“Looks like a jungle out there.”

Dean’s gaze lingered on the tangled chaos in front of him. The season had been kind, and the grass and weeds had grown tall and wild. It was hard to tell where the grass ended and the weeds began. They were so twisted around one another it was almost impossible to tell.

“Kinda have to agree with you,” Dean said.

Silun turned away from the overgrown mess. “And you want us to clear it out?”

“That’s the idea.”

It had seemed like a good idea when he’d first suggested it. He owned plenty of land that was still uncultivated. He would never end up using it all, as there was far too much. He was only one man and as helpful as Mikael was, the man was busy at this time of year. It was meant to be a simple clearing job, mowing down the wilderness to find some relatively flat land to build on. Now, it was looking a little trickier than he’d originally thought.

“You sure your Druid powers don’t make everything grow really well?” Silun asked.

Dean shrugged. “I doubt whatever weird effect people say I have is just limited to the useful plants.”

“Dude, you can talk to plants. You told me that yourself, so it’s not just everyone else saying it.”

Dean smiled at the casual protest in Silun’s voice. The teenager had been coming around the farm a lot more lately. He’d been too weak and unsettled to leave the Grove after his rescue from the clutches of Damian in the bowels of the mountain. By the time summer arrived, Silun started showing up around the farm more often. Whatever horrors he experienced at the hands of Damian and his goons hadn’t seemed to put Silun off his stride.

Dean respected that sort of resiliency.

“Yes, but I meant where people think everything grows better automatically just by being around me. But after seeing the harvest last fall, and now looking at this, I’m beginning to wonder,” Dean explained with a sigh. If there was a way to make it work only on the plants he wanted to grow, he needed to find it. Silun was only voicing what Dean had already thought. Now he was wondering if all the extra weeding he had to do this year really was due to his druid influence.

“You could always talk to the weeds, couldn’t you?” Silun asked, eyeing the foliage.

“And say what? ‘Please don’t grow here.’ I’m not sure how that would work. Plus, I would probably have to talk to each and every damn weed while I’m at it. Easier to just get rid of them when they appear and move on.”

“Wait, now I have to ask. Do you like, hear the plants when you’re weeding them?”

Dean winced at the thought. “Thankfully no. Just like you can turn off hearing spirits when they decide to get chatty, I can turn off hearing plants. It would be a nightmare otherwise. How’s that coming along by the way?”

Silun looked at Dean once more, and Dean realized the shaman was already as tall as him. It was enough to make him sigh all over again. Being a few inches shy of average height, Dean had grown used to other guys being taller than him. At least the law of averages was on his side, and he would run into men his height or shorter. When it came to werewolves however, tall seemed to be etched into their genetic structure. Even a lot of the women were taller than him.

“What, listening to the spirits?” Silun asked.

Dean nodded. “You haven’t seen any other shamans, and you haven’t really talked about what happened.”

It was Silun’s turn to shrug. “It’s alright. My master was a good teacher. He taught me enough that I can get by. That book you gave me has helped a lot though, so thank you for that. I’ve been taking really good care of it.”

“I appreciate that. I pretty much have it memorized anyway. It’s better if a shaman has hold of it and I think Talon would be happy with you having it. He, uh, hasn’t by any chance, done one of those ancestor visit things, has he?”

Silun shook his head. “No. I’m sorry, Dean. It’s really rare for the spirit of a werewolf to visit another, even a shaman. I’m pretty sure he’s gone to the Summerlands by now.”

“Summerlands?”

“You’ve been doing all this reading on werewolf lore and shamans and you haven’t come across the Summerlands? I guess I should have looked into what Samuel and Matalina are teaching over in the Grove, huh?”

Dean grinned at that. “I would love to see you try and tell Samuel what he should and shouldn’t be teaching. I’m sure that would go over really well. And no, is that like, werewolf Heaven or something?”

“Basically. It’s a land of plenty, rife with prey, where the forest is never ending, and a werewolf can live free.”

“Sounds nice, but it really doesn’t sound like something Samuel would be big on teaching. The guy might be a werewolf, and know that all sorts of supernatural stuff exists, but he doesn’t strike me as the spiritual type. But, is there by any chance a werewolf Hell, too?” Dean asked, his mind flashing to Damian.

“Not really. Any werewolf who is found unworthy to walk the Summerlands, you know, betrayers, kin-slayers, murderers, etc. don’t get to go there. Instead they apparently have to wander the places between worlds, lost and alone forever.”

“Sounds close enough to me,” and, he thought, no less than someone like Damian deserved. The former alpha had done nothing but cause chaos and pain in the little time Dean had known him. Then he used kidnapped shamans to fuel a crystal to gain power to serve his own ambitions. It had been cut short when Dean interfered, ending with him stabbing Damian and sending him falling into a pit in the collapsing depths of the mountain. Dean told himself Damian deserved nothing less, and that the world was better for his absence.

It didn’t do anything for the twist in his gut when he thought about it, however. Any more than thinking about the death of Scar, the jailer Damian had been using in the mountain, did. Dean knew his only choice had been to fight his way out, or end up a plaything for Damian’s pleasure. The jailer hadn’t exactly been a good person either, just one more sadist in Damian’s pack. Yet the memory of the blood splattered cage Dean had been held in haunted him still. Scar’s death might have been necessary, but it had also been messy.

“Dean?”

Dean’s head jerked up. “What?”

“I asked if you wanted to get started. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, sorry. Just got lost in my thoughts I guess. There’s still a lot to do; trying to wrap my head around it.”

Silun frowned at him, with a disbelieving look. “You sure? You got this really…scary look on your face?”

That surprised Dean. “Scary?”

“Yeah, you thinking about the mountain?”

Dean shook his head, perhaps more vehemently than he needed to. “No.”

“You know you can talk to me about that stuff, right? I know I’m just a kid to you, but I’m here for you too. It’s the least I can do. I owe you for saving my ass like you did.”

“You also saved Apollo’s life, so I think that makes us even.”

“You dragged me out of a prison cell in a mountain where I probably would have spent the rest of my life if you hadn’t come along?”

Dean had no intention of talking about what happened in that mountain. Not with Silun, and not with anyone else for that matter. The threat of Damian and what he’d been attempting was over and he wanted to move past it. The past year had been filled with enough horrors to fuel his nightmares for the next decade, at the very least. Now he wanted to get something good out of all of it, and fully appreciate the things he had earned.

“I’m okay Silun, I swear.”

“Uh huh, I might be young but I’m not dumb. And I know I’m not the only one who’s noticed. You’re not talking to Mikael about it either, are you?”

Dean’s jaw tightened. “There’s nothing to talk about. And what I do or do not talk about with my mate is none of your concern, Silun.”

The young werewolf held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “Alright, okay. I’ll leave you alone about it. Just, please, talk about it eventually, okay? Nobody can go through all that and not need to get it off their chest eventually.”

Dean squinted up at him. “Uh huh, and who have you been talking to?”

At that, Silun blushed. “Dante.”

“Really? Wow, I would have expected Apollo, or maybe even Matalina. Dante? Really? The same werewolf who gets grumpy and swears a lot?”

Silun frowned. “He’s not that bad, he can be really nice. You just got off on the wrong foot with the whole ‘fight over Mikael’ thing.”

“Heard about that, huh?”

Silun nodded. “Do you not like him?”

“I like him just fine, but he didn’t strike me as the type to let someone cry on their shoulder is all. He’s a good guy. He just has a temper.”

Silun’s blush didn’t disappear. “I didn’t cry. We just, you know, talked.”

The bashful tone of Silun’s voice piqued Dean’s interest. “Wait, do you have a crush on the guy?”

At that, Silun turned completely red in the face. “Dean!”

Dean laughed. “You do! Lord, wasn’t Katarina enough?”

At the reminder of his short-lived crush on Katarina, Silun turned away from Dean. He knew it was so Silun could hide whatever mortified expression he had on his face. He’d admitted to Dean about his crush on Katarina after being in the Grove for a couple of weeks. Those hadn’t been the teenager’s exact words, but a crush is what it was nevertheless. Dean didn’t know why it had petered out, but it had, and before the summer was in full swing. Now, it seemed like Silun’s feelings were swinging toward a different, if equally brusque werewolf.

“It’s not like that!” Silun protested, his back still to Dean.

“Hey. I’m sorry I laughed,” Dean apologized, meaning it. “I just wasn’t expecting you to get a crush on Dante is all. He’s not what I would consider the soft and cuddly type.”

“I just like him a little. Just a little. I know it’s not a big deal or anything. He’s way older than me, I’m still a kid to you guys. It’s just, well, a crush, like you said. A teenage crush.”

Dean curled an arm around one of Silun’s elbows. “Hey, don’t put yourself down like that. You’re more mature at your age now than I bet most of the pack were at the same age.”

“I notice you didn’t disagree with anything else I said.”

Dean winced. “Look, it’s obvious, now anyway, that you swing both ways. That’s upping your chances of finding someone perfect for you, right?”

“I don’t think it works like that, Dean.”

“No, probably not. But do you really want me to give you platitudes about how you’ll find the right guy or girl? Or that this too will pass? Darkest before the dawn?”

Silun laughed, “Please don’t.”

“See?”

Silun gave their entwined arms a warm squeeze. “It’s alright. Even if I was older or something, he’s not going to pay attention to me. I’m pretty sure he’s already got his eyes set on someone else.”

“Again with the surprises. He didn’t strike me as the crush having type either. Do tell.”

Silun shook his head. “No way. I don’t even know if I’m right, because it’s hard to tell. But if I am right, I’m not going to go around telling everyone his business like that.”

Dean turned them away from the overgrown patch of land. “Oh, you’re no fun at all. A little bit of gossiping is bound to make you feel better.”

Silun opened his mouth to protest further and then stopped, squinting in the direction of the farmhouse. “Who’s that, at your house?”

Dean stood taller, looking into the distance. “Oh boy, that’s the Williams’ truck. You’re in for a treat.”

“Uh, the Williams’?”

“Neighbors. And Mrs. Williams is going to love you.”