The pain is white-hot, sharp and immediate—like being pierced by twin daggers of ice and fire. I cry out, my body going rigid, light magic exploding outward in a burst of golden energy that makes the shadows in the room recoil before surging back with renewed hunger.
But the pain transforms. In a heartbeat, it becomes pleasure so intense I can't breathe, can't think, can only feel. His fangs are buried deep in my scent gland, and I can feel him—feel his mouth working against my throat, feel the pull as he begins to drink.
He's drinking my blood.
The sensation is intimate beyond anything I could have imagined. Each pull of his mouth sends waves of pleasure radiating through my entire body. I keen, a high desperate sound, as something fundamental shifts inside me. The incomplete bond that's been pulling at us both, making us both half-mad with need, suddenly snaps into place.
Complete.
Whole.
Perfect.
The bond floods fully open between us like a dam breaking—no barriers, no walls, no potion-dampened edges. Just pure, absolute connection. I feel everything he feels as he drinks from me: his possessive love, his desperate relief, his overwhelming satisfaction at finally claiming his mate, the taste of my blood on his tongue—sweet and bright and perfect, made for him.
And he feels me—my surrender, my acceptance, my own feelings that I've been denying for weeks, the pleasure-pain of his bite, the fullness of his knot, the rightness of this moment.
He drinks deeper, his growl vibrating against my throat. His knot swells impossibly larger inside me, triggered by the completed bond, and I scream as another orgasm crashes through me—harder, more intense than any before it. This is what I was missing, what I needed. This completion.
Through the bond, I feel his own release trigger in response to mine, his knot pulsing as he spills inside me again, still drinking, still claiming, marking me inside and out.
He drinks until I'm dizzy, until I'm trembling in his arms, until I'm purring with such deep satisfaction I feel drunk on it.
Makalai finally releases my throat, his tongue laving over the wound to seal it with his saliva, a final claim. I'm trembling, overwhelmed, tears streaming down my face as wave after wave of pleasure-pain-completion washes through me.
"Mine," he murmurs against my throat, his voice raw with satisfaction. "Forever mine."
"Yours," I breathe, unable to deny it any longer. "Yours."
We stay locked together for long minutes, his knot still pulsing inside me, the bond between us singing with contentment. His hands stroke soothingly over my skin, gentling me as I come down from the intensity of the claiming.
Through our completed bond, I feel his satisfaction—but also his awareness, his Alpha instincts recognizing what's coming. "It won't be long now," he murmurs against my hair, his voice a mix of satisfaction and possessive anticipation. "The bite will trigger it fully. Your heat will break soon, beautiful one."
Before I can process his words, before I can feel fear or relief or anything coherent, something shifts.
A wave of heat rolls through my body—different from the arousal I've been feeling. Deeper. More primal. My skin suddenly feels too tight, hypersensitive to every touch. My core clenches around his knot with renewed hunger that borders on painful, and fresh slick floods from me in a rush that makes me gasp.
"Malakai," I whimper, confusion and alarm flooding through our bond. "Something's... something's wrong..."
His eyes snap to mine, pupils blown wide. His nostrils flare as he scents the change in me—the shift from satisfied Omega to something desperate and needy. Through our bond I feel his Alpha responding with fierce, dark satisfaction.
"Not wrong," he murmurs, his voice dropping to that commanding rumble that makes my Omega keen with need. "Your heat, beautiful one. The bite triggered it, just as it was meant to."
Horror and desperation war inside me as another wave hits, stronger this time. The room suddenly feels stifling. My body is demanding more—more touch, more of him, more everything. The slick coating my thighs feels excessive, obscene, my body preparing for what it knows is coming.
"No," I gasp, even as my hips roll against him involuntarily, seeking friction, seeking relief. "I can't— it's too much?—"
"Shh," he soothes, but his scent is flooding with Alpha pheromones, thick and intoxicating, responding to my distress with possessive hunger. "I've got you. I'll take care of you. This is what your body needs—what we both need."
His knot begins to soften inside me, and I make a sound of protest as he withdraws. The loss feels catastrophic, like losing a vital part of myself.
"Three days, Omega," he says, gathering me into his arms with shocking gentleness. "Your first real heat in nine years. After nine years of suppressants, your body is going to demand everything it's been denied."
The reality crashes over me with the next wave of heat. Three days. Trapped in this overwhelming need.
"I don't— I can't—" I'm shaking now, fever building under my skin, making me feel delirious.
"You can," he assures me, standing with me cradled against his chest. "And you will. Because I'm going to spend every moment of the next three days taking care of my Omega. Knotting you. Filling you. Making sure you never doubt who you belong to."
