Chapter 32: The Mark of an Alpha

The air was electric, the spinning firelight casting shadows on the features of those about him. Ben's muscles were coiled, his body still bruised from what had happened this morning, but all of that was meaningless in the face of the storm brewing in his chest. His skin prickled where the bond mark was, the same mark that had bound him to Jack so many three years so many years ago. It was shifting now.

No, it was fading away.

"Stop it," Max gasped, fingers knotted and clamped on Ben's wrist as he stared at the mark in moonlight. There was a flicker of unguessed thing in his green eyes, a wary wariness.

Ben struggled to fill his lungs with air, but it wasn't simple. His body was full of power—old thing welling up through his marrow. He didn't feel right. Wrong.

Or maybe, at last, right.

"What is the matter with me?" Ben growled. "This—this isn't natural."

Max released a breath, his fist still clenched. "Because you weren't supposed to be an omega."

Ben's stomach dropped. The words pounded in his head, shattering like shards of glass.

He recoiled, his head shaking. "What the hell is that even saying, even supposed to be saying?"

Cyrus and Kieran, who had remained silent up until then, both looked at him. Neither of them had an expression.

Max breathed bitterly. "What it means," he started slowly, "is that the bond Jack put on you wasn't just unnatural—it was wrong. It took something from deep inside you. Something more."

Ben's heart was pounding. He couldn't be hearing what Max was saying. He looked down at his wrist, at the colored lines of ink there which had bound him to Jack all those years. The colored wounds were distorting, blowing up like parched earth, pieces of them crumbling off.

"What are you saying?" Ben panted.

His gaze locked on his, his face set sternly cold. "I'm telling you, you were never meant to be an omega, Ben. You're an alpha."

The world whirled round and round.

Ben sprang from his chair, gasping in and out. "No. No, that isn't—" He stepped backward, nearly over the log at his side on the floor. His vision clouding for a second as the drumming in his heart shouted through his ears.

This simply could not have happened. Not to Joshua, not to him.

"Don't lie and tell me I did," Ben snarled, fists clenched at his belt. "I felt the bond. I felt everything. Omegas can't—just fall to alpha!"

Max sat back from his own chair, movement smooth, guarded. "You were never yielded," he told Ben in careful words. "You were born so. But some—so changed you.".

Ben's focus was broken by a cold, humorless laugh. "That's ridiculous." But no sooner said than his body had betrayed him. His senses sprang to life, fine-tuning themselves to the rustle of leaves in the distance, the thudding, heavy beats of the hearts of everyone around him. The wind brought smells he'd never experienced before—Max's, earthy and colossal; Cyrus's, with a bite; Kieran's, with an old blood flavor.

And then his own.

Not an omega's scent. No more.

"No," Ben shuddered, gasping. His palms seared, his skin writhing as his claws strained to come out. He clenched his jaws together, forcing the sensation back. "No, that won't do. Why—why would Jack—?"

"Because an omega is easier to defeat than an alpha," Cyrus growled. "And Jack? He needed you at his mercy."

Ben flinched. He wanted to protest, scream at it, but way deep inside his heart he knew better. Jack had always dominated him—physically, mentally, chemically. The way his body obeyed commands, the way his instincts rolled over at Jack's appearance—it had never been the natural way.

It had been engineered.

Max edged closer, moving slowly. "Ben," he whispered, "your body's healing. That scar?" He nodded toward the wrist. "It's disappearing. The repression's receding. And when it does." He trailed off, his eyes wandering.

Ben swallowed. "Then what?"

No one answered.

A dull stabbing pain tore the back out of Ben and he gasped. He doubled over, putting his hands on his knees as his breath came heaving out of him. His bones ached as if they were reforming, something tearing loose.

A stayhand kept him upright—Max.

"Breathe," Max gasped.

Ben sucked air in through clenched lips. His body was slick with sweat, shaking all over. This wasn't right. This wasn't—

A branch broke in the woods.

Not his.

Ben's head snapped up, every sense alert. Instinct had been so highly developed through training that he felt the movement before he could actually see it. A shadow movement among the trees. An alien heartbeat.

They were not alone.

"Shit," Cyrus cursed, scrambling for his gun.

Ben's reflexes kicked in. He didn't even know he was doing it; he just pulled Max to the side of him as a bullet flew past his head where he was standing.

A shot.

Another.

"MOVE!" Kieran yelled.

The camp descended into chaos.

Ben's vision was blurring as his body moved faster than it ever had before—side-steps, dodges, dodges to the side of the fire behind him. His heart pounded in his head, his gasping, wheezing breath torn from his chest as the adrenaline struck him.

He didn't think. He felt.

And his reflexes were screaming one thing—

Fight.

A figure sprang out at him from the side, but before he could attack, Ben moved. His body turned in a spin, claws glinting as he sliced his knife in a liquid crescent through the man's chest. Blood erupted, and the man let out a strangulated gasp before he hit the ground.

Silence.

Ben's hands shook. He was breathing rough gasps, staring down at the blood seeping from his fingers. He'd acted on reflex.

Like an alpha.

The clearing echoed with the slow, reverent sound of applause.

Ben snapped his head up.

A man stepped out of the trees, his smile twisted and sympathetic. "Well, well," he drawled. "Look at you."

Ben's stomach tightened.

He knew that voice.

Well-dressed, slicked-back hair, blazing silver eyes walked into the light of the fire, his clothes immaculate for having stood in the midst of the carnage at his feet.

"Gabriel," Max growled, jaws clenched.

Ben's blood ran cold.

Gabriel smiled, his eyes fixed on Ben's as if with ravenous hunger, not unlike a predator looking at prey. "I waited until you woke up," he languidly drawled. "And now that you do?"

His silver eyes flared.

"It's time to go home."