Pamoen stood alone beneath the vaulted ceiling of the Groken throne room, moonlight spilling through the broken stained glass that had once depicted pixie queens and kings. Now those delicate figures lay shattered across the marble floor, replaced by crude banners bearing the Apex sigil: a black wolf rampant on crimson.
Every breath she took tasted of old blood and older betrayal. Four years had passed since Sous let her go off on Zhiliary's dragon, leaving her supposed daughter to learn under the Alpha.
Pamoen had spent every day of those years sharpening herself into a weapon aimed directly at the moment she could prove her sire wrong, wrong for thinking she was weak, meak.
The throne itself, carved from living moon-oak by pixie artisans centuries before the war, still stood at the far end of the chamber. Its branches had withered since the Apex took possession, leaves curling black and brittle.
Pamoen refused to sit upon it. She stood instead at the foot of the dais, arms folded across her chest, waiting with the patience of a predator.
Footsteps echoed from the western archway, slow and deliberate. Pamoen felt her pulse quicken, then steady. She had imagined this reunion countless times, yet nothing prepared her for the reality of Sous stepping into the moonlight.
She wasn't alone. She came with Kara, with two others as well.
"Mommy?" Pamoen said, surprised to see her here.
Kara ran toward her daughter, hugging her tightly for having not seen her for years.
"What are you doing her" Pamoen asked.
"We're here to take you home," the Omega said but the younger Omega shook her head, stepping away.
"How can you say that when she doesn't want me home," Pamoen looking over Kara's shoulder at Sous.
Faye and Tany looked at one another then back at Sous. Pamoen pointed at Tany, remembering her from some time ago.
Footsteps were heard from the side and the women turned to see a young man coming forward, Xeno. Sous caught her breath as she watched the man come forward. She closed her eyes, smelling his scent, smelling both Zeynab and her own musk on him.
"Xeno!" She yelled.
Xeno said nothing. His golden eyes flecked with the same emotions as Sous', locked onto her face with an intensity that made the throne room's chill deepen.
"Do you know who I am?" Sous asked.
The Omega was quiet for a while until he answered. "I can smell who you are."
Sous stared at him. For a brief moment, her entire body locked rigid, not with the tension of a warrior, but the stillness of something far older, far deeper. Her nostrils flared slightly as she drank in his scent again, committing it to memory like a map she'd been denied for half a lifetime.
SNAP!
Suddenly, Kara, Tany, and Faye were gone, disappeared.
Sous's hands clenched into fists at her sides, her claws biting into her own palms as she spun sharply, her boots scraping against the marble shards.
The throne room stretched empty around her, no whisper of fabric, no echo of retreating steps. Only Xeno and Pamoen stood before her.
"You're very good at abandoning your children," Xeno said.
"I LOOKED EVERY WHERE FOR YOU!" Sous screamed out.
"You looked everywhere for him but you looked no where for me," Pameon said. Sous didnt know what to do, what to say. She felt ashamed at what happened with both of them.
Xeno's shoulders twitched first, a ripple beneath his tunic like muscles remembering a shape they'd been denied too long. Then his spine arched, tendons snapping taut as his jaw.
CRACK!
No scream accompanied the transformation, just the wet crunch of realigning bones and the whisper of fur erupting from skin.
Xeno's attack unfolded in absolute silence, his claws carving the air where Sous' throat had been a heartbeat before as she twisted aside.
Sous backpedaled across the ruined pixie mosaics, her own blue magae erupted from her hands but she aimed to not cause her eldest son.
His fangs grazed Sous' forearm as she twisted, drawing black beads of blood. She countered with a sweeping kick that shattered marble where his paws had been, forcing space between them in the wreckage of pixie craftsmanship.
His next lunge wasn't silent. The growl ripped from his chest vibrated through the broken tiles beneath their feet, deeper than any unmatured Omega should produce. Sous barely pivoted in time, his claws shredding the sleeve of her battle-worn jacket instead of her jugular.
She struck mid-dodge, her elbow smashed into his ribs.
CRUNCH!
Xeno staggered, wheezing blood-flecked air as his furred side caved inward. Sous followed through, her claws raking down his flank. Strips of fur and flesh peeled away, scattering droplets that sizzled where they hit the moonlit marble.
SMACK!
Sous felt a hard kick to the face that sent her flying back several feet. She looked to see Pamoen standing before her in her fighting stance.
The Alpha wiped the blood from her mouth and smiled.
Sous shifted her stance, knees bending slightly, arms loose at her sides, a posture that could erupt into violence or stillness with equal readiness.
Pamoen mirrored the movement, her claws glinting under the fractured moonlight filtering through the destroyed stained glass ceiling. Between them, Xeno staggered upright, his ribs knitting together audibly, golden eyes never leaving Sous' face even as fresh blood matted his fur.
"Tsk," Sous sounded off. He was stitching himself together like Doureena did in her fight against her at age 10 or 11.
Xeno's ribs realigned with wet pops, the sound grotesquely loud in the hollowed-out throne room. His fur stood on end along his spine, each hair quivering with barely restrained violence even as his wounds sealed themselves shut.
Pamoen struck first, a blur of silver claws aimed at Sous' neck. The Alpha barely pivoted in time, feeling the wind of the slash kiss her throat as she countered with an elbow aimed at Pamoen's temple.
The younger Omega ducked, rolling under the blow, and came up with a vicious kick to Sous' ribs that sent her skidding back across the shattered pixie mosaics.
Xeno lunged in perfect synchronization with Pamoen's recovery, his golden form a blurred streak of claws and fangs. Sous barely twisted aside, his fangs catching only air, but the movement put her directly in Pamoen's path. Pamoen's claws carved crimson lines across Sous's collarbone as she twisted away, the scent of iron flooding the throne room.