The Unknown Lycan Princess

Chapter Five

Ethan’s POV

“So, oh smart one. How are you going to explain this to everyone when they find out those pups aren’t yours? Which will happen eventually when they don’t have any resemblance to you or, you know, carry your scent.’ Jess mind linked to me as we were walking to the next class.

‘Well, oh non smart one. There is this thing called mate scenting and offspring claiming. A pup only gains the scents of its parents from scent marking, which can come in many forms. One of those forms is marking the woman while pregnant as long as the wolf claims the child, they will be scent marked as well. Another would be to scent mark the pups when they are born. Considering Dex has already claimed the pups even before I did, as long as I can mark my mate before she delivers, the pups will then have my scent. Now, offspring claiming is a little more complex, but as long as it is done before the end of the 1st trimester, the pups will gain my DNA through my claiming bite.’ I told Jess.

‘Well, when you put it like that, then yeah it is doable, but you had best put the claiming bite on her in the next day or so. The 1st trimester is over by week 12. I’m pretty sure that is like now.’ Jess said.

Well s**t. “Umm Beth? Can I ask how far along you are in your pregnancy? In weeks, I mean?” Ethan asked as they were walking to her locker.

“I’ll be 12 weeks tomorrow. Why do you ask?” She said while placing a hand on her stomach.

Damn it. I may have just f****d this all up. How in the hell am I going to convince my mate to let me mark her in less than a day. “Uh…Well you see I uh… well I may have… umm..” I tried to spit out what I needed to but I didn’t want her to be mad at me.

“Oh for Pete’s sake. He let his mouth overrun his ass is what he was trying to say. You guys are going to have to bump up your relationship speed a bit to like hyperdrive. Meaning he is going to have to give you the claiming bite today before midnight.” Jessica said exasperatedly.

I heard Beth gasp before she blushed tomato red. “Oh.” She whispered while her eyes were as wide as saucers. I felt like my face was as red as hers was. ‘She’s right, you know. You did let your mouth overrun your ass. I can’t believe your sister had to explain that to our mate because you were tongue tied’ Dex rolled his eyes at me in my mind. Again. Why did I get stuck with a sarcastic moody wolf?

We heard the bell ring to signal that we were late for class. We hurried from our lockers and I walked Beth to her class before sprinting to mine. When I walked into the classroom, everyone was staring at me. I received a lot of congratulations from my pack members. News had already spread to all the kids. I was mentally preparing myself for when I got home to deal with my parents. I’m sure they already know by now too. A buzzing noise came from my pants and I discreetly pulled out my phone from my pocket to check what it was.

I groaned internally when I saw it was a message from my mother. Another buzz came and I saw it was a message from my father. Well, I was right. They knew. I put my phone back in my pocket hoping to avoid that conversation for at least a little while, but, of course, I didn’t have such luck. Not even five minutes later, I got called to the principal's office. As I grabbed my books and walked out of the classroom, I noticed the door down the hall open too and Beth was coming out of her classroom with her books as well.

She looked up and noticed I was just standing there and she gave me a small wave. I asked, “Let me guess. A call to the principal’s office?”

She nodded and said, “Yeah. How did you know?”

“A lucky guess considering I just got called down there too,” I said. I held out my hand to her and she interlaced her fingers with mine. I grabbed her bag with my other hand and she pouted. “I know princess. You are capable of carrying your own bag. Though, like with your tray with me around, you just don’t have to. I want to do this for you. You are standing there creating two lives right now. The way I see it, I can’t help with that so I am happy to help in any other way I can, and carrying your bag so you don’t have to is one of them.” I kissed her on her cheek again and she blushed crimson while another tear slipped down her cheek which she scrubbed away quickly with a small laugh.

We walked the rest of the way in silence. I was mentally jumping with joy at the fact she was even letting me hold her hand. I hope that whatever happens next doesn’t change that. I was hoping I was wrong and it wasn’t my parents being the cause of us being called to the office right now and something else. As we walked into the office, my hopes were crushed when I saw my parents with mixed emotions crossing their faces and the biggest ones were anger and confusion.

“You better have a damn good explanation, Ethan Xavier Smith, about what is going on here.” My father all but yelled. I felt my mate stiffen and cower behind me as she clung to the back of my shirt.

I growled at my father for making her feel afraid. “Can you not yell around my mate please. She’s been through enough. Can we please take this into a more private setting where there are fewer ears and eyes around.” I said through clenched teeth as I cradled Beth to my chest.

My father’s eyes softened as he saw Beth’s response to his explosion. “Principal Matthews, could we use your office for a bit to get to the bottom of this?” My mother said.

He nodded and led the way to his office and let us in. He then left the room and closed the door behind him. I went to speak when my father stopped me by raising his hand in the universal one moment gesture. He walked to the door and locked it then proceeded to place a device on the desk that started to flash red and then went to green and stayed illuminated. “Now we may talk. The room is secure and anything said here will not be able to be recorded or heard outside of this room.” My father said.

“Now son. We’re happy that you found your mate, but what is this about you having fathered her children? I assume she is Jessica’s friend Beth. Is that correct?” My mother asked in a soft, soothing voice, trying not to upset Beth any further than what had already happened.

“Mom, I had to say something out there. People were spreading lies about Beth and I couldn’t stand it. Ashley was practically screaming about how I couldn’t be mates with Beth because she was pregnant with another man’s child. Dex couldn’t stand it either. Ashley thought she was my mate. I had to put a stop to it before the legitimacy of my claim to Beth could be challenged. Beth is in no condition to be able to uphold a challenge right now.” I almost pleaded for her to understand.

My father sighed and said, “I understand why you did it, son, but now you put yourself into quite a situation. When those pups are born, the pack will know they aren’t yours and then you’ll be putting yourself into a challenging situation. How did you expect to pull that off? You weren’t thinking things through son. An Alpha has to always think everything through before making any type of decision. Even if it is about protecting their mate.”

“But that’s the thing, dad. I did think about it all the way through. At least subconsciously. Mate scenting and offspring claiming will solve the problem. Though I do admit my mouth and brain didn’t account for the timing. I didn’t even think about the timing of the pregnancy for the offspring claiming. However, I am confident that Dex wouldn’t have mentioned it to me during that time if it wasn’t possible to do.” I defended myself. My father stared at me for a moment before he laughed and had a look of pride on his face.

“Well, how about that, Martha? Our son is a genius. How long do you have before you need to do the claiming son? We need to make the proper arrangements for yours and Beth’s school. It wouldn’t do to have a newly claimed mated pair around a bunch of people for the first few days at least, maybe even a week. Your wolf will want to stake its claim several times to make sure it works. We need to make arrangements with Beth’s mother. Hell, we need to meet her mother.” My father prattled on with his monologue. Jessica definitely took after our father in that department. They would just go on and on until someone stopped them.

“Umm. Excuse me, but can someone please explain to me what you are talking about? I don’t understand any of this, and quite frankly, it’s freaking me out.” Beth said.

“Oh sweetheart. We are so sorry. My husband tends to forget to include everyone else in his conversations.” My mother said, with a pointed look at my father who had a sheepish look on his face. “Mate scenting isn’t the important factor right now for the explanation, because it is the least pertinent and is done at the same time. However, the offspring claiming is very important with timing. Offspring claiming is an old ritual, if you will, that allows a male wolf to claim the unborn child of their mate if it is not of their bloodline. By claiming that child, the male inserts parts of their DNA through the mating mark and ummm other fluids. By doing so, they essentially rewrite the DNA of the child by removing the previous father’s DNA markers and replacing it with their own.” My mother blushed when she finished explaining.

“Is it painful?” Beth asked innocently. My mother blushed again and averted her eyes. ‘Well, she is basically telling your mate that she is going to be having lots of s*x with her son so I would say it would be a little embarrassing for her to explain, you dumbass.’ Dex decided to butt in.

“Umm no. It isn’t painful. It...umm Arthur, some help please.” My mother said.

My father looked at my mother horrified. He obviously didn’t want to be the one to say it, so they both looked at me. My face paled as they looked at me expectantly. A knock at the door made us all jump and I sped over to it, thankful for the distraction, whatever it may be. When I opened the door, to my surprise it was Jess. She pushed past me and I closed and locked the door behind her.

“I assume we are having a family meeting? I’m hurt that I wasn’t invited. I also gather from the looks on your three faces and the confusion on Beth’s that I showed up just in time for the good parts too.” Jessica said with excitement.

‘Mom just finished explaining the offspring claiming, didn’t she? And I am guessing that she left out the part of lots of s*x and tried to pussyfoot around it. Am I right Brother?’ Jess linked me.

I nodded my head. Jessica sighed in exasperation and said, “I swear this family is full of a bunch of pussyfooting scaredy cats. I thought we were wolves for goddess sake. Beth, sweety, what they are trying to tell you is that in order for Ethan to do the offspring claiming you and he will have to have lots and lots and lots of s*x in the next few days in order for him to become the biological father of your twins. Because my brother basically said your pups were his in front of half of the pack, you are kind of s**t out of luck getting out of it without a lot of repercussions. Though, in his defense, he didn’t realize at the time that your time to make the choice was damn near already up, so he thought he could give you a little time to get to know him first. However, because he is a male and therefore an i***t by default, he didn’t realize that most women don’t even know they are pregnant before the end of their 1st trimester. In order for the offspring claiming to work, it has to start before the end of the 1st trimester, which means you two need to be getting freaky in the sheets before midnight tonight.” Jess said with no semblance of embarrassment.

I, however, was red in the face and horrified that my mate was going to run away screaming her head off and not wanting to speak to me ever again. Dex said ‘Stop being such a damn p***y. We are an Alpha for Christ’s sake.’