Bind Me in Steel

by Beast

  He let himself sink into that feeling, and let himself listen to the sounds of the forest at night—the brook that ran parallel to their path, the dryads singing, insects chirping, night hunters scattering out of their path as the larger, stronger predator came tearing through. He could feel the first touch of the waxing moon on his skin like a silver kiss, and he realized…

  In this moment, right now, he was content.

  He would never have to force himself to obedience for Connaught again. When he asked Ero questions, Ero didn’t treat him as if he was stupid for not knowing; he just answered, gently giving Wren bit after bit of information that he was so hungry for when it changed what he knew of the world around them. He’d always thought the rest of the world was like Neg Keep; small, mean little places where everyone knew their station and acted accordingly, locked forever into the hierarchy of hackles and teeth, their roles ordained.

  He was learning from Ero that the world was wild and strange and different, filled with more things than Wren could even conceive of…and he’d yet to see more of it than the forest leading away from the keep.

  It was all painted in words in Ero’s voice, promising new and terrifying and wondrous things as the miles disappeared and took him farther away from the life he’d known, and closer to…

  He didn’t know yet.

  This was still too new, too uncertain, and he was still adjusting to the idea that there could be something more.

  But he felt as though he hadn’t known he’d been in a cage until someone had unlocked the door, and let him see the bars for what they were.

  He squeezed Ero just a little tighter for a moment, snuggling into his back, and settled in to let the hours pass.

  But the moon was still high in the sky, when he felt Ero begin to slow, then drift to a halt. The wind felt different, more direct, and Wren knew they’d broken from the trees before he even opened his eyes when the scents were different, clearer; the scents of open spaces, and something like stone that wasn’t quite stone, and animals he’d never smelled before but that some deep instinct recognized as the same scent as the leather wrapped around Ero’s body.

  “Wren,” Ero rumbled. “Look.”

  Wren lifted his head, opening his eyes, looking past the hefty curve of Ero’s shoulder—and froze, his heart hammering in his chest.

  He’d…he’d never seen this much open space before. It was like the land stretched on for thousands of years, marching on toward the far curve of the horizon with no trees to break it, the sky strange and round and full of so many stars with nothing to block their light. A wide, perfectly smooth, perfectly straight-edged path of unbroken gray stone cut right in front of them, running forever in either direction, painted on white and yellow lines just barely visible beneath a coating of windblown dust. In the distance blocky black silhouettes stood against the sky, some stationary and square, others moving slowly, letting out soft lowing sounds that drifted across…it had to be miles. Miles of land covered in tall, waving grass; miles in which he could run in any direction and not see the end of the world.

  “Oh,” he breathed. “It’s…Ero, there’s so much of it…”

  “The world is a large place,” Ero said, a smile in his voice, and when he tightened his grip on Wren’s thighs it felt almost like a hug, a companionable squeeze. “This is just a fragment of it.”

  Wren’s eyes widened, his heart thudding harder still, skipping beats. “How much is out there?”

  “Have you ever made a quilt before?”

  “Yes…”

  “What you see in front of you is just one square in a quilt with thousands of squares. Millions. The world you knew at your keep…that was barely even one stitch in that quilt, Wren.”

  Wren tried to picture that—but it was too much, too big, and he shrank back, ducking down behind Ero. “That’s a lot.”

  “It can be a bit to get used to.” Ero looked over his shoulder at him. “But just remember that this has always been here. It’s not that new. You just didn’t know. So it doesn’t have to be frightening.”

  Wren met that pale blue eye, letting its warm, its certainty calm him. “How much of the world have you seen?”

  “All of it,” Ero answered. “All of what’s left.”

  He bent, then, shifting to let Wren down, supporting him until his sore legs steadied and he could stand on his own. Wren let the packs down, glancing back at the line of the trees, which was cut off almost like a razor, walled in by a deep ditch to the side of the stone path. “Are we camping here?”

  “Yes. I’d rather have the trees for cover on one side while we can, and it’s easier access to firewood.” Ero straightened, unwinding his scarf and pulling it back to let his hair tumble free, exposing the handsome lines of his face. “But I’d like to show you something first.”

  Wren looked down, wiggling his feet in the soft grass that poked up through his toes. “You said you wanted to run with me.”

  “I did. Do you know what that means?”

  “You…want me to change.” Just the thought made Wren’s stomach tighten, when changing was forbidden, for him. Taboo. As if he’d stop being an omega if he did, and would instead turn into one of the bulky, thickly furred men, thrown out to survive on his own, his identity stripped from him by changing who he was. He peeked at Ero from under his lashes. “I don’t know if I can, Ero.”

  “I don’t know why Connaught taught you that you couldn’t. Shouldn’t.” Ero sank to one knee before him, reaching out to clasp Wren’s hands; Ero’s were warm, gentle, kind, holding him steady as those patient blue eyes seemed to envelop him. “It’s nothing to be afraid of, Wren. It’s who you are…and you don’t know what it feels like to be free until you’ve run underneath the moon and felt the wind in your fur.”

  Wren swallowed. “But when you change…it makes you a monster.”

  “Only when…I’m in that half-state. It’s different. When I’m just pure wolf…”

  Ero smiled, then, warm and taking Wren’s breath away with the pure quiet joy of it, like this whispered euphoria.

  “It’s the only time my mind ever feels free.” Ero squeezed Wren’s hands. “Try it. And if you hate it, you can change back immediately and we don’t have to do anything, or go anywhere. We can make camp and have dinner and rest. Talk. I’ll tell you about the Silk Islands.”

  A tremor went through Wren, but he nodded, breaths shuddering in his throat. “I’ll try it.”

  “Good. I promise, the more you try…the less frightening trying new things will become.”

  The husky rumble of approval in Ero’s voice warmed Wren, and he had to turn away, pulling his hands free from the large wolf’s. He couldn’t let himself need Ero’s approval so much; being out there like this made him feel like a child, completely helpless and ignorant, and if he only did things so Ero would approve of him, would smile at him that way…

  He’d always feel like a child, dependent on someone else, instead of taking advantage of this chance to start again.

  But when he glanced back, he sucked in a breath and immediately slammed his eyes shut, heat crawling up his face and down his throat as he covered his eyes with both hands and yelped. “What are you doing?”

  Stripping, that’s what Ero had been doing. Unwinding the strips of leather around his chest and arms, peeling them away to reveal swarthy skin littered in scars, a broad chiseled chest of solid, brick-like muscle, cut into hard ridges and blocks as if he was made of the same kind of rough granite as the stone of the keep. A dark dusting of chest hair furred his torso, tapering down to a thin trail that snaked over his abdomen; Wren hadn’t seen anything else before he’d covered his eyes, but what he had seen was imprinted on his vision.

  Ero let out a low, growling chuckle. “I can’t change fully while dressed. I’d ruin my clothing. You should undress, too.”

  “No!”

  “Wren.” Ero’s amusement was gentle, in his voice and in his scent. “I won’t look. And you don’t have
to look at me. We’ll keep our backs turned to each other.”

  Wren peeked through his fingers, keeping his eyes only on Ero’s shoulders and face. “Promise?”

  “I promise.”

  Wren nodded tentatively, and turned his back on Ero. He could feel the man’s eyes following him, and feel the weight of them lifting away. His fingers were thick and clumsy as he fumbled with the rope binding his robes closed, then let it fall, the thin layers of homespun drifting open over his body. He could hear Ero still working at his leathers, too, only for the sound to stop…replaced by the sound of bone crunching, realigning, popping, the wet shifting of flesh, the hitch and draw of breaths deepening into soft whuffs, then growls. A familiar sound, but it was different like this, somehow, when Wren barely remembered a childhood memory of pain, of his body shifting and realigning and then the world looking different, smelling different, everything sharper and more simple.

  He let his robes fall, opened his eyes, lifted his gaze to the moon…

  And when he didn’t know what to do, just let that pull in his blood reach deep.

  Nothing happened, at first—until the first ripple of pain went down his spine. He let out a soft cry, falling forward, dropping to his knees; his joints went loose, ripping, twisting, realigning, the ache tearing through him in a low, deep burn that seared in his muscles and tore them apart to shift them into new shapes. Popping in his tailbone as it lengthened; a sore pull in his face as his nose, his jaw, lengthened and reshaped, his eyes shifting, his arms falling to catch him before he could collapse—and curling to dig lengthening black talons into the earth, as soft, pale gray fur sprouted from his skin in tufts, then in a spreading pelt, wrapping him in warmth as if his own body would embrace him to soothe away the pain.

  He blacked out, for a second—one last second as everything wrenched into place with a final harsh shift, tearing him from his consciousness only to slam him back into it as the worst of it passed. He lay on the grass, panting, his tongue lolling from his jaws as he pulled himself together and tried to get used to his body. His senses, turned up into vivid reality that was more than he’d ever experienced, every tiny sound rushing over him to paint pictures miles away, every scent telling stories not just in the now but layered through time, the passage of feet and the growth and death of generations of plants and the smell of an apple, an apple, that had rotted into the earth long ago, its seeds still lying dormant under inches of dirt and waiting to grow. He swished his tail, tottering on all fours as he tried to adjust to suddenly having not two legs but four, his balance shifted, his center no longer defined by a head that held higher than everything else.

  A low whuffing sound, amused, at his side warned him just before a heavy furred weight dropped down next to him, a weight that smelled so good, that scent of clean fur and something salty and crisp, and the heat and kindness of Ero. The massive black wolf at his side dwarfed Wren, easily head and shoulders above him even lying stretched out in the grass and leaning his heavy weight companionably against Wren’s flank. As a wolf Ero was just as thickly bulky as he was as a man, a barrel chest set on long, graceful runner’s legs, large paws tipped in dark talons, his face narrow and tapering to a pointed muzzle. His scars were white slashes making patterns through his coat, and he looked down at Wren with those same warm blue eyes, as if to say See? It’s not so terrible after all.

  No…it truly wasn’t. It was like seeing the night in different colors, where sounds had tastes and scents were alive in bright shades. He didn’t know where to look first—and he bounced to his feet, only to tangle his paws and go tumbling clumsily, spilling into the grass.

  Ero made that whuffing sound of amusement again and rolled over to flop against Wren, pinning him briefly, before rolling off and pawing at him lightly. His scent was bright, prickling, eager, and he side-stepped a few times, paws lifting high, tail swinging. Wren pricked his ears forward; Ero’s quiet, simple joy was contagious, infecting Wren, giving him the energy to try again. He gathered his paws more slowly this time, pushing himself up, waiting until his wobbling legs steadied and his center of gravity realigned. He took one tentative step, then another.

  Then promptly pounced Ero, rolling the massive wolf back into the grass.

  Ero tumbled back with a deep, startled yip, paws flailing, then twisted his body around and rolled Wren over, pinning him into the grass with his greater bulk. Playfully, Ero nosed under Wren’s jaw, only lightly brushing his throat, less a dominance display and more a gesture of gentle trust…

  Before Ero rolled to his feet again, looking down at Wren for just a moment longer before, with a ringing bark, he turned and vaulted across the ditch, racing across the stone road and darting into the grassy fields beyond.

  Instinct took over, and Wren bolted upward and leaped after him, clumsy for his first few strides before his body remembered that this was right, that he was made for this, born for this, and suddenly he was racing in a ground-covering lope, his body singing with power and fluidity and responsive strength, his blood burning bright inside him as he pursued that lashing black brush of Ero’s tail. Ero led him on a merry chase, tearing through the fields, running for the pure joy of running, startling rabbits from their burrows and sending massive beasts Wren had never seen before, big blocky things with black and white patterned hides and curving horns, clattering away with a thudding of hooves. Wren started to chase them, only for Ero to nip his flank and send him pivoting about, rearing back on his haunches and pawing the air before pouncing the other wolf again.

  They rolled, tumbling in the grass, tangling with each other—before Ero licked his cheek, marking Wren with his scent, and took off in another direction. Wren followed without thinking, surging toward those distant blocky shapes on the horizon…but as they drew closer, Ero slowed, creeping up more slowly. Wren moved to his side, letting his eyes adjust as he stared out across an open field littered with wooden spikes driven into the earth at outward pointing angles.

  At the far end of the field stood the tallest stone wall he’d ever seen. Taller than the entirety of Neg Keep, and stretching on forever to either side, disappearing toward marching tree lines and low hills. Bright spots of light were spaced along the walls, and tiny black silhouettes moved along them, highlighted against the…were those torches? Cold, large, perfectly round white torches, and Wren winced as one of them swept toward him, blinding him briefly before it passed over. He squinted his eyes, shaking his head sharply until his vision cleared.

  Were those humans?

  He smelled living things, but they smelled so strange. Like flesh without fur. They smelled like wolves but without that wolf scent, just meat and bone and a living heart.

  And fear.

  So much fear, like it was cut into their flesh to make permanent scars.

  And he caught the instant that fear spiked, a cold rush on the air, falling over them like rain, as the lights swept back toward him and Ero again. Ero tensed, sinking into a low crouch, the burly black wolf peeling his muzzle back in a low growl as shouts went up along the wall. It took only a moment, too, for it to sink in:

  The humans were shouting at them.

  Shouting and afraid, as a great gate in the wall began to roll upward with a massive grinding of stone and metal.

  Ero’s growl rose into a harsh, ringing bark of challenge, before he caught Wren’s eye and tossed his head. But Wren froze as a carpet of living creatures, of humans, came pouring through the gate, their voices so loud, so angry, ringing the bell of his heart in trembling notes of fear. He might have stayed petrified there, if Ero hadn’t nipped his flank and spurred him forward with a firm nudge, practically shoving him into motion. He flattened his ears back, risking one last glance at the humans…before he took off across the grass, stretching his legs and racing over the fields with Ero a protective presence at his shoulder.

  They left the humans behind until Wren couldn’t even smell them anymore, their churning noise far distant, then gone—and then they we
re just running for the sake of running again, the wind fingering his fur in luxuriant strokes and the moon keening high and sweet against his skin. He lost himself in just being an animal, without thought for anything but the earth under his paws and the scents of the night.

  And the scent of Ero, so perfect and so right that Wren just wanted to curl against him and bury his nose in Ero’s fur and breathe him in.

  He slowed, though, panting and catching his breath as their abandoned belongings came into sight. He was tired, his bones sore, his chest tight, and he wanted nothing more than to drape against Ero and doze off in a comfortable tangle of fur and paws; everything felt so much simpler like this, life reduced to basic needs and comforts. As they drew closer to the place that would become their camp, though, Ero lay down with a soft whine next to the abandoned leathers of his clothing, resting his head on his forepaws. Intense blue eyes watched Wren closely as he flopped down in the grass next to his robe and let himself just feel…

  Tired.

  Tired, but so very good.

  The ripple and flux of Ero’s shoulders was the only warning before he began to change, thick black fur gleaming lustrously even as it receded into tanned flesh, bone and muscle writhing under skin as he arched with a growl. Wren looked away, but not without catching a glimpse of a powerfully sinewy body, cut from head to toe in lines of unforgiving hardness, built with a sort of crude, tapering grace. He let his ears tell him when Ero was done and gasping in the grass, and reluctantly willed his own body to shift back—stretching out, vertebrae realigning, fur melting away to leave him feeling naked, too exposed, too small as the powerful body of a wolf crunched and twisted itself back into the slender limbs of an omega.

  When it was over Wren lay naked in the grass, sore and panting and wincing as he buried his face against his forearm. “Ow.”