"There are, sweetheart."

Felicity moved through the ground floor, counting rooms, mapping the layout. Kitchen at the back and stone counters, a massive old stove that probably hadn’t worked in months, but the plumbing fixtures looked functional. A pantry. A basement. And beyond the kitchen, a door that led outside to a cobblestone courtyard and, beyond that, stables. Empty stables with hay still scattered in the stalls.

Ash appeared in the kitchen doorway, leaning against the frame with that lazy, shadowed grace of his. His gaze found Casper, who was examining the stove with a critical frown.

"You and your brothers could stay in the stables," Ash said. His voice was perfectly deadpan. "Plenty of room even fresh hay." 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

Casper didn’t even look up. He just reached over and backhanded Ash across the chest not hard, but with enough force to make a solid thump.

"Ass," Casper said.

Ash’s mouth twitched. The closest thing to a smile he ever gave.

Felicity was about to say something when she noticed Dimitri catch Victor’s eye from across the kitchen. A small tilt of the head. Victor’s jaw tightened, but he followed Dimitri through the door and into the courtyard, out of earshot.

Felicity watched them go through the window. Dimitri was speaking, his hands moving in sharp, precise gestures. Victor stood with his arms crossed, his wings slightly spread, listening. She couldn’t hear what was being said, but she could read the tension in Victor’s shoulders.

Then Victor nodded. Just once. Firm. He said something short, and Dimitri’s posture shifted, something almost like relief moving through the leopard’s frame. Then Victor was already turning, already coming back inside, already crossing the kitchen toward her with that long, purposeful stride.

"Everything okay?" Felicity asked.

"Fine." Victor’s voice was low, steady. His hand found the small of her back, warm and possessive. "Dimitri was just confirming territory."

"Mmm." She let it go. She’d ask later, when the children weren’t listening.

Victor moved through the house like a man on a mission. One by one, pieces of furniture materialized from his storage space a massive wooden dining table in the dining room, chairs, a sofa in the sitting room, rugs, lamps, curtains that he hung with brisk efficiency while Casper directed him on height. Beds appeared in the upstairs bedrooms, made up with sheets and blankets. a few crib materialized in one of the smaller rooms, and Felicity felt her chest tighten with something warm and aching when she saw it.

Within an hour, the manor had transformed from an empty shell into something that felt, if not quite like home, then like the beginning of one.

Felicity stretched, her spine popping, and felt the day’s exhaustion settle into her bones like deep water. "Ivan," she said, catching the wolf’s eye where he stood guard by the front door. "Can you wash Frost? I’ll take Luna."

Ivan nodded. He crossed the room and picked up Frost, who had been attempting to scale the bookshelf, and carried the cub toward the bathroom without a word.

Luna, meanwhile, was already vibrating with excitement. "A bath? A real bath? With bubbles?"

"yes i have everything we need in my space remember?" Felicity said, leading her daughter up the stairs.

suprisingly the tap worked and it had hot water, which was its own miracle the plumbing worked, fed by some system Felicity didn’t question because she was too grateful.

Luna’s bubble bath became an event that involved half a bottle of soap, a great deal of splashing, and a rendition of a song Luna had made up about a frog and a cloud that rhymed approximately twice.

Afterward, wrapped in towels and smelling clean for the first time in days, Felicity led Luna back downstairs and found the room she’d been looking for. Ground floor, near the kitchen, with a window that faced the garden. Small enough to feel cozy, big enough for two cubs.

"This is your room," she told Luna, and then Frost, who Ivan had deposited on the floor still damp and blinking. "Yours and Frost’s. We’ll make it yours properly."

Luna’s eyes went wide and round. "Our own room? Really?"

"Really."

The little girl threw her arms around Felicity’s waist and squeezed so hard it nearly hurt, and Felicity reminded her to be gentle because of the cubs in her tummy, but still pressing her nose into Luna’s damp hair and breathing in the smell of soap and warmth and safety.

She straightened and found Damien watching from the doorway, his red eyes soft in a way that made her chest ache.

"Damien," she said. "I need you to go into town. I have supplies in my space, anything you could want. Trade for whatever the cubs need. Clothes, toys, books if you can find them. Things that are theirs."

Damien crossed the room in three silent steps. He didn’t speak. He never did, not when words weren’t necessary. He simply bent down and pressed his lips to her forehead a gesture so tender it made her throat close and then he was gone, slipping out the kitchen door and into the fading light without a sound.

Felicity lingered in the doorway of her cub’s new room, one hand braced against the frame, the other kneading absently at the sore line of her hip as she let herself simply stand and witness the scene. Luna and Frost were already busying themselves, Luna stacking the pillows against the headboard and declaring it a "fortress" while Frost circled the perimeter of the little rug like a wary scout. She heard their voices blending together, shrill and soft, the quiet harmony of siblings who were finally safe enough to bicker over unimportant things. The window caught the late sun, casting the faintest golden rectangle on the floor, and Felicity watched the dust speck’s drift through it in lazy spirals, entirely unhurried, entirely at peace.

She swallowed, and behind the ache in her throat she recognized a feeling she had nearly forgotten: the faint, stubborn spark of hope. How many houses had they sheltered in, over the long months of running? How many places had felt, at best, a bus stop, temporary home before the next wave of people being after them or violence or loss?

----A/N-----

places stealing my Chapters so author notes are here now haha, thank you so much for reading and enjoying! i have a discord btw! also castles make me do extra 3 Chapters day of, and gachapons 5 day of, also i love you all very much, and im SO EXCITED FOR CUBS!!!