~~

Reece

~~

I never expected that Dietrich would mate with Shawn right after he got here. That was unexpected, and frankly quite surprising, but mates were beyond our choosing. There is someone out there for everyone, and the Goddess chose Dietrich to be Shawn's mate. But how fortunate they would finally get a chance to meet, otherwise they would have been mateless forever. So I guess it was a good thing that I killed Octavius after all.

The dinner started with no other incidents or surprises. Dietrich sat in the spot to my right facing Trinity. Shawn was sitting next to the vampire with a scared and confused look on his face. Agent Otsana joined us at the table as part of the meeting and sat across from Shawn. An extra setting had to be placed to accommodate Shawn who was supposed to be guarding and not eating. Shane, Vincent, David, and Noah were all stationed at the four corners of the room, keeping watch.

Abigail and Peter brought the meal in, extravagant and decadent foods that were both domestic and European. A vintage red wine was paired with the meal for us, well everyone except Little Bunny, she had cran-raspberry juice, it was both delicious and healthy according to her.

Before we actually started eating there was something that I wanted to say, to clear everything up for those who had not been outside.

"There are a few people at this table that still do not know about the news from the Luna and I." I said in a loud, clear voice. "Dietrich was able to discern immediately that the Luna and I are expecting a child together. She has yet to visit with a pack doctor, but I would like to spread the news the rest of the way. Shane, Shawn, Agent Otsana, you were not outside when the others found out."

"That is excellent news." Shane immediately declared.

"I am happy for you and your Alpha." Agent Otsana congratulated Trinity. The guards were looking truly happy, and even Shawn was looking a little less nervous as he spoke.

"Congratulations, Luna, that is wonderful news for you and the entire pack."

"Thank you everyone." My Little Bunny was a little shy at having them all stare at her, but there was no hiding that smile on her face.

"Now, let us eat. We may talk business now or after, that is up to you Dietrich." I smiled at those assembled around me.

"I wouldn't mind a friendly chat while we eat. But we can hold off on the major issues until after the meal." Dietrich indicated his preference.

"That sounds perfect. Please, enjoy your meal everyone."

We ate our food, talking about the upcoming wedding. There were discussions of the baby. And, not surprisingly, Dietrich wanted to know more about Shawn, Shane was all too happy to provide those details from his corner.

"Dietrich, how did you know that I am pregnant?" Little Bunny asked him shortly after we started eating.

"I may not have the same senses as a wolf, and I have never smelled you before so I would not have been able to detect it from that alone. However, as a vampire, I have the ability to sense life. And when I looked at you I saw not just one life essence, but two."

"Does that mean you would know if someone were having multiples." Agent Otsana asked in a joking tone of voice.

"I admit, I do not know. It has not happened yet as far as I know. I am not often around pregnant women. If the few that I have encountered personally in the last five hundred years did indeed have multiples I have no way of knowing."

"Hmm. Sounds like it would be interesting to find out, you know." Otsana added with a curious smile.

"Are you planning on multiples?" David asked with a hint of shock and fear from across the room.

"Goddess no!" Otsana exclaimed. "I'm still coming to terms with having mated with you, don't go and bring kids into this too soon." David visibly relaxed at those words at which point we all started laughing at the relatively new couple.

"That's one thing you won't have to worry about." Dietrich joked with Shawn as he gave him a heated look. "We've got built-in birth control." Shawn blushed crimson at those words, his mouth hanging open in utter shock with Shane nearly collapsed to the floor laughing.

"So, Shawn, your brother said that you have not had many relationships and that they didn't last long, does that mean that you're innocent?" Those words from Dietrich darkened Shawn's blush.

"I-I-I-I-I-." Shawn spluttered uncontrollably, not able to answer.

"Shawn are you?" Shane shouted.

"Shut up!" Shawn yelled at his brother. "My personal life is none of your business."

"I'm sorry." Dietrich gave him a soft expression. "I should not have asked that. It was too personal. Forgive me."

"No, it wasn't you." Shawn backpedaled. "I was yelling at my brother. He's just an asshole."

"So, you're not angry with me?" Dietrich leaned into him again, a sly smile on his face.

"Uh, well, I, it's not, you're my, we're, no I'm not." Shawn finally got to his answer. "I'm not mad." He said again.

"Good, I'm glad. We can save the personal talk until we're alone."

"Alone!?" Shawn practically yelled in a squeaky voice.

"Yes, I am so looking forward to getting to know you, all about you and the life you've lived.

Once dinner was over, and Shawn's face was back to a normal color, we moved from the dining room to the office to discuss business. Once again, Dietrich wrapped his arm around Shawn's shoulders and pulled him along with him to the office as he followed the others. Once in the office, Dietrich sat on the love seat, sitting close to Shawn as he had pulled him right along with him. I could tell Shawn was apprehensive, but he didn't seem quite as nervous as he was downstairs.

Otsana sat in one of the armchairs opposite the Vampire and Shawn, I pulled Little Bunny onto my lap in the other armchair. The rest of the guards stood around the room just like before. Despite the comfortable seating arrangements, for everyone except Shawn that is, we were about to discuss very uncomfortable topics.

"So, Reece, there is much we need to discuss. First, will you give me the full story, with full details, about what happened when my emissary arrived?" Dietrich didn't look angry, he was sitting next to Shawn with a content smile on his face and a hand resting lazily on Shawn's arm. Again Shawn looked slightly uneasy but not as much as before, and still he didn't pull away. Between Vincent, the twins, and Little Bunny, they were able to relay all of the information easily. But there was one little problem with the explanation.

Dietrich shot to his feet at the words that Shane had just shared.

"WHAT!" The anger and rage was clear in his voice. "Octavius was further gone than I thought then." Rage was still pouring off of him.

"Is there something wrong?" I asked him. Shane had just told him about Octavius attacking and slicing open Shawns shoulder.

"There very well could have been. One of the abilities that Octavius had, aside from being very skilled in tracking through special means, he could control those he gets the blood of. If he were to have licked your blood off of his fingers, you would have been like a puppet to him. To think he would not only attack but use that forbidden technique on our allies. It's absurd. He used to be a loyal and dutiful soldier of mine. What could have happened to him?" By the time he was done talking, the anger was ebbing away from Dietrich's face, being replaced by sadness.

"I wonder, Dietrich, but could he have been turning?" Little Bunny asked him, drawing his attention to her.

"Turning?" Dietrich was shocked by her question. "Do you mean that he might have been losing his humanity? I never would have thought it, but listening to the way he was behaving, I honestly do not know."

"Well, I only ask because of the things I noticed that day. First, he had a scent that was old and decayed, like dust and dirt, and the mildew smell of old damp leaves. All things that were dead and lifeless. Also, when he died, the blood that came from him was almost black. It was such a dark red color that to say it was anything other than black would nearly be a lie."

"Meine Goettin." He slipped and spoke in German for a moment, My Goddess was what he said. "He was close to becoming dark. He was losing all hope for his humanity, his soul was leaving his body and making him into the type of monster that you see in the movies."

"What would cause something like that?" Shawn asked him, worry clear on his face.

"Many things can be attributed to it. It would all depend on the type of person they were when still human, how they lived their lives as a vampire, whether they have someone around them to keep them grounded, and lastly their view of humans. Honestly, Reece, I am so very sorry I did not see it sooner. And I truly must thank you for doing what must be done when a vampire changes like that. It is a job I would have had to do myself if you had not."

The mood in the room had dropped dramatically. None of us, aside from my little mate, had suspected that the vampire was losing his humanity. It wasn't something that I thought about all that often, alright, I never would have.

"How were you able to figure that out?" Shane asked her. "I didn't notice anything different with his scent. Nothing that indicated death and decay."

"I believe it is because your Luna is quite the special one." Dietrich smiled at her.

"Special how?" Trinity looked uncomfortable as she asked.

"I think you already know a little about that, don't you Trinity." Her eyes went wide at his words. "I believe you are not just a normal Luna, am I right? You are special, different, than the others."

"How can you tell?" I demanded. I needed to keep my mate safe, I knew he wasn't a threat, but others might be able to sense her specialness if he could.

"Just as I can sense the life force of people, I can also sense the level of their life force."

"What do you mean? How can you sense the level of someone's life force? What does that even mean?" Shawn asked Dietrich. Shawn didn't seem very nervous at all anymore as he was talking with the man next to him so easily.

"Every person has a lifeforce. Even vampires have a life force, but reading a vampire is different than reading a human or a wolf. The same goes for all the supernatural beings. Fae, witches and warlocks, the other shifters and even the less common types like daemon, djinn, spirits, merfolk. It doesn't matter what the type is, if they're alive they have a life force, essence, inside of them and I can read that essence like it's an aura. I don't often pay attention to it unless I am meeting new people, but it is a handy skill to have sometimes. I just wish I would have seen Octavius in person before sending him your way, I would have known his essence was changed."

"And what exactly is different about my essence?" Little Bunny asked him nervously.

"Well, Trinity, I see the wolf essence in you, strong and powerful." He smiled at her and she nodded. "I can see the essence of a powerful witch, but one as of yet untrained." Shock flitted across her face now as she listened to him more. "And there is another essence, one that is stronger, more powerful than the other two, but it is still awakening. But when it is fully awakened, it will be quite powerful indeed. This third essence will be the one to rule your aura, it is who you were meant to be all along."

"But what is it?" Little Bunny pleaded with him to know.

"I wish I could tell you. But know this my dear, in all my five centuries and more of life I have never seen an essence quite like this one."

"Is that a bad thing?" I asked him as it looked like Little Bunny couldn't talk anymore.

"Not at all. I sense that this essence is great and powerful, wise and fair, strong and determined, it is full of nothing but positives."

"When, and how, will I find out what it is?" There was fear in my mate's eyes that looked like it would be permanent.

"I do not know the answer to that, I am sorry. But I am willing to help you figure this out if I can."

"We would appreciate that, Dietrich, thank you." I offered him my sincere gratitude.

It seemed that everyone in the room was at a momentary loss for words as everyone looked slowly around at each other. Trying to figure out the meaning behind Dietrich's words would take us a long time, I was sure. But for now, it was time to move onto the most important subject. The whole reason why Dietrich was here.

"Dietrich, we need your help, same as we needed the help when the emissary was coming here. We need to find the leader of a certain coven of Warlocks and Witches."

"Yes, I know that you mentioned that before, but you didn't tell me who it was you were looking for. Nor did you tell me the reason why." I could see the seriousness sharpen the look in Dietrich's eyes.

"We need to find the High Warlock of the Sacramentum de Mortis." Dietrich's eyes went wide with shock.

"Why on earth are you looking for Gannon? He is a terrible man with terrible ideals."

"We've noticed." Little Bunny quipped sarcastically.

"Trinity, you must stay away from that man, if he learns you have the blood of a witch, he will most definitely try to make you one of his."

"He already tried." I stated flatly. "He took her back in January and held her for a little over two days."

"How did you ever find him then?"

"He tracked me through our mate marks." Dietrich's eyes flared at the plural use of that word, I'm certain we will be talking about that at some point.

"You are lucky to have escaped. Gannon is a ruthless, ruthless man. He is not even against experimenting on and torturing his own children."

"Oh, I know that first hand, I experienced said torture."

"Wait, Trinity, are you telling me that Gannon is-."

"Yes, Gannon Cornelius Edmond is my father." Trinity interrupted Dietrich, causing him to gasp at her words. "Mind you, I didn't know who he was until I woke up in the cellar of his torture house. He and four other warlocks tortured me both with and without magic."

"You're very lucky to be alive. Having your wolf is most likely what saved you."

"I didn't even have a wolf until after he kidnapped me. I had never changed until then. It happened literally at the stroke of midnight."

"That's a powerful time." Dietrich smiled.

"Yeah, well, to make it worse it was the stroke of midnight ringing in my birthday." Dietrich gasped, his jaw hanging open for just a moment before he snapped it shut and continued to speak.

"Trinity, how old are you now?" Dietrich's voice was filled with awe.

"Ninteen, why?"

"I knew it."

"Knew what?" I demanded of him.

"The number nineteen, while having so many important signifiers in numerology, is a number very prominent for the moon goddess. As you know there are several Gods and Goddesses that we supernaturals worship, a different one for each of us. Shifters, of all types, worship the Celtic Goddess Nehalennia. She was said to have a fondness for the number nineteen and would have that number around her in some way. Nineteen pieces of fruit in her basket, nineteen wolves following her. Whatever the reason, nineteen is indeed a number to be associated with your moon goddess. And that you would wait to have your shift until you were nineteen means that you are destined to be special. Goddess touched as they might say."

Noah and I both looked at my Little Bunny, identical looks of worry on our faces. Dietrich was not the only person to say that Trinity was marked by the Goddess.

"Rest assured, Reece, I will make sure I help you find Gannon, no matter what."

"Good, then we will be able to rescue the children."

"What children?"

"Edmond orchestrated the kidnapping of eight children from the city, three of them cubs from the pack." Otsana told him, finally adding something to the conversation after watching on completely enraptured by everything being said.

"Only eight? You're sure."

"Only eight from here, we haven't been informed of any others yet." I told him.

"Though I have a feeling he wants, or needs, four more before he can do whatever it is he has planned." Little Bunny told the whole room.

"I believe you are right, Trinity." Dietrich frowned, a line of worry and anger between his brow, it was the first wrinkle I had seen appear on his face. "We truly must work hard to find them. I will not leave until I help you bring those children home."