To You, Who Shines

AN: Oh man. I was banging out the chapter for patreon yesterday when cosmic forces decided to interrupt me. Like for instance my neighbours press-ganging me into joining the wake they were having? And then giving me a bunch of food that it turns out I'm intolerant to half of, so I was forced to spend a nice long time getting to know my bathroom. So yeah, sorry this one's a lil late lol

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“...What do you-”

“I mean, you like Lady Heston, do you not? And seeing as she allowed you to come see her during her heat, surely Lady Heston must like you as well, correct?”

“...Father-”

“And yet you what? You run away? You run away and don’t say a single thing to her until she suddenly comes looking for you a few days later? And instead of bringing her to the privacy of your room to talk things through, you bring her to the parlor and sit across from her?!”

“...Father you don’t understand-”

“What don’t I understand, daughter? What? Because to me it looks like my daughter ran away. It looks like she found out that the 'beta' that she was close to was actually an 'omega', and she didn’t know what to do with the feelings that that realization gave her. It looks like she doesn’t know what her instincts are telling her.”

“...”

Seeing how Eris slowly shut her mouth and lowered her head like someone who knew they’d done wrong, her father’s previously condemning face softened into something more akin to understanding.

“...Well, perhaps I hold some of the blame. After you manifested, I let your teachers handle this, instead of speaking to you alpha to alpha. I never expected to have to do this with you, out of all of my children, but…”

“...Hmm?”

Confused, Eris raised her head again, only to flinch when she looked into the overly fatherly expression that he was making, knowing that something must be wrong.

“Wait-”

“You see, my dear daughter... When an alpha and an omega love each other very much-”

“...Stop this.”

“-influenced by their affection for one another and the pull of each other’s pheromones, they will perform the act of 'mating', mingling their bodies together-”

“Silence!”

“-the alpha will bite the nape of the omega, leaving a scar called a ‘mark’, which permanently bonds them together as a ‘mated pair’-”

“Cease this right this instant!!!”

As if unable to take any more, Eris, with her face fully flushed like a rose, turned menacingly towards her father. Seeing in her eyes that this was truly the limit, he immediately backed away a good distance, clearing his throat with an apologetic look.

“Ahem. I see, so my daughter already knew about this subject. …My apologies.”

Though Eris still glared at him fiercely, letting out a breath that was only a shade off of a growl, she didn’t chase after him; For now it seemed that he hadn’t scratched her indignation enough for her to snap quite just yet. However, knowing that any trace of further teasing would lead to great danger, her father dropped all plans of it, deciding that it was finally time to get to the point.

“Eris.”

“What is it this time?”

Her voice was unsurprisingly still rough with anger, and she was quite obviously refusing to look at him. But as he watched her huff and finally put away her greatsword as if giving up on any further training, he could tell how rapidly she was cooling off, seemingly used to his antics.

“...How do you really feel? Towards Lady Heston, I mean. I can make all the educated guesses that I wish… but I’ve already thoroughly learned how foolish that can be without hearing directly from the person in question.”

His daughter, who’d grumpily crossed her arms and kept her back to him, suddenly glanced over to him in surprise at those words. It was a brief look, one filled with many swirling emotions. He almost wanted to stride forward and catch her face before she could turn away again, just to better understand what those eyes were trying to convey to him.

-But once again, his cowardice betrayed him.

Before he could make up his mind, she’d already turned away once more.

“...What a difficult question.”

The pair stood in silence for a few moments, quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Feeling the awkwardness build up, her father took a step forward, trying to reach his daughter’s side. However, like a butterfly dancing out of his grasp, Eris only glanced towards him with a sigh and quickly moved away, coming to sit slumpingly on the already long-cold chair that Siffia had once occupied.

Feeling rejected by her actions, her father merely stayed in place, fearing that she might just leave if he were to move again. Though it felt like a stone was trying to work its way up his throat, he tried once more to interact with his daughter in the only way that he had left.

“Eris-”

“As I said, it is a difficult question, father.”

With the clear intention of cutting him off, her voice rang out like a knife. However, when she looked over at him a moment later, the tired look in her eyes immediately diffused the tension left in the air.

“...Or perhaps it’s not such a difficult question. Perhaps I’m simply making it difficult.”

She looked so fragile, so weak, as she sat there and smiled softly, seemingly laughing at herself with a far away look. It was a defeated expression of which he’d only seen on her once before, back when she’d given up on everything that she'd once worked so hard for.

Remembering how quickly things had changed that day still haunted him. It was enough to make the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and his heart beat wildly. If he hadn’t promised to never fail his daughter like that again, then perhaps he would have already run away.

It was all he could do to force himself to speak.

“...What exactly do you mean?”

“Haa…”

Eris closed her eyes for a moment, looking as if she were reluctantly accepting something, before opening them again tiredly.

“To tell you the truth, father, I think I’m already too far gone.”

“...Hmm?”

The ominous words made the lump rising in his throat feel like it had finally come up to choke him. It was all he could do to hum a question to her.

“You see… Even I, so unused to the topic of love, can tell how deeply infatuated I am with her.”

“Ah-”

It took him a moment to remember the previous topic, what they’d been talking about before his fear had kicked in. It almost felt as if he’d get whiplash from how quickly the tension left him.

As he stood there reeling, Eris pulled up her knees, hugging them to herself as she perched on the edge of the chair, resting her head on them insecurely.

“...It’s like there’s some pull to her, something that I can’t seem to look away from, even back then… And the more I look, the more magnetized I become. ...I used to dislike spending time with others, and yet I look forward to every moment with her… I was like this even before I knew the truth, even back when I still thought that she was a beta. But now that I know… Now that I’ve smelled her pheromones, I-”

Her face crumpled, looking deeply pained. The way her hands clenched tightly around her calves showed how desperately she was fighting against something. And then, a moment later, her body suddenly relaxed, as if having given up.

“...As I said, I’m already too far gone.”