With Micah's invitation, the pack entered one by one, until Celia, the leader who was customarily the last in the pack, finally entered, with Gabriel also following a second later.

The watcher students, the best ranked werewolf students of the current year, looked around a little nervous, but still maintained their calm outward look. It was not every day they had the opportunity to meet the king, so naturally they held a little interest in speaking with him. Although not that much interest as a visit to the city apparently, considering Gabriel had been afraid they would escape, if he so much dared look away for half a second.

The king worked a lot and he was also not a very sociable person, one could count on one hand the events he participated in a year. As such, not many people had the honor of meeting him. Most could never meet him in person even once in their entire lifetime.

Although they were bestowed the honor of speaking with the king of werewolves, a living legend, the watcher students of course wouldn't become haughty and overstep themselves. As such even the curious gazes were restrained a lot, not wanting to anger the man who was a subject of many infamous rumors.

Glancing inside the large and well lit room, they saw four couches, arranged in a circle. Two larger couches were set one in front of the other with a small coffee table in between them. They were placed directly parallel with the windows, and the other two smaller couches were placed the same, one in front of the other. The nearest couch had its back towards the entrance, while the other had its back in front of the large desk, where Salas was still checking some documents. Occupied with urgent work most likely, the king did not raise his eyes to look at them, so his beta, Micah, asked them to take a seat and wait for a little while longer.

Gabriel unceremoniously immediately plopped down on the smaller couch closer to the entrance, and asked his students to sit on the larger couches that were just in front of him, on his left and right sides. Celia was already mixed between the other watcher students, so she could've chosen any part of the couch she preferred to take a seat on.

But perhaps feeling a bit nervous and conscious to sit too close to the man that had made her lose her breath earlier in the amphitheater, she decided to sit down near Gabriel's left side, on the part of the couch also closest to the entrance, and at the same time the part furthest from the king. This was her intention, one she wasn't able to follow through unfortunately, as Gabriel spoke just when she was about to lower herself to the couch's level.

"You are the alpha Celia, please sit on the other end of the couch." He smilingly said and pointed to where she should move to.

Celia did not understand why her position entitled her to move to the other end, when Gabriel as a teacher was near the entrance, regardless of his rank. But she also had no valid reasons to refuse her teacher's words, so she listened to him and sat where he said, although she did not feel comfortable to do so, as the other side of the couch was the closest to the king's desk. Being so close to the king, a distinct lovely smell enveloped her nose, even more than when she had entered, making her heart rate increase.

With her nervousness almost shooting through the roof, as she was afraid that the king would certainly be able to hear her elevated heartbeat, Celia became even more anxious. But as her aloof face rarely showed such emotions on her expressions, on the outside she looked quite calm. A calmness that she soon also felt on the inside of her heart, realizing that her state of anxiousness could also be attributed to the solemn moment of being introduced to his highness.

A few moments later, as the watcher students waited patiently for the king, Salas signed the last document he was checking, then placed the closed file on his desk. With his urgent matters taken care of, the tall man rose on his feet and buttoned the coat of his black suit, before making his way to the couch nearest his desk.

Seeing him move, all the students as well as Gabriel tried to stand up and bow, but in response to their greeting, he immediately raised his hand to stop them, and also affirmed his gesture with his words.

"Please take a seat, there is no need to bow. We are between family, as we are now in the same pack. The watcher packs are all smaller parts of the royal pack. There is no need for other formalities."

Celia's heart skipped a beat hearing his voice. And the fact that he had referred to them as family only served to unsettle her more, but luckily, because of her expressionless face, one could not tell such a thing.

At his words, the students took their seat again, while Salas also approached the smaller couch.

"Well then, you all know my name. Please tell me yours." He said as soon as he was in front of them, while he looked directly in Celia's eyes.

The close distance between them, as Salas coincidently or not, chose the end of the couch nearer Celia's position to sit, rather than the middle of the couch, made her feel once again nervous, for the tenth time today.

Not to mention, to be under his scrutinizing gaze, to be watched by his ocean blue eyes that did not seem to even blink, Celia felt her heart enrapt by him in its entirety, making her unable to look anywhere else but in his sparkling clear irises. From far away she had thought he was beautiful, but as she avoided as much as she could to stare at him for too long, she had failed to realize just how handsome he truly was, breathtakingly so.

"M-my name is Celia Blair." She answered with a bit of a lower tone, an evident stammer. She had no problems speaking before, she had never stuttered, but she did just now. Her cheeks quickly turned pink hearing her own words, while her interlaced fingers that rested on her lap clenched together tighter, whitening her knuckles. At this point, she could only hope they would all assume this reaction was also because of his illustrious position amongst them.

"Nice to meet you, Miss Blair. I have high hopes for our first female watcher." His baritone voice tingled her ears, as he showed a small smile. Didn't everyone say he did not smile? She thought, as she tried to keep the small gasp she felt like releasing inside her chest.

"I feel honored, your highness." Celia replied, successfully managing not to slur her words this time.

"The fight for the alpha position was especially inspiring. You chose your team well." Salas sincerely commended Celia. It was after all a true fact that she had handpicked her own team. If her pack members had noticed this fact, the hundred year old werewolf king of course would know it even better.

Celia's cheeks took on an even brighter shade of red, as the intelligent yet one track minded person, had not realized her actions were that easily distinguishable.

Not confirming or denying his deduction, she only slightly nodded her head in recognition of his words, but did not feel herself worthy enough to accept the king's compliments. She also could not tell him that what he thought was wrong, it would be treason to lie to the king.

Noticing her gesture, Salas had not insisted with the praises more, as he moved his attention to the next watcher student. With his gaze directed to another person, Celia felt she had received a merciful pardon.

The introduction continued for several minutes, with each simply stating their names, and answering one or two simple everyday questions, before the king spoke again, asking them about their studies and life at the Academy.

The meeting took no longer than half an hour to finish, but the king seemed he still wanted to inform them of another matter. They guessed this, as he opened his mouth again, but was not able to continue his words when the ringtone of a phone call interrupted him.

In fact Salas was really about to suggest to eat dinner together, but his phone rang just as he was in the middle of inviting them. Taking the phone out of his coat's pocket, he frowned checking the lighted up screen, then answered the call. The ID that showed it was a call from the Council's building, could not be ignored considering the work scope of the second ranked werewolves. Naturally he had to listen in case it was something of utmost importance. Putting his phone near his ear, he listened to the person at the end of the call.

A minute later, while slightly furrowing his eyebrows in what appeared and annoyed or angered expression, he closed the ongoing call, before putting the phone back in its place. Then looking a bit regretful, he apologized that he had to leave because of urgent matters.

He thought the students would be feeling sad for the lost opportunity to share a meal, as he was not aware that the latter had actually tried to dodge the meeting, so he wanted to reschedule another meal with them. But as the king, naturally his schedule was always full and he could not make such a promise. Even coming to the Academy had barely been forcefully squeezed in his busy program. So he could only let the students leave... as a matter of fact perhaps it was better like this, the king thought.

Once the students left the office and were at quite at a safe distance away, they all sighed relaxing their hearts. Just outside his office they could not afford to release a relieved breath, knowing that the man on the other side of the door could possibly hear them. His aura was no joke, making them feel like if they were to attack him all together, even giving up their life, they would not be able to leave a scratch behind. The current king was a force to be reckoned with.

The meeting ending earlier than intended, was quite a fortunate event for the students whose hope had previously been shattered. With still a lot of free time left from the day, they could resume their original plan. With this in mind, they each went to their rooms and returned shortly changed and ready for some fun out.

Being born from alpha leaders, the pack members all had a substantial background and each one, beside Celia, had a car in the Academy's parking lot. Though when they went out they did not take one separately and preferred to only take 3 cars, just enough to accommodate the 10 members.

Conscious that someone could interrupt them again, all the members hurried to alight the cars, when a tender female voice was heard.

"Brother!" The young girl called, just as Jake opened the driver's door.

Recognizing the familiar voice, the pack's beta did not continue to alight his car and turned around to search for the voice's owner. Already inside in the passenger's seat, Celia had just finished buckling her seatbelt, when the voice also captured her attention, and looked out the window. Gazing at a few feet away, it was apparent that Jake knew the person who called, as a small girl approached him.

She saw them talking and also Jake sighing, before agreeing to what the girl asked of him. Not one to intrude and listen on in other people's private talks, she tried not to use her wolf hearing most of the time. This coupled with the fact that the radio in the car was turned on at a high volume, she did not know the subject of their discussion.

Even her gaze did not linger more on them, as she waited for them to finish. Soon enough Jake approached the car on the passenger side with four girls following behind. The one closest to Jake was the one who he had spoken to, and three others who had been standing near her when she was talking to Jake earlier.

With a resigned face and reluctant movements, he opened the passenger's door and, looking at Celia apologetic, spoke.

"Alpha. I am sorry for the delay, please meet my sister Jessie. Jessie, please meet my pack's alpha." He said with an unwilling voice, and waited for them to greet each other.

"Hello Jessie. My name is Celia. Pleased to meet you." Celia greeted with a gentle tone, while extending her hand, and waited for the other to shake it.

Jessie immediately took hold of her hand with both hands, and enthusiastically shook it, a small smile adorning the round young face.

"The pleasure is all mine Alpha. I have heard so much about you."

"Please call me Celia. The guys are obligated to call me Alpha because of the rules, but I prefer my name." Celia said expressionlessly, but the corners of her lips were already slightly tugging up in her usual almost unnoticeable smile. She could not deny, she was a little overwhelmed because of the attention. Beside Clarissa, this was the first time another girl seemed happy at talking to her.

"Okay, I will do so. These are Leah, my classmate, her sister Lisa and Lisa's classmate, Angie." Jessie pointed at each one of the girls, introducing them to Celia.

This time Celia only nodded acknowledging the other girls. In the first place she was not a sociable person, she treated Jessie friendlier because she was Jake's sister. And anyway, the other girls did not seem that enthusiastic as Jessie to meet her. It was evident, considering they were silently checking Jake out and only looked her way when their names were mentioned.

"Now then Alpha, my sister would like to come with us to the city. She and her friends do not have a car. Would that be alright with you?" He said reluctantly while looking directly at Celia's eyes for any sign of disapproval, then also added using the pack link.

"I had to ask because she threatened me with telling my mom and I would like to avoid a two- three hour long call from her. But if you feel uncomfortable it is not a problem to refuse."

"Okay. I can ride in the other car. They can all ride in this one." Celia of course wouldn't refuse, the young girl was Jake's sibling, so it was not a big deal to also bring them along. Not to mention, she was only a passenger in Jake's car, it was not really her decision to make. As she replied, she was already about to unbuckle her seatbelt, when he denied her offer to move to another car.

"No, it is alright. Jessie and her classmate can ride with us and I will ask Marcus to bring his car also and take the other girls." Jake immediately refused, then went to the other car, without waiting for someone to say more.

The ride to the city was a little tiring in itself. Jessie was curious about Celia and kept asking questions about the training, and the acceptance exam. From time to time, Jake intervened knowing well enough that Celia did not like to talk much, even now he could see she was forcing herself to reply gently to his sister. From his own experience, when the pack talked and joked around, Celia quite liked to listen to them, but she was not one to speak much.

After some time, he stopped the questions altogether when Jessie got a little too personal. She had asked Celia if she had a mate or at least a boyfriend already. Jake immediately intervened then, and the questions finally stopped.

Arriving in the city, Jake asked his sister where should he drop them off, but she only said they would tag along wherever they went, so they could go back together.

He wanted to refuse, but Celia accepted it before he could. She already knew from the beginning that coming with them was the actual purpose. And though Jake had asked his sister, he of course knew as well this was the girls' intention.

The girls had thought that the guys would go to a club, but they were surprised to find them roaming the mall instead, and even more surprising actually staying together without separating. They also went to a family friendly restaurant, instead of a fancy one, which was unusual considering that all of the pack members looked and were dressed in high end fashion.

"Are we eating here?" Lisa asked checking from left to right the place, her face showing a little distaste that she did not manage to hide in time.

"Yes, this is always where we eat." Marcus replied showing a similar face towards her. Then using the pack link, also added "But we will probably switch to another place to make sure we don't run into you next time."

He was usually a sociable person, perhaps the most sociable of the entire pack. He liked to talk and meet new people and he could find subjects to talk about with anyone, but the ride here made him reconsider this part of his personality. He should choose in the future who to talk to. The girls would not stop asking him about himself and about the other members, as they sat in the backseat of his car. It did not seem like they were only looking for a ride to the city, he could bet they were actually looking for boyfriends.

Evan had also ridden in the car with them, but after asking him a few questions to which he did not bother to reply at least in common courtesy, they gave up quickly. Unluckily for him, Marcus did not possess such foresight, and as a result only he was assaulted with questions.

The pack members did not say more to the girls, as they took their seats at a window table, ignoring Lisa who also sat silently, seeing the brisk manner in which she was talked to.

Not too long during the meal, Lisa found another target for her questions. She saw that Celia was unusually quiet and did not interact so much with the other guys, but still they kept including her in to their talks and each one treated her very well.

"Celia, could you tell me how is it that a girl as frail as you, managed to defeat so many strong Alphas. It baffles me that you defeated all the gentlemen here and you can all still get along so well." Her face adorned with a smirk, and an evident sarcasm in her voice, indirectly she implied that Celia had used her charms to take the leader position.

In fact, this is what she really thought. She imagined that the beautiful girl before her had actually convinced the nine guys, sitting around her protectively, to help her during the test. She could see that even in the mall, where Academy rules were no longer necessary to be applied, Celia was always placed in the middle of the guys, and they catered to her each time they could. If they did not help her, how was it possible to not only pass the test, but also take the leader position?

Celia did not reply, not that she did not want to. She did not have time, because at almost the same time the guys answered for her.

"It is none of your business." Was in some way or another the general response from them, it only differentiated slightly for each one. They did not try to answer anything more, answering would only seem like making excuses for her, and why was it necessary to do so in front of a no name girl.

Beside sooner or later, as a watcher, her power would be revealed by itself. And actions spoke better than words.