Page 154 of Fated or Knot

He ate them just like that, bones and all. I sat on the other side of the fire and did the same thing. Simmering with my monstrous form just below the surface was good for one thing, at least. The fangs were very helpful for tearing into this kind of dinner.

I sat on a stone, shirtless, venting so hard I created a humid furnace around me. The evening was a little chill, but signs of spring were all around us. The snow was all but gone, flowers bloomed, and insects sang outside the radius of our campsite at the top of a rocky hill. Our horses cropped the grass nearby. I watched the stars blink into being above us and wondered where Lark was, what she was doing. It’d barely been a day, and I already missed her so much my heart ached.

No, in a way, it’d been longer. I’d thrown myself back into my duties after realizing my self-control was worse than ever after we’d joined. It didn’t make sense. I shouldn’t feel fire igniting in my chest in a slow burn of heat just from taking a breath of her sweet chocolate and honey crackers scent. All my rage was good for was destruction—she deserved better than that.

“So,” Dad said, breaking into my thoughts. I stopped glaring at my half-eaten dinner to take another bite and looked at him through the ripple of heat and smoke over our campfire. “You finally had sex. I heard you had some difficulties.”

I swallowed wrong and considered letting the mouthful block my throat. Better for the stars to have me than to answer my dad’s unspoken question. He never actually asked questions. With his size, strength, and station, his every whim was answered without having to ask for anything.

“Ach. Don’t choke, boy,” he grumbled.

I coughed painfully and glanced away, my face and body turning a uniform red. But then I thought about what he’d actually said. My eyes vibrated before flames replaced my pupils and my chest expanded with muscle and heat.

“Who told you? Fal?” I asked with growling menace. Tongues of fire escaped my mouth.

It had to be Fal. He’d suddenly decided thatcommunicationwas vital to making Lark happy going forward. He wasn’t wrong, but the way he went about almost every kneejerk decision he had ended with one or all of the rest of the pack pissed off at him.

“Aye. Don’t worry. He didn’t give details,” Dad said. He fixed a commanding stare across the fire at me to supply said details.

I breathed plumes of smoke as I struggled with what to say next. Only when I was a little cooled down did I say, “You’ve always told me there are four ways to control the rage form.”

He nodded and listed them, as he always did. “Venting, to a degree. There’s also a good fight, the feeling of taking a life, and sex, preferably with your mate. In an emergency, a mate can also extinguish the rage, but it’s not worth the risk to a one and only.”

I felt the bite of ice on my skin from dread, and my anger cooled as I nodded in agreement. My li’l bird had had to call me back to my senses on the train before she’d even known what I was.Shameful, putting her into danger like that.

“I heard Lark had to do that for you,” he said, echoing my thoughts. I nodded again reluctantly. “For her, as your fated mate, it works the other way. She can extinguish the rage, or she can set it free even if you are perfectly calm.”

“I know,” I mumbled. Nothing else explained why I unleashed myself on her in her bedroom.

He breathed a heavy sigh. It was a sign I knew well. As his son, I wasn’t quite as intimidated by him to prattle off anything he wanted to know. Sometimes he had to ask questions. “Did you finish?” he asked briskly.

I bristled. “Aye.”

“Did you have perfect control of the rage?”

I hesitated, which was answer enough for him.

“So, you didn’t knot her, then.” It was a statement of fact.

“I was hurting her,” I answered more quietly.

“Ach. Tell me why you think that.”

Well, she had reassured me that it’d been good for her, but… “She clawed at me,” I said.

Dad’s lips pressed together. I kept talking, sure to lose my nerve if I didn’t. “And she was moving around, not holding still. And, um, the noises she made. There was a lot of them, and they sounded pained.”

He closed his eyes, shoulders shaking. Stars, he waslaughing.

“Dad!” I protested.

He rubbed a hand down his face. “Did she tell you to stop? Or make noises of obvious pain, like whimpering or keening?”

“Well…nay.”

“I’ve been remiss, apparently, by not telling you omegas areloud,” he deadpanned.

He told me what I’d done wrong and how to fix it. I could’ve wilted from relief as I listened intently and asked a few questions. I wasn’t broken, and Lark was still the solution to my rage. In all this time, I hadn’t realized how the way my monstrous form grew to full size matched the mounting pressure of sex.

---