Star-Crossed Lovers

            We were spending the better part of a week with the pack, visiting and celebrating.  Heechul and Siwon would not marry until the following year.  It was customary for important people, like the sons and daughters of pack leaders, to be engaged a long time before they mated.  Someone like myself wouldn’t even require a ceremony to celebrate my mating with someone.  I could just mark them and that would be it.  It seemed simpler than all the fuss my cousin was going through, but it was the way of things in the world of wolves. 

            A couple days after our arrival, there was a very long, tedious meeting to discuss what each party would give to the couple and each other, for the mating agreement.  These meetings usually ended up being more of a heated debate, on both ends, so I opted to skip it and explore the territory around the den a little instead.  It was early summer—not too hot out yet, although everything was in bloom—and I decided to walk south along the river, so I wouldn’t get lost.  I’d only been to the pack a handful of times and couldn’t trust myself not to get turned around.

            I found a spot on the bank, far away from the den, and tossed off my shoes and socks, sitting down and sticking my feet in the cool water.  After a little while, the frogs and fish seemed not to notice my feet and began to swim past me again.  I zoned out for a stretch, just thinking about my pack and my own future, which would not end up being the same as my cousins, no matter who raised me.  I was privileged enough to be one of the alpha guards in the pack and ranked high, partly because of my birth, partly due to my abilities.  I was fast and had a high endurance, unlike many of the older alphas, so they often utilized me during hunts to take down prey first or to respond to calls quickly.  Even when my uncle passed, my rank would stand, but it did not give me much recognition outside of the pack itself.  To everyone else, I was still a nobody, just as Ryeowook had said.  They were only a little nicer to me because I was related to Sooman.

            Across the field from me, I noticed a couple deer wander out into the tall grass to eat.  They were lucky that I wasn’t out hunting or they’d be dead.  They weren’t even aware that I was sitting in view of them.  In wolf form, they wouldn’t see me stalking them at all.  I would have been tempted to try for them anyway, were I home, but hunting on another pack’s land without permission is forbidden.  You can get killed for that, although they probably wouldn’t attack a guest.  Still, my uncle would give me hell for it later.  And I wouldn’t get to keep the meat, so why bother?

            The two deer raised their heads just as I caught a scent that I recognized upwind.  Ryeowook.  The deer knew a wolf when they smelled it, even in human form, and bolted for the tree line.  I looked north, but the trees were dense and I couldn’t see him.  I remained sitting on the bank, not entirely sure if he knew I was there or if he was accidentally stumbling upon me.  Several minutes later, I heard rustling in the grass behind me.  My heart raced and I fought the urge to turn around to look at him.  A moment later, Ryeowook sat down beside me on the bank, sticking his feet into the water.

            We sat in silence for a minute and I debated if I was still mad at him.  The omegas in his pack stayed covered up from neck to ankle, most of the time, whether summer or winter, but Ryeowook had clearly shed some of his clothes since leaving the den.  He wore silky maroon pants and an off-white, sleeveless silk shirt.  He rolled his pants up to his knees as he sat beside me on the bank, trying to keep them dry.  I couldn’t help but watch.  His legs were toned and oddly tan, for how rarely he was allowed to show skin.  He must sneak out of the den on a regular basis.

            “I must not smell as bad today if you’re sitting with me.”

            Ryeowook looked over at me, brows furrowed.  “No one is watching us now.  I can sit as close as I want.”

            Is that how it worked?  His words made me feel relieved.  Was everything he said yesterday just because the others were watching and listening to us, or was there some truth to it? 

            I narrowed my eyes at him.  “You wouldn’t really kill yourself if you were forced to mate with me, would you?”

            Ryeowook scoffed at this.  “No!”

            I couldn’t help myself.  I smiled.  And it was probably the stupidest looking smile I’d ever smiled in my life.  Thank God he wasn’t looking and was still working on his pants.

            “But I’d probably kill you if you kept being an .”

            “You?  An omega?  How would you manage that?” I asked, still grinning like an idiot.

            “Poison.”

            His answer was so quick and decisive, I was a little worried that he meant it and my smile faded.  Perhaps he wasn’t quite as fond of me as I was of him, after all.  “Did you go to the negotiations?”

            He nodded, dropping his legs further into the water.  “They’re still in the middle of it, but I was getting a headache, so I snuck out.”

            “Kind of kills the romance a little, fighting over who gets what,” I pointed out.  “I won’t have that problem if I ever mate.  I don’t really own anything.  My parents had a house.  I guess I have that to offer a mate, which is more than most have.”

            “When I become engaged, I think I’ll just skip my negotiations.  Omegas don’t own anything,” he said, shrugging.

            “That doesn’t mean you aren’t entitled to some of your father’s goods upon mating,” I pointed out.  “You don’t want your father giving you less because you weren’t there to argue for more.”

            Ryeowook grimaced.  “It won’t go to me anyway.  It will all go to my mate,” he grumbled angrily.  “Maybe I can skip mating altogether.”

            “That would be best for everyone!  No one would be forced to put up with you the rest of their life and you wouldn’t reproduce!”

            Ryeowook stomped on my foot hard and I was so shocked that he’d touched me, I barely registered the fact that he’d done it in anger.  “I thought you weren’t allowed to touch alphas!”

            “Our feet are in the river.  My foot won’t smell like you!  It will smell like fish!”

            I kicked him back, careful to keep my foot under the water.  My mind was reeling with the knowledge that I could touch him, at least a little, but I tried to stay focused on our conversation.  “Are you worried about becoming a bartering tool for your father?”

            Ryeowook nodded.  “Siwon has it easy, as an alpha.  My father won’t mate him to someone horrid, since he’ll remain at the pack.”

            “You don’t know my cousin very well,” I told him, winking.

            Ryeowook lightly tapped my foot with his and I noticed it lingered there a moment afterwards.  “One of my older sisters has already mated as well.  She’s an omega and he sent her off to one of the packs that we’ve had an iffy background with.  They’ve threatened to attack us in the past.  Even worse, I’m to