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Stolas presents at age twelve on the morning of his birthday. It’s a simple spell for royalty- bow your head, fold your hands, and an elder will set their palms on the top of your skull as the magic scurries through your blood before blooming teal, lavender, or silver.
Stolas is teal- an alpha, befitting the son of a King. His father sounds pleased as he pats his head, and his destiny can continue undeterred. (They had suspected his designation even before his birth, but sometimes the stars ducked and weaved in unexpected ways.)
He is to be given a duty to the future, to the stars, and to sire a precautionary heir with an omega who would become a princess as his future bride. A good role. An important role.
(He curls away at the picture, hugging the book for stability. Tears roll down his cheeks and he’s told that alphas don’t whimper and cry, but he’s offered a chance to go to the circus, and to meet an unexpected friend.)
___
Blitzo presents at age sixteen. It’s a more gradual sort of thing for imps, dependent on how hard puberty hits you, but your smell comes in over the months at sometime after fifteen and is solidified by first heat or rut, or the absence of either. Barbie and Fizz’s scents had already grown strong enough to cement their designations. Alphas, both of them.
Blitzo expected the same- twins of different designations were uncommon. But the days ticked on after Barbie’s first rut (spent in the ‘go mess with the toy chest and don’t get somebody pregnant unless you mean it, dammit’ tent), and he didn’t feel the slight minty chill in his chest, or the protective buzz around packmates, at least not any more than he had since he was small. There was only a roiling churn of lava in his stomach that worsened by the day, and the scent of sweet butter and sticky fruit that clung to his skin like the sweat under his costume.
He wanted to pretend it could be just a fluke or a fever as Barbie pulled his head into her lap, dizzy and nauseous, before sending him out to the tent with slick between his thighs and a black hole in his gut.
___
Stella is, objectively, beautiful. She knows how to fluff her tail behind wide hips as they circle each other with the ceremonial dances, even if she digs her talons into his arm as they whirl around the floor. Her feathers are preened just so with eyelashes fluffed to extend like feathers of their own, and the jewels that glitter on her tiara, her necklace, and her rings all catch the light in a way that would be beautifully enticing if on a marble statue spinning under a spotlight.
Stolas wants to be happy, wants to enjoy the party the way that other couples seem to. He can hear sparks of laughter tittering on the floor, even if most of the pairs around them are focused on keeping the motions correct, but Stella clicks and steps on his foot when he looks away, and he barely manages to catch himself before he would have tumbled into the table with the prepared meals.
She’s quick, dances half a step off but with strong arms and legs as they take in each other while the music crescendos. Her eyes are cold but she smiles with a beak that suggests a knife, and Stolas has never felt more like a mouse going into a stew.
___
Fizz, Barbie, and Blitzo spent a lot of time draped over each other as children, and designations shouldn’t ruin that. Blitzo knows that their scent is rubbing off on him as they cram into the couch to watch a monster movie marathon, but it scratches an itch in the back of his brain, and neither of them bring it up. It keeps people from bothering them when they duck out into the city.
Fizz and Barbie both smell of rubber and ring dirt most of the time, scent muted by the equipment for the acts, and for a while, they can pretend that everything is normal. That nothing needs to change.
Sometimes, though.
The Mammon concert was crammed with the bodies of sweaty adults and sweatier teenagers, and in the aftermath, Fizz’s cinnamon aroma trailed into the night air, mingling with Blitz’s popcorn as they chatted.
He stepped in front of Fizz when that stalker fucker tried to corner him, and got a sneer that omegas shouldn’t get in the way when the alphas were talking, even as Fizz fell in step at his side after pulling away. (“Not even a real alpha if you let him fight all your battles!” was spat out, and Blitzo forced up a grin and tried to cheer him up. Fizz was better than this- all of this. Blitzo could only hope to grab a piece as he went up and up, could only hope to get a chance to keep him safe.)
___
Stolas wanted this to be like the stories.
The first night with Stella after their wedding…
It wasn’t there.
Whatever spark that was meant to alight between alpha and omega, it lay cold and dead on the floor outside of their bedchambers, and the grinding of thighs with legs pressed together to create the kiss and bring out his cock was nothing but friction that drew only the barest sparks of pleasure, drowned in her voice and her face and her movements as she grabbed him to do with as she pleased when he couldn’t force his body to move.
“Worthless, pathetic- what kind of alpha even are you?” she snarled out, a hiss at the demeaning of her own status, her own use, and all he could do was murmur apologies as he clenched at the bedsheets and wished for it to be over.
___
Blitzo wanted Fizz.
That wasn’t particularly new- he had wanted Fizz in some fashion since he was thirteen and a half and had realized that the squiggly feelings in his stomach weren’t just bad food, as they only arose at hearing Fizz laugh or having Fizz nuzzle up against him when they were sharing a blanket. (He had wanted Fizz earlier than that, really- since they’d met, he’d known that he wanted Fizz in his life for the rest of it, because they were a team and they could do anything together.)
This, though… this was for real. Forever.
He ran his fingers over the second-hand collar that had been shoved at him, the leather still stinking with the whiskey that had been spilled over it by black-tipped fingers. The charm in the center, a simple ‘O’, made his thighs clench.
(“If you’re not gonna pull in numbers with the act like Fizz and your sister, you’re gonna make money some other way, got it? No bitching.”)
A mated omega isn’t nearly as appealing as an unmated one, and there’s only one person he’d ever want. (Who might ever want him, a smartass with too-big hands and no off button, who overflowed on all edges with barbed wire and overheated honey and would only roll over pretty for green eyes.)
He set the collar aside, folded the note, and headed for the main tent.
(He opened the flap to see Fizz smiling and laughing and his father right there. He couldn't do this, couldn’t ruin this for him, couldn’t drag him into the mud, and then everything went up in smoke.)
___
It takes three ruts before Octavia is born. Goetian ruts and heats aren’t as effective as they are for other species, due to the fact that high birthrates amongst the immortal may cause issue, but Stolas had felt his heart sink to the lowest pools of Envy at the empty result from the first cycle. Stella declared that he must be faking his designation- he didn’t even try, she’d had to do all of the work, and what kind of lazy, sad alpha didn’t keen for an un-bred omega under their roof?
(Secretly, he wondered if she may be right, even as he shrunk beneath judgemental gazes and buried himself in liquor and pills, barely 18 and already far too acquainted.)
___
It’s the first week out of the hospital. He's due for heat again soon. The terror burns almost as much as the flames did, burns still painful and ragged on his skin. It's only him now. Only him.
It's loud in the wrong way, the city, doesn't smell of greasy fair food and animals but oil and metal. The fire burnt away the what had remained of the layer between him and the world, ruined his glands so no alpha could even know of him unless they were already skin to skin. He's meat. He's meat.
The heat comes and goes. He buries the memories deep.
He sneaks into a store to snatch a bottle of false scent, then slathers on an alpha spice to erase himself, dropping the busted buckle he’d snagged in the trash and the ‘o’ in his name with it.
(Blitz’s body is a commodity, and the best thing he has to offer. He learns to use it well on the streets, to steal hearts and wallets long enough to gain a bed or a full belly or a moment of comfort. Blitzo wanted a bond with his best friend. Blitz finds pleasure where he can in survival, but lives with his teeth and spines flared and ready.)
___
Stolas is told that he’s lucky to have her, a pretty and sociable omega wife that gave him a sweet daughter that looks like him. He smiles and nods and grips the stem of his glass until the wine quivers within, and looks out to the conquests of fellow alphas with a nauseous unease.
___
Blitz is told that he’s lucky he’ll always be wanted when he’s in heat, purred out by a stranger whose name he’s already forgotten as he plots how to grab more suppressants to smother his body’s cycle out of existence. (No matter how good it feels in the moment, the aftermath stings if he’s left alone. Broken and scentless when not burning from the inside out.)
___
Peahens enjoy color and noise. Even as an owlet, Stolas enjoyed the beauty of the galaxy while stargazing or spellcasting, purples and navies and deep nebula reds, while she enjoys brightness, pinks and lavenders and yellows and baby blues. He tries to plant flowers and hang banners that match her fancy, to give the garden the touch of both of them that she didn’t have to initiate, but she throws the pot of one that got too close to her dress and he cleans up the shards with shaking hands.
___
Succubi can sense designations no matter the species- it helps them adjust their own in order to wring the most bang out of their buck when feeding. Verosika likes playing alpha with him, but likes doing omega friend-fucks as well when they’re both in the mood. It’s consistent, and she doesn’t shy away despite his lack of scent.
They fit together, loud and irreverent and eager for the praise of others even as they playfully bitch at each other, conversation and cum both flowing easily. She finds him charming and funny, at least enough to want his dick stuffed in her and to stuff her own in him, and enough to share a bed and a life while on the road as her star rises.
He can feel the spiral when the fights get worse and they cling closer every time before she makes the mistake of thinking that it would be good to keep him.
He can’t stand the thought of partnering with anyone who can’t unravel him the way that she did, so he swallows down the suppressants month after month after month.
___
Octavia is born when Stolas is nineteen and a half, and when he pulls her fragile body against his chest, it is with tears shimmering in his eyes.
A reason to remain, a life that relies on him and that he can’t help but rely on in these cold ancient halls. The protection of family, of his owlet, is one alpha trait that he is more than happy to take on.
(Twelve years later, she is declared a beta, and the annoyance of his wife at the potential stunting of Octavia’s marriage prospects is nothing compared to the relief he buries deep in his chest, promising her that carrying on his duties, should the need ever arise, can be done perfectly well no matter what she is, so she tilts her head and allows herself to be pulled into his arms.)
___
Loona is curled up against the wall in the pound when Blitz passes by her, an omega and a growly thing of seventeen that could be superimposed over himself a decade ago so nearly it makes his teeth ache.
She’s his within the hour, given in a muzzle but ushered out with only the clothes on her back after he tells them to keep their chains. She’s bristly but anxious, and he offers her his scent, his camaraderie.
She gets the bed, and he takes the couch. He’s slept in far worse. In the morning, he makes pancakes before taking her to get her own things, and when she allows him to untangle her knotted hair, he can feel his soul easing as his fingers run through the fur and his pup doesn’t pull away.
A new pack of two. A new start. A new life.
___
Stolas finds routine where he can. His duties, his books, his garden, Via. His ruts are put off for as long as possible, magical delays allowing him to skip a dozen before his body aches and he’s forced to lock himself in a room with toys, discomfort a splitting seam on the edges of what is supposed to be the time of joy and ecstasy as nothing feels solid enough to pin down no matter how many words he has at his disposal.
___
Blitz finds Moxxie first, then Millie- a pair of betas underestimated by the world and by themselves. They make a name for themselves, all of them, and Blitz slathers on the scents to make his way through the world, to get him a foot in the door to rent an office space in Pride after pleading his case. An imp only barely allowed the chance to try, but he’d be blessed if he wasn’t going to give it his all for the misfit pack he’d managed to scrounge up.
___
Imps, as it turns out, display their designation largely through smell, and the scent rolling off Blitz burns brightly enough for even Stolas to be able to tell that his first friend is as boldly, dominatingly alpha as they come.
Stolas allows himself to be swept away in the rush of it all- this is what they wanted him to be, this is power and control, but as his eyes and limbs are bound, all he can do is moan for more, for a chance to see what might have been if he’d been made the way he was supposed to, a chance to feel right on the other side offered up so freely by someone who wasn’t shying away.
A chance to feel a bond that had been crooned for since time immemorial, but had always slipped through his grasp. A chance to be with his first friend again, in every way that he could be.
___
Birds, it turns out, don’t have a very good sense of smell, and even when Blitz is right on top of Stolas on the too-large bed, the false scents are more than enough to convince him, and having a Goetia moaning out ‘yes, Alpha!’ to him while squirming underfoot is intoxicating.
Stolas moans out that he was his first friend, and when he turns back, he feels a bubbling in his gut that itches at the desire to claim someone who wanted him in any way that he could. To be a friend and a playmate, to be desired for some deeper burnt and buried part of himself just for one more round, even if it wasn’t real, wasn’t the whole story.
One more round.
One more round.
One more round.