Hell Hounds

Yolanda and lan finally got out of their cottage. They returned to the packhouse and promptly found breakfast platters in their hands, thanks to a rather perky Hilda.

"The dining room is still available for those eating up here, but the buffet won't be until lunch, and you'll find that served in the main lobby to go only. We've more soldiers than we have spaces for. At least the Bears and Vampires are feeding themselves. Everyone else is in the dining room, so mind the crowd, and no, the sitting rooms are off limits to food. I'm not clean sofas and carpets again." Hilda puttered about the kitchen serving area, adjusting various containers.

She'd clearly organized the various meals by dietary needs of the now various supernatural creatures eating here. Hilda even displayed little placards stating. The woman was far too organized. Yes, it was her job, but... She made it her mission to make Martha Stewart look disorganized.

"Have they have informed the new troops of the packhouse rules? Would you like me to find someone to address that?"

"Not that I know of. It would be nice if you did. I don't have the time to hunt down everyone and tell them about it."

"Then I'm on it." Yolanda didn't mind helping Hilda. The woman saved her butt often enough in the past. Yolanda couldn't count how many times she'd found a delivered meal on her desk in the armory over the years. To her, the weapons were just like meal preparations to Hilda. "I'll see if one of the Hell Hounds can spread the word for you. Let's try to hedge off any accidents or broken rules. Nothing like an international incident over a food stain." Hilda, at least, saw the humor in that.

Historically, there'd been a few over far more insignificant issues over the years. The craziest incident, to Yolanda's knowledge, was the wine glass set down without a napkin under it. Okay, the table was over eight hundred years old, but it's a vampire thing. They get attached to the strangest things.

"lan, I'll be just a moment. I'll just leave a message for Catherine and get her or another to make the rounds." lan nodded as he fixed their coffees.

As she set up that job, Hal and Aria entered. They received the same treatment as Yolanda and lan regarding breakfast. "Morning everyone. You're here for the meeting too?"

"Yeah, just waiting on Yolanda before heading in to eat in the dining room. I hear it's busy and the sitting rooms are off limits to eating in."

"Good to know." Hal saw the morning humor in that extra bit of information. That's lan's way to tell his buddies that he'd already received an earful. "Oh, and if you see a shifter in their animal form inside the packhouse. Warn them Hilda will find them and give them an earful." He remembered Hilda and her tirade about the Alpha's father for doing just that.

"You better believe that. I just finished having all the floors in this building refinished and you don't want to see the bill from that. Or how long it took to get it done properly." Wolf shifter hearing. It's a thing most definitely. Thank heavens he didn't comment on what he thought of it. But that explanation made sense. Who would want all that work and expense to go to waste right away?

"Okay, morning Aria, Hal. Now, Aria, if Catherine contacts you to tell anyone about house rules, you get to say no. So, does Devine. I should text her about that. We've enough to do. They can man the home fires for a bit." Yolanda tapped at her phone a few times, then smiled. "Okay, that's done. I also told them to meet us in the dining room. They're just a few steps behind us, it seems."

"Great! Let's go eat. I'm hungry. Thank you, Hilda." With a series of similar acknowledgements for the hard-working Den Mother, they left the kitchens and moved on to the dining room.

Hilda wasn't joking about the number of people in the dining room. The dining room appeared crowded, and utter chaos seemed to reign.

"She wasn't joking. I think some pups could come in and help keep this place clean in the meantime." Aria mumbled to Yolanda, as they looked around for a table they could use.

"No, kidding. These are adults, right?" Yolanda couldn't believe how many things were just abandoned. "No wonder Hilda is staying out of here with a buffet. I'll text a message to Catherine to add the job of finding some older pups to deal with this."

"Let's eat and get to the meeting. Last thing we need is to be late because there's no place to eat."

The group eventually found a place they could eat. Ian felt like he'd found himself back in a high school cafeteria. How could these people believe this was, okay? He'd never understand these different supernatural creatures. He wasn't sure if it was cultural or actual disrespect and contempt for other races. Right now, it wasn't his problem.

"So, what have you been doing? You were missed in guard rotation."

"Yolanda and I were downstairs supervising the upgrades to the armory. Looks like it's getting a huge upgrade and they want me to work with her to maintain it."

"Well, I guess that's about as good as it gets. When we aren't on guard duty, we're in helping with the research."

"How's that going, anyway?"

"It's rough. From what I can tell, a lot of the documents are in long dead languages, others are encoded, and yet some others are in both. Let me tell you it's hard to translate when you're randomly trying to translate something into another language which you don't understand. Lue often stands over me and tells me if the translation is a hit or miss. It's insane. The we have the incredible disappearing mage. Dean keeps disappearing for one reason or another. Right now, we're waiting for him to return with news on another portal that they've found. This one's different in some way. I didn't understand it at all.” "I'm afraid his distraction didn't allow him to go into much detail about anything."

"Well, we'll see what happens. Maybe we'll hear something at the meeting? Oh, there's Devine and Jaxon." lan stood up and waved them over.

It didn't take long for everyone to greet the newcomers and return to eating. "So how goes the search for refugees?"

"It's a slow slog. A few have come forward, but groups need to go out and look in on these packs that don't check it. This isn't just for shifters either, so we're working with other people from other factions. We're found several hundred now, but it's slow going. Part of the reason is because of their self-isolation or unwillingness to communicate with their own kind."

"Have you been a part of those groups going out to check up with them?"

"No, we're here helping out because Edith and Allan must travel for a few days. It's pretty busy because of that."

"Well, it looks like we aren't doing much of what we thought we'd be doing. Who's ready to get this meeting with the Alpha over and get back to all of this again?"

A series of groans and acquiescing went around the table. "Hey, remember we came late, can we get a couple of more minutes to eat before you throw us all to the dogs?" This was Devine's words and the non-wolf shifters stared at her because of her words in shocked dismay.

"Really? Can you get more insulting and insensitive?"

It took her a few moments to understand what she'd said. "Oh, come on. I wasn't calling anyone directly dogs. I know better than that."

"Just eat up quickly please, because it's arguable that you may have referred to the Alpha like that. Either intentionally or not."

"Sorry." Devine looked at Yolanda, and she returned a shrug to Devine.

"Don't look at me. That's something I might have said at one time."

They fell silent as those with food struggled to finish it at record speed. They at least to their dishes back to where they could be found to clean them.

It didn't take long to find out where they needed to go for the meeting. Another meeting room, because the number of in the know people expanded again.