Page 140 of Promised to the Alpha Prince

“Right,” I said, sitting up to look at him. “You still haven’t explained that. How did that even happen?”

“It can happen to anyone,” said Corentin. “We all—every single person—have the latent gene that would trip us over into having a designation. But it needs to be triggered by the right combination of pheromones and stimuli. Usually, for you royals, that happens when you scent someone else with a designation at one of your big, royal get-togethers or whatever. For the rest of us, it’s more complicated, usually. We’re not running around mingling with a bunch of different alphas and omegas.”

This was similar to that theory that Rohan had, wasn’t it? I blinked at him. “Every single person?”

He nodded.

“Then explain why only a portion of royals present,” I said. “Most don’t.”

“It’s a complicated pattern of pheromones and stimuli to trigger it,” he said. “It happened by chance for both of you. For me, it was a long and painful process. It took months, and I had to be in a state of constant arousal, achieved by pumping me full of Viagra, and then being exposed to various combinations of alpha scents. I tried just smelling them, and when that didn’t work, we went to the more aggressive techniques, which included, uh, having things injected directly into the shaft of my dick. It took a while, but eventually, I got my knot.”

Dmitri looked at me, eyes wide.

I didn’t know what to say.

Dmitri turned back to Corentin. “You brute-forced this on yourself?”

“Well, most people who try it give up way before they get to levels of it that I did,” he said. “But… I mean… for Aurelie…”

“And?” I said. “Do you like being an alpha?”

“I mean? First time I got kicked into a rut, I regretted it,” he said, with a shrug. “I tried to get to her, but I was on the other side of the world, down at the tip of the Arenze peninsula, with a bunch of mob guys surrounding me. It wasn’t exactly pleasant, and it lasted a while. The other alpha who’d triggered it finally showed up to give me some relief. He knotted me right out of it, but… fuck.”

“Alphas don’t trigger ruts in other alphas,” said Dmitri. “Whatever you were in, it wasn’t a rut.”

“Well, my knot wouldn’t go down no matter what I did,” said Corentin. “I fully own that whenever Aurelie goes into heat, it’ll be different.”

“Right, when she goes into heat,” said Dmitri softly.

“Look,” I said, “I don’t buy that every single person has the designation gene. You did, I guess, Corentin, just like that commoner omega in Angleford or like Nikolai. It’s not limited to royal bloodlines, clearly, but I don’t think everyone has it.”

“There’s nothing different about you guys that they can isolate, though,” said Corentin. “Admittedly, the science isn’t great. The contraption they used on me looked like it had been the same thing they’d been using since 1843, so maybe if there was more funding, some proper studies into this, maybe then we’d know more.”

“No royals are ever going to agree to that,” I said.

“Right, because the last thing you guys want to find out is that you’re not special,” said Corentin with a little laugh.

I furrowed my brow, thinking about it.

“I don’t want to be special,” said Dmitri. “If I’m not special, doesn’t that mean I get to resign from being the heir to the Valhn throne and I don’t have to spend the rest of my life cutting ribbons at new buildings for various charities and I don’t have the paparazzi following me everywhere I go?”

“Sure, sure,” said Corentin. “You don’t want to be special.”

“I don’t,” said Dmitri. “I’d give all this up in a heartbeat.”

“I wouldn’t,” I said. “I would never have met Nikolai otherwise, or Aurelie, or you, Dmitri. And Corentin, do you hate me, too?”

“Nah,” said Corentin. “I don’t know enough about you to hate you.”

“You wouldn’t give that up, would you, Dmitri?” I said.

He sighed heavily. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? You’d give up Aurelie?”

“Aurelie is amazing, and we have a fucking life bond, and there’s no getting out of that, so it’s an entirely hypothetical situation,” said Dmitri. “But if you’re asking me if I would rather have a woman who’s mine, all mine, and I don’t have to share her with other men because I’m not enough to satisfy her? If you’re asking me if I could stop being so pathologically dominant every second of every day? I mean, don’t ask me that, Johannes.”

“Look,” I said, “there’s a certain amount of downsides to being in this polyamorous pack, no lie. But the advantages clearly outweigh the disadvantages. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

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