Philip came into the living room in a flurry. "They have eyes on him."

All eyes in the room went to Philip, processed the information, then turned to Finn.

Finn nodded. "Then we go and don't come back until it's done."

For the first time in weeks, Mikko was leaving me. My security blanket to make sure I didn't step out of line was leaving.

Finn and Philip both immediately walked out of the room, I could feel the vibrations throughout the pack, mobilizing.

There were wolves going towards the specified location, there were wolves coming to guard the pack house. There were wolves changing in anticipation of the fight that they were going to seek.

Mikko walked over to me. "There are going to be pack fighters around the grounds. Even if they try to get in, they won't." I nodded, hoping he was right. He grabbed me by both sides of my head. "Put on the necklace and stay with the kids."

"The necklace that is at the house, away from here."

Mikko shook his head. "I wouldn't leave that artifact unprotected. It's in my room in the closet in the safe. The combination is the date of their conception."

It took me a moment to think back all that time ago to a specific date. When realization sparked in my eyes, Mikko gave a short nod.

He started to the door, leaving the office. "say the words Em."

"Bás a thagann dó."

He smiled, "You better mean it." And he was gone.

I went into the room and found the safe with the necklace, now humming with energy, waiting to be worn, waiting to be used.

I held the necklace in my hand for a long time, staring at it. The large, black, emerald shaped stone sat in a plain setting and was just as beautiful as I remembered when Clare had given it to me.

Clare was a witch, who happened to be the sister of Mikko's one and only wife, who died. Mikko wasn't one to talk about her much. I knew more from Clare's recollections about her sister than Mikko ever disclosed about his late wife. All I knew for sure, was that his wife was a witch, and that I looked just like her.

I felt like most of the problems that were between Mikko and I stemmed from looking like his wife. In my gut, I knew that if I looked different, he wouldn't have been so terrible to me. Things would be different.

I broke eye contact with the stone and shook off the feelings. Abigail had told me that strong magical artifacts had a tendency to find your weak spot and exploit it. The trick was to stop looking at them, which also was the hardest part.

I couldn't help but feel that as I put the necklace on, that it was going to be used tonight. I tucked the necklace into my shirt with the gemstone on my skin, effectively preparing the stone for usage.

I went to the play room to find Nikki play fighting with Ben as the girls played nicely, for once, and Madeline held Erik.

Nikki and Mad helped me feed the kids and bathe them so they would get sleepy. Tonight was not a night that I wanted them up late. I felt nervous enough just to be there that I didn't want the kids distracting me.

Nikki rocked on the chair, watching the kids sleep when I finally put down Erik. The necklace spilled out of my shirt when I bent down to put him in the crib.

"That's not one I've seen often." She stared at the stone.

I tucked it back into the shirt, getting it out of sight. "Yeah, it's that special one."

Nikki blinked a few times. "From the witch?"

I gave a nod. "The very one."

"I'm surprised Mikko would hand that back over." She sounded surprised when she got up from the chair.

"I was too when he recommended I wear it while he's gone."

Nikki smiled slightly as we left the kid's room. Normally I would've closed the door, but I wanted to keep an eye on them tonight.

"Things seem to be getting better on that front."

I looked over at my best friend. The distance had put a strain on our relationship, I felt like we weren't as close as we had been, and I missed her. "We were able to clear the air a bit."

She eyed me a minute. "I heard you marked him."

I gave what probably looked like a very sad smile. "Yeah, my wolf did, and I didn't stop her."

"Is that something you wanted?"

I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders. "I don't even really know what I'm doing anymore. I feel like I don't know all the rules or what I'm even supposed to be doing. There are so many feelings and so much guilt that I have just randomly popping up that I don't know what to do with. I don't know how to cope with it by myself." I didn't want to cry, but a few tears of sadness and frustration escaped my eye.

Nikki crossed the distance between us and gave me a hug. "You're going to be okay. I'm here for you whenever you need to talk and Mikko's being an ass. And Mikko's there to beat on if you need some anger management."

I let out a short laugh. We both sunk to the ground, leaning against each other, talking and watching the triplets.

It was a good time to have my best friend with me.

***

I had never been so grateful to have her by my side then when it all went sideways. There felt like massive amounts of traffic going on in my head all of a sudden.

While I was stunned in confusion, Nikki was on high alert, instantly on her feet and looking towards the massive bay window at the end of the hallway.

I stumbled up as the words flew around in my head, jumbled together, unintelligible to me.

Then for a second, my thoughts cleared, and Mikko was in my head.

"He's there. Use the necklace if you lay eyes on him. We'll be there as fast as we can."

Then he was gone, focusing on getting home. I shook my head. All three Madill men were away from home, distracted when they needed to be here.

I heard growls from outside and the sounds of what was probably fighting.

"He's here Nikki."

She nodded and pulled out a silver loaded gun. "There are more here than just him."

The bay window crashed apart, shattering glass through the hallway. I wished that hallway was longer.

"Which one is he?" I asked Nikki as two more wolves jumped into the hallway, baring teeth as us as glass crashed around them.

"Not these."

She lifted her gun and shot expertly at the two wolves who ran at us.

A wolf darted between Nikki and I, barreling towards the intruders. I knew it was Abigail without anyone having to tell me.

Abigail hit the wolf jumping in the window so hard that they both fell out of the window, tussling as they fell.

Nikki went forward, to check out what was happening as I stepped back into the nursery.

Because I was new and untrained, I was a hindrance to the fight. I just had to stay with the children. I had to keep them safe.

I thanked everything I had when I walked back into the nursery to see the window open and a silent intruder coming in.

It was him, in human form, coming in to take my children while the rest were distracted.

"Bás a-" His hand over my mouth cut me off.

He ticked his tongue at me twice, unapprovingly. "None of that magic now, mama."

I had to do something against this old damn werewolf or he was going to take my kids.

I felt my wolf surface. Over my dead body he would take my kids.

I had to take what little I knew and use it to mutter those damn words. The spell was halfway out. A little more and I'd end him. And I would mean the words with all my soul.

In such close quarters, I knew my elbow was strongest. I brought it up and around his arm to hit him on the side of the head, jarring him and knocking us both to the ground.

I knew we had gotten Nikki's attention when she yelled my name.

"thagann-"

His fist came at my face quickly. All I was able to do was get out of the way slightly, so it was more of a graze, than a full on punch. But it still hurt, still dazed, still brought dark stars into my vision.

Having never been hit that way, I was stunned. I had no experience on how to react to that. I couldn't take a full on hit like that.

I heard the kids all start crying as the noise from the struggle had woken them up.

He got up quickly and started walking towards Ben.

I shot my foot at the back of his knee, knowing that was the weakest spot and there would be nothing he could do about it.

His quick fall meant that he pinned my leg in behind his knee, all his weight falling directly on me. He turned quickly on top of me, wrenching my leg, I knew he had hurt my leg in the process.

"You're putting up a good fight for no experience."

"dó." I wanted to spit the word at him.

The spell was absolutely terrifying.

The black smoke seeped through my shirt, engulfed the man, entering his eyes, ears, nose and mouth, suffocating him and killing him nearly instantly. Blood oozed out of his orifices when he fell lifeless and limp on top of me.

Nikki pulled him off of me in one good heave and threw his lifeless body into the hall.

"What the fuck was that?" She was clearly scared.

"That was Clare's spell."

Nikki's wide eyes looked at the body as the kids cried. "That's terrifying. Is it over?"

I nodded once and started getting up. "She said it was a one shot kind of thing."

Nikki quickly looked over the kids. "Good. He deserved it."

"I don't think he touched any of them, but can you help check?"

She helped me to my feet. I knew my knee was strained, but that would heal.

All the traffic came back into my head, making me wince.

Nikki looked out the window. "It sounds like they're all receding."

I sighed in relief. "Good. I only had one shot."

Nikki smiled over at me. "All these kids are fine. Good job mama."

I gave her a hug. "That sucked."

Nikki laughed. "So do your fighting skills. You need to start training ASAP."

I grabbed Ben, who was crying and held him tightly. I felt tears come to my eyes as I realized that they were almost taken, that I almost died.

The SUV came down the road much faster than was legal and didn't even have a chance to stop before two of the doors opened and the two Madill brothers got out of the SUV. Mikko came in through the window to the room while Philip came up the stairs like a normal person.

Mikko looked at the body, then went to it without saying a word. I could feel the waves of anger coming off of him and knew that his wolf was ascended with him. Mikko ensured that the body was dead before coming back into the room. By this time, Philip was there too.

Once happy that his crying kids were safe, he turned to me and kissed me fiercely.

"Where's Mike?" Nikki asked, mildly worried.

Mikko looked over at her with a smile. "He's fine. He's coming in the next car."

She nodded and headed down to meet him.

Mikko looked over me and pulled the necklace out by its chain. The once black stone was now a brilliant green emerald. "How's your knee?"

"It'll be fine." I was amazed with the change of color on the stone.

Mikko had me sit down before grabbing Erik and handing him to me. He handed Ben off to Philip and managed to juggle consoling Angie and Cass. I felt drained and ready to sleep for a day.

Finn came into the room and looked around at his family, making sure that all was ok. He then looked at me. "Come with me, bring the child."

Mikko glared over at his father and took a step forward to follow. Finn shook his head.

"No, you stay right there and fix this place up."

With narrowed eyes on Finn, Mikko stopped. I slowly followed Finn to his office. I wasn't afraid because he let me bring Erik with me.