My Panther Mate & Our Little Cub novel Chapter 113

Transmigrated to Raise Panther Cubs

Chapter 113 A Little Argument

Zachary looked around the cave with unhurried calm. “This is my home. Where exactly would you have me go?

Gerald shook his head with the gravity of someone delivering a deeply important lesson.

“My foolish child, this place isn’t really your home. Matthew is the true owner of this cave. You need to understand that we are family. He might cast you out one day, but we never would.”

Zachary’s expression didn’t flicker. “Then, I’ll worry about that when Matthew actually kicks me out.”

Gerald’s face tightened for just a moment. “Doesn’t it concern you at all? What would you even do if Matthew threw you out? You wouldn’t even have a cave to your name.”

Zachary was perfectly matter–of–fact. “I’d wait to die.”

Gerald went very still and said nothing.

Seeing his mate coiling toward an outburst, Harper stepped in with perfectly timed warmth, pouring every drop of parental affection into the words. “Zachary, don’t say things like that. We’re family, and we all look out for each other.”

The words gave Zachary a full–body shudder of pure discomfort. “Done looking?”

Harper blinked. “Sorry?”

“You came to see me, didn’t you?” Zachary turned a slow, unhurried circle in front of all of them. “Front, back, left, right. All accounted for. You can leave now.”

“What is wrong with you?” Wesley’s eyes went sharp with fury. “Your Alpha came here personally, and this is how you act?”

Personally.

What extraordinary self–importance.

If Zachary didn’t know any better, he’d think Gerald was a sitting senator.

Or perhaps the sovereign ruler of Beastworld.

Zachary let his eyes roll without apology. “How am I acting? If anything, look at you. You came to older brother, and you’re scowling at me like I owe you something. That’s the rude behavior here.”

Gerald’s patience snapped. His hand came down hard on the stone table.

visit your

Zachary thought briefly that he should’ve scattered porcupine quills across the surface as decoration. Would’ve made for a far mor

teresting reaction.

“Zachary Gerald’s voice sharpened into thing cold and commanding. “You’re the eldest in this family.

Don’t you dare forget what that means.

You look like the oldest person here too, Zachary thought. Funny how that responsibility

never seemed to apply to you.

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Chapter 113 A Little Argument

He kept his face perfectly blank. “What responsibility would that be, exactly?“:

Gerald cleared his throat, and Harper filled the pause with practiced seamlessness. “Zachary, even though we’re here in Black Panther Tribe now, we haven’t really found our footing yet.

“Food gets divided up thin, and your Alpha’s leg is injured on top of everything else. We’re family. We’re supposed to lift each other up so we can all survive here.”

Harper’s expression turned pained. “You haven’t brought anything home in a very long time,

There it was.

No more pretense, no circling around it.

Zachary let his gaze slide to Gerald for one deliberate moment and stretched his words out with unhurried patience. “Sire, Avery lost a mate and still managed just fine on their own. And as for the Alpha,” he continued, “he’s standing here looking perfectly healthy to me.”

“But the Alpha has an injured leg. The whole family still needs to eat.”

Zachary tilted his head with genuine–sounding curiosity. “Sire, are you saying you resent the Alpha for not working while he eats?”

Gerald looked at Harper.

Harper shook his head quickly. “That’s not what I said.”

Wesley jabbed a finger at Zachary. “If it weren’t for you, would the Alpha’s leg even be injured?”

“Because of me?” Zachary’s brow furrowed slightly. “I don’t

remember breaking it myself?”

Wesley went quiet.

Knowing that Zachary had taken a blow to the head during the beast tide and spent two years in a fog with no memory of anything, Harper and Gerald exchanged a glance and pulled out the same practiced lie they’d told before.

ved by a

“You don’t remember?” Harper began, already working up the emotion in his voice. “You were rampaging black bear. Alpha threw himself between you and the beast. If he hadn’t, you’d be dead.” Harper dabbed at the corner of his eye. “The bear tore into your Alpha’s leg. It was horrific.”

What a moving story.

If Zachary hadn’t already seen exactly who these people were and what they’d done to the original occupant of this body, he might have believed it

He sat with it for exactly

and

I don’t buy it.”

Harper and Wesley both blinked.

Neither of them had expected that.

Harper pressed down the flame rising in his chest and put on a wounded expression. ‘Sweetheart, that’s

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Chapter 113 A Little Argument

simply what happened.”

Zachary looked at Wesley. “Do you have any evidence?”

Wesley knew perfectly well Zachary was being deliberate, and the fury that surged through him pitched his voice high. “It was because of you!

“Everything that happened to this family happened because of you, because you’re cursed!”

So now they are resorting to superstition.

Zachary looked at him with open curiosity. “Who said I was cursed?”

“The shaman of the Lynx tribe said it directly.” Wesley had said it like he was driving a spike into a wound, his face lit with a faint, satisfied superiority. “Everyone in the tribe knew.”

Zachary’s expression didn’t shift. “Sounds like you hired a fraud for a shaman.”

“Enough!” Gerald’s voice came down like a hammer. “You will not speak disrespectfully about a shaman.”

Zachary had heard them mention it before, that he and Wesley’s family had fled here as refugees during the beast tide. “This shaman,” he said. “Was he truly that powerful?”

Wesley’s chin lifted. “Absolutely.”

“Then if he was that powerful,” Zachary said with unhurried ease, “why are we here in Black Panther Tribe right now? Did Lynx tribe simply decide they didn’t want us anymore?

“Or is there no Lynx tribe left to go back to?”

The cave went completely silent.

Zachary felt a purely private amusement ripple through his chest. They call me cursed? I’m practically a walking good luck charm. I bring fortune wherever I land.

His grandmother had taken him to a reader when he was small, and the man had told her he was auspicious person he’d ever encountered, destined to bring blessings to everyone around him.

the most

Zachary was just about to tell them all to leave when Gerald rose from the stone bench in a single fluid motion and shifted, a massive grey lynx launching itself straight at him.

“Are

you serious right now?” Zachary threw himself sideways as fast as he could.

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