Chapter 7 - Return of the Claimed

The Silver-Bark Expanse reeked of storm-wet wood, but beneath the usual stew of moss and predator scat, I caught something sweeter. At first it was a bare tickle on the edge of memory, half-drowned by the stink of wet leaves. Then a burst of wind bent the trees and the scent punched me square in the snout: spiced clover, and that damnably persistent wildflower syrup. I hadn’t smelled her for weeks. I thought she’d run south for good.

No such luck.

I found her crouched at the edge of my den’s clearing, one trembling paw arranging a neat bundle of herbs like she was offering tribute to a god who might eat her for blinking wrong. The rabbit’s long ears quivered but stayed high, watching the entry tunnel. Her tail was still, a white dot of surrender.

I dropped from the branch above her, low and quiet as rot. She tensed but didn’t run. Not this time.

“Expecting something?” I rumbled, more bark than talk. My lips curled back from my teeth.

She flinched, but her voice held steady. “I brought you a gift.” She gestured to the bundle, fingers delicate, nails clean despite the dirt ground into her knuckles. “If you want to snap my neck, wait until you see what’s inside.”

I sniffed. Not just the clover stink now, but real stuff: arrowroot, feverblossom, wormseed. She’d been out gathering at dawn, risking every fox and crow in the forest to piece this together. The roots were still damp. The leaves, sorted and pressed flat, looked almost ceremonial.

“You trying to bribe me?” I said, circling closer, not even bothering to hide my tail’s twitch of amusement.

She shrugged, the motion dragging her neckline lower. “Some things worth trading for.”

“Like what?” I closed the gap, putting her under my shadow, staring straight down the line of her nose. Her heartbeat kicked into overdrive, a pulse visible just above the fur at her throat.

She didn’t answer. She dropped to her knees, so graceful it made my hackles stand. Then she bowed her head, ears laid back, hands open and flat on the moss. The pose was surrender, practiced, patient. No fight left.

I stalked around her, slow and deliberate, letting my claws drag on the stone. Her scent wound itself through my head and sent signals straight to my groin, hard and hungry.

“I tried to stay away,” she whispered, so faint I almost missed it. “But every night I dreamed of your knot locking inside me.”

For a second, I wanted to laugh. Instead, I shoved my nose into the crown of her skull, inhaled deep, and exhaled a wet growl into her ear. “You’re a dumb little prey. And a liar.” I gripped the back of her neck in one big hand and squeezed until her shoulders bunched under my palm. “Say it.”

“I want it,” she gasped, shuddering under my grip. “I want you to take me. Use me.”

Her voice broke, and she trembled with it, either fear, or the raw edge of anticipation. I didn’t care which.

I dragged her through the mouth of my den, boots scraping a smear in the moss. The floor was lined with skins: fox, hare, even a pelt or two from bigger game. She landed hard on her knees and I didn’t give her time to adjust before pushing her face-down. Her ears flattened to the side and her tail lifted on instinct.

I took her then and there, not even bothering to undress her, just yanking the soft tunic up to her hips and splitting it in the back to expose the line of her spine. The way she arched, the shiver in her calves, she was already soaked, leaking scent all over my forearm.

“Good girl,” I said, voice low and full of teeth. “Coming back for more.”

She moaned at the words, hips grinding against my thigh. I didn’t waste time on foreplay; she didn’t need it. My cock was out and hard, the tip already slick. I pressed it to her, not gentle, and let the head slip inside. She was as tight as I remembered, clamping down with a desperate, greedy rhythm that left little question why rabbits bred so quick.

She cried out on first entry, not in pain but shock, and scrabbled at the furs. “Fuck—oh, that’s—” She didn’t finish, because I rammed all the way in with one smooth thrust.

She shrieked and the noise echoed off the stone walls. Her cunt squeezed around me, milked me for every inch. The wet of her smeared down my thighs, clover and salt and something hotter underneath, and I dragged my nose along the curve of her neck just to taste the panic still threaded through her arousal.

“Name it,” I growled, thrusting again. “Name the thing you want.”

She gasped, and through her panting she managed, “Knot. I want the knot. Gods, please—”

I laughed, short and brutal. “You’re not ready yet.” I pulled out almost all the way, only the tip stretching her, then slammed home again. And again. Slow at first, each stroke deliberate enough to make her feel every ridge of me, then faster, the wet slap of my hips against her ass building into a rhythm she couldn’t escape. Her thighs shook. Her tail twitched against my belly with every drive. I watched the pink stretch of her around me, the way she gripped, the way she swallowed me back in like she was starving for it.

“Look at you,” I rasped, dragging two claws down the line of her spine. “Soaked through. Begging without a word. Pretty little prey thing, born to be split open on a wolf’s cock.”

She started babbling, and it took me a moment to realize she wasn’t just screaming. She was reciting names of the plants I’d hung to dry in the den.

“Aster, feverroot, wolf’s bane—fuck—amaranth, nightshade—oh—” She twitched, her thighs shaking so hard she could barely stay upright.

I was close. The knot was already swelling, but I held it back just to watch her break. I leaned in, teeth at the base of her ear, and snarled, “You’re gonna take all of it. You hear me?”

She nodded, jaw slack, drool starting to wet the pelt under her chin. “Please. I need—”

I bit her shoulder, hard enough to bruise but not break skin, and locked my hips to hers. The knot popped inside, stretching her impossibly wide. She screamed, really screamed, the noise half-pain, half the wildest fucking pleasure I’d ever heard, and I felt her come, pussy milking me so tight it hurt. I pumped thick seed into her and she took it all, body shuddering under the onslaught.

The pressure was incredible, the lock absolute. I held her there, one hand still gripping her neck, the other holding her ass flush against my belly. She whimpered and spasmed with every pulse.

When it finally slowed, I leaned down and licked the sweat off the curve of her ear. “That’s better,” I said, my voice thick with pride.

She laughed, weak and breathless. “You’re going to keep me here forever, aren’t you?”

I grinned, letting my fangs graze her skin. “Only if you keep bringing gifts.”

She twisted around as much as she could, cheeks flushed, eyes wide and glassy. “Next time I’ll bring double.”

“Good,” I rumbled, rolling my hips just enough to make her squeal again. “You’ll need the energy.”

We stayed like that, tied, until the moon rose. Her scent faded from fear to comfort, and the den felt more like home than it had in years. I wondered what it would be like to wake up with her there every night. I decided I’d find out.

Eventually, the knot shrank. She rolled over, wiped her mouth, and curled up against my chest.

I licked the blood off her shoulder and said, “You’re a weird little thing, you know that?”

She smiled up at me, eyes half-lidded. “Takes one to know one.”

I thought about the other prey out there in the forest, those who ran, those who hid, those who sometimes came back. And I wondered what they tasted like, after they learned how good it felt to be caught.

---

The rabbit girl made a decent housemate, if you liked the smell of carrot tops and whatever the hell “rampion” was. She swept out the den every morning and patched my old wounds with stinking poultices that stung for hours but worked twice as fast as scar moss. She was easy enough to keep happy, a couple rough fucks a week, a compliment on her fur, and she’d purr herself to sleep knotted around my cock. If I’d wanted to settle, I could’ve done worse.

But the woods were big, and prey never stopped coming.

Three days after the last full moon, a sound like deliberate stupidity cracked through the early dusk: the brittle snap of an over-tensed bow, amplified by a rustle of leaves and a curse shouted for effect. I caught the scent before the echo faded, oak oil, iron, and a sweat that burned with challenge.

Archer girl.

She sat forty feet up, straddling a white birch like it was the finish line of a race, legs swinging and boots muddy. Her bow hung from her thigh, more ornament than weapon, but the new quiver on her back gleamed with hand-turned arrows fletched in crimson and black. When she saw me looking, she smirked and popped a berry into her mouth, juice running down her chin. Show-off.

She snapped another twig, just to piss me off. “Come up here, mutt,” she called, voice sharp as a throwing knife. “Or are you scared of heights?”

I could’ve shinnied up in seconds, but I preferred the direct route. I leapt, clawed a nearby trunk, and bounded from limb to limb until I landed below her, paws sinking into a cushion of dead leaves. “You planning to make a nest, or is this a new method of surrender?”

She arched her back, balancing with her hands behind her. The pose exposed the long line of her throat, the perfect spot for a bite if she’d ever let me get that close. “I heard you took in a new girl. Thought I’d see if you still remembered my name.”

“I never learned your name,” I said, circling the tree and letting my claws scrape the bark for effect.

She laughed, low and mean. “Guess I’ll have to teach you again.” In one fluid motion she kicked off the branch, flipped, and landed beside me, bending her knees to absorb the shock. The movement knocked the quiver loose; she caught it, held it out like a peace offering.

“For you,” she said, shoving it at my chest. “Handmade. Barbed tips. You could kill a bear with these.”

“I prefer my teeth,” I said, taking the quiver anyway and testing the weight. It was perfect, better than any she’d offered before. “But thanks.”

She grinned, showing a gap in her front teeth. “Figured you’d say that. But I wanted an excuse to see you.”

“Could’ve just walked in,” I said. “No need for theatrics.”

“Oh, but then you wouldn’t chase me,” she said, eyes sparkling. “And what’s the point if there’s no hunt?”

She took off, tearing through the underbrush like she’d mapped every rabbit hole and game trail within ten miles. Her scent blazed a path even an idiot could follow. I waited, counted to twenty, then gave chase.

She was fast for a human, legs pumping and breath steady, but I was built for this shit. I let her think she was gaining ground, ducking branches and vaulting logs, until she doubled back and tried to lose me in the ferns. I pounced, caught her by the waist, and slammed her into the soft green moss.

She twisted, tried to elbow me, but I pinned her arms above her head and straddled her hips. Her chest heaved, sweat beading down her neck. “That all you got?” I growled, baring my teeth.

She spat at me, got my chin. “You wish.”

I kissed her hard, biting her lip until it bled. She groaned and arched against me, her hips bucking. I tore her leggings in half with one swipe, claws careful not to nick the skin. She wasn’t wearing anything under them; the scent hit me, pure sex and adrenaline.

I shoved her thighs apart and lined up, pressing my cock against her dripping cunt. She clenched, tried to twist away, but I grabbed her hair and forced her to look at me.

“Beg for it, hunter,” I snarled, grinding the tip inside her.

She bit my wrist, hard enough to bruise. “Fuck you,” she gasped, then moaned as I buried half the length with a savage thrust. “Shit—yes—”

I pounded her, each stroke shoving her further into the moss. Her fingers clawed at my fur, nails digging deep enough to draw blood. Her legs locked around my waist and she bucked to meet every thrust, desperate and unashamed. The moss tore up under her shoulders in green clumps. Her bow lay pinned beneath her hip, useless as a twig.

I flipped her without warning, dragged her up onto her hands and knees, and fisted her hair like reins. The new angle let me bury myself deeper, every drive punching a fresh sound out of her throat. Her tits swung with each impact. Her thighs were already shaking.

“Look at the great hunter,” I snarled, slapping the curve of her ass hard enough to leave a print. “Climbed a tree to find me. Ran so I’d catch her. Tell the truth, hunter. You came out here to get split open.”

“Shut up,” she gasped, then pushed back onto my cock so hard her teeth clicked. “Shut up and fuck me harder.”

I obliged. Long, punishing strokes that slapped wet against her ass, then short brutal ones that ground the front of her against my belly. I reached under, found her clit, and worked it rough between two fingers while I kept the pace murderous. She came around me with a strangled scream, cunt clenching in waves, and I didn’t slow for a second. I fucked her straight through it, until her arms gave out and her cheek smeared into the moss.

The pace went brutal, sweat and spit and the stink of arousal filling the air. She kept screaming, not caring who heard, every “more, harder, gods yes” ringing clear enough to scare off birds for a mile. I felt the knot starting to swell but held it back, drawing it out.

“You want it?” I barked, voice deep and guttural.

She nodded, wild-eyed, and reached back to grab my ass. “Do it. Fucking do it—”

I gripped her hair, yanked her head back, and slammed the knot inside, stretching her wide. She shrieked, her whole body going rigid as she came, hard, cunt spasming around me. I felt the pressure snap and flooded her, cum leaking out around the seal.

For a minute, neither of us moved. Then she rolled us so she was on top, still speared and locked, her palms flat against my chest.

She caught her breath, then spat another berry-stained glob at my nose. “Miss me, wolf?”

I licked her cheek and grinned, tail thumping the ground. “You’re the only one dumb enough to come back for seconds.”

She laughed, loud and raw. “Thirds, asshole. Get it right.”

When the knot finally let go, she slumped on top of me, shivering. I wrapped my arms around her, more to keep her from sliding off than anything tender.

After a while, she said, “You keeping that quiver?”

“I don’t take gifts from prey,” I said, but I slung it over my shoulder anyway. “But you can come back with more.”

She nipped my neck, drew blood, and muttered, “Next time, I’m bringing poison.”

I didn’t doubt her for a second. And I couldn’t fucking wait.

---

The Expanse had a cruel sense of humor. One day you’re chasing your own tail through a maze of stinging nettle, the next you’re dragging a half-bleeding doe back to a den that smells like a brothel in springtime.

I caught the new scents before I saw them: sharp, tangy, and layered with too much perfume. My nose wrinkled. Cats.

Sure enough, when I ducked into my den, there were two of them, barely more than boys, all sinew and muscle, with mismatched eyes and the kind of nervous energy that says “we broke something and now we’re praying you don’t notice.” They were arranging a pile of shiny junk in a perfect circle around my sleeping furs: glass beads, river shells, twisted rings, even a rusty spoon. Tribute, or a bribe. Or both.

The bolder one spotted me first. His ears perked, tail flicking like a snake. “Hey, big guy,” he said, voice too casual. “Didn’t think you’d be back so soon.”

I dropped the doe with a wet thud. “What are you doing in my den?”

The shyer one, smaller and all fluff, shrank behind the other’s shoulder. “We, uh, just—cleaning up. Wanted to make it nice for you.”

I stalked closer, bare feet silent on the moss. “You’re the ones from last spring. The ones who ran when I caught you raiding my traps.”

The bolder one grinned, baring canines. “Yeah. You caught us good.” He looked down at the sleeping furs, then back up. “We’ve been thinking about how you marked us. Claimed us.”

I circled, letting the silence stretch. Both of them watched me, pupils wide, not sure whether to bolt or beg. I made up my mind for them.

“Prep the kill,” I ordered, gesturing at the doe. “Show me you remember how.”

They scrambled to obey, claws flashing. The bolder one worked the skin off with quick, practiced motions; the shy one gathered stones and kindling for a fire, pausing to shoot me nervous glances. When the meat was set to roast, they sat at attention, tails curled tight around their ankles.

I let them stew for a bit, leaning against the wall and cleaning my claws. When the smell of cooked flesh filled the den, I pointed at the food. “Feed me.”

The bolder one grabbed a strip, knelt at my side, and offered it up like communion. I took it, letting my lips graze his fingers. He shivered.

The shy one watched, silent, eyes darting between the meat and my crotch.

I tore off a chunk, chewed, then wiped my mouth. “Is that all you wanted? To play house and serve scraps to a wolf?”

The bolder one shook his head. “We want you to take us again. Like before.” His gaze flicked downward, to the spot where my cock was already starting to harden. “But this time, all the way.”

The shy one squeaked, nodding.

I grinned, hunger spiking in my gut. “On your knees. Both of you.”

They dropped instantly, side by side, bodies pressed close. I unstrapped my leathers and let my cock free; the sight made the shy one gasp, then lick his lips.

“Who wants it first?” I taunted, stroking myself.

The bolder one leaned in, mouth open, tongue flicking the head before sucking it down in one smooth motion. The shy one watched, paw between his legs, grinding against his own palm.

“Greedy little thing,” I said, fisting the bolder one’s hair and driving deeper. He choked a little, then adjusted, taking me all the way to the knot. When I pulled out, strands of spit clung from his lips.

I turned to the shy one. “Your turn. Don’t be scared.”

He hesitated, but when I shoved the tip into his mouth he started sucking, eyes wide, purring low in his chest. He wasn’t as skilled, but the sensation was different, sweeter, more desperate.

I pulled them both up by the scruffs of their necks. “You want to please me? Show me how you fuck each other.”

The bolder one grinned, spun the shy one around, and mounted him right there on the furs. The shy one moaned, arching his back, tail high and trembling. The bolder catboy wasted no time, lining up and plunging in, their hips slapping together with a wet, needy rhythm.

I watched, stroking myself. Both of them kept glancing at me, as if waiting for permission to finish. I let them go until the bolder one was panting, claws dug into the shy one’s shoulders, both of them leaking and whimpering.

“Switch,” I commanded. They obeyed, the shy one now on top, riding the other with surprising confidence. The bolder one’s eyes glazed, mouth open as he yowled and begged for more.

I couldn’t wait any longer. I dragged the shy one off, bent him over, and shoved into him in a single savage thrust. He cried out, but it was pure pleasure, his whole body trembling as I fucked him hard, deep, relentless. His tail lashed against my ribs with every drive. His claws shredded furs under his palms. The bolder one crawled under us, licking at my balls, tongue wet and eager, and every time my hips snapped forward his chin caught the wet slap of skin on skin.

I pulled out of the shy one with a slick wet sound and shoved my cock straight into the bolder one’s waiting mouth. “Taste him,” I growled, fisting his hair. “Clean what you begged for.” He moaned around me, throat working, eyes rolling back, while the shy one knelt panting, rim still gaping pink and used.

Then I switched again. Bent the bolder one over the furs, lined up against his hole, and fed him my cock inch by deliberate inch just to watch him squirm. “You wanted it all, didn’t you, kitten? Then take it. Slow. Feel every fucking inch.” He yowled, claws raking the pelts, while the shy one knelt by his shoulder and licked the tears off his face.

I alternated between them, fucking one, then the other, sometimes both at once. One riding my cock while the other sucked on the swell of my knot. Switching places when I told them to. Their fur got matted with spit and sweat and my own cum, drool sliding down their chins, holes red and stretched and dripping. They purred, yowled, begged, each one desperate to outdo the other for the next thrust.

When I finally knotted the bolder one, he screamed, biting the furs as I filled him. The shy one licked at the place where we joined, tongue soft and worshipful, then nuzzled my chest, eyes bright with adoration.

We collapsed in a pile, tangled together, the den thick with the smell of sex and victory. The two catboys purred, rubbing against me, marking me as much as I’d marked them.

“You’re mine now,” I said, voice raw.

They nodded, eager and content, already thinking about next time.

I stretched, arms around my new pack, and wondered who else would come crawling into my den before spring.

---

News travels fast in the Expanse, even when you kill all the messengers. By the next moon, my den had become the world’s worst-kept secret, a magnet for every beast, outcast, and sex-crazed wanderer who’d ever tasted my teeth.

The rabbit girl stayed on as the den’s unofficial medic, brewing salves that actually worked and occasionally dosing the catboys with “herbal supplements” that turned them from lazy sloths to vibrating furniture. The archer set herself up as lookout, perching in the highest branches and calling out the approach of strangers with a coyote’s bark. The twins, after a week of pissing contests and bite marks, took to cleaning, sharpening blades, and sleeping curled up together at my feet like a pair of overgrown kittens.

It was chaos. It was loud. It was home.

One night, after the archer declared the territory clear and the rabbit had finished bandaging the twins’ latest “play fight,” I called a meeting. A proper pack needed rules, and it needed to be reminded, often, who the top dog was.

They gathered around the fire pit, a shallow bowl lined with the skulls of lesser prey, flames licking the cold air. I stood above them, arms crossed, tail high, eyes glowing gold in the firelight.

“Listen up,” I said, voice loud enough to rattle the hollow logs. “You all came here for a reason. You want to belong? You want to be more than just prey? Then prove it.”

They looked at each other, then at me. The rabbit swallowed, the archer smirked, and the twins nodded in unison.

“Tonight,” I said, “we celebrate. Tomorrow, we hunt as one.”

The archer raised a hand. “What about tonight?”

I grinned, letting the tension snap. “Tonight, you show me who you are. Who you belong to.”

They didn’t need more direction. The archer lunged for me first, teeth bared, hands clawing at my chest. I grabbed her by the waist and tossed her onto the sleeping furs, pinning her down. The rabbit was next, crawling between my legs, mouth already open and eager. The twins flanked me, one nuzzling my neck, the other working fingers into my hair.

It turned into a pile-up of legs and arms and tails, but I made them work for it one at a time. A pack needed order, and order started with knowing whose turn it was on the alpha’s cock.

I took the archer first, because she fought hardest. Pinned her to the furs with one hand around her throat and fucked her in slow, grinding strokes that made her snarl and curse. She slapped my jaw. I bit her tit hard enough to leave teeth marks around the nipple. “Harder,” she rasped, voice already shredded. I gave it to her in short brutal jabs, balls slapping her ass, until her eyes rolled and she came with a shout, cunt clamping me so tight my knot started to swell early. I yanked out before it could lock and watched her come dribble down the inside of her thigh while she cursed me for stopping.

The rabbit crawled up next, already on her knees, mouth open, ears trembling. I shoved her face down into the archer’s sweat-slick belly and mounted her from behind. Three thrusts in she was babbling plant names again. “Goldenrod. Nightshade. Dandelion. Oh gods, oh gods.” I fucked her in the long deliberate strokes she liked, watched her tail twitch, watched her little hands fist in the archer’s hair while the archer ate her out from below. When my knot pushed at her rim I forced it slow, inch by stretching inch, and her scream cracked into a sob of pure thanks.

I knotted her until she went boneless, then pulled free wet and dripping and turned to the twins. They were already tangled together, the bolder one fucking the shy one against the wall, both of them watching me over their shoulders, waiting for their turn at the alpha. I pulled the bolder one off, bent him over the rabbit’s back, and pushed in to the hilt in one stroke. The shy one whimpered and crawled to my feet, tongue out, begging without words.

“Patience, kitten,” I growled, dragging him up by the scruff. “You’ll get fed.”

The firelight cast everything in red and gold. The scent of sex and sweat choked the air. The archer pulled the shy one into her lap and made him suck her tits while I fucked his brother. Every wet slap of skin echoed off the stone. Every moan stacked on the last until the den itself sounded like it was breathing.

When the bolder twin finally went limp around me, twitching and leaking, I pulled out and dropped onto my back across the furs. “All of you,” I growled, slapping my own thigh. “At once. Show me you can share.”

They moved before I finished the sentence.

The archer climbed on first, knees bracketing my hips, sinking down onto my cock in one greedy slide that punched a hiss out of both of us. She rolled her hips, slow, watching my face for the moment I broke. The rabbit clambered up my chest and planted her thighs around my jaw, dripping cunt pressed to my mouth, ears trembling against the stone above. I licked into her until clover and salt smeared across my chin and her hands fisted in the archer’s hair for balance. The bolder twin shoved two fingers between my lips alongside the rabbit’s wet, then pulled them out and fed them to his brother. The shy twin straddled my thigh and rutted against it like he couldn’t help himself, tail wrapping my calf, mewling every time the archer’s motion jarred me deeper.

I lost track of who was making which noise. The archer’s short sharp grunts as she rode me. The rabbit’s breathy plant-litany above, “lavender, valerian, oh fuck, marshroot,” her thighs trembling around my ears. The bolder twin purring filth into the shy one’s mouth, “taste him, taste what he tastes like, look how wet you are for the alpha.” The wet slap of skin everywhere, layered, overlapping, building into one long obscene rhythm that filled the den from floor to ceiling.

I let the rabbit come first, because she was loudest. She seized up against my mouth, thighs locking around my skull, and I drank her down while she chanted nightshade and goldenrod into the rafters. She slid sideways into the shy twin’s lap, boneless, and he licked her own slick off her chin like he’d been waiting his whole life for permission.

That was when I rolled.

I caught the archer by the hips and flipped her under me without unseating my cock, pinned her wrists over her head, and finally let the knot start to swell. Her eyes went wide. Her mouth fell open. She’d watched me knot the rabbit and the twin, but she hadn’t taken it yet, not in this den, not as one of mine.

“You wanted to know if I remembered your name,” I snarled, hips driving slow and deep. “You don’t have one yet. Tonight you earn it.”

“Then fucking give it to me,” she spat, baring her teeth.

I obliged. Three more brutal strokes, each one slower than the last, each one stretching her wider. The other three pressed in around us. The rabbit on her knees by the archer’s shoulder, stroking sweat-damp hair off her forehead. The bolder twin at my hip, mouth on the bite-scar he’d left on my ribs the week before, sucking it back to a bruise. The shy twin behind me, tongue dragging up my spine, paws kneading the meat of my ass like he was urging me deeper.

The knot popped past her rim and locked. The archer screamed, a real scream, the sound stripped of every smart-ass edge she’d ever thrown at me, and I bit down on the side of her throat hard enough to break skin. Blood beaded under my teeth. She came around me in clenching waves, cunt milking the knot so violently I saw white at the corners of my vision, and I finally, finally let go.

I pumped into her until she overflowed, until cum slicked the inside of her thighs and pooled where we joined. The rabbit dipped two fingers in and brought them to her own mouth, eyes never leaving mine. The shy twin licked the bite on the archer’s throat clean, purring. The bolder twin pressed his forehead to my shoulder and whined, soft and worshipful, like a kit asking to be claimed too.

I took the bolder twin’s hair in my free hand and dragged him up to my mouth. “Tomorrow,” I growled against his lips, the knot still locked tight in the archer, the rabbit still licking my fingers, the shy one still humming against my back. “Tomorrow you all wear my mark. Every one of you.”

He nodded, eyes glazing, and kissed me like a promise.

We stayed locked for a long time. The archer’s breathing slowed under me. The pack settled in around us, limbs tangling, tails draping, every one of them touching me somewhere. Even tied and spent, I felt the next round building already, low and patient in my gut.

By the time the knot finally released, the fire had died and so had all resistance. They lay in a heap, sticky and sated, fur and skin decorated with bite marks and bruises and the slow drip of my claim. I rolled out from under them and stood watch at the mouth of the den, chest heaving, the first sunlight washing everything clean.

I looked back at my pack, my prey, my lovers, my fucking miracle, and I knew I’d never let anyone take this from me.

Not the Expanse. Not the gods. Not even time.