Vengeful Bonds S3 - Episode 1- Saint (Patreon)

Unbeta'd/Unedited.

Episode 1

Saint

Saint didn’t know what time it was. He’d blacked out the windows a while ago so nobody could see inside. It could have been hours ago or maybe even days. Probably not days. But maybe. The only light in the room came from a small lamp in the corner, the others were all too bright. They burned his eyes and made it feel like someone was driving lava-coated spikes into his skull. 

He wanted to extinguish the light entirely—it hurt less that way—but every time he did, the shadows closed in. Soldiers made of smoke, carrying guns and grenades, closed in on him, threatening everything Saint loved, until the light returned. So he endured. Whatever it took to keep his mate safe. Even if it made him feel like his head was two seconds away from exploding like a dirty bomb. 

Saint swiped absently at his forehead, growling when sweat still dripped into his already stinging eyes, blinking rapidly to clear them. He couldn’t look away. He couldn’t take his eyes off him for even a moment. It wasn’t safe. He scanned the room in full, once, then again, kept the closets and bathroom door open so there was no chance of anyone lurking unseen.

That’s why he sat there in the far corner of the room. It was the perfect vantage point. No blind corners, no way for anyone to sneak up on him without warning. As long as he was awake, he could keep him safe. And that’s all that mattered. Sleep was for the weak. Sleep got people killed. 

Saint got people killed. 

He scrubbed his hands over his face, just to clear his blurring vision, just to give his eyes the smallest reprieve. He was exhausted. His skull felt too small for his brain, like there was no room for his thoughts. When his eyes cleared, they found his sleeping mate, relief washing over him. 

He was still there, still sleeping, even if it was fitful. 

The room smelled like a graveyard. The rotting orchard of Seth’s prolonged heat and the scorched earth scent of his own rut hung so thick in the air he could taste it like ash on his tongue. 

The evidence of their union was all around them, a nest soaked with slick and blood and sweat and cum. Sheets wrapped like shackles around his mate’s ankles. But there was no greater evidence than his mate’s tiny, fragile body sprawled across their bed like a sacrifice. No, like a crime scene photo. Seth was a living, breathing testament to Saint’s rapidly declining mental health and his alpha’s feral, unforgiving appetites; his skin a map of bitemarks and bruises, dark fingerprints and shallow cuts, abrasions so deep they might scar.

A low rumble escaped his chest as he lurched to his feet, stumbling towards the bed, then changing his mind. It wasn’t safe. He wasn’t safe. He just needed to move. In the desert he could run. When his anxiety crawled under his skin, growing like some kind of invasive species, he could just open the door of his trailer and run…run for hours, run for days, run forever if that’s what it took. 

But he couldn’t run now. He couldn’t leave him. He shook his head, then nodded. He stretched his arms overhead, then dropped them. Nothing worked. His muscles were too tight under his skin. His blood was too hot. His heartbeat too fucking loud. But he couldn’t leave. Not even for a minute. 

He couldn’t leave his mate. 

His baby. 

His little one. 

The one person in the world who looked at Saint and saw something more than a broken toy clumsily pieced together with duct-tape and wood-glue. 

Seth was still in the throes of his heat—and Saint still deep in his rut—but no matter how much Saint tried to satiate them both, it wasn’t enough. He’d fucked him too many times to count, had used his little body until he’d passed out beneath him and then used him more still. 

But even then it wasn’t enough. 

The fever never broke. The need to crawl inside his mate never fully receded. If anything, it only seemed to grow. It was like the beach before a tsunami, the tide disappeared but came back a hundred times bigger and far more destructive. Saint was the wave. So big. So, so destructive. If they kept on like this Seth would let Saint fuck him into an early grave and die with thank dripping bloody from his lips. 

He flexed his jaw, pacing the room, righting the things Seth had given him over their time together. Acorns, crystals, dozens of love notes scrawled in swirly loops of pen on neon sticky notes he’d then expertly folded into little origami animals. A cat, a bear, a fox, a crane, the list went on and on. He moved them this way and that until his brain relented and let him move on to the next impossible task. 

The little figurines that lined the shelf closest to Seth’s side of the bed were facing the wrong way. The ones Saint had carved when his mind and his hands just couldn’t be still. He put them where they belonged, then lined them up like sentries, then snarled in frustration. Nothing was right. Nothing. 

Nothing. 

So he paced. He stretched. He did push-ups. He paced some more. He rearranged the nest around Seth’s sleeping form and then he rearranged it again. When Seth cried, Saint tried to soothe him by burying him in the scent of their pack so he would know. So he would understand that Saint didn’t want to do this. 

He didn’t. 

But he had to. 

He had to keep him safe. It was his only job. It was the only way they would know. They would all know that he could do his job. He could protect his mate. He could breed him. He could be a provider. A father. A…soldier. He was a soldier. No. That wasn’t right. He was. He was a soldier. Past tense. He’d…been a soldier. Now he was just…broken. A broken toy. A broken toy soldier. Barely held together. 

He blinked the sweat from his eyes once again. It was hot. So hot. It was so hot in there, oppressively so. But he couldn’t open the windows. It wasn’t safe. He knew his pack meant well, but he couldn’t let them take Seth from him. If they saw what he’d done. They wouldn’t understand. They wouldn’t. He didn’t. He didn’t know what was happening to him. 

They should take Seth from him. They should. They should. They should. 

But they couldn’t. He couldn’t let them. He needed him. He needed him like air, like…like water. Without Seth Saint would dry up, he’d turn to dust and get swept back to the desert. He’d die a pathetic loser just like his father. 

His insides twisted, a snarl leaving him at the thought. No. They wouldn’t take him. Even if he wasn’t safe. 

No. 

No. 

He was safe. He was the only one who was safe. He was the only one he could trust with his mate. But was Saint safe? He couldn’t think straight. His thoughts were scattering like leaves, like flies swarming around some dead, decaying thing. He tried to catch them, tried to hold them together but there were too many. They were too fast. What was he saying? 

If his head would just stop hurting, if he could just…fucking think. 

Once more he looked at the battered body of his mate. He would be safe. He would keep Seth safe. Safe from them. 

Safe from him. 

Safe from him.

Saint dug the heel of his palm into his left eye, shaking his head. When he dropped his arm and looked up he was standing in front of the dresser mirror. He barely recognized himself. He was naked, drenched in sweat, his eyes bloodshot and red-rimmed. 

For all the damage he’d done to his tiny mate, he’d given as good as he got. Until Saint had to tie him up. For his own protection. To keep him safe. He traced the deep gouges, the tiny bites, the perfect indentations from Seth’s teeth, deep enough to bleed. But were they deep enough to scar? He hoped they scarred. Then everyone would know. His mate was little, but he was fierce. So fierce. 

Seth whimpered, fighting his restraints, hips canting. “Alpha…” he sobbed. “I need you…it’s starting again.” 

I need you.

I need you.

I need you.

Saint nodded even though Seth couldn’t see it, crawling up the bed to blanket himself above him. He was burning up, his skin scorching against Saint’s equally feverish body. His ass and thighs were covered in fresh slick, but the rest of him was tacky to the touch, skin caked with god knows what. He was panting, eyes glassy and head empty as he tried to twist his head around to look at him. His lips were cracked to the point of bleeding. 

Still, when he saw Saint, he smiled. 

He fucking smiled. 

But almost immediately the smile faded, face contorting as another wave of raw need swept over him. He looked up at Saint, wide eyes brimming with tears, a choked sob escaping before his face crumpled and he began to bawl. “Please…” 

Saint growled long and low, satisfaction coursing through him as Seth immediately bared his throat in submission, canting his hips, grinding back against Saint’s hard cock, then rutting into the mattress. His movements were frantic, desperate. Even as he cried, he surrendered himself to Saint. 

And Saint took it. His fingers twisted in Seth’s hair, temporarily stalling Saint’s rapidly fracturing sense of reality to carry out his alpha duties. To breed his mate. His omega. 

“Alpha…hurts…need you inside,” he begged through his tears, still squirming beneath him.

“Be still,” Saint growled against his ear. 

Seth immediately went limp beneath him. The very picture of obedience, even as his body was racked by another wave of sobs.

“Good boy,” Saint purred against his ear, feeling Seth shudder beneath him. “So pretty when you do as your told. Lie there like a good little hole and let me breed you.” 

Seth tried to nod, but Saint tightened his grip. 

The omega, whined, but stayed dead weight beneath him. “Yes, yes, yes…” he babbled, words slurred, tongue sounding too thick for his mouth. “Use me. I’ll be good. So good. A good hole. A good toy. I’m good. Please…please, alpha. Breed me. I want your pups…want your babies…wanna be a good omega.” 

Saint’s alpha rumbled low in his chest as he licked a broad stripe over his omega’s salt-slick skin. 

His perfect little omega. Much too good for him, but far too damaged to know it. 

Saint pressed the head of his cock to Seth’s gushing hole, deliberately hesitating until his omega wailed beneath him, then bottoming out in one hard thrust. Seth jolted like he’d been electrocuted, limbs twitching where they were tied to the bed posts. 

Saint slid his arms underneath him, curling his hands around his narrow shoulders to hold him in place while he fucked him. There was no fight left in his little omega. He didn’t beg to be freed. He didn’t try to trick Saint into calling the others. He just moaned and cried and whined beneath him, reduced to this desperate little thing that was all need. 

Saint would feel guilty later, but not his alpha. This wasn’t about love. This was about instinct. This was about something dark and primal, something as basic as perpetuating their species. Saint would brood and wallow when it was all over but his alpha knew how much Seth’s omega loved this, how much he craved it. 

He could see it in his submission, in the way he stared up at him with those wet Bambi eyes, the perfect picture of trust even when he’d tied him up like an animal. He could smell it in his scent. The only time Seth smelled like crisp, fresh apples and not the sour stench of fruit rotting on the vine was when Saint was using him. 

He snapped his hips, his pace relentless, their headboard beating against the wall like a metronome in time with his rapidly beating heart. Other sounds filled the room, ramping up his alpha’s animalistic frenzy, his unrepentent instinct to fuck and knot and breed his mate until his seed took root. 

The mattress creaked in its frame, overlapping with the wet slap of skin on skin and the obscene squelching of Seth’s sloppy cum-soaked hole. Saint’s grunts and animalistic growls mixed with Seth’s breathy pants and his sweet begging, until Saint was dizzy with it. 

“Alpha…alpha…alpha,” he chanted like a mantra. “Knot me. Breed me. Give me your pups. Please. Please. Please.” 

Seth had to be pregnant. He had to be. There was no way it hadn’t taken this time. But just in case…He’d keep going just in case. Until the fever broke. Until their heat and rut subsided. He could do this for his mate. He would. He would do this for him. 

He’d give him his pups…he’d give him pretty babies that looked just like him. As many as he wanted. Saint was broken and borderline useless but his alpha could at least do this. He could be his breeding stock. He’d build Seth an army of children who would grow up and keep him safe, who would protect him at all costs. 

Saint snarled at the thought, driving into him harder, faster, his knot already swelling. Seth screamed each time he drove into him, the sound so sharp and grating, Saint had to push his face into his pillow to muffle the sound. He didn’t want the other’s breaking the door down, but he couldn’t stop either. He had to give him a baby. Had to give him what he so desperately begged for. 

Pleasure spiked through him every time he ground himself deep, his mate’s sloppy little hole still tight enough to milk his seed from him, even though he was already so wet, so full of Saint’s cum that he fucked as much out of him as in. 

Eventually, Seth’s screams became hoarse moans, then frantic little whimpers as he lifted his hips as best he could, trying to take Saint even deeper than his little body already had. But no matter how full he was, Saint knew if he put his hand over his swollen belly he’d still feel his own cock every time it made a home inside the omega’s womb. 

He couldn’t wait to see his mate, his little one, all round with his pups. He was going to look so pretty, so cute…then everyone would know. They’d know what a good alpha Saint was. They’d know he was broken but not so broken he couldn’t protect his mate, not so useless that he couldn’t give him the family he never had. 

Three more thrusts and he was locked inside, burying himself deep as he came. Only when he was throbbing inside his omega, filling him up once again, did he feel Seth spasm around him, his own orgasm coming from Saint’s knot massaging him from the inside. 

Saint became dead weight on top of him, licking over the skin he could reach, his throat, his shoulders, the nape of his neck. He didn’t realize he’d sunken his teeth into his mate until he yelped, coming again. His clenching hole had heat shocking through alpha, another orgasm rolling through him, causing him to spill inside him a second time. 

He kept his teeth buried in Seth’s flesh until his gums stopped aching, until the urge to keep biting down waned. 

“A-alpha?” 

He pulled his teeth free, licking the blood from his skin. “My mate…my little one…” Saint mumbled. 

“Saint…baby?” 

Saint flinched at the way his mate’s voice trembled. Was he scared? Did he think Saint incapable of protecting him? Had he already let him down? He didn’t want him to worry. He pressed fevered kisses against his clammy skin, trying to tell him with gestures what he couldn’t with words. He could do this. He wasn’t as competent as Loch, or as smart as Binnie or as talented as San or as powerful as their enigma—he was damaged goods—but he could still protect him. 

“My mate…my little one…my omega…” he mumbled, once more attempting to bury him in the clothes of their pack. “I’ll keep you safe. I promise. I’ll protect you…protect our pups.” 

“Baby…” Seth whispered, his voice cracking. “I am safe.” 

Saint nodded, licking over Seth’s cheek, tasting the salt of his tears. “I’ll protect you. I’ll always protect you. Protect them…our pups. I can do that.” 

Saint’s heart fractured as Seth choked on a sob. “You do protect me. What are you talking about? You’ve always protected me. But who are you trying to protect me from right now?” 

Saint froze. Who was he trying to protect him from? How did he not understand? “Everyone.” 

“Baby? Who’s everyone? Our pack?” Seth’s voice was gentle but Saint could hear the fear, the…concern. 

Saint was ruining everything. 

“Please don’t leave me…” he begged, holding onto him tighter, burying his face in his scent, his words muffled against his skin. “It’s selfish…I’m selfish…but I can’t live without you…I was fine before…I was fine in the desert when I didn’t know you existed…when I didn’t know there was the possibility of this life. But now that I have it…” Saint choked back the tears, shaking his head against Seth’s skin. “I can’t go back to life without you.” 

“Baby…what are you talking about? Why would I leave you?” Seth wailed, sounding so bewildered. “You’re my mate. You claimed me. We claimed each other. We’re tied together…for life. I couldn’t live without you either. I don’t want to live without you. Is that why you tied me up? You think I’m gonna leave?” 

Saint shook his head. “It’s safer. I can keep you safe here.” 

“This house is a fortress. The only people you’re protecting me from here are our own pack. Baby…I think this is the medication.” 

“The medication? My meds?” Saint asked, thoughts muddled, his migraine returning so fast it made his teeth sweat. “I took my meds. Not the suppressants but my other meds. I didn’t stop. I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t put you at risk-” 

“No,” Seth said, cutting him off, before hesitantly adding, “Mine.” 

Saint flinched as his mate’s scent soured until it was sharp enough to cut through the many others swirling around them. 

“Yours?” Saint asked distractedly, still rubbing his cheek against Seth’s scent gland. 

“Yeah…This is my fault. This is all my fault,” he said, voice breaking on a wet sob. “I did this. I did this to you.” 

Saint shook his head. “Shh.” He pressed more kisses to his skin. “This is me. I’m just…broken.” He’d wanted to make him feel better but instead he just began to sob harder. “Don’t cry. Please. I’ll fix it. I’ll do whatever you want. Please, don’t cry. Don’t leave me. I’ll do better,” Saint said, pressing each word into his mating mark like it might strengthen his conviction. 

They both lay there, tied together, crying, locked in their own misery. When his knot went down, he slipped free of Seth even though it was the last thing he wanted. 

“Will you really do anything?” Seth finally asked, voice thick and nose stuffy.

Saint nodded frantically. 

“Will you…untie me?” Seth asked. 

Fear, knife sharp, lanced through him. “Are you…gonna leave?” he asked, barely able to choke the words out. 

“Oh, baby,” Seth said. “No. I just want to be able to hold you. I hate this. And maybe…maybe we can take a bath? I feel so gross. And we smell so, so bad.” 

“I kind of like it,” Saint said, holding him tighter. 

“I know you do, you freak,” Seth said around a giggle. 

Something unknotted at the sound. He didn’t hate him. He hadn’t ruined everything. He wasn’t going to leave him. 

“So…will you?” Seth hedged.

Saint’s alpha paced, filling his head with reason after reason of why he absolutely shouldn’t untie him. But Saint couldn’t stand the fear in Seth’s voice, the worry. He wanted to hear him laugh again, wanted to see him smile and not bleed. He wanted to feel Seth’s arms around him again. 

With one last kiss to Seth’s mating mark, he got to his knees, carefully untying each of the restraints, then sat back on his heels, waiting to see if Seth would run. 

If he did, he vowed not to chase him. His eyes locked in on the deep red abrasions encircling his wrists and ankles. If his alpha tried to run Seth down, he’d only hurt him worse than he already had. 

Seth moaned in pain as he moved his arms, then tried to stifle the sound. For Saint’s sake. Because he didn’t want his broken alpha to feel guilty. Saint blinked away tears he hoped Seth would think was just perspiration. 

Once the omega made it onto his knees, he launched himself into Saint’s arms, wrapping his limbs around him like a koala, forcing him to hold onto him tight or send them both toppling over. They sat like that, just clinging to each other, for a long while, Seth licking and nuzzling at Saint’s mating mark until his headache started to ease.

“Carry me to the bath, alpha,” Seth sighed. “Then you need to feed us.” 

“I’ll feed you,” Saint said. “I feel too sick to eat.” 

Seth pulled back to look at him. “Not us,” he said, wagging a finger between the two of them. Saint watched as Seth settled a hand over his belly. “Us.” 

“Us…” Saint repeated faintly.

Seth smiled. “Us,” he said again this time with conviction like he was speaking it into existence.

Maybe he was.