For all his years, Steele has seen plenty of problems and troubles that he overcame. Wars, love, dealing with his pain-in-the-ass family even. But the one thing that seemed to perplexed him was a certain young male that popped out of nowhere and was interested in his sole daughter. Estelle was his heart and of course she was plenty beautiful so that wasn’t the shocking part.

What was how he was to approach all this?

Dante offered his uninvited advice, but he’d have none of that. His brother could hardly keep a grasp of his own daughter while she buried many of her would-be suitors. Colden’s own daughters were far too young to have boys on their minds; one was too busy thinking of her next scheme and the other was enthralled with playing doctor anyway.

He then turned to those he knew but hardly interacted with from Eldora’s extended families. Being the most experienced father of the lot, Blaine suggested keeping a close eye on Alexei and to trust Estelle. From the bits he had heard about him, this seemed odd given the lycan’s temper when it came to his girls and the pool of men they chose from, but it was still decent advice. Krystopher offered similar words and their father…well, he was much more for interrogating and scarring the holy crap out of the lad until he either left forever stood his ground.

Kaiser’s daughter was getting towards that age, but she was more interested in the “family business” at the moment, Eirik’s twins were too young and too much into violence, and Nemesis was too busy at the time to deal with the situation. In the end, Steele had time to ponder and eventually he came to a conclusion and prepared a letter for Alexei.

Alexei was escorted to Sularia for a “business” trip, though he was unsure what the lord would want with him. He had hoped that he hadn’t done anything to stir his legendary temper, but he also didn’t want to get ahead of himself. For all the youth knew, it could have been military related; though it was the case, would it had not been better for his own father to receive the summons?

The trip took a few weeks and he used that time to prepare mentally for the meeting, but what he wasn’t completely ready for was the heat of the desert as the ship was coming up towards the docks. Dante had been waiting for him, mainly because he wanted to see how all this played out. “Oh, you are gonna love it here, kid. Plenty of beauties around here for miles!” His eyes did narrow a bit in play, “Unless there’s a certain one you’re looking for.” Alexei sighed and spoke nothing as he maneuvered his way around him, clearly seeing where those troublesome twins of his got their ways from. His suspicions were festering even more about Steele’s reason for his audience.

Before long, they made it to Steele’s house which was empty aside from the patriarch waiting for them in the foyer. “Lord Norcross”, Alexei spoke as he dipped his head down. “May I ask the reason for my summons here? I take it that it's much of a personal one than business?”

Aside from a few formal but brief encounters, Steele wasn’t really acquainted with Alexei. Then again, he was never a people person to begin with; only stomaching those he had a reason to deal with. Often it was on the behalf of his father or other allies, but this time he had to be much more considerate in his approach. Until now, he saw the young man as not much of an obstacle as he had quite the potential and pedigree to boot.

However, as time had quickly passed by and he began to understand the gravity of the situation, he couldn’t help but to be protective over Estelle. Even so, the ultimate decision was hers to make, but he wasn’t going to merely stand by completely. “Oh, don’t rough him up too much, brother of mine”, Dante snickered. Steele, on the other hand, rolled his eyes and looked at his guest. “Don’t mind him. Dante was dropped on his head a few times in his infancy.”

Getting up to his feet, he offered his hand to him. “Simple. You have an eye for my daughter, correct? It’s not hard to recognize but I don’t plan to just let it happen without testing you first, Alexei.”

“Testing? So…you’re not gonna beat him up?” The disappointment in his younger brother’s voice was immeasurable. “That’s not fair. You beat me up all the time for far less!”

“Constantly trying to grope my wife is nothing less, you buffoon”, he spoke as calmly as he could muster. The young man probably heard about his temper but he was trying to be as rational as possible.

“Anyway, I have thought about what to do with you and I decided that you will go through three trials, each to test your mental, physical and emotional fortitude. I have also asked for help from the other houses of the Rosenites here to do so. So tell me, Alexei Dusknoir, do you wish to undergo this and seek my approval?”

While her father wasn’t exactly what he had expected like he imagined it, it was far too early to judge on how this encounter would go. For the time being, he would try to keep himself guarded and not expose any signs of weakness. Steele was still part wolf, much like himself and there was a sense of hierarchy when it came to these sorts of things. Dante was doing his best to make himself look foolish, though he’d had to admit that the idea of him getting interrogated or threatened hadn’t been excluded from his thoughts. He was fully prepared for some sort of scare tactics but it appeared that it wouldn’t be the case. With the handshake, it looked like Steele was more of the straight-to-the-point type.

Speaking of which, Alexei stood quiet for a moment before answering. There was no point lying, especially to Estelle’s father who could easily rip him apart. He wasn’t planning on hiding it either. “That is right. I had no intention of doing anything until I had the alpha’s approval. Though…” He turned his sights to Dante briefly, “I was told that her mother was more of the alpha.” That earned a gulping sound from the little rabbit as he knew that the wolf wouldn’t have taken kindly to the decree. “But I am honest in saying that Estelle has intrigued me ever since she crashed my party many moons ago.” He wasn’t about to go into any specific details with him; especially since he didn’t know her own feelings on the matter. But he would respect her decision and hopefully not entice the anger of either of her parents.

He relaxed a bit more and nodded. Whatever these trials would be, he’d have to prove himself worthy in the eyes of the lord. “I will. My pride is on the line, I can’t simply walk away from this challenge. So what are these trials?”

Steele only gave his brother a menacing glance, “Estelle’s mother and I are both the alphas. We share the responsibility.”

“Oh yeah? Tell that to Artemis”, Dante shot back but went quiet as he knew that his brother would soon take out his frustrations on him…again. The older Norcross left it be as he had bigger fish to fry right now. He knew that the boy’s feelings were strong but he was reserved on how he went about it. That much he respected but he also wanted to test it.

“The trials are short and simple. Each will test you mentally, emotionally and physically. As I had said…” He stopped as he watched a young woman dragging something in chains. “I borrowed some help from the royal houses here. Here’s one of them, from the White Rose Court.” With that, the three headed outside to the courtyard.

Aurora headed towards them with a dragon on the other end. “Here you go, Steele. Ma said that this one’s rowdy but it won’t kill Estelle’s boytoy, at least on purpose.” Green eyes latch onto Alexei and tilted her head. “Well, my young cousin got good taste. Hope this big guy doesn’t think so too”, she teased before she dropped the chain and it made a heavy thud.

“Your first task is to withstand getting bucked off for as long as possible.” He crossed his arms and waited for Alexei’s response.

“The hell?”

Alexei’s voice was near silent as he watched the smaller woman pulling at something much larger with ease. “Be fortunate that you didn’t go after one of those White Rose women. They are bat crazy”, Dante offered, “Especially that one. Who the hell can be normal when they have dragons like pets?”

He never saw a dragon in the flesh before and unfortunately he didn’t think he would enjoy seeing one of these majesty beasts up close.

Alexei wasn’t exactly being referred to as a boytoy, but his attention was more onto the large dragon that stared at him like he was meat. Even so, he wouldn't let his spirit be broken just like that. No, he had to go through with this and besides, they weren’t going to actively kill him. Right?

No, he was sure of it- otherwise why would Steele instruct them to send this one to test him. He gathered that much from Aurora’s previous words. Slowly he started to move towards the dragon, who was softly growing at him. Aurora clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth twice, making it lower its head and he circled around and saw the saddle upon it. “Let’s make sure this fellow comes back in one piece”, she said.

“Thanks”, he offered but she shook her head. “Was referring to the dragon, kid. Ma will have all our asses if something happens to him.”

At that moment, he wasn’t sure who sounded scarier- his mount or its master. Taking a deep breath, he got onto the saddle and Aurora clicked her tongue once more and before he was properly secured, the dragon stood up and quickly took off into the air. High enough so that most of the city could see it and the lad that was screaming his head off while holding but not so much that he would die from the fall. Steele looked on in earnest while Dante was laughing his head off. “Poor boy! Steele, you are so heartless!”

His roaring laughter eventually summoned Colden and soon after Sol nearby.

“What the…Steele, what did you do”, Colden said as his eyes kept following the dragon and its attempts to throw Alexei off.

“Whatever it is, the boy’s acting like he’s gonna die”, Sol spoke up and sighed. “Honestly, if you wanted to keep your girl suitorless, wouldn’t it be better just to run a blade into him? At least let him die with honor.”

“This is too rich, I gotta go tell someone!”, Dante said as he ran off stumbling until he found his daughter. “Honey, go tell your mother to get her black dress ready. That Alexei boy is gonna get killed by your Uncle Steele’s trials. But don’t tell Estelle, okay?” Of course he wasn’t that foolish- he knew that she would go tell her cousin.
Meanwhile the courts, one by one were noticing what was going on in the sky- some found it funny while others felt bad for the lad. One in particular that did not was Garland as he watched with the triple grandchildren gathered around him. “There you go, boy! You go and tame that bastard. Show ‘em that you aint afraid of Toya’s little pussycats!” Krystopher, however, grimaced at the thought and looked at his father, “For heaven’s sake, what would have done for a trial then?”


“Easy, he’d have to wrestle the brute down instead. Besides, this is a cake walk unless the boy wanna sprout his wings then”, he chuckled.

At the Red Rose, the lord was looking on with a pout. “I get that he just wants to test him, but Steele took this too far…”

“I’m afraid it gets worse”, Kaiser said, coming up beside him. “He employed your sister for the next stunt.”

“Which one?”

“Aelwen.”

“Oh god, what does he want her to do?”


Alexei was hanging in there, barely as five minutes went by. And then ten. Then near twenty when he felt his grasp slipping. Gods knew whether he’d be sick or spoil himself first before this was over. Given that he wasn’t launched off the dragon first.

Steele looked on silently, never moving and never taking his eyes off the situation before he felt it was enough. “Alright, call him back, Aurora.”

“Sheesh, he lasted decently well”, she said before she whistled. The dragon responded and dove straight for them; Alexei barely clung onto its neck as its speed threatened to finally end him and this ridiculous test. With a few feet from the ground, it halted itself and landed with as much regal grace as it could before setting foot onto the earth. Alexei fell off and hit his back, gasping for air as Colden went over to help him back to his feet. His legs were shakily but he managed to balance himself by leaning against the mount. He eyed at Steele while the werewolf glanced over and noticed a tiny woman coming towards them. “You didn’t”, Colden muttered to his brother.


“Well, he’s a dead man”, Sol spoke with a shrug. “Nice knowing ya.”

Gods, what now?", Alexei thought to himself, barely managing from the first trial.