Black Mountain

Chapter Four

Warren 

"You invited the witches to the field tonight?" Drew whined as he climbed into my car at the end of the day. 

"They're not that bad and you know they'll never let Sophia go alone and Elaine's not ready for me to be alone with her yet so it seemed like my best shot. Plus I don't know maybe this whole mated with Sophia thing could turn out to be a good bridge. Maybe bring the families closer."

"Okay now you sound like Elaine." James criticized from the passenger seat. 

"Well maybe she's on to something. Just because the adults can't play nice doesn't mean we have to hate them too. We're the ones who will be taking over someday, may as well start to play nice now."

"Yeah whatever," James huffed. 

"Hey," Lucas appeared at my rolled down window. He nodded at James and Drew. 

"What's up?"

"Heard you're mated to the new witch." I didn't like that he made it sound so flippant. 

"Yeah."

He nodded. "Coven must be pissed."

"We'll see tonight at the meeting. You gonna be there?"

"You know it. See you at the field after?"

"We'll be there."

He tapped the car and left. 

"Since when are you and the vampire all buddy buddy?" James demanded. 

"Since I told him this morning exactly what I told you. That maybe it's time we start burying the hatchet." I said as I pulled out onto the road.

"And he just listened? Dude hundreds of years of feuding isn't going to end in a day."

He was right of course it wouldn't. But for the last five years there hadn't been fighting in the streets, out right attacks, or even sever arguments. We stayed to our land, they stayed to theirs, and things were civil. Maybe Sophia being here would push it form civil to friendly. Or end in a full out war. The dice was fifty fifty. As the future alpha though I had to seize this potential opportunity to do what I knew would be right for my people in the long run. Hopefully Lucas saw it the same way. "You never know," I said. "Beer can fix a lot of things."

The rest of the afternoon went by slower than I ever though possible. Every second seemed to tick by impossibly slow as I waited until I was able to see Sophia again. Several time I had to stop myself from walking out of the house and running directly to her house. 

"Hey do you have a second?" my dad asked as I walked downstairs. 

I nodded.

He ushered me into the study and I took a seat in front of his desk. 

"How was school?"

"Fine," I said. "Same old."

He nodded. "Look son, tonights meeting could go one of two ways. Either the coven supports your mating or they don't. I need to know that if they don't, you will not do anything rash."

"What do you mean?" I knew what he meant.

"Under no circumstance are you to shift," he said. "You know the rules about the neutral territory. I need you to promise that if this does not go how we want that you will keep your anger in check."

"I will," I said. 

"Good," he went to stand from his desk.

"But," I continued and he slowly lowered himself back into his seat.