The Claiming by Cooper
Chapter 96

The Council Chapter 3: Mason

Mason

At the announcement of Mignon's pregnancy, the girls all give that high pitch squeal again. While they hug and congratulate Mignon, we congratulate Asher. He was the first in the claiming to catch his mate. There was a lag of nearly two weeks after that between Mignon and Annabel because of the issues with Layan and her claiming.

"How about you?" Asher says to Antonio. "You two should be getting close too."

Antonio looks at Annabel. "She wanted to wait. She wanted to get to know each other a bit before bringing a baby into the mix. I don't mind. Getting to know my mate has been amazing." He looks at Asher. "But we'll see if spending time with your mate changes her mind." He smiles.

"Hana is the same. I made a deal with her that while I would mark her when I caught her," we all recognize that there was never a question that he would catch her, "that she could decide when she wanted to mark me."

We all look more closely at his neck. Hadn't I seen a mark there?

He pulls his collar away from his neck, proudly showing off his mate mark. "Once she made me hers, then everything changed. But that's only been a couple of weeks. We'll have to wait and see what happens."

They all turn to me. "And you?" Asher asks.

I shrug. "We've only been out of the claiming territory for a week. But..." I shrug again.

Seth looks at me. "Seriously? My sister wanted to start having a baby right away?" I can tell he's surprised, but also a little cautious wanting to know that this is also her decision. Their entire family still has residual concerns based on their experience with Mila, and I can't blame them.

"Seth, I only tell you this because I know your question comes from a place of concern, and just know that we will never discuss my sex life with your sister again, but she insisted on taking my knot before I thought her body was ready. I wanted to give her body more time to adjust, and your sister wasn't having it."

Seth gives me a pained look. "Yeah, lets never speak of it again." He looks thoughtful for a moment. "But thanks. I'm glad to know that everything that happened with Mila isn't keeping her from having the life she deserves."

We all get a drink and move off to the side of the room, watching our mates. "Okay, I need to ask a question." Antonio takes a large gulp of his drink before looking at all of us. "I'm terrified of

knotting Annabel. I'm so afraid that I'll hurt her, tear her....I mean, we all saw the condition Layan was in when she came out of the claiming territory. If I ever did that to my mate...." He stops, gulping down the rest of his drink.

"I wasn't there, obviously, so maybe it's different for me. But Mignon was an omega too, so maybe it's more similar to me than these guys, I don't know. For me, it was about making sure she was ready and willing. Almost like, if she was mentally ready to accept it, her body was too. That's not to say she didn't bleed the first couple of times, but she loves the closeness and my purr helped to ease her discomfort. And now, it's no problem."

"I would echo what Asher said. You need to expect the bleeding the first couple of times. Nothing like what we saw with Layan, but she will bleed. And it's the closeness afterward, caring for her and being together that makes it easier for Jara. That, and depending on the position, I will rub her stomach or her back to help ease her body's need to expand. That seems to help as well."

"Warm bath, before and after. The heat helps relax her before and helps to soothe her aching muscles afterward." Seth adds.

Asher clinks his glass to Seth's. "That's a damn good idea." He

says.

"Is this a private party, or can I join?" Alpha Luke says, walking up.

"Hey, Alpha Luke, do you know everyone here?" I ask, bringing him. into our group.

"I know Alpha Seth, but I've never officially met you two." He nods to Asher and Antonio.

I give introductions. "Asher was Beta Asher when he was in the claiming. His Alpha was also killed in this year's claim."

Asher looks at Luke. "Wait, you were the one who's Alpha went feral during the second round of assessments, right?" "Yes, that was me. Alpha Cameron was too close to going feral and the assessments pushed him over."

"I'm sorry about that. Cameron was a good man." Antonio says.

"Thank you. I hope I can live up to his expectations."

י

He looks at where our mates are still huddled together, laughing and talking. "I hope the Elders realize what they are in for. Your mates are going to give them a lot of problems. Four Lunas, all friends and all with very strong personalities."

"They have no idea, and it's something I wanted to talk to you

about. All of you actually. Seth, Jara, Hana and I have put together a petition to change the claiming. We'd like to get all of your

support because we know that it will be a fight with the Elders and some of the other Alphas."

"What kind of changes." Antonio asks, and Seth and I lay it out for them.

"So, three of those are directly related to Layan and Mila?" Luke asks.

"And another one is about keeping them healthy while in the claim. The last two are about trying to keep our numbers from diminishing so drastically. Between the loss of our females and the massive reduction of our males in years like this one, we'll be downsizing our packs every year until we go extinct." Seth says.

"Does anyone know how many females we have among the packs? And how many of those are still young enough to reproduce?" Asher asks.

"The last I heard there were only 50 females left. Some, like Seth's mom are too old to have pups. And there are some that are underage still. If I had to guess, I'd say we only have 15-20 in adulthood and still in child birthing years." I

say.

"It's not enough. Even if they were willing to have two pups a year, that's only 30-40 pups every year, if they are all born healthy and have no problems during pregnancy. And they can't sustain that for long, no matter how well we take care of them." Antonio says.

"I know. Elder Jason told me our numbers are around 1500. Fifteen hundred total werewolves, and of those, only about 50 females, with less than half in childbearing years." I say.

"We have to start doing a better job of protecting our females. Things like what happened to Layan and Mila cannot continue to

happen." Seth says.

"We need more than a petition to change the claiming." Luke says. "We need to change the laws."

"We need a new council." I say, looking at where the Elders are sitting together.

"It's time for a change in our governing body."

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