Disclaimer: As always I own nothing but the original characters and the plot. Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it.

Note: So this was going to be a lot longer and more developed, but the muses just weren't and aren't cooperating and haven't been for a while now. So sorry for any loose ends that will be left in the end, I'll try to wrap things up a few chapters so you all at least have an ending. Thanks for sticking with it!

The Challenges Ahead

To give credit where it was due, Blake had to hand it to Kingsley for the amount of restraint the older man had shown over the last hour or so. The man had hardly had any chance to make real physical contact with Beta, Barsad having made it quite clear that he had no intention of letting her go from the circle of his arms for the foreseeable future. And more than that Kingsley hadn't had a chance to really talk one on one with his daughter either, since she was justifiable just as wrapped up in Barsad who she actually knew and had an emotional connection to. Not that she'd ignored her biological father, she'd spoken and hugged him when they'd been introduced, but for the most part Barsad and Beta were very obviously all about each other with very little else filtering through.

But the older wolf obviously understood, at least on some level, the sort of bond Beta and Barsad had, and therefore wasn't complaining about the fact that his daughter's 'boyfriend' was taking precedent over him. Well that and Blake was rather sure that the man still hadn't quite wrapped his mind completely around the idea that the daughter he'd never met, and had believed for years to be dead, was actually sitting beside him now on the couch.

Though technically the men were sitting on the couch and Beta was sitting in Barsad's lap.

The better to transfer his scent onto her, Blake thought with continued amusement, having noted that the wolf hadn't liked smelling Blake on his girl one little bit. The suspicious looks Barsad had been sending in his direction since he'd gotten here hadn't been all that subtle. And only a little subtler that the way Barsad had been nuzzling, caressing, and keeping Beta physically close to him to get his scent all over her in a claim no one with a proper nose could miss.

It was both amusing and sweet, with the added edge of personal pain since Bane had never deliberately covered him in his scent that way to warn others away from him. But then they just didn't have that sort of relationship, now did they? Couldn't, because of the same bitch that had kept these two apart for years.

Life was far too often as much a bitch as Talia, really.

And since four and five would be even more of a crowd than three in this case, Blake stayed off to the side with Salar for the most part, observing the three wolves while staying out of the conversation or even drawing attention to their presence. Not that their ears weren't cocked to hear everything being said no matter how low Beta and Barsad occasionally dropped their voices as they stared into each other's eyes like the star crossed lovers it was embarrassingly obvious they were.

Which, Blake noted, had Kingsley obviously torn between being embarrassed and trying not to look, a little annoyed because when the two zoned out that way they forgot all about him, while also being pleased that his daughter had a man in her life who loved her so much.

Still, when Kingsley got up from his seat and walked over to take a seat beside Blake for the moment he wasn't all that surprised, and would have even suggested they go outside to let the lovebirds have more alone time if not for the fact that the two were too wrapped up in each other to properly protect themselves from a possible attack. All their senses were focused on each other, and that left them too vulnerable given the present climate.

So they were stuck and they all knew it.

"She's said nothing to you about her plan?" Kingsley asked quietly, despite the fact that their hearing was all good enough that he might as well have shouted it.

"No, which concerns me. Not even pulling the pretend alpha card worked for me, and that usually does."

"Knowing what you do about their pack, what would you do in her shoes?"

"I'd temporarily paralyze Bane and rip The Great Bitch's fucking throat out."

Blinking, Kingsley just raised an eyebrow before asking the obvious and most important question. "Is she up to killing her if necessary?"

Blake nodded. "Yes, in a fair fight. Or even in an unfair one, provided it's one on one. She couldn't get past Bane." That he could was left unsaid, just implied. "She's a Gotham survivor, Kingsley. Killing is what we were bred and trained for. And she's been training to kill Talia for decades. That's not what we need to worry about."

"What do we need to worry about?"

"Under what circumstances she kills her. And the backlash that comes from that. Talia is their alpha, however undeserving of that title she is, so Beta can't challenge her in a way they would understand and automatically accept. According to their rules she has to work her way up the ranks to earn the right to face off against the alpha, and while Barsad would submit…"

"Bane won't."

"Exactly. And Talia won't accept a direct challenge, she's not that stupid. In some ways she's probably even weaker than she was the last time she faced Beta simply by virtue of the fact that her father hasn't been alive to push her to excel, and Bane's been her muscle for over a decade. She's been relying on her brains, not her brawn for years now. And while normally that's a good thing, in this case Beta is smarter than she is too."

A short silence of contemplation, and then Kingsley asked if Blake thought his daughter was banking on Bane exiling Talia for the fact that she'd attempted to murder Layla years ago, and had caused her to be sent to Gotham.

"According to what I've been told, Bane promised that only if she'd died as a result of Talia's actions. Beta isn't dead. And the members of that pack have been brainwashed since birth to think of Talia as their alpha, her wellbeing paramount and her word law. There's no guarantee they'll agree to have her expelled from the pack, especially since we can't know what Bane will have to say on the matter."

"What do you think he'll do?"

"Besides piss me off at him?"

A faint sound of amusement. "Besides that, yes."

"I have no idea. And that worries me almost as much as what Beta has up her sleeve."

)

After spending a little over twenty minutes trying to get Beta to tell her what she had planned, she wouldn't even tell Barsad no matter how he tried to reason or pressure her into it, the alarm went off on Blake's cell to inform him that they had company coming. Naturally Blake wasn't surprised that after accessing the images the cameras revealed to him that it was Bane coming to pay a visit, no sign of passengers with him in the vehicle. He'd expected the man earlier, but better late than before Beta unleashed her plan on the masses.

Getting up from the chair he'd been occupying Blake cleared his throat, waiting until all eyes were on him before stating that Bane was coming up the drive and that he was going out to greet and bring him in. If that was okay with them.

"She's not with him?"

Beta's father was quick to reassure her on that count. "Talia is confined to her quarters, as I said."

The look Beta gave him was rueful, her hand leaving Barsad's arm to pat Kingsley's for a moment before returning to its earlier position. "She doesn't tend to stay where she's put…Father. It's one of her many annoying quirks."

While Kingsley all but blushed with pleasure at being called father, Barsad surprised everyone by asking if Bane was armed, his tone of voice suggesting that he wasn't discounting his best friend as a possible threat in this case. One he was prepared to fight, if necessary.

"He wouldn't need one, but no, I won't let him in here with anything. And I wouldn't let him in here if I thought he would hurt her. She's MINE too, you know."

"And yet he's still in denial that he's my alpha." Beta smirked at him, and then grinned at Barsad.

"That's a stupid wolf thing. And I never said I didn't have a dominant personality. An of my exes will swear to that." Winking as he tacked that bit on for a bit of mood lightening, Blake saluted them and then telling Salar to remain behind headed for the front of the cabin, knowing that Bane would be waiting for him outside rather than just coming inside. The wolf wasn't a complete idiot after all.

Opening the door to find Bane leaning against the side of his car, not even daring to step onto the porch without permission given that he hadn't called ahead, Blake raised a hand in teasing greeting, wiggling his fingers in Bane's direction as he walked across the porch to the short set of steps. Steps he didn't bother to use of course, the jaguar in him sniffing at the idea as he jumped down and then continued to saunter over to the wolf who'd straightened up from his deceptively relaxed pose, and was now facing him squarely, eyes focused solely on him.

"She's in there."

"Yes. How'd you guess?"

"I can smell her on you."

Lips twitching a little, how could they not given the tone and his earlier thoughts on the matter, Blake raised a questioning eyebrow. "Problem?"

Bane gave him a cool look. "You know the answer to that."

"Do I?" Moving in closer, Blake deliberately gave the other man as innocent a look as he could manage when he came to a stop with hardly a breath between them, silently daring the wolf to even think he had the right to demand that Blake smell only of him.

Reaching out Bane ran one possessive hand down Blake's back, letting his actions speak for him on that count. "May I go in and see her myself?"

"See but not touch without permission." And realizing how that sounded Blake frowned for a moment before tacking on the explanation that Barsad was feeling very possessive and had allowed Kingsley to hug his daughter once before pulling Beta into his lap and keeping her there.

"They're mates."

"Yes."

A moment of silence, and then Bane's gaze shifted over to look in the direction of the cabin. "When the members of the Sullivan compound visited here, they warned me that if Talia stepped out of line there was someone waiting in the wing who would put her in her grave. They were very careful at the time not to give a gender or species…they meant Layla, didn't they?"

"Can you think of someone who would want her dead more?" Not even his hatred ran as deeply, Blake silently acknowledged, which was saying something. But when you got right down to it Bane had never really been his, but Barsad had been Layla's until they'd been separated. She knew what she'd lost. And had had years of living with that loss.

"Does she intend to kill her now?"

"Currently she has a plan she won't tell me about." And because it needed to be said, a line drawn in the sand so to speak, Blake reached out to forcefully grip the other man's chin so that he could turn Bane's head so that he was looking at him again. "If I have to I'll take you down to protect her. She and I aren't pack, we're family. And I won't let harm come to her. Even if it means hurting you. Don't make me hurt you, Bane."

Their gazes holding without so much as a blink, time passed and then Bane reached up behind his head, undoing the straps that kept his mask in place. And taking it off, Bane let it dangle from one hand, the other now moving to cup Blake's cheek. "I know."

"I know? Did you just 'I know' me?" Thanks to his jaguar genes Blake's jaw had no problem dropping in surprise, even as his brain quickly supplied the answer that Bane had no idea of the pop culture reference he'd just made. Which was confirmed by the confused look Bane gave him as he asked what he meant by that.

"Star Wars, Sweetie. It means…nevermind what it means." And realizing that this brief moment of amusement and calm before the storm had to end, Blake said to hell with it, and framed Bane's face between his hands, giving him the words back. "I know too."

The kiss was short but passionate, the tight, clinging hug that followed it lasting several minutes more before Blake forced himself to pull away and remind them both of what was to come. "We need to go inside."

"Duty calls." Bane agreed softly, taking Blake's hand and bringing it up to place a kiss against his wrist where the webbing would come out if Blake attacked, a final loving touch before Bane's fingers went to work returning his mask to its place over his face, hiding so much of it and his thoughts from view.

Nodding his head in acknowledgement of that, Blake turned around and started back towards the cabin, Bane following after him

)

As he stepped onto the porch Bane heard it, the faintest of sounds that had him looking in the direction of Blake's hands, something telling him to look there. And looking he saw the claws that had come out from under the man's fingernails. Painful, Blake had told him once, when he'd asked about them, but over quickly and worth it for the ten small blades his kitten now had at his disposal. Though not his kitten now. The unsheathing of the claws signaled, like the return of the mask to his face, that this wasn't about them anymore. This was about those under their protection. The people whose wellbeing they put before their own.

Following the other man into the cabin, they didn't have far to go before Layla came into Bane's line of vision, the grown up version of the girl he'd once known standing in the middle of the room with Barsad and Kingsley flanking her, Salar standing off to the side a little, but remaining close enough that he could throw himself into the fray in mere seconds.

Focusing on Layla, his pack mate back from the dead, Bane didn't know what to say to her. A selfish part of him wished she'd never come back, that they'd never learned of what had happened to her, while at the same time her return meant an end was coming. Regardless of what happened today things would change, Layla a pebble dropped into their pond with endless ripples on the horizon. And change was needed, they all knew that.

"Hello, Bane."

"Hello, Layla."

Neither making a move towards each other, Layla's voice was soft when she asked him what he would do now.

"In all honesty, I don't know."

The look Layla gave him was kind and gentle, making it clear that no matter what horrors she'd experienced at Gotham, her core personality had remained the same. A fierce, but loving protector of her pack and family.

"I thought that would be your answer. You haven't changed. But I owe you a debt, my old friend, and I'll honor that. Just give me a few minutes to change and then I'll go with you to face her. You won't have to decide what to do about Talia and what's she's done."

"You owe me no debt. It's I that failed to protect you." He'd known that Talia was jealous of her after all. He should have seen the attack coming, should have found some way to keep her safe and with Barsad.

"No. She'd have found a way. She always finds a way. You know that. And I owe you for taking care of Barsad when I couldn't." A brief look in Barsad's direction, a squeezing of the hand she held, and then Layla looked back over at Bane to meet his gaze. "Whatever happens today, I don't blame you for anything."

Knowing he was undeserving of that, but that she wouldn't listen, Bane inclined his head in acknowledgement instead.

"I'll be right back, promise." Giving Barsad's hand one last squeeze, Layla tugged on the hand that held hers, her gaze locking with Barsad's when he refused to let go.

Finally he let go, and with a smile meant to encompass all of them Layla headed out of the room, Blake stating that he needed to change too, leaving the four wolves alone in the room to stand around and wait for the other two to return.

Turning his gaze to his closest and most trusted friend, Bane didn't know what to say to Barsad, who was very pointedly ignoring him at the moment. But something had to be said, especially since there was no one's advice he valued more. "Exiling her won't work. And I…I can't kill her. I'm sorry, but I can't."

"Then let me do it."

"I can't."

"Let the rest of the pack vote about what to do. Let everyone have a voice."

Both wolves turned their head to look at Salar, who was obviously fighting his need to look away as he continued to meet their gazes head on. "I know there's a hierarchy, and that we've been trained since birth to let the higher ranking wolves make all the decisions, but that's not fair. And it will backfire in this case. She has a lot of supporters, we-you need to do this as fairly and openly as possible. Layla no more wants to tears the pack apart than any of us do."

"And she has this plan of hers. We should find out what that is too." Kingsley added, finally joining the conversation.

Knowing that to be true, and none of them wanting to fight amongst each other, the four nodded in silent acknowledgement of the FUBAR situation they were in.

And the fact that it was probably going to get worse before it got better.