A kiss to the back of her neck closed Yui’s eyes. Then, the hands that had held her skirts released to take the ties that started just beneath her shoulder blades. She couldn’t imagine Bellona wearing a similar garment, but she had no difficulty loosening the corset-like bodice until it collapsed to the tops of Yui’s thighs. The drag of lips and the light graze of pointed teeth followed down her spine. A palm offered to her side assisted her in stepping free of the pile of frosting that the dress had become. Her legs weren’t long enough, even fully extended, to clear it all in one step. There, again, was Bellona’s mouth, seeking her skin with both delicacy and desire.

Her reverence emboldened Yui. “May I take off the coronet, my mate?” she whispered.

Instead of vocalising the answer, Bellona took the edges of the offending article in her thumbs and forefingers and raised it with a careful gentleness until Yui’s ears were free to flop down to her head again. She flung it across the room and Yui startled at the clangs of it bouncing against the corner walls. Almost with the same swing of her arm she snatched Yui’s chin and brought up her mouth for a kiss that stilled her breath. Raw strength and alpha scent, a heat searing through her that had been dampened for almost a decade. Bellona directed her with forceful tongue and Yui hung from her lips gladly.

Beneath her gown she had mere lace for her small clothes. Not that Bellona had missed any inch of her during the cleansing ritual. Bellona took her by the bare waist and walked her (carried her an inch off the ground) to the bed. The drapery was tied back to the bed posts on all sides. Their lips broke apart and Yui turned into her mate, desperately seeking reconnection. Bellona had already bent to meet her. This time she received only a soft kiss, sweet but not satisfying, and her mate’s mouth dipped past her jaw, trailing her scent all the way.

“No matter how far you are,” Bellona growled into her throat, shaking the skin all the way through. “Your scent has maddened me every moment since we met.”

“My scent?” Yui squeaked. She smelled of a herbivore omega, she smelled of rabbit, she smelled of her homeland. Nothing special or noticeable. Different, maybe. Although the First Princess was well-travelled. She’d marched into war, for goodness’ sake.

Bellona’s confirmation was a groan that sunk into the meeting of neck and shoulder, she mouthed at the skin there until it was sore and smarting. Her own heavy and intrinsically threatening scent remained in her lips’ wake. Thumbing Yui’s nipples, straining them up that little more, she murmured, “I have craved you like sunlight.”

“I still… I don’t understand why.” The words should please her, should flatter her, should not make her feel so unworthy. She shook her head and felt her braid crown loosening. The pleasure in her mate’s touch was confusing her. Already she was dampening. Like an eager teenager again!

Bellona halted her tease of Yui’s breasts. “I cannot put it into words, my mate. It is a feeling.” Her hands, wrapped over the round edges of Yui’s hips, shoved her back onto the bed. “Allow me to share the feeling.”

Yui scrunched herself up a little on landing, suddenly shockingly aware of how bare she had become while lost in the fog of an alpha’s toying. Bellona had no such shame. She shed her uniform like it was all in her standard routine. No flash or show. She didn’t need to perform, what she revealed with her last piece of clothing tossed aside almost got a gasp from Yui. All alphas had cocks, that wasn’t the shock that had struck her. And she had certainly seen one before – she had a child! Yui’s swallow got caught in her throat. Yuki’s father had nothing of the sort hidden in his breeches, though. It wasn’t the length and girth alone, it was the bulbous hilt.

The ghosting of Bellona’s fingers in the gap between her thighs widened it. Then her head threaded into the space. Yui curled inwards – for a better view of the alpha whose mouth was dipping lower and lower. A deep inhale shivered her fine hairs, Bellona drinking in her scent like a fine wine. A slit revealed her eyes rolling back a little before lashes fell.

The frills of the thin stripe of white cotton covering her was tugged aside and Bellona’s mouth met her, covering her back up possessively with a drag of her tongue that squeezed Yui’s knees together again. She was no match for the alpha, and soon she didn’t wish to be. Bellona lapped at her with a ferocity that sent bolts of pleasure in every direction through Yui’s body. Flicked her clit until she sobbed. Dug through her folds until her back ached from arching. Had anyone ever showed such lust for her? Such famishment? It made her legs quake all the way to her toes. Only when she screamed and twisted and kicked against the orgasm that crashed into her did Bellona unlatch. Her hands slide up the backs of Yui’s thighs, into her knee caps, and pressed her open, presenting her, twitching still, to the canopy above.

“Do you need further stretching?”

Asked so simply, yet it still embarrassed Yui. She shook her head. “I’ll be fine.” She’d done this before… a decade ago… it could not be so different.

Bellona held her in place for a moment, waiting for something else. Her patience passed and she withdrew a hand to align herself. Another hesitation. Bellona looked upon her. Yui smiled weakly. She must appear so fragile and pitiful splayed out beneath her. Bellona tilted forward and sunk, unimpeded, into Yui’s wet heat.

It was thick and throbbing and with every one of Yui’s out-breaths it inched deeper. She curled her fist into the bedding and squeezed shut her eyes, bringing all her focus into her core, onto relaxing around her… mate. It still thrilled her, the thought, or rather, the realisation that she was mated. At her age she had no expectations to find love again. Bellona’s hips met the back of Yui’s thighs. Was this love? Could it be? A warning thrust fluttered her lashes apart again.

“Does it ache, my mate?” With Yui bent in half beneath her weight, she swapped her hold to her waist, tracing Yui’s curves with her thumbs.

“It-” Yui gasped at the entire withdrawal of Bellona’s cock. “It’s-”

It filled her again in a rush. Yui squealed into the handful of bedding she had collected.

Bellona bowed herself to order directly into Yui’s ear, “Answer me, my mate.”

“Yes!” Yui bleated. “It- Yes! Please, more!”

The first chuckle that had ever escaped Bellona in Yui’s presence rumbled into her cheek. Pleasure burst inside of her with every thrust that accompanied it. The hands holding her waist journeyed upwards, stroking her sides, her breasts, her soft upper arms, settling over her wrists like shackles. There was no malice, no attempt to trap her, the hold was gentle. Yui squinted up at Bellona. Her mate’s expression was… relieved? Or perhaps deep in contemplation. When she dropped her nose to Yui’s hairline to breath her in again, her emotions were no longer visible to be decoded.

The drapery of the bed swung in jolted timing with the First Princess’ hunt for her release. Yui’s was teetering the edge, fizzing beneath her skin. Over and over. In and out. Filled to bursting. So close to falling apart on the end of her mate’s cock.

“Have you taken a knot before, my mate?”

“No,” Yui croaked. And she had not considered the possibility for a moment leading up to this one. She had lain with one man: Yuki’s father. He was no wolf or dog kin.

A hand to her belly pressed both firm and gentle. Pressure that pleasured her right through her womb. “Breathe.”

Yui obeyed. Before her lungs were full she felt a sudden stretch just inside of her. A swelling. A claiming. A sealing of her body with Bellona deep inside. The breath stuttered back out of her like the rattle of chains.

Bellona released her other wrist and wedged her fingers between the joining of their bodies, just beneath Yui’s furry hood, and pet her in slick-smoothed-circles. Shocks and sparks and surging tingles followed that were all too much for a little rabbit to endure while stuffed full and dripping. Her body snapped, squeezing everywhere. Wringing Bellona’s cock until it spilled and inflated.

―ǁ―

The king, shining from his exalted position at the head of the table, did not give Yui his gaze. All the better for all of them in her opinion. She had no energy for feuding. Despite hers and the First Princess’ early retirement to the bedroom, she’d gotten little sleep. Mostly on account of the massive knot that had held its guard of Bellona’s seed for what had felt like hours. It was impossible to doze off with such a thing pulsing and straining inside of one’s most delicate areas. Now, the affection that had come with it… Yui thought of Bellona’s stroking and petting and kisses… That was quite lovely. Although Yui did have a private theory that such touching actually prolonged the knot, as she was acutely aware of Bellona’s cock stirring inside of her when their fondling reached lustful levels.

Yui blinked the fog of reminiscence from her gaze and took in more of the scene before her. Bellona had requested, in the least amount of words possible, as was her way, that Yui accompany her to breakfast with the rest of the royal family. This was not something Bellona attended regularly that Yui could tell from her short time in the First Princess’ wing. Perhaps it was a mating tradition...

Their entrance had brought pause to the long table that held Bellona’s parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and a few Yui did not recognise from the family tree portraits she had been ordered to study. Jars sized to perfectly fit in Yui’s palm scattered the table, unopened. To the alpha carnivores sat around it, that was a morsel most likely. Bellona outstretched her arm, downward, halting Yui with a hand over her womb. They awaited something. Yui peeked up to her mate searching for a clue. Bellona stared ahead, locking stern gaze with her father. Tense, silent seconds passed. The king rose. The queen followed. In seconds the entire banquet table was on its feet. Once all were upright, Bellona retracted her hand.

There were two seats remaining and Bellona dragged the nearest out and gestured for Yui to take it. Yui did her best to appear graceful as she did, lowering herself with swaths of skirts falling all around. The royal family sat with her.

“Congratulations again, niece,” said a man chewing bread smeared with meat paste.

Bellona ducked her head in thanks and took to pulling plates from the centre of the table for them to pick from.

The man spoke to Yui this time, waving his bread with a grin. “The duck is delicious.”

“Oh, I’m-”

“She’s a herbivore,” the woman at his side hissed.

“Not all herbivores restrict themselves from meat,” the queen reminded them all. She said it as though sharing an interesting tidbit, but the tension in her hands as she cut pieces from her own plate told Yui otherwise. “You will need to assimilate one day, First Mate, you may as well begin with a few bi-”

The cut of Bellona’s eyes to her mother halted the attempt to dictate to Yui. The king returned the look. Bellona restrained a growl though not well enough to still the rumble in her chest.

“Thank you, Grand Queen,” Yui offered politely. “I will certainly do my best.”

Bellona settled. Yui ate half-heartedly. The table returned to quiet chatter as it must have been before they entered.

Not a soul spoke to Yui for the remainder of the meal. A relief, really.