Horizon Ridge pride comes before the fall

Akhlut's initial feelings of guilt and uncertainty as he'd approached Pied's den were returning now, and quickly, accompanied with a growing sense of panic. Alpha he might be, and he'd grown up in a family full of women in all their various personality incarnations from imperious to gentle to snotty, but he still shared that universal male discomfort and discomfiture when faced with a tearful female. He couldn't help but let out his breath in a nervous whoosh when she asked if she and Kisu had his formal blessing to bear pups; if he said yes, which he intended to anyways, perhaps he could forstall more tears tracing down her dappled cheeks. "Yes, Pied," Akhlut said quickly, a smile forming broadly despite his unease with her sadness. "You are the Gamma, and I haven't got girls howling at the borders morning, noon, and night eager to bed me," he jested, with a chuckle that diluted the truth behind those words. "For now, at least, you and Kisu's children are the future of the Ridge, whether they are biological or adopted. You have my blessing in either course."

It occured to him after a moment that perhaps Kisu should have been present for this permission-giving, but the words had been spoken now without her mate there, and so it was done already. The thought of where Pied's mate might be hadn't come to mind until now, but he didn't think that pointing out that Pied had been left all alone in the den before Akhlut's arrival would really be relevant, and he didn't want her to think he was all too eager for Kisu to return and quell her tears. A part of Akhlut ached to be the one to quiet her fears and reassure her, but he had said all he could think of to do so, and the reality was that he didn't know that she was out of the metaphorical woods yet. Knowing no other cliched statements of positivity that he could share with Pied, all he could think of was to shuffle closer to her in the den and move to touch her cheek with his nose, a platonic gesture of comfort that nevertheless lit his nerves unaccountably ablaze.