The next day came with some wonderful news. Robbie called Alex to say that Laura from his pack had decided to move to Lunar Ridge to be with her mate, Dylan. Even though it had only been 2 days since they had last spoken, Alex spent a half hour on the phone to Robbie, revelling in the familiar and making each other laugh. She was invigorated after the call and got ready to start her day.

Although Alex was ecstatic for Laura to join her new pack, she was also mindful that this would be a big change for Laura, not being a warrior. Alex decided that she had better start getting some sort of planning underway on how to get the pack onside for some serious changes that needed to happen here. She would attend training this morning with Kit and the team to assess what was happening and how best to go about her plan. She would need to get the community onside to understand where she was coming from and that her most basic concern was for women and children to be able to defend themselves. It all sounded very reasonable to her.

After checking and re-checking that she was 100% healed, Aidan had left early in the morning. Alex had assured him that she would manage making her way around the pack by herself but she noticed wolves in her peripheral vision, walking alongside her as soon as she left the house to go to the training grounds, obviously on instruction from their Alpha. Alex didn't want to make an issue of this yet. She was still assuming that there was some sort of reasoning behind Aidan's madness, something to do with his mother and sister perhaps, and she was willing to let it go for now. She waved at the wolves either side of her and they came closer to her.

'I can't mind link yet', Alex said aloud, remembering that Aidan was yet to complete the blood oath ceremony so she could link in with the pack. One of the wolves shifted so he could speak to her. Alex recognised him from the training at Black Mountain. 'Nice to see you again Simon,' Alex shook the hand that wasn't covering his naked body. 'Thank you Luna. I really loved the training last week', Simon spoke enthusiastically about various aspects of the sessions that he had enjoyed and found useful.

'Well hopefully I can share a bit more with your pack now that I'm here. I'm just heading over to the training grounds now to check in with Gamma Kit,' Alex said, disliking the way Simon's face fell at her words.

'Yes, hopefully Luna,' Simon said with a forced smile. 'Anyway I better shift back before we get there.'

Alex knew that Kit had never taken on board any of the training or techniques that Nolan had taught the pack over the years and that was why Aidan had come to Black Mountain in the first place. She hoped that with her being the Luna, she could better influence Kit and get him better aligned to the modern way of fighting and strategising. But that was going to take work.

Training was well underway when Alex arrived and she stood back to take in the scene. Groups were sparring, all in wolf form. Kit was walking around the groups but didn't seem to be offering any feedback. Alex couldn't make out exactly what the purpose of the exercises were. The groups seemed to just be constantly fighting each other over and over. She stood for an hour, waiting until Kit called time for a break.

Alex meandered slowly over to Kit now, fully aware that he had spotted her some time ago and chose to completely ignore her. No matter. She was a Luna now and would be as diplomatic as she could stomach with this barbarian.

'Gamma Kit,' she called and he turned around as if surprised to see her.

'Luna', he gave a little mock bow, 'to what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?'

Alex forced herself not to roll her eyes at the distain dripping from his words. 'Just here to offer my services Kit. I can help continue the training from last week. Your warriors seem to have really enjoyed it and learned a lot so why not give the training to the entire squad?' She made sure to speak clearly so that the warriors could hear her. A few of the warriors who had trained at Black Mountain nodded in agreement. Kit noticed this and became incensed.

'No need Luna, I have the training under control here as always,' he said through gritted teeth. 'Maybe you'd be better placed using your energies elsewhere.'

Alex smiled in the face of his clear disrespect. 'I think I'll stay a while Kit, just in case you've forgotten any of the particulars of the training. I'd be delighted to help.'

'Luna, I would remind you that the womenfolk don't train. You have no authority here.' He was almost shouting now. Alex was appalled by his disrespect.

'Unless you want me to lay you out on your back again Gamma, I'd advise you to be quiet and go about your business. I'll be over here when you need me.' She indicated the seating area at the back of the grounds which would give her the best view of the entire training area. She walked away, glad at least that she had kept her temper but not happy with causing a scene on her first day at training.

Marcus joined her after she had watched another hour of training. She was appalled by Kit's methods and the fact that he hadn't tried to introduce anything from the Black Mountain training.

'I don't understand Kit. I want to make his team better. I want to protect the pack better. Why won't he accept my help?'

'Well, first things first, and I hate to be the one to tell you this but Luna, you are a lady,' Marcus gave her a playful shove and continued, 'Kit is stubborn and hates change. Simple as that. But he's loyal as hell to Aidan. There were times when things could have gone really badly for Aidan but Kit convinced a lot of the ranked members who had loyal to Aidan's father to give Aidan a chance and let him do things differently. Ironic, I know that he got others onside for change,' Marcus said it before Alex could. 'So Aidan is lenient with him, sometimes too much so, but Kit makes up part of the stability of the pack. And I think he knows that he needs to update his mindset but absolutely despises anyone or anything that lets him know this. And so the vicious circle continues.'

'This pack sounds very complicated,' Alex sighed heavily at the insight.

'Do you want to spar for a while? I could use a workout and you seem like you might be able to keep up with me,' Alex goaded Marcus.

'You're on Luna,' he laughed, jumping up from his seat.