Every step to the clinic felt heavier, like eyes were on his back. Maybe they were. Maybe he was already too late.
The clinic was quiet—too quiet.
Riven sat on the leather chair, jaw locked as the doctor prepped the scanner. He'd known this man his whole life, yet even here, even now, he felt no safety. Only the crawl of suspicion.
"Relax," the doctor murmured, but the word made his skin prickle. He didn't relax. He couldn't.
A thin needle slid into his arm. Vials filled, machines hummed. The room smelled sterile, sharp—like bleach and iron.
The doctor studied the readout, brows furrowing. He adjusted the scanner. Checked again. His silence lasted too long.
Riven's chest tightened. Say it. Just say it.
Finally, the doctor looked up.
The room smelled faintly of antiseptic and steel. No windows, no witnesses. Just the steady hum of machines tracking things Riven didn't want tracked.
The doctor adjusted his glasses, eyes flicking to the monitor before settling on him. Too calm. Too measured. "Your results are… unusual."
Riven's jaw tightened. "Unusual how?"
The man hesitated, choosing his words like landmines. "Your pheromone signature isn't stable. It isn't just stronger than your peers—it's shifting. Sweet one moment, sharp the next. Inconsistent."
Riven's stomach twisted. He'd expected something, but not that. "So what does it mean?"
"It's called Pheromone Dysregulation," the doctor said finally. His tone was low, cautious, like he wasn't sure the walls could be trusted. "Rare. Dangerous. Your body's scent output isn't following its natural rhythm. Instead, it's… misfiring. Reacting as if you've already bonded—or as if you're in heat."
"That's impossible," Riven snapped. "I haven't—".
"How can a Pheromone signature be changed. I haven't heard of anything like that." Riven tried so hard to deny what he just heard from his grandfather's doctor.
The doctor didn't argue. He only whispered: "Then tell me, Riven—who did this to you?"
Riven couldn't force the words out. His grandfather might trust this doctor. He didn't. Not when his siblings and cousins had shaken hands with the man, shared secrets in the same office. That tie alone made him dangerous.
If the doctor asked the wrong questions? If he filed one report in the wrong drawer? If he let one phrase slip over dinner, a casual remark passed to the wrong ear, Riven would be exposed. His scent. His weakness. His body betrayed him in ways he couldn't explain.
The walls suddenly felt too close. The faint antiseptic bite in the air stung his throat, clinging like a warning. Even the steady tick of the clock above the door sounded like a countdown.
What if this wasn't a consultation at all? What if his grandfather had already told the doctor to test him, trap him, confirm suspicions? What if they were all waiting outside, listening, ready to pounce the second he admitted it?
No. He couldn't trust anyone. Not here. Not ever. Not when the wrong word could turn into a knife.
"Something triggered it. Trauma, forced exposure, maybe even an incompatible contact." He tapped the chart. "Whatever happened to you in that ballroom… it destabilized your system."
Riven swallowed hard. Images surged up unbidden—heat, lips on his skin, the way his body had betrayed him in the dark.
The doctor leaned in, voice dropping to a warning. "Listen carefully. If this continues, your pheromones could collapse into chaos. You'll smell like prey one day, predator the next. And to the wrong people, that will read as weakness. Defect."
Defect. The word landed like a knife. He could already hear his brothers saying it, his cousins smirking as they tore him apart piece by piece.
Riven forced his voice steady. "So how do I fix it?"
The doctor looked at him for a long moment, then lowered his gaze.
"There's no cure. Only management. Suppressants, isolation, or…" The doctor paused, as though the next words were too heavy to say. "A stabilizing bond."
Riven's chest tightened. "A bond."
"With someone whose pheromones can anchor yours. An Omega." The doctor's voice was calm, measured. "You'll have to tell your family. The sooner you find an Omega with at least ninety-percent compatibility, the sooner this… defect can be contained."
Defect. The word cut through him like a blade.
Silence pressed in. The machines hummed steadily, but in Riven's ears, it sounded like a countdown. If the doctor knew, how long until his family did? How long until they branded him broken?
He could already see it—his eldest brother, smirking with that cold, practiced superiority: An S-Class Alpha? More like a cracked blade. His cousins circling like wolves, tearing at the flaw in his armor, waiting for the chance to drag him down. They'd call him defective. Diseased. Unfit to lead. They'd whisper that his strength was a lie, and the family would listen.
And worst of all—his father. Not anger, but disappointment. Cold, measured, final. A single glance enough to slice him into nothing.
The irony twisted in his gut like poison. To survive, he had to bond with the one thing he despised. An Omega. The legacy of his mother's disgrace chained to him like a curse—and now the cure demanded he embrace it. The world had a cruel sense of humor.
The doctor slid a datapad across the desk, fingers steady. Too steady. "You wanted answers. Now you have them. The real question is—what will you do to keep this secret?"
Riven's head snapped up, eyes burning. That's the question, isn't it? How to bury this before anyone else could dig it out. How to keep the blood in his veins from betraying him. He pictured them again—smirks, sneers, hands reaching, claws sinking in. They wouldn't just strip his title. They'd dismantle him piece by piece, make him watch as they paraded his failure through the halls. And he could do nothing, because the moment they knew… it was over.
The datapad gleamed between them, waiting. But Riven didn't see it. He saw a knife. A blade sharp enough to cut throats. To silence secrets before they spread.
And in that moment, he knew—this wasn't about treatment. This was survival.