by Aiden Bates
"Well," Blake said, flopping back down against the bed, holding his hips still for Darren though Darren could feel in the tightness of his thighs how much he wanted to move. "If this is how you wake me up, I can assure you that you will soon be the most cherished, doted upon, and utterly spoiled omega in the history of mating."
Darren laughed around his alpha's cock, and felt a little smug than he maybe had right to when Blake swore and clawed at the blankets.
Blake's hand tangled in his hair, pulled just enough to make Darren moan, not enough to choke him. What Darren couldn't get his mouth around he wrapped his hand around instead, pulling back until only the head was in his mouth and stroking the length up and down until Blake's hips moved with little aborted motions that were trying very hard not to be bucking up into his throat, and thought that when he'd had more practice, he would let Blake do it, let his Alpha fill his mouth until he almost couldn't breathe with how full he was.
He could feel, as his hand slid back down, his Alpha's knot swelling. He'd gotten over thinking it was strange pretty quickly, and he curled his hand around it, rippling his fingers, and listening to Blake growl low in his throat. The hand in his hair tightened until the pull almost hurt, but it was good. It was exactly what Darren wanted. He slid down his Alpha's cock again, taking him in until he couldn't any more, squeezing his hand around the knot, and then his Alpha's hands were on him, slowly dragging him up the length of Blake's cock.
"If you don't quit that," Blake said. "I am going to come."
Darren licked his lips. Yes. He knew that. Blake's knot had already begun to swell. Soon it would be too big to fit inside him if it was not there first, and for a moment he thought about moving, taking it into himself instead, but that wasn't what he really wanted, so he leaned down again, pulling against the hand in his hair, and slid his mouth down his mate's cock until Blake stopped caring about the fact that he was going to come, and started giving in to the inevitability. Darren rubbed his tongue over the slit, over the head, and Blake's fingers curled and uncurled in his hair, Blake's thighs closing against his shoulders, then falling open again. Darren did it until Blake was nearly writhing beneath him, and his hand squeezed and then gentled, tightened and then loosened in rhythm.
"Fuck," Blake was saying over his head. "Fuck, Darren. You unbelievable-" He didn't finish. The words trembled into a groan, and then Blake was coming, filling Darren's mouth, and Darren was trying to swallow it all, but there was so much. He pulled back, and it splashed against his cheekbones, his throat, his collarbone. Darren moaned.
Blake fell back against the bed, his orgasm shorter without a hole to continuously milk his knot, but he was still coming across his own stomach in pulses, and Darren leaned back against one hand, looking down at Darren flushed and pleased, and slid two fingers into himself, rubbing them over his prostate, his knees spread wide to give his Alpha a good view.
When his eyes opened, Blake looked up at Darren fucking himself on his fingers, and a wicked smile spread across his face.
"What," he said, catching Darren's wrist in his own larger hand. "Do you think you are doing, omega?"
Blake looked up at him with wide eyes, making sure to dip his head so that he looked up through his lashes, so that Blake leaned down and claimed his mouth with a hard kiss, his lips bruising under it, and he tipped his chin up and eagerly kissed back, his free hand wrapping around Blake's shoulders for support instead of him leaning back against it. One of Blake's hands wrapped around his waist, helping him balance, and then Blake's hand was pulling his fingers from himself, and Blake's fingers were sliding inside him instead. Darren moaned. God, how could it still be so good after a week of doing it pretty much non-stop?
He writhed on Blake's fingers as they moved over his prostate, and his cock slid against his Alpha's stomach, still slick with his own come, and he moaned, whimpered, gasped Blake's name. Said, "Alpha, please." and "God, Blake." And Blake fucked him harder with his fingers, knowing already exactly what he wanted, exactly how he wanted it. His fingers stroked hard over Darren’s prostate, and Darren came with a sob over his belly and Darren’s own.
"Good," Blake said, leaning down and closing his teeth almost gently over the marks the mating bite had been leave behind. He licked at it, then pulled back. "Good boy. So very good."
He leaned back, and his hand tangled in Darren's hair, gently pushing him down. "I think you made a mess, though, darling. How 'bout you take care of that for me?"
Darren whimpered, but he went with the gentle push and began licking up his own come and Blake's, sighing happily when Blake's fingers stroked gently through his hair.
Chapter Eight
They left for Minnesota the day after Darren's heat ended. There wasn't much for Darren to pack, just a duffle bag full of the few clothes he owned, and his books, his laptop. Blake left a letter for the landlord, and enough money to cover the end of Darren’s lease. To his employers they said nothing. Let them be as angry as they liked. Darren hadn't wanted anything more to do with them, and Blake wanted only what Darren wanted. They were packed up and pulling out of the parking lot in his truck by the time the golden rim of the sunrise became full light in the sky.
Darren sat in the passenger seat with his bare feet up on the dash and a bag of beef jerky in his lap which he frequently shared with Blake. He was watching the world go by outside the window with the kind of attention that Blake usually only gave to watching rabbits run by in his wolf form, and he would look back and grin at Blake, his brown eyes bright, happier than Blake thought maybe he'd seen him yet. It made Blake want to reach out and pull him across the seat so he could kiss him, a lot. But that wasn't exactly the safest driving plan, so Blake restrained himself to laying a hand on his mate's thigh. Darren, looking down at it, smiled, and slid a little closer to Blake on the bench seat, snuggling up against his side so that that hand on his thigh could hold him close.
"I can't believe I'm leaving Iowa," he said softly a few hours in. "I've been in foster homes all over the state, you know, but never outside it. My parents died there, and no one knew who I was. They didn't have ID, and neither did I, of course. So they just called me a John Doe and put me in the foster system, hoping they might be able to find someone who knew me one day, I guess, and turn me over to them. They gave me the name Darren so they had something to call me, and it just kind of stuck. But I've never been anywhere that wasn't Iowa." He smiled brilliantly up at Blake. "I've always wanted to go north."
Blake knew that, of course, had learned that about his mate in their first few nights together. One day, he promised himself, he would take Darren to Alaska, up through Canada. They would hike and camp and swim in the lake, and at night their wolves would run free. But first he had to get him to Minnesota and introduce him to his pack. Who would be happy for him, he was sure, when they had gotten over the slight snub of his mating without their knowledge or permission. It was generally frowned upon, because one's mate because part of the pack, and so the pack had to live with them as much as their mate did, but they would all love Darren. It wasn't like he was bringing home some wild and angry omega who would spit in all their faces. He had rarely met anyone as sweet as Darren. His mate had much to learn about the ways of their people, but Blake had no doubt he would learn what was needed, that he would learn it as quickly as he could. Darren was so very eager to please.
Sliding his hand down his mate's back to settle his palm in the small of it, Blake traced his fingertips along the waist line of Darren's jeans, occasionally slipping them beneath to watch Darren squirm a little.
"Having trouble, darling?" he asked after a little while, not quite managing to hide his smile.
Darren looked up at him, and his expression, Blake was sure, was meant to be a glare, but there was too much happiness in his eyes.
"You're teasing me," he said, a little petulantly, though only in play.
Darren laughed. "Yes, darling. I am. Deliberately." He slid his fingers beneath the waistband
of both Darren's jeans and his underwear, tracing one along the cleft of his buttocks. "Cruelly," he said, pressing a fingertip against Darren's hole but not pressing in. "Teasing you."
Darren was breathing a little quicker, and his hips rocked a little, and he pouted up at Blake in a way that was entirely too appealing. It was so good to see the light in his eyes. To see him playful and playing, having the things he had been so long deprived of. When Blake thought of what his pretty omega had been through, living without pack all those years, he had to swallow back the growl that wanted to rise up in his throat. Darren was safe now, and he would be safe forever. Blake would never let any harm come to him, would never let him be lonely or lost again. And neither would the pack.
"Make it a little longer for me," Blake said. "Another hour, darling, and we will stop, and I will make it up to you."
Darren hid a smile against his shoulder, but Blake felt the curve of it through his shirt.
"I'll wait," he said softly, and Blake smiled too.
----
Later that night, Blake stopped as the sun began to set, pulling into the lot of an isolated trailhead.
"We're going to practice tonight," he said.
He had been teaching Darren the basics of shifting, how to feel his wolf. How to reach for him. How to breathe and stretch and move to make the shift easier, but he had not yet allowed Darren to attempt the shift itself, though had Darren done it through instinct as they practiced those things leading up to it, Blake would not have stopped him.
Darren looked up at him eagerly as they stepped out of the truck.
"Will you let me try tonight?" he asked. "Will you let me shift?"
Blake smiled, because how could anyone not smile at that? "Yes, sweetheart. Tonight we're going to try shifting."
Darren nearly danced around him with eagerness, and Blake could almost imagine the wagging tail. He had to hide his laughter at that one. Blake would have been a little offended. He wrapped an arm around his mate's shoulders and led him up the trail. He had hiked this place before and knew there was a meadow about half way up the slope of the trail. They would practice there. It was a good night for it, the moon full in the sky. Always their gifts were easier when the moon was full. Blake had sometimes wondered if perhaps the first of their line had been bound by its cycles, had only been able to change when it was full, or if, like the werewolves of legend, they had not been able to stop themselves from the shift in the full moon's light.
These days, they had practiced. They knew the art of letting the wolf in and out at will, of being one with the beast instead of fighting it back. That he had tried to teach Darren, but they would see now how successful he had been.
It would not surprise him if Darren did not succeed immediately. He had grown up with other wolves, had known from childhood how to shift, but Darren did not have that advantage. And so he would be slower. Blake was prepared to comfort him if he did not make it; he knew how sensitive his mate was to believing he was not as good as others, knew he had been told his whole life that he was something lesser. Something strange. Blake would not let him think that of himself any more. He kissed the self-deprecating words from his mate's mouth each time Darren spoke them, and Darren had at first flushed and laughed and looked away, but now he kissed back, and forgot himself, and the words, in the space between them. One day, he would forget the words entirely, and truly see how beautiful, and how bright he was.
In the meadow, the moon fell on the grass, painting it grey, and Blake and Darren stripped out of their clothes. This was where his mate was meant to be. Not locked within that dingy apartment with its ragged furniture, but out in the trees, under the glow of the moon, his skin dyed silver by her light, his eyes wide and laughing.
"Walk with me," Blake said.
They paced the circumference of the circle, loosening up, feeling the wolf began to move through them, and Blake could see in Darren's eyes that it was rising, eager to be free for the first time. It was a good sign, but it did not mean the attempt would be successful. Many first time shifts stopped when the human fell to fear, fearing that the wolf would take control and not return it, fear of running too wild. And Darren, Blake knew, had lived long in fear. But he believed in his mate. If he did not make it tonight, he would make it tomorrow, or the next night. He would learn the wolf, and then they would run together, and it would be beautiful.
Blake took another step, and shifted, fluidly. The colors of the world changed, and its scents grew sharper, and deeper. He could hear in the woods around him the little animals rustling as they moved, scurrying for their beds, searching for food. And behind him he heard Darren take a step and let out a frustrated exhale, then another. He turned and faced his mate, bumping his head up against Darren's hand and looking up into pained eyes. He licked the hand that reached up to stroke behind his ears, and Darren managed a very small smile.
You will make it. I know it.
Blake took a step back, then another, still looking up at Darren's, eyes locked with his, and Darren's expression changed as he looked into the wolf's eyes through Blake, smoothing out, growing thoughtful. His head tipped slightly to one side, like a dog's when it is trying to puzzle something together. Blake bared his teeth in a wolf's smile, and took another step, Darren moving in sync with him. Another, and then another, and then Darren was stepping through the barrier that kept him from his wolf, and he was shifting.
It was not as smooth as Blake's shift. He was rougher in his movements, the bones changing more slowly, and Blake saw the discomfort in his mate's body language, the sudden fear there in his eyes as the change began. A moment later he was human once more, and stood looking down at his hands with obvious dismay written across his face. Blake shifted back into his own human form, and wrapped his omega in his arms.
"You did very well for a first time," he said against Darren's ear, knowing that the qualifier would not please him, but that telling him he had done well without it would only make him disbelieving. He knew very well that he hadn't done as well as a shifter who had tried more than once would have, though Blake could have told him there were many wolves who took 4 or 5 or 6 tries to get it right. "I am sure you will learn it, sweetheart," he said, stroking his fingers through Darren's hair.
Darren nodded against his shoulder, but Blake could feel the wet warmth of tears against his skin, could smell the salt of them.
"I promise you, darling," he said. "I promise you that you will learn it."
"What if I don't?" Darren protested, sniffling a little, muffled against Blake's shoulder.
Blake reached down and lifted his mate's chin, looking into brown eyes that were sheened bright. "Have I been wrong yet?" he asked. "Have I lied to you? When I have promised you that something would go some way, has it not gone that way?"
Slowly, Darren nodded. "No," he said, dropping his gaze. "You have not lied to me. And you haven't been wrong."
"Then I am not wrong now," Blake reassured him. "I have watched many wolves in their first shift, wolves who grew up with other wolves and knew exactly what they were trying to do, who had seen it every day of their lives, and yet they too struggled the first time. Many of them didn't make it then, or the second time, or even the third time. So you see, darling, you are not unusual in that. You are not less than anyone else."
Darren didn't look like he quite believed it yet, but when he nodded this time it was promptly, and when he looked up, his eyes were dry.
"Now come, darling," Blake said, and he smiled. "There are other things for us to do in a private meadow in the mountains."
He took his mate's hand and led him over to a place where the grass was thick and soft, and laid him out on it, and kissed him until he forgot entirely that he had not made the shift.
It took a great deal of kissing. Not that Blake minded in the least. Like this, laid out under the stars together, there was an air that had not been there before. Something that made them both hungry for it in a way they had not been during Darre
n's heat. Heat was beautiful, and to need each other so deeply, so immediately, that was beautiful. But Blake liked best the times when they wanted each other without the rush of hormones. When, like, tonight, they could lay quietly together in the grass and kiss just because they wanted to. When there was no rush toward the next step, toward completion.
His hands slid over Darren's body, exploring with a leisure he hadn't much been allowed during the frantic days of Darren's heat. It had hit him hard, coming so late, and there had been few moments between the waves of need. He kissed slowly along Darren's cheekbone, kissed his jaw, his throat. He licked over the mating mark, and Darren bucked like Blake had bit him all over again, making Blake laugh against his skin, though there was nothing but want in the sound. He did not want to mock his mate for his sensitivity. It was one more thing he loved about his omega. One more thing about Darren that pleased him.
Darren was hard, and Blake could smell his slick, could feel it when he reached down between his mate's thighs and gathered some on his fingers, using it to curling his hand around his mate's length and stroke smoothly upward, making Darren writhe under him.
"I want to take you apart," he confessed. "Slowly. I want to see you fall to pieces for me, and I want to hear my name on your lips."
His omega quivered beneath him, but it was not with fear. There was nothing but desire flowing along the path of the bond between them, and Darren's eyes were blown wide and dark with it, his lips parted and wet with their kisses. He leaned up to kiss them again, because he wanted to, and because he could. His hands kept up its slow stroking, and then he sat back and laid his other arm over Darren's hips, holding him down so he could not buck into the touch, so that he whimpered and clutched at the grass, tearing it up under his hands. Still that same, slow stroke, his hand too loose to offer any real pleasure. It wouldn't give Darren what he wanted, not yet.
"You are beautiful like this, darling," Blake said quietly. "You're just so pretty for me. I could do this all night, you know. I could listen to your noises forever and not be satisfied. I'll never have enough of you."