“You sure about that?” Dante leaned forward, the lounging dropped and the intelligence underneath poking through—sharp, focused, the thing that must have made him much more intimidating in some life he had before living with Nulls. “You haven’t been feeling things lately? Things you know aren’t yours? Emotions that taste like someone else?”
Riot didn’t answer.
“Do you mean like when Riot is mad and I feel like I want to hit something?” Cass asked, pressing a hand against his still-sore chest. “Because that’s very unusual for me…I’m not a hitting person.”
Orion shoved Dante’s hand off his thigh and leaned forward. “That’s exactly what he means. And he could have said it without being a—”
“I was being direct,” Dante said. “It’s a time-honored communication strategy.”
“You were being a dick. Again.” Orion turned to Cass, and his voice changed—still flat, still direct, but gentler. The effort was visible, like a person used to speaking at full volume trying to remember that the person across from them startled at loud noises. “Granny Lu has a journal from before the Adjustment—all the real science, not the corporate version. She explained this when it happened to us. But I asked to do it this time because...” He glanced at Dante, smiled a little, but when Dante grinned back at him, he immediately scowled and looked back at Cass. “...because I went through the same thing you did. I went in blind, not knowing what was happening. It just happened.”
“That is very kind of you, Orion. Thank you.” Cass smiled. He knew when he had approached Orion months ago, there was something good and kind about him, even if he did bear a striking behavioral similarity to a stray cat Cass had encountered in the Neutral Zone. That cat had bitten and scratched him more times than he could count, but eventually Cass was kind enough to it it would sit near him sometimes. “So, you and Dante are bonded, and you didn’t know what you did to bond? Is there no bonding ceremony where you are from?”
“I spent my whole life avoiding Alphas,” Orion said. “In SVI territory, bonding means being owned, that’s it. I never wanted any part of it. And then—” He gestured at Dante, who smiled likesomeone being complimented. “This asshole kidnapped me and a different bonding happened.”
“Against your will?” Cass frowned.
“Against my better judgment.” Orion’s mouth twitched. “My will came around eventually.”
The concept of not wanting to bond was strange. He’d wanted it his whole life—the sacred bond, the connection, the person who was supposed to be his. None of the Elysian methods worked for him, but wanting had been real. The wanting had always been real, even when everything around it felt off.
“Okay, so let me ask you some questions, and they might be personal, but it will confirm whether or not you completed the bond,” Orion said. “When did you first smell Riot?”
“In an alley. He smelled like strawberries and cream. And cordite.” Cass felt the heat rising in his face as he said the words, his voice soft. “I followed the smell without thinking.”
“So that is Stage 1 of the Primal Triad, it’s called the Scent-Sync. It happened to Dante and I the first time we met, and it pretty much made him a weirdo who was obsessed with me,” Orion explained.
Dante scoffed. “Iwas the only one obsessed? What about you—”
“Stage 2 involves blood,” Orion cut him off with a sharp elbow to the ribs. “Riot mentioned before that you were both injured when you met.”
“Yes, I helped him with his hands,” Cass said. “My arm was bleeding.”
“Then that’s when it started. You both essentially did Stage 1 and Stage 2 at the same time.”
Cass sat with that. It felt…right, actually. Not frightening. The idea that their blood mixed and something began, real and biological and beyond any of Elysian’s algorithms. He wasn’t sure he believed in divine will or the guidance of the universetowards transcendence anymore, but knowing he had something real from a situation where a scared missionary bandaged a stranger’s hands…that felt messier and cleaner at the same time.
“So you’re telling me,” Riot said, “that everything that has happened…the suppressants failing, the heat, the part where I almost lost my mind, multiple times, happened because I got into a fistfight in the Neutral Zone and ran into Cass right after?”
“That’s essentially what happened, yes,” Dante said. “Your Stage 2 activation was triggered by a chance encounter with a compatible Omega, and your blood mixed outside your bodies. It’s a very inefficient system, if you think about it. If Orion wasn’t constantly trying to kill me when we met, it never would have happened to us. If Gensyn cared about the whole permanent bonding thing, they probably would have done it in a lab with significantly less bleeding.”
“Horrifying. Thank you for that assessment.” Riot sighed.
“Happy to consult.”
“Stage 3,” Orion interjected, “has a stupid name, but it’s called the Soul-Bite. It’s not well known outside of places like this, because it changes how things work in the corporate territories. Omegas choose to bond, not the Alphas.”
If he means a real bite, then I have to explain…
“There’s a gland at the juncture of the neck and shoulder. The Dominance Anchor.” Orion looked at his hands. “The Omega’s saliva changes during peak heat and produces an enzyme. The bond completes when the Omega bites that gland.” He paused. “During, well, when you’re being intimate. At the, uh, at the end. Both of you. At the same time.”
The blush hit Cass like a wave. His ears, his neck, his face, the backs of his hands. Every part of him that could turn red turned red simultaneously.
“At—” His voice cracked. “Both—at the same—”
“Yeah.”
“Oh heavens….”
