Since Anise was still sleeping, Angus decided not to wake her up. There would still be plenty of soup and pasties left whenever she woke.

Andrew fixed a tray for Elwood and took it upstairs and then came and fixed his own. Angus just had taken a bit of his pasty when the floo sounded. It was, of all people, Khaat.

"Angus? Are you there, by chance?" she asked.

"I am," Angus said, going to the floo.

"Sam is awake. Thought you'd like to know. He's been told you were there to see him, and both Brian and my father have had words with him. For what it's worth, I think he's learned his lesson. My father took a much closer look at Sam after you left, and he's got a greenstick fracture of his collarbone, a cracked cheekbone, and he's got three broken toes on his left foot. Not to mention that where things aren't broken, he's pretty badly bruised everywhere else. He was very soundly trounced, and from what Brian tells me, Sam seems to realize he's not the tough cookie he believed he was. Since the boys' beds are lofted in their rooms, it would be entirely too difficult for Sam to get in and out of his bed there at your place. If, perhaps, Edward would let him use one of the guest rooms on his side, you might be able to take him home, if Andrew would assume his care while he's also taking care of Elwood."

"I'll talk to Edward," Angus said. "I imagine he'll be alright with it, but in all fairness, it's his house, so I can't speak for him."

"I would expect no less," she replied. "If you need time, we can admit him overnight or for a day or two. Realistically, if we didn't have the staff we do and the facilities we have at the estate, there would be no way we would be looking at releasing him."

"Understood."

"How's Anise?"

"She's actually very comfortable. She's been sleeping most of the time, and we've kept the ice on her knee, 20 on, 20 off," Angus said

"Excellent. That's exactly what we hoped for. Keep up the good work. I'm sure either my father or jess will check on her around supper time. After you talk to Edward, get back in touch with me, would you?"

"Of course. Thanks, Khaat. And do please thank Brian and Robert for me. I should have sent you all in some lunch."

"Will do. We haven't even had time to get to lunch. I think all four of us are starving."

"I can send you some. We're just sitting down to eat here."

"What's on the menu?"

"Scotch broth, deviled crab pasties, homemade oatcakes, and millionaires shortbread."

"God, stop. My mouth is watering just hearing the menu," Khaat laughed.

"I'll send you some. I'll find someone to drop you off a food delivery shortly. We have plenty."

"That would be fantastic. Much appreciated, my friend."

"Any time. Thanks, Khaat," Angus said, closing the floo.

"Hi, Jack," Angus said. "Victor is as mature right now as Sam is being stupid. Yeah. I went to see Sam earlier when Robert notified me they had him in A&E. He's got a concussion, a broken collarbone, a broken cheekbone, 2 broken ribs, and three broken does, not to mention that he was already black and blue just about everywhere when I saw him. And, undoubtedly, the hangover from hell. He was completely blotto when I saw him. The Hogs Head is absolutely one of the worst places to go for a young snot like him to go with a chip on his shoulder and think he's just going to have a few pints. I don't know that I have any new rules for him. I can't bring him home til I have someplace to put him. His bed and Victor's are both lofted with furniture underneath them. There's no way he's going to be able to climb ladders up and down out of his bunk in his shape. And that uses all of my bedrooms. Edward has his guest rooms empty at the moment, but if Edward isnt' going to be around, I'm out of options. I suppose I could ask Jessie if he has a guest room Sam could stay in. Oh, and so you know, Anise broke it off with Sam. I presume they might eventually work that out, but, for the moment, he's been jilted by his fiancee too. Robert and Brian have been hammering some common sense into him, hangover and all, and they say he's very apologetic and wants to come home. I hate to tell him but there's no place for him here because of how bad he's screwed himself up."

"There's Scotch broth and deviled crab pasties if you're hungry, Jack," Marcus said. "One of us is going to do a lunch delivery for Khaat, Brian, Robert and David when we finish eating, so tuck in while you can."

"You're right, Jack. I did dodge a bullet, that's for sure," Anise agreed. "Sam needs to learn he can't go after someone just because he's not getting his own way. When you grow up in a whole pack of werewolves, most of them think it's part of their animal nature to be able to just rip people out and be as violent as they want and that its going to be perfectly excusable. I saw a lot of stupidity. Feeling that you're entitled to be violent is not the sort of man I want to be married to. And I absolutely won't raise my children to believe it either. Sam was way off the mark to blame Angus for my knee. I did it myself. He had nothing to do with it, but Sam didn't want to listen. And that's the other thing. I refuse to marry anyone who won't bloody listen. For him to even think Angus would do anything to hurt us, Sam has just lost his mind. Angus is always, always, the very first to protect us. Sam's..." she sighed, calming, "not my Sam right now."

"Calm," Angus told her, understanding why she was upset. He finished assembling a lunch tray for her "We've got this. We'll do our best to get Sam back on the right track. In the meantime, here. Lunch. Get some food. You need extra nutrition so you body can get the extra vitamins and minerals it needs to heal your knee." He took it to her and set it in place so she could eat.

"I'll start packing up lunch to go to St. Mungos," Andrew said, going to the kitchen.

Andrew and Angus finished packing up lunch for four and put it all in a picnic hamper.

"I can deliver this, if none of you really want to go," Andrew said. "As long as someone stops up and picks up Elwood's lunch tray when he's finished."

"You want to go to see Sam, Ruby?" Marcus asked. "I need to either take or send a pair pf pajamas for him anyway so he doesn't have to come home naked. I think that a pair of warm pajamas would be easier than having him dress in street clothes for the matter of a minute or two to apparate home and then change again into some pajamas. If you and Aria don't have anything else on your schedule, maybe you'd like to see him. But it's totally your choice."

"I'll go if nobody else wants to," Angus said, "but I need to talk to Edward before I go." He got up and headed over to Edward's to get that settled.