"This place uses fresh handmade mozzarella. It makes a surprising amount of difference." There is a pause for pizza appreciation. "Just to clarify," Alex says after a while, "I'm not really scolding you for risking your life doing what you believe is right. I didn't try to stop Bel from doing it, and I won't give you a hard time for it either. I'm just a little... this is the second time I've had Bel lying in a hospital bed telling me 'at least I got the bad guy' and it's... stressful." He drains his bottle and gets up to fetch another.
You want to lick him, but you settle for patting instead. "We've turned out a few of the paladin type ourselves," your dad says. "I didn't expect it from Erskin, honestly, most of the kids come along to work with me at one point or another and he didn't seem particularly suited for it." "It was fun," you say. "I had fun." Your dad shrugs and opens another bottle of beer. "It's not just fun, if you're suited. You'd have asked to go again, not for a lift back to whatever you were up to before I offered. Something to do with shipping containers?" "I wanted a look at the bermuda triangle," you say defensively. "So I went on cargo ships. There were rats, it was a good plan, I saw a sea serpent." Your dad salutes you with the bottle. "You're an explorer," he says. "An adventurer. There's nothing wrong with that, aren't you on your third lap of the globe?" "Forth." "Well, there you go, fourth, that's nothing to sneeze at. It'd be a pretty terrible world if everyone were spies and soldiers." Mollified, you take another piece of pizza.
"Quite right," Alex agrees. "Truth be told, I'm more the support type myself, I just didn't realize it until I moved to the Reserves and suddenly my job was fighting fires instead of starting them. But Bel..." He sighs. "I'm not sure anyone can keep him from Galahadding about, but if he's going to, it eases my mind to know he's got you to wallop him upside the head when he gets stupid."
"Well, I'll try. It doesn't help that while I'm running away from danger I blow past him running towards it." You grimace. "Maybe we can all gang up on him to wear a damn leash. Or at least one of those collars with the jingle bell on."
"You've already got a collar for him," Alex points out. He's the one who retrieved Bel's truck, and whatever of Bel's belongings as weren't held as evidence. "Which of you picked that? Bright blue with little white stars on? Very cheerful. The Harry Potter reference was inevitable, of course."
"So everyone tells me!" you groan, exasperated. "Is it after Remus?" Aspera asks. "On the tag?" "No! I don't even know who that is yet!" You chomp a bit of sausage vengefully. "It's Sirius, apparently he's a big black dog character and everyone loves him and thinks I'm tremendously clever. I just thought the constellation reference was funny. I should have stuck with Puddles."
"Don't laugh, code names are very important. I learned this from my superspy dad." Aspera grins and gets himself another beer. "Did you consider Mr Woofs?" "I may just have!"
"And did Bel come up with 'Rusty' all on his own? I'd have expected him to name his 'service dog' after some fancy-pants historical figure, to go with the name I perpetrated on him." To Aspera, you add, "Hannibal. Family tradition; Kadros men are named after warriors, Kadros women are named after queens. My sister Elizabeth and I don't have much to complain about; my aunt Zenobia wasn't so lucky."
"The fictional Hannibal that ate people was named after the same real Hannibal that Bel is named after," Alex explains patiently. "The real Hannibal was a Carthaginian general, one of the greatest tacticians in history."
"Oh. I'm sorry, sir, that was a terrible choice, Bel has no head for tactics at all, he tried to knife a bear. He's ridiculous." You help yourself to your Dad's beer, then grimace at the taste. He pulls on your ear, admonishingly, and takes his beer back. Of course, after that you have to try to steal it again. It's difficult— your dad spends a lot more time with hands than you do, and doesn't spill a drop while keeping it away from your clumsy swipes, even with one of his hands attached to your ear.
"Yes, and I think you should have a talk with him about conflict de-escalation, I just about had fifty heart attacks," you huff. You obtain the beer again. "We were hunting ducks and I ran into a bear. I was about ready to take my chances with running away like a normal person when Bel decided to charge to my rescue, barefoot in the snow, with a knife. I had to talk my way out of it all after that, humans can't run faster than ten miles an hour, can they? Also I think the lever for 'run away like a normal person' in his brain got snapped off somewhere." You think about it. "Maybe he thought it was romantic. Later he went fishing and gave me the fish, I think that's the actual proper sort of romance. Where you survive to actually have a romance." "Speaking of romance, I heard you were thinking about kids?" Your dad asks. He's carefully timed it so you choke on the beer. "Dad!" you wail, in between coughing. "No!" Everything is terrible.
"Sixteen was the number I overheard," Alex says helpfully. "And yes, I am pretty sure Bel would think knifing a bear for you is romantic. I raised an idiot."
You pull a very grave face at Alex. "You should have named him Puddles. There's nowhere to go but up, from Puddles." To your dad, you defend yourself: "He's gorgeous, Dad, he's already had an offer, this summer even, you know everyone and their damn granny will be lining up for him in March. Just you have a look at him. It'd be an absolute tragedy if he didn't have any. Even if he is an idiot." Your dad is laughing at you. "You are thinking about children!" he says gleefully. "Not for ME!" you wail, and have to hide your burning face in your arms on the table.
"Science is not yet that advanced," Alex agrees solemnly. "You could alternate, I suppose." He's not sure how much of this is a joke -- maybe the wolfy thing really is to find some girl just to have your babies, which sounds barbaric -- but Erskin's embarrassment is hilarious and cute. "In any case, I very much doubt anyone will be taking him away from you. He goes glossy-eyed with adoration when he looks at you. One of these days I'll get pictures of him doing it, and tease both of you with the photographic evidence for years."
"I'm not scared of losing him to anyone, romantically," you say. "I mean, unless he's got terrible taste in all his other partners beside me, that'd be a problem. But. It's nice to know he, er. Feels that way."
"Other partners?" Alex hopes he sounds politely curious, not worried. "So... you two are doing a... poly? Thing? I'm sorry, I'm not up on terminology."
"I don't know it either," you assure him. "And anyway, I don't— know. He says he only wants me, but, you know, people change, it seems silly to rule everyone else out before you've even met them. I don't think I'd mind sharing as long as it was with someone nice." You scratch your nose, uneasily. "Is he the sort to mind sharing? Only I don't think it'll be all that much of an issue, on my end, I don't get too many offers." Your dad cuts in, talking to Alex: "I'm not surprised he's not anticipating monogamy, he was raised in a fairly extended domestic arrangement. You could say I have two wives, but it was more that Daisy and Suzie decided to keep me around. Most reproduction has been with other, ah, consorts, as I've about the number of detrimental genetic conditions you'd expect from a chap who's royal ancestors kept on marrying their first cousins. But they liked me, terrible pedigree and all." He smiles, still alight with happiness at the thought, even after decades. "Anyway—pair-bonds are the norm for werewolves as they are for humans, both of us and wolves are all semi-monogamous. It's just, the involvement of other participants to ensure the best possible conditions for birthing and raising healthy children preclude the emphasis so many human cultures put on sexual exclusivity, so you see a much more tolerant, permissive attitude towards open family networks, as well as trios or quartets. Generally a sibling pair with a mutual romantic interest, but there are already-romantic pairings that bring in a third friend, or lover, to help with the children. Or a third-and-fourth sibling pair." Aspera opens his third beer. "I'm sure it makes a lot more sense if you're raised to it. You can bet when I got this lecture—back in the sixties— I had to have a lie-down. It's one thing to think you're such a tremendous stud you've just landed yourself a harem, and quite another thing to find the harem's got their own idea about how it's all going to go." He laughs at himself, loud and careless.
