B+Bs: To Stand In A Beast's World

55. Setting Up The Hand

Before I put my plans into action, a few things needed to be done. First, I will be including my family in this discussion. When Curtis goes to hunt one day, I will lay my thoughts bare so my mates can find any flaws before we proceed.

Second, I need to give Curtis another test. I cannot continue to have him this close to my family without feeling some kind of trust towards him.

Third, it needs to stop raining... It's been four weeks since I've given birth, and I haven't been able to go outside. I wasn't stir-crazy yet, but I was getting close. Very close.

Fourth, I needed more information. Harvey was doing a great job with this. He was traveling back and forth to the city by taxi Muir to help care for the sick or injured. He brought back a lot of useful information on the city on top of news of his growing reputation.

The only piece I'm lacking right now is if the wolf king will be replaced. The tiger king's throne has been filled already, but it's by a triple-marked tiger who is constantly being challenged by others of similar strength. The tiger king has already changed twice and will likely change again.

The leopard king kept his throne, and so did the ape king. The leopard king still stands neutral when it comes to politics, but as the only tetra-marked king in good health, beasts were gathering under his banner without being called.

The ape king is building support slowly. And there are talks of why the scorpion came to the city. Gossip moves quickly and Mitchell is suspected by some. The rumors may or may not be coming from the ape king himself...

Regardless of whether I get more information, it won't change my plans at the heart, only tweak them for a better outcome.

The last thing I need to do is pick nicknames for my kittens. I will not have them running around nameless and calling them by numbers was unappealing. But I didn't want to mess around with their customs too much unless I felt it was very important. So I was thinking of calling them by their eye colors.

The firstborn had grey eyes, a little darker than his dad's. The second born had blue eyes that ran in my family. So, Grey and Blue. I just had to ask Winston and make sure those names were safe.

I brought up the potential names as soon as possible. Winston agreed to my name choice so fast that I felt like the silly one for thinking so much into it. Grey and Blue it was.

I appreciated Winston's willingness to agree to my choices. He was quite zealous lately when it came to fulfilling my requests. He was even willing to keep his short hair since I complimented him on it a lot. The grown-out buzz cut really highlighted his strong facial features and it was hard to get enough of it.

But long-haired Winston was just as attractive, and if I tried styling his hair, I'm sure I could bring out those features without Winston having to run around as a shaved tiger in his beast form. His fur isn't just for looks, and I'd never ask him to get rid of it because I liked his hair one way more than the other.

A day of sunshine eventually graced us, and I took the opportunity to test Curtis. It was somewhat risky, but it will be very effective in building trust. Not just for me, but with my mates. So this one and only time, I handed over a sliver of trust to Curtis without a guarantee that he wouldn't take advantage of it.

"To the river... with me?" Curtis did not understand.

"Yes. I want to survey the area and catch fish for dinner."

Curtis was still not believing it. "With just me?"

"Shuu will follow later." I side-eyed my nervous mates and decided this was the best course of action. There was risk involved, but it wasn't nearly so reckless as the last time I confronted Curtis.