Scent of Deception

Saskia sat in the silence of her bedroom. The ache of her biological heat took root in her bones. A feverish chill spread through her muscles. She kept her gaze fixed on the blank wall. Her mind piecing the fragments of Kelsie’s condition together. A small spike in natural scent would not drag an Alpha away from his first mate. Not when he demanded an heir just days ago. Kelsie bypassed normal biology.

Injecting synthetic heat pheromones into the bloodstream remained a notorious black-market trick. Saskia recalled the contraband reports she had studied on her laptop. A she-wolf would inject the chemical cocktail into her veins. The drug tricked her body into a state of biological panic. Her system responded by producing a surge of natural heat pheromones to match the synthetic ones. This created a dense scent cloud in an enclosed space. This chemical cocktail bypassed standard hospital blood tests. The doctors would find nothing in her veins.

But the toll was brutal. The synthetic hormones triggered a prolonged, unstable fake heat. It stretched for days, tearing the body apart from the inside. The dense scent hijacked the Alpha's olfactory glands and brain. The illusion overrode his higher reasoning. It plunged him into a feral fury. The drug forced a bonded Mate into a relentless mating frenzy. The Alpha lost all control. He was driven only by the primal urge to breed the source of the scent.

Saskia understood the reality. Kelsie risked the fatal physical side effects of the drug for one purpose: to steal Dominic. By dosing herself and luring him into her room, Kelsie ensured the Alpha remained trapped. The feral instincts bound him to her bed with chemical chains. He could not return to Saskia's suite. He could not sire the legitimate heir he had requested. Kelsie manufactured a biological cage. She locked Dominic inside it to guarantee Saskia remained barren.

The first day of her cycle bled into the second. Then came the third. Three days. Saskia endured the pain of her natural cycle in solitude. Fire licked through her veins. The heat scorched her nerve endings. Her lower abdomen cramped with vicious intensity. Her wolfen body begged for the grounding touch and claiming bite of her bonded mate. Sweat slicked her skin as she writhed on the tangled bedsheets. Her breathing grew ragged. Her claws gouged deep grooves into the mattress.

Whenever the torment spiked, she attempted to reach out. She pushed her consciousness through the mind-link to beg Dominic for relief. But every time the connection flickered to life, the truth vibrated through their severed bond. She felt him. She did not just sense his general location. She felt the raw, uncensored mechanics of his betrayal. Vara, her inner wolf, whined in the back of her mind. The sensations flooded them. She felt the rigid, swollen length of Dominic’s cock driving relentlessly into Kelsie. She felt the heavy expansion of his knot. It locked Kelsie down, breeding her time after time. She felt the feral thrusts. She felt the sheer volume of his seed pumping into the younger female's core. He was busy. Biting, claiming, pounding into Kelsie in an endless loop.

Before leaving her suite, Dominic had offered an excuse. He claimed he could not be in two places at once. He swore a promise to come back to her suite. He said he would alleviate her pain once the initial frenzy faded. He never did. No visit. No brief moment of physical comfort. Not even a whispered apology transmitted through the telepathic link. He left her to burn in her own fever. He prioritized the chemical mirage over her natural cycle.

Gamma Wyatt stepped in. Wyatt sensed Saskia's pain pulsing through the deep pack link. He recognized the danger of an unattended Luna suffering alone. He took command of the situation. He cleared the Alpha floor of all personnel. He sealed the corridors and locked down the perimeter. He dispatched a trained female nurse to deliver medical-grade painkillers directly to Saskia's door. Wyatt knew pack law by heart. No un-mated male could safely approach a Luna in active heat. It would trigger a feral bloodbath.

Saskia dragged herself across the floor. She swallowed the pills. The over-the-counter drugs proved useless. They dissolved into her system and did nothing to curb the biological demands of her wolfen body. The heat tore through her. It was a tide of fire and ache. It mocked the chemical substitutes. Her body demanded an Alpha's knot. Her body demanded an Alpha's bite. She needed the heavy weight of her mate. She received nothing but empty air. The fever burned her from the inside out, leaving her to endure the worst of her biology in isolation. The primal need for an Alpha's scent, for the rough scrape of teeth against her marking gland, went unanswered. She was hollowed out by the sheer force of her unanswered heat.

By the morning of the final day, the spikes of her cycle began to plateau. The physical torment ebbed. It left behind a hollow shell. Saskia lay on the floor, staring at the ceiling. She stopped calling out for her Alpha. The pleas died in her throat. The lingering embers of her love extinguished. Her heart turned cold. Ice filled the void where her twenty years of devotion had burned. It was a permanent freeze.

She sat up. Her muscles screamed in protest. She dragged her exhausted body toward the edge of the bed and leaned against the wooden frame. She mathematically calculated the betrayal. Dominic had twenty-four hours in a day. He could have spared one or two hours to visit her suite. He could have eased her biological torment. He could have claimed her and fulfilled his duty to his first Luna. Just two hours. Two hours out of twenty-four. That would have left him with twenty-two solid hours to tend to his manipulative Kelsie. He could have bred Kelsie until his muscles gave out.

He could have found a balance. He chose not to. He willingly abandoned his sacred duties. He abandoned his first mate to suffer the darkest depths of a heat cycle alone.

Saskia understood the ugly truth of his affections. He favored the younger mate. The sacred bond they shared meant nothing compared to the feral lust Kelsie triggered. The realization did not break Saskia. It hardened her. The tears dried up. A freezing clarity washed over her. Her emotional attachment to Dominic died. A razor-sharp strategic planning took its place in her mind. She would not beg again. She would not cry for a mate who cast her aside for an illusion. She would not let this pass without consequence. The pack would see the truth. The Goddess Elyria did not turn a blind eye to those who manipulated the sacred bonds of mating for selfish, vindictive gain.

Long after the horrific ordeal passed, the fever broke. Saskia finally stepped out of her isolated suite. She pushed the heavy oak door open and stepped into the quiet corridor. The cool air hit her skin, a sharp contrast to the suffocating heat of her room. She looked pale. Her features were drawn. Dark shadows clung beneath her eyes, bruising the delicate skin. Physical exhaustion weighed down her limbs. Her legs trembled with every step, but she held her spine rigid.

She found Gamma Wyatt pacing the floorboards outside her door. The heavy thud of his boots echoed in the empty hall. He stopped in his tracks the second the door clicked open. Wyatt approached her. He bowed his head in deep respect and profound shame. He could not look her in the eye.

"I am sorry," Wyatt murmured. His voice was thick with regret. "Pack law forbade me from crossing the threshold. I could not come inside the room to help ease your suffering."

Saskia looked at the loyal Gamma. Her voice emerged quiet and deadened. "I understand the laws, Wyatt. I hold no anger toward you. You did what you had to do."

Wyatt nodded. His shoulders slumped. "You need to head straight to the pack hospital for medical recovery. The doctors have prepped the Luna's medical suite. Nolan is waiting for you and Vara to begin the recovery process."

Saskia did not move toward the stairs. She leveled her gaze at him. "Being locked alone gave me a lot of time to think. Kelsie’s sudden heat is suspicious. The timeline is damning. It started right after she accused me of lying about my own cycle. One day later, she drops into a cycle of her own. That is not natural biology, Wyatt."

Saskia engaged their secure mind-link to ensure privacy. Her mental voice echoed in Wyatt's head, sharp and clear.

'Vara sensed Dominic and his feral beast mating Kelsie dozens of times a day through the bond,' Saskia explained. She watched Wyatt's eyes widen in shock. He knew the dangers of those chemicals. They were banned within their territory. 'It was an unnatural, hyper-aggressive drive. His knot kept swelling. He locked her down and bred her in a continuous, endless loop. Normal biology does not push an Alpha to that extreme without a break. That points directly to the use of illegal, self-induced black-market pheromones.'

Wyatt shifted his weight. He hesitated. His loyalty to the pack structure warred with the weight of her accusation. 'You two share a mutual dislike for one another, Saskia. Are you sure you are not letting that cloud your judgment? Maybe she just went into an early heat.'

Saskia’s tone turned lethal and unyielding. Through the mental link, she snapped at him. The crushing force of her Luna aura bore down on his mind.

'Stop right there,' she commanded. 'Do not question my motives. Look at my twenty-year track record. I have never tried to get between Dominic and his new mate. Not once. Have I yelled or screamed right now about him not tending to me? No. You know this truth yourself, Wyatt. It is always Kelsie who deliberately steps between us to cause chaos. Kelsie is insecure. She needs to mark her territory through manipulation. I am not. I know my place as the first Luna.'

Wyatt swallowed hard. His eyes dropped to the floor.

'Never accuse me of thinking up such a sick, toxic plot,' Saskia warned. Her mental voice vibrated with lethal promise. 'If you ever question my integrity again, I will personally punish you. Do you understand?'

Suitably chastised and reminded of her supreme authority, Wyatt sighed. He submitted to his Luna.

'I understand, Luna,' Wyatt replied through the link.

Wyatt ran a hand over his jaw. He admitted a critical piece of information. 'I already checked the secure pack medical records.'

Saskia waited. Her icy resolve hardened into steel.

'Kelsie’s natural biological cycle was recorded,' Wyatt confessed. 'It is regular as clockwork. She wasn’t due for another natural heat for exactly three months and eight days. Your cycles have never overlapped in the past two years. They fall at the same time each year, give or take one day.'

Saskia nodded slowly. The final puzzle piece snapped into place. She reminded Wyatt of the divine lore they all lived by.

'It is the divine will of the Goddess Elyria to keep shared Mates' biological cycles separate. She designed it this way to prevent this exact torment,' Saskia stated. Her eyes gleamed with razor-sharp calculation. 'Rarely do two females sharing one mate go into heat at the same time.'

Wyatt met her gaze. A silent question hovered in his eyes.

'If Kelsie manipulated her own body with illegal drugs just to force me to suffer alone in agony, she will pay the price,' Saskia finished. A cold smile touched the corners of her mouth. 'The physical ramifications of surviving that unnatural, chemically prolonged heat will expose her guilt. You can go read the medical journals yourself. Inducing a heat with your own extracted pheromones forces the body to produce double the bouts. The sheer exhaustion and internal damage from the feral mating will break her down.'

Wyatt frowned, processing the information.

'We just have to sit back and watch,' Saskia added, her voice echoing with chilling finality through the link. 'The crash of the synthetic hormones will rip through her system. Her body will begin to deteriorate. She will not be able to hide the bruising, the fatigue, or the hormonal crash. We do not need to accuse her without proof. Her own flesh will betray her lie. The truth will reveal itself, and Dominic will have to face the monster he chose over his first mate.'