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The sun was molten on the back of Jeongguk’s neck—not the heat of childhood and playing too long in the summer. It was oppressive and cloudless. It made the shadows of the trees look violent on the grass.
“I’m so proud of you, my baby,” his Mama said, brushing her fingers through the black of his long hair. He’d been growing it all summer, only so that he could cut it all off once he’d mated.
A final act of defiance, maybe.
His Mama would probably cry at the loss of his curls. She’d always loved them when he was a pup, and he’d been born with a head full. But Jeongguk had kept his haircut severe, functional and neat, since his first heat. Maybe he'd grown it back for her too, before he reverted into a house omega, angry at his lot in life and with something to prove.
Maybe whoever caught him wouldn’t care at all. Maybe whoever caught him wouldn’t give him a choice.
“Thank you, Mama,” he whispered, letting her drag him to her chest. She straightened up his linen blouse, so loose it slipped off his angular shoulders. It was shapeless and wide, like a night gown, and almost as transparent as one too. It hit his legs mid thigh, showing off the work he’d put in in the fields, the things his body had achieved that omegas shouldn’t.
If he was lucky, the very legs that would bring him to safety.
Or, the first thing to break his fall when he was pushed into the rough earth and bitten.
“You look so beautiful, my baby. I know you’re scared,” Mama said, pushing a curl behind his ear, pinching his cheek with her other hand. “You have nothing to fear. Hayoon is a provider. You’ll make such sweet pups, with your face."
Her eyes went foggy, and Jeongguk didn't know if it was the lies, or just nostalgia.
"Your Appa would have been proud to see what you’ve made of yourself.”
She looked back at him with eyes that looked just like his own.
Hers held less worry. She’d never understand what it meant to be born an omega. What this mating run really meant for him. She’d never been through it, so how could she?
Everyone said that every omega born was a gift from the moon, that he was blessed. Jeongguk couldn’t understand how a blessing could hurt so much. Since he had his first heat at only twelve years old, his life had only gotten worse.
If omegas were so precious to the pack, then why did Jeongguk feel so alone? Why did he not get the luxury of choice? His Mama and his Appa had chosen each other, made a life together with the blessing of the Pack Alpha. It all seemed to simple, and yet nothing was so out of reach as choice when you were blessed by the moon.
Fucked by the moon, more like.
There were only three of them running today—and it was a big year too. The three of them made up a third of the omegas in the whole pack of more than a hundred wolves. It was maybe the biggest year the pack had ever had. Blessed, they were born in a year of abundance.
Nine doe-rabbits in a pack of wolves. Three kits left and none born since, each destined to run on their wobbly legs only to be devoured whole.
No, Jeongguk didn’t feel blessed or rare. He felt totally fucked.
Jeongguk had been intended for Hayoon since the day he presented. He was young, too. Most omegas in the pack before him, because he was the youngest, had their first heat well into their teens. Some as late as their early twenties. But Jeongguk had been a baby, wobbling around the Harvest Moon festival on his thin, pale legs when his time came.
He’d fallen right into Hayoon’s arms, blood right under the surface of his skin, hair plastered to his head. His neck was already thrown back in a natural act of submission. It’s funny how none of them ever got to choose that either, their bodies just acted on their own.
Hayoon had been sixteen, and he was already cruel. Jeongguk hated him with a passion, his elder alpha brother’s best friend, the one who pushed him in the dirt and laughed. The one who would rule the pack with a brutal hand one day.
Hayoon’s one good deed that day had been carrying Jeongguk to the healer’s hut without drawing too much attention to either of them. He’d laid a trembling Jeongguk down on the flat of those coarse white sheets and dipped his nose into the crook of the blooming scent gland. He left him with the healer, but the damage was done.
It wasn’t quite an imprint, but to Hayoon it was enough. He’d gotten drunk on the scent of black raspberry, sweeter than anything he’d smelled before, and that was that. It didn't matter what Jeongguk thought his life was going to be. The pack alpha’s son always got what he wanted.
In theory, someone else could mate Jeongguk if they ran fast enough. There was no real hierarchy when it came to a primal run, only alphas and their desires.
Sometimes Jeongguk dreamed about it, being chased by a wolf with fur like snow, a blistering bone that stood out in the gaps between the pine trees—white motion thundering through the forest floor on legs that beat the muck like a snare drum.
He dreamed about the bite.
He dreamed about the reckoning afterwards.
Hayoon would catch him because everyone else was too afraid. There was no imprint, surely there wasn’t. But the pack alpha’s son always got what he wanted.
Some fucking blessing.
At the starting line, a haphazard dash in the grass that ran between a couple of pines, Jeongguk stood with his shoulders pressed to Jieun on his left, and Jihyo on his right.
“It’s going to be brutal,” Jihyo whispered, reaching out to take Jeongguk’s clammy hand in her own.
He wasn’t sure which one of them was shaking, but he felt anchored between the two girls he’d grown up with—Jihyo with her strong but silent confidence, and Jieun, graceful enough to evade any alpha if she wanted to, at least in her wolf form. A tiny girl, but a magnificent beast bigger than most of the betas.
Jeongguk didn’t know if they wanted to get caught, or if they never considered anything other than coming out of the run with a mate.
“I just hope whoever claims me gives me a clean bite,” Jiuen chuckled darkly.
They all shuddered in unison when they thought about Hana, an omega who ran a few years back, and whose alpha had mangled her as soon as he’d knocked her into the grass. He’d left his mating bite right in the jugular, along with a litter of teeth marks all the way down her neck and back. Hana had bled so much he’d carried her across the winner’s line unconscious.
“I don’t know,” Jihyo said with a wicked arch of her eyebrow. “Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if they knocked me out. I could just sleep through the first knotting and get it over with.”
Jeongguk grimaced and Jieun whined. Jihyo always had a dark sense of humour. He just wished it weren’t a real possibility. Humour only hurt when it cut that close to the bone.
“Gods, can you not mention that right before we run? I’m going to avoid thinking about knotting right up until I have a fat one waved in my face, thanks,” Jieun said. It sounded filthy in her pretty mouth, and the three omegas tittered in their little group, stranded at the middle of the starting line.
Their parents and the rest of the pack were gathered behind them, one hundred yards or so away, just at the edge of the town’s boundary. Their pack grounds sprawled another ten miles or so in any direction you walked, so there was no way to know if the run would be over in seconds, or if one of them would make it hours further.
“You don’t really have anything to worry about, anyway,” Jihyo said, rolling her eyes at a vibrating Jieun. “As if Insu isn’t going to catch you as soon as you slow down and bat your pretty eyelashes at him. Admit it, you want to be mangled. Balls in your face or not.”
They laughed when Jieun stomped her bare foot in the reeds and hissed.
And for a few minutes, it felt like any other day. They were just three nineteen year olds, letting their warm toes touch grass, not a care in the world beyond whatever duties they would be landed with at Monday’s pack meeting.
When Pack Alpha approached them, he was in wolf form. All of the single alphas in the pack would have shifted by now, some of the mated too even though they would only be spectators. Alpha’s coat was like grey straw, thick and bristled, worn by age, like the persistence of rain on the river rocks. He was a different grey than the soft duck feather of Jeongguk's coat.
When he stood before them, Pack Alpha's snout reached their shoulders. In his own wolf form, Jeongguk was only half the height, two-thirds at best. Even his Mama's Beta wolf had a hand or more on him.
But Jeongguk was fast. He wouldn’t be allowed to shift for the mating run, even though his hunter's would. It gave them all a disadvantage, but then the run had been designed for the purpose of omegas being caught.
Jeongguk knew that he had to make it nearer to the border before he could shift. Because when he did, his scent would intensify so much that every wolf on the pack grounds would smell him in an instant—black raspberry to such a concentration that the sweetness would cloy in their throats.
The pack would be on his heels in seconds.
Jeongguk had to make it to the border on his own two feet.
Alpha licked each of their feet in turn, a custom that Jeongguk had always found confusing. When he was young, on the rare occasions he’d witnessed a mating run, he’d watched the big wolf tend to the runner’s feet in the only act of submission he’d ever seen from their leader.
Now, at nineteen, as his own feet were doused in the scent of rough metal, wiggling against their will at the intimacy of the act, he saw it for what it was—ownership.
The alpha’s howl rang through the forest like a violent puncture. Jeongguk only hesitated for seconds before he ripped through the trees, easily catching Jieun who wasn’t even trying not to be caught, and Jihyo who never had the advantage of speed.
His heart hammered so desperately in his chest that it ached. The first tear was all guilt at leaving the girls behind. His sisters, and the only ones who had ever truly understood him. Jieun would be okay, but Jeongguk felt selfish, scared that he’d never know what would become of Jihyo.
She didn’t want to be mated any more than he did, but she’d also never leave. Most of the alphas in the pack would treat her well, on the surface at least.
As his body gained speed, Jeongguk prayed to the moon goddess that Jihyo would be caught quickly and painlessly by someone that would cherish her. He prayed that she and Jieun would always have each other, even if he was dead or alone.
He had twenty minutes to make it as far as he could, and then the real pursuit would begin. As he ran, Jeongguk dipped into the hidden pocket he’d sewn inside the hem of his shirt, just a folded piece of fabric, big enough to hold the bottle.
Scent blocker. The tiny amount he could get his hands on. It was like gold dust in the pack, because they had no real use for it. There was no reason that a wolf would need to hide their scent amongst their own. But Healer Kim kept a small supply on hand for when neighbouring packs came through. Alphas were territorial like that. Jeongguk would only have his glands swabbed with the ointment when someone other than his pack was there to smell him.
It wouldn’t matter when he shifted, because there’s no sticking a bandage on an open wound—no scent blocker out there could keep an omegan wolf undetected. But it would help him get to the border without getting caught.
Jeongguk felt clumsy as he swabbed it on his neck and wrists like petroleum jelly, just enough to make a fine barrier that would wash away with a lick of spit or sweat. It would probably fade before he made it far enough, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.
His feet crunched through the twigs, snapping and crackling like water on a hot fire. Later, he’d need to move with more stealth, but while he was running unpursued, covering ground was more important.
Jeongguk got to the stream a mile or so from the village before he realized he couldn’t smell Jiyho anymore. The only trace of her mild lavender was on his own skin, the sweat of his palms, the subtle lingering brushes she’d left behind on his shoulders and bare forearms.
“I can’t do anything to help her,” he whispered aloud when his eyes filled up with tears. He’d been telling himself that for weeks, but it didn’t make much of a difference.
Jeongguk leapt over the stream and landed on the smooth rocks on the other side.
He couldn’t help the prickle of instinct when he caught the smell of rabbit in the air, wild hares bigger than the ones they kept in the village for the pups. To a wolf, rabbit smelled like boiling stew when you’re starving. And despite being force fed a hearty breakfast only hours before the run, bread and oats, meat freshly caught and killed, the best they’d ever tasted—Jeongguk was starving.
But it was the kind of starving that felt acrid. Like anything he put in his mouth would turn to ash. He kept moving, despite his omega chomping at the bit, licking her sharp canines.
It was probably instinct too that told him that the alphas were moving, because he didn’t hear a thing. He was too far from the start then, maybe more than three miles now. Half way to the border, but this was the easy part.
Jeongguk’s feet were bleeding already, and he found he couldn’t wait to get his paws on the soil, give himself some reprieve from the blistering pain, the jagged rocks and foliage that ripped into his human feet.
He ran and ran for what felt like hours, but he hadn’t even reached the river yet. It couldn’t have been more than half an hour more, an hour altogether. He was moving slower too, his thighs aching, his breath coming so fast in his chest it felt like he was breathing dry ice.
He smelled Hayoon before he heard him. The sting of nettle, harsh on the breathing, brittle in his throat. Jeongguk struggled to breathe as his body slowed, arms running lax like water. He needed to move now, more than ever but he was fighting some great chasm in himself that told him to lay on the forest floor with the insects and show his belly.
“Come out, come out little rabbit,” Hayoon shrieked, only just audible through the forest. Jeongguk felt the shiver run right down his spine and settle at the root of his legs.
Hayoon was arrogant enough to have shifted back, so confident that he could catch Jeongguk even without the advantage of his primal form.
It was time to shift. Jeongguk’s blockers were fucked, bled and sweat off miles ago already. He’d probably baited Hayoon right into the valley that led to the river by the trail of blood on his feet.
“Fuck,” he whispered to himself, eyes darting from left to right like some mythical bird would appear and take him on his back—show him the secret to his escape, a hidden flume that would carry him to safety.
Fuck the bird, and fuck the flume. Jeongguk was on his own. He steeled everything in himself to run faster than he ever had, right down the middle of the valley where he’d be most visible but have the most speed.
As he thundered, he felt his bones crack and elongate, the tired muscles in his thighs turn to sticky treacle as they moulded. Slowly, his body keened forward. He reached his arms out as he ran, and by the time they hit the soil, they were already paws. His mouth already a set of jaws.
“You fucking bitch,” Hayoon screeched as he ran after him, closer and closer with every second that passed.
There was officially no going back now. Even if Jeongguk was caught and mated, he’d broken a cardinal rule of the run by shifting. He’d be at Hayoon’s mercy, or his fathers, but either way it wouldn’t end without blood.
Jeongguk’s smokey grey paws moved so fast that they were a blur even in his own peripheral vision. He kept his eyes fixated on the curve of the river as he approached it, turning from a tiny pencil line on some haggard parchment to a mighty, roaring creature, alive and gushing like a kraken.
If he could only jump over.
If he could only send his small, smokey body over the dangerous folds of it.
If Jeonnguk could only get to the other side, to the border that lay just beyond the menacing water. Hayoon could never follow if he wanted to go back. No wolf could during the run.
And if Hayoon did make it over the line, too, then they’d both be damned, and Jeongguk would die.
Hayoon’s howl told him that he’d shifted, too, and it sounded so close that Jeongguk could almost taste it in his throat. He felt like his lungs were bleeding now, the salt of defying the law of order, the crush of pushing his body further than it was physically capable.
The snap of teeth through his ankle felt like spears of acid, his muscle pliant as game in Hayoon’s mouth.
The noise that came from Jeongguk at the contact was so animal he didn’t even recognize it as his own. His body skidded to a halt just as his front paws hit the water.
Hayoon’s big claws flipped him onto his back, pinning Jeongguk to the river’s rocky bank by his shoulders. The alpha’s drool splatted on his face. As his body weakened, Jeongguk felt his omega loosen its hold, felt his body melt back to skin and bone, soft pink flesh and black curls.
It felt cruel that he’d die before he got a chance to cut them. Jeongguk would be fucking damned if he let himself survive this.
“You’re pathetic,” he whined, his voice still half wolf, baiting the alpha to end him. He wanted to dip his head backwards and cool his scalp in the water, get some moisture on his tongue, but it was probably fitting to die thirsty instead.
“You know that? The omega you want hates you so fucking much they’d rather run that be mated by you.”
Hayoon’s black eyes sharpened, his nettle scent so fiery now that Jeongguk felt like every inch of his body was being stung. The alpha dug the claws that were pinning Jeongguk right into the soft of his flesh, a reprimand. Not enough to do any real harm—Hayoon wouldn’t want damaged goods, never a mark that would last.
“I’d rather die than ever be mated by you,” Jeongguk spat, his eyes filling up with tears. He hated himself for it. He wanted to be angry, to be so furious at his lot in life. But all Jeongguk could do now was cry.
“Please, alpha,” he said in a whisper as Hayoon’s snout leaned into the crook of his neck. The wolf lapped at the heated skin around his collar bones, licked the sweat that made Jeongguk’s scent sweet. “Please, let me go, please.”
He felt so ashamed for begging, but what was there left? What did he have really but his wiles, the gentle pull of persuasion that a sweet omega had over an alpha that loved them? Over their mate?
The real mistake Jeongguk made was equating Hayoon’s obsession with love.
When the alpha shifted back for the bite, he was laughing.
“Oh sweetheart, you have no idea, do you?”
Hayoon ran his palm softly on the sharp edge of Jeongguk’s jaw. He was straddling him now, heavy alpha bulk pinning the omega in place.
“Pretty omega, you’re already mine. You’ve been mind for seven years now. You can't run from fate.”
He leaned in to Jeongguk’s throat, only to make for his mouth instead. It was Jeongguk’s first kiss, more brutal than he’d ever imagined a kiss could feel. Hayoon tasted like meat and decay and hatred, and it felt like choking.
When he pulled away, the alpha’s eyes were soft—green like the pine forest around him, but poisonous like viper.
Jeongguk closed his own eyes and waited, his heart hammering in his ears. But all he felt was the heat of Hayoon fall onto his chest, the alpha a dead weight.
When he snapped his eyes open, Jeongguk stared right into the eyes of an alpha wolf—enormous, predatory, mouth bloodied from where it had bitten Hayoon fatally in the back of the scalp. It wasn't one of their own, Jeongguk had never seen those sharp eyes that pointed in at the corners and rounded at the top.
He smelled like burning wood, campfire, hickory.
Jeongguk shifted without even moving. He snarled at the alpha, and pushed backwards on his spine, his baby soft grey fur catching on the rocks.
The wolf, no more than a meter from his face, prickled. Jeongguk could see every hair on its body stand erect, brushing up like a warning. The alpha’s jaws fell lax, his top lip pulling back to show the teeth of a killer.
Jeongguk didn’t wait for his move. He thrust himself backwards, Hayoon’s dead body flopping off his hind legs as the omega fell backwards into the rapid waters.
When his head went under water, Jeongguk tasted blood at the back of his throat, iron and saliva, the panic of fresh water in his chest.
This was a better way to die, he thought.
When he was a pup, Jeongguk remembered one of the pack’s storytellers telling them that when you drowned, there was a moment of euphoria. It felt like an eruption of sun in the darkness of his lungs.
“He’s so small,” one of the voices said, light and almost feminine. “I thought my wolf was small, but he’s like a doll.”
“Don’t be so cliche,” another of the wolves growled, deep like molten chocolate, playful only in the way den mates are. “He’s perfectly normal sized for an omega. You just haven’t seen one before.”
“Well you wouldn’t know what to do with an omega if he rubbed his snout between your legs, Taehyung.”
Jeongguk’s eyes were closed, but his senses were prickling back to him.
He was alive.
He was warm.
His fur was tingling by the heat of a fire.
He was in danger.
“Can you two shut up? You’re going to wake him up, and he’s so skittish already,” someone else said in a quiet monotone.
Jeongguk knew instinctively it was the black wolf. The hickory. His scent blended in so well with the fire that if he hadn’t had a lungful earlier, he might have been fooled in his weakened state.
“He’s a beautiful beast, it must be said,” said another.
“Must it, Namjoon? Really?” said the monotone one.
“God, and this is why we can’t let you be the first one to talk to him, Joon. You always say the weirdest shit,” cackled another in a husky voice.
“It’s weird to call him beautiful? What if I never want anyone to ever look at him again except me, what then?”
A few of the alphas chuckle, but the monotone wolf just sighs.
“You possessive freak”, someone says, one of the deep voices. Taehyung. There are too many. “You’ll have to get past me first. Don’t think I can’t take you just because you’re a hulk. I’ve been working out, you know.”
“God, his fur looks so well cared for. He’s like a dandelion puff. Do you think he’s still a pup?”
“No, no, don’t say that shit Namjoon—”
"He can't be a pup if they had him running. He'll be 18 at least."
Jeongguk squinted his eyes shut and concentrated on the scents, trying to separate them in his head. It was almost impossible this close up. However many of them there were, two things were certain:
One, that they were nest mates, all of them. Their scents were too harmonious—no battle for dominance, no sour notes. Only warmth and smoke and citrus, deep and woody like it had always been that way, like they’d been designed for each other. If Jeongguk weren’t petrified for his life and frantically trying to rationalize his way out of this mess, he’d want to drown in their combined musk.
And two, they were all alphas. Rogues most likely. Five voices, he thought.
“When is he going to wake up?” the light voiced one asked, sweet and soft. He sounded like a flute, Jeongguk thought in his injured state. He could barely even feel his bones, and didn't have the presence of mind to wonder why.
“We’ll need to get back by morning at least. Seokjin-hyung will have our pelts."
"I think he'll forgive us this once, given what we're bringing home."
From there, their voices muddied up like dishwater, soap and scum turning the clarity of Jeongguk’s thoughts milky white.
When he woke for the second time, the camp was quiet and the fire had gone out. He could tell by nose alone, without even needing to open his eyes that there were only two of them left. He creaked an eye open without moving a single muscle in his body.
The two wolves—a chocolate brown fluffy alpha that looked young and puffy, and a thinner, lean russet—were fast asleep.
It was easier to scent them out now that they were in their wolf form, and now that there were less of them. Lemon and some kind of herb. Rosemary maybe. Jeongguk had other things to think about, but the way the two wolves smelled together made something warm start to circle in his belly.
The comfort didn't last long as sleep withdrew. Jeongguk’s blood slowly ran cold as he felt the heat in his body, recognized it for what it was.
He had to escape now while he still could. He could smell the preheat now between his own legs, the beginnings of slick on his fur. He had a day at most to run before he’d be completely fucked.
If he stayed, who knew what these rogues would do to him. An omega in heat, sprawled out on his back. There were five of them. These rogues had probably never even seen an omega before. Jeongguk had walked from the lion's den right into the jaws of the beast.
He shuddered, and a twig underneath his shoulder snapped. It was a tiny thing, the noise, but Jeongguk swore that it rang through the forest like a drum. He shivered in fear, and it was only then that he realized that he’d shifted back at some point in his sleep. He could only hope that it was after the other three had left, after the two sleeping wolves had drifted off.
Still it would be easier to move silently in his human form, with two less legs to trip on. He wouldn’t be fast, but he had a better chance at travelling undetected.
And still the alphas didn’t move. He could see their bellies swelling and falling as they breathed, and Jeongguk knew that it was now or never.
“Fuck,” he whispered silently when he rolled over on his back.
He was naked, of course he was naked. He’d been that way since the shift that tore his shirt in two, but he didn’t remember dropping the scraps from his mouth. And it was freezing now in the April night without his fur. The jagged stones and foliage bore into his skin like knife blades, but he kept moving. When he was off the flattened earth and bark chip that surrounded the camp space, he crawled through the wet grass.
The problem with having nowhere to go, and no knowledge of what lay beyond his line of vision, was that every tree looked the same. Jeongguk had no way of knowing which way would bring him to water, to food, and which would lead him right into the path of the rest of the rogues. He could run for all he’s worth from two wolves, and land right in the other four wolves’ lap. Or worse, back to Hayoon's dead body, back to where the rest of his pack was ready to snap his neck, sacred gift or not.
Jeongguk's stomach was so empty now it ripped through his middle, making it hard to muster the energy to even move.
He rose to his knees, wobbly and scared. But he didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t go back home now, even if he wanted to. Which was worse—going back only to have his neck ripped open by the Pack Alpha, or surrendering every iota of courage he’d had in leaving only to get lost and die on the way?
Jeongguk started to move. The further he got from the smell of lemon and rosemary, the more disquieted he felt. Right now, the most important thing was getting distance from the camp, finding water, filling his belly with some bloodied rabbit, and finding somewhere to curl up and have his heat, alone.
Preferably in that order, though the dry stickiness in his throat was fighting to be heard.
Jeongguk’s foot went into the stream before he saw it, and he could have fainted for joy that something had finally gone his way. He fell to his knees and cupped his hands in the water, funnelling as much of the ice cold trickle into his mouth as he could stomach. He doused his face with it too, his shoulders and his hands.
It wasn’t until he tried to cool down his legs that he even remembered his injury. His fingers trailed his knee in the dark, almost pitch black now the moon wasn’t visible through the dense brush of trees overhead. His fingertips met dry, rough poultice, like muck and grass emulsified, caked all over his injury. He didn’t feel any pain, though he knew that under the layer of covering lay Hayoon’s bite.
Whatever was in the poultice, it worked. When he’d drunk his fill and relieved himself on a tree nearby, Jeongguk started to move, shifting back into his little smokey wolf to put some distance in. Now that he was gaining speed, he could feel the dull ache of the injury reverberate in his heel, the smack of pain sharp when he thundered on the earth on his paws.
It wouldn’t last long either.
He’d been running for what must have been an hour when he smelled it—deer, already dead but barely so. The doe was laying flat in a clearing, moonlight on the spot where its amber fur was ripped open.
The blood was still warm on his tongue. Jeongguk’s laid his trembling forehead, sweaty and cold but slowly growing warmer with pre-heat fever, on its body in thanks. The doe’s sacrifice would keep him alive a half day longer, if he was lucky. He wasn't even sure if he had the strength to kill one himself.
“Don’t move, little one.”
The deep voice came from just yards in front of him. Jeongguk couldn’t move a muscle, even if he tried. He let his head grow heavy on the fallen doe, eyes filling up with tears as he yielded prostrate in front of what could only be the rest of the rogues. He could smell them all so clearly now that his nose had become accustomed to the prey beneath him.
Hickory. The monotone black wolf, he thought.
Anise.
Clove.
He heard a single set of feet shuffle over to him, and a light palm lay on the back of his head, just behind his prickled ears. Not heavy, or grasping, just gently touching.
Jeongguk cracked his eyes open and looked up.
“Well, I suppose you at least came to us for the food, though I would have by far enjoyed bringing it to you, little omega,” said a tall man, broad shouldered and handsome. Impossibly handsome, actually—strong and dimpled, with button features and the warmest dragon eyes Jeongguk had ever seen.
A whine slipped out of him before he could even rationalize why.
“Would you like to shift back? Or I can feed you like this?” the alpha asked. The other two lay further back in the trees, enough that Jeongguk couldn’t really make out their features yet, just that they were both much slighter—perfect opposites, black and blonde heads in the shadow.
Jeongguk slowly edged away from the wolf, his belly low, dragging on the soil, his head almost as close to the ground. He wouldn’t run, because he wasn’t stupid. The poultice on his leg was barely functional anymore, and he hadn’t eaten yet. He wasn’t fit to even try. But he wasn’t ready to show his vulnerable belly to these rogues yet either—even if they, as he was starting to suspect, didn’t want him dead.
They’d want something from him.
Alphas always did.
“Hey now,” said the monotone man from the trees, walking up until he was shoulder to shoulder with his companion—or shoulder to mid-bicep as it were. There was a big height difference between the two men.
All Jeongguk had seen earlier was the man’s wolf, heard his deep voice. The delicate, pale face was shocking in its beauty. Like the porcelain dolls the pups treasured back home. He had sleek eyes, more feline than wolf, and a rich brown. So soft looking for an alpha. His shoulders and broad hands betrayed him.
“It’s okay sweetheart, we’re not going to hurt you. I know you don’t want to but you need to try and trust us, if even just long enough so we can get some food into you and treat that leg,” he pointed to Jeongguk’s back paw, now sagging and wet. He couldn’t tell what was rain, the dew on the grass he dragged himself along, and what was blood.
His own?
The doe?
Who knew. Who cared.
The taller man smiled and slowly moved to his knees. He hoisted the deer away towards the edge of the clearing.
“My name is Namjoon,” he said. He looked towards the black wolf man. “That’s Yoongi, and the blonde one over there is Jimin. You’re safe, I promise you.”
Jeongguk felt the whimpering building in this throat again before he could even stop it. He didn’t have much of a choice either, he knew that in the next half hour at most he’d shift back whether he wanted to or not. His body was too weak to hold on to his animal form, his omega needed to put all her focus on healing his body, fending off the human side that was desperately trying to push off the pre-heat.
With a whine, he pushed his muzzle to the earth and stretched out his injured leg, his healthy one. It was far more painful to shift in place, and not mid-run, but he didn’t have the energy to move.
Namjoon edged closer to Jeongguk on his knees, stopping when his leg brushed against Jeongguk’s shoulders, still prostrate.
“Give him your shirt, Joon,” Yoongi said. He was still standing close, with Jimin now beside him. Jeongguk didn’t even hear him move. Some wolf he was.
Namjoon laid a warm shirt over his back, and Jeongguk braved himself to look up from the ground.
All of the alphas stared at him, and it should have made him retreat. It should have made him feel threatened and scared.
But it didn’t. Jeongguk wasn’t sure he had the energy to worry anymore, and maybe it was just that. Maybe it was the calming pheromones he could now tell the alphas were pushing out to him like a safety blanket. Maybe it was their expressions—all warm and molten, like they didn’t want to hurt him. Like they wanted to offer him safety if he only reached out a hand to ask for it.
“Oh, look at you,” Jimin said, coming closer with a big grin that made his pretty grey eyes arch. He looked almost like an omega he was so pretty, smooth and youthful, but with a little hard edge.
“You’re just the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Jeongguk sniffled, pulling the thick flannel shirt, checkered and warm, around his shoulders, right under his nose. Namjoon, clove, his brain catalogued.
“Give him some space, Joon,” Yoongi said as he too fell to his knees and started digging into his pack. He pulled out some bloodied meat wrapped in brown paper. “Or make yourself useful and feed the boy.”
Namjoon moved his head so he was in Jeongguk’s line of vision, making it hard to avoid the searching gaze.
“Can I?” he asked, taking the package that Yoongi had handed him and giving it a little crinkle in his fingers.
When he unwrapped the doe’s meat, Jeongguk started to growl. He was so hungry, he couldn’t help it.
“Oh, he’s so sweet,” Jimin said, sounding like he wanted to cry. Jeongguk bristled.
“I’m not sweet,” he spat, though his voice still came out half whine—half wolf still, maybe.
“Cute little pup turning those big, glossy eyes on me and telling me he’s not sweet might just be the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen,” Jimin laughed, dropping to his own knees with an oof.
He and Yoongi sat five or so feet away while Jeongguk ate. He was sitting now, the large shirt buttoned enough that he felt less conscious of his body. Namjoon was opposite him, so close in his own cross-legged posture that each of their knees pressed together.
Jeongguk didn’t even fight it when Namjoon held the meat to his face.
“Open,” he said, prodding the deer against Jeongguk’s lips until they dropped open. “Good boy.”
They watched him eat in silence for a few minutes, ever more packages appearing and being unwrapped until he feared he’d eaten at least a hind leg all of meat all by himself. All three of the alphas rumbled as he ate, Namjoon the loudest. An instinctual response to feeding an omega, Jeongguk supposed.
“Won’t your pack go hungry?” he asked, a little too late as he blotted his lips with the corner of his cuff.
“We have enough. My belly feels full just watching you,” Yoongi said with a warm voice. It was strange—how his eyes smiled, and his voice sounded fond, even though his expression didn’t move. He looked almost gruff.
Jeongguk flushed and pulled his fingers inside his shirt arms. He looked between them all—at Namjoon, Yoongi, and Jimin. He was able to tell them apart now, their scents. Namjoon clove. Yoongi, hickory. Jimin was an ironic star anise that didn’t fit his face but felt like a warm, spicy hug.
“I… what are you going to do with me?” he asked finally.
Namjoon looked at Yoongi, and then at Jimin. They all glanced from Jeongguk to each other, and back again like they were trying to decide what to say.
“Maybe we should wait for… until we get home,” Yoongi answered slowly, fastening his pack and getting to his feet.
“No,” Jeongguk snapped. Now that the food was settling in his belly, the buzz of exhaustion felt a little further away. He felt on edge, ashamed maybe that after everything he’d been through to get this far, he’d let himself be tamed, hand fed by some rogues he didn’t even know.
By rogues who could bite him or take him or scruff him any second. If he was lucky, all they’d do was kill him clean.
But then why were they feeding him? And caring for him?
Jeongguk felt afraid to ask, but even more afraid not to—to blindly follow them into their den, when anything could be lain in wait.
“Tell me now. I won’t go anywhere with you unless you’re honest with me,” he said, wrapping his arms around his shoulder. He wasn’t under any pretence that he looked fearsome, that he could scare them into answering his questions. But he refused to just submit.
Namjoon looked at him, dead in the eye. Long and hard.
“Don’t you feel it?” he asked softly, holding out a hand to Jeongguk. “We felt it as soon as you crossed your pack border. We smelled you right away, even with those blockers on.”
He pointed to Jeongguk’s neck, making the omega flush.
“Take my hand and you’ll understand,” Namjoon said, shaking his palm a little.
Jeongguk stared at the alpha, ran his eyes over the strong jaw, the marring of scar tissue at his neck. More than one bite. Mangled. They all were. The only way an alpha could truly mate another of their subgender was with violence and pain. They didn't have the natural healing powers that omegas had when bitten. They had to really want it.
A mated wolf.
A mated pack.
He couldn’t say why the thought of it made him sad. What they were—it was everything he was trying to escape. Alphas, no matter what kind of sweet lines they sold, weren't to be trusted. And yet, something in Jeongguk said to reach out, to hold out his bare hand and take a leap of faith.
He took a deep breath and reached out to Namjoon, dropping his small hand in the alpha’s big, splayed one.
There was no crack of lightning, and Jeongguk didn’t feel his body rip into fire or see white light, no span of his future fluttering out around him. Nothing like that happened. He just felt calm when he touched Namjoon, felt his limbs fill up with a soft sense of knowing.
He snapped his head back and swallowed.
"You're my mate?" Jeongguk asked slowly, his body cowering from Namjoon's larger one.
Namjoon nodded.
"I'm yours, little omega, and you are mine."
He looked over his shoulder to the other wolves, Yoongi and Jimin who were keeping their distance, wrapping up the last of the meat. They were looking anywhere but at the pair of them, like they were scared to frighten Jeongguk off—scared that he would run again.
Jeongguk wasn't sure that they were wrong.
"You belong to all of us," Namjoon added, edging closer to Jeongguk, just an inch at a time.
The smell of clove was warm, but something was telling Jeongguk to run, run from the threat, run and never let himself be caught. Or worse, to run only to be caught. It was confusing, the strange thoughts that seemed to contradict each other, the pull of pain in his belly.
Namjoon had him in his sights like a true predator, and Jeongguk knew that even if he did bolt, he'd never make it far. His injury was starting to tingle, ache turning into the sharp smart of active pain. It wouldn't be long before he was dragging his leg along like an extra limb.
But Jeongguk's omega didn't know reason, only chase, only alphas. She wanted to run, to be caught rightfully.
So Jeongguk moved while he still could. He scrabbled backwards on his back, shifting as he moved. The only advantage he had was the element of surprise. Namjoon reached out a hand for him, but he was already running, three fluffy legs taking on the burden of the fourth.
"Heel," Namjoon growled, but it was Jimin that shifted first and followed him.
Jeongguk could smell the swell of animal in the anise that was lulling around the camp, could tell without looking back over his shoulder that the wolf was the smallest of the three. But he moved like a shadow, and it wasn't long before Jeongguk could feel him huffing at his tail.
"If you think we aren't going to catch an injured little omega in pre-heat, then you've got another thing coming," Yoongi laughed, short and out of breath, before Jeongguk even saw him at his shoulder. Before he even realized that whatever the hell this thing was, it had gone far enough and deep enough that he could hear them, even in his shifted form.
Jimin pushed up so that he and Yoongi were flanking Jeongguk on either side, running along side of him more than chasing, but close enough that he was locked into the formation. He was fast, maybe even faster than the alphas, but he was sick and injured.
"As fun as this is, omega, you're only going to hurt yourself more," Jimin panted, the white of his wolf glimmering in the side of Jeongguk's eye like a fluttering bird.
"Take him down easy," Yoongi said slowing down as they came to the river.
Jeongguk tried not to cry that his wolf had led him back here. His pack lay only over the river. They hadn't travelled far after all, for all his running and all of his efforts. The sight of the familiar pines, green and orange, even in the low light of dusk, made his legs falter. He wanted to run right into the river and be washed down the valley, through the forest and away to some salvation. He wanted the river to save him, but the trees—
Jeongguk's front paws stopped before his hind ones did and he would have crashed right over his own body if human hands hadn't gripped him. He didn't even know when Jimin had transformed, how he'd managed to keep the pace. He didn't even know when his own wolf had given out, when he'd returned to human blood and bones.
Jeongguk lay on Jimin's lap, trembling, Jimin's fingers running through his hair. The alpha's human body was small and lithe, maybe even smaller than his own. But he was springy muscle, the way alphas were, not soft and lithe like Jeongguk's own.
He was sodden in sweat, naked again, probably leaving dirt and grime on Jimin's bare thigh. He guessed Namjoon's torn clothes were somewhere on the path back to the clearing, the shirt he'd borrowed and already ruined.
"It's okay, baby, it's okay," Jimin cooed in his ear.
"I'll shift, put him on my back," Yoongi said to someone out of ear. Namjoon. He hadn't even shifted by the looks of his clothes, but he hadn't needed to. It was like three trained hunters pursuing a puppy who hadn't even learned to walk yet. It would have been funny if it wasn't so heartbreaking.
Jeongguk whimpered when Namjoon lifted him, first just by his hip bones like an animal, and then in a bridal hold. He was still scared, but all the fight was gone. He just cried into Namjoon's chest, bled on his pants. Namjoon pushed Jeongguk's nose into the crook of his neck where his scent was intoxicating.
"It's going to be okay, I promise," Namjoon said, holding him firm, probably in case he tried to wriggle to freedom.
The last thing Jeongguk remembered before everything went dark, was the touch fur on his cheek, black and soft.
Jeongguk's belly was moving on someone's back. With every deep breath they took, his body shifted over and back, like a warm breeze in the foliage.
But he wasn't in the forest anymore, he was sprawled out on cotton sheets, fine and smooth, smelling half of him and of millions of other unfamiliar things.
"You're alright, little wolf," the mound in front of him said in a soft voice, barely there in the morning light. At least he guessed it was morning from the way the light was dappling through the room, pure white with no orange at all. Not dawn or dusk, just imposing daylight.
The man turned over to face him. Jeongguk hadn't even realized he was the one holding on, his arms loosening from their grip on the other man's body as he turned.
"Where—" Jeongguk started, but his words choked in his throat when he looked at the beta.
He was beautiful—longish wavy hair the colour of roasted chestnuts, pretty features. He was broader and bigger than Jeongguk, but soft and lean still, different from the alphas, even if he was a rogue too.
"You're home, sweetheart," the beta said, brushing his hand through Jeongguk's hair, intertwining their calves. "Well. If you want to be. We'll never hold you here against your will. But this is my den."
Jeongguk sat up slowly, pulling at the blankets to cover his nakedness only to realize he was fully dressed. The oversized pants and shirt were comfy and thick, like they'd been made for an omega. None of the scratchy materials the alphas wore, just fine threading, weighted on his shoulders. He pulled the shirt to his nose.
"Cinnamon," he said, with a small smile.
"Right," the beta said.
"And the others—" Jeongguk whispered, looking around the big room. It was sparsely decorated, but clean and simple. A huge bed covered in pillows and blankets. Plants on the high shelves made of thick, slabbed wood. Nothing much else to show that a whole packed lived in here.
It didn't smell like any of them, only Jeongguk and the beta. Cinnamon and black raspberry, muddied together like jam.
"They don't come in here, honey. This is just ours."
"You're mine too?" he asked in a tiny voice, not sure what answer he wanted. "My mate?"
The beta nodded. "I'm yours."
He held Jeongguk to his chest, and hadn't it all been so hard, Jeongguk thought. He felt so tired of running.
"Whats your name, little one?" The beta asked, dipping his nose into the pale skin on Jeongguk's throat.
"Jeongguk," he said, feeling his bones soften, the muscles in his arms and legs melting out like butter on a hot pan.
"Jeonggukkie," the beta chuckled, scuffing his chin with a broad thumb. "I'm Seokjin. You've already met the others, but don't worry, I'll introduce you properly when you're well."
He let Seokjin lay him back down on the pillows, his chest a field of puffy chrysanthemum, fluffed up and light.
"I'm not well now?" he asked, but his voice was slurring, consonants not sharp enough to differentiate his words.
"No honey, you're going into heat, and your leg is infected. You're probably not feeling much because Seokie's got you drugged up to your eyeballs, but… You're not going to feel very well in a while."
"Seokie," Jeongguk lisped. He must be the red wolf, or the fluffy brown one. "Pack Alpha?"
Seokjin smiled, big and broad. He had these thick, pink lips that look like fat camellias.
"No, he wishes," he laughed, pulling the blanket up all the way to Jeongguk's chin. "This is my pack, honey."
Jeongguk wanted to laugh at the thought of it—a pack of rogue alphas tamed by a beta. It seemed nonsensical, funny in his foggy state. But his laugh just came out like a little blubber, spit bubbles and a soft huff.
When Jeongguk woke again, he was alone, and the room was like a furnace. It was pitch black, without even a candle, and his body felt like it could melt the wood right off the walls.
Jeongguk gasped when the heat began to claw at his ovaries. Heats had always been hard for Jeongguk, and he'd been having them for seven years now. When he was a pup, they were so intense that he would be laid up in bed for nearly a whole week. Now, he'd have two or three days in bed, but spend the rest of it working or helping his Mama, dragging his puppy paws around the fields in misery, but well enough to make himself useful.
But this was something else, like lightning in his tummy, like his organs were trying to rip from the warm confines of his blood and flesh. He tried so hard to make his voice howl, but he was too thirsty and weak.
Instead, Jeongguk stumbled from the bed, his eyes unaccustomed to the darkness. He was lucky the room was so bare, because there was nothing but wooden floor, the edge of a soft, shaggy rug to break his fall when he landed on his knees.
He managed to get the door open with his sweaty hands, and crawled to the sound of voices, the glowing light down the long hallway. The den was so much bigger than he thought.
With a slap of skin on wood, he made it to the the threshold of the door and collapsed, a pathetic whine ringing through the whole den.
"Oh fuck," Jimin said when the door slammed open. He dropped on his knees and gathered Jeongguk to his chest. "Oh he's really in heat now, guys. His scent—"
"Jimin, if you can't reign your own horny pheromones in then get the fuck out of the way and give him to me," Namjoon growled, pushing in behind Jeongguk to prop him up on his chest. He was laying back into the bigger alpha now with his legs stretched out over Jimin.
"You wouldn't even know what to do with him—" Taehyung said when he appeared in the doorway, his hair fluffy and soft. Brown wolf, Jeongguk thought as he watched him, his head bobbing a little from the exhaustion. How had he not known? It seemed so obvious.
"All of you, back now."
Seokjin's voice rang out from inside the room, even though Jeongguk couldn't see him. The whine inside his chest started to build.
"Beta," he said, reaching his hands out. Something deeply instinctual in him calling out for his beta, some guy he only just met but that his heart wanted. He wanted comfort now, more than anything, he needed to be held.
The alphas sat around him like puppies, Namjoon, Taehyung and Jimin.
"He wants you, hyung," Yoongi said from inside the room.
"Yah, you better not ruin my stew. And take that frown off your face, he just wants someone gentle," Seokjin said with a little laugh. He appeared in the doorway, carrying a large jug of water and a flannel.
"Carry him into the bedroom, Namjoon," he said, smiling warmly at Jeongguk.
Jeongguk was getting used to being carried by Namjoon, their bodies seemed to fit together so well. He wondered if the big alpha carried any of the others, if he was always the one called upon to carry an injured wolf or toss an alpha in rut onto the bed when they were unruly.
It made his body feel hot in a different way, one he was far less versed in.
"Oh he likes it," Hoseok said joining Yoongi at the door to the living room where Seokjin had started to shepherd the other wolves. "God, I've never smelled anything like that in my life."
"I know," Taehyung said with his own whine, "his body is literally begging for us, its so unfair. Fuck I think I might knot in my hand."
"Oh my god, shut up."
Their voices were drowned out again when Seokjin closed the door to the den. Namjoon laid him down on the bed and turned to look at his Pack Beta.
"Hyung, do you think he needs… well. I could stay, you know. The others will be pissed, but they do understand."
Seokjin rolled his eyes, and sat at the edge of the bed.
"There'll be time for all of that later. He just needs some affection right now, and his wolf might be singing out to you lot, but I know he's not ready for that yet."
Namjoon pouted, running his hand over Jeongguk's hair, sweaty and warm. But he left the room with a sigh, gently closing the door.
"Don't worry about all of them baby. I don't even let them in here most of the time. They're all acting like pups on their first rut," Seokjin said with a fond sigh as he poured some of the water from the jug into a broad, wooden bowl. He submerged the flannel in the steaming water, and wrung it out.
Jeongguk watched with his eyes wide, already feeling calmer with the smell of cinnamon in the air. It was like being around the alphas made his body ache all the more, the fire lapping at his skin, roaring out for things he didn't know how to verbalize.
But with Seokjin close to his body like this, the warmth of his scent, things felt different. It soothed the pain inside of him, wrapped around him like a warm blanket. It made Jeongguk want to touch, but softly, to be caressed and worshipped.
"Let me help you my little puppy," Seokjin sang in a high, lilting voice, laying down the flannel on the edge of the steaming bowl. He slowly lifted Jeongguk's arms, laying them on the pillow so he could remove the linen shirt first, then his pants.
Jeongguk thought that maybe he should feel vulnerable, stripped bare like this for the beta. All he felt was content, aching and sore still, but somehow confident in the knowledge that Seokjin would take care of him.
Seokjin washed every inch of his body slowly, running the fluffy heat of the flannel over Jeongguk's feet first, in between each toe, delicate and attentive. His skin felt hot first, and then cold as the moisture evaporated in the cool air.
"You did so well, running all that way, honey," Seokjin cooed in a sing-song voice as he worked. Every so often, he'd lay down his cloth, and dug his fingertips into the soft toffee of Jeongguk's muscles, massaging away little aches here and there that he didn't even know he had.
"You made it all the way over to us, and kept yourself so safe. We're so proud of you."
Jeongguk huffed, snuffling his face into the pillow.
"I have to wrap this leg up, and I know you're not going to like it, pup," Seokjin said with a sigh when he laid Jeongguk's left leg down on the bed and moved to his right.
He sniffled, but let Seokjin take the newly rinsed flannel to his calf, whimpering when the skin smarted.
"Seokie's balm is working well, thank Moons," Seokjin whispered as he wrapped the entire calf up in a long, springy bandage. "Can you talk pup?"
Jeongguk thought that he might have been able to talk, but he didn't want to. He wanted to be silent and taken care of, half animal, turning his belly fur over for the pretty beta.
"Okay, okay," Seokjin laughed.
He took a glass bottle of some kind of liquid from the floor beside the bed and pushed the now cooled bowl of water away with his foot.
The oil smelled like eucalyptus when it hit the skin of Jeongguk's belly, medicinal but soothing with the spring-fresh smell of mint and wood. Seokjin rubbed it over every part of his body, under his chin and over his scent gland. That made Jeongguk tingle, and the mound between his legs start to slick. He pushed his thighs together, shamed.
"You don't have to be embarrassed, honey," Seokjin said, tickling under his chin with an index finger. "You have no idea how good it makes my wolf feel to know that I'm making you feel good. It's okay."
Seokjin even covered his hair in the oil, slowly relishing in massaging it deep into each curl, every inch of his scalp. When he finished, Jeongguk felt slippery and clean, more cared for than he'd ever been in his life.
For a moment, he thought about Jieun and Jihyo, and hoped they were being cared for just as well. It hurt, to think of them. It probably always would.
"Pup, do you want me to touch you there?" Seokjin asked gently, running his wide hand down Jeongguk's chest but stopping just as his pinky brushed the soft of his public bone. "Or one of the alphas?"
"Can we talk first?" he croaked, the effort to speak gargantuan. More than anything, he wanted Seokjin to talk, to help quell the chaos in his mind, but he knew then he'd have to ask the right questions.
"Of course we can honey, if you're able. You've been in full heat for two days now, I don't know if you knew that. You've slept through a lot if it, but with all of these alphas around you… you're probably not used to being in heat around them."
Seokjin paused and scratched Jeongguk's belly, like he was in wolf form. It felt wonderful. "Things are worse when you're around your mates and you haven't been knotted yet or had a bite. No one here wants to make you do anything you're not ready for, but we don't want you in pain either if we can help."
Jeongguk nodded slowly, trying to wrap his head around the last few days of his life. These wolves. The walls around him. How safe it felt in Seokjin's den. He called it a den, but it was more like a nest.
But betas didn't nest the way omegas did. They didn't lead packs either, rogue or otherwise.
Those were questions for later though, ones he didn't need to know the answers to right now. There were more pressing things.
"You're my mates," he said slowly, as Seokjin lay his head on Jeongguk's belly. The proximity felt like a remedy for his cramps, sweet and pleasant, head heavy, dipping into his cushy, omegan flesh.
"Yes," Seokjin said, the vibration of his voice rumbling.
"And you're also… each other's mates."
"Yes," Seokjin said again, pressing a small kiss against Jeongguk's bellybutton. "I know its confusing darling. Coming from a pack like yours, too. It's… I suppose the best way to put it is, we all chose each other, and then the moon gave us the gift we didn't even know we were missing."
Jeongguk purred at contact on his skin, the gentle fingertips kneading into the sore points along his thighs, where his cramps shot down to his knees.
"But… they're all alphas. And… the bites look so painful. Pack Alpha always said—"
Jeongguk stopped himself, biting his lip. He supposed the grey wolf wasn't his Pack Alpha anymore. His mind floated back to the lick on his feet, the possessive scent of metal. It's strange, he thought, how letting go of the hard things was almost as difficult as letting go of the good.
"The bites. Why would they do that to each other?” Jeongguk asked in a small voice, pointing to Seokjin's neck. His were pretty and neat, unlike the alphas. If they bit Jeongguk, eventually time would leave him with a perfect pink circle too, a remnant of love and not of pain. It didn't feel fair.
“I believe in fate, to some degree. It brought you to us. But I believe in choice too. Have you ever heard the myth of the red string of fate?” Seokjin asked.
He nodded.
“I guess what I think is that we don’t have just one path in life. One fate. Imagine, hundreds of strings around our fingers, yeah? And every choice we make sets us on a new path. My decisions haven’t always been perfect, but each one led me to one of my mates. I think that's something to be celebrated, and I know that each of my mates agree, even if it was painful at the time. Every good memory has a little pain in it, doesn't it?”
He pointed to one of the scars on his neck, small but maybe the deepest.
"Yoongi," he said, tapping it with a nail. "My first. We came from the same pack."
The one underneath was bigger, but pretty. "Seokie. He... well, I think its best if he tells you his own story one day. He's been through a lot, but he's our rock."
He moved his head and pushed his waves back to show the last bite on his neck. "Namjoon, our sweet wanderer."
He pointed to the cluster of bites on his wrist. Not the traditional place to bite, but Jeongguk was learning that there wasn't much traditional about Seokjin. "Jimin and Taehyung, my first babies. They escaped their own pack, together. Mated each other when they were just baby alphas. They'd have had their necks cut open if they weren't so brave."
Jeongguk felt his eyes watering up at the thought.
“So it’s fate that we met but you chose the others?” Jeongguk asked slowly, wringing his fingers together and dropping his eyes to the meandering grain of the table’s wood.
“No, sweetheart. It’s not like that,” Seokjin smiles. “We may be designed for each other, but we’re with you right now because of your choice Jeonnguk. You could have chosen the path of least resistance, but you didn’t, just like Tae and Jimin. I know maybe right now you feel like you ran from the inevitable only to find yourself right where fate intended you, but—I don’t think of it like that.”
Jeongguk frowned, feeling his eyes get heavy. "Then how?"
Seokjin laughed, sitting up to pull the blankets up over Jeongguk again. He tapped a finger over his legs, his arms, to make sure the oil was dry now.
"I just think you're brave, and that even if fate designed a perfect life here for you with us, none of that would have mattered if you hadn't reached out and grabbed it."
"I miss my family, the other omegas," Jeongguk whispered, letting Seokjin spoon him up into his side, tucking his nose into the musk of his armpit. His cinnamon smell was intense there, roasted like autumn, and sunsets, and deep, meandering forest walks.
"I know," Seokjin said, with a sad smile. "I miss mine too."
Jeongguk sniffled, but found he didn't want to cry. He was sleepy, but the ache was deep in his belly, building slowly like a storm that hadn't gotten here yet, but would pillage the forest tomorrow.
"You know that you can stay with us forever, if you want, and you still never have to take a bite if you don't want it. Fate is one thing, but we'll never take away your choice."
"Can you touch me now?" Jeongguk asked, meek, a little afraid, covering his face with his hands.
Seokjin laughed, leaning down to kiss the soft curve of his belly, the smooth semi-circle of flesh that marked him as omega. When he was angrier, trying to make his body strong, nothing he did wore it down.
"I can sweetheart. I'll help you feel good, and then if you want it, we can call alphas in."
Seokjin dipped a hand between his legs, first wrapping around his half hard cock, small enough to cradle in his hand. Jeongguk could feel the fire in his legs and tailbone turn into something molten with the touch, like Seokjin was leaning inside him to lap away at the flames. He rubbed his finger over the Jeongguk's tip, laying a flat thumbprint on top.
"I'm going to use my other hand to open you up, Gukkie," he said, kissing his public bone, the tops of each thigh, the place where his own hand ended as it pushed into Jeongguk's flesh.
"You won't need much, you're so wet already, but I think… this is all new to you right?"
Jeongguk nodded, still too embarrassed to open his eyes. He melted into the blankets, pulled a pillow over his head and contented himself with just feeling.
Seokjin flicked his wrist gently, slowly getting Jeongguk off as he ran the ring finger of his other hand along his entrance. Jeongguk cold feel how wet his own body was, the slippy lack of resistance as Seokjin circled him, the lack of tension when he slipped his finger right into the knuckle.
Jeongguk gasped at the feeling, like nothing else he'd ever felt before in his life.
"I'm so lucky getting to touch you like this before anyone else, pup," Seokjin sighed. When Jeongguk finally opened his eyes and peered down at the messy head between his thighs, his own legs spread open like two falling triangles. When he looked up, Seokjin's eyes were all pupil—black and impossibly deep.
Seokjin pushed his finger in slowly until he was buried inside Jeongguk, right to the hilt. It felt good, but it also felt strange. Jeongguk started to wriggle, like his body was searching for something blunt enough to give him pleasure, something bigger and searing that could push him open enough to numb the pain.
"More," he asked in a small voice, feeling the heat in his body start to build again, feeling his own sweat drip down the side of his face and onto the pillow.
"I think you might need a knot, baby. I'm sorry we let you sleep this long, you've come a little too far," Seokjin frowned, pushing in a second and a third finger all at once. He didn't even need to scissors his fingers or push past a ring of resistance, because Jeongguk was already opening up like a ripe fruit, slick rolling past his fingers, and sliding down the crack between his legs.
Jeongguk wanted it. He didn't know how his body knew, but his wolf was howling in his chest for something more, something he thought Seokjin wasn't able to give him.
"Please don't leave me," he cried, his eyes filling up with tears, pain ripping through his chest as Seokjin pulled his drenched fingers from inside him and suckled it in his own mouth.
"God," he groaned, dropping his head to Jeongguk's hip and mouthing at his hip bones. "You're so…"
"Please, Beta Hyung, please," Jeongguk sobbed, feeling like something was opening up in his chest, ripping him open, and bearing every secret he held inside of himself—laying himself so wholly vulnerable for this man he didn't know.
"Okay, sweetheart. I'll get alphas."
"No," Jeongguk yelped, clutching at Seokjin's wrist where it tired to unwrap from his cock. "Don't leave me, you can't leave me—"
"Hush, baby, hush, it's okay," Seokjin just cooed, curling against his side, still fully clothed. The groin of his trousers were sopping wet from pushing against Jeongguk, and he thought that he could smell himself more on Seokjin's clothes that from his own body. Scent could be strange like that. Jeongguk thought he smelled good when it was from Seokjin's body.
"Okay honey, I won't go anywhere."
Seokjin propped himself up on his elbow and tossed his head back. The howl that came out of him was so loud, Jeongguk swore he could feel his eardrums vibrate. It was a noise he'd never heard come from a man, only from a beast.
The door opened in seconds, and Namjoon and Hoseok toppled in, the other three wolves only seconds behind him. Jeongguk rushed to pull the blankets back up his body, probably a pointless attempt to cover himself up. Seokjin was no longer on top of him, but his knees were bent and splayed. He was completely exposed to the rogues.
"Holy fucking shit," Jimin said, his ears pricking up. He looked like he got a foot taller in seconds, his neck extending long and willowy, his shoulders pushing back like he was trying to make his chest look bigger. If Jeongguk wasn't so scared, he might have laughed.
"Calm the fuck down, now, or you and Tae will wait outside," Yoongi growled, wrapping a big hand around the back of each of the younger wolves napes. Jeongguk had never seen an alpha scruff another of his kind. Jimin and Taehyung both went limp, folding under the dominance of Yoongi's thumbs and fingers, pushing into their mating bites.
"I didn't even do anything," Taehyung said, his voice dreamy, his eyes still locked on Jeongguk's open legs. "Just wanna—"
"Bring the pups outside, Yoongi. It'll be better if they come back in when he's coming back down," Seokjin said, fisting his hand loosely into Jeongguk's hair periodically, and then loosening. It felt incredible, the pull of his hair gentle but somehow tickling a buried need deep inside, under all the fire.
"But hyung—" Yoongi started, but gave in with a sigh. He dragged the younger wolves outside while they were still pliant and closed the door.
Namjoon and Hoseok crawled to the end of the bed and made themselves small at Jeongguk's feet.
"What does he need, Hyung?" Hoseok asked. Jeongguk watched him the closest. He didn't know much of Namjoon either, but Hoseok felt like a stranger, sinewy and small, his rosemary scent still foreign to Jeongguk's nose.
"Hang back a little Seokie," Seokjin said, holding out a hand for Namjoon. "Stay by his feet and scent him a little, okay? He needs you to make him feel calm and cherished. You can do that, right baby?"
Hoseok just nodded his head, curling up in a ball by Jeongguk's bare toes, nosing along the arches of his feet so gently. Jeongguk thought he could feel the rush of rosemary under his skin, running through his blood. It felt like a painkiller, a caress, like smooth waters and waves lapping over his sore muscles.
From here, with only the candlelight and his now-adjusted eyes, Jeongguk could see the russet undertones in Hoseok's hair, the red of his lithe wolf.
Jeongguk looked up to meet Namjoon's dark eyes, brown but ringed with liquid gold. He was sitting on the bed by his side now, holding Seokjin's hand over Jeongguk's stomach.
"He needs a knot to help break the fever," Seokjin said gently, bringing both of their joined hands down between Jeongguk's legs.
He could feel the tiny barely there hairs on his pelvis bristle, goosebumps ripping up on his arms and legs as the muscles in his core tightened.
"Don't be scared, baby, I'm here," Seokjin said, turning over a little so he was lying on his hip, the entire length of his body flush with Jeongguk's side. He didn't let go of Namjoon's hand, just brought the alpha's fingers to Jeongguk's hole and pushed their fingers in together.
It was already so much more than just Seokjin's fingers inside of him, almost a handful between them.
"He's ready," Seokjin said to Namjoon, running his free hand over the alpha's back. "Don't be scared Namjoonie, you're doing great. You're going to make him feel so much better."
Jeongguk looked at Namjoon in shock. Even in his hazy state now he could see it—the way the alpha's hands shook, the sliver of worry in his eyes along with all of that lust. It was his first time with an omega, too. Hoseok helped him undress, peeling off his shirt and pants until he was big and bare.
It made something inside of Jeongguk unclench, his legs falling open for the wolf to mount him.
"Alpha," he whispered, reaching out for Seokjin's hand, but eyes locked with Namjoon's. Their eyes were locked together still when Namjoon crawled between his legs and settled on his elbows.
"Should we… make him present?" Hoseok asked from his feet. He looked half drunk himself, his arms wrapped around one of Jeongguk's ankles which were now splayed wide, his cheek rubbing against Jeongguk's calf.
"I think he'll feel better if he can see Namjoonie's face," Seokjin said, kissing Jeongguk's ear. "And I can help them both more like this."
"Can I—" Namjoon asked slowly, leaning down over Jeongguk so their chests were pushed together. "Will he let me…"
He looked helplessly to Seokjin, his teeth sharper than they were before, his hips making little undulations against the soft plush of Jeongguk's inner thigh like he didn't even know he was doing it.
"Kiss him, Namjoon," Seokjin said, holding his hand to the back of Namjoon's scalp and guiding the alpha down to Jeongguk's lips.
And a little voice in the back of his head was telling Jeongguk that he should be speaking, talking for himself, telling the alpha what he needed. But a much bigger part of him, maybe the overwhelming pull of his omega, was relishing in being so submissive, laying like molten lava in a pool at Namjoon's mercy, letting Seokjin decide how and when he received pleasure.
Namjoon's lips felt feather soft, warm and tender on his own. Jeongguk felt everything in him open up at the feel of his soft, wet tongue, his legs hanging so loose it felt like his hips could dislocate. Just as he pressed the points of his canines into Jeongguk's bottom lip, Namjoon pushed deep into his body.
"Oh fuck," he moaned, sliding in achingly slow until Jeongguk was full, so full he felt it in his throat. For a few moments, Namjoon didn't move at all, and Jeongguk struggled to catch his breath.
"It's alright, deep breath, let it all go. Deep breath, baby, and let it all go," Seokjin whispered in his ear, taking Jeongguk's hand in his own. He thought maybe he'd crush the beta's fingers so hard the bones would snap, but Seokjin didn't make a sound, just kept his mantra going on a loop until the panic abated.
"Feels good, Alpha," he slurred, melting into the bed. He could feel the tiny muscles inside of him latch around Namjoon, coaxing him deeper and deeper until there was nowhere else to go.
"I don't… fuck I think I might knot," Namjoon panted, squeezing his eyes shut and dropping down to lap at Jeongguk's scent gland. He mouthed and mouthed and didn't move his cock at all, until Hoseok came up behind him and grabbed him by the hips.
"You want the baby to feel good, don't you Joonie?" Hoseok said, moving Namjoon's hips with his hands. "Make him feel good first, I know you can do it."
"Feels so different," Namjoon gasped, his thrusts building in momentum until he was snapping into Jeongguk. "Just feels like, so fucking wet and tight, I just—"
"I know honey," Seokjin said. He pushed up on his knees and crawled back to Hobi, slowly unpeeling his hand from Jeongguk's. He took Jeongguk's fingers, and laid them gently on Namjoon's back.
"Aren't they beautiful together?" Seokjin asked Hoseok, pressing little kisses into the juncture of his neck. The alpha rumbled as he kissed him back.
Namjoon's head was buried in Jeongguk's neck now, and Jeongguk's arms and legs were wrapped so tightly around the alpha's body neither of them could move much. Namjoon just rocked his body back and forth, barely even pulling out anymore. He didn't even need to.
"Go on, give him your knot, baby," Seokjin said, rubbing Namjoon's back. Hoseok reached out too, and hooked his fingers around Jeongguk's ankle again.
It was the most overwhelmed Jeongguk had ever felt in his life, being so full, so surrounded. He felt the human part of him slowly slip away, almost into unconsciousness while his omega snarled and moaned for more. He felt like he was hanging over the edge of a cliff, so close to something that he could barely breathe.
When Namjoon's knot pushed inside him, Jeongguk's brain went blank. He heard a whine so loud and ear piercing rip through the room, loud enough that even Namjoon flinched on top of him, shuddering and twitching as he filled Jeongguk up so much he felt like his stomach might explode. He didn't even realize the noise had been him, that he'd come with such force he'd bitten right though the skin of Namjoon's shoulder, until Seokjin melted back down beside him and started to hum. To soothe both of them.
The pain in his stomach ebbed away, and all that he was left with was the feeling of euphoria, the feeling of being stretched to his absolute limit. Jeongguk fell asleep to the rumble in Namjoon's chest, and his own returning purr.
Jeongguk's heat lasted for days. He didn't remember anything after that first knotting, but when he woke up in the bed between Jimin and Taehyung, every muscle in his body was spent—every inch of white skin marred with blooming purple.
It was the clearest his head had been since he'd even met the rogues, the fuzzy carpet that had been laying over his senses finally lifted. And with it, the pain in his body was sharp. Not heat, or cramps anymore, but bruising, ripped skin, the lingering sting of his injury. And an ache so deep in his body that it could only have been left there by an alpha's knot. More than one, probably. It felt frightening to have a hole so large in his memory, but he couldn't ignore how safe his wolf felt in the bed either.
He wasn't in Seokjin's nest, anymore either, but stranded in the middle of a large, pack bed.
Jeongguk flushed and watched the faint shadows on the ceiling, leaves from the window blocking the sun as they fluttered, for what felt like hours before Taehyung stirred.
"Oh, you're awake finally," the alpha said, sitting bolt upright with his hair on end. Jeongguk felt like he was seeing him for the first time—his impossibly handsome face, perfect yet asymmetrical. He had glossy eyes so dark they were almost black, and a youthful face.
Jeongguk felt more shy than scared now. He might not have been mentally present for the last few days, but it was clear that his body remembered—and more than that, judging by the rumbling satisfaction in his chest, his wolf had bonded with Taehyung's too. With all of them, if that strange pull both towards the two wolves on the bed and to the warmth emanating from the door in the room was anything to go by.
'I'm… I don't know what to say. I feel embarrassed," he whispered, hiding his face in the pillow, which only stood to jostle Jimin awake too.
"God, can you try not to be so cute first thing in the morning," Jimin groaned, peeking open an eye, a cracked egg just big enough for Jeongguk to spy his natural grey irises. "I might have to eat you whole and then what would the rest of these horn dogs do?"
Jeongguk laughed self consciously, and Taehyung startled. He and Jimin exchanged a look as the cautious giggle grew into a hearty belly laugh, and Jeongguk exploded.
"Wow, that's new. Best laugh I've ever heard in my life," Taehyung said, leaning into tickle Jeongguk's belly. It only made him laugh more.
"Smile like a big cheese triangle," Jimin said, jumping on top of Taehyung so Jeongguk was now buried under the pair of them.
"I can't—breathe—" he gasped, lodging a knee into Taehyung's groin and drawing a howl from the alpha as he rolled over on his back, taking Jimin with him.
"Foul! Foul play!" Taehyung whined, clutching between his legs as his eyes watered.
"I… oh—" Jeongguk felt his proverbial tail tuck between his legs, and he nearly whimpered until he saw the matching smiles looking up at him from the mattress.
"We're just playing with you baby," Jimin said. "Taehyung loves playing rough. He'd probably ask you to step on it if he wasn't trying so hard not to come on strong."
"Well, Seokjin did say we should reign it in a little," Taehyung adds, cuddling into Jimin's side.
Jeongguk felt a little lonely looking at them, but he didn't know how to ask for what he wanted. He also felt scared of what he wanted, frightened that he didn't know these wolves at all.
Jimin and Taehyung blinked back, opening up their arms to pull him into their puppy pile. He'd nearly fallen back asleep with his head on Jimin's chest when Taehyung's deep, syrupy voice startled him.
"Do you want to shower together?" he asked gently, tapping on Jeongguk's hip before pulling himself out of the pile up. "It's a beautiful day, and you haven't even seen the den. Seokjin and Seokie washed you up a lot, but we couldn't actually wrangle you into a bath
"Oh," Jimin said, perking up beside him. "He hasn't even seen how beautiful the forest looks right now. Yoongi's flowers are all up. Oh, lets take him out for a run."
Jeongguk yawned, stretching his arms out wide, but didn't budge from his spot on the bed.
"Hold old are you?" he asked, blinking slowly at the alphas as they started back down at him.
"I'm 23, and so is Jiminie," Taehyung said, slumping back against the wall and tucking his toes under Jeongguk's thigh. Jimin lay down beside Jeongguk, and made small circles on the bare flesh of his tummy. Jeongguk was relieved to find that he was wearing underwear, maybe for the first time in days if his hazy memories were accurate, and the other two were fully dressed.
"Next is Namjoonie, he's 25, and Seokie just turned 26. Yoongi and Seokjin are old as shit though. They could literally have sired you," Taehyung said with a guffaw.
"Wait, that's kind of hot," Jimin said slyly, kissing the curve of Jeongguk's neck. "You're not a pup, really are you?"
Jeongguk flushed. "I'm 19."
The two alphas curled around him, pinching his bare flesh.
"Speaking of old as shit, Yoongi told us to wake you for dinner like… an hour ago. He's going to be pissed," Taehyung said, with a guilty expression on his face.
"But he looked so warm," Jimin whined, snuggling into Jeongguk's side. "How were we supposed to resist that little raspberry when he was all tucked up and snuffling into the pillows."
"Fucked if I know," Taehyung nodded, laying back down on Jeongguk's other side, and taking up the spot on the other side of his neck. "Jeongguk, you sleep with your mouth open, did you know?"
They lay silently like that for a few minutes, before Taehyung propped himself back up on his elbow."
"Can I have a kiss, pup?" he asked, batting his long, pretty eyelashes and leaning in to nip at Jeongguk's chin.
Jeongguk nodded, eyes fixed on Taehyung's slick bottom lip.
"He's a great kisser," Jimin said, sitting up to watch them. He dropped his hand to Taehyung's lower back, nearly crawling over the both of them.
Taehyung was a good kisser. His lips tasted like fresh lemons rolled in sugar, just like his scent but sweeter. He kissed with his tongue and with his teeth, like he wasn't patient enough to start slow, to lure Jeongguk into safety before he plundered.
"My turn," Jimin said, yanking Taehyung off Jeongguk and climbing over him to straddle his hips.
He nipped at Jeongguk's neck first, teeth dragging against his scent gland dangerously, before he leaned in for a sweet kiss. Much softer, but wetter than Taehyung. Jeongguk could feel himself slicking up at Jimin's heavy weight on his pelvis, the smell of Taehyung rubbing against the side of his body.
"You two are fucking insatiable," a deep voice said from the doorway. Yoongi stood with his arms folded over his chest, nodding with a hangdog expression on his face. "What part of wake the pup up so he doesn't starve to death did you not understand?"
"Hyung," Jimin and Taehyung chorused, rolling off Jeongguk. It was embarrassing really, given that he was the only one in his underwear. He could see Yoongi drop his eyes to the wet spot on his underwear, the curve of his nostrils quivering as he picked up the scent of slick but tried to pretend he didn't.
"Well," Yoongi says, clearing his throat. "Just… come on now, time for lunch."
He rushed from the room, leaving two cackling alphas and one mortified omega on the bed behind him.
"We'd better go, he's a big lump of sugar, really, but he can get so moody when you ignore him," Jimin said with a little shake of his head, pushing Taehyung off the bed.
They dressed Jeongguk in some of their own clothes, a big loose knitted sweater and some linen pants. Comfortable and cute. He drowned in them, and the alphas cooed, even though Jimin was hardly bigger than him, and Jeongguk wasn't exactly small for an omega. He'd been nearly a head taller than Jieun at home.
The pack ate around a large wooden table outside, half shaded by the cabin. The pack grounds, if they could be called that when the pack was only six wolves, was just a single building and outhouse, a few animals, and an abundance of Yoongi's flowers—heathers in every shade of pink and purple, sunflowers and dog daisies.
"He keeps vegetables too," Namjoon said, as he piled up the food on Jeongguk's pate into an active volcano, fit to overflow onto the table—mounds of fresh buttered vegetables, kimchi and raddish, jiggae that bubbled in its stone pot at pride of place in the center of the table.
"You cooked all of this?" Jeongguk asked Yoongi shyly, feeling the alpha bristle with pride beside him, a sweet swell of clove warming Jeongguk like a hug.
"Yah, don't take all the credit," Seokjin gasped from across the table. "It's a joint effort keeping all of these bellies full."
"We all have our strengths, and we all contribute."
Yoongi spoke so quietly that Jeongguk had to lean right into hear him. They had that in common, their quiet voices in a sea of exuberance and extroversion. Yoongi felt like a sold boulder in the middle of the rapids, and Jeongguk found himself wanting to cling to it when the natural buzz of conversation became overwhelming.
'What… would you want me to do if—"
Jeongguk didn't know how to ask, didn't know what he wanted to ask.
"If you stay?" Yoongi asked, another quiet whisper in his ear. The others were talking among themselves—Namjoon determined to steal a little from everyone's portion to fatten up Jeonnguk, Hoseok humming as he topped up everyone's water.
"If I stay," Jeongguk whispered back.
"We want you to," Yoongi said, laying down his chopsticks and turning to Jeongguk. His eyes looked just like his wolf that first time Jeongguk had seen him, Hayoon slain at his knee, the river lapping at the back of his head. Possessive and wild, but endlessly soft.
Jeongguk wondered how long it would take until he too laughed around this table, if he'd ever truly be one of them.
"I think I want to stay, too," he said, letting Yoongi take his hand. His warm hand.
Everyone was silent, but Jeongguk didn't know how much of the conversation they'd heard.
"Do you… I think I'm not ready to be mated," he said simply, turning to the food on his plate. "Maybe one day, but right now it just feels too soon."
The crush of scent swirled around him like water, like deep moisture in his bones, reaching into the cracks and swelling there, kintsugi for the bits of him he thought were irreparably broken. Jeongguk wondered how he smelled with them, if his own sweet raspberry scent melted with the others. If that would take time, too.
"We can wait a lifetime for you, little one," Seokjin said with a smile.
Yoongi held his hand all through dinner. It was the best food he'd ever tasted.
❀