Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chapter 1 – The General Who Does Not Break

Vegas POV

Every evening the wind carried a melody from the far hills.
It was never loud, just a thread of sound, fragile as breath, a flute weaving through smoke from the campfires.
The men grew used to it, a ghostly signal that dusk had arrived. Vegas never did.

He would stand outside his command tent, one hand resting on the hilt of his sword, listening until the last note faded into darkness.
The tune bothered him more than the hunger in his soldiers’ eyes or the reports of dwindling rations.
Music, he decided, should serve its master. Whoever played that song still believed the land belonged to someone else, and that defiance was enough to keep him awake long after the fires died.
When he owned the hills, when the flutist and the wind itself bent to him, there would be silence. Then he could rest.

Inside the tent, his new adviser Taran hovered over maps marked with ink and ash.
“Supplies are thin,” Taran said quietly. “Another week of siege and we’ll be starving our own.”

“Another week,” Vegas repeated, eyes still on the hills. “That’s all I’ll need.”
He traced a finger over the border lines—boundaries drawn first by arrogance, then by his father’s blood.
“This war isn’t about supplies. It’s an old debt.”

Taran hesitated. “The general you’re fighting—the one they call Pethros…is the same man who..?”

“I know who he is.”
Vegas’s voice was soft, but Taran stepped back as if burned.
The camp fell silent outside. Even the horses stilled. Somewhere, the flute continued to play.

~~~~**~~~~

Pete POV

Down in the valley, the same notes trembled against Pete’s lips.
The flute was cracked; he had repaired it with twine from a fallen banner. It no longer held tune well, but the sound, thin, aching, was enough to keep his men calm.
He played until their breathing slowed, until the murmurs of despair turned to sleep.

When he lowered the instrument, darkness seemed to close in.
Only fifty soldiers remained fit to stand. The rest huddled around dying fires, their eyes dull from hunger.
Rations had ended three days ago. He had given his share to a wounded boy and pretended not to notice the dizziness that followed.

A lieutenant knelt beside him. “We can’t hold another week, General. Even if they don’t attack, the men will break.”

Pete’s hand tightened on the flute. “I know.”

He watched the smoke drift toward the mountains, toward the same ridge where the enemy’s banners glowed under torchlight.
The land was bleeding, and his king was nowhere to be found. Lecharus had fled with the treasury, leaving his people to starve.
Pete thought of the oath he had sworn as prince—one he had kept secret behind the mask of a general. Protect them, even from your own bloodline.

He looked at his soldiers again, gaunt and loyal, waiting for orders that would mean their lives or their deaths.
There was only one way left to save them. If he could trade himself for their survival, he would.
He wiped dust from the flute and whispered, “One last song, then.” As a free man - he never said out loud

~~~~**~~~~

Vegas POV

Morning came gray and cold.
Vegas mounted his horse and rode out to the field where both armies waited.
The opposing ranks were silent, hollow men in torn uniforms, standing behind a single figure on a white horse.

The general rode forward alone. His armor was battered, his face hidden beneath a half-broken helm.
When he removed it, Vegas felt the air thin. The man was younger than he expected, eyes pale and calm, voice low but steady.

“I am Pethros,” he said. “If I fight you and lose, you will spare my men. That is the offer.”

Taran hissed under his breath, but Vegas lifted a hand for silence. So this is the one who ended my father’s war.
“Agreed,” he said. “If you fall, they live. If you stand, they walk home.”

The general inclined his head once. No bravado, no pleading. Only acceptance.
Vegas felt something in his chest twist.

~~~~**~~~~

The Duel

Steel met steel in the pale light of dawn.
The watching soldiers held their breath. Every strike rang through the valley, echoing off the burned walls of the city.

Pete’s movements were precise but heavy, slowed by hunger. He fought to protect, not to win. Each parry was a prayer that his soldiers were watching, that they would remember restraint could be stronger than rage.

Vegas fought like fire incarnate. Every blow carried the weight of a dead father and a lifetime of pride.
When their blades locked, he saw his reflection in the other man’s eyes: not a king, not a victor, just a son still fighting a ghost.

At last Pete’s strength failed. His sword slipped from his grasp, clattering across the stones. He stayed on his knees, chest heaving, gaze level.

Vegas pressed the tip of his blade to the general’s throat.
“Yield,” he said.

Pete closed his eyes. “Spare them.”

The single phrase, quiet, certain, cut deeper than any sword.
Vegas lowered his weapon. “They’ll live,” he said, and the words tasted like defeat.

~~~~**~~~~

Vegas POV

By evening, the camp celebrated. Flags were raised, drums thundered, but Vegas felt none of it.
He sat apart from the noise, waiting for the sound that had haunted every sunset of the war.

The wind came down the valley carrying only dust. No flute. No melody.
He listened harder, until the silence began to sound like accusation.

“Strange,” Taran said softly, approaching with wine. “You finally have your victory, and you look as though you’ve lost something.”

Vegas didn’t answer. He kept his eyes on the dark line of the hills.
The missing music scraped at him like a wound that wouldn’t close.

~~~~**~~~~

Pete POV

Beneath those same hills, in the damp hollow of a cell, Pete sat against the wall and tried to breathe through cracked ribs.
No healer came. No food was given. Only water, once a day. He accepted it without word or expression.

He counted the hours by the flicker of torchlight beyond the bars. Every time the flame wavered, he imagined the field above him, the men he had saved marching away from this place, alive.
Pain was a fair price for that.

He pressed his fingers to his side and listened to the emptiness around him. For the first time in years, he did not play the flute. The silence felt cleaner than any melody.

~~~~**~~~~

Vegas POV

Midnight found Vegas pacing the length of his tent.
The wine had gone sour on his tongue. Outside, the camp slept; victory banners flapped lazily in the wind.
Still no music.

He imagined the flutist’s hands, the breath that shaped those notes, now stilled somewhere in the conquered city.
He told himself it was fitting, the song belonged to him now, silent because he had taken it.
But the thought didn’t soothe. It burned.

He went to the balcony, looked out over the valley. The night was clear, stars thin as scars.
Below, torches flickered in the dungeons. He wondered which cell held the enemy general, and why the darkness there seemed deeper than the rest.

The king of Theerapanya had won a kingdom, and yet the land refused to sing for him.

Chapter Text

Chapter 2 — The King’s Offer

They left before dawn, when the valley was a grey bruise under the low sky. Wheels creaked and hoofs thudded, and the convoy unspooled like a wound. The ruined farms and half-collapsed walls slid past in a procession of claims and losses. Men shifted in their saddles, looking neither to left nor right. Their hunger was a slow thing that tugged at the edges of their voices—an ache that made laughter brittle.

Vegas rode at the head because that was what kings did; the sight of him set the line straight, made men pick up broken discipline as if by muscle memory. Vegas could feel the weight of the campaign on his shoulders; in the way the map pinned him down like a thing he could not shake. He had come to finish an account. He had come to put a period where his father had only left an ellipsis.

Behind him, in a battered wagon, chained among other prisoners, sat the man who had once been a name to be feared.

They called him ‘general’ to keep the story simple. Vegas had heard the stories plenty of times, the traps in the ravine, the sudden flank, the column that had been turned into a burn-mark in the earth. Names turned to legend in battle, and legend hardened into long, dull hatred. But standing within reach of the man now, watching the line of his jaw, the straight fall of his shoulders, Vegas felt an irritation that tastefully became curiosity. This man had been an alpha among armies; that fact lingered in the set of him like an old scent.

Pete did not look like most captives. His hair had been cropped roughly lading like an inverted bowl on his head and his uniform was a ragged thing, but he carried himself like someone who had been used to being obeyed. When the cart stopped for a brief halt, when men climbed down and burned the morning chill from their hands, the prisoners were sorted and counted. Guards fussed with straps; others tossed stale bread by half-heartedly. Pete kept his eyes ahead, watching the road.

On the second day his wounds soured. What meeker bandages were wrapped around his wounds, loosened by sweat gathered grit in their folds; fever came on and off like a tide. He did not say so. He never said anything. He let a small child share his bread, breaking his portion without a motion to bother anyone about it. The little things he did, folding a blanket for a man shivering two rows back, placing his own cloak over a shoulder, were the sort of administration only a leader who had known hunger could recall. A lieutenant whispered to another that you could still see how he once moved across a field, and the other answered that a body can be an instruction even when the leader is gone.

Rumours found their easy routes. Soldiers who had laughed when he was first brought in at the surrender hushed as the days trailed on. Some swore the general hummed to himself at dawn; others swore he never slept. A few said, in the sort of voice used for stories told late at night, that they had seen him place his hand over his chest and whisper names, names of villages, of women, of boys whose faces hovered for a moment under the fever, then vanished. Even those who had shouted abuse at him now crossed themselves when they passed the side of his cart.

Vegas read the patrol notes with the kind of attention he often reserved for war correspondence. Prisoner remains silent. The phrase had become a small, steady thud in his reports. He began to look for that line before he slept. He found that knowing the answer to a question calmed him less and less. The silence was no longer a lack; it had a shape. It had gravity.

They entered the city like a coin tossed into water: ringing and then swallowed. Walls rose black against the sky and the towers clustered like teeth. The capital smelled of freshly plucked flowers and riches. Abandoned by its own King in the head of the war, like a forgotten tune of a fairy tale. Couriers ran for instructions, and men in livery passed with messages of welcome ready on their tongues. Vegas felt the soft hiss of the court’s machinery come to life around the edges of his campaign. He had come for land and for ledger; he had not come to be haunted by a tune, but the ghost of that music had lodged in him and settled there.

Vegas had heard through his advisers, when the old king fled, he did not go quietly. He left through the eastern gate with half the palace maids, the choicest of his harem, and wagons of gold wrenched from the hands of the people. He had stripped his kingdom to gild his own escape.
Yet in the wake of his cowardice, something strange flickered among the ruins—relief. Fear still clung to the streets, but beneath it stirred the brittle hope that the new ruler, brutal though he was, might at least end the hunger that had emptied their homes.
The grand gardens and mirrored halls Lecharus had built with stolen coin stood abandoned now, their fountains dry, the marble floors furred with dust. They were monuments not to beauty but to greed, silent reminders of how easily a crown can rot from within.
When the court finally unpacked its ambitions, Vegas took residence in halls built by theft. Lecharus’s ballrooms glittered with stolen gold; the fountains were nothing but cracked stone. It was a palace raised from hunger, and Vegas knew it.
He would rule from these same rooms, but not enjoy them. Their beauty had a taste—salt and ash.

Once the echoes settled, he ordered the prisoner cleaned.
They brought Pete into the audience chamber under torchlight. The hall swallowed the sound their boots made; it turned speech into something small and fragile. Courtiers had crowded in, faces pale with curiosity, with the hunger for scandal. They leaned forward like birds on a wire.

Pete stood as he had stood on the walls in some other life: not defiant, not pleading, but masterfully still. Fever had burned the colour from his face, and the bandages at his arm had been tightened once more, but whatever the sickness did it could not alter the geometry of him. To the men in the hall, damp from travel and drunk with success, he looked like a relic of a war that had been—and yet, the aura of command clung to him like dust to cloth.

Vegas watched him until he felt the observation needing to become speech. He did not ask for showmanship; he wanted information, and he wanted the sight of the alpha humbled. This is what a victory should look like. This, he thought, is how memory is paid.

He stepped down from his place and crossed the floor until the space between them was small enough for a sword to be pulled without warning. The courtiers drew a little closer, like children to a story. Vegas kept his voice low.

“Will you serve?” he asked. The words were almost casual, but they cut to the bone of what he had in mind. Serve him, wear the insignia of the victor. Turn the man who had ruined his father into an instrument of his reign. A man of such talent like the general, would be a waste if lost to war. Vegas could very well use the man to his advantage. He did not need to answer to the ministers that raised an eye to his request. They all bowed to him in the end. If general flipped his loyalties, Vegas could very well bring more territories to kneel to him and make the ministers richer in turn.

Pete lifted his chin a fraction. Even now, this small movement conveyed the steadiness of someone used to giving orders. “I will not be used to adorn power,” he said, and the voice, though weak, was the voice of someone who had been used to being obeyed. It was plain as a shovel in the earth: duty before self.

Vegas’s mouth tightened. He looked at the men who had come with him, at the faces in the gallery. “Then you will make it difficult to be silent,” he said. He spoke with the kind of allowance a king often used. Obey me, and the world will remember your name differently. Refuse, and you will learn the cost of not bending.

There was laughter at the edges, nervous, sharp. Some of the court took his answer for mercy, some for sport. The king’s command settled into the room like a mist: make the general’s recovery visible. The ambiguity was deliberate. It gave the men who carried commands the license to be cruel without having to admit it. Orders became theatre with the springs loosened.

They took him away.

The sequence that followed would be better described later in the histories. If the histories had the mercy to be kind. For now, it is enough to say that the treatment the prisoner received over the next days was public and humiliating in intent though not obscene in description. Guards quarrelled about methods. Servants whispered over bandages. There were times when healers were denied and times when their ministrations were allowed as if the discretion were a test of the public’s appetite. The wound that had been tucked under wraps flared up; it grew hot under the skin and cursed the edges of the bandage. The smell of rot is not something to be written like a headline. It moves through a room like a secret and leaves faces pallid in its wake.

He was summoned again. The King had heard of his rotting body.
He stood in the same place as before, in front of the same man as before. Same question asked of him - “Will you serve?” Even less nonchalant this time, like the torture and humiliation of the past days never happened. Pete chose to not reply. Eyes focused on the ground, refusing any acknowledgement.
Vegas not used to such treatment internally fumed. How dare this man, he was offering a way out - Out of eminent death!. What was so great about a land that was abandoned by its own king , that this general continued to be loyal?
“So, you chose to stay silent? Well, that won’t do, will it? Let’s see here. I hear you have a constant fever these days and your wounds are festering? Grads, summon the Royal Physician.”
Within a few minutes, a tall thin man entered the halls. He hastily introduced himself to Pete as Doctor Top. With the Kings permission he got to work on Pete’s shoulder injury that looks especially necrotic.
“Your Highness, all other wounds would heal with the medication I will provide, but the skin on this part of his shoulder must be cut off, if there is any hope to prevent further necrosis.”
“Cut if off, what are you waiting for” Vegas asked.
As the doctor moved to apply some numbing agent the king stopped the doctor. “Just cut if off, do you know who you are standing in front of? Our Great General - The silent blade of Kittisawasd, do not offend his achievements. He does not need all this.” The King declared loudly.
Pete’s stomach dropped. He knew what the king wanted, Pete refused to dance to his insanity.
The doctor gave Pete a pitying look, took out a scapple , took a deep breath, praying for both himself and his new patient, He put the first cut on Pete. Pete paled even more as the blade cut into his already heated festering flesh. But to Vegas’s dismay, no sound escaped. As the court looked on, almost everyone holding their breaths not a sound emerged.
Silence continued until Pete’s blood flowed down his chest and his resolve finally broke , but darkens took him first.

Vegas, absolutely in shock, looked on. Never, NEVER had someone challenged him so, oh so be it. “Take him away. This is too morbid for morning court” he said in a calm voice, even though a wave of emotions surged in his heart.
And so that day, just like that the court was dismissed.

The courtiers who had expected a quick, vulgar joke found their expectations unsettled. Instead of breaking, the general’s composure acted like a mirror. Junior officers brought fresh water to his pallet and would not take the ribbing of older men who said he had no right to their charity. Servants who had expected to be laughed at by the camp instead looked on in a kind of confusion that bordered on reverence. Stories drifted from one corridor to another: how Pete had refused to cheapen himself with spectacle; how he moved with the quiet, efficient attention of a man still tempered by command.

Men’s cruel delight soured into a different emotion: the creeping, resentful admiration you get when someone you intended to mar shows you how clean they can remain. It is a small, dangerous thing. To admire is to permit, and to permit is to give the other man power you never intended to concede.

Vegas heard the talk. He heard how the servants spoke of the general’s dignity. He heard how a young officer muttered something about the “stone man” and how an older hand corrected him, “No, he’s granite.” The noise should have been a balm, a chorus of the king’s success. Instead, it lodged like a shard.

He paced his chambers that night with the patrol reports open before him, the line he had stared for days—Prisoner remains silent—a drumbeat under the page. The city slept under a net of rain. Through the window he could see the dull flicker of lamps, the narrow gutters of light that marked other people’s lives. He found, to his own alarm, that he had begun to wait for those reports like a man waiting for a confession.

“Make him speak, then,” Taran had told him before the audience. “Or make him useful. Either would smooth the court.”

Vegas had not believed it then. Now it seemed complicated. He wanted the man to bend so he could label the bending as his victory. He had expected a broken thing; instead, he had a live, stubborn presence that refused to fit the mold.

Standing by the window, he whispered into the dark as if the night might answer him, an old promise transformed into a new hunger. “You will answer me eventually,” he told the empty air.

No sound came back but rain and the faint memory of a flute that had once threaded the dusk. The tune had stopped when the wars ended; now, for reasons he could not name, its silence was louder than any trumpet. He turned away from the window and from the map and from the ledger he had come to settle, and the king felt, for the first time in a long while, uncertain of the cost of his victory.

Chapter Text

Chapter 3 – The King’s Inheritance

Morning spilled across the council chamber like molten silver. Scrolls unfurled across the table, the scent of hot wax and damp parchment thick in the air. The law-speaker cleared his throat and began the recitation every conqueror dreaded.
“According to the Concord of Bonds,” the law-speaker read, “since the reigning king of Kittisawasd was neither slain in combat nor taken into custody, this realm cannot yet be claimed as conquered. It remains a dependency until its new Alpha ruler is lawfully joined—by bond or treaty—to the surviving Omega line of that land.”
When no questions came the law-speaker continued in a pleading voice “The law is clear, Your Majesty. Because the old king lives, your victory is not complete. Until you bond with his surviving Omega line, this crown is only borrowed.”
Vegas listened without expression. “And if there is no Omega line left?”
The man hesitated. “Then, Majesty, sovereignty cannot be sealed. You would rule as regent only, until such lineage is restored.”
Taran added, voice low, “The Kittisawasd royal house perished. Their last prince is said to have vanished years ago. Without him, the law calls your crown… symbolic.”
Vegas drummed his fingers once on the table. “Symbolic. Tell me, if I take another kingdom next year, must I wed again? Shall I line my halls with treaties in silk and heat, one for every border I cross?”
The councilors froze.
“Impractical,” he said, smiling without humor. “And exhausting.”
Taran risked a breath. “The law was meant to restrain conquest.”
“Then it arrived too late.” Vegas stood, his chair scraping sharply against the marble. “Find me a solution that does not require a wedding parade.”
He left them bowing to the sound of his footsteps, the word impractical echoing in their silence.

~~~~**~~~~

The corridors beyond were lined with gilt mirrors clouded by dust. This palace—Lecharus’s masterpiece—was a mausoleum of stolen splendour. Vegas ran his hand over the cold marble balustrade, thinking how easily greed survived its maker. I will rule here, he thought, but I will not enjoy it.
He told himself the unease was political. It was not. For days he had been thinking of the general in the lower cells: the man’s stillness, the strange dignity that had turned gossip into worship. He wanted to see him again—he said for strategy, though the word rang false even to him.
~~~~**~~~~
At dusk he ordered, “Bring the prisoner.”
Guards looked at each other but no one questioned the command.
When Pete entered, the chamber was lit by a single lamp. The light caught the edges of clean linen and, the faint scent of herbs from his bandages; the wounds had begun to knit but still pulled at his skin. Vegas’s pheromones were unrestrained and held tick in the room. Any other omega would have knelt at the sheer dominance of it. For Pete now, Fever still glazed his eyes, but the carriage of his body remained steady, almost regal. He bowed once, neither humble nor proud, and waited.

“You’re healing. Grateful?” Vegas’s tone was soft.
“You allowed medicine. I am… alive. That is gratitude enough.” Pete replied
Vegas moved closer until the lamplight blurred between them. “Serve me,” he said. “You commanded armies; command them again—under my banner.”
Pete’s gaze lifted only a fraction, enough for the lamplight to find his eyes.
“I don’t wish to serve anyone. Not anymore.” Pete let it out almost like a prayer.
Vegas’s tone hardened. “Because you’d rather rot in my dungeons?”
Pete’s breath left him in a thin sound that might have been a laugh. “Because I’ve already done my duty. I’ve marched children to die for this king who forgot their names before the ground closed over them. I’ve written strategy on the backs of men too hungry to hold a sword. I’ve watched cities burn and told myself it was for protection.”
He paused, voice catching on the word. “Protection. That was the lie we all lived on. I thought if I fought hard enough, if I obeyed long enough, I could keep one corner of the world from falling apart. But the world fell anyway. The walls I built only kept the fire in.”
He looked down at his bandaged hands. “What’s left to protect now? A crown that eats its own? I’ve done all I can do for kings. I will not pretend there’s anything noble left in it.”
The speech wasn’t loud, but it filled the room. Vegas felt each sentence settle like a stone in water. The anger he had prepared—cold, righteous—evaporated, leaving only the ache of recognition. He had come into this meeting ready to assert dominance; instead he found himself staring at the wreck of someone who had once believed in the same illusions he still carried.
Pete lifted his eyes again. “So no, Your Majesty. I won’t serve. Not because I despise you, I despise your greed to power, because I finally understand how easily service becomes another kind of greed.”
The refusal was soft, but final. Vegas’s temper flared.
“You’d rather rot in my dungeons” Vegas said as a statement meant as a warning.
“Better rot than forget why the walls were built.” Pete replied regardless.
Vegas could not look away. The lamplight made the other man’s face a study in contradictions, tired, proud, unbowed. He had heard speeches of loyalty all his life; this refusal sounded truer than any oath.
The calmness unsettled him more than defiance.

~~~~**~~~~

The air was cold against his back, the manacles colder still as they bit into his wrists. Pete hung from the chains, his body a map of old scars and newer, angrier welts. He focused on the chill of the granite, letting it anchor him, letting it swallow the heat of his humiliation.

For the past hour, Vegas had taken the whip to his back and chest, an unrestraint madness dancing in his eyes. Like every strike against Pete’s skin made Vegas alive anew. The constant lashes against his self and the air filled with Vegas’s strong pheromones almost sent him in a trance. Still not a single sound escaped his mouth.

Vegas, the Usurper King, circled him like a predator, the soft tread of his boots the only sound in the vast, torch-lit throne room. “Still nothing?” he murmured, his voice a low rumble that seemed to vibrate through the stone floor. “No pleas? No curses? Not a single sound from the great General Pethros?”

He stopped directly in front of Pete, his gaze a physical weight. Pete kept his eyes fixed on a crack in the floor ten feet away, his breathing even, his expression a blank mask carved from ice. Inside, a familiar, shameful heat was coiling in his gut. Again. He’s going to do it again. And you’re going to love it.

Vegas’s hand snapped out, not to strike, but to grasp Pete’s chin, forcing his head up. “They said you were an Alpha. A proud, unbreakable Alpha. Yet you take your degradation like a common omega whore.” His thumb stroked the line of Pete’s jaw, a mockery of a caress. “Perhaps they were wrong.”

As Vegas eyed Pete’s body, all flushed and glistening with sweet, Vegas felt an exhilaration like never before. The chase of this hunt, gave him a new high he had never experienced before. He wanted to take those plump lips. Electricity ran straight down his body. As his eyes moved back from Pete’s lips to his eyes, he realized what he was feeling towards this man that despised him. Pete’s eyes were empty. Noting reflected in them even after all that had happened. Vegas annoyed released Pete with a shove that made the chains rattle. “Perhaps you’re just a hollow shell. A man with no pride left to break.”

For weeks it had been like this. The capture. The stripping of his armor and dignity. The relentless, creative humiliations designed to make the famed general crack, to give Vegas the satisfaction of a scream, a sob, anything. Pete gave him nothing but silence and that infuriating, placid stare. It was a silence that was driving the new king mad with obsession.

Vegas picked up a slender, cruel-looking riding crop from a nearby table. He traced the line of Pete’s spine with its tip, from the nape of his neck down to the cleft of his ass. Pete’s muscles jumped under the teasing touch, a traitorous reaction he couldn’t suppress.

“Such control,” Vegas mused. He brought the crop down—thwap—a sharp, stinging blow across Pete’s shoulders. The pain was bright, electric. It sang through his nerves, a filthy melody that made his cock twitch against his thigh. More.

Another strike, lower this time, across the swell of his buttocks. Pete gritted his teeth, swallowing the gasp that threatened to escape. He welcomed the pain, craved it. It was a focus. It was a purpose. It was the only thing that made the gnawing emptiness inside him feel full.

Vegas saw the subtle tremor that ran through Pete’s body. He stepped closer, his chest almost touching Pete’s back. His breath was hot on Pete’s ear. “Do you enjoy this, General? Does my attention please you?”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He did not anymore knowing an answer will not come. He brought the crop down again, and again, painting lines of fire across Pete’s skin. The rhythmic punishment, the focus of Vegas’s entire being upon him—it was intoxicating. Pete’s control, usually an iron fortress, began to waver. The heat in his core grew, pulsing in time with the strikes. He was tired, pushed to his absolute limit, his body and mind worn thin.
All the time, Vegas just let out his frustrations not caring for what Pete was experiencing, Pete was his perfect Pet.
When the guards finally brought Pete down from his restrains, he had passed out from his beatings. Vegas stood breathing hard, anger curdling into a fascination he could not name.

~~~~**~~~~

“You have a talent for provoking kings.” Vegas almost growled as Pete regained consciousness.
“Only those who think they are owed obedience.” Pete whispered, hoping against hope his shame had gone unnoticed.
Vegas almost laughed. “Tell me your name. Pethros—what do you call yourself?”
“Pete is what my mother called me before the court decided names belonged to pedigree. Pethros was what my king wrote on his rosters. He liked titles more than truth.”
“And your king?”
“A man who gilded hunger and called it glory. He built gardens with the people’s coin and let them starve beneath their beauty.”
“You hated him.”
“I pitied him. Hate costs too much.” Pete replied
Each sentence stripped another layer from the legend Vegas had grown up with. He realized, startled, that he wanted the man to keep speaking. Every word redrew the world.
When he finally dismissed him, his voice came quieter than command.
“Rest. I’ll find work for you yet.” Vegas said dismissively
“I have no wish to be useful.” Pete added
Guards dragged him away. Vegas watched the door long after it closed.
Later, wine sat untouched beside maps he no longer read. The chamber smelled of metal and rain. He replayed their conversation until it lost its shape—no longer interrogation but something more dangerous: understanding. He had demanded loyalty; what he wanted was comprehension. And that, he realized, was far worse.

~~~~**~~~~

In the lower quarters, Pete leaned against the wall, exhaustion folding him. Heat crawled under his skin; the fever that had plagued him since the march rose again, sharper, stranger. His pulse quickened, his breath shallow. Just illness, he told himself. Not weakness. But his body refused him calm. He pressed his hand to his throat, half afraid of what the trembling meant. He had heard tales of bodies turning on themselves under strain, of old instincts roused by pain. He forced the thoughts away.
The only remedy he trusted was sound.

From beneath his pallet in his jail cell, he drew the cracked reed flute a sympathetic guard had slipped through the bars. He turned it in his hands, thumb over the split wood. The first breath produced no tone; the second found one—a fragile thread of melody that trembled in the air, then steadied. The tune wound upward through the corridors, a ghost of the music that had once haunted battlefields.

~~~~**~~~~

Above, Vegas froze at his desk. The faint, broken song reached his ears like a pulse from another life. He set down his pen, listening. The melody slipped between the stones, searching. He could not tell whether it accused or forgave.
He crossed to the window. Outside, the gardens the old king had built with stolen wealth lay drowned in moonlight—fountains dry, marble nymphs veiled in ivy. The music touched them, and for an instant the ruins seemed almost alive again.
Vegas whispered into the quiet, “Everything that defies me will be mine—land, crown, even you.”
The tune faltered, then faded, leaving only the echo of breath and rain.

Chapter Text

Chapter 4 – The Flute at Dusk

The palace of Kittisawasd had learned to fear silence.
Each night, when the sun sank beyond the black hills, a flute began to play. The melody was neither warlike nor courtly; it was soft, mournful, carrying the ache of something lost and never recovered.
Servants paused mid-step to listen. Even the guards held their breath when it rose through the corridors like mist. The sound haunted every hall—and most of all, the king’s chambers.

Vegas never ordered it stopped. He told himself he tolerated it, yet every night he found himself listening, waiting. On evenings when the flute fell silent, the palace felt emptier—like a heartbeat missing a beat.

One such night, the tune began earlier than usual.
Vegas followed it, guided by instinct more than curiosity, through a darkened corridor to down in the dungeons towards a cell. There, bathed in a shard of moonlight, sat the man who should not have been the one at all: Pete, the captured general.
He played with unhurried precision, his fingers moving like someone long trained in finer things. The way he held the flute, the posture, the stillness—it spoke of breeding, of lessons learned in candlelight, not barracks.
Vegas lingered in the doorway until the melody stopped.
“You play like someone raised for courts, not trenches.” Vegas almost whispered. Like if he spoke out loud something would shatter. It still reached Pete’s ears.
“War doesn’t spare those who know how to bow.”
“So you learned both.”
Pete rested the flute on his knees, eyes unreadable.
“My father believed etiquette built empires. He was wrong.” Pete deadpanned
“Mine believed conquest did. He was wrong too.” Vegas said in understanding.
For a moment, they were just two sons of disappointing fathers, sharing the same exhausted disillusionment.
Vegas’s gaze flicked to the flute again.
“Return it when the guards come.” Vegas said and regretted it instantly.
He turned before Pete could answer, but the melody followed him back to his chambers, threading itself into his thoughts.

~~~**~~~

He summoned the prisoner again. Once. Then again. And again.
At first his court assumed he sought intelligence—details of the old kingdom’s tactics, maps, secrets. By the third week, they stopped pretending to believe it. It was the gossip of corridors now: The new king cannot sleep unless he has seen the general.

Pete obeyed each summons with the same weary composure. He entered, bowed faintly, endured whatever questions the king posed—military, moral, or meaningless—and left without emotion. He never brought up the flute, and Vegas never asked. It was the one silence they shared willingly.

~~~**~~~

By the end of the week, the council was restless.
The ministers murmured about the king’s sleeplessness, about the strange music in the halls, and, most of all, about the prisoner who had his attention.
At the morning session, Taran cleared his throat and began carefully.
Taran said “Majesty, the Concord remains unresolved. The conquered lands cannot be yours until the surviving Omega bloodline is joined by treaty or bond. Yet you refuse every offer.”
Vegas leaned back in his chair, voice sharp.
Vegas replied “You mean marriage.”
Taran pleaded, “A necessity, not an insult. The last Omega heir of Kittisawasd fled years ago—rumored to have run off with a lover. If he yet lives, he’s far from these lands. Until the line is secured, you rule in practice, not in law.”
Vegas’s eyes hardened.
Vegas replied “Then I’ll rule in practice.”
The old man hesitated.
“Majesty, the court grows uneasy. They whisper that your… fixation with the captured general keeps you from seeing reason.” Taran had done it. Said out loud that which was being whispered so far.
Vegas’s tone dropped low.
“The court whispers because it has nothing else to do. I conquered a kingdom. If I choose to study its enemies, that’s my prerogative.”
Taran said bravely “Studying him nightly, Majesty, is not strategy.”
Vegas, “You all wish for my marriage, why not build a harem of everyone I capture? Would that suite the narrative the courtiers wish to pursue?”
“Your Majesty! You must not jest like so, you must not let others question your Leadership!” Taran exclaimed.
The silence that followed was long enough to break composure.
“Then perhaps I should remind them what command looks like.” Vegas’s voice sent chills down everyone present.
He rose, taking the torch from the nearest sconce, and walked out.
The council exchanged glances of quiet dread.

~~~**~~~

 

The stairwell to the lower cells was slick with damp. The guards straightened at his approach, startled that their king had come without escort.

Pete’s door groaned open beneath his hand. Inside, the prisoner stood waiting, still shackled to the wall, pale, fever-sharpened, but still upright. The torchlight found the hollows of his face, the steadiness of his eyes.

“You look better than a man awaiting punishment.” Vegas held his head a little higher today. More arrogance in his voice than usual.
“I’ve endured worse than your anger, Majesty.” Pete said.

Vegas studied him, the measured speech, the quiet precision in his movements. There was something unmistakably refined about him, a polish that no soldier’s life could teach.
Vegas: “You still speak like someone who expects to be obeyed.”
Pete: “Habit dies slower than loyalty.”

Vegas: “You think you understand power?”
Pete: “I’ve seen enough kings break themselves proving it.”

Vegas: “You’d do well not to test mine.”
Pete: “If it were worth fearing, you wouldn’t need to prove it.”

The torch sputtered. The air grew thick with tension.

Vegas’s grip on the torch tightened. “Careful.”
Pete smiled faintly, the kind of smile that carried more pity than defiance. “You want to know why your father failed here? Because he came to own the land, not to feed it. You’re already walking his road.”

The words struck harder than a blade. Vegas crossed the space between them before he could think.

Vegas: “You presume too much.”
Pete: “Do I? Every time you come here or make me come to you, you’re not seeking obedience—you’re seeking an answer. You could kill me, but you keep me breathing. Tell me, Majesty, is that mercy… or curiosity?”
Vegas: “You speak as though the chains aren’t there.”
Pete: “Because they’re yours, not mine.”

That struck something deep and dangerous. Vegas moved before thinking, voice sharp with something between rage and fascination.

A full brunt of Vegas’s suppressive pheromones surged out of him, filling the whole jail cell.

The air seemed to shift around him, heavy and electric. The flame bent sideways as though to bow. Pete staggered, breath shallow, skin flushed with heat. It wasn’t fear; it was something older, stranger—his body reacting to what his mind couldn’t name. His true nature. His body wanted to submit to the alpha in front of him. He needed it. Pre heat or Heat , did not matter. All Pete had in that moment was his alpha in front of him.

Vegas saw him falter, satisfaction flickering and dying in the same breath.

And then it happened.

A wave of dizziness hit Pete. His knees buckled for a fraction of a second, the chains taking his full weight with a jarring clank. And with that small lapse, his meticulous control shattered.

A scent bloomed in the air around him.

It was subtle at first, a mere hint of night-blooming jasmine and warm honey. But it was unmistakable. Omega.

Vegas went utterly still. He inhaled deeply, his eyes widening slightly. The air was suddenly, profoundly different. The sharp scent of sweat and stone was now layered with something lush, something inherently and powerfully erotic. Vegas instantly reeled his pheromones in, instinctually trying not to harm an unarmed Omega.

“No,” Vegas breathed, not able to grasp what was in front of him. Not believing it almost. He moved to stand before Pete again, his eyes ravenous now, seeing everything anew. “It can’t be. The unbreakable general. The stoic Alpha.” He leaned in, his nose almost touching Pete’s throat, and inhaled again, a long, deep drag that made Pete shudder with a fresh wave of shameful arousal. “You’re not an Alpha at all. Are you?”

Pete closed his eyes. Caught. The game was over. The one secret he had fought so hard to protect, revealed not by a spy or a traitor, but by his own traitorous body.

Vega’s hand came up, not to strike, but to palm Pete’s cheek, his touch shockingly intimate. “And you like this, don’t you? Tied up here like your true Omega nature demands.”

Pete’s shock filled eyes widened and he shook his head franticly trying to fight the sudden omega instincts in him, surging, reacting to Vega’s alpha. It wasn’t true, It wasn’t true at all Pete wanted to yell, but the collapse of his omega body due to weakness , malnutrition, days of physical torture, and slow heat creeping up could not be pushed aside.

Vegas: “Enough.”

He turned toward the corridor.

Vegas: “Fetch the royal physicians. Now.”

Dread warred within Pete. He knew what was coming. The ultimate humiliation. The one he dreaded about in the dark, secret corners of his mind.

Two healers arrived within minutes—a senior physician and a young apprentice whose eyes went wide at the sight of the king standing in a cell. Both of them affected and trembling due to Vegas's oppressive alpha pheromones in the air.

“You ordered an examination, Majesty?” The healer stammered out

Vegas: “He’s fevered. See to it.”

They worked quickly, checking pulse, skin, breath. The younger one hesitated, fingertips pressed to Pete’s wrist.

Apprentice whispered “It isn’t sickness. The pattern—it’s not Alpha.”
Healer shushed him, “Quiet.”

But the elder’s face had already changed. He bowed slightly toward the king.
Healer: “Majesty, forgive the presumption, but this is no ordinary fever. The patient’s constitution is… Omega. Dormant traits reawakening under strain.”

The torch hissed.

Vegas froze. “Impossible. He was recorded Alpha. How can it change?”
Healer: “Records can lie, Majesty. Blood and biology cannot.”

Pete exhaled shakily.

Pete’s voice cut through it, hoarse but steady. “There’s your truth. Do what you will with it.”

Every syllable pouring out of Pete’s mouth sent anger soring straight through Vegas's veins. How dare this omega still feel he had power over the King!? He would see to it that the omega would be humbled fast enough. For that was his duty as a King and as an Alpha.

“Check him,” Vegas never taking his eyes off of Pete, commanded, his voice dripping with malicious glee. “I want a full examination. I want to know if the grate general Pathros is as pure as an unmatted Omega should be.”

“NO!” Pete gasped, giving Vegas the satisfaction of a reaction.

The attendants approached. Their hands were cool and impersonal as they guided Pete’s trembling legs apart. He was exposed, utterly vulnerable, the chains allowing no modesty, no escape. He focused on the heat in Vegas’s gaze, letting his hate for the alpha be his anchor for now.
One of the attendants used a slick, cool finger to probe him. Pete flinched, a sharp intake of breath hissing through his teeth. It was invasive, clinical, and it made his head spin. The physician observed, nodding.

“Well?” Vegas demanded, his voice tight.
“He is intact, Your Majesty,” the physician announced. “A virgin.”

Vegas’s smile was predatory. “Leave us.”

The healers fled, leaving the torchlight quivering against the stone.

The room emptied, the heavy door thudding shut, leaving them alone again in the flickering torchlight. The silence was thicker now, charged with the new, undeniable truth hanging between them.
Vegas stepped so close their bodies almost touched. He didn’t need the chains to hold Pete anymore; his revelation was a far more effective prison.

“So this is what you were hiding.” Vegas said
“I wasn’t hiding anything. You just weren’t looking.” Pete said eyes narrowing in anger
Vegas’s jaw tightened.

“It explains everything. Why your army fell. Why your men starved while you played hero. An Omega pretending to command—it was doomed.” Vegas continued to insult Pete
“I fought while your father burned his soldiers for pride. If I failed, it wasn’t for lack of courage.” Pete was not about the back down just yet.
“Courage? You mistake defiance for discipline.” Vegas poked
“And you—born to rule—still don’t know how.” Pete corrected

“A virgin omega,” Vegas whispered, his hand sliding down Pete’s chest, over his stomach, his touch branding him. “And you played the fierce Alpha so well. All that control. That silence.” His fingers traced the hot, raised welts on Pete’s thighs. “It was all a lie, wasn’t it? This is what you are. This is what you need.”

His hand moved between Pete’s legs, and Pete couldn’t stop the broken yell that escaped his lips. It was a sound of desperation.

Vegas’s eyes lit up at the sound. “There it is. That’s the sound I’ve been waiting for.” He leaned in, his lips brushing the shell of Pete’s ear. “But we’re just beginning. Tell me, my little omega… How did you practice abstinence with a needy body like this? Did no one wish to take you? and when your heats came… Who did you dream of? Who did you cry for in the night, alone in your bed? ”

His fingers began to move towards the hallow of his back, over the curve of his ass, a slow, torturous rhythm that made Pete’s vision blur. The pleasure was acute, unbearable, a direct assault on his crumbling resolve.

“No one,” Pete gasped, the words torn from him.

“Liar,” Vegas purred, his touch becoming more insistent in Pete’s pre heat state. “An omega like you… the ache must have been unbearable. Did you use your fingers? Did you think of a soldier? A stable boy?”

Pete shook his head, his hips wanted to move of their own volition, chasing the shameful pleasure Vegas was offering. His whole world had narrowed to this room, to this man, to this exquisite degradation. But Pete still had restraint. He would absolutely not give Vegas what he wanted. His Omega could still be controlled and not falter under that alpha. He bit down on his own tongue hard.

Vegas noticed Pete’s demeanor change. “You think yourself noble? You think refinement makes you my equal?”

Pete not to be brought down replied “I think nothing makes you one, Majesty. Not yet.”

Something inside Vegas twisted, sharp and bright.

Vegas ginning said “Tomorrow you’ll prove your worth before the court. Let them see what kind of general an Omega makes.”
“A spectacle, then.” Pete observed
“A lesson.” Vegas said
“And who will it teach?” Pete enquired
“You wanted truth? You want to learn? Let the whole kingdom see it. If you win, you’ll serve. If you lose, history will correct itself.” Vegas proclaimed

Vegas turned before he could answer, the torchlight sliding across stone as he left the cell. The door shut like the close of judgment.

~~~**~~~

By sunrise, messengers galloped through the gates bearing the royal decree. Nobles and officers were summoned to the great courtyard: A public trial of the enemy general, to prove the worth—or weakness—of Kittisawasd’s last commander.

Servants whispered that the king had looked wild-eyed when he gave the order. No one dared to ask why.

Below, in the quiet dark, Pete sat unmoving. He could hear the first bells of morning above and the faint hiss of his own breath. Humiliation, he thought, was only a sharper form of truth. Let them watch. Let them learn what a beaten man could still become.

For the first time since the war, he almost smiled—a thin, dangerous curve.
If Vegas wanted a trial, he would give him a legend instead.

Then he closed his eyes and waited for daylight.

Chapter Text

Chapter 5 – The Trial of the Omega General

Dawn cracked like a blade across the horizon.
The palace stirred early; servants carried banners to the courtyard, guards polished armor that already gleamed. The air itself felt sharpened by rumor.

In the lower wing, the sound of bolts drawing back echoed through the corridor.
Two attendants entered the prisoner’s cell—one veteran guard, one young page whose hands trembled around a folded bundle of white cloth.

Pete looked up from where he sat beside the burnt-out torch.

“The king commands you be made presentable.” The guard said.
“For judgment or for spectacle?” Pete asked
“It makes no difference to us, General.” Guard said

The title slipped out by habit. The guard caught himself, cleared his throat, and thrust the bundle forward. “Dress.”

The cloth was finer than anything Pete had touched since captivity: white linen, long tunic, plain but spotless. The color stung the eyes in the dim cell; purity, innocence, surrender. A statement, not a kindness.

Pete unfolded it slowly. His fingers were still rough from chains, but he smoothed the creases with the same care he once gave to maps before battle. He said nothing while the attendants waited. Only when he stood did they see the steadiness in his posture, the calm that made the uniform feel like armor instead of costume.

The younger page dared a glance upward.

“They say white suits an Omega best, my lord.” The page meant it as a compliment for how beautiful Pete looked but Pete’s tone stayed even.
“Then today it will suit a soldier.” Pete said proud

~~~**~~~

The corridor stretched ahead, lined with guards at every turn. Word had spread; even the soldiers who once fought against him stared in silence as he passed. The white garments caught every torchlight flicker, turning him into a moving reflection of the morning sun.

Outside, bells rang. Banners snapped in the wind; black and red, the colors of Vegas’s reign. The court gathered like vultures dressed in silk, their voices low, hungry for confirmation of hierarchy.

Pete’s steps did not falter. The wind tangled his hair, pulled at the thin fabric, but he kept his chin high. Each echoing footfall sounded like the measured beat of a war drum.

Vegas waited at the far end of the raised dais, half-lit by sunlight spilling through colored glass. He wore no crown today, only the dark armor that gleamed like an accusation. The court lined both sides of the hall: ministers, generals, merchants, all curious to see whether a myth could be humiliated into nothing.

When Pete entered, the noise dipped into a hush. The white against the stone floor looked almost unreal. He stopped at the center, bowed once—neither deep nor shallow, perfectly polite.

The white cloth caught the morning light, turning the dust around him to silver haze.
For a moment, the prisoner didn’t look conquered at all. He looked like a saint carved from breath and defiance, every fold of linen a whisper of the purity the court had tried to use against him. The sun turned his hair to flame, his eyes to liquid steel. He stood not as a prisoner, but as proof that grace could survive ruin. The purity of it drew every gaze until even his captors forgot to breathe.

Vegas’s eyes traced the scene: the whiteness of the tunic, the unflinching gaze, the quiet authority that survived every attempt to erase it. He had ordered this show to prove a point; now he felt the court watching him instead.

He had chosen the color himself.
White—to strip away the general’s dignity, to show the court an Omega polished for display, nothing more.
But when they had brought Pete out into the sunlight, the plan began to die.

The light struck him first. It spilled down his shoulders, caught in the curve of his throat, and clung there like it had found something purer than itself. The white that should have meant surrender burned instead with defiance. He looked untouched—unbroken—and Vegas’s chest tightened with something too heavy to be hatred.

He’d dressed him to be conquered.
Now the court stared as if witnessing a coronation.

Vegas’s thoughts tangled. Every bruise, every mark that was meant to humiliate only made the man seem more real—human in a way that Vegas himself had forgotten how to be. He realized with a kind of sickness that the crowd was seeing what he saw: strength that didn’t need armor.

For a heartbeat, he wanted to fall to his knees—not from reverence, but from the unbearable weight of understanding how wrong he’d been.

He’d wanted to prove power.
Instead, he’d proved grace.

And when Pete lifted his head, sunlight catching his eyes like tempered steel, Vegas felt the last of his triumph turn to dust.

“Bring forward the charges.” Vegas said resigned.

A herald stepped out, voice carrying across the chamber.
“By royal decree, the captive known as General Pathros stands accused of Conspiring against the crown and deception—passing as Alpha, leading armies beyond his nature, defying divine order.” The Herald said

A murmur rippled through the room. Pete did not look away from the throne.

“You may speak before judgment is passed.” Vegas nodded to Pete

Pete’s reply was quiet but steady.
“You call this deception. I call it necessity. Hunger doesn’t ask who feeds it; war doesn’t ask who bleeds for it.” Pete’s voice was clear and steady, He looked comfortable, looked like he belonged. No trace of self-doubt.

The words stirred something heavy in the air. Some courtiers shifted uneasily; others frowned at the audacity.

Vegas’s fingers tightened on the armrest. The line between fury and fascination blurred again.

“Then prove necessity breeds strength. Before this court, before the people—show them your worth, if any remains.” Vegas said

Pete inclined his head slightly.

“As you wish, Majesty. But when the dust settles, remember who asked for proof.” Voice clear and face neutral Pete stood his ground

The council broke into whispers. Taran leaned toward the dais.

“Majesty, this defiance—should we silence him?” Taran asked
“No. Let them hear every word.” Vegas flicked his hand

It was not mercy; it was something closer to obsession. Every sentence Pete spoke pressed against the hollow inside Vegas’s chest that nothing else could fill.

Pete stood motionless in white, sunlight glinting from the polished marble beneath him, the living image of contradiction—prisoner and general, Omega and soldier, purity and defiance. The crowd saw an outcast; the king saw the one thing he could neither conquer nor dismiss.

The trial had only begun.

~~~**~~~

The king’s council gathered in the antechamber while the courtyard below filled with soldiers. A courier knelt before the throne, dust still clinging to his cloak.
Taran had requested an urgent meeting and Vegas did not want to put it off, especially if it found a solution to his claim to the throne.

“News from the eastern frontier, Majesty. Your spies found traces of the runaway heir—Prince Porsche Pachara Kittisawasd. Alive, un-mated. Traveling with an Alpha protector.” The courier said.

The words struck like flint in dry air. Vegas motioned him on.

“There is more. The scouts speak of a bastard child—born of a palace maid named Saengtham. Said to have aided the prince’s flight. Vanished during your father’s first campaign, yet still carries a half-claim by blood. All other former king’s descendants have either passed away or mated already with no legal claim to the throne” The courier said.

A low murmur rippled through the chamber.

“And the bastard’s name?” Vegas asked almost uninterested.
“The full record arrives by sealed dispatch before nightfall, Majesty.” The courier said

Vegas waved him away, though his mind stayed fixed on the fragments:
A maid. Saengtham. A bastard who disappeared during the first war.

He told himself it was coincidence. Yet his thoughts drifted, unbidden, to the man waiting in the courtyard; silent, refined, impossible to read.

~~~**~~~

The courtyard overflowed with people. Soldiers lined the walls; nobles filled the balconies; even merchants and children crowded the outer gates to glimpse the day the king would “restore order.”

Vegas rose from his throne beneath the canopy. His armor caught the morning light like a drawn blade. When the drums fell silent, he spoke; each word carrying across the marble like thunder.

“People of Kittisawasd, the so-called general who led your fallen armies deceived you all. The man you feared as Alpha is no Alpha at all. He is Omega—proof that arrogance, not fate, lost you the war!” Vegas declared.

Gasps rippled outward, disbelief first, then murmurs swelling into noise. Every head turned toward the figure standing alone in white.

Pete did not flinch. The color drained from his face, but his shoulders stayed square. The silence that followed was worse than the outcry: the sound of hearts breaking and deciding all at once.

“Let him stand trial in the open. Let every citizen see the cost of lies.” Vegas’s voice boomed

The herald lifted his staff. “Trial by combat begins!”

~~~**~~~

Pete’s sword came up smoothly, neither hesitant nor proud. The first opponent advanced; a veteran in the king’s black crest. Steel met steel; sparks burst in daylight. Pete turned each strike aside with surgical precision, never wasting breath or movement.

The second soldier came harder. Pete’s blade slipped under his guard, knocking the man backward into the sand. A shout rose—half outrage, half awe.

By the time the third entered the ring, the rhythm had changed. Pete moved as if memory itself fought beside him. Every parry was a lesson, every counter a reminder of the wars he’d survived. The onlookers who had come to mock found themselves holding their breath instead.

From the balconies, villagers and farmers recognized him; the quiet man who’d once ridden through their fields delivering grain after the harvest tax was lifted. An old nurse pressed a hand to her mouth. Children who remembered a gentle commander who taught them how to hold a wooden sword began to cheer his name softly.

Crowd whispered “General Pete… our general…”
Vegas felt the sound crawl under his armor.
The fight went on too long. The sun climbed, heat thickening the air. Pete’s steps slowed, his breath harsh. The faint tremor in his arm grew visible, but his eyes never left his opponents.

Taran whispered to Vegas “Majesty, end it. He’s earned his mercy.”
Vegas’s jaw tightened. “He’s earned judgment.”

When the next blow came, Pete blocked it; and the soldier’s sword clattered away. The crowd erupted. What had begun as a spectacle had become legend. Even some of the palace guards were cheering now, forgetting whom they served.

Vegas rose. His shout cut through the noise.
“Enough!”

The word crashed over the courtyard. Pete froze mid-step, chest heaving. For a moment he stood as he had on every battlefield—victorious, defiant, utterly spent. Then his knees gave. He hit the sand before anyone could reach him.

The sudden quiet felt like mourning.

 

A woman’s cry broke first. Then another. Hands pounded against the railings. Soldiers who had once fought under him called his name; villagers pleaded for the healers to be let through.

Even the guards nearest the king hesitated, torn between command and conscience.

Vegas stared at the man on the ground. This was meant to be triumph; to prove order, hierarchy, control. Instead, he saw loyalty rekindled in every face around him. They were not witnessing shame; they were witnessing faith return.

Vegas whispered to himself “What have I done…”

~~~**~~~

The uproar still echoed when a courier burst through the archway, holding a sealed parchment.
“Majesty—urgent from the eastern frontier.” The Courier said

Vegas broke the seal with a trembling hand. The wax cracked; the parchment unrolled like prophecy.

To His Majesty, Sovereign of the Western Crown,
Regarding the heirs of King Lecharus Kittisawasd:
All legitimate issue confirmed deceased save one rumored bastard—born of the maid Saengtham. Given name: Pete.

The scroll curled at the edges in the heat. The ink shone dark red.

Vegas’s gaze lifted to the figure being carried from the arena; the white cloth stained now with dust and blood. The name on the parchment blurred as sweat or tears reached it; he could no longer tell which.

Around him, the crowd still chanted the name he had tried to bury.

“Pete! Pete! Pete!”

Chapter Text

Chapter 6 – The Crown and the Fever

 

The council chamber smelled of melted wax and panic.
Vegas sat on the dais, the torn seal of the royal archives in his hand.
The name written there burned through every word of protocol.

Pete Phongsakorn Saengtham.
Bloodline: Kittisawasd.

The man he had paraded before the world—branded liar, Omega, traitor—was the lost bastard of the old king.

The council watched him like men waiting for a storm to choose direction.

One of the ministers cleared his throat. “Majesty, if this spreads—”

Vegas cut him off. His voice was low but carried like steel scraping against marble.
“He told me once,” he says, staring at the parchment, “in one of our sessions… that his name was Pete. I thought it defiance, a relic of a forgotten life. I didn’t know it was truth.”

The chamber rippled with shock. No one spoke until Taran rose slowly from his place beside the throne. Everyone knew who Vegas ment by 'he'...
“Majesty, that makes him...”

“The son of Lecharus,” Vegas finishes for him. “The bastard, the old court whispered about.”

The words hang heavy.

Another minister leans forward, voice shaking. “Then it is treason for him to live. Execute him before the rumor takes root.”

Vegas’s gaze sharpens. “Kill him, and we prove the rumor. Spare him, and I prove weakness.”
He rises, the parchment crumpling in his fist.
“Then I will choose neither. We end this farce another way.”

He turns to the guards, each syllable crisp and lethal.
“Send riders east. Search the borderlands. Bring back Prince Porsche Pachara Kittisawasd alive. If the court needs an Omega to bless my reign, they shall have one.”

Murmurs break out—fear, awe, calculation.

Taran’s voice follows him to the door. “Majesty, be certain you’re not chasing one brother to hide another. The heart has never obeyed crowns.”

Vegas pauses only long enough to say, quietly, “I no longer know which obeys which,” before leaving the chamber.

~~~**~~~

 

The royal infirmary, once built for kings and queens, now smelled of blood and herbs.
Pete lay beneath gauze and white linen, so still he might have been carved from stone. The flicker of his pulse was the only proof he lived.

Dr. Phana, the palace’s chief physician and keeper of the royal ledger of births, straightened when Vegas entered. He bowed once, his long coat whispering against the floor.

“Your Majesty,” Phana begins carefully. “His condition is not fatal. What you witnessed in the courtyard was collapse, not wound. Years of suppressants, exhaustion, starvation—the body rebelled.”

Vegas’s tone hardens. “Then why doesn’t he wake?”

Phana hesitates before replying. “Because he doesn’t believe he’s safe. Until he does, the body will refuse to rise.”

Vegas looks down at the still figure. “Safe,” he repeats, as if the word were foreign.

Phana clears his throat softly. “He might recover, but not quickly. Keep him away from the court. Keep the world small, quiet. The wrong environment could drive him deeper into the fever. His heat will arrive, but will not be stated without a mate. Biology is trying to take back what has been suppressed. Pheromone disruption, is fatal for Omega's. He has been subjected to strong Alpha suppressive pheromones for long periods of time. Tortured in doingness, if he was just a prisoner it should have killed him by now.”

Phana paused and looked up at the King, wondering if he should continue. Vegas waves him on, under Vegas's permission he continues "The only natural remedy to stop the Pheromone disruption is to naturally elevate those symptoms with an Alpha. Scenting and temporary marking." Phana mentions, then wonders if the King would care for the captured general in such a way or would he let him die.

"Your Majesty, for now we can only monitor him and hope when he wakes up his heat doesn't take his life."

Vegas nods once. “Then he stays where I can watch him.”

Phana blinks, startled. “Majesty—”

“Do it,” Vegas says, and no one argues again.

 

When word spread that the king intended to move the prisoner into his private chambers, half the palace erupted in whispers.

Advisers protested. Guards murmured about impropriety. Captain of Guard says, “Majesty, that’s not proper—”
Vegas silenced them all with a glance. “I’ve caged enough men in darkness. He will not be one of them.”

That night, they carried Pete through corridors lit by blue torches. Rain drummed on the windows. In the king’s chambers, the scent of steel had been replaced by crushed mint and lavender; the only medicines Phana trusted for Pete now.

Vegas dismissed everyone and sat beside the bed. He did not speak. The night passed in silence except for the rain and the slow, steady sound of his own regret.

 

~~~**~~~

 

Pete woke to warmth that did not belong to him. The sheets were soft, the air still, the ceiling carved with gold. Slight alpha pheromones in the air, almost making his heart calm. They were soothing pheromones he realized. Someone was trying to sooth his omega. The thought almost made him laugh at himself in pity. His body was weirdly buzzing but that could be ignored for now. He could still control his own pheromones.

Pete turned his head and found Vegas seated by the window, the crown on the table beside him, forgotten.

His voice was hoarse but calm. “I should have died.”

Vegas did not look up. “I won’t allow that.”

“You already tried.”

The words hit harder than any blade. Vegas finally meets his eyes, and for the first time, he looked older than his crown.
“You’re a prince of the blood. I didn’t know.”

Pete’s laugh is small, bitter. “It wouldn’t have mattered. You needed an example.”

He shifts, grimacing at the tightness in his chest.
Vegas moves to steady him, but Pete pulls away.

“Tell me,” Vegas says quietly, “Tell me about who you really are.”

Pete closes his eyes, the confession slow and deliberate.
“I was born Pete Phongsakorn Saengtham; my mother’s shame and my father’s secret. When my half brother Porsche fled with the man he loved, I helped him. I traded my life for his freedom.”

He swallows, voice weakening. “Our father wanted the runaway dead. I offered myself instead. They renamed me Pethros, remade under is name. But not as his son, no, he would never acknowledge me or my birth. As as a pawn, just a throw away solider, he sent me to the front, thinking war would finish the guilt he had about his hidden bastard son. But I lived. Someone had to guard what remained of the kingdom.” Pete laid it all bare, there was no point in hiding anymore. There was no one he needed to protect anyone any more.

Vegas listens, torn between admiration and a jealousy he cannot name.
“You saved the crown that exiled you,” he murmurs.
“It was never the crown I saved,” Pete replies. “It was the people beneath it.”

A long silence falls.

Vegas says at last, “The council demands your death. I told them I would find your brother instead.”

Pete’s gaze sharpens. “And then?”

“When he is found, I’ll marry him, claim him as my mate. The court will have its union, its peace, its legitimacy.”

“And the bastard?” Pete asks quietly.

“The court wants him executed,” Vegas answers. “I’ll decide when the time comes.”

Pete exhales, eyes half-closing. “So the kingdom will live,” he says softly. “And I’ll die for it. Again.”

He forces a weary smile. “Porsche is probably safe by now. He’s strong. His mate would never let harm come to him. They’ll be far from all this; free.”

Vegas hesitates, then speaks with measured weight. “My spies report otherwise. He’s alive… but unmated. No bonded pair beside him. Wandering.”

The color drains from Pete’s face. “Unmated?”

Vegas nods once. “He was seen traveling under false names, no mate.”

Pete’s stomach twists. What had gone wrong? He had tried to do everything right. Then why was Porsche still unmated? Was he betrayed? And what about himself? All the sacrifice, all the years of secrecy, had it been for nothing?
Pete stares down at his hands. “Then I’ve saved no one.”

Vegas steps closer, voice low. “You survived, Pethros. You’ve saved more than you know.”

Pete shakes his head faintly.

 

Night settles like ink over the palace. The only sound is rain against glass and the slow rhythm of breathing—one steady, one uncertain.

Vegas turns toward the window, the city lights flickering below like dying stars.
“The court believes I should kill you,” he says. “They don’t understand that you’ve already changed everything.”

He glances back at the bed, at the man who has rewritten the meaning of strength before his eyes.
“You were supposed to make me a ruler,” he whispers. “Instead, you made me human.”

Outside, lightning flares, throwing their shadows together against the wall—a king and a fallen soldier, bound by a truth neither can undo.

Chapter Text

Chapter 7 – The Fever and the Foundations

The fever returned before dawn.

The corridors outside the king’s chamber were filled with noise and light, the quick movements of attendants, the sound of glass shattering. Vegas heard the commotion long before he reached the door. When he entered, he saw the cause of it all. Pete was on his feet, pale and furious, the sheets torn from the bed and the floor littered with medicine bottles. Dr. Phana and two servants tried to reason with him, but their words only sharpened his defiance.

Vegas’s voice cut through the room. “Enough. You will destroy yourself.”

Pete’s eyes were bright with fever. “Then let me. I’m tired of waking up only to serve another crown.”

He tried to push past the attendants, but Vegas caught his wrist. The skin beneath his hand was burning hot, the pulse erratic. “You will accept the treatment or you will not survive the day.”

Pete’s breathing was unsteady, but his glare did not waver. “You think I am afraid to die?”

“No,” Vegas said quietly. “But I am.”

The words hung in the air. The servants fell silent. Even the rain outside seemed to pause. For the first time since the war began, the king sounded human.

Pete’s strength gave out, and he stumbled back onto the bed, shaking his head. “You don’t get to care. Not after everything you’ve done.”

Vegas did not answer. He simply picked up the medicine from the floor and poured it into a clean cup.

Dr. Phana tried to intervein again, "Please general, you must understand, for Omega's pheromone disruption is deadly! You must get a temporary mark or at least accept scenting by an alpha."

Pete's look threw draggers at the poor doctor and he shrunk.

"And why must it be him?" Pete asked the doctor not looking at Vegas.

Afraid that he might lose his life today to either the captured general or the King Dr. Phana shakily said, "The most powerful source of the oppressive pheromone was from his majesty. We believe that his pheromones could help you better, seeing as how his soothing pheromones have had a better impact on your health. And since his majesty has been so kind to agree to scenting you, please reconsider. this is such an honor."

"You sound like a quack" Pete retorted. "Why must you waste your highness's time with a mere prisoner that was supposed to be killed anyways?"

Dr. Phana turned to look at Vegas with pleading eyes. Knowing his own life was at risk if he wasn't able to convince the general and he dies

When Pete refused again, Vegas took things in his own hands and tried reason. “Your soldiers, the ones captured during the southern siege, are alive. I freed them weeks ago. They are farming now, with families. They believe their general is lost, but they still honor you.”

Pete’s expression flickered, uncertain. “You’re lying.”

Vegas turned to Dr. Phana. The physician hesitated, then nodded. “It’s true. The king released them under new names.”

Vegas spoke again, softer this time. “Even your grandmother, Lady Saengtham, is alive. She was found in the refugee quarter. I moved her to the new capital. She is safe.”

The fight went out of Pete’s eyes. His breathing slowed. When Vegas offered the cup again, he did not push it away. He drank with a trembling hand, and then his eyes fluttered closed. His body went slack against the pillows, sweat cooling on his skin.

"That's good then. I can die peacefully" Pete said. His eyes having a shine they hadn't had in a long time.

Vegas's temper faired, He hadn't said that to Pete to give him his dying peace, it was to have motivated him to live. He will need to change that. If Pete only wished to live to save people, that is what Vegas would let him live for.

"Guards, Round up all the soldiers released, also bring that old hag here. We have a very cold jail cell ready since the general had so willingly offered to vacate."
The guards stood dumbfounded but scrambled out to do the lords bidding.

Pete paused only for a second before asking, "What are you planning to do?"

"You wish to die, the deal was to have you instead of your soldiers. When your refuse to keep your end of the deal why would I?"

"Your wouldn't do that." Pete said his strength fading. "And Yai? She is old, she has nothing to do with this!?

"We shall need to integrate. How can I, as a king, take the words of a prisoner that was supposed to be killed anyways?" Vegas asked using Pete's own words against him.

Pete was at a loss. Pete’s scent, usually a delicate note of jasmine and honey, was now sour with the bitter tang of sickness. He gripped the hem of his dress shirt, knuckles white, his entire body a rigid testament to his refusal. " What do you want from me?" He whispered

Vegas, leaned forward, his voice, a low rumble that vibrated through the very stone, cut through the tension. “You will accept my scenting, Pete. This isn’t a request. It is a necessity for your survival.”

Pete lifted his head, a sheen of sweat glistening on his brow. His voice was a strained whisper, yet it echoed in the hushed room. “I would rather face the end with dignity than become your… your obligation, Majesty.”

A muscle ticked in Vegas’s jaw. He saw the stubborn pride warring with the physical agony in the omega’s dark eyes. The wasting sickness was progressing; Pete’s slender frame seemed to grow more fragile by the minute. Vegas’s own instincts roared, a furious need to protect and possess crashing against the wall of the general's defiance.

He stood, his height and power casting a long shadow over Pete. The attendants held their breath. Instead of issuing another command, Vegas simply gestured to a guard. “Fetch his grandmother, kill anyone in his village.”

Pete’s resistance shattered. The weight of his grandmother’s plight, combined with a fresh, dizzying wave of nausea, broke him. A single tear traced a path through the dust on his cheek. He bowed his head. “I… I will accept. Please.”

"What will you accept ? What is it that this the prosier wants?" Vegas Mocked.

"I... I want you to scent me. Just please... Please don't harm my people or my grandmother! they are all innocent!" Pete pleaded

 

Vegas didn’t hesitate. “Everyone out. Now.”

The command was absolute. The attendants, doctors, soldiers scattered, the heavy doors thudding shut, leaving the vast room in a silence that was suddenly intimate and charged. The moment they were alone, Pete’s composure dissolved completely.

Vegas closed the distance between them, his own control fraying at the edges. He knelt, the fine fabric of his trousers stretching over powerful thighs. Gently, he gathered Pete into his arms, lifting him and then sitting on the bed, cradling the prince against his chest.

Pete held his mouth, while humiliation burned through him and colored him red.

“I’ve got you,” Vegas murmured, his voice losing its regal edge, becoming something deeper, darker, meant only for the omega in his lap.

He tilted his head, exposing the powerful gland at the junction of his neck and shoulder. The rich, dominant scent of sandalwood, aged whisky, and pure Alpha power poured from him. Pete made a choked, greedy sound and buried his face against Vegas’s neck, his lips and nose pressing desperately into the source of the scent. Pete wanted to end it as soon as possible. He inhaled in great, shuddering gulps, his entire body trembling with the relief of it.

A deep, satisfied rumble started in Vegas’s chest. He held Pete close with one strong arm, his other hand beginning a slow, possessive journey over the omega’s body. It was meant to be comforting, to help distribute the scent, but it instantly became something else entirely.

His broad palm slid down Pete’s spine, feeling each vertebra through the thin silk of his tunic. The touch burned. Pete arched into it, a wanton, involuntary movement against his own will, that pressed his ass flush against Vegas’s lap. The hard ridge of the Alpha’s cock, already fully erect and straining against his trousers, pressed directly into the curve of Pete’s backside.

Pete froze for a second, then a fresh, different kind of heat flooded him. Was he doing this to protect the people he loved? Or was he really just a needy omega?

“Feel that, little omega?” Vegas’s voice was a thick whisper against Pete’s ear. His hand swept back up, not stopping at the shoulder, but sliding around to palm Pete’s chest through the silk. His thumb found a nipple, circling it slowly, making the fabric rasp against the sensitized nub. “That’s what you do to me. Your desperate little noises. The way your fucking body fits into me.”

“Vegas…” Pete’s protest was weak, dissolved into a broken moan as the Alpha’s fingers pinched his nipple gently, then soothed it with a rough stroke.

The king’s hand drifted down again, over the flat plane of Pete’s stomach, his fingers splaying wide. He could feel the frantic beat of the omega’s heart, the heat blazing through the silk. His touch was a brand, claiming, mapping territory.

Pete’s voice trembled, his words thick with the heady haze of scent . “Not like that. I can’t… I can’t think when you touch me, You said scenting!.”
His body writhed in Vegas’s lap, he arched his neck back, exposing the delicate curve of his throat. His scent glands pulsed faintly, a subtle throb that screamed for attention. “Here,” he whispered, his breath hitching. “Just your tongue… please.”

Vegas’s eyes darkened, a primal growl rumbling deep in his chest. His hand, which had been teasing the edge of Pete’s trousers, stilled. He shifted, his grip tightening slightly on the omega’s waist as he leaned down. His lips hovered just above Pete’s exposed neck, his breath hot against the sensitive skin. “Your scent is intoxicating,” he murmured, the words low and possessive. “You’re giving me this freely? Tell me Pete”

Pete nodded, humiliation burned through him, his eyelids fluttering shut. “Yes”

The Alpha didn’t wait. His lips brushed against Pete’s gland, achingly soft at first, before his teeth grazed the tender flesh. Pete gasped, his body jerking as sparks shot through his veins. Vegas’s tongue followed, lapping at the spot with a slow, deliberate thoroughness that made the omega’s head spin. The sensation was overwhelming—part pleasure, part pain, and entirely consuming.

Pete was conflicted. On one side his omega was screaming for more, wanting to be protected by the Alpha. On the other the man that he had made himself , the general, the war strategist, the fighter, wanted nothing to do with this submission of his body.

A moaned ripped out Pete's throat, his hands clutching at Vegas’s shoulders. His body went limp, boneless, as though the Alpha’s touch had sapped every ounce of strength from him. The room seemed to tilt, his vision blurring at the edges as Vegas continued to lavish attention on his neck. “I can’t… I can’t breathe. It’s too much.”

But Vegas didn’t stop. He couldn’t. The taste of Pete’s skin, the way the omega trembled beneath him—it was irresistible. His teeth pressed down again, this time with just enough pressure to make Pete cry out, a high-pitched whimper that echoed in the empty room. The Alpha’s tongue swirled around the mark he’d made, soothing the sting even as it sent fresh waves of dizzying pleasure crashing through Pete’s body.

Mine, Vegas's mind yelled. Every inch of you. Every drop of your scent. Mine.

“Rest now,” Vegas murmured, his voice softer now, almost tender. “You’ve taken enough for today.”

Pete didn’t argue. He couldn’t. His body sank into the Alpha’s embrace, his head spinning with the echoes of pleasure and the lingering warmth of Vegas’s touch. Drifting into a light-headed daze, he let himself fall into the darkness.

The last thing he felt was Vegas’s lips pressing a shockingly soft kiss to his temple and the deep, steady rhythm of the king’s heart under his cheek. Cradled in the lap of his Alpha, sated and secure, Pete fell into a deep, peaceful sleep. Vegas remained still, looking down at the sleeping omega in his arms, his own need a throbbing, unsated ache.

Vegas called Dr. Phana in when he was sure Pete was fully asleep.

Dr. Phana wiped his brow and nodded to the king. “He will sleep now. The scenting was good. For now a mark would not be needed. The fever will break before morning.”

Vegas stayed beside the bed long after the room had emptied. The sound of rain returned, steady and calm. The king leaned back in the chair, eyes fixed on the man who had nearly chosen death rather than his mercy.

For the first time, Pete did not look like a prisoner. He looked like a man who had been given permission to rest.

~~~**~~~

Within a week, the palace transformed. The banners of conquest were lowered, replaced by new ones bearing the crest of the united crown. The halls filled with workers, scribes, traders, and children chasing through half-built courtyards. Vegas had declared that this place, once a fortress in the central plains, would become the heart of his new kingdom. The air smelled of mortar and rain-soaked stone. Hope thrived in the chaos of construction, even as the king who built it felt nothing but unease.

Pete recovered slowly, still weak but alive. He often sat by the tall windows overlooking the growing city, silent and thoughtful, watching the people begin lives he no longer felt were his to live. Praying that his villagers and his grandmother were living a peaceful, happy life not aware of the palace politics,

When the royal convoy arrived from the west, the sound of hooves and trumpets filled the streets. At its head rode Prince Macau Theerakul, the king’s younger brother. The court adored him, an Omega known for his easy charm and sharp wit. His arrival marked both relief and uncertainty. Where Vegas was cold and deliberate, Macau carried sunlight in his voice and too many questions in his eyes.

That afternoon, as Macau wandered in to the King's chamber, he ran into Pete still help captive there. “Forgive me,” he said, steadying himself by instinct.

Pete looked up, startled but polite. “You must be the new arrival. His Majesty spoke of you.”

Macau laughed softly. “Then I hope it was kind.”

Their conversation unfolded easily, Macau’s warmth drawing answers even from Pete’s reserve. Pete treated Macau as any other attendant of Vegas, just better informed of the lands and refined. But open and easy to speak to. They spoke of the city’s rebuilding, of the workers’ songs, of the quiet beauty of the courtyards. To passing servants, it looked like a friendship forming. To Pete, it felt like an introduction to the kind of peace he had forgotten.

But when the guards and maids whispered as they brought in snacks —“Prince Macau, the King’s own ”—something in Pete’s chest tightened. He stepped back with a small, practiced smile. “So you are the king’s companion.”

Macau blinked, confused. “His what?”

“I meant no disrespect,” Pete said, bowing slightly. “I only didn’t realize His Majesty… had an Omega close to him.”

Understanding dawned, followed by amusement. “Ah. You mean you thought I was his betrothed or a concubine.” He laughed, shaking his head. “No, I am neither. I’m his brother. Though he might prefer the concubine to my advice.”

Pete’s cheeks flushed. “Forgive me, I misunderstood.”

Macau smiled. “Nothing to forgive. My brother doesn’t explain himself to anyone.”

~~~**~~~

That evening, Macau entered the strategy room where Vegas stood over maps and letters, his brow shadowed in lamplight. The younger prince leaned against the doorframe and said quietly, “Brother, why does the man in your chamber carry your scent?”

Vegas’s head lifted sharply. “He is under my protection.”

Macau stepped closer. “You never protected an Omega before. People are beginning to talk.”

“Let them,” Vegas said, his voice even.

“Then at least be honest with yourself,” Macau replied. “You’re not keeping him for the crown’s sake.”

Vegas looked away, eyes fixed on the map as if the ink could hide his thoughts. “Go rest. You’ve travelled far.”

Macau turned to leave but paused at the door. “You’ve built a kingdom out of ashes,” he said softly. “Don’t let one man be the fire that burns it again.”

That night, the new capital gleamed under a pale moon. From the highest balcony, Vegas watched torches flicker along scaffolds and city streets. The air below hummed with laughter and song, the sound of people beginning again. Behind him, in the shadowed chamber, Pete slept with the ease of someone who no longer had the strength to resist rest.

Vegas whispered to the quiet room, “I gave them a kingdom, and somehow you became its heart.”

The night carried his words into the dark, where even kings had no power to take them back.

Chapter Text

Chapter 8 – The Distance Between

“Let me out of this room. I need out of your royal chambers! This is not up for negotiations!”

The words, sharp and clear, cut through the opulent stillness of the room. Pete stood rigid, his back to the lavish four-poster bed, his gaze fixed on the Alpha King lounging in the single armchair by the fireplace.

Vegas didn’t look up from the glass of amber liquor he was swirling. A slow, easy smile touched his lips. “Everything is a negotiation, General. You, of all people, should know that.”

“I’ve been in this gilded cage for days now. I am not a pet to be kept,” Pete’s voice was steel, but a faint tremor of frustration ran beneath it. The silken robes Vegas provided felt like a mockery against his skin, so different from the crisp, authoritative wool of his military uniform.

Finally, Vegas looked up. His eyes, a deep, calculating brown, swept over Pete from head to toe, a leisurely inspection that made Pete’s skin prickle. “A pet? No. A prize. A magnificent, infuriatingly stubborn prize.” He set his glass down and rose to his feet in one fluid, powerful motion.

Pete instinctively straightened his spine, his shoulders pulling back. The movement did exactly what he feared it would. The deep V of the silk robe gaped open, and the generous swell of his chest became more pronounced. He saw Vegas’s eyes drop, lingering for a heartbeat too long on the exposed line of his collarbone and the soft hint of cleavage below. A hot flush crept up Pete’s neck.

Vegas closed the distance between them without hurry. The air thickened, saturated with the Alpha’s scent—spice, aged wood, and a dominant musk that felt like a physical pressure. Pete’s own omega scent, usually so tightly controlled, began to stir in response, a lighter note of Jasmin and honey threatening to rise and mingle.

“You ask for freedom,” Vegas murmured, his voice now a low rumble meant only for the space between them. “But I have a kingdom to think of. A general who led a rebellion against me. How can I possibly trust you?”

“My war is over. I lost. You have my surrender, My word” Pete said, forcing his voice to remain level even as Vegas stopped mere inches away.

“Words spoken under duress.” Vegas’s hand came up, not to touch, but to hover near Pete’s jaw. “I need something more… tangible. Something real.”

He leaned in, his nose skimming the air just beside Pete’s temple. The act of scenting was intensely personal, intimate in a way that felt more invasive than a physical blow. Pete held his breath, every muscle locking tight. Vegas’s warmth radiated against him. Pete had long since stopped opposing the scenting. That was the only thing keeping him well. And he himself could feel some of his strength recover. He wasn't full like before. But he was better. The sudden heats were bearable now.

But right now Vegas was everywhere. His scent, his heat, his overwhelming presence. Pete’s mind raced, a whirlwind of defiance and a traitorous, unwelcome thrill. This was a different kind of battle, one he was woefully unprepared for.

Vegas’s breath was warm against his ear. “I can smell your frustration. Your pride. And something else, General… something quieter. A curiosity, perhaps?”

“You’re imagining things,” Pete gritted out, but his protest was weak. His gaze was fixed straight ahead, on the intricate embroidery of Vegas’s royal tunic, refusing to meet his eyes.

Vegas’s chuckle was a soft, dark sound. “Am I?” His hovering hand finally made contact, not on Pete’s face, but on his shoulder. His thumb brushed along the ridge of Pete’s collarbone, a slow, maddening stroke over the silk. Pete flinched at the contact, a jolt of electricity shooting down his spine.

The Alpha’s eyes were dark with intent, utterly focused. They dipped again, drawn irresistibly downward.

“I could let you out,” Vegas whispered, his thumb still moving in that lazy, hypnotic circle. “I could give you the run of the palace. The gardens. A real bed in a real chamber.”

Hope, sharp and sudden, flared in Pete’s chest. “Then do it.”

Vega’s smile was devastating. “There’s a condition.”

His hand left Pete’s shoulder, coming up to cradle his jaw instead. His grip was firm, unquestionable, tilting Pete’s face toward his own. The command in the gesture was absolute.

“Give me a kiss,” Vegas said, his voice dropping to a husky whisper that vibrated through Pete’s entire being. “One kiss. Not as your king. Not as your captor. And I’ll unlock every door in this palace for you.”

Pete’s world narrowed to the feel of Vegas’s strong fingers on his skin, the heat of his body, the dizzying, intoxicating scent of him. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat of panic and something else, something warm and pooling low in his belly. This was a different kind of surrender. A terrifying one. A delicious one.

He could refuse. He could spit in the Alpha’s face and be dragged back to the dungeons, his pride intact but his cage reinforced.

Or…

Pete’s eyes finally flickered up, meeting Vegas’s intense gaze. The air crackled. The silence stretched, taut and heavy with unspoken promise. He saw the raw desire there, the absolute certainty that he would comply.

His own lips parted, just slightly. A silent, shuddering inhalation.

One kiss.

The distance between them was nothing now. A breath. A choice.

Slowly, so slowly, Pete began to close the gap.

The warmth of Vegas’s breath vanished as Pete recoiled, putting a foot of cold stone between them. His chest, broad and straining against the confines of his simple tunic, rose and fell with the force of his defiance.

“No,” Pete said, the word sharp and clear in the chamber’s stillness. “I won’t.”

Vegas didn’t move. His deep brown eyes, which had softened a moment ago, hardened into chips of obsidian. A low, almost inaudible sound rumbled in his chest. Not a growl, but the promise of one. “No?” he repeated, his voice dangerously soft.

“You think my freedom is so cheap? That a single kiss buys it?” Pete’s laugh was harsh, devoid of humor. “I am not a courtesan to be bargained with. I am a general.”

“You were a general,” Vegas corrected, his tone flat. “Now you are my... guest. And my guest is making a very poor choice.”

“A guest?” Pete’s voice rose, his omega pride flaring hot and bright. “A guest has a door that opens. A guest isn’t scented like a possession.” He gestured wildly at the space between them, at the invisible threads of Vegas’s alpha musk that still clung to the air, to him.

Vegas took a single, deliberate step forward. The space shrank again. His gaze was no longer on Pete’s eyes. It had dropped, lowering to Pete’s chest. Pete instinctively straightened his spine, a soldier’s posture, but the motion only served to push his chest out further, accentuating the powerful curve of his pectorals beneath the soft linen. The fabric stretched taut.

“I scent what is mine to protect,” Vegas murmured, his attention unwavering. He wasn’t just looking; he was studying. Calculating. “And you are that, Pete. In this den of wolves, you are under my protection. Whether you enjoy it or not is irrelevant.”

Pete felt a flush creep up his neck. It wasn’t entirely from anger. There was a strange, unwelcome heat under that intense scrutiny. He was used to stares on the battlefield, assessments of strength and weakness. This was different. This was an appraisal that felt intimate, possessive. It made the fine hairs on his arms stand up.

“Stop looking at me like that,” Pete demanded, his voice losing some of its edge.

“Like what?” Vegas’s lips quirked. He took another step. He was close enough now that Pete could see the dark flecks in his brown eyes, could feel the sheer, radiant heat coming off his body. “Like I am appreciating the… form… of my most valuable prisoner? You have the build of a warrior, Pete. It’s impressive. A commander should inspire awe in his men.” His eyes dragged slowly back up to meet Pete’s. “And in his king.”

The compliment was a weapon, and it found its mark. Pete’s breath caught in his throat. He refused to let it show. “Your flattery is as transparent as your intentions.”

“My intentions are the only honest thing in this room,” Vegas said. He didn’t touch him, but his hand lifted, gesturing vaguely toward Pete’s torso. “You hold yourself with such pride. Even now. It’s in the set of your shoulders. The line of your throat. And here…” His gaze dropped again, a physical weight that made Pete’s skin prickle. “A commander’s chest. Broad. Meant to bear the weight of command. It suits you.”

Pete felt a jolt, a confusing mixture of insult and a dark, thrilling pride. He had trained for years, built his body into a weapon and a shield. No one had ever spoken of it like this, as something to be admired for its aesthetics, its sheer physical presence. It was always about utility, about strength. Vegas was stripping that away, leaving something raw and uncomfortably sensual in its place.

“You speak nonsense,” Pete muttered, but his protest was weak. His heart was hammering against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat he was sure Vegas could hear.

“Do I?” Vegas’s voice dropped to a husky murmur. He leaned in, his mouth near Pete’s ear, and Pete froze. “I think you are a man who understands power. You respect it. You commanded it on the battlefield. Now you are learning to recognize it in other… forms.”

His scent washed over Pete, alpha and spicy and utterly overwhelming. It was the scent of the man who had beaten him, who held him captive, who was now dissecting his pride piece by piece. Pete’s own omega instincts, long suppressed under layers of military discipline, had already began to stir in response. A treacherous part of him wanted to lean into that scent, to let it drown out the stubborn voice in his head.

“I am learning nothing,” Pete whispered, his eyes slipping shut. He was trembling. He hated that he was trembling.

“You are learning the price of defiance,” Vegas breathed, his words a warm caress against Pete’s cheek. “And you are learning the reward of submission. That kiss wasn’t for your freedom, Pete. It was for a chance. A chance to walk these halls and see the power you so desperately want to defy up close. A chance to understand what you’re truly dealing with.”

He pulled back just enough to look down at Pete’s face. His expression was unreadable, a mask of alpha composure, but his eyes burned with a fierce, hungry light.

“The offer is still open,” Vegas said, his tone final, leaving no room for argument. “But my patience is not infinite. You can return to staring at these four walls, clinging to a pride that gains you nothing. Or you can take the first step toward… something else.”

Vegas’s eyes dipped one last time, a swift, searing glance at the firm line of Pete’s chest, before he turned and walked toward the door. His boots were silent on the stone.

He paused at the threshold, his hand on the heavy iron ring that served as a handle. He didn’t look back.

“The door remains locked,” he stated. “Until you decide what you really want.”

~~~**~~~

The permission had come that morning.

Pete was finally allowed to walk outside his chamber as long as he remained in the sight of the royal guards. It was a freedom wrapped in command, but he took it anyway not questioning what had changed Vegas's mind. The air of the new capital was fresher than the old walls. The people had begun to smile again. For the first time in years, the corridors didn’t echo with hunger or mourning.

He was making his slow way down the upper hallway when voices drifted from an open door ahead. The king’s office. Pete would have passed by, but one sentence stopped him.

Macau’s voice, clear and insistent.
“You need to be careful with him, brother.”

Vegas’s reply was low. “I know what I’m doing.”

“No, you don’t,” Macau said. “You’re too close. If you keep this up, you’ll destroy more than his peace.”

The air in Pete’s lungs turned to ice.
So this was the consort, he thought—the one who could speak to the king without fear. His voice was kind, protective. A man who wanted to keep his lover from ruin.

Pete moved away before they could see him. The words burned in his mind as he walked the long halls back to his room. Each step echoed louder than it should have.

When he closed the door behind him, the silence hit hard.

 

~~~**~~~

Vegas came later, as he always did when the sun began to set. The light followed him in, soft gold on the edges of his armor. Pete was by the window, pretending to read.

“You’re walking again,” Vegas said, glancing at the book in his hands. “Good.”

“Under watch,” Pete answered, without looking up. “But good enough.”

Vegas came closer, until the distance between them was filled by the quiet hum that always accompanied his presence. He had grown used to being near Pete, to standing too close when there was no need. Sometimes his hand would brush Pete’s arm when he gave him a cup, or he’d lean forward to look at what Pete was reading, breath grazing the edge of his hair. It was never meant to be cruel, only unthinking. Yet Pete felt each moment like a pulse beneath his skin.

He closed the book. “You need to stop.”

Vegas frowned. “Stop what?”

“This.” Pete gestured between them. “Standing too close. Watching me like you expect me to disappear if you blink. I hear things, Your Majesty. People will think...”

Vegas cut in quietly, “Let them think.”

Pete blinked, startled. “Why would you want that?”

“Because I can’t seem to want anything else.” The words came too quickly, and he regretted them the moment they left his mouth. He turned away, jaw tight. “You’re still weak. You shouldn’t be walking this much.”

Pete took a step back, putting distance between them again. “You talk like I belong to you.”

Vegas looked at him, eyes unreadable. “You don’t.”

“Then act like it.”

The silence after that was sharper than argument. Pete’s heartbeat felt loud enough to drown out thought. He didn’t understand why he said it—why the words came out like an accusation when what he wanted was reassurance. He wanted to be wanted, even if he shouldn’t. Even if it ruined him.

He set the book down on the table. “Is there something you wanted, Majesty?”

Vegas exhaled, the mask sliding back into place. “The council has met. They’ve set a date for the royal wedding.”

Pete stared at him. “Wedding?”

“With your brother,” Vegas said. “One month from now.”

 

~~~**~~~

 

Macau found Pete later that evening, wandering the outer gardens under guard. The younger prince smiled when he saw him, though his eyes looked tired.

“You shouldn’t be out here alone,” Macau said gently. “Vegas pretends not to worry, but he does.”

Pete managed a small smile. “He doesn’t need to. I’ll be gone soon.”

“Gone?” Macau tilted his head. “You don’t have to be.”

Pete looked toward the city lights. “He’s getting married. The kingdom will have its peace. There’s no reason to keep me here.”

Macau hesitated, then said, “If you want, I can take you away from this place. The court, the guards, all of it. I can have a carriage prepared by dawn.”

Pete looked at him, startled by the kindness. Before he could answer, a voice came from behind them.

“You will not.”

Vegas stood in the archway, the torchlight outlining his figure. The tone was low, dangerous, almost trembling with something he refused to name.

Macau turned to him. “He doesn’t belong here.”

Vegas’s reply was sharp. “He already bears my claim.”

The words hung in the air. Pete froze, his pulse roaring in his ears. Macau’s mouth opened in disbelief. “Your claim?” he repeated.

Vegas realized too late what he’d said. He looked at his brother, then at Pete. The silence that followed was unbearable.

Pete spoke first, his voice breaking through it. “So that’s what I am to you. A claim.”

Vegas stepped forward. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?” Pete’s voice rose, rough and tired. “You can’t even let me breathe without making it about ownership.”

He turned to Macau. “Thank you for the offer, Prince. But I’ll save you the trouble. I’ll ask for my release myself.”

Macau looked between them, sensing that the argument wasn’t meant for witnesses. He bowed slightly to Pete, then to his brother, and left them in the garden.

 

~~~**~~~

 

The night was windless. The lanterns along the walls flickered as if uncertain whether to burn or die. Pete stood facing the king, his eyes too bright to be calm.

“I’m happy for my brother,” he said quietly. “He’s found his way home. He’ll sit on the throne like he was always meant to. Maybe he’ll even find peace with you.”

Vegas took a slow breath. “Pete—”

“Don’t.” Pete shook his head. “Whatever this was, whatever you think it could be, let it end here. You have him now. And I have nothing left to give.”

He turned to go, but Vegas caught his arm—not hard, not in command, only in a plea that shook more than it should have.

“Let me at least explain.”

“There’s nothing left to explain.” Pete’s voice was soft, but the words landed like finality. “You don’t need me anymore, Majesty. You never did.”

Vegas released him. Pete bowed once, the gesture almost ceremonial. “Please see to the preparations for your wedding. And if there’s any kindness left in you, send me back to the cells. I’ll rest easier there.”

The king stood still long after Pete disappeared through the corridor, the sound of his steps fading into the dark.

When he finally looked up, the moon hung low above the new city, pale and distant, a coin balanced on the edge of collapse.

 

For a long moment Vegas did not move. The calm he forced around himself felt like glass; the first breath cracked it. He slammed his fist against the table, sending maps and ink scattering across the floor.

He had built a palace of mercy only to be asked for chains.

When the guards carried word to Macau that the king was looking for him, the prince came quickly, still unsteady from the argument in the gardens.
Vegas stood by the fire, eyes bright and dangerous.

“What exactly,” he asked, voice low, “do you plan to do with another Omega if I give him to you?”

Macau met his brother’s fury without flinching. “Protect him. Something you can’t seem to do without hurting him.”

“Protect him,” Vegas repeated, almost a laugh. “Is that what you call it when you want what’s mine?”

“He’s not yours,” Macau said. The quietness of it was worse than shouting. “Give him to me. Let him start again somewhere you can’t reach him.”

The silence that followed seemed to tilt the room.
Vegas’s jaw locked. “Leave,” he said finally, each word carved from ice.

Macau bowed slightly and obeyed, though he lingered in the doorway long enough to add, “You can’t keep everything you break, brother.”

When he was gone, Vegas turned back to the fire, the heat against his palms doing nothing to ease the cold inside him. The anger built and built until the knock at the door broke it.

A courier stepped in, pale from the ride. “Majesty,” he said, kneeling, “news from the coast. The royal escort has set out. Prince Porsche will reach the capital within a fortnight.”

Vegas closed his eyes, forcing his breath steady.

Two weeks.

Two weeks before the brother returned, before the court demanded the wedding, before Pete’s name became nothing more than a whisper in the halls.

He opened his eyes to the flames, and they reflected red.

Chapter Text

Chapter 10 – A King’s Breaking Point

Dr. Phana’s hands smelled faintly of crushed herbs and ink.
He drew the partition back from the bed, checked the pulse at Pete’s wrist, and nodded to himself.

“The imbalance has eased,” he said, his voice gentle but tired. “His body is adjusting. There will be a short heat cycle soon, brief but intense. When it comes, His Majesty should keep distance. Over-exposure to an Alpha’s presence could trigger another collapse. Also so close to your own rut, Majesty It could...”

Vegas, who had been pacing near the window, gave a short laugh. “He’s just another Omega, Doctor. I’ll manage.”

Phana’s eyes flickered up from his notes. “Majesty, he’s not just anything. His restraint kept him alive this long. Don’t test the limits of what he can bear.”

Vegas dismissed him with a wave, but when the physician left, the echo of his warning stayed behind like smoke in the air.

 

~~~**~~~

 

For several quiet days, the palace slept under calm skies.
Pete moved through his allotted corridors, silent as always, reading, walking, and keeping to himself.
Vegas saw him often enough to believe the storm had passed.

That illusion broke the night Arm returned.

The new capital slept easily under a drizzle of summer rain. Guards were lazy with peace; they played cards under torches and let the gate stay half open for the bakers’ carts. That was how Arm slipped through mud splattered, hood pulled low, the smell of horses and long road still clinging to him.

He slipped through the west gate in a soldier’s cloak, every step practiced from years of campaign stealth. He had come to find his general or his ghost, whichever waited here. He had spent months chasing rumors, that the General lived, that he shared quarters with the new king, that he had become something less than a legend. Arm needed the truth more than safety. Arm needed to see the truth with his own eyes before he could damn it.

He found the west wing by memory of old maps, following the rhythm of guards’ boots until he reached the inner hall. The marble looked wrong, too polished for war. He paused at the open door where the lamplight fell in thin bars across the floor. Inside, Pete sat by the window, wrapped in a robe of pale fabric, the moon gilding the tired lines of his face. A tray of untouched food stood at his side. He looked up when the floor creaked.

“General,” Arm whispered, stepping from shadow.

Pete turned, startled, and then his expression softened into disbelief. “Arm? You’re alive. You shouldn’t be here.”

“I see the King’s pet has grown accustomed to his golden cage. You look… comfortable, General.” Arm stepped in, shutting the door behind him. The light caught the scars that ran from his jaw to his collar. “You’re alive,” he said flatly. “They said you were dead. Maybe you should have been.”

Pete froze. “What are you...”

“I expected chains,” Arm cut in. “Instead I find you free, dressed like a noble, smelling like him.” He spat the word as though it burned his mouth. “Tell me, General, what did you trade for that privilege?”

“It isn’t like that,” Pete said, standing quickly. “I...”

“Then what is it?” Arm’s voice rose, sharp and shaking. “You led us through winter on no rations, bled yourself dry for every farmer’s child in this cursed land. And now you sit in silk while he sleeps in your bed?”

Pete stepped closer, hands out as though soothing a frightened horse. “Arm, listen. I had no choice...”

“No choice?” Arm laughed without humor. “That’s what cowards say before they bow. Don’t tell me about duty, not while his scent clings to you like a mark.”

Pete flinched at that. He could feel the heat rise to his face, could taste the metallic tang of shame that had no easy name. The air between them thickened. “It’s not what you think,” he said again, quieter this time. “I don’t even understand it myself.”

“Then maybe it’s simple,” Arm said. “Maybe you liked it. Maybe you liked the power of being wanted by a king.”

“Stop,” Pete whispered.

But Arm stepped closer until their faces were inches apart, every word a lash. “We buried brothers for you. We burned towns to buy you time. And this is how you repay us? By warming the bed of the man who killed our own?”

Pete’s composure cracked. He reached out on instinct, grasping Arm’s sleeve. “Please, let me explain. I didn’t...”

“Don’t touch me!” Arm snarled, wrenching free. “You don’t command me anymore.”

The room went very still after that. The only sound was the rain on the shutters and Pete’s unsteady breathing. He felt suddenly small, stripped of rank, of words, of the strange, unwanted bond that had rewritten the air around him. There was nothing to say that would make any of it sound clean.

He whispered, “I never meant for any of this.”

Arm’s expression softened for half a heartbeat, then hardened again. “You should have died on the field,” he said, voice low. “It would have been kinder to your name.”

The words landed like a blade. Pete’s hand fell away, trembling. He looked at his old lieutenant and saw only contempt where loyalty had once lived. His mouth opened, but no sound came.

That was the moment the door behind them opened.

That was how Vegas found them, Pete standing too close to another Alpha, eyes wide and guilty, Arm braced for a fight. The king’s arrival was like a drop of blood in water; the air went crimson.

 

The door slammed open so hard the hinges shuddered.

Vegas stood in the doorway, the torchlight behind him throwing his shadow across the floor. His gaze fixed first on Pete, then on Arm, and then on their proximity , the faint curve of Pete’s hand still half-raised as if he’d been reaching out.

Something cold and primitive flickered in the king’s expression. “What,” he said slowly, “is this?”

Neither man answered at once. Arm straightened, defiance settling in like armor. “Your Majesty,” he said, giving the word a sneer. “I came to see what became of my general. Now I see he serves new masters.”

Vegas’s gaze sharpened. “And you are?”

“Arm of the Seventh Division,” he said, chin raised. “One of the men he abandoned.”

“Abandoned?” Vegas took a step forward. “You mean saved. From starvation, from death...”

Arm’s laugh was hoarse. “Saved? Look at him. He doesn’t look saved. He looks owned.”

Pete flinched at the word.
Pete stepped forward, panic cutting through the fog of shame. “Arm, stop...,” he said, but it only poured fuel on the fire.

Vegas’s tone sliced through him. “I wasn’t speaking to you.”

He crossed the space in three strides, seized Arm by the front of his tunic, and hauled him forward until their faces were inches apart. “Do you walk into a king’s hall to spit on his floor? Guards!”

The doors burst open again. Two soldiers appeared, startled but quick to obey. Vegas didn’t let go of Arm. “Take this intruder to the lower cells. If he resists, break him.”

Pete’s voice cracked. “No! He came because of me.”

Vegas turned on him, eyes bright with something too sharp to be called anger. “Because of you,” he echoed. “Because you couldn’t stay where I put you, because you invite ruin into every corner I try to make safe.”

He looked back to the guards. “Take him.”

Arm didn’t resist; he smiled instead. “Does it please you, Majesty,” he said, “to chain the only man who still saw him as more than your plaything?”

Vegas’s hand twitched. “Gag him,” he ordered, and turned away.

As they dragged Arm down the hall, his voice still carried, muffled but unmistakable: “He was worth ten of you before you touched him!”

“You bring spies into my palace?” Vegas's words came out low and shaking. “You conspire with them in my own chambers?”

“Please,” Pete said, breathless. “He came alone. He thought I was...”

“Betraying me?” Vegas finished, half-laughing, half-furious. “And what would you call this?”

Pete pressed forward, desperate. “Please, he’s my man. He came for me. Don’t...”

“Your MAN!" "Yours?? and Don’t what?” Vegas asked, advancing until Pete had nowhere left to retreat. “Don’t punish him? Don’t punish you? Which mercy do you want this time?”

“Just let him live,” Pete said, trembling. “He’s all that’s left of what I was.”

Vegas stared at him, breathing hard. “All that’s left?” he repeated. “You think I haven’t given you everything else?”

Pete’s voice cracked. “Vegas, no! He’s only trying to protect me!”

That plea snapped what little control remained.

Vegas spun, eyes blazing. “Protect you? From what? From comfort? From the man who gave you food, safety, a life?”

Pete’s voice cracked. “From humiliation!”

The words sliced through the air. Vegas froze.

Pete took another step toward him, shaking but unafraid now. “If you must punish me, then do it properly. Send me to the dungeons where I belong. Don’t drag me through your halls like some...” His throat worked on the word. “...like some pet for the court to laugh at.”

Vegas’s expression changed. For a moment he looked stunned, not by defiance, but by the reminder of what he’d made of a man who once commanded armies.

“You think I would throw you to rot in the dark again?” Vegas asked, his voice suddenly too calm. “After all I’ve done to keep you alive?”

Pete’s gaze lifted, clear and steady despite the trembling in his hands. “You’ve kept me breathing, not living.”

That did it. The last shred of control slipped.

Vegas’s tone dropped to something cold, almost whispering. “You dare lecture me? You, who lost your war, your kingdom, your name?”

Pete didn’t answer. The quiet was its own rebellion.

Vegas turned to the guards at the door, his composure cracking back into command. “Drag him to my chambers. Now.”

The soldiers hesitated. No one moved at first. The order was too strange, too dangerous.

Vegas’s voice dropped into a dangerous calm. “Do it. Now.”

They obeyed.

Pete didn’t struggle when rough hands caught his arms. He went limp, too tired to fight, eyes hollow. Arm’s shouts still echoed faintly from somewhere below, already swallowed by stone. The corridor blurred past, banners, torches, faces. The guards said nothing. No one dared meet his eyes.

When they reached the royal quarters, Vegas dismissed everyone with a single word. “Out.”

The door shut behind them, leaving only silence. He looked up at the king, exhausted.

“You can’t keep doing this,” he said quietly. “Not to them, not to me.”

Vegas stepped closer. “Then tell me how to stop.”

Pete laughed once, bitterly. “You don’t stop. You conquer. Even when there’s nothing left to take.”

For a moment Vegas just stared at him, something flickering behind his eyes, guilt, fury, fear, too tangled to name. Then he turned away sharply, as if the sight burned.

Pete stood in the center of the room, wrists raw. “This isn’t mercy,” he said quietly. “It’s shame.”

Vegas’s reply came like a growl. “Then you should be used to it by now.”

Pete’s voice was barely more than breath. “You don’t humiliate a war general like this. You humiliate yourself.”

That struck deeper than any weapon could have.

Vegas moved before he knew it, the fury in him too tangled with hurt to untangle. “Enough,” he said, his voice shaking. “Enough of your pride, your defiance, your endless need to remind me of what you were.”

Pete’s reply was steady, if quiet. “You don’t have to remind me, Majesty. You’ve already made sure I’ll never forget.”

“Guards,” he called through the door, voice flat. “Double watch on the prisoner below. No one enters his cell without my word.”

Pete whispered, “You’re proving him right.”

Vegas’s hands clenched at his sides, but he didn’t answer.

Only thing Vegas knew was that he was seeing red. More anger and frustration than he had ever felt before. Like sand slipping from his fist, the more tighter he tries to hold. And then something in his mind snapped...

 

“Guards,” Vegas called through the door, voice hard. “Tie him to the bed post.” Guards scurried to oblige their king.

Pete’s wrists were already raw from the guards’ rough handling, his pride a shattered thing on the polished floor. He didn’t struggle as two more guards shoved him backward onto the vast bed, its silks smelling faintly of power and Vegas’s scent. They wrestled his arms above his head, tying the coarse rope to the ornate bedposts with efficient, impersonal knots.

“Get out,” Vegas’s voice was low, a controlled tremor of venom. The guards scurried away without a backward glance, sealing them in.

The heavy oak door slammed against the stone wall, the sound echoing through the king’s chambers like a gunshot. Vegas stood in the threshold, his silhouette carved from pure, furious energy. He’d shed his formal robes, leaving only a black tunic that stretched tight across his chest with each ragged breath he took.

Pete glared, his jaw set. “You parade me in chains for the crime of compassion. You are a tyrant, and a petty one.”

Vegas laughed, a dark, humorless sound as he stalked toward the bed. “Compassion? Is that what you call it when my property lets another Alpha put his hands on him?” He leaned over, his fists sinking into the mattress on either side of Pete’s head, caging him in. "Is that something you like? His Pheromones on you? He is your man, is he? Tell me Pete. Humm? You want him to take you in what ways?" His scent intensified, a storm of dark spice and dominant fury that poured into Pete’s lungs.

Oppressive pheromones, Pete's eyes widened in shock. What was Vegas doing?

Pete’s retort died on his tongue. A strange, liquid warmth flickered deep in his gut, an unwelcome and traitorous response. No. Not now. He squeezed his thighs together, a futile attempt to stifle the sudden, slick ache that blossomed between his legs. The humiliation was a physical blow, hotter than any fever. His body was betraying him, responding to the very Alpha who sought to break him. His own pheromones surged in response, unrestrained. His heat had arrived.

“You see?” Vegas murmured, his nose almost brushing Pete’s throat, inhaling deeply. A cruel smile touched his lips. “Your body is far more honest than your tongue, general. It knows its master. It aches for him. Just a little of my alpha pheromones and there you are dripping like a common whore. Is this how a real General's body would behave?”

“Go to hell,” Pete spat, turning his face away, trying to struggle in his binds, but a traitorous shudder wracked his frame.

“I’d rather stay here and enjoy the view,” Vegas purred, his gaze dragging down Pete’s body with possessive hunger. His fingers hooked into the neckline of Pete’s thin linen shirt. With one brutal wrench, he tore it open, buttons pinging onto the floor. The cool air hit Pete’s chest, pebbling his nipples, making him gasp. Vegas’s eyes darkened. “Such a waste, letting beauty like this rot in a dungeon. If you insist on acting like a common whore, I’ll treat you like one.”

He lowered his head, and his mouth, hot and demanding, closed over one peaked nipple.

Pete arched off the bed, a choked cry ripped from him. It wasn’t pain. It was a bolt of pure, undiluted pleasure, so sharp it felt like agony. Vegas’s tongue was relentless, laving, sucking, his teeth grazing the sensitive nub until Pete was panting, his hips giving an involuntary jerk.

“You fucking… bastard…” Pete moaned, the curse losing all its force, becoming a plea. "You wouldn't! You must not! Stop releasing your pheromones!"

Vegas moved to the other nipple, giving it the same devastating attention, his hand coming up to roughly knead his chest. “This is what you needed, isn’t it? Isn’t this why you meat that other alpha? Why your currently releasing parahormones to attract an Alpha?” he growled against Pete’s damp skin. “All that posturing, that fucking arrogant pride… just a mask for a desperate Omega in need of a knot.”

His hand slid down Pete’s stomach, fingers dipping beneath the waistband of his trousers. Pete tensed, a final, feeble attempt at defiance. Vegas ignored it, his calloused palm scraping over Pete’s hip bone before cupping him fully through the fabric. Pete cried out, his back bowing. He was painfully hard, his cock straining against the rough material, and underneath, a devastating wetness was already soaking through.

“So wet for me already,” Vegas breathed, his voice thick with awe and triumph. “Your perfect, tight hole is dripping just from my scent. You’re a desperate little thing, aren’t you?”

He made quick work of the trousers, yanking them down Pete’s legs and tossing them aside. Pete was laid bare, trembling, his flushed arousal on full display. Vegas stood back for a moment, just looking, his own erection a prominent bulge in his pants. “Look at you. My gorgeous, fallen general. My perfect whore.”

He crawled onto the bed, settling between Pete’s spread legs. He didn’t touch him yet, just let the heat of his body radiate against Pete’s inner thighs. “You’re going to take my cock, Pete. You’re going to take every fucking inch of it, and you’re going to scream my name while I fill you up.”

Pete shook his head, a tear of frustration and overwhelming need finally escaping down his temple. “I won’t…”

“You will.” Vegas leaned down, capturing his mouth in a searing kiss. It was nothing like before. This was all conquest. His tongue plunged inside, tasting, claiming, stealing the breath from Pete’s lungs. Pete kissed him back, his resolve dissolving into a molten pool of want. He could taste his own desperation on Vegas’s tongue.

Vegas broke the kiss, breathing heavily. “I’m going to fuck a pup into you,” he whispered, the words a blasphemous promise against Pete’s lips. “I’m going to flood your womb with my cum until it takes. You’ll swell with my child, and everyone will know exactly who you belong to.”

"You must not! You have a Prince Consort Macau, You will have Price Porsche! Please don’t..." Pete tried to rationalize.

"Why must I care about them when I have the most beautifully perfect omega underneath me right now? All wet and ready to be bred for me?" Vegas said. the praise went straight to Pete's omega brain, almost making him purr.

The vulgarity of it, the raw, biological finality of Vegas’s words, should have repulsed him, should have made him fight harder, scream louder, anything. But instead, Pete’s body betrayed him in the most visceral way possible. A fresh wave of slickness gushed from him, hot and shameful, his traitorous hole clenching around nothing as if begging to be filled.

His mind screamed no, but his body screamed yes, and the war between them left him trembling, tears of humiliation spilling down his cheeks. He turned his face away, trying to block out the sight of Vegas above him, but the Alpha’s scent was everywhere, dark, intoxicating, and suffocating, like a drug coursing through his veins.

“Look at you,” Vegas growled, his voice thick with predatory satisfaction. His hand slid down Pete’s thigh, calloused fingers digging into the soft flesh as he spread him wider. “You’re dripping for me. Do you even hear yourself? That pathetic little whimper? Your body knows what it’s for, even if you’re too proud to admit it.”

Pete bit down on his lip hard enough to draw blood, but a low, desperate moan still escaped him as Vegas dragged the thick head of his cock through his slick folds. The sensation was maddening, electrifying, and utterly humiliating. His back arched involuntarily, his hips lifting off the bed as if chasing the pressure.

“Stop,” Pete choked out, though the word lacked any real force. His hands strained against the ropes, but they only tightened, holding him in place. “I don’t want this...”

“Liar,” Vegas hissed, his voice dripping with cruel amusement. He pressed the tip of his cock against Pete’s entrance, not pushing in yet, just teasing, driving him mad. “Your hole is begging for it. Look at how it clenches, how it aches for me. You can lie to yourself, but you can’t lie to me.”

And god, he was right. Pete could feel it, the way his body opened for Vegas, slick and willing, as if it had been waiting for this moment all along. He tried to clamp his thighs together, to stop the obscene display of his need, but Vegas was stronger, forcing him open with a single brutal thrust of his hips.

The stretch was unbearable and exquisite all at once. Pete’s cry tore through the room, raw and broken, as Vegas buried himself to the hilt in one relentless push. His cock felt impossibly large, filling him so completely that it stole the breath from his lungs. For a moment, Pete could do nothing but cling to the bedposts, his body shaking with the intensity of it.

“There you go,” Vegas groaned, his voice rough with pleasure. He leaned over Pete, his breath hot against his ear. “Take it, whore. Take every fucking inch. You were made for this, for me.”

Pete wanted to scream, to claw at him, to do something to make it stop. But his body had other ideas. His body spasmed around Vegas’s cock, greedy and hungry, pulling him deeper. A sob tore from his throat as his hips jerked upward, meeting each thrust with an instinct he couldn’t control.

It was done. He was undone. His pride lay in tatters, his defiance reduced to ash, and all that remained was the undeniable truth, his body belonged to Vegas now, whether he wanted it to or not.

“Please…” Pete begged, not knowing what he was asking for.

“That’s it, beg for it,” Vegas snarled, and drove forward in one brutal, perfect thrust.

Pete’s world shattered into a million points of sensation. The burn of the stretch, overwhelming and undeniable, tore through him as Vegas buried himself to the hilt. His pelvis pressed flush against Pete’s ass, and for a moment, neither of them moved. Vegas trembled above him, his breath ragged, his control hanging by a thread.

“Fuck… you’re so deep,” Vegas growled, his voice thick with awe and dominance. “I can feel you squeezing me, you greedy slut.”

Pete’s body betrayed him, his inner walls clenching tightly around Vegas’s cock as if trying to pull him deeper. But his mind rebelled. “N-no…” he whimpered, his voice trembling with defiance even as his hips involuntarily shifted, seeking more. “I… I won’t… let you…”

Vegas chuckled darkly, leaning down to drag his teeth along Pete’s jaw. “You already are,” he purred, his breath hot against Pete’s skin. “Your body knows what it needs, even if that stubborn pride of yours won’t admit it.”

Pete screwed his eyes shut, trying to block out the sensation, but it was impossible. Vegas’s scent surrounded him, consumed him, and every inch of his skin felt like it was on fire. “You’re… a monster,” he gasped, his voice breaking as another wave of pleasure threatened to consume him.

“And you’re mine,” Vegas replied, his tone leaving no room for argument. He shifted slightly, pulling back just enough to make Pete whimper in protest before slamming back in with a force that stole the air from Pete’s lungs.

I hate you, Pete thought desperately, even as his body arched into the thrust. I hate you, I hate you, I...

“Beg for it,” Vegas demanded, his voice rough with need. “Beg for my cock, Pete.”

“Never,” Pete choked out, but the word was barely audible over the sound of his own ragged breathing. His toes curled as Vegas hit that spot inside him, sending sparks of pleasure shooting up his spine.

Vegas laughed, the sound low and predatory. “Your body is begging for me, even if your mouth won’t,” he taunted, his thrusts relentless. “Look at you, tied up, wet, and desperate. You were made for this.”

Pete shook his head, tears of frustration and humiliation spilling down his cheeks. He wanted to scream, to fight, to do anything but surrender. But with each thrust, his resolve crumbled a little more, until he was left with nothing but the raw, primal need that Vegas had awakened in him.

“Please…” The word slipped out before he could stop it, a broken whisper that betrayed everything he’d been trying to hold onto.

Vegas grinned, his victory written across his face. “That’s it,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss Pete fiercely. “Now let go.” And with one final, brutal thrust, he shattered whatever remained of Pete’s resistance.
Then he moved. He set a punishing rhythm, each thrust pounding into Pete’s core, hitting a place inside that made him see stars. The sound of their bodies meeting, skin slapping against skin, filled the room, punctuated by Pete’s ragged moans and Vegas’s guttural praises.

“Such a good fuck… taking my cock so well… born for this, weren’t you? Born to be my perfect, bred whore.”

Pete was lost, his earlier humiliation consumed by a raw, primal need. He met each thrust, his tied hands clutching the ropes above him, his body convulsing around Vegas’s invading length. The coil in his gut wound tighter, tighter, a scream building in his throat.

Vegas’s pace became erratic, his thrusts harder, deeper. “I’m gonna cum,” he grunted, pistoning into him. “Gonna pump my seed so deep inside you, Pete. Gonna claim you forever.”

His words tipped Pete over the edge. Pleasure detonated, a white-hot explosion that tore through every nerve ending. Pete’s scream was raw and real as his orgasm ripped through him, his body clenching rhythmically around Vegas’s cock.

The fierce pulsing milked Vegas through his own climax. With a final, savage thrust, he buried himself as deep as possible, and Pete felt the hot, sudden flood of his release filling him. Vegas groaned, a long, low sound of absolute possession, and collapsed atop him, still pulsing inside.

For long moments, there was only the sound of their harsh breathing. Vegas’s weight was a comforting anchor. Pete could feel the warm trickle of cum seeping out around where they were still joined. Vegas shifted slightly, but didn’t pull out. He nuzzled into Pete’s neck, his voice a spent, raspy whisper against his sweat-damp skin.

“Still full of me,” he murmured, his hips giving a faint, possessive roll, pushing his softening cock deeper, making more of his spend leak out onto the sheets.

The ropes bit into Pete’s wrists, a stark contrast to the overwhelming heat enveloping him from the inside. Vegas’s knot was a thick, relentless presence, locking them together, a brutal anchor in the sea of sensation that had just wrecked him. His own spend was a cool smear on his stomach, but it was nothing compared to the scalding flood still pulsing deep within his hole from Vegas’s cock.

Vegas’s weight was a heavy, possessive blanket. He propped himself up on one elbow, his dark eyes tracing the tear tracks on Pete’s temples. A slow, smug smile spread across his face.

“Look at you,” Vegas murmured, his voice a low, gravelly thing that vibrated through Pete’s oversensitive body. “Tied to my bed. Filled with my cum. You look like you were made for it.” His free hand trailed down, his thumb stroking over the slight, trembling curve of Pete’s belly. “I can feel you clenching around me still. Your pretty little hole doesn’t want to let me go, does it?”

Pete turned his face away, the movement stiff with humiliation. The slick, intimate sound of their joined bodies as Vegas shifted minutely made his cheeks burn.

“Don’t,” Pete whispered, the word stripped of all its former defiance.

“Don’t what?” Vegas’s thumb dipped lower, circling his dick with a feather-light touch that made Pete jerk. “Don’t tell you the truth? Don’t remind you that you just came harder than you’ve ever come in your life on your enemy’s cock?” He leaned down, his lips brushing the shell of Pete’s ear. “The way you gripped me… so impossibly tight. It makes a man wonder.” His voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “Tell me, General. Was that the first knot you’ve ever taken?”

Pete squeezed his eyes shut. No. The denial was a scream in his mind, but it couldn't escape his throat.

Vegas chuckled, a dark, knowing sound. “It was, wasn’t it? All that arrogance. All that fucking military discipline. And underneath it all, a virgin , just waiting for a real Alpha to ruin it.” He nipped at Pete’s earlobe. “I should have known. The way you fought me… that was fear. Not of me. Of this. Of how much you wanted it.”

His hand left Pete’s dick to cup his jaw, forcing his head back around. Vegas’s gaze was intense, searching. “You’ve never let anyone else have you. All those years playing soldier, hiding what you are. You saved this,” he thrust his hips gently, emphasizing the knot, making Pete gasp, “for me.”

“Stop it,” Pete pleaded, his voice cracking.

“Why? It’s a fact. One the council will be very interested to learn.” Vegas’s smile was all teeth. “They’ll need to perform an examination. Document the state of you. The proof of your deflowering. The court physicians keep meticulous records on the purity of its noble captives. Especially ones they plan to breed.”

The words were a cold dash of reality, a violation that went deeper than the physical. Pete’s eyes flew open in horror. “You wouldn’t.”

“I am your King. I do as I please.” Vegas lowered his mouth to Pete’s, but this kiss was different. It wasn’t the brutal conquest of before. It was slow, deep, and devastatingly thorough. His tongue explored Pete’s mouth with a languid ownership that left no corner untouched. Pete felt himself melting into it, a low moan escaping him as his body betrayed him all over again, responding to the sensual promise in the kiss despite his revulsion.

When Vegas finally pulled back, both of them were breathing harder.

He kissed him again, swallowing Pete’s whimper. This time, his hand slid between them, fingers finding Pete’s swollen, sensitive dick. Pete cried out against his lips, his hips bucking. The overstimulation was a sharp, bright pain that immediately flared into a shocking new wave of pleasure.

“You see?” Vegas panted, rubbing tight, relentless circles. “Your body doesn’t care about your pride. It only cares about this. About being used. About being claimed.” His fingers worked faster. “You’re going to come again. Right now. While I’m still knotted inside you. You’re going to milk my cock dry while everyone in this fucking kingdom learns what a perfect, untouched whore I’ve broken in.”

The degradation was a whip crack, but the praise hidden within it, perfect, untouched, wound him tighter. The coil in his gut, which had never fully unwound, snapped back with a vengeance. Pleasure, sharp and undeniable, ripped through him. His back arched off the bed as much as the ropes would allow, a ragged scream tearing from his throat as his hole convulsed violently around Vegas’s knot.

Vegas groaned, a sound of pure, satisfaction, his own hips stuttering through the intense pulses. “That’s it… fuck… squeeze me like that. Milk every last drop into you. Take your King’s seed like a good little breeder.”

The sensations seemed to last forever, a relentless, toe-curling aftershock that left Pete boneless and shuddering. He was floating, mind blank, aware of nothing but the throbbing fullness and the heavy weight of the man atop him.

Slowly, Vegas’s knot began to soften. He shifted, finally sliding out of Pete with a slick, obscene sound that made Pete flinch. Vegas didn’t move far. He rolled onto his side, pulling Pete against him, the humid heat of their bodies mingling. His hand splayed possessively over Pete’s lower stomach.

Vegas had stared to become possessive. Pete in his heat rendered mind hadn’t noticed the change in Vega's behavior.

 

The humid air in the chamber thickened, growing heavy with the raw, untamed scent of Alpha. It was no longer the controlled dominance Vegas wielded like a weapon; this was something feral, a pungent musk that scraped against Pete’s senses. Vegas’s breathing had shifted from the satisfied rasps of a conqueror to a low, continuous growl rumbling deep in his chest.

His eyes, once sharp with cruel intelligence, were now glazed, pupils blown wide with a black hunger that saw nothing but prey. Possession.

Pete felt the shift viscerally. The arm locked around his waist wasn’t an embrace; it was a steel band, clamping down, pulling Pete’s bare back flush against Vegas’s chest with a force that threatened to crack his ribs. The slow, possessive circles Vegas’s hand had been drawing on his stomach became something else entirely, a frantic, clawing pressure, as if he were trying to physically mold Pete’s flesh, to force his claim deeper than skin.

“Mine,” the word was a guttural snarl, wet and hot against Pete’s ear. It wasn’t a declaration. It was a biological imperative.

Vegas’s hips began a shallow, frantic rutting against Pete’s ass, his soft cock already beginning to firm again against the cleft of Pete’s cheeks, spurred by the rut consuming him. The slippery mess of their previous coupling made the movement obscenely slick.

“Vegas...” Pete’s voice was a strained thread of sound, fear lancing through the lingering haze of his own pleasure.

“Need to… get deeper. Need to breed it… again,” Vegas growled, his words slurred and animalistic. His teeth scraped the delicate junction of Pete’s neck and shoulder, not a love bite but a testing of flesh, a precursor to the claiming bite his feral mind screamed for. A fresh wave of slickness betrayed Pete, his treacherous body responding to the primal call of a rutting Alpha despite the terror chilling his veins. Realization sinking into Pete that his omega was instinctually responding to the Alpha trying to control him and he would bend to whatever the alpha did to him.

The door opened. Dr. Phana stood there, his usual composure shattered. His sharp features were drawn tight, his medical satchel held in a white-knuckled grip. He took in the scene in a single, professional glance: the King lost to a feral rut, his captive tensed in a silent scream of fear and unwanted arousal.

“Your Majesty,” Phana said, his voice cutting through the humid air with clinical precision. He took a cautious step forward. “My King. You need to release him.”

Vegas’s head snapped up, a low warning growl erupting from his throat. He pulled Pete tighter, a possessive shield. “Mine. My Omega. My breeder.”

“His body cannot withstand a consecutive knotting in this state, especially not in a feral rut. You will rupture him. You will kill the very vessel you seek to claim.” Phana’s words were deliberate, each one a calculated risk aimed at the sliver of rationality buried beneath the instinct. He nodded to the two hulking guards who had entered behind him, their own faces set in grim determination. They fumbled with a small lacquered box.

The distraction was enough. Vegas’s glare fixed on the intruders, his focus shifting from Pete to the perceived threat. In that split second, Phana moved. With a speed that belied his composed demeanor, he lunged forward, a heavy cloth pressed over Vegas’s nose and mouth.

Vegas roared, the sound muffled by the fabric, his body bucking violently. He thrashed, his arms tightening convulsively around Pete, who cried out at the crushing pressure. The world became a dizzying whirl of muscle and fury and the cloying, medicinal scent of the tranquilizer. Pete could feel the exact moment the fight left Vegas’s body. The immense strength seeping away, the rigid muscles going slack, the terrifying growl dissolving into a choked, wet gurgle.

The dead weight of the unconscious king collapsed onto him, pinning him to the sweat-soaked sheets. The silence that followed was deafening, broken only by Pete’s own ragged panting and the soft click of Phana closing his medical box.

The guards moved swiftly, their movements efficient as they carefully rolled Vegas’s limp body off of Pete and onto his back. Pete lay there, exposed and trembling, the cold air a shocking contrast to the heat of the Alpha who had just been engulfing him. The evidence of their coupling – the spend, the slick – was a cold, wet reality on his thighs.

Phana approached the bedside, his expression unreadable. He didn’t look at Pete’s face, his attention solely on the medical reality before him.

“The king’s rut was… unprecedentedly swift and severe. Your biology is a powerful trigger for him, General.” He leaned closer, his voice dropping so the guards couldn’t hear. The clean scent of antiseptic on his hands was a stark contrast to Vegas’s animalistic musk. “It makes you exceptionally valuable. And exceptionally vulnerable.” His gaze dropped back to Pete’s exposed body, lingering on the faint bruise beginning to bloom on his hip. "We must take all the precautions we can from now."

~~~**~~~

The air in the chamber was thick with the scent of Pete’s own shame, a humid, cloying reminder of what had transpired. Vegas had been taken away, he moved to a different room, but the king’s presence lingered in every breath Pete took, his alpha pheromones still clinging to the walls, the sheets, his skin. Pete sat on the edge of the bed, his legs trembling as he reached for the cloth and bowl of water the guards had reluctantly provided. The water was cold, a stark contrast to the heat still pulsing between his thighs, and he flinched as he dipped the cloth into it.

Dr. Phana had given him heat suppressants for which he was grateful. He was almost back to his senses.

He pressed the cloth harder against his skin, as if he could scrub away the humiliation. But no matter how hard he tried, the scent of Vegas wouldn’t leave him. It was in his pores, in his lungs, in his very soul. You’re nothing but a whore now, he thought bitterly, his eyes stinging with unshed tears. A dirty, broken whore who can’t even keep his own body from betraying him.

You’re disgusting, he thought, his nails digging into his palms. Worthless. A whore who can’t even keep himself from wanting it again. The words echoed in his mind, each one a lash against his pride, each one a reminder of just how far he had fallen.

And yet, even as he sat there, trembling and humiliated, a small, traitorous part of him wished Vegas would return , not to torment him, but to claim him all over again. The discomfort was nothing. It was the fucking pleasure that was flaying him alive.

His mind, finally clear of the fog of pheromones and fear, began to turn on itself. The general, the strategist, the man who had led armies, was now picking apart his own surrender with the brutal efficiency of a battlefield autopsy.

He thought of Arm. His loyal Arm. The hurt and betrayal in his eyes when he’d seen Pete in the king’s space, misreading the situation entirely. Arm’s words, meant to wound, now rang with a terrible, prophetic truth.

“I see the King’s pet has grown accustomed to his golden cage. You look… comfortable, General.”

A whore. Arm had all but called him a whore, and Pete, tied to a bed and dripping another Alpha’s seed, had proven him right. He had enjoyed it. Not just the climax, the shocking, mind-shattering peak Vegas had ripped from him, that could be blamed on biology, on a traitorous Omega body he’d spent a lifetime suppressing. But the rest of it? The moments before?

The way his breath had caught when Vegas’s scent first hit him. The involuntary clench of his gut, the slick rush of wetness that had shamed him even as it prepared him. The way he’d kissed him back, his tongue tangling with Vegas’s in a desperate, hungry dance.

He was... He was done.

~~~**~~~

Vegas remembered almost nothing of how the night ended.
One instant he had been holding Pete, the next the room had blurred, his breath coming in gasps that tasted like iron. Someone, Phana, maybe, or one of the palace physicians, had stepped in with calm words and then the cloth had came too fast to stop. The sedative hit like ice water through his veins, dragging him down into a heavy, dreamless dark.

When Vegas woke, the world was gray and strangely hollow. His body ached as though he’d fought a war in his sleep. The fire in the hearth had burned out, leaving only the sour smell of smoke and medicine. Dr. Phana sat beside the bed, his notes open, face drawn.

“You’re awake,” Phana said quietly. “Stay still.”

Vegas pushed himself upright anyway. “Where is he?”

“In the lower wing,” the doctor answered. “Under guard. He isn’t hurt.” A pause. “Majesty, you can’t go near him again. You forcibly triggered his heat, Without any blockers and in his weakened state its a miracle he survived any of this. Whatever bond you’ve formed is unstable. Your pheromonal levels are spiking past control. You’re showing symptoms of what we call mate-rejection syndrome.”

Vegas stared at him. “Meaning?”

“Meaning,” Phana said carefully, “that your body and mind are fighting the separation from someone you perceive as bonded. If you push it, it will worsen. For your safety and his, you must stay apart.”

Vegas let out a laugh that sounded too sharp to be sane. “Safe,” he repeated. “You think I care about safety?”

Phana’s tone tightened. “Then care about him. He’s not safe with you in this state.”

That landed like a blade twisting in his chest. The image of Pete’s face, silent and bloodless beneath his hands, flashed through the haze. He pressed a palm to his eyes, but the memory stayed.

“I know,” he said at last, voice hoarse. “After what I’ve done, there’s nowhere in this palace he’s safe. Not even from me.”

Phana didn’t answer. There was nothing left to say.

Vegas leaned back against the headboard, staring at the dark ceiling until his pulse slowed. He could still feel the ghost of the tranquilizer burning through his veins, a dull reminder that even kings could be sedated when they became monsters.

Outside, the palace was quiet again, but the quiet felt wrong, like the silence before collapse.

~~~**~~~

Hours later, servants found Pete in his room, conscious but withdrawn. He would not speak. He would not eat. His eyes stayed open, fixed on nothing, the quiet of someone who had given up even the sound of breath.

Dr. Phana came twice that day, left untouched trays, and told the king in careful tones, “He’s alive, Majesty. But whatever you did, you’ve silenced more than his voice.”

Vegas dismissed him, though the words dug under his skin and stayed there.

 

By evening, a courier brought fresh news from the southern roads. “Majesty,” the man said, bowing low, “the royal escort has reached the river gates. Prince Porsche will be here by tomorrow’s dusk.”

Vegas’s heartbeat stumbled. One day. After months of war and intrigue, one day until everything he’d built came to judgment.

He went to Pete’s chamber himself. The room was dim, the air heavy with untouched food and the faint smell of rain from the window left ajar. Pete sat where he always sat now, still, eyes fixed on the floor.

Vegas stood a long time before speaking. “Your brother comes tomorrow. If you want to see him, you’ll have to live through tonight.”

No answer.

“You could at least eat,” he said, softer. “He’ll want to know you’re well.”

Still nothing.

He tried again, quieter still. “If you speak to him, he can convince the court to spare Arm. You have my word.”

Pete didn’t move. He stared ahead, listless, as though the meaning of words no longer reached him.

Vegas’s voice broke in frustration. “I’m offering you everything left, and you won’t even look at me.”

The silence that followed was worse than hatred. It was indifference. The kind that made kings feel small.

When he left, the door closed on that stillness. Outside, the city was already dressing itself in banners for the prince’s return. Drums echoed from the lower streets. Somewhere in the noise, a flute played, soft, uncertain, like a memory refusing to die.

Chapter Text

Chapter 11 - The Return of the Heir

The bells didn’t ring for welcome.
They tolled, low, heavy, and mournful , as the gates of the capital creaked open under gray morning rain.

The soldiers entered first, boots splashing through puddles, shields slick with mud and blood. Behind them, surrounded by spears, came a carriage covered in black cloth, wheels hissing over wet stone. Chains rattled once from inside before silence reclaimed the courtyard.

Vegas stood waiting beneath the archway, armor dark, cloak thrown over one shoulder. He looked like a statue carved from the storm itself, jaw tight, eyes unreadable.

When the carriage door opened, the guards stepped back. A figure emerged, lean and travel-worn, wrists bound in ceremonial silver that gleamed like mockery.

Prince Porsche Pachara Kittisawasd.

He didn’t bow. He didn’t even hesitate. He took in the courtyard, the banners, the silent rows of soldiers, and then his gaze found Vegas.

“Your Majesty,” Porsche said, voice cutting through the rain, “I see your hospitality hasn’t improved since the war.”

Vegas’s lips twitched, not in amusement. “You weren’t invited, Highness. You were found trespassing on royal soil.”

“Then I should thank your dogs for being better trained than your diplomats.”

A ripple went through the soldiers, some half-turning to gauge the king’s reaction.
Vegas didn’t move. “Your tongue was sharper when your kingdom stood,” he said quietly. “Now it drips like old wine.”

Porsche tilted his head, rain running down his cheek. “And yet, here I stand. Shackled, yes. But standing.”

“Not for long,” Vegas murmured. “Unbind him.”

The guards obeyed, cutting through the silver chains. Porsche rubbed his wrists but didn’t look away from the man who held his fate.

“Tell me,” he said, voice dropping low. “Is this what you do with every rival you can’t kill? Lock them up until they forget their name?”

Vegas stepped closer, close enough that their breaths fogged the same air. “Some forget. Some make me remember.”

Their eyes met, fire and flint, the kind of stillness that feels like something breaking.

Macau appeared at the side stairs, rain on his shoulders, worry already in his eyes. “Brother,” he said softly, “the council waits.”

Vegas didn’t look away from Porsche. “Let them.”

Porsche smiled without warmth. “A king who keeps the council waiting. The stories undersold your arrogance.”

“And yours overstated your charm,” Vegas said. “Inside.”

Guards fell into step behind them. The sound of metal and rain filled the silence as they crossed the threshold. The heavy doors closed, cutting off the courtyard and the storm.

For a heartbeat, the world seemed to hold its breath.
The war had ended months ago, but the real battle had just walked through the door.

The throne room smelled of damp silk and cold fire.
Tapestries hung limp against the stone, their colors dulled by rain and neglect. The council had already gathered, nobles in embroidered robes, advisors with ink-stained fingers, guards stiff along the walls. Every breath carried unease.

Vegas entered first. He wasn’t wearing his crown, only the deep red of his battle cloak. It made the gold in his eyes seem crueler.
Porsche followed under escort, wrists bare but flanked by soldiers, the picture of captured royalty forced into civility.

When the herald’s staff struck the marble floor, the noise echoed like a warning.
“All rise for His Majesty, King Vegas of the Unified Realms,” the man cried. “And for the captive heir of the fallen house, Prince Porsche Pachara Kittisawasd.”

The air felt too thin.

Porsche gave a low, mocking bow. “Captive heir,” he said under his breath. “You should add unwilling groom to that title.”

Vegas didn’t rise to it. He took his seat, gaze fixed straight ahead. The herald unrolled a scroll with shaking hands and began to read.

“By order of the royal council and in accordance with the Concord of Bonds, to ensure the peace of both nations, the crown decrees that His Majesty King Vegas shall enter into formal union with Prince Porsche Pachara Kittisawasd within the span of one week.”

The words hung in the air like smoke. No discussion. No consent. Just decree.

Porsche didn’t move at first. Then he let out a quiet laugh that didn’t reach his eyes.
“So that’s how you make peace,” he said. “Chains, then vows.”

A murmur rippled through the court. Vegas’s voice cut it clean in half.
“This isn’t peace. It’s repair.”

“Call it what you want,” Porsche said. “You’ll still have to convince me to wear the collar.”

Vegas’s tone was calm, too calm. “Convincing you was never part of the plan.”

The words hit like a blade disguised as velvet.

Taran, the advisor closest to the dais, cleared his throat nervously. “Your Majesty, perhaps...”

Vegas silenced him with a look.

Porsche folded his arms, jaw tightening. “You’ll have your alliance, Your Majesty, but not until I see my brother.”

The room went still.

Even the torches seemed to dim.

Vegas’s eyes flicked up. “Your brother?”

“Pete,” Porsche said evenly. “The general you keep alive and hidden. The bastard you made your prisoner.”

Murmurs broke again, sharper this time, whispers of the bastard prince, of war heroes and lost heirs.

Vegas’s hand clenched on the throne arm. “He is under protection.”

“Is that what you call it now?” Porsche asked softly. “Protection?”

The question bled through the room, cold and poisonous. Macau shifted beside the throne, glancing at his brother’s rigid shoulders.

Porsche took a step forward. “I’ll see him before your wedding. Or you can wed the corpse of your peace.”

Vegas’s jaw twitched. “You are not in a position to negotiate.”

“Neither are you,” Porsche said. “You rule over my father’s folly and call it victory. Let me see my brother.”

The silence that followed was heavy enough to choke on. The council members exchanged wary looks; no one dared breathe.

Finally, Macau spoke, his voice calm but firm. “Brother, let him. One meeting. It costs us nothing.”

Vegas looked at him, then at the room of men waiting for a reaction, waiting for the crack.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low.

“Fine. You’ll see him.”

Porsche’s expression didn’t change. “Today.”

Vegas’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “You don’t command me.”

“No,” Porsche said, “but I’m the only thing keeping your council from calling you what you are.”

“And what’s that?” Vegas asked.

Porsche met his gaze. “A tyrant who mistakes ownership for order.”

A sound, sharp, fragile, split the air. It took the council a moment to realize it was Vegas laughing.

“Prepare his audience,” the king said finally, standing. “Let him have what he wants.”

He stepped down from the dais, passing close enough to Porsche that their shoulders nearly brushed.
“Be careful what you ask for,” he murmured. “You might find he’s not the brother you remember.”

Porsche’s jaw set. “You should worry for yourself.”

The doors opened, and the room let out the breath it had been holding.

~~~**~~~

The lower wing was a world of its own, narrow corridors, locked doors, and the smell of herbs too sharp to be comforting. The windows never opened fully, and light only came when the guards remembered to unshutter the lamps.

The lower wing didn’t feel like part of the palace anymore.
It was too quiet, too clean. The air smelled of herbs, soap, and the faint tang of disinfectant that clung to the back of the throat. The guards outside stood like statues, not daring to breathe wrong near the door.

“Only Omegas,” the steward repeated to the staff. “By the King’s decree. No Alphas. No Betas, No one who’ve worked under Alphas. No one who carries their scent.”

The maids nodded, frightened more of the silence than the rules.

Pete sat by the window, bare feet on the cold floor, staring at the courtyard far below. His back straight despite the exhaustion hollowing him out. The robe they’d given him was white, too soft for a soldier, too delicate for a prisoner. His robe hung loose at the collar. He hadn’t eaten in three days. The fabric slid off his shoulder when he moved, revealing skin marked by healing bruises.

Dr. Phana had been clear. The King is not to enter this wing. No Alpha is. His orders had spread through the palace like prayer, whispered, obeyed, feared.

“His pheromones are unstable,” the doctor told the guards. “If they mix again, the Omega could collapse. You’ll have blood on your hands before your swords even draw.”

Dr. Phana’s orders echoed in the hallways like scripture.

“His Majesty must not approach. His pheromones are unstable. If they meet again too soon, the Omega could collapse.”

No one questioned it. They just obeyed.

So they barred the halls. The king himself hadn’t crossed the threshold since the tranquilizer. The space between them grew like rot.

Inside the room, the only sounds were the soft scuff of slippers, the clink of porcelain, and whispers, hushed and hurried, just loud enough for Pete to hear even when they thought he wasn’t listening. The maids entered quietly, heads bowed, arms full of clean linens and trays of untouched food. They never met his eyes for long. They whispered instead. Always whispers.

“He doesn’t talk?”
“Not a word. Not since the King stopped visiting.”
“I heard the physician say he’s refusing food.”
“Then why not force it?”
“Because His Majesty forbade it.”
“His Majesty forbade everything. No Alphas, no Betas. No one can go near him.”
“Because he’s fragile.”
“Because he’s his.”
“You don’t mean—”
“Oh, I do. You think it’s mercy, keeping him here? You don’t lock a man away to heal him. You lock him away to keep him.”
“But why so secret?”
“Hush. Don’t say that.”
“Why not? He’s an Omega who spent a heat with a rutting Alpha. Why else would the King keep him locked away from the world?”
“That’s not confirmed—”
“Then what else explains it? No Alpha allowed near him, no Betas either. The guards change outside the door, never inside. The King’s own scent on him for days.”
“It’s for his safety.”
“Or the King’s reputation. Mark me, they’ll hide him till the wedding’s done. Then what? A quiet scandal? A child no one names?”
“Don’t say child.”
“Why? It’s not like the first bastard didn’t grow up to be a soldier too.”
“Don’t be cruel.”
“Cruel? I’m honest. You’ve seen the way he stares at nothing. The way he flinches when someone opens the window. He knows he’s ruined.”
“Ruined? He’s the Great General! A hero!”
“Was. You can’t be a hero and a scandal in the same breath.”
“Stop it. The walls have ears.”
“Oh shush. Everyone knows what’s coming. The King won’t marry that kind of an Omega, he’ll use one. When the heat comes again, who will stop him? The doctor? The guards?”
“The Queen, maybe.”
“Queen?”
“The new one. The captured prince. They say he’s to be wed within the week.”
“Then all the more reason to keep this one hidden. Two brothers, both tied to the same crown? The gods won’t forgive that.”
“Nor will the people.”
“If he carries, we’ll all pay for it.”
“Don’t say carry. The word alone is curse enough.”
“Then say what you will, but look at him. He’s all marked up.”
“Marked?”
“I saw it. When the robe slipped from his shoulder. The bruise. The scent that never fades.”
“You shouldn’t have looked.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“Then don’t speak of it. If the King hears...”
“The King doesn’t hear whispers. He makes them.”
“Hush!”
“I’m only saying what the court already wonders. Why else guard him so tightly? Why else keep every Alpha out? The King doesn’t share. Even when he’s done.”
“Done?”
“Have you seen him when he passes this hall? He doesn’t breathe until he’s gone. I’ve never seen an Alpha fight himself like that.”
“Then maybe he’s ashamed.”
“Ashamed of what?”
“Of wanting him still.”
“That’s not want. That’s ownership.”
“And what happens when an owner breaks what he claims?”
“He hides it. Locks it away. Waits for it to rot quietly.”

The older maid dropped the water jug then, the crash too loud in the fragile quiet. They froze, glancing at the door, waiting for guards. None came.

“Enough,” she hissed, voice trembling. “Do your work. Gods help you all if he ever hears.”

They gathered their things in silence and slipped out, leaving behind the faint scent of lavender and fear.

Pete didn’t move. He sat staring at the spilled water as it ran across the stone floor, a thin, winding trail that mirrored the veins in his hands. His reflection trembled in it.

Every whisper reached him. Every word sank like a stone into a well that would never echo back.
He wanted to tell them they were wrong, that there was no child, no treachery, only exhaustion, but his voice refused to come. It stayed buried under all the things he hadn’t said when it mattered.

But the words wouldn’t leave his head.
An Omega that’s spent a heat with a rutting Alpha.
A child.
A scandal waiting to bloom.

At night, the maids left candles by his bedside. Some prayed when they thought he slept.

“Poor thing,” one whispered one evening, tucking a blanket he’d never use. “He’s too beautiful for war, too broken for peace.”

Pete’s fingers twitched at that, the smallest flicker of life, then stilled again.

Dr. Phana came every dawn. Checked his pulse, his temperature, his eyes.
“He’s stable,” the physician told the steward. “But if he keeps refusing food, we’ll lose him to his own silence.”

The steward bowed, unsure how to respond. “What should I tell His Majesty?”

“Tell him nothing,” Phana said. “The King’s scent alone could kill him right now.”

Pete heard that too. He turned his head slightly, as though looking for something behind the words. The doctor didn’t notice. None of them did.

 

Later, when the room was empty,He pressed a hand to his abdomen before he realized what he was doing. The touch sent panic rushing through him. His breath caught. He pushed harder, as if to flatten the thought, the possibility, the curse.

It couldn’t happen. It mustn’t.

He had lived his whole life as a mistake the King pretended not to see, the bastard son of a maid and a monarch too proud to claim him.
He’d sworn no child of his would ever live like that. No one else would inherit his shame, his name whispered in corners like a curse.

But now...

Now his body ached in ways he didn’t understand. His scent wouldn’t fade, no matter how many times he washed. The doctor’s herbs didn’t work. The servants’ pity clung to him heavier than the air itself.

And somewhere in the back of his mind, a cruel thought whispered: If it happens, they’ll call it his fault. Again.

His chest hurt. His throat tightened. He rose too fast, the room spinning, and caught himself against the wall. The sound of his pulse filled his head. He wanted to scream, but no sound came.

Through the window, the gardens looked so far away, unreachable, like another life.
He used to fight for those lands. Now he was afraid to step outside his own door.

He slid down to the floor, arms around his knees, breathing shallowly. The white robe pooled around him like something ceremonial, like a shroud.

“I won’t,” he whispered to no one. His voice cracked on the word. “I won’t bring another bastard into this world.”

The candle on his table flickered low.
The air barely moved.
The silence settled again, thick, final, unbroken.

Pete whispered to the air, voice raw and small.
“I’m not afraid of dying,” he said. “I’m afraid of being remembered like this.”

The wind shifted through the half-open window. No answer came.

~~~**~~~

The guards left the door open just long enough for the scent of cold air to slip in, then closed it again, locking the rest of the world out.

The room was too bright for comfort, white sheets, white curtains, white robe. The kind of clean that meant something unclean had happened here.

Pete turned at the sound of footsteps. He knew that walk even before he saw him.
He closed his eyes. Of all the people to see me like this.
When he finally faced him, the look on Porsche’s face cut deeper than pity ever could.

“Your Highness,” he said softly.

Porsche stopped in the doorway. “Don’t call me that.”

Pete tried to smile. “You’re the only royal left to call.”

“Not to you,” Porsche said.

Pete’s gaze dropped. “Then what should I call you?”

Porsche didn’t answer. He just looked at him, really looked, and saw how pale he’d become, how the robe hung too loose, how his eyes didn’t shine the way they used to.

For a moment neither spoke. The air between them was heavy, humming with something unspoken. Then Porsche’s expression shifted, confusion, realization, fury.

And then he smelled it.

The scent in the room gave it away. It was faint but inescapable, woven into the walls, the sheets, the skin.

Vegas.

It was faint, a shadow of a scent, but once recognized, it filled the room like smoke.

Porsche froze. Every muscle in his body went tight.
He took one slow step closer. “Whose scent is that?” he asked, though he already knew.

Pete’s breath stuttered. “It’s nothing.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

Pete’s throat tightened. “I’m not...”

“You are.” His voice was barely above a whisper, but it cracked the air open. “It’s him, isn’t it?” Porsche’s eyes went cold. “He ...”

Pete flinched, and that was all the answer Porsche needed. He let out a sharp, shaking breath, like a laugh with the joy scraped out of it.

“He did this to you,” Porsche said quietly. Porsche repeated, lower now. “He... touched you.” each word trembling with control. “And now he keeps you locked away… like a curse he made himself and can’t stand to look at.”

Pete’s hand tightened on the windowsill. “Don’t make it sound like... like I didn’t let it happen.”

“What? Don’t say that,” Porsche snapped, and the sound made Pete flinch. “You didn’t let anything.”

Pete’s breath hitched “I’m an Omega,” Pete said, the words spilling out too fast, too small. “My body reacts. Maybe it called to him. It’s… instinct. Maybe I... maybe I let him. Maybe it’s my fault.”

Porsche’s eyes darkened. “No.” “Stop.” The word cracked through the room like thunder.

“Porsche...”

“No.” He moved forward, slow but dangerous. “You don’t get to say that. You don’t get to make yourself responsible for his violence.”

Pete’s voice broke. “But I’m the one who...who reacted...”

“You reacted because you were hurt. Because your body was terrified and trying to survive.” His tone softened but shook. “That’s not consent. That’s survival. Don’t ever confuse the two.”

Pete blinked hard. Tears built at the edges of his lashes, but he didn’t let them fall. “I can’t help it. It’s what I was born to be. A thing that bends. A thing that yields.”

Porsche stepped closer, his anger trembling at the edge of control. “Don’t twist what he did into something you own. Don’t carry his sin on your back.”

Pete’s voice broke. “Then why can I still feel him? Why does my body still...” He swallowed the rest. “Every breath feels like I’m betraying myself.”

Porsche softened, but only slightly. “Because he forced his scent into your skin. That’s not desire; that’s damage.”

Pete shook his head. “It feels like both. That’s what terrifies me.”

Porsche’s breath caught. “You were born to be loved, Pete. The world just didn’t know how.”

The words hit too deep. Pete’s knees wavered. He looked away, biting his lip hard enough to taste blood. “I wish I could believe that.”

“Then believe me,” Porsche said. “Because I do.”

Pete laughed, a soft, cracked sound. “You always did believe in broken things.”

“Maybe,” Porsche said, “but this time, we’ll fix it. Together. You don’t face this alone.”

Pete’s eyes flicked to him, uncertain. “You think we can fix him?”

“I don’t care about him,” Porsche said, almost whispering. “I care about you.”

"Me..." Pete pressed a hand against his stomach, half-conscious of the gesture. “If I’m...if something happens...” His voice crumbled. “If there’s a child... another bastard like me...Will you forgive me?”

Porsche caught his wrists before he could press harder. “Don’t.”

Pete trembled. “I swore I’d never repeat her story. I can’t be my mother. I can’t bring another mistake into this world.”

“Look at me,” Porsche said.

Pete refused. “I can’t.”

“Look at me.”

He did, eyes wet and wild.

“You’re not her,” Porsche said, quieter now. “And nothing he did can make you her. You fought to protect this land when no one else would. You’ve already paid for their sins a hundred times over.”

Pete’s eyes flicked up. “Then why do I feel like her? Ashamed. Used. Ruined.”

“Because he made you feel that way,” Porsche said. “Not because it’s true.”

Pete shook his head, voice breaking into a whisper. “But my body...”

“Your body kept you alive,” Porsche cut in, fierce again. “Don’t punish it for surviving.”

Pete’s lips parted, words lost. The silence between them was thick with everything he couldn’t say... the scent that wouldn’t fade, the warmth he still felt, the confusion that shamed him more than any wound.

Pete shook his head, tears streaking down his face. “You don’t understand. My body doesn’t know the difference. It craves him like punishment.”

Porsche stepped forward, grabbed his shoulders, forced him to meet his eyes. “Then let it crave and hate him at the same time. But don’t break for him.”

Pete trembled, voice a rasp. “I already did.”

Porsche’s hands tightened. “No. Not yet.”

Pete stared at him, lost, fragile. “What do I do then?”

“Survive,” Porsche said. “That’s what you’ve always done. Survive, and let me carry the rest.”

Pete shook his head weakly. “You shouldn’t have to.”

“I already do.”

He pulled him close, not gentle, holding him like something he was terrified might disappear.
Pete didn’t cry out, didn’t fight. He just stood there, shaking, the sound of his breathing uneven against Porsche’s shoulder.

When he finally spoke, it was a whisper, cracked and hopeless.
“I don’t want to be my mother. If there’s a child, if the court calls it another bastard...”

“Then don’t,” Porsche said. “You get to choose what happens next.”

Pete’s voice was barely audible. “You can’t fix what’s already dirty.”

Porsche drew back, met his eyes. “Then I’ll burn the whole damn world until you feel clean again.”

Pete stared at him, silent tears slipping free, and whispered, “Then we both die.”

“Maybe,” Porsche said, voice trembling. “But not today.”

He turned to leave, but Pete caught his sleeve. “Why are you doing this for me?”

Porsche looked back. “Because someone should’ve done it long ago.”

Porsche’s fury softened into something steadier. “You’re not facing this alone,” he said. “Do you hear me? Whatever comes next, we handle it together. Not you. Us.”

Pete wanted to believe him. He wanted to believe there could still be us after everything he’d become. But guilt pressed down heavier than hope. “You can’t save what’s already ruined,” he whispered.

“I can stand beside it,” Porsche said. “And I will.”

Pete’s throat worked, a dry, broken sound escaping him. “Then don’t let go.”

“I won’t.”

 

They stayed like that, one man holding another together by sheer force of will, until the sound of the guards shifting outside reminded them the world still existed.

Porsche let go first, gently. “Eat something,” he said. “Please.”

Pete nodded, though he wouldn’t. He watched his brother reach the door, watched the fury barely contained in his shoulders.

Porsche turned once more. “He doesn’t get to own you, Pete. Not your scent. Not your shame. Not your story.”

The door closed softly behind him.

Pete sank to the floor, hands pressed to his face. The smell of herbs, the faint trace of Vegas, the echo of Porsche’s anger, all of it tangled together until he couldn’t breathe.

He whispered into the quiet, voice shaking. “Then why does it still feel like he does?”

 

The door closed with a dull click.
The silence that followed wasn’t peace, it was pressure.
Pete sank down until the stone met his knees. His palms covered his face, but the heat of his skin would not fade.

The scent of antiseptic hung in the air, but beneath it was another trace, his own, faint and wrong, mixed with the ghost of an Alpha who wasn’t there. He could almost hear the whisper of a breath against his ear, the low command that had stolen his name from his own mouth.

He pressed his hand against his stomach again, harder this time, as if he could push the memory out through skin and bone. His pulse hammered there, a traitor’s rhythm.

What if it’s already too late?
What if something grows inside me that carries his scent, not mine?

He bit down on a sob until it was nothing but air. The room felt smaller, the walls too white, too clean, as if someone meant to scrub him out of existence and forgot to finish.

His mother’s voice came back from some half-remembered dream:
Hide the shame before it learns to speak your name.

Pete let out a hollow laugh that turned into a cough. His body hurt from stillness. His heart hurt from memory.

When he finally spoke, the words were barely sound at all.
“He says I’m not her,” he whispered, staring at the light pooling on the floor. “But the world will see the same thing, a broken body carrying someone else’s sin.”

He reached for the bowl on the table, not to eat but to pour the untouched water over his hands. It ran down his wrists, thin and clear, and for one second he imagined it washing everything away, the scent, the blood, the war.

It didn’t.

The water dried fast, leaving only chill skin and the echo of Porsche’s promise: Then I’ll burn the whole damn world until you feel clean again.

Pete tilted his head back against the wall, eyes open but unfocused. His lips moved around words too soft to hear. A prayer, or a curse, or maybe both.

When sleep finally took him, it wasn’t rest, it was surrender.

 

~~~**~~~

The corridor outside the lower wing was too bright.
Porsche walked fast, head down, each step a heartbeat he couldn’t slow. He’d left the smell of herbs and fear behind, but it clung to him anyway.
Every word Pete had said followed him like smoke.

I reacted. I couldn’t stop it.
If there’s a child...
I don’t want to be my mother.

He pressed his palms together until the bones in his fingers ached.

“Porsche,” a voice called softly.

Macau.

He was waiting at the corner, wrapped in his royal coat, eyes searching Pete's brother’s face. “You shouldn’t be here,” Macau said. “The King asked...”

“The King.” Porsche’s voice cracked on the word. “Don’t call him that right now.”

Macau frowned. “You’re shaking.”

“I should be killing him.”

“Porsche...”

“He hurt him,” Porsche snapped, every syllable sharp. “He... your brother...he... touched him, He did that to him! and now he keeps him locked away like a secret he’s ashamed of.”

Macau blinked. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“I know exactly what I’m saying,” Porsche hissed. “I saw him. I smelled it on him.”

The younger man flinched, as if the words themselves burned. “No,” he whispered. “Vegas wouldn’t...”

“Wouldn’t?” Porsche’s laugh was thin, ugly. “You think I can’t tell what he’s done? I saw the way Pete couldn’t look at me. The way he kept apologizing for existing. You think that comes from nowhere?”

Macau shook his head slowly, as if he could undo what he was hearing. “He’s my brother.”

“And he’s a monster,” Porsche said. “I don’t care whose blood he shares.”

Macau’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. The silence between them filled with the sound of a far-off bell, low and hollow.

Finally, Macau whispered, “You don’t know him like I do.”

“Then maybe you don’t know him anymore,” Porsche said. “Maybe no one does.”

He started to turn away, but Macau caught his sleeve. “What are you going to do?”

Porsche didn’t answer right away. He just looked at him, eyes red, voice flat. “Whatever it takes to keep Pete breathing.”

“Please,” Macau said. “Don’t make this worse.”

Porsche pulled free. “It’s already worse.”

He left without another word, boots echoing down the corridor until the sound faded completely.

Macau stood there for a long time, the torchlight flickering over his hands. When he finally moved, it was slow, deliberate.

Brother,
They say you have conquered half the world. Tell me, was it worth losing yourself for the other half?

He stopped, staring at where his hand shook.
The world blurred, useless, and he cursed.

“Gods forgive us,” he murmured, “for the things we let love excuse.”

The candle guttered out.

~~~**~~~

The throne room was empty except for the guards and the echo of boots on marble.
Vegas had been reading reports when Macau entered without permission. He didn’t bow.

“Little brother,” Vegas said without looking up. “You’re braver than most to walk in like that.”

“Bravery,” Macau said quietly, “or desperation?”

That made Vegas glance up. “Which is it?”

“I came to ask what you’ve done.”

Vegas closed the ledger. “Be specific.”

“With him,” Macau said. “With the Omega General you keep in the lower wing.”

For a moment, there was no sound but the crackle of the torches.
Then Vegas leaned back in his chair, a faint smile pulling at his mouth. “You’ve been speaking to the prince.”

“I’ve been listening,” Macau said. “To the whispers. To the doctor. To the silence that follows your name.”

Vegas’s expression didn’t change, but his voice sharpened. “You should choose your sources more carefully.”

“Then tell me the truth,” Macau said. “Did you touch him?”

Vegas rose, slow and deliberate. “What does it matter?”

“It matters,” Macau said, voice trembling, “because you’re not the brother I remember.”

“That boy died with our father,” Vegas said. “The one who came after learned how to win.”

“By breaking someone who couldn’t fight back?”

Vegas’s eyes narrowed. “You think I broke him?”

“I think you’re trying to convince yourself that you didn’t.”

For a long time, neither spoke. The fire popped in the grate, the sound small and sharp.

Vegas turned away first, running a hand through his hair. “You don’t understand, Macau. He’s different.”

“Different?” Macau repeated. “You say that like it’s an excuse.”

“It’s not,” Vegas said. “It’s a fact. He makes me feel...” He stopped, jaw tightening. “Forget it.”

“No,” Macau said. “Say it.”

Vegas’s laugh was hollow. “He makes me feel human. And I hate him for it.”

Macau took a step closer. “Then stop hurting him.”

Vegas turned, eyes dark. “It’s not that simple.”

“It is,” Macau said. “You can end this. Let him go.”

Vegas’s voice dropped to a whisper. “If I let him go, what’s left of me?”

“Maybe that’s the point,” Macau said. “Maybe what’s left is what you were supposed to be.”

Vegas stared at him for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet, almost tender.
“You always thought love could save people.”

Macau met his gaze. “And you always thought power could.”

The silence stretched, sharp as a blade.

Finally, Macau said, “You can’t hold what you’ve already destroyed.”

Vegas turned away. “Get out.”

“I won’t leave him here to rot.”

“You’ll do what I tell you,” Vegas snapped, the mask slipping. “Or I’ll have you locked out of this palace entirely.”

Macau didn’t flinch. “You can lock me out of walls, brother. Not of shame.”

He turned and walked away before Vegas could reply.

Vegas stood there alone, hand gripping the edge of the table until the veins showed white. The papers beneath his palm tore under the pressure.

When he finally spoke, it was to no one.
“I never meant to destroy him.”

The words hung in the air, too quiet to echo.

~~~**~~~

The court chamber was packed, nobles, soldiers, advisors, each one whispering as Porsche entered.
The sound died when he reached the dais. He looked nothing like the man who had once begged for mercy; the prince who had survived capture now stood wrapped in silence, his eyes unreadable.

Vegas sat higher on the throne, shoulders squared, the crown glinting like mockery under the torches.

“Your Majesty,” Porsche said evenly, bowing just enough to be polite. “I have one request before the coronation proceeds.”

“Another?” Vegas asked, voice measured.

“The release of Arm,” Porsche said. “General Pathros’s lieutenant.”

The name dropped into the room like a stone into still water. Every head turned toward him.

Vegas’s expression didn’t change. “He was arrested for insubordination.”

“He was arrested,” Porsche said, “for loyalty.”

Murmurs rippled through the court.

Vegas leaned back, fingers tapping the armrest. “You seem very invested in a soldier who betrayed me.”

“He didn’t betray you,” Porsche said. “He tried to protect a man your soldiers left to die.”

“That man,” Vegas said quietly, “is now under my protection.”

“Your protection looks a lot like imprisonment,” Porsche answered.

The words cut cleanly through the room. The nobles froze, watching the way Vegas’s jaw tightened.

The king rose slowly from his seat. “You forget yourself, Your Highness.”

“No,” Porsche said, voice steady, cold. “I remember exactly who I am. The brother of the Omega you keep caged below this hall. The last bloodline of the land you claim to rule. If I am to marry you for peace, I will have it on my terms, and that begins with releasing the man you condemned.”

Silence. Even the torches seemed to hold their breath.

Vegas’s eyes narrowed. “And if I refuse?”

“Then you’ll have a wedding,” Porsche said, “but not a kingdom.”

A ripple of fear passed through the courtiers. The statement was not a threat. It was a fact.

For a moment, Vegas said nothing. Then he turned to his guards. “Bring Arm to the main hall. Release him.”

Porsche bowed. “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

Vegas’s gaze lingered on him as he sat again. “Tell me, Prince,” he said softly. “Do you intend to challenge me at every turn?”

Porsche’s smile was small, humorless. “Only when you deserve it.”

The court exhaled as the session ended, but Vegas’s stare followed Porsche all the way out the door, dark and unreadable.

~~~**~~~

 

The palace was quieter that night than it had ever been.
Even the guards spoke in whispers, as if the stones themselves were listening.

Pete sat by the open balcony, the cool air brushing against his skin.
Below, the courtyards were empty, shadows stretched long under torchlight.
The silence felt endless, until it wasn’t.

A single note drifted through the darkness.
Soft. Familiar. Carried by the wind from the far side of the palace.

The sound of a flute.

Pete froze.

It was a melody he knew too well, the song he had once played during the siege at the western ridge, when the soldiers were starving and hope was running thin.
A song that meant *hold on*.
A song that meant *I’m still here.*

But now it sounded different. Slower. Heavier.
Each note lingered too long, bending under its own weight.

Pete rose, moving toward the edge of the balcony as if drawn by it. His hands gripped the cold railing.
The moonlight spilled silver across the flagstones, catching the faint glint of movement far away, a figure, standing alone by the lower courtyard, flute raised to his lips.

Porsche.

Pete’s breath caught.

The melody shifted midphrase, a modulation only they would understand. It was something they had created as boys, a hidden pattern of notes they used during drills, a code no one else could read.

He closed his eyes and listened.
He could still hear the meaning inside it.

*Stay quiet. Stay alive.*
*Forgive me.*

His chest ached. The song climbed higher, trembled once, then fell into silence.

Pete pressed a hand against his mouth, trembling. The air still vibrated with the last note, fading slowly into the night.

He understood.
Porsche couldn’t come to him. Couldn’t risk the walls hearing what he had to say. So he spoke through the only language they had left: music and memory.

And that final shift, the last haunting phrase, was not a farewell.
It was a promise.

*It ends soon.*

Pete’s vision blurred as tears filled his eyes. The wind carried the last echoes away, leaving him with nothing but the cold and the ache in his chest.

He whispered into the darkness, voice trembling.
“Don’t do this, brother. Please… don’t do this for me.”

But only silence answered him.

And far below, the flute’s last note lingered in the air, one soft thread of defiance, breaking before it reached the stars, and in that silence, Pete understood, promises could sound like prayers, and both were meant to be broken.