I'm Hard For Your Sister, Actually

They left Ashbane the way you leave a place you never intend to return to. Before dawn. Without looking back.

Fin: I need everyone to stop mindlinking about Ashbane before I turn this horse around and burn it down.

Two officers exchanged a look. Whoops.

Aeron: The princess may not be a complete disaster. People raised in vipers' nests sometimes only learn to hiss. Give her time.

Jax snorted.

Jax: Let's see how she behaves once we're out of range of Ashbane scouts. I have my bets. They're not flattering.

The mist thickened as they rode deeper into the forest, Ashbane fading behind them.

Jax wrapped Nova's cloak around her, making sure she was covered. It was chilly. He pulled her closer to his chest, holding her tight.

Her scent hit him the second the fabric moved. Vanilla and moonlight, warm and devastating. Heat flooded south, fast and insistent. His jaw locked.

His wolf surged hard enough that he had to close his eyes and breathe through it.

Talon: Mark her.

Closing his eyes was a mistake. Nothing to focus on but her scent, her warmth, her pulse against his arm. Talon went very still in a way that was somehow louder than the howling.

When he opened his eyes, he looked forward and kept his expression neutral.

Don't look down, he told himself, with the full conviction of a man who was absolutely about to look down.

He fixed his gaze on the treeline and kept it there. The treeline was very interesting. Fascinating, even.

He looked down.

Talon made a sound of pure satisfaction that Jax refused to acknowledge.

After five minutes, he gave up entirely. In fact, he was unable to look away. She was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, and his wolf was not going to let him forget it.

Talon: I agree. Beautiful. And unmarked. That is a problem we should solve.

His cock ached, steady and relentless, and Talon had been composing the same argument on a loop for three miles.

Talon: Her neck is right there.

Jax: I know where her neck is.

Talon: You are looking at it.

Jax: I will turn you into a rug.

He could feel Fin watching. It made it worse, not better. His wolf read another wolf's attention as competition, and competition made the marking urge claw harder.

Her pulse beat soft against his forearm where he held her. Talon locked onto it.

Talon: One mark. Small. She won't even feel it.

Jax: She'd feel it.

Her throat was right there. The curve of her neck where it met her shoulder, unmarked, and Talon treated that fact like a personal offense.

She shivered faintly and pressed closer in her sleep, her face turning into his neck.

His breath stopped.

Her lips were an inch from his pulse. Talon detonated.

Talon: MARK. NOW. IMMEDIATELY.

Jax: I will not be taking instructions from you at this volume.

Talon: SHE IS RIGHT THERE—

Jax: I know where she is. I know exactly where she is. That is the entire problem.

Fin said nothing, keeping his face impassive as his Gamma adjusted Nova in his arms. It shouldn't bother him.

She's not your business. You agreed to take Meredith.

But every second Jax did this, Fin saw red.

He clenched his jaw, doing his best to ignore Princess Meredith, who had insisted on riding with him. Her scent, leather and grass, was wrong. And his wolf recoiled from it.

Meredith twisted in the saddle to look at him, her smile slow and practiced. "You're quiet, King Finric."

"Should I be entertaining you?" Fin's tone was flat. She was the last person he wanted to talk to.

"No. But I've heard stories. I wanted to know if they were true."

"Which ones?"

"That you're cold. But easily warmed with the right touch."

She slid her hand down his thigh, then rolled her hips back into him without apology. "I'm very good at warming things up, my lord."

He didn't react, which took great effort.

She followed his line of sight to the unconscious girl in Jax's arms and sighed.

"Oh. You brought that," she commented, unbothered.

"Shadowclaw must have different philosophies. Someone like her requires careful containment. Or removal, if she becomes inconvenient again."

Aeron's gaze flicked over, sharp, but she didn't notice.

"Mother wanted her executed years ago," she added casually. "Right after Father died. But Riven insisted on keeping her."

Fin's voice cut, cold. "Isn't she your sister?"

Meredith blinked, clearly taken aback by the question.

"Family?" She repeated the word like it tasted foreign. "No, Finric. She isn't family. She's a stain Father was too soft to scrub out, and the rest of us have been stepping around it ever since."

Her eyes narrowed on Jax and Nova in front of them. "A complication."

"No," Fin said calmly, not looking at Meredith. "Complications should be managed. Cruelty is what gets removed."

Meredith went still and her smile faltered.

His wolf growled in approval.

Xeon: Finally.

The breeze shifted, and Nova's scent slammed into him, wrapping around his cock like a fist. His body reacted instantly, shaft hardening so fast it strained painfully against the front of his trousers.

His jaw tightened, fighting the growl rising in his throat.

Meredith twisted in the saddle, her eyes widened for half a second, then a slow, satisfied smirk curved her lips.

She thought it was for her.

"Oh," she purred, voice pleased, rocking her hips once more so her ass rubbed against his throbbing length. "You're not so cold after all, my lord."

Fin said nothing. His hands tightened on the reins until the leather creaked. Inside his mind, his wolf was roaring with fury.

Xeon: Wrong. Get her off me before I rip her throat out and take what's actually ours.

But Meredith only smiled wider, mistaking his silence for desire, completely unaware that the hard cock pressed against her was aching for the unconscious girl riding in another man's arms.

He mindlinked Jax and Aeron.

Fin: Aeron.

The mage trotted up beside them, robes wrapped tightly against the wind.

Fin: Knock her out. Gods.

Jax barked out a laugh from in front of them.

Jax: She's charming. Really. You two will be so happy.

Meredith glanced over her shoulder at Fin.

"What—"

Before she could blink, Aeron reached forward and pressed two fingers to her forehead. Her eyes fluttered, and her body went slack.

"Honestly, you could have led with that at dinner," Jax called over his shoulder.

"Turns out the solution to her personality was unconsciousness," Aeron agreed. His hands glowed gold, and the air next to him split open with a crack. "After you."

They went through the portal, emerging in a private courtyard of Shadowclaw Castle.

Jax exhaled as the courtyard materialized around them. "Home." Then he looked down at Nova. "Finally."

Fin dismounted his horse, handing Meredith to a waiting omega. "Put her in a guest suite in the main castle. Away from my private wing."

"Yes, Alpha."

He turned to speak to his Gamma, but froze. Jax was still holding Nova, watching her, face wrecked with concern.

Xeon: I have been calm. I have been patient. I have been a DELIGHT. Take YOUR MATE out of his arms or I am coming out.

He cleared his throat.

"Take her to the infirmary. Have the healers look at her. Then..." Fin paused. The words stuck in his throat like they knew they didn't belong there. "...assign her omega quarters. Lowest rank. She is to tend to Meredith. That is the agreement."

Xeon: No. Mate sleeps where we sleep.

Jax frowned. He tore his gaze away from the girl and met Fin's eyes.

"She's not—"

Fin cut him off. "She is an omega." The words came out sharper than he intended.

"Understood, Alpha."

Fin turned away and didn't look back as Jax carried her off.

The regret came anyway.