Oh no he didn't, Puma exclaimed as she face palmed herself.
It was too quiet when we arrived at Lion's castle. Everything was a mess.
Lion looked at me sheepishly while I kept glancing around in disbelief.
It looked like a dumpsite.
What happened here? I asked him incredulously.
Lion did not say anything. He just shifted his gaze upward while I continued to gasp at the mess.
It's not just a mess. There's empty bottles everywhere which I suspiciously think must contained liquor.
He didn't say anything. Instead, he carried me towards his room with a slight flush on his cheeks.
He placed me gently on the bed, nuzzling me on the neck when I noticed him trying to distract me as he pulled something that looks suspiciously familiar on the bed.
What the.
Is that Subus' clothes? He didn't get rid of that?
He noticed me looking at the clothes and he hurriedly told me that he was distracted at the time as he was going mad trying to find me.
Huh. Really.
I raised my eyebrow at him and turned my back on him.
I AM NOT JEALOUS. I am just highly emotional right now.
There was a blanket on the bed and I was about to go underneath it when I remembered that Subus sat on it while she and Lion were sucking on each other's faces.
That WITCH.
Lion must have noticed me getting irritated as he immediately took all the beddings from the bed and burned it using his magic, including Subus' clothes.
I heard him cursing Subus underneath his breath.
Good.
He replaced a new set of beddings on the bed and covered me with a new blanket as he pulled me towards him.
No. I refused to look at him.
He embraced me from behind, kissing me on the neck and face when he noticed me trying to ignore him.
He sighed before he told me that this is his last resort.
What last resort?
I was about to ask him when he suddenly tickled me.
Noooooooo!!! Anything but not that!!!!
I kept laughing as he continued to tickle me again and again until I begged for mercy.
I lay down on the bed, panting. My skin got very sensitive because of the tickles that when he tried to kiss me on the neck, I moaned.
I hurriedly covered my mouth. Uh-oh, that was a huge mistake.
Of course you can guess what happened next.
And also why Puma was facepalming herself.
Puma sighed as she gave me potion to apply on the area as I was swelling too much.
She said that she is happy that the two of us finally mated and that Lion's madness was finally soothed but what she isn't happy is the fact that I am suffering from Lion's loss of self control around me.
She scolded Lion, telling him that no intercourse for the meantime or I might really die.
Of course Lion was terrified of the thought of losing me that he immediately agreed.
He also took a more potent potion to control his urges. I'm hoping it might work this time as I felt like dying.
But it was worth it.
And now I'm suffering.
....
Orm, Ghost and Sly finally came back to the castle after months of trying to look for me and to track the rest of the high council members who escaped. They arrived just as Puma finished applying some sticky paste on my back. Puma is staying now at my room as I am now staying at Lion's room. She is now working part time as my personal healer since 2 of her other offsprings took over most of her minor work at the forest. She does go home from time to time but she prefers staying here and also her mate who now works for us, taking most of Sly and Ghost's task as they were busy looking for me and tracking the escaped high council members.
When Lion sent them a scroll, telling them to go back since I've finally been found, they immediately went back without resting on the way.
Ghost was overjoyed seeing me and Sly kept shedding scales from overexcitement.
Meanwhile, Orm was quiet for a time until I asked him why.
He told me he noticed the mating mark on my chest.
Oh.
I thought that since he noticed the mark that he will keep his distance away from me. When I looked at his eyes, to my surprise, he is looking at me with intense desire. Not only him, but also Ghost and Sly who had a certain yearning look at me as well.
Um, what is happening here?
After they left, I asked Puma about what happened.
Puma guffawed before telling me the reason.
Ah. I forgot about the Alpha and Beta relationship.
The relationship between Lion, Ghost, Sly and Orm is like a pack of wolves. Lion is clearly the Alpha while it is unclear who is beta. Unlike what I used to know all about this kind of relationship back on earth, here on this world, the rest of the pack are considered the Alpha's female secondary mates. That is after the Alpha's consent.
Being a secondary mate though doesn't require actual mating and intercourse. There is a ritual in which the secondary mate (or mates) pledges to protect the female with his life. They would act as mates without intercourse, though some females does the deed with them, provided they don't give birth to children that are not from their Alpha mate.
That is what happened with Sly as he was born as a bastard offspring.
It is highly unusual to have an Alpha-Beta relationship with different classes as each classes has their own females except for the deserters.
Even more unusual as the four of them are from different kinds of species. (Which Lion forgot to explain to me)
Ghost, Sly and Orm seemed to see Lion as their Alpha as they obeyed him without a question.
Puma gave me a knowing look as she told me that Lion will be more needy after mating. She doesn't blame him though as he was almost out of his mind when I disappeared.
Puma cried as she apologized to me for being deceived by Subus. (Yes, she also called her a witch. Ha. Take that Subus.)
Of course I told her that it wasn't her fault.
She hugged me and promised me that she would always take care of me too.
....
It was Lion who enthusiastically prepared the food this time.
We are all eating inside Lion's room as I am still too sore to move.
Everyone is in high spirits as they were all glad and relieved that I'm back.
I was quite emotional with the warm welcome that I sobbed to the point that I started hiccuping. Then Puma's mate brought several bottles of liquor that he made in which everyone enthusiastically consumed especially Lion as Puma gave him a deathly stare.
That made him stop drinking.
Everyone was congratulating us as they can see my mating mark with Lion quite clearly as he insisted earlier that I should wear another dress with a plunging neckline.
Sigh.
Puma whispered to me that I should expect Lion to show off to the other males as he was establishing dominance.
I don't mind that though.
Puma was grinning at me when we noticed Ghost, Sly and Orm giving me quick glances whenever Lion is not looking at their direction.
As I looked around the room, seeing everyone laughing and having a good time made me smile and thought,
I'm finally home.