Chapter Text
Katsuki breathed fire into the bundle of tinder in his hands. The smoke becoming darker and larger as the wind picked up behind him and assisted, enveloping the dry material with each gust until a spark caught, and the rest followed.
Heat threatening his felted gloves as he pushed the door aside with his back, taking a few short strides to the fire pit where wood planks awaited to feed the flames he had worked far too long to create.
After waiting and tending the flames to ensure it took and that the smoke rose through the chimney, he dried his brow with his forearm and heaved an irksome sigh. The sweat that clung to his cloth and fur was heavy and pungent, a production of his exertion since the peak of dawn and an early sign of his yearly rut that came a season too soon.
Back out to the crisp arid air he went, sniffing through his reddening nose too hard and stinging his nostrils as he gathered up all the tools he had created from scratch that morning. A small bow, fireboard, jute, bearing block--all of it he had to carve and scrape into shape from the pre-cut logs he had left behind last spring.
By the time he had collected enough dead grass for the kindling, the clouds had shadowed the land and the ensuing chill could’ve stiffened his bones.
He had forgotten matches in his rush. He had managed to pack everything else of importance, but the small box he had on his shelf back home had completely slipped his mind. Traveling back would’ve taken far longer by the time he figured that out, so he made do and set to work crafting as soon as he realized his error.
The cabin still needed to be dusted out. Insect shells and cobwebs and stray leaves had melded with the dust and piled in all four corners and gathered around the crevices of the few furniture pieces he had.
As the fire began to warm the room and the snow remained as soft fluttering flurries, he swept everything out, replaced the old tattered furs that had lined the mat and reeked of mildew, checked the roof, door and windows to fill any cracks or holes before finally settling within the familiar space.
He had a month’s worth of food, and had enough water to last three of his rut days. The rest of the week would either be supplied by the snow or the stream eastward, but traveling to and fro would be risky in his state and in this weather.
All four of his previous ruts had happened in the spring, which was an opportune time as any. He could pack a variety of fresh meat, breads and fruits. His clothing was loose if he chose to wear any at all. He could cool his inflamed skin in the stream and spend all day soaking and swimming, working through his pent-up energy and masking his scent from any other agitated beast trying to find something to fuck or fight.
The rains always came in short bursts. Hard and drumming against the rooftop, always threatening to flood through the decades old framework as the clashing winds cracked in the sky and the trees howled loud enough to hide Katsuki’s own as he worked the fever out of him. The afterglow of gentle showers would always lull him to sleep, and he’d stay asleep until the next bout of urgency ushered him awake.
This fifth rut had been a surprise.
The twinging below his gut and the heightened aggression and senses had alerted him almost too late to the change in his body. Not only did he have to contend with that, but it was also the dead of winter, and they had yet to have their seasonal blizzard. It had been windy, harsh, and punishing the days before, yet it had suddenly stopped the day Katsuki began to stuff his bags.
In fact, everything had stopped--the game, the stream, the beasts, all but the clouds and the ancestors whispering a warning to his joints.
A storm was coming, and it would be soon, and it would be bad to be unprepared.
He had trekked day and night to reach the cabin in time. His rut supplying him with the energy and stamina needed to get through without gripe, but with it came a sense of paranoia. Not paranoid in the sense of fear, but one that made him overly alert and far too hungry to tear at the flesh of either prey or rival as if he had to constantly be ready to prove himself to a mate that didn’t exist.
Fortunately, the first day was the most diluted, so he clacked his irritated, growing teeth as he traveled, and that was enough. He hated that part of his rut the most, though all of it made him feel like a damn beastie.
By the time everything was all settled, he was exhausted and physically drained. The adrenaline from his rut had worn off by the time he had peeled off his pelts and leather. He poked at the flames once more, watching the embers float like lightening bugs and glancing toward the window whenever the wood cracked. His instincts putting him more and more on edge, even as his eyelids hovered and grew too heavy to bare.
He collapsed into his trophy bed of furs, all caught and collected by his own hand. A faint itch tried to get his attention, but he wouldn’t touch himself. Far too tired and overworked, yet he knew by morning he wouldn’t be able to help himself. His rut will hit him full-force, and he’d be trapped inside with nothing but his imagination and two working hands.
--
Katsuki woke with a start, heart pounding and eyes wide and searching. A brief ponder about where he was before he calmed his breathing and remembered.
He rolled onto his side and lifted his head, taking note of the state of his fire. It had dwindled, but it was still going strong and bright enough to fill the entire cabin, as small as it was. Looking outside, he saw darkness and hints of racing snow whenever it was caught by the light, more numerous and much faster than earlier.
Nothing had gotten inside, that much was obvious, and even though he wanted to shove his hands into his pants and settle the discomfort of his half-erection, he knew that wasn’t the cause of his waking.
His eyes squinted as he focused his other senses. The only scents he found was the burning pine and holly even in his heightened state, but there was something else lingering there. Something from outside that crept in through the tiny openings Katsuki didn’t bother fixing.
There had been a noise, that much he could figure, and it was loud enough to startle him up. Heavy and crunchy in the snow, and it had been close. Too close. It could’ve been wolves with his proximity to the mountains, but they're a wary lot and would’ve been far noisier. Bears were hibernating, and deer were far too skittish to brave anything that even smelled like human.
Katsuki got up, threw more logs into the pit and crept near the entrance, avoiding the windows as he twisted the knob as slowly as he could. He creaked it open, bracing himself and the door when a strong wind tried to blow it off its hinges, throwing flakes of snow into the crack and leaving his face a bit damp, but it soon evened itself out like a receding wave, and Katsuki peered out into the transformed forest.
The sky had looked ominously light as it always did when it snowed. The dead, leafless branches were black silhouettes against it, like the shadows of twisted giants, and the snow had already piled up past Katsuki’s ankles without a sign of it stopping anytime soon.
Katsuki opened and breathed through his mouth as he attempted to take in that whiff he noticed earlier, inhaling and ignoring the cold that clipped at his skin.
The wet snow was making it difficult to keep ahold of, but it was there.
He knew that scent like the back of his hand and the realization made him shut the door and gather up his fur-lined pants, boots, and coat. His rising body temperature gave him an extra layer of protection so any more clothing would’ve had him sweating and possibly dehydrated. The last thing he grabbed was his knife before he headed out into the flurry, following his nose toward his right when his lips and tongue became too dry.
A trace of copper lined his throat and it grew stronger with each step, stimulating his senses and pushing aside anything rational that would’ve kept him in his cozy bed and made him fall back asleep.
He stopped just outside the glow of his fire. A foot away was the figure of a body face-first in the snow. A trail of blood following behind and staining its dragged footprints. It had fallen in the direction of his cabin and upon further notice, one of its outstretched hands was brandishing a knife, painted in something dark and crusted that had spilled down and soaked the worn-down glove that gripped it so tightly.
The blood that attracted him hadn’t been from an animal.
---
Katsuki had worked fast as soon as he laid the heavy body on his floor near the heat of the fire.
He pried out the used blade from the stranger’s fingers, placing it aside along with his coat and boots beside it. He then removed each layer of oversized clothing the body had on: a coat, a wool sweater, a blouse. All wet with blood and melted snow, tattered and torn but salvageable, if one was desperate or had the skills to fix it.
Katsuki always had medical supplies with him, and as he soaked up the excess blood with a drenched rag dipped in alcohol, he realized most of it hadn’t come from the body. This body.
There definitely was some that belonged to it, and that is what Katsuki had picked up first, oddly enough, but there were plenty of claw marks that ripped at its olive skin. The deeper slashes were on its chest and shoulder with a few on its stomach that veered off its side. Its face was fine, if not unclean with red splatter.
Sterilizing his needle and thread, he began to sew up the wounds. Carefully and meticulously, licking at his chops as the scent of raw flesh seeped from its ruptured pores.
His rut was gnawing at him. The rusty odor made his stomach growl and the feel of damp, lukewarm skin against his brought a tremor to his fingers as he stitched.
When he finished with the upper body and washed his hands, the boots and socks were next, and they appeared to fit the large feet well enough. If Katsuki liked the style he would’ve kept them for himself.
Upon severing the thick rope that must have worked as a belt to hold up the pants, he tilted his head at the sight.
Everything below the navel was wrapped up in bandages. Fresh ones, too.
As he slipped the loose bottoms from its legs, his brow quirked at just how far down the wrappings went. Past its thighs, its knees, down to its ankles. Any claw marks that had affected the fabric covering them had only been surface damage. The binds were still held together, thickly applied with a rough woolen material as Katsuki ran his hand along a leg.
Strange.
Too tight, though. Its feet and waist were starting to pale and seem to turn purple, but it wasn’t at the point of gangrene, yet. Katsuki scratched at the back of his head but he stepped away for now, grabbing the iron pot from the pit and filling it with snow, which melted it upon contact.
He placed it beside the stranger before lowering to his knees and shifting the body so it was horizontal to the fire. He checked its back, and seeing no sign of injury, he picked up his blade and dug a finger under the band around it’s hip bones, although it clung so tightly that only his nail could squeeze inside. It gave him enough leverage though, as he started to slice through the top layer.
Once he reached the third layer, he noticed the color returning to its skin, and when he touched its pulse under its chin, pushing aside the thought of how vulnerable it looked, he found it wasn’t as faint as it had been before.
Katsuki inhaled through his mouth as he withdrew, but his eyes fluttered in bewilderment as something stuck to the back of his tongue. It tasted tangy. Warm. An aftertaste of bitterness that made him suck on his teeth.
He placed down his knife and checked the water that was now at the right temperature, dipping a cloth and squeezing out the excess liquid before he started to scrub the red-dyed flesh. Wiping at its youthful face and revealing a toned but ultimately flat chest with small tan nipples and freckles dotted everywhere. He lifted the arms by the wrists, holding them both up in one hand as he rinsed them and exposed old scars and patches of damaged skin that couldn’t return to its smooth state.
The body was starting to warm up from the fire and the water, slowly but surely as was best, but as Katsuki continued the motions, it was getting harder not to notice the natural perfume permeating the air around him. More so after he finished rinsing off the blood and grime and tied fresh bandages around it, when he briefly held and lifted the body to place it on a thick blanket he had stretched across the floor, nostrils flaring from the weight and the thickening scent.
Katsuki squeezed where he held under the knee and arm and pulled closer. A shaky breath as he followed the line along its exposed throat as the head fell back like a crane. His teeth rattled as he willed himself to place the body down, shaking his head and taking some steps back to collect what little of himself he had left, but it was a battle he had lost the second he had opened the door.
The stranger was getting to him.
He’d never smelled something so tantalizing before, but he also never had company during a rut. Maybe that’s what happened when others were around and why they required seclusion. Everything would be devoured otherwise.
Katsuki dumped out the murky water and to air out the room, taking note of how high the snow had continued to grow as he filled the bucket again so the stranger could drink when it came to.
Even as the gales swept inside in one current, the aroma was still poignant when he closed the door. Growing sharper as the skin dried, yet began to perspire under the direct heat.
He flexed his fingers as he approached and stood over the body. Tilting his head to the side as he let his eyes drift over its features. To at least acknowledge the brand that was on the potion-filled bottle.
Not an elder, that was certain. Full face, no wrinkles, no sagging. Smooth freckled cheeks and a rabbit-like nose. Opaque lashes that twitched with life every so often. Skin still tight and muscular and lean; some softness that curved the chest and lower stomach. Sides slightly indented under the ribs that made the hips more defined. Dark green curls splayed over the wood like the top of a tree. Hair was under its arms, on its forearms, a thin trail under the navel that likely lead to more between its legs. Nice shape to them, but the exact size and strength they held was unknown.
Katsuki came to a crouch, blade returning to his hand as he eyed what was left of the bindings around its limbs and whatever it was that hid between them.
That was also unknown.
The bandages were still too tight, that’s what Katsuki thought as he pinched the bit of skin that bunched above the bands.
Far too constricting. Suffocating. Uncomfortable. Should take it off. Remove it.
Sweat dripped above his lip and he brought the back of his hand to wipe it. He kept it over his mouth as he flattened the dagger against the leveled surface between its thighs, wide gaze searching as he dragged it down the slope.
He traced it and felt nothing familiar.
It must hurt, keeping everything so tucked and compressed.
He knew somewhere that he was making up excuses, pointless and unneeded because he knew what he wanted all the same. He heard the stories. The gossip. What little alpha and beta children whispered about in the secrecy of their gardens, but that couldn’t apply here. It wasn’t possible. Not a scenario like this.
It’s hiding. What is it hiding? The smell is coming from there. From the well--
Using the pointed edge, he slit along the top of the thigh until the bandages split down to the ankles. He did the same to the layer beneath it. Then the one beneath that. Following the same straight path with growing impatience as his brow furrowed and his head surfeited with the heady spice that seemed to grow as he drew closer to the surface. Shredding and yanking at the off-white material until skin peeked through.
Katsuki wriggled his finger into the small gap of the last layer, and the flesh was cold to the touch. Abandoning his blade he used both hands to tear through it from the thigh down, splintering the fabric in two before tugging off the rest of the debris that was in the way until nothing remained but skin.
He bit his finger hard enough to indent when the aroma surged, rising like heat, saturating the cabin as blood quickly bloomed color into its bulky calves, the scarred up knees, the plush yet fit thighs surrounding the fit of hair settled between them.
That heady musk came from there, where it was void of what Katsuki possessed and what he readjusted in his pants. Redolent and rich, pulling him in as something carnal and ancient wanted him to dip his head and drag his nose through the musty strands, bury himself in that well until all the aches were gone. Omegas cured these types of yearly ailments. Made it short-lived and trifle.
And he found one, alone.
In heat.
Something restrained him from giving in, halting his body as he leaned forward and bowed his head near an imprinted thigh. His ears picked up a low drowsy murmur, and his gaze traveled to the source. The omega’s arm twitched before it lifted, nails scraping along its waist where the bandages had squeezed before sliding to its thigh.
Katsuki shivered at the sound of sharp, hard nails grazing against flesh. He sat upright and reached for its wrist, raising it to his eye-level, observing the weaponized fingers that limply hung in his grasp. They were more claw-like than anything, grown to a point, and when Katsuki pressed on one to try and fold it, he found it immoveable.
The village omegas always had theirs clipped.
His eyes narrowed.
Katsuki grabbed his knife and squeezed the heel of its palm as he exposed the veins on its wrist, pointing the sharp edge against the blue vines as he made the omega come to.
The smell was near intoxicating now, and Katsuki pointed it to ginger. Heavy and spicy with something sweet added in to really make his gut twist into tight knots. He knew his own pheromones were robust. Blazing with something intense and tart as his guard increased, combining with the other’s to make an almost sickly burning scent when it clashed.
The omega scrunched up its face and hissed low and distressed from it, teeth exposed and canines long and uncapped. Katsuki swallowed and flexed his fingers around the handle as the omega muttered something incoherent and tried to take its arm back, turning its head to Katsuki when the effort failed.
As the storm yowled outside and rattled the windows and door, the omega’s eyes slid open and Katsuki remembered spring.
Bright fauna, flourishing greens and clear waterways. Wet, bright moss that coated the trees and rooftops after the rain.
They widened on Katsuki like a doll’s eyelids when it tilted backward. Nose crinkling and lip curling up as it noticed the weapon and who wielded it.
If it wanted to put up a fight, its body seemed too weak to do it. Its free arm had tremored as it reached for Katsuki’s face, fingers splayed and talons bare, but it collapsed before anything could be done, failing to turn on its side or lift its chest properly. Katsuki added more pressure to the bone and twisted, and a broken groan made it hold its throat and audibly swallow.
It was dehydrated. Loss of blood and sweat--and glancing between its legs there appeared to be slick where all of its attractive redolence oozed from--made it too weak to attempt escape, that, and the wrong move would have Katsuki slit its wrist and let it bleed out outside where he should’ve let it do before.
“Where is your mate?” Katsuki queried, throaty and ruggard from underuse and tinted with something brutal bubbling under the surface that he kept just barely in check.
The omega turned to him again, but this time its gaze was past him. Eyes large enough to watch the irises shift like an insect in a puddle, snapping upward toward the windows as they vibrated with force before looking towards Katsuki’s mat, but he had no patience for curiosity or being ignored.
“Where is your mate?” He repeated, dagger piercing at the side of its arm, close to the precious vein to remind the omega of its situation.
It watched the small red beads that spilled over his knife, fingers twitching once or twice, but the reaction Katsuki wanted was missing.
Instead, when it looked at him again, its eyes were hovered and its grimace had begun to shrink. Any distressing aroma it had released before began to disperse as the beguiling aura returned and made Katsuki’s jaw clench and glare waver.
The omega was able to move its legs, but Katsuki used his peripheral to see it bend its knees and flatten its feet on the blanket. The motions somehow made the odor billow like incense. It removed its paw from its neck and waved each of its fingers.
It gave its hand a glance, “right here,” it answered with a raspy and dry voice, edging with an accent Katsuki might’ve heard before but couldn’t point from where, a wicked smile stretching over its lips but Katsuki was far from amused.
“Why aren’t you in the capital?” He growled and the omega only showed its own teeth in a grin that pinched its eyes, “who brought you out here? Where are your caps? Who taught you how to use a weapon? If you aren’t mated, where did you get those fucking clothes?”
Its whole demeanor had changed so suddenly, and Katsuki could admit it was unsettling, but it only made him more defensive. Omegas weren’t normally like this.
“Come, big smart alpha,” it cooed, broken and strained and it raised Katsuki’s skin, “I can not answer if it hurts. Let me drink.”
“You’re talking just fine right now,” Katsuki seethed.
It let one of its knees fall open and Katsuki’s head was reeling but he refused to loosen his hold. Yet he caught a glimpse of the blushed folds. Red and glistening with slick and making drool pool under Katsuki’s tongue. That’s why they send all the omegas away, that was what the others had said, but you can buy one and then it’s yours--
“I’m weak,” it groaned. Fake. Mirth in its mischievous eyes as Katsuki’s breath grew heavy, “I’ll do what you say, if you let go of me. And let me drink.”
“I should kill you,” Katsuki spat as he pressed further, enraged that it thought it could negotiate, his knife dragging along a line in its hand and that finally made the omega frown and wince but with a harsh glare that Katsuki met, “I will kill you and it’d be far less kind than whatever the beast that attacked you had in mind, so don’t try anything funny. Understand?”
He didn’t wait for a reply as he tossed the arm aside and dried the red off the blade against his pants.
Katsuki lugged the bucket beside it, liquid sloshing and running down the sides, making the omega lick its lips as its focus quickly shifted. It didn’t even give Katsuki an expected look before attempting to sit up again on its own, grimacing as its arms flexed and the bandages strained around its muscles.
It took a long ass time before it could sit up and turn, and Katsuki scowled when it dunked its face inside as soon as it was able to. Holding it there for an impressive and almost unnatural amount of time, to the point where Katsuki grabbed a fistful of hair and yanked backwards making it grunt from the force.
“Trying to drown yourself, winter folly?” Katsuki followed as the water streamed down its face, got caught in its lashes and brows, stuck its bangs to its forehead and spilled from its mouth like a waterfall as it caught its breath.
“You stink, alpha,” said the omega, voice already a lot more clear and sharp, “it smelled better there.”
Katsuki snarled and jerked the omega away where it returned on its back. Apparently its shoulder hurt too much to rest on its side. It pushed the water into its hairline and rubbed its eyes with its wet fingers.
“Talk,” he demanded as he pushed the pail out of reach again, “now.”
It licked the cut on its hand with the full length of its tongue, “an alpha in rut is the worst kind. The worse under that is an alpha.”
“An omega in heat is a bitch,” Katsuki retorted, “an omega otherwise is a cocksleeve.”
“Then enough talk. Wear me.”
Katsuki worked his jaw as he let the thought trickle by, glancing at the pressed thighs as its legs fell together to the side, hips seeming more rounded by the twisted position as it laid there, bandaged and defenseless with hot cloying slick dripping out and staining his blanket.
“Is that not why I’m here?” It appealed, long shank-like claws sliding up its side, “is that not why you healed me? Why my bindings are now shreds at my feet? Corpse too cold to fuck?”
As much as his flesh yearned for it--and as true as it was that he would’ve screwed the bitch if he knew where it came from, maybe would’ve bed it while it lay quiet and unmoving to stop his dick aching--the omega reminded him of his dignity and pride and allowing himself to fall for the impudent harlot’s wiles would make him unworthy of claiming his name.
Yet having to repress himself for so long was beginning to grate his own nerves.
“You’re supposed to be in the capital if you’re mateless,” Katsuki brought up instead as he sat, criss-crossing his legs and using the dull side of his blade against the underside of his jaw, “if not that, you’re supposed to be in one of the villages, a child on your hip and one rounding your stomach. But I find you in the woods. Alone and dying. Couldn’t get pregnant, omega? Mate dump your ass and made you fend for yourself?”
It chuckled, shallow and as bare as its body, “what wonderful choices.”
“Your accent,” he pointed out next, “you aren’t northern, are you? Somewhere south. You weren’t prepared for the winter.”
“In a way, I was,” it answered as it looked above toward the snow piling on the window, “here I am in a nice warm cabin. Better than before.”
“You have scars all over you…” Katsuki leaned forward and with the tip of his dagger, traced one that started from its inner thigh that tapered off at the hip, but the omega didn’t move, “your kind is supposed to be smooth. Curved. You look strange,” he commented as he used the butt end instead to jab at the outlined pack of abdominals, making the omega flinch and cough with a smirk.
“And yet you do not cover me.”
Katsuki clicked his tongue.
“You see the blizzard outside,” he nodded toward the door, “and the position that you’re in, but you fail to answer me. I don’t have to keep you here, and it’d be better for me if I don’t.”
“Why should I make an answer when you have your own?” It replied coolly, rubbing over the bandages around its chest, “that’s why you are so angry with me suddenly. You figured it out after you undressed me.”
Katsuki glowered, twirling the weapon in his hand idly, “you can’t be what I think you are.”
“Oh?” It turned its head away from him and Katsuki grit his teeth at the insolence.
“Omegas can’t survive on their own, especially out here,” he scoffed, “clearly.”
It hummed and seemed to stretch out its arms, at least the one that wasn’t wrapped up.
“But your teeth are uncapped, and your nails are unclipped. I don’t smell anyone else on you, not even pups…And you wielded a weapon, all like--”
Katsuki’s voice hitched when a flick of something had lashed out and constricted around his throat, needles digging into his skin, unable to stay upright as he crashed to the floor from the sudden load on top his torso, like an anchor slamming into his frame.
“Fuck--” He barked, unable to move his arm that held his knife and when he could sliver open his eyes, he saw that the short omega had its leg bent with its foot restaining him by his elbow.
Above him, the previously weakened omega was no longer smirking or grinning. It’s teeth were exposed and threatening, larger than any of its kind should have. Honeydew eyes inflamed and blazing like a forest fire and when Katsuki used his free hand to try to wretch its wrist away from his neck, there was a piercing cut at his temple and warm liquid dripped into his ear.
It’s left-handed, too?! How did he not notice the fucking bitch reaching for its knife?!
“You let me go, alpha bastard,” it snarled, deep and foreign and triggering Katsuki’s own growl but that increased the pressure on his throat, “I take my things, I take your food, and you will never see me again. Understand?”
“Stupid--whore--” Katsuki grunted as his windpipe narrowed and he struggled to gather enough air to stay conscious, “you won’t--make it--”
“I’m tired of alphas telling me what I can not do--” Katsuki watched as the blade raised and glinted, reflecting reds and angry oranges from the fire behind them. He refused to close his eyes as it pointed at his pupil, steady and sharp and still stained with the blood of something else--”so I’m going to pluck each of your lashes, and I will poke them in the red pools of your eyes until it cracks and spills over like an egg, and you will watch me lap up the yolk.”
As black dots began to overwhelm his vision, that was when Katsuki had enough. Fuck an eye, he wasn’t letting an omega overpower him and gain the upperhand so swiftly.
He made a grab for the blade instead, gritting his teeth and squeezing his eye shut as it sliced at his palm, blood spilling onto his face when he began pushing it back while the omega hissed, losing its grip around Katsuki’s neck as it strived to put its entire weight on top of the handle using both hands instead. The omega made a mistake, and Katsuki used that error to his advantage, flipping them onto their sides and throwing it onto its injured shoulder while Katsuki’s other arm was freed.
He yanked the dagger out of its hand and threw it to the fire as the omega writhed and Katsuki straddled its waist, pressing on its wounded stomach and side as he snatched up its wrists and held them to the point of breaking beside its head.
“I’ll be honest with you, omega,” Katsuki panted, drool spilling down his jaws as the omega kicked and struggled despite the blood blooming under its bandages. His rut made this all seem exciting, adrenaline and something pleasant and eager pumped through his veins and made his lips unfurl under the threat of death, “the only reason I haven’t shoved my dick in you and filled up that barren well is because of sheer spite. Nothing else is saving you, yet you keep trying me, little beast. So you know what I’m going to do instead once this storm passes?”
“Fuck off!” It thrashed and Katsuki bowed, lowering his head with a grin that exposed his canines to the gums.
“I’m going to take you to the capital myself. I bet I can get decent coin off of you, you damn beastie--because that’s what you are, aren’t you? You want to be an animal and roam free with the wolves and rabbits, but you belong there with all the other omegas and the rich alphas. I’d be doing you a favor as kind as I am and as pathetic as you are. They’ll treat you real nice there with all your meals and plenty of baths, and the next time I see you, it might be in my own village on your mate’s arm all fat with pups. How do you feel about that?”
“Ha!” It cackled, high and short-lived but its eyes held something dark in them that Katsuki both recognized and didn’t all at once, “you take me back and we both die!”
Katsuki blinked but he kept his guard up. Take it back?
“Your lot are the same, all the same minds, like bees!” It growled as it tried to wrangle its good arm free, “they will take me once they see me, and then they will see you with me and believe you told me to do it. Even if I deny it, they will not hear me.”
Katsuki’s brow wrinkled up, leaning back with his hands still restraining its wrists as he slowly began to frown, “do what? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“After all, how could I kill a man?” It asked as something wild and uninhibited glimmered in its eyes, “with what thoughts of my own? Since when do we have the ability to snap? Since when does a cock-hungry omega desire bloodshed after getting a lay from a “kind” alpha, like you?”
That’s what it was. That look.
Katsuki had killed. Plenty of times since a young age as was the family profession, but never another person. Not even a beastie. The thoughts have occurred to him, of course, but never followed through because overall it’d all be over meaningless things.
This omega, who wanted to raise its hands and scoop out Katsuki’s eyes, supposedly crossed that line before, and the thought didn’t disgust him as it should.
“Unlike you, however, my execution will be slow,” it continued, finally stilling itself as it caught its breath, “chained down or drugged up so I can’t fight back this time as the visitors come to me. You will still get a better option than I, even in death.”
“You didn’t.” He had no reason not to believe it. There were too many signs pointing to that outcome, but the idea of it all was still bizarre.
“You ask me where I got the clothes from. There.” The omega seemed to have grown exhausted from the effort and bleeding it caused itself, “...it was some winters ago.”
“There is no reason for you to even contemplate killing,” Katsuki reasoned, “perhaps you didn’t get the right perfume that day? Or maybe there wasn’t enough bread and wine to go around during sup? Was it a war-torn elder that made you its mate so you could put it out of its misery with those burly arms?”
“You know nothing of what goes on in the capital, you poor lame fool...but that...matters not,” it murmured, tossing its head and clenching its fists as if fighting off unconsciousness, but it was loosing, “...you believe me, alpha...and what a strange thing you are to actually do so...”
There were a few moments of silence where they measured each other before Katsuki heard its legs slip to the floor and watched its lashes begin to waver close.
The words came and went between his ears, hollowing out his brain. This omega, with large hands and sharp teeth, with an adder tongue and a gentle face when it slept, in heat with spiced ginger wrapped around Katsuki’s nose, was nothing like the few omegas he had seen before. Looked nothing like them, acted nothing like them, and it confused yet intrigued Katsuki nonetheless.
Was it due to his rut? Maybe so, but Katsuki had a great deal of control over it, especially the first couple days, and his body had been aroused long before his mind was.
“Tch…”
The omega wasn’t faking anything this time as Katsuki moved off of it to gather it up in his arms again as it muttered while fading in and out of consciousness.
Katsuki slipped it back onto the blanket and brought over his supplies. Wrapping up his hand and cleaning the side of his face before he could start on the beastie, re-sowing its scars and replacing the gauze it ruined.
When he was done, he dipped his face in the pail, took in as much water as he could hold in his mouth and sat the omega upward. It had growled and still wanted to put up a weak fight even in such a state, but Katsuki wretched its face and tilted its chin as he clamped down around its opened mouth and made it swallow.