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The others say it together. “Yes, omega,” in a little chorus.

“You knot me through Striker,” I say. “All at once, right now.”

“Present, omega,” says Knight in a dark voice.

I groan, gasping, a mix of emotions and instinct, and then I do it. I pull off Striker and go down in front of all of them, down on my elbows and knees with my butt in the air and my legs splayed, ready for a cock, for a knot.

Striker growls and pounces on me. He knots me in one long fluid movement, and everyone reacts vocally, and the bond goes taut and strong.

“Good omega,” says Striker. “Take your alphas’ knots.”

It’s my turn to say “please.”

Because I see it now, see the path free of the heat, see it up ahead, like a light at the end of a long tunnel. I begin to beg frantically, reaching through the bond for my alphas, needing the energy of all of them to do as I said, to concentrate through Striker, to lend him the power of their alpha essence so that we are all as one, all together, all pushing towards this, my pinnacle, my satisfaction, my pleasure.

I hurtle towards it, feeling my alphas with me, all of us together, the light getting closer, its warmth touching each of us, welcoming us.

And then, we break through, and it’s a release, all of us basking in its joy as we find this here,together.

20

knight

I FALL ASLEEPafter her heat breaks. I fall asleep while Lotus is rubbing antibiotic ointment on the little fissures at the opening of my asshole, something that I’m pretty sure I would never have thought I’d trust someone to do to me.

But then, I think about trying to explain to my past self that I actually like having men fuck me, and I know that past me would never have gotten that either.

I feel through the bond that she’s sorry. She says she’s sorry, too, but I also feel some sense of settledness about it. It is what it is. We are what we are. We’re not like other people, and sometimes that sucks, but other times, it’s an advantage. We have to take both the advantages and the disadvantages together. There isn’t a world where we only get the good parts.

I fall asleep and dream nonsensical dreams that aren’t even remotely sexual, which is nice, because I’m tired, and the thought of being aroused again anytime soon seems nothing but tiring, not even a little appealing.

When I wake up, I hear voices.

It’s Arrow and Calix. They’re not in the bedroom. They must be out in some other part of the suite.

I listen, burrowed into the bed, yawning, unwilling to move.

“I’m only saying, maybe we’re more used to it than you,” says Arrow.

“That doesn’t make sense,” counters Calix. “I should be more used to it than you. You guys didn’t grow up around packs. You don’t even know what this is like.”

“Well, no, we don’t know about what it’s like to be in a pack,” says Arrow. “But being an alpha, having a designation, it’s already meant I had to make sacrifices and I had to accept the fact I wasn’t like everyone else.”

“Me too,” says Calix.

“Well, in the Polloi, it meant something different,” says Arrow. “It meant, in a way, that you were marked for, I don’t know, sort of slavery.” He groans. “No, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s not slavery, not exactly, but the way the Polloi omegas use the alphas, the way they treat you guys—”

“Yeah, okay, I get it,” says Calix.

“Anyway, you thought you were escaping,” says Arrow. “You thought you’d live in this world, where you’d have freedom. And then… boom. Here you are scent matched and life bonded and stuck here. No freedom. It must make you angry.”

Nothing from Calix.

“Hey,” says Arrow, his voice gentle. “Hey, come here.”

I register Calix’s emotional pain through the bond, then, and I realize he might be crying.

“It’s going to be okay,” says Arrow.