FLUFFY'S GOOD ADVICE

Harvey hesitated.

"Do you wanna try it too?" I asked.

"Is that really alright?" Harvey looked uncertain.

"Yeah, Sam doesn't mind." Ben said, "As long as it's not food, especially chocolate food, Sam is a good sharer."

"I don't share my toothbrush or my mate either." I piped in. So it wasn't just chocolate.

It was meant to be a joke, but Harvey nodded seriously, "Understood, Alpha."

Anyway, Harvey did worse than Ben, he couldn't even make the ring meld. They would magically fit his fingers and just sat there.

Nevertheless, he attempted to draw the arrow. Unlike Ben, Harvey had prior experience with the bow and arrow at some high school leadership program, so his stance wasn't terrible. It was a little stiff and unnatural, but not in anyway I knew to how to correct.

Still, the bow and rings just stubbornly refused to respond.

Harvey for most part looked like he was acting in a play. The guys clapped in encouragement for the decent attempt.

Wolfgang stepped forward for his turn too. Wolfgang had read about such bows, and he was most keen to try it. He was a rather magical fire wolf too, so I had felt that if anyone could make it work, it would be him.

To Wolfgang's disappointment, it didn't work at all. His stance was beautiful though, like poetry in motion - it was that liquid that the idiom "like poetry in motion" popped up when I saw him hold up the bow. Coach Em would have approved if he was still here, but the Lorent wolves had long left by now.

After that, there was a line of wolves who wanted to try the bow and arrow.

Thanks to Ink who kept track of the success statistics, we soon figured out that the bow and rings only responded to black wolves.

Like the rings adjusted to fit everyone's fingers perfectly, but they only turned liquid for Dad, Beta Lucas, Ben, Lizzy (we made her come down to try it just to test the theory - just the rings), and me.

Also, after observing us take turns to try the bow, Wolfgang concluded that it also only loaded if our stance and intent were aligned. It was a very fussy old fashioned Lycan legend bow in everyway.

We didn't have time to experiment further. Dad's 10 minutes had stretched out to a half hour. In this time, the only other wolf who managed to draw an arrow was Ben, although it was arguably my draw since I stood behind him to guide his hand, but it flew wide and hit the packhouse. Till now, I had no idea how that happened.

Luckily, the wolves standing around scattered in time and it was just like splashing the porch beam with a pail of water. No harm done.

I had to demonstrate multiple times, so now the poor tree was now a very wet piece of charcoal in the mud. This was all on me.

But the really worrying thing was that the plants growing around the large branch of charcoal died. Within the next 20 minutes, there was a dead radius around the charcoal tree.

"Hoo boy, it's like someone poured herbicide here." Beta Lucas exclaimed.

"The purple arrow was indeed poisonous." Wolfgang concluded. "The charcoal is porous so the poison must be seeping out into the soil. We need warriors to suit up and dig everything out before it contaminates the rest of the land."

Apparently, it was a poison of Lycan legend proportions too.

Note to self: Do not use yellow or purple stone. EVER.

We stood there watching was warriors in full vampire hunting suits work with chain saws and spades. Ben said it was the safest most air-tight suits we had. They dumped the contaminated dirt into plastic bodybags. Why bodybags? Were those the most air-tight bags we had too?

"Alpha Solomon would surely be tearing out his hair if he knew what he had given away." Fluffy smiled.

"Hooboy." Beta Lucas laughed, "I'd like to see his face."

I put my finger on my lips, "No, we can't tell him. Let him think he's won this round."

Fluffy nodded agreeably, "I guess it'll be a good idea to tell your wolves not to post their videos of it online then."

Wait, what?

Harvey was immediately on it though, {Bow shooting incident behind the Alpha House is on blackout.}

So now, ALL our wolves would know there was a "bow shooting incident in our Alpha's backyard. I wondered what they'd think when they saw the number of bodybags being piled up on the other side.

Ben was more annoyed with Fluffy though, "Can you tell us these things sooner dog? What's the use of your advice if it comes AFTER everything is over?"

"Like what kind advice should I tell you?" Fluffy smiled, "Should I also have said that it would be safer for the human if no one knew of her uncanny abilities?"

We all took pause at that.

"It was fortunate that the little princess didn't pick the top three treasures." Fluffy continued, "If Alpha Solomon knew of her powers, I wonder how much he would pay for her."

"Sabre is not for sale! She's family!" I yelled.

And then I decided to add, "Neither are you. You're family too."

Fluffy smiled, "In what way am I family, pretty alpha?"

"You're like a very weird cousin." I decided on the spot.

"I hope I'm at least twice removed." Fluffy smiled, "Did you know that there are laws against inter-mating between close relatives?"

And then he started coughing. Blood. Again. This was getting annoying.

"Bell!" I turned and glared.

"He provoked me." Was Bell sulking?

"Its just Fluffy! He always talks weird!" I argued, "Can you NOT keep jumping into conclusions?"

Bell took offense to that, "In what way have I jumped into any conclusion?"

"Like Wolfgang was just showing me how to put on the finger tabs!" I flared.

"I'm fine now." Wolfgang looked down. I don't think his proud wolf liked being reminded of the number of times he had suffered in Bell's hands.

Bell narrowed his eyes, "And what was Fluffy's excuse?"

Like how would I know what Fluffy was thinking? It was Fluffy!

Fluffy couldn't answer for himself either. He continued to cough till he collapsed on the ground.

"Oh my goodness!" Little Sabre's hands flew to her mouth, "All the pretty wolves are sick, Sam."

Ki came over glowing. He picked Fluffy off the ground.

"Ki isn't sick." I said.

"Neither is Bell." I quickly added before Ki suffered any calamity.

Sabre shook her head. According to Taylor (who knew everything), the most beautiful wolves had golden hair.

"That's why Taylor is prettier than me." Sabre explained, "Even if I wear more pink, she'll still be prettier because her hair is golden."

That's what happens when you take what a 6 year old brat says as word.

"When I grow up, I want to have golden hair like a princess." Sabre told me.

Urm... Nope. You're a redhead Sabre.

"And my soul mate is going to have golden hair too." Sabre decided.

Nope again, Sabre. Little Eddy is a black wolf. All black wolves had black hair.

"Oh, Baby." Mum scooped Sabre up, "Every color of hair is beautiful."

"You can't change the color of your hair." I tried to help Mum explain, "Or your mate's hair either."

"Haven't you ever heard of hair dye?" Sabre said.

Oh.

Mum decided enough was enough. She excused herself. Dapper Dad dropped a kiss on her temple, and she took Sabre back into the house.

Lizzy and Savy came over.

"Did I just lose an argument to a preschooler?" I asked. They laughed.

"You're slipping." Savy told me, "Previously, you've always managed to draw a tie."

And they laughed again.