Page 37 of Forbidden

“But your lack of heat symptoms is concerning,” she said, frowning. “We’ll need to run more tests. And then I’ll do an ultrasound.”

Half an hour later, Lucien was seated opposite his doctor, a knot of anxiety in his stomach.

She looked unusually grim as she looked at his bloodwork. “That’s what I’ve been afraid of,” she said with a sigh. “Your body is not producing the hormones it should. A Dainiri omega’s body is supposed to constantly produce eggs, which are released by the ovaries during your heat—and sometimes outside of your heat, though it’s rare. But you do not have an egg to release right now. That’s why your body is not reacting to the full moon as it should.”

“What does it mean?” Lucien said quietly.

She frowned. “It means you have an anovulatory cycle. It’s quite normal in female betas of your age, but not for omegas. Usually... usually omegas start getting anovulatory cycles right before the end of their fertile years.”

Lucien felt like he had been punched in his stomach. “But... But I’m only thirty-five.”

“Yes. You should have still been at the peak of your fertility,” she said. “Normally, Dainiri omegas start getting anovulatory cycles after the age of forty-five, sometimes fifty. But your case is unique. You have been on very strong suppressants for two decades. You haven’t experienced a natural heat in ages. It was inevitable that such abuse of suppressants would affect your fertility. I have warned you about it, Lucien.”

She had, a decade ago.And he’d brushed her concerns off. It had seemed irrelevant back then. It had seemed like a good thing. Why would he worry about the early loss of his heats?

And now...

Lucien wet his lips with his tongue. “How long do I have until the end of my fertile years?”

She shook her head. “It’s impossible to say. This might be just an odd anovulatory cycle or you might never get another heat again. We’ll have to wait and see.” She pursed her lips and seemed to hesitate. Her voice was soft when she spoke again. “Even if your heats return, I have to warn you that it’s unlikely you’ll be able to get pregnant or carry to term. The suppressants have altered your reproductive system too much.”

Lucien barely remembered thanking the doctor and saying goodbye to her.He barely remembered how he got home, his mind buzzing with a single thought he couldn’t let go of.

His body was defective. Ruined irrevocably. His body wasn’t good at the very thing omegas were supposed to be good for.

He was defective.

Lucien sat down on his bed and stared at the opposite wall unseeingly.

He was defective.

He’d always known that, but having it actually confirmed was...

The knock on his door barely made him react. It couldn’t be Aksel, because Aksel wouldn’t knock. It was a good thing it wasn’t Aksel or he would burst into tears and cling to him like a baby, wanting to be comforted. Aksel couldn’t comfort him, not about this. Not when he was part of the reason why he felt like this.That baby with Aksel’s eyes that he had imagined? It would never exist.

It would never exist.

“It’s rather rude not to open your door when someone is knocking,” a familiar voice said sharply.

Lucien turned his head and found himself looking at Vagrippa.

In other circumstances, he would have felt worried and annoyed by her uninvited presence in his room. Now he felt nothing. He couldn’t summon any feeling.

“We need to talk,” she said.

“I don’t feel like talking,” Lucien said tonelessly.

Vagrippa fixed him with an unimpressed stare. “You will put an end to it. Immediately.”

Lucien stared at her blankly, and finally, felt a twinge of concern. Surely she must have been talking about something else, not his relationship with Aksel. Surely she didn’t know?

But what little hope he had disappeared when she spoke again. “Aksel has enough trouble being accepted in society as it is. I didn’t think you so thoughtless. So senseless and selfish.”

Lucien swallowed. “Vagrippa—”

The glare she pinned him with made him feel fourteen all over again.

“You ungrateful, selfish boy,” she hissed. “We accepted you into our family when you had nothing, when even your pack turned their back on you. We gave you the protection of our name and our home, and that’s what you repay us with? By seducing my youngest son?” Her face scrunched in disgust. “Don’t you have any shame? I don’t want to imagine when this sordid relationship even started—”

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