Chapter 4: Being Careful

Three nights passed in a blur of menial work and doing everything to avoid the three brothers.

Levi learned the east wing’s rhythms quickly. He rose before the sun, answered Merrick’s clipped instructions, scrubbed floors that were already clean, carried laundry that smelled of the brothers, and kept his head down whenever a dark-haired figure crossed a distant corridor. Kai never looked at him again. Aaron passed him once in a hallway and did not bother to slow. Dexter’s silver hair appeared at the edge of his vision more than once, but the third son never spoke. The household treated him like furniture that had the misfortune of being able to flinch.

By the afternoon of the third day the air itself had changed.

Levi felt it first in his blood. A low, restless heat that no amount of cold water could chase away. His scent kept slipping his control, turning sweeter and thicker no matter how hard he tried to fold it inward. His skin felt too tight. Sounds were sharper. The layered alpha scents that clung to every corner of the mansion made his stomach twist with something that was no longer only fear.

He realized the truth while kneeling on the stone floor of a storage room, folding linens that smelled faintly of Aaron.

He had forgotten his suppressants.

The small glass bottle had been sitting on the shelf beside his bed at home the night they took him. In the rush of packing, he had left it behind. Three days without them. And now the full moon was only hours away.

His hands shook so badly he nearly dropped the stack of towels.

Merrick found him still kneeling there.

"Up," the servant said. "The ceremony begins at moonrise. You will serve in the outer hall. Do not speak. Do not approach the dais. Do not let your scent become a problem." His eyes narrowed as he caught the edge of what Levi was already failing to contain. "Control yourself, omega. Tonight is not about you."

Levi nodded because there was nothing else he could do. He knew he was losing himself, but he hoped he’d make it through the night without completely losing control.

***

The great hall had been transformed.

Dark banners hung from the high beams. Candles burned in tall iron stands. The long tables that usually stood empty were laden with food and wine for the visiting packs. Nobles in formal black and deep green filled the space, Alphas with heavy scents and sharp eyes, Betas in quieter colors, a scattering of high-ranking omegas kept carefully close to their mates. The air was thick with perfume and dominance and expectation.

At the far end of the hall a raised dais waited. Three chairs of dark wood and silver stood side by side. The princes’ chairs.

Levi was placed along the western wall with the other low servants, a tray of crystal glasses in his hands. He kept his gaze fixed on the floor and tried to breathe through his mouth. It did not help. The heat under his skin had become a steady pulse. Every inhale carried the scents of too many Alphas, and his body, starved of suppressants and already tilting toward heat, answered them with a sweetness he could no longer fully hide.

He felt eyes on him more than once, but he did not dare look up to see whose. He knew better than to do that, especially at a mating ceremony for the princes.

The Alpha entered first, and the entire hall rose. Conversations died. The old wolf took his place at the center of the dais without a word, only then did his sons enter.

Kai walked with measured precision, his expression unreadable as always. Aaron moved like something that had never needed to hurry, while Dexter followed last, silver hair gleaming under the candlelight. The three of them took their seats.

When that little show was finally over, the Alpha stood once again and spoke with a grace Levi never thought the old wolf had in him.

"Tonight the moon is full. My sons have reached the age of claiming. Let every pack present witness. Let every worthy omega step forward when called. The Goddess will decide."

A low murmur of approval rolled through the nobles.

Levi’s tray trembled in his hands.

The heat inside him had begun to climb in earnest. It started low in his belly and spread outward in slow, liquid waves. His pulse thudded in his throat, in his wrists, behind his eyes. He could smell himself now, sweet and open and wrong for this place. He tried to step farther into the shadow of the wall, but his legs felt unreliable.

The first of the formal presentations began. Young female omegas from allied packs were led forward one by one, heads bowed, scents carefully composed. The princes regarded them with polite detachment. Kai’s face never changed. Aaron looked almost bored. Dexter’s pale eyes tracked each candidate with minimal interest and then dismissed them.

Levi soon stopped hearing everything that was happening, the moon was rising and his condition was getting worse.

He felt it the moment the silver rays of the moon found their way through the windows. Something inside his body answered like a door being kicked open.

His suppressant-starved system had nothing left to fight with. The first full wave of his pheromones broke free before he could even gasp.

It rolled out of him in a thick, sweet surge—ripe omega heat, unmated and sudden and impossibly strong. The tray slipped from his hands and shattered. Crystal exploded across the stone. The sound was sharp and small compared to what his scent did to the room.

Every Alpha in the hall turned.

Conversations died mid-word. Chairs scraped. A low, collective growl of shock and offense rose from the visiting packs. The carefully controlled atmosphere of the mating ceremony fractured in a single breath.

Levi staggered back against the wall, one hand pressed to his mouth, but it was far too late. The heat kept pouring out of him. His knees threatened to give. His vision blurred at the edges. He could feel the moon’s pull like a fist around his spine, dragging every buried instinct to the surface at once.

On the dais, three heads turned in perfect unison.

Kai’s ice-cold composure cracked for the first time. His eyes had gone dark, pupils blown wide, fixed on the trembling omega against the far wall with an intensity that looked almost like pain. Aaron had risen halfway from his chair, one hand gripping the armrest hard enough to whiten his knuckles, nostrils flared. The lazy detachment was gone, and something far more dangerous had taken its place. Dexter sat perfectly still, but the serene mask had slipped. His silver head was tilted, pale eyes locked on Levi with a focus so absolute it felt like a blade against the throat.

The rest of the hall recovered faster than the princes.

An older Alpha from a mountain pack slammed his fist against the table. "An unmated omega in heat? During a sacred claiming?" His voice rang with outrage. "This is a deliberate insult!"

Another voice joined him, then another. "Remove him!"

"How dare a servant interrupt—"

"The Goddess’s night is not for common omegas to soil—"

"Execute the insolent thing and be done with it!"

The demands rose in a jagged chorus. Several Alphas had already started forward, faces twisted with offense and the sharp edge of unwanted arousal that only made their anger worse. A dominant omega near the front covered her nose with a scented cloth, eyes wide with disgust. The ceremony had been sacred, and the sudden, uncontrolled flood of a low-born omega’s heat was a stain.

Levi could barely stand. The heat was a living thing under his skin now, rolling through him in waves that left him shaking. He tried to speak, to apologize, to beg, but only a broken sound came out. His scent kept spilling, thicker with every breath, drawing every dominant nose in the room straight to him.

On the dais, the Alpha had risen as well. His expression was thunderous. "Contain that omega," he ordered, voice cutting through the noise. "Now."

But his sons did not move to obey.

Kai’s gaze had never left Levi. The eldest prince’s chest rose and fell in a deep, controlled rhythm that looked like he was fighting himself. When he finally spoke, the word was low and rough, meant for no one but the two brothers beside him.

"Do you feel that?"

Aaron’s answer was a tight nod. His eyes were still fixed on the omega who had prepared his bath only days earlier and now stood trembling and undone in front of half the kingdom’s packs.

Dexter’s voice was softest of all, almost wondering. "He’s ours."

The three of them felt it at the same moment, the unmistakable, impossible recognition that the Moon Goddess had not chosen any of the carefully presented candidates. She had chosen the collateral. The omega who was never supposed to be more than a living reminder of a blood debt..

Another angry Alpha’s voice tore the brothers away from their thoughts and back to reality.

"Throw him out!"

"He has ruined the night!"

"An omega who cannot even control himself has no place in this house—"

Levi’s legs finally gave out. He slid down the wall, one hand still pressed to his mouth, eyes wide and glassy with heat and terror. He could see the three princes standing now, could feel the weight of their attention like hands already on his skin. The rest of the room wanted him punished. The brothers looked at him as if the rest of the room had ceased to exist.

The Alpha’s voice cracked through the chaos again. "I said contain him!"

Kai stepped down from the dais first.

The visiting Alphas parted without thinking. Something in the eldest prince’s face left no room for argument. Aaron followed a breath later, then Dexter. The three of them crossed the hall in a straight, inevitable line toward the omega who had just set the entire ceremony on fire with his scent.

Levi could only stare up at them as they stopped in front of him. He had felt the same pull they did, and it did nothing to save him from the mess he had become. This was probably what his mother meant by being careful, and unfortunately for him he had been nothing but careless.