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It was a few hours before dawn, and all seemed quiet. After a successful hunt, the Warugaruga had settled down to sleep in one of the cozier of their rendezvous sites, and Ralastor, filled up to the ribs, was snoozing. He had positioned himself near the outer edge; the weather was still pleasant enough that he could get comfortable away from the body heat of others, and he didn't know his newer pack members well enough to cuddle up to any of them just yet.

Still, he felt safe, confident, deep within the boundaries of his packlands, his warriors close at hand, should he call. Slowly but surely, his fantasy was working its way towards reality. Satisfied, he allowed himself to dream - literally - and curled in upon himself, seemed nothing more than a happy wolf among his family. Of course, that was far from the truth; everything is just so much gentler looking when it slumbers.

The big male jolted awake, his hackles all standing at attention. At first, Ralastor couldn't remember what had yanked him so ferociously from his rest. Then he inhaled, and a memory tickled his nostrils; a female lone wolf who whipped him thoroughly as a cocky adolescent. The words his son had spoken a short time ago suddenly rang through his thoughts: Brutus had encountered the scent of a lone female, but had never caught up with her.

He wanted to laugh, a little. Perhaps being made a fool of by this sharp-tongued (and even sharped-fanged) woman was a rite of passage for young males in this area. The hairs in his air where he dreamed she had whispered tickled and bothered him. Perhaps she was a ghost. Ralastor shook this pup-thought from his mind quickly and, with a glance around the rendezvous site to ensure none of the others had been awoken, slowly sat up.

Face to the ground, he inhaled deeply. No, no ghost could have such a scent. Surely she would not be far. Impulsively, Ralastor left the rest of his pack sleeping. This female was his rival to conquer, his powerful ally to win - his loss to recoup. Moving with as much silence as he could muster, the alpha foolishly walked away from his supporters, lured by an amber shadow.

She was surprisingly easy to follow. When he got close enough that she came into view, he stopped to peer from within the underbrush and among the trees, unable to break his natural habit of stalking his target before he revealed himself. Still, he reasoned with himself, she led him here. She knew he was coming. With that in mind, he stepped out into the open and eyed her. His pulse quickened, but he said nothing.

As on edge as he'd already been before the she-wolf started talking, Ralastor still found room on his skull for his ears to perk up even more in mild surprise and interest. So she'd been watching him? Enough to glean a good bit of information, too - how long, he wondered? Like the first time they had met, Ralastor immediately began to consider the uses he could have for this strange creature. If her fighting skills were still as honed as he'd remembered them being, she would be a talented soldier as well as spy. Trying to stay calm, collected, confident, he smiled.

"Not just numbers. Wolves trained from birth, raised to a life of absolute obedience and ruthless strength." He inflated a little, pretending to be more proud of the results than he really was. "The perfect soldiers." The male peered at his company, moving forward a bit more while still leaving a respectable distance between the two of them. "And you? You greet me with an outdated phrase - I'm a little wolf no longer. Are your fighting skills as behind the times as your vocabulary?" Although a fight wasn't really what he wanted, Ralastor couldn't resist baiting her a little bit. For once, he felt like being younger than his opponent could actually be an advantage.

In a way, it was almost a relief that the she-wolf hadn't changed. It was always rather jarring to see someone again that had left an impression on the mind only to discover they had changed, or had simply never been the idealized way one had remembered them. He considered asking her name again, but he had a sneaking suspicion that her disinterest in sharing that information probably hadn't changed either.

"I think I'll just take your word for it," Ralastor replied smoothly, less rash to get into needless fights than he had been as a youth. Maybe she had not changed, but he had. "I'd hate to have the pack hear the sounds of a scuffle and accidentally kill you." A threat? Not quite, but getting uncomfortably close. He changed the subject quickly, lest she felt the need to prove what she had proved to him long ago.

"The mother was useless to me. A weakling. I used her to gain offspring and then took them from her incapable care. I have a feeling you would agree with me that a she-wolf who can't even protect her litter from one lone male doesn't deserve to contribute to their... education." If only he had realized weakness was in the blood. A weakling mother meant weakling pups, no matter how great the father or how extensive the training. What else explained the many flaws of his children? And to think he had to select an heir from that batch of failures.

"I probably should have killed her," he contemplated out loud, almost whimsically. "She might be a nuisance if she ever learns to use her nose and her brains in conjunction with one another." His attention flicked back to the she-wolf, and if she missed the implications about capable females, he certainly did not. He became smug. Despite her mockery of his pack, clearly his growth and progress had impressed her if she was offering herself in such a way.

"And you think you are that female, do you?" Ralastor said, misunderstanding her. He smirked. "Think to whip my 'rag tag wolves' into shape?" His voice lowered to something that was taunting, but perhaps also meant to be seductive. "Replace my children with better ones?"

The smile fell from his face like a collection of snow falling from an overburdened tree branch, slipping slowly and then, abruptly, dropping dead to the ground. Insult played across his expression, and he started to show fang before he collected himself again. "Well," he spat, "That's no mark in favour of your intelligence. If you've been watching my pack, you'll know it's not the standard 'raise children, live and let live, happy butterfly family' pack." He wasn't sure how butterflies had gotten in there. He was angry. "I won't settle for just that." His parents had settled for just that, and look what had happened to them. One banished child, one dead child, and steadily shrinking borders. No vision, no imagination. "I'm going to live a life like no wolf ever has, have unheard of power. You'd be a fool not to want to be part of that."

The brief flicker in which he thought she was offering herself to him reawakened in Ralastor a desire he'd forgotten about. It was partially, of course, a desire to be physically close with a female, but it wasn't just that - a desire to conquer the demons of his past, perhaps? And what better way to conquer a female than to make her a conquest? But no, he didn't want to do to the she-wolf what he had done to Layla. She was actually good for something other than making pups. Pups which, he thought with a thrill, would have skilled fighters on both sides of their family trees. She was right - she was more than just a womb on legs. She could be as valuable a member of the pack as any of the rough, eager-to-fight males he'd recruited.

From the way she was talking, it sounded like there was hope. "If you have ambitions," he said, keeping his tone as even as he could, not wanting to betray his emotions any more than he already had, "then you are already something like me. You stand to gain..." he trailed off, unable to coherently express the muddle of thoughts on his mind. "It would be of mutual benefit," the packleader asserted, deciding this was a better way to say it, and forced himself to smirk. Revealing how very, very interested he was in having her as part of the Warugaruga was not a smart idea. It would let her know she held all the power in this negotiation. Then something struck him.

"Why have you come here? Why draw me away from the pack to speak with me?"

Her last comment made him smile a little. Ah, so she thought him interesting. That was a step in the right direction - and why wouldn't she? He was incredibly interesting. And, eventually... incredibly powerful. Ralastor had already gotten bigger, gained experience in battle, learned a bit more about tactics and manipulation.

Pride salved, he pondered what he was willing to offer her.

"Most packs, of course, have a dominant male and female," he suggested quietly, still smiling. "For many the rank comes from simply mating with whichever wolf is the alpha... within my pack, it is a position that must be earned." He began to walk, slowly, moving as if to circle around her. "If you are as... ambitious as you say you are, why," his smile became a toothy grin, "you would have no problem securing that title and the benefits that come with it. Aside from my charming company, of course." He indulged in a tiny, tiny bit of self-mockery here. Ralastor could pretend to be charming, but he was sure he was far from it in reality.