Unedited.

Blood was rushing to my head, making me dizzier than I already felt. All my senses had dulled down and for the moment my brain was only focusing on the perceptions coming from my skin. I could barely hear the sound of water splashing against my flesh mostly because my mind was preoccupied with the task of tracing the pathways of numerous water droplets clinging onto my clothes for dear life before eventually landing on the marble near my feet.

"Thea..."

Amongst the chaos run by countless droplets dripping down my body, a distant sound reached my buzzing ears. I squinted my eyes, urging myself to hear clearly but I was too distorted to focus on anything but the hands wrapped around my body. The hot touch that had been gripping me my by waist had abruptly turned cold. My core temperature was rising. Something was happening to me.

"Are you..."

A soothing voice ringing inside my head was trying to talk to me, but I was too feverish to even understand what was happening to me.

'Am I in...'

"... Okay?"

'Heat?'

By now I had fallen limp in my benefactor's arms.

"Thea..."

With a sudden jerk the person holding me drew me impossibly close and engulfed me in a bone crushing embrace.

As the urgency in his embrace seeped into my core, my eyes opened wide with realization. I was going into heat.

"Snap out of it, Thea!"

'I'm up! I'm up!'

"Alpha Erebus?"

The first thing I heard after recovering from almost slipping into a heat spell was the sound of Erebus' pack doctor.

The right side of my face was pressed flat into Erebus' rock-hard chest. I was drenched to my core, my eyelids parted wide and my mouth shaped into an 'O', I probably looked like a wet cat.

"Are you in the shower Alpha Erebus?"

The faint tapping of footsteps accompanying his grave voice had stopped. He sounded closer than before; he was probably standing at the doorstep of Erebus' room.

Trying to shuffle as less as possible, I detached myself from Erebus' torso in an attempt to look at his expressions, only to find him already staring back at me. As Erebus blinked and reopened his eyes, the scared look he had been harboring in his gaze disappeared. He was in work mode again. He was no longer a person with a family. He was a lone king.

"If the sound isn't proof enough, you can get in to see it for yourself, Victor."

His lips were moving but his eyes remained glued to my face.

"I apologize for my inconsideration but I need to tell you this immediately, Alpha."

"Speak."

"Initially, I thought it was an outbreak of some unknown disease, but I was unable to isolate any abnormal microorganism from both the dead and alive creatures,"

'You managed to capture a live creature?'

"Mhm."

The answer seemed to be directed at both the doctor and myself.

"But once I started performing an autopsy on the dead creatures and sawed their skulls to take their brain out, I noticed an eerily similar pattern. All their brains had similar areas of atrophy... uh wasting."

Victor, the pack doctor, took a small pause for a moment before continuing with his speech,

"I examined their brain tissue under a microscope. Besides gross wasting, all of them had the same peculiar microscopic spongy appearance in particular areas of the brain. It was almost like their brains were swollen, eaten from inside out, underwent wasting until only one part remained dominantly functional and that part controlled their-"

'Hunger.'

"Hunger."

Both Erebus and I had said the word on the same time.

"What do you think is the reason behind this?"

"Uh..."

I could hear the nervousness in the doctor's voice,

"I'm not sure, Alpha Erebus. I need more time and maybe some help from another pathologist to come up with a more plausible explanation. I just wanted you to be aware of my findings plus I needed to warn you about the possible route of transmission."

I could see Erebus getting agitated by Victor's stalling tone, but I couldn't really blame the doctor. He sounded like he hadn't slept in days.

"And that is?"

"I think it's the bite of an alpha."

Erebus sucked in a sharp breath as soon as Victor uttered those words making my eyebrows furrow.

'An alpha is doing this?'

"These creatures had no scent of a pack on them. They were in mid-shift as if no one had trained or told them they ways of doing it, but what all of them did have was an old scar resembling a pair of bite marks on different parts of their body."

'No scent of a pack... No family guiding them on the rules of shifting...'

"Rogues."

"I don't this it's an outbreak, Alpha. I think it's war."

Just as Erebus whispered that word in my head, Victor's words followed closely behind, sending a chill down my spine.

We knew what this meant, the rogues were gathering again, they were creating an army, and all three of us knew what had happened in our last war. We had lost our king.

"May I go now, Alpha?"

"Go."

The tapping of feet turned lighter and lighter until it was followed by the sound of a door closing before it disappeared altogether. In a few seconds, Victor was out of Erebus's house.

"Ha..."

The moment I heard the door close, I let out a breath that I had been holding for God knows how long.

"You... You told me the l-leader had escaped. Is he reassembling an army?"

I had asked that question in a quivering voice.

"You're shivering."

A frown settled on Erebus's forehead as he hurriedly turned the shower off before turning back to face me.

"Stay here for a second."

I watched as he drew the curtain back, stepping out and walking away while simultaneously unbuttoning and removing his wet shirt. I didn't know how I managed to stifle a gasp when I saw the muscles of his bare back stretching as he was detangling his arms from his white shirt. The water sticking to his skin was making his muscles appear more prominent as they glistened with the subtlest movement he made. I had no doubt that if I were to make him stand under the moonlight, he would look like a statue made of melted silver.

"Huh?"

I was still stuck inside my thoughts when a pair of strong hands gripped the sides of my waist making me sit at the edge of the tub before I felt a soft surface gently being rubbed against my head.

As I blinked back in surprise, my gaze fell on the warm fuzzy towel draped on my shoulders while Erebus diligently massaged my head with its corner.

"You're back to family mode."

"What?"

Erebus' hands paused midmovement as he heard me say this.

"You know how you turn all serious in front of your pack in stark contrast to how gently you treat me, I've decided on calling it your family mode."

I playfully booped Erebus's nose as I said this.

I was trying to lighten up the mood. It seemed like Erebus' didn't want to talk about the Rogue Leader at the moment and I didn't think pressuring him into telling me all the details was a good idea. I believed he'd tell me things on his own, at the right time.

"Do you think I can be a family man?"

The question had come out of nowhere.

I raised my eyebrows in surprise as I saw Erebus looking my way expectantly. He was asking me this in all seriousness.

"I think you're already one."

This time I had lightly nudged his head with mine, just like how he used to do to me in his wolf form.

"How can you say that? I-"

I watched silently as he paused midsentence to correct himself immediately,

"We... We don't have that yet..."

I was sitting at one end of the bathtub and he was towering over me with his tall built, he could dominate me in any way possible yet he this large werewolf was stammering to find the right words in front of a girl who couldn't even shift.

"Have what yet?"

I innocently tilted my head to the side as I asked him this. I think I had an idea about what he was hinting at.

"Children."

This word he mumbled was followed by a faint blush creeping up his neck, bringing life to his sunken cheeks before settling down on the tip of his ears. He had been looking directly at me through all of our conversation but now all of a sudden he had everted his gaze and was now staring at the towel he had placed around my shoulders.

"Do you want children of your own?"

"I don't think I deserve to." His tone had switched back to the usual grim one he preferred using, "You can wear the bathrobe there after drying yourself up."

As I saw him walking out of the bathroom, I knew I needed to say something to reassure him. He had finally opened up a bit about this concept of mating. I wanted him to explore this possibility a bit more.

"I think you'll be a great father."

He had almost reached the doorstep when I said this out loud making him stop in his tracks.

"How so?"

He seemed genuinely curious as he turned his head a bit to stare at me inquisitively.

"I've seen how you treated your pack and how much impact you had on them despite being absent for such a long time. You cherish your responsibilities. You'll be great with your kids too."

By the end of my reply, he had turned his head back to the front.

"R..."

"What?"

He had his back to me and it was making it difficult for me to understand what he was whispering under his breath.

"Our."

Saying this, he swiftly walked out of the bathroom, leaving the door ajar behind him.

'Our?'

As I got up to remove my damp clothes, It dawned on me what he meant to say.

"Our children!"

The expression had left my lips in the form of a loud squeal.

"Don't be loud, Thea. Someone will hear you."

I was smiling ear to ear while trying to tie his giant rob in the front when I heard his voice resonating inside my head. I wanted to tease him a bit.

"You may become a good father but currently, you're a very bad daddy!"

Instead of whispering back I had once again voiced my thoughts out albeit a bit low this time.

"Stop it, Thea."

Walking towards the mirror, I passed a hand through my dark locks, trying to pry the wet locks away from my face before gargling with some mouth wash.

"Daddddy."

I said this in a singsong voice as soon as I finished spitting the mouth wash into the wash basin.

"Don't."

"Oh, daddy."

Passing one last look in the mirror, I whirled around to walk out of the bathroom.

"I'm ready, daddy!"

I was laughing while saying this but as soon as I stepped inside the bedroom my smile dropped, my face quickly morphing into a look of terror as I felt a strong arm wrap around my waist, lifting me off of the ground and slamming me into the wall behind while a familiar voice asked,

"Are you, baby?"

Possible smut in the next chapter. I wanted to add some in this one but I got a bit sick and it  became near impossible to continue writing this chapter. I wrote this with a dead mind.

I'll try updating the next chapter in 2-3 days!

Love you all! ❤️