Kuwabara was decidedly the worst idiot ever. Hiei glared out the near-by window as the idiot told Kurama that Jen reminded him of Hiei. Kurama took the foolish comment in stride as he replied. "Jen is held to a certain standard with many restrictions. The way she acts within the kingdom is rehersed and watched closely. She is actually quite amusing once she warms up and relaxes."

Hiei stopped paying attention after that. Instead, he was thinking of what he saw in Jenista's mind when he peaked in with his abilities. He saw her ambitions, her memories of a chiding mother and a father unsure of what to do with her. Some parts were blacked out to him, but he assumed it was because she blocked them out of her own mind.

Hiei pulled out of his thoughts as Jenista walked through the door with a group falling behind her in a tight formation. Her clothes had changed to simple battle attire; A black tank top and black pants. Her hair was tied back tightly, though instead of the traditional bun that her mother wore, her hair fell loosely from the tie. Her subtle defiances were both intruiging and utterly silly; Pointless.

He studied the six wolf-demons who fanned out infront of the group. There was a tense silence as the groups assessed each other. Aside from Jenista, there was one other female. Her hair held the same wolf-like qualities as Jen's, but colored in tones of light brown and honey. The largest male was closest to this female and held a striking resemblence to Jenista, his hair the same erray of colors and sharp golden eyes. This was the first person to speak as he walked forward to Yusuke and held his hand out, an odd look on his face. Yusuke shook his hand carefully. "My name is Salvatore. I apologize, I am not entirely well-versed with human customs, but I believe this is the way humans greet each other."

Yusuke nodded. "My name is Yusuke. The big guy over there is Kuwabara," he paused a moment for Salvatore to nod slightly to Kuwabara, before continuing. "The short guy over there is Hiei," another pause and slight growl from Hiei.

"The girl with Kuwabara is Yukina," pause. "The red-head is Kurama in disguise, though you probably knew that," pause. "And the old hag behind me is Genkai."

Genkai reached out and struck Yusuke just above the knee, causing him to yelp in pain before nodding her head slightly to Salvatore. Salvatore then motioned to each of the wolves, starting with the one furthest from him. All of the males, except for one had black hair and golden eyes, the exception having a reddish brown hue to his hair. "This is Avidan, the jokester and youngest," he said, regarding the one with the different hair and then listed off each name of the wolves.

"Terrance, Makya, Vaislen, the moody one, and my mate, Jettalynn," he finished, motioning lastly to the blonde female.

Each member nodded silently in acknowledgement before Jenista spoke up. "Alright, it is time to head out. We have a long trip to the tear Kurama has informed us of, but if we leave now, we can make it there with only making camp once."

Yusuke clapped his hands together. "Alright then, let's get this show on the road."

They were greeted at the kingdom walls by what Hiei recognized to be Jenista's father and two of her younger siblings. The youngest, a female, barely over the age of six stared up at them in wonder. Her golden eyes were large and round, her mouth formed a small "o" shape and her hair looked like Jenista's, but tied back in a braid. The little girl squeeled as Jen picked her up to hug her tightly. "Be careful, Jen-Jen," she said quietly as she wrapped her tiny arms around Jen's neck.

Jen patted her on the back lightly before whispering, "I will, Leta. We will build your kingdom when I return, okay?"

The little girl squeeled in excitement as Jen set her down and moved to hug her younger brother, who was in his mid-teens. His hair was closer to their father's, a dark shade of brown. "You are going to miss my mate-celebration, big sister," he said with a disappointed frown.

Jen smiled warmly before placing both hands on her brother's shoulders. "I will be with you in spirit, Asher. It is rare to find love in an arranged marriage. Cherish her, little brother."

Asher seemed to accept that and he turned to say goodbye to Salvatore. Leta had wondered over to Hiei and jumped up as high as she could to wrap her arms around him, which was only about half-way up his chest. Completely stunned and wide-eyed Hiei remained frozen before awkwardly patting the little girl on the back. "You be careful too," she mumbled into his chest before letting go and skipping off to say goodbye to Salvatore.

Still stunned into silence, Hiei dropped his arm back to his side. He assumed his shock was still on his face as Kravyn, the king and Jen's father laughed quietly, staring off after Leta. "She knows no strangers, that little one," he said warmly as his gaze turned to Hiei. "You and your pack have a great deal of courage to face the Delphyr. I have heard their numbers range well into the thousands. I wish you all the best of luck. Take care of my daughter, will you? She tends to let her ambition blind her."

Hiei wasn't entirely sure why the wolf king was speaking to him, much less telling him to watch over his daughter but he chose not to elaborate on it, avoiding further conversation. "Hn," he said slightly.

Kravyn seemed to take that as answer, since he turned to Jen to wrap his arms around her. "I'm sorry your mother could not be present. She is ill in bed at the moment."

Jen looked less than convinced but she said nothing on the subject as she blew out a long sigh. "Come home in one piece," he said lastly and she nodded.

The king turned and gave his final blessing to the entire group as one last male came in. Hiei watched with mild curiousity as the male approached Jen, who didn't even look in his direction as he stood by her. The second he placed his hand on Jen's shoulder, a snarl came from Jen as she cut a glare to him. Hiei swore he heard the male whimper as he jumped back, removing his hand from her shoulder. Appeased by the reaction, Jen turned away and walked toward the exit, everyone save for Leta, Asher, Kravyn and the male following suit.

Jen was walking beside her brother, Salvatore, through the forest. The trip had been mostly silent. A few questions and answers here and there, but not much else. Kuwabara, who most of the questions had come from, piped up again. "So what exactly do you guys do to greet each other if you don't shake hands?"

Avidan snorted. "We sniff each others' asses, man. Careful with V though. He is one smelly bastard."

Jen laughed quietly, noting the glare from V as he smacked Avidan on the back of the head. "Don't play coy, Avi. We all know you like the smelly ones the best," Salvatore said, causing Jen and the rest of the group to laugh a little more as Avidan gave no other response besides a wide grin.

Kuwabara laughed too, though he seemed a little off-set, like he was unsure if Avidan was serious or not. Jen decided to clarify for him. "We typically greet each other by grasping one another on our upper arms, similar to a hand shake. Closer friends or family will touch their foreheads together as well."

He seemed to accept that explanation and went back to talking with Yukina. Jen slowed her pace to fall back and walk beside Kurama. "So what have you been up to, fox-brother? Last I saw of you, you were in quite some trouble," she said, smirking slightly.

Kurama was almost always in trouble when he came to her. Aerisia was the safest place since no one in the Makai would even contemplate her closed society to harbor a demon bandit. In truth, her society never knew. Only her and Salvatore. "More trouble, as you probably can guess. I was wounded and had to flee to the human world, sharing the body of an unborn child to survive. You should come meet my human mother some time. She is a lovely woman."

Jen smiled and nodded. "After all of this is settled, that shall be arranged."

Jen glanced up at the quickly darkening sky. "We should make camp," she said and the others nodded.

Turning to her pack she addressed each one. "Makya, V and Terrance, give me a scan of a two-mile parameter of the area, to ensure there are no threats near by. Salvatore and Avidan, assist the rest of the group with building the camp. Jettalynn and I will start to prepare the food."

Avidan huffed, "Aww, man! Not Jen's cooking again. You nearly killed us all last time you cooked for us!"

"My cooking is fine," she said shortly, Salvatore snorting behind her.

She glared back at her older brother. "You can starve for all I care, big brother."

This earned a grin from Salvatore, "If you are cooking, that would probably be best."

Jen opened her mouth to speak, but closed it and tilted her head. "Is it really that bad?"

"Yes!" At least three of the wolves exclaimed, including Avidan and Salvatore.

Jen huffed but turned to Kurama. "You cooked, last time I checked, didn't you?"

Kurama nodded with a kind smile, his eyes apologizing, which told her quite a bit. "You think my cooking is terrible too, don't you?"

Kurama bit back a smile and held his hands up. "Well, not terrible, persay. I can say I've eaten worse, if that is any consolation."

The indignant sound Jen gave in response said it wasn't much consolation at all. Sighing, Jen shrugged and turned to Jettalynn. "Give Kurama any assistance he needs with cooking. I'm going to go gather some wood," she said, mumbling towards the end. Who knew a trained cook would be so terrible at it? I suppose it's one more thing to piss my mother off with though. She smirked slightly to herself as she made her way through the forest to gather wood.

Some hours later, everyone sat at around the camp fire as Hiei watched the flames dance haphazardly. He paid some amount of attention to the group around him, the open flame soothing him enough to a degree to tolerate them. "Man, you need to come on our hunts more often, Kurama. Feed a wolf like that and he can kill anything," Avidan said, leaning back. "I am certain the next meal Jen would have cooked for me would have poisoned me."

Jen arched a brow. "That's because it would have been intentional, Avi."

Avidan scoffed in response. "It would happen even if you didn't hate me for my opinion of your cooking and my good looks."

Jen snorted in response. "Yeah, Avi, looks so good, you could give a warthog a run for his money," she said and the group errupted in laughter. Even Hiei smirked a little at their banter.

"Gee, is that why you are unmated, Jenny? You prefer warthogs to wolves? We both know you got a thing for me, and if I resemble a warthog..." he trailed off, wagging his eyebrows at her as he leaned closer to her.

Jen wrinkled her nose and pushed Avidan away, smiling. "I was actually curious as to why you are unmated, Jen. I had assumed you would be by now," Kurama said, frowning.

Jen shrugged. From what Hiei could tell, she had relaxed. Her regal and formal air was gone and she appeared to be just like anyone else in the group. "Have you seen the prince's of Aerisia? They are weak and snivelling babies."

Salvatore scoffed. "Being a prince of Aerisia, I take offense to that. I happen to be stronger than you, little sister. I am only your second by choice," he said, humor tinging his voice.

Jen smiled slightly but chose to ignore Salvatore, continuing. "Take the male that approached me before we left, for example. Impeccable bloodlines. According to the council, the most fit mate for me," she said before she arched a brow. "I could poke him and he would start crying, Kurama. Hell, I could sneeze on him and it would kill him."

Avidan errupted with laughter, seizing an opportunity to poke more fun at Jen. "Well you've always liked your men submissive, Jen. The council is just trying to make it easy for you," he said, throwing his arms up.

Jen shook her head with a smile as she looked up at the sky. "Some day, I'm going to find a place where I don't have to live my life always focused on formalities and traditions. I won't have to be constantly scolded because of one wrong word in an entire speech."

It was Hiei's turn to scoff. Had he not been relaxed slightly by the fire, he probably wouldn't have said anything. "Hn, must be difficult, being a princess."

Jen looked at him pointedly and images of her being beaten to the brink of death flooded his mind. This must be some of the parts she blocked out. The beatings were brutal and her final beating nearly resulted in rape. Jen had narrowly killed the guards before dropping them in a bloody heap in front of her parents bedroom door. His mind cleared before she spoke again. "It has its ups and downs," she said, rather calmly.

"Hn."

Sensing the tenseness, Avidan changed the subject. "By the way, don't ever let Jen try to cook you her rendition of the human dish called tacos. Worst. Idea. Ever."

Kurama stiffled a laugh. "I believe Jen has already tried to make those for me. Remember, Jen? We were about seven and you had been reading about human dishes in your cooking class and the result was a disaster."

Jen scoffed. "It wasn't That bad."

"Jen, we had food poisoning for nearly a week," he said, Avidan howling with laughter.

"I don't see you doing any better, Avi," Jen said raising an eyebrow.

Avidan shrugged. "I know my limitations. My talents reside in killing stuff and looking sexy," he said, winking at Jen, who, again, pushed him.

Avidan tumbled away from her, pretending as if she had actually pushed him hard and sprawled out on his back, grasping at his arm. "Oh, Gods! My arm! It hurts! It burns! The agony is unbearable. My own pack leader beats me. What is this world coming to?"

Jen picked up a rather small smoldering stick and tossed it behind her at Avidan. He yelped and jumped up, brushing the embers off his shirt as he stomped on the stick to extinguish it. "You crazy woman! Smoldery the Bear would be furious!"

Jen frowned. "Smoldery the Bear?"

Kurama coughed slightly, "I believe he means Smokey the Bear. He is something of an icon for wildfire prevention in the human world."

"Yeah! That guy!" Avidan said and Jen shook her head.

"You and your slaughtered human catch phrases," Jen cleared her throat. "Anyway, we need to get some rest. We will reach the tear tomorrow as dark falls. We need to be ready."

Avidan snorted "Yeah, right. Delphyrs are nothing but target practice with how slow they move," he said, but even as he was voicing his disagreement, he still moved to lie down for the night.

Hiei leaned back against a tree, staring into the flames as the group quieted down for sleep, contemplating what was coming and who their new allies were. He could say he enjoyed them mildly, though grudgingly and he would never admit actually it. Their humor was sharp and quick-witted. Most importantly they left him alone for the most part, allowing him to quietly observe unless he chose to say something.

He sighed as he leaned his head back and closed his eyes, allowing a light sleep to over take him. Tomorrow would be a long day.

A/N~ Yeah! Another chapter done! On a roll! I can honestly say I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. I've always loved writing interactions between Jen and Avi and this was no different. Looks like tomorrow is our epic battle scene and everything changes from there. I'm really excited to see this all play out.

Thank you for reading :) Review, Favorite, PM, do whatever it is you do, but most importantly, enjoy it :)

Much love ~Jessa