Page 2 of The Barren Luna
“Oh. I’ll drop by to see Lucy then. See you at dinner.”
He gave me a peck on the cheek and left.
I walked over to Lucy and Calum’s house feeling dejected. I found myself coveting what that couple had, their closeness,their love, and it did not sit right with my wolf. She knew she was hierarchically above them, so she resented the fact that I was feeling inferior to them. As I said, things were much more straightforward for her. She actually wanted to go back to the hospital and make them submit to us to make me feel better, and I found it endearing. Although I had to hold her back a lot of the time in order to keep peace as the Luna, she was the better part of me. She never let me doubt myself or talk down to myself, which helped keep my sanity during this ordeal.
“Ginny! What are you doing here?” Lucy hugged me after opening the door.
“The Tomlinsons had their pup, so we went to visit them,” I explained, and she grimaced slightly.
“How was it?”
“Eh, not great, not awful. Please, let’s talk about something else. How are you?” I smiled at her and she gave me a wide grin back.
She was my best friend in this pack and our Beta’s mate. We initially bonded over both being transplants to the pack, but over time we forged a genuine sisterhood since we were very similar. She and Calum had one female and another pup on the way, and she was the only one aside from my nursemaid who truly understood that I didn't resent her for it, so she never tiptoed around my feelings.
“I’m ready for this stage of pregnancy to be over, to be honest. I’m tired of eating mashed potatoes only,” she sighed and I fake gagged.
“Ugh, it sounds so exhausting. I hope you feel better soon. Did you tell Nora she’s going to be a big sister yet?”
“I’m waiting for my belly to grow a bit, and I’ve asked the daycare workers to focus on some books about siblings in thecoming weeks, so I think that combination will be a winning one when we do tell her.”
“Oh, that’s smart!”
“Thank you, I’m a fountain of wisdom,” Lucy laughed and I couldn’t help but join in. I stayed at her place for an hour, drinking tea and just chatting about ourselves, the pack, and different things on our to-do lists. The stress of the morning gradually melted away.
“Is Calum staying for the meeting with the Elders?”
“I honestly have no idea. I didn’t even know they had one today. I thought it was scheduled for the end of the month?”
I frowned and thought back on Henry’s monthly agenda. She was right.
“Well, it must have been moved because Henry told me about it right before I walked over here. Oh well. I have to go soon since I still have to go to the market before I get dinner started.”
“What are you making? I’m all out of ideas, help me out.”
“Nothing crazy, I’ll make a batch of ragù to freeze and serve some with pasta tonight. I also need to make bone broth.”
“Nah, all too time-consuming for me. Mashed potatoes and chicken tenders it is for the Phillips household. Not all of us have professional chef ambitions like you, Ms. Regina.”
“God, please don’t. You remind me of my mother when you call me that.”
She made a displeased face, pursed her lips, and blinked really quickly at me, looking exactly like my mother whenever she was about to deliver a scathing comment.
“And why would that be a bad thing, Regina, dear?” she said in an uncanny impression of her.
I groaned, “Okay, Lucy, time for me to go home.”
At the market, all the vendors knew me, not only as their Luna but also as a very particular customer. I made my way around the stalls, knowing who had the crunchiest fennel, whose onions were good for eating raw and whose for stews, who sold tomatoes ripened in greenhouses and who let them ripen in the sun.
The process of cooking was my preferred form of meditation: from choosing the recipe to selecting every ingredient by hand, over chopping, dicing, slicing, sautéing, braising, glazing, and then, in the end, eating – it was a dance I was very well versed in, one that allowed me to lose myself completely and forget everything outside it while it lasted. If my mate weren’t an Alpha, I’d probably pursue a culinary career. Even so, I often hosted dinners for friends, political visitors, and pack allies, and it was my favorite thing in the world.
It was my nursemaid Dorothy who'd taught me how to cook. She was the one who raised me for the most part since that was how things were done in my mother’s Welsh pack. My father met her during an annual summer training program for high-ranked wolves held in England, and she quickly joined him on our side of the pond without ever fully letting go of her old ways. She was a Beta’s daughter and basically grew up like nobility in her pack, which prompted her to hire a widowed former packmate to care for her pups while she attended to the Gamma female duties.
When I moved to be with Henry, I brought Dorothy with me, partly to ease the transition for me and partly because my mother insisted I would need her help with my own pups soon. And she was partially right: I did rely on Dorothy’s help a lot, only it was me who needed the mothering and the comfort. Dorothy now lived next door with her widowed beau Jonathan, and still came over to spend time with me almost daily. Asidefrom Lucy, she was the most cherished female presence in my life.
I took the batch of bones from the freezer and put them into the oven. I took out the defrosted ground venison from the fridge. Henry and I killed this deer together, I realized fondly. Our wolves were still very much in love and playful with each other. Chopping the onions gave me an excuse to cry for a little bit over that fact, and then I recovered as I diced the carrots and the celery. I sautéed the veggies in olive oil and the smell of the soffritto had me hungry in seconds. I added the venison and took my time carefully breaking it up with a wooden spoon, then browning it until all the liquid evaporated and bits of the meat started sticking to the pan. Some salt and diced tomatoes helped deglaze the bottom of the pan, and then I added a bay leaf and some water and let it all simmer while I prepared the broth.
I got so absorbed in the process that I lost track of time and before I knew it, I heard Henry coming home. I quickly put a pot of water on the stove for the pasta before washing my hands and going to the hall to greet him.
