Page 4 of Ruined By His Alpha King
“I’m a beta! I will have a wife.” Seidrik’s chest heaved faster by the minute. In his eleven years of life, he’d never felt such fear.
“What if I asked King Alluin?” Menace glinted in his pretty blue eyes.
“No! Please don’t. Please.” Seidrik’s ears rang. “I’ll do anything!”
“Anything?” Stamel took a step closer.
“Please. Anything. I’ll get you vitalis! I’ll… I can get money.” Seidrik panted, ears ringing harder.
“Nah.” He chuckled and came so close to Seidrik, leaning down the few inches to match their height. “But I’ll stay quiet if you do me a favor.”
Seidrik whimpered.
“Practice kissing with me. I’ve never kissed anyone before.” Stamel turned his head, his mouth puckered oddly.
Seidrik didn’t know what to do but close his eyes and lean in, their lips touching. They held their lips there for a solid few seconds before pulling away, and heat seared Seidrik’s cheeks. He’d kissed an alpha… He was dirty… Seidrik’s mind spun with all the horrible things that could happen from omegas who kissed alphas. “I don’t want to get pregnant!”
Stamel snorted hard and laughed. “You don’t get pregnant from kissing, dummy. I think you have to sleep in the same bed and do weird stuff and make gross noises. That’s what my parents did alotbefore Lumic was born.”
Seidrik let a shaking breath free in relief. “Really?”
“Yup!” Stamel leaned in and pecked a quick kiss to his cheek. “I don’t like Virion. I like you. So, every time we see each other, you have to come practice kissing with me, okay? Then I won’t tell anyone.”
Seidrik nodded dumbly and sagged to the ground with a whimper as Stamel flew off. “I wish I could hide it forever.” Seidrik sobbed once, and Catpaw flew over, concern over his face.
“I could make it go away. I could make you hide it.” Mischief danced in the nymph’s monochrome eyes.
“Please.” Seidrik fell to his knees and sobbed once.
“Ask me my name. I’ll take them away as payment.” Catpaw’s soft fingers brushed his cheek, and the glamor of Seidrik’s wings and horns released. “If your horns are gone, you won’t need to let them out as much.”
An omega’s horns were sacred, but Seidrik did not want to be an omega. “W-what’s your name, your true name, Catpaw?”
Seidrik screamed as two harsh cracking sounds reverberated through his head. With a clatter, his horns fell to the grass in front of him. He sobbed as sharp stabs of pain racked his body, starting at his head and down his back, forcing his wings to rescind.
With a whisper as soft as a breeze and gentle as milkfluff, Catpaw whispered, “Honeythistle.”
And what a name it truly was. Honeythistle stopped an omega from conceiving and paired withnightflower, made their begging nights lessen. For some omegas, it came less often, and for others, it was far gentler.
Honeythistle flower, the omega’s preventative.
So fitting.
“I’ll take these as payment, and I’ll do with them what I please. But for now, since I have them, you can hide. See to it you’re not discovered at all costs, or else these are worthless.” Catpaw picked the horns up, waving them at Seidrik before he disappeared into the trees.
Seidrik never saw the nymph again.
Stamel
Fifteen years ago, Stamel recalled, thinking back to the moment he first discovered Seidrik’s secret.
Stamel vaguely recalled sitting in a tree outside the clearing, watching the secret omega, and the nymph brought him no pleasure as he bartered his antlers away for a name.
He stayed there for a long time, watching Seidrik leave in tears, watching the nymph gather the tines almost reverently.
“Nymph!” Stamel had heard the creature issue his name, and knowing a nymph’s true name was power. “Catpaw.”
But that was not it’s true name. In years gone by, the true name had gone from his memory. He’d given it back, given much.
