I laid there for a good while, my body humming with the aftershocks of pleasure, my mind slowly returning to reality. The furs beneath me were rumpled and damp, the air thick with the scent of sex and sweat and something uniquely Soryn; musky, wild, unforgettable. I stirred, pushing myself up on trembling arms, and reached for my discarded gown.
Soryn’s hand shot out, wrapping around my wrist with startling speed. Before I could react, he had pulled me back against his chest, his arms encircling me like iron bands sheathed in velvet. His skin cool, heart thundering against my back.
"Are we done?" His voice was husky against my ear, his breath hot and sending shivers down my spine. "I can keep going. I still want to keep going."
I blushed furiously, heat flooding my cheeks. The sex had been... more than I expected. Mind-blowing, if I was honest with myself. But I had no desire to continue. My mates outside were probably worried sick, and I had responsibilities weighing on me; preparations for the cubs, the new home, the aftermath of the cheetah attack. The venom was gone, the bond was sealed, and that was enough for now.
I sighed, the sound heavy with finality. "We got rid of the venom, right? I have other things to finish before the cubs arrive." I pulled away gently, reaching for my gown. "And my mates... they are waiting."
A flicker of something crossed Soryn’s face. Pain? Hurt? Rejection? It was so fast I could not be sure, but the set of his jaw hardened, his emerald eyes dimming.
"I get it." His voice was curt now, clipped and cold. "You have what you need from me. The bond is sealed. The venom is gone." He released me, turning away to find his silk wrap, his movements sharp with barely suppressed anger.
"Soryn..." I reached out, guilt twisting my stomach.
"I know I pretty much forced myself into your tight circle," he continued, not looking at me. His shoulders were tense, his back rigid. "I will do my best to not get in your way. To be... convenient. Silent. Unobtrusive." Then, barely a whisper, so soft I almost missed it, he added, "Just please do not desert me. Do not break your bond with me. I have nothing else. No one else. You are all I have now."
I grabbed his hand, forcing him to turn back to face me. "Soryn... it is true that the way we bonded was not really my choice. And I felt forced into it. But I know you mean well. You saved my life." I searched his face, those beautiful emerald eyes that held such loneliness. "Just give me some time, please."
Then I told him the truth, vague enough to protect my secrets but honest enough to be real. "Where I am from, snakes were not liked very much," I said, my voice quiet but steady. "There were a few who loved them, who kept them as companions. But I was one of the many who feared them. I was ignorant of your kind, Soryn. I did not understand that you could be this." I gestured at him, at his human form, at the gentleness he had shown. "I only knew the fear. So I need time. Time to adjust to having a snake as a mate." I looked up at him, meeting his emerald eyes. "It is not you. It is years of fear I need to unlearn."
His eyes widened, something softening in his gaze; understanding, perhaps, or relief that I was not rejecting him personally.
I pressed on, desperate to soften the blow. "You saved my life and my litter. I will never forget that. I am grateful, truly." That much was true. He had saved me, had given me a future when I would have had none. I could not deny that his serpent form terrified me, that I worried about what other horrors this world might hold. But those were thoughts I kept to myself. "I just need time to adjust to this. To us. That is all."
He did not look entirely convinced, but the tension in his shoulders eased. The truth sat between us, fragile but honest, and he nodded slowly, his expression less shuttered than before. "I understand," he said quietly. "Fear is not easily forgotten. I will give you time. As much as you need."
I squeezed his hand once more before finishing dressing, my movements less hurried now. Once we were both presentable, I walked to the door, my hand steadier on the wooden latch. I took a deep breath, then opened it.
Ravin and Leon stood exactly where we had left them, positioned on either side of the entrance like guardian statues. I blushed instantly, heat flooding my face, my neck, my chest. I knew they had heard it all. There was no soundproofing in these dwellings, and I had been vocal. Very vocal.
Ravin acted nonchalant, his arms crossed, his gaze fixed on the horizon, but his ears were bright red, betraying his thoughts. Leon did not bother pretending. He was sulking, his dark eyes fixed on the ground, his shoulders hunched, his entire body language screaming hurt and jealousy and insecurity. After all our time together, I could read him like a book, and Leon was definitely sulking.
I gave them a small, tentative smile, then turned back to Soryn. "So how are we doing this? It will be another month until the new home is finished. Do you mind squeezing in here with us?"
"I have no issue," Soryn said, his voice flat, his expression unreadable. "I can lay anywhere. Floor, corner, outside. As long as I can be near you." The words were sweet, but his delivery was cold and indifferent, walls erected to protect himself from further rejection. It would be a while, I realized, before I could understand how Soryn truly felt, before I could read him as easily as I read my lions.
When Soryn went to bathe in the river, I turned to my lion mates, my heart heavy. "Are you guys okay?" I asked softly.
"We will be fine," Ravin said, though his voice was strained. He looked at me, his golden eyes searching. "Are you okay?"
"I am okay," I said, blushing again at the memory of what had just transpired.
"You were very vocal," Leon mentioned, his voice tight.
I cleared my throat, as though something were lodged there. "Is... is that so? I am sorry."
"I do not like this," Leon confessed, his voice breaking slightly. "I do not like sharing you. I do not like that he... that you..." He could not finish.
"I know," I whispered, stepping closer to them.
"But it is something all females do," Ravin said, though he sounded more like he was reminding himself than explaining to me. "It is our way of life. What we are feeling is selfishness. She needs him. The bond, the venom, the alliance. We cannot let our feelings hurt her."
Leon shrank, his dark head bowing. "I know. I know. I just... I love her. I want her to myself." He glanced at Ravin, his brother, his closest friend. "Of course that is excluding you, brother. I like what we have. The three of us."
I stepped forward then, pulling them both into my arms, burying my face between their shoulders. "I love you guys," I whispered, my voice fierce and certain. "And no amount of mates I will have or not have will change this fact. You are my heart. You are my home. Nothing will ever change that."
They held me tighter, and we stood there in the twilight, three hearts beating in painful, hopeful rhythm, while somewhere in the distance, a serpent bathed alone, learning what it meant to be the outsider looking in.
---
The sleeping arrangement was a comedy of errors waiting to happen.
Our bed, which had always felt spacious with three, suddenly resembled a sardine tin with four. Ravin immediately claimed his favorite side, spooning against my back with possessive familiarity. Leon mirrored him on the opposite side, his arm draping over my waist, his nose buried in my hair. That left Soryn standing at the foot of the furs, looking like a man who had arrived at a party only to find the cake already eaten.
He coiled himself at my feet, his serpentine lower body arranging into neat loops that somehow managed to occupy twice the space a human would. His tail flicked restlessly, brushing against Leon’s shin.
"Watch it, snake," Leon growled, kicking at the appendage.
"You should lay over there," Ravin suggested, pointing to the cold stone floor near the wall, "until we can move into our new home."
Soryn’s emerald eyes narrowed to slits. "I am her mate too," he said, his voice dangerously soft. "Why can I not be near her like you two?"
"We came first," Leon said, his chin jutting out stubbornly. "So this is our spot."
"Ah," Soryn purred, his tongue flickering with dry amusement. "Possession is nine tenths of the law, is it? How primitive." He shifted, rising up so his human torso towered over us, his expression deadly serious despite the mockery in his tone. "Tell me, lions, would you be guarding this spot so jealously if I had not plunged into that waterfall and pulled your precious female from death’s grip? Would you be arguing about sleeping arrangements, or would you be standing vigil over her grave?"
The silence that followed was heavy and horrible.
Then both lions roared. Soryn hissed, his hood flaring instinctively, and my headache, which had been a dull throb, exploded into a full orchestra of pain.
"Enough!" I sat up, my voice cracking like a whip. Three heads swiveled toward me, six eyes wide with varying degrees of guilt and surprise. "If you three cannot come to an agreement, I will sleep on this bed alone, and all of you can find spots on the cold floor. Like dogs."
The image was apparently dire enough to shock them into submission. Soryn suddenly relaxed his defensive posture, his hood flattening, his shoulders slumping in what looked disturbingly like defeat. He sighed, a long, hissing exhalation that seemed to deflate him entirely.
"Your lions can have their spots," he said quietly, his voice stripped of its earlier arrogance. "But if I may..." He hesitated, something vulnerable flickering in his emerald eyes. "If I may wrap my tail around your ankle? Just to feel you? I promise I will not do anything else. I simply want to be near you too."
The thought of his serpentine tail coiling around my ankle made my stomach perform an uneasy flip. But I had felt his scales before, had slept in his coils and survived. I had even slept with the man, for heaven’s sake. If I could not overcome this fear now, when would I?
I also felt a stab of guilt. He had saved my life, had given me everything he asked for, and I could not even tolerate his touch while sleeping? I was being cruel, even if he could not hear my thoughts.
"Tha—that is fine," I managed, pushing myself to put on a brave face despite the queasiness in my gut.
The boys settled back on either side of me, their warmth familiar and comforting. Soryn slithered to the end of the bed, arranging himself on the stone floor with a grace that seemed almost resigned. I laid in the middle, sandwiched between my lions, and tried to relax.
Then I felt it; cool, smooth scales wrapping gently around my ankle, tightening just enough to establish contact without restricting movement. I flinched instinctively, my whole body tensing, unable to help my reaction.
Ravin seemed to sense my discomfort. His hand found mine in the darkness, his thumb tracing soothing circles against my palm, a silent reminder that he was there, that I was safe, that this would get easier.
Soon, the warmth of my lions and the exhaustion of the day overcame my anxiety. Soryn’s tail became a forgotten weight, just another blanket in the night, and I drifted into sleep, wondering what tomorrow would bring. I needed to check on Layla and Rhonda too. Since this whole situation began, I had not visited them, had not made sure they were coping with Layla’s loss and Rhonda’s mate fate.
Later that night, I stirred half awake, feeling Soryn’s tail slip away from my ankle. Through bleary eyes, I saw him turn away, curling into himself on the cold stone, his back to us. He laid there for a long while, his shoulders shaking almost imperceptibly, as if his heart was slowly breaking in the darkness where no one could see.
I watched the subtle tremor of his shoulders, the way his body curled inward as though protecting a wound, and something inside me cracked open. The guilt flooded in, thick and suffocating, drowning out the lingering fear that had governed my actions since the moment I woke in his coils.
I was the worst person in the world.
The realization hit me with devastating clarity. Soryn had no one. He had told me so himself; his family were dead, his territory stolen, his existence reduced to wandering and solitude. He had saved me when he had no obligation to do so, had plunged into churning waters and risked his life for a stranger who would repay him with nothing but revulsion. And yet this whole day, from the moment he arrived to claim what tradition demanded, I had treated him as nothing more than a hindrance. An inconvenience. A monster to be endured rather than a male to be embraced.
The contrast was humiliating. With Ravin and Leon, when we had first fully bonded, I had welcomed them into my body with eager abandon. Had allowed them to have me multiple times, had reveled in their touch, had given myself freely and joyfully because I wanted them, desired them, loved them. But with Soryn? I had practically scrambled to escape the moment the act was done, had dressed with shaking hands and made excuses about venom and cubs and other responsibilities, anything to avoid the intimacy that should follow such joining.
I felt like the biggest villain in this world or any other.
He deserved so much better than this. Better than a mate who flinched from his touch, who needed to be coerced into kindness, who could not even tolerate his tail wrapped around her ankle without her stomach turning. He had been patient, had compromised, had accepted a place on the cold stone floor while my other mates enjoyed the warmth of my body and the softness of our bed. He had asked for so little; just proximity, just connection, just the barest acknowledgment that he mattered.
And I had almost denied him even that.
I wish my aversion would vanish, that I could wake tomorrow and find my fear of snakes transformed into acceptance, into desire, into the same love I felt for my lions. But fear was not rational. It did not respond to commands or guilt or good intentions. It simply was a wall between us that I did not know how to dismantle.
But I could try. I had to try. For him. For the life he had given back to me.
"Hang in there, Soryn," I whispered into the darkness, the words barely audible even to myself. "I promise I will try. I will do better. Just... give me time. Please."
I watched the curve of his back for a long while, memorizing the line of his shoulders, the way his emerald hair spilled across the stone, the fragile humanity of his posture. I let the image burn into my mind; the sight of a male who had given everything and received so little in return and I made a silent vow to be worthy of his sacrifice.
Finally, exhaustion pulled me under, but even as sleep consumed me, my last conscious thought was of him. Alone. Hurting. Hoping.