The small infant with foresight leads them up into northern Quebec! While it does turn out to be both pretty and suitably out of the way, it doesn't seem at all notable compared to the rest of the picturesque wilderness around. A decent spot, tactically speaking? It's tucked away in the re-entrant of a couple modest foothills, with a lovely view of the wilderness below. The angle makes it tricky to spot from afar, with the foothills mostly in the way for any vampires speeding below, and not in the direct shortest distance path one might take. They aren't near any large bodies of water nearby, or roads, or cities, or anything else. It is just this one, very specific spot in the middle of nowhere.

"House!!" declares Aurene, happily.

Not... not questioning it.

"Is there a specific place where we should build our house here, princess?"

"Mmm-mm. Here though."

"Fair enough. Shall we begin, then?"

"I guess so, yeah."

... Okay, Yvette does like getting to design a house from nothing. She is still a little cranky about burning the last one down, but! This time she doesn't have to leave anything to her brother's questionable design tastes! With vampire superpowers and transmutation, it's easy to put together, if occasionally pretty tedious. Chop down a couple trees with super strength, use transmutation to clean them up, set them into place, so on. Soon enough, an adorable little cottage starts taking shape.

Aurene is very helpful, and also thinks it's great fun!!

Blair is sent south to clandestinely buy books. He's not very useful at interior design, and he is just fine being far away from the happy couple that includes his sister. In fact, taking a while to acquire the books is encouraged, because it'll help disguise where they're being brought to, which can only be a good thing, when a little family is avoiding attention.

Several days later, with Blair still away, the house is mostly complete, or at least adorable and livable. Yvette still fusses with final touches, though, occasionally zipping out into the woods to acquire more building supplies on her own to add an extra end table or a couple of shelves or molding to the cabinets or something. She is in the middle of one of these trips (with James back at the cottage, watching Aurene) when something unexpected occurs.

The something unexpected is a vampire.

It's weird, it's not like this patch of wilderness is at all different from any other patches of wilderness around. The vampire is probably just passing by on their way somewhere, and Yvette hears them from a distance before she sees them. The noises are unmistakable, someone running through the woods faster than anything else could, and said vampire probably heard her too, because they start (again, from the sounds of it) making a beeline towards her.

It's only courteous to check in with the locals about the boundaries of their territories, after all, even in the middle of nowhere.

Ohhhhh dear okay, she can do this, it's fine. It'll be fine. She's just alone this time instead of letting her husband or her brother do this. She transmutes the entirety of her wardrobe to an exact copy of itself to rid herself of all suspicious dhampir scents, and then. Goes to say hello. From a distance.

Belatedly, she realizes that she still has newborn red eyes, but. She can definitely come off as not newborn crazy in advance, that's not hard. She'll just hop in a tree and lounge in a way that makes absolutely no sense if one is a newborn vampire running entirely by instinct. And then she waits for the other vampire to come say hi.

"Hello," she says, a little nervously. "Don't worry, my coven doesn't have any towns in our territory, it's very easy to not step on our toes."

The vampire course-corrects to go directly towards the source of the voice and says, "No towns? Where do you—"

But whatever it was he was going to ask dies in his throat as he freezes as soon as he comes into view and his gaze lands on her.

She returns his gaze, and. And. Uh? Um???? Um! But she already has a mate???

Um???

She opens her mouth, but no words come out. She just. Stares at. This vampire. That is definitely the hottest vampire in all of the world, along with James, they are both equally hot in different ways.

The... the hottest vampire in all the world, along with James, they are both equally hot in different ways, seems similarly struck.

And then he's atop the tree, as well. He doesn't cross the distance between where he was and the tree, she can tell, he just—relocates himself from where he previously was to where he currently is, now, and stares at her intently.

She freezes at the clear teleportation, is he a witch too this is getting ridiculous, and makes a little tiny un-vampiric squeaky sound in her throat. He is now in close proximity to her and it was actually upon reflection probably dangerous to go greet a strange vampire by herself??? And also he's hot???? He's very hot???

"........... hi," she says, for lack of a better idea. "I'm. Yvette. Nice to meet you."

"Hi," he replies almost breathlessly, if a vampire could run out of breath. "I'm Alexei," and yeah, that's a faint Russian accent there. "Nice to meet you, too, Yvette."

OH NO! HE HAS A HOT ACCENT TOO! THAT'S NOT FAIR. NONE OF THIS IS FAIR.

She is honestly a little too shocked by his existence to really properly register that he's real. Uh. There's a lock of his hair that's slightly out of place in comparison to the rest of his hair, and he's close enough that she can just. Fix that. There. It is fixed now. Oh no what does she do now.

He beams widely at her and—vibrates? Teleports in place, a tiny fraction of a milimiter to the right, to the left, it's almost like he's blurring except he's not doing it so fast that she can't straightforwardly track every location he teleports to.

Oh no he's an incontinent teleporter when he's embarrassed that's so cute instead of blushing he's flickering aaaaaaa! This cuteness earns a little smile.

".... You should um." God it's hard to think when half of her brain is distracted by pretty and the other half of her brain is distracted by WHAT THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE IMPOSSIBLE and she's operating out of half of a percent that's shoved in the margins. "Come meet my coven??"

He immediately nods and teleports down to the ground again, looking up at her and still vibrating in place while he waits.

He's so cute!

She hops down after him and, and, uh. Takes his hand. With her right hand. Oh man is he going to ask questions about her wedding rings she feels unfaithful to both of the people she's mated to that's not fair she hasn't even done anything!!!

"Our, um. House is this way." She points with her free hand.

Alexei does not seem to immediately notice her ring, or if he does he does not comment on it at all. When he takes her hand the incontinent teleporting stops—he wants to be very solid right now, he is holding his mate's hand—and he waits for her to lead on.

Ooookay this way they go! Back home! What time is it, she has forgotten, can it be after 8 PM because she is still a mother with a young daughter and, so, it.

Probably she should try to give Alexei some kind of heads up??? About things??? But there is too much, and too many feelings besides, and and and she is just going to take him home with her and put him in front of James and probably it will all be fine, right. Right. Probably.

James—notices. His witchcraft's range is large enough that he notices that—there is another vampire? And they're holding hands? What the fuck.

"Uh, princess, can you stay here for a minute?" he asks Aurene.

"Mhm!!" Aurene says, bouncing happily.

".... James we just became more complicated!!!" calls Yvette, because, because. Probably she should explain but help.