Sungu’s on his way to the lake to have a quick dip before he turns in when the he sees it.

The
tent flap is pushed open and Wangho steps out, a fur wrapped provocatively around himself.
Sungu doesn’t need to see to know it’s Wangho on another one of his conquests, running
around sleeping with all the Alphas in the vicinity.

Wangho leans up on the tips of his toes to kiss the Alpha goodbye and Sungu looks away. In
the past, he would’ve tried to see who it was, tried to figure out who Wangho had spent the night
with this time, but now he’s numb to it. He doesn’t want to know who Wangho slept with, who
had the privilege of holding Wangho close and taking pleasure with him.

He walks away, towards the lake, unaware that Wangho had glanced over at the very last
second to see him skulking away, heart sinking.

The next morning, Sungu wakes up to chanting. He pulls on a shirt to look halfway presentable
and walks out of his tent, squinting at the sunlight. There’s a group of people standing in a
circle, still chanting. Sungu rubs his eyes with his fists tiredly, walking up to a familiar face.

“What’s going on?” He asks.

Jaeha turns to look at him, bright eyed and chirpy in the morning. He reaches up to flatten
Sungu’s hair for him, sighing. “Kyungho just asked Wangho for permission to court him and
everyone’s chanting for Wangho to say yes.”

Sungu stiffens then, fully awake. He turns his gaze to the boy in the middle of the circle, whose
face is flushed pink from the attention that he’s getting. He looks flattered, almost, and Sungu
clenches his hands into fists.

“I need some time to think about it,” He hears Wangho say. “I’ll give you my answer tomorrow
night.”

Sungu watches as Wangho, pink faced, walks away from the crowd. Everyone’s looking a little
disappointed that no courting came through, but they seem hopeful that it’ll happen anyway.

“You’re going to draw blood if you use continue like this,” Jaeha says, uncurling Sungu’s
clenched fists. He’d had them clenched so tight that there were crescent shaped marks on his
palms from his fingernails. Jaeha sighs and shakes his head. “Why don’t you just go ask him for
permission to court him if you like him so much?”

“Because he doesn’t like me,” Sungu replies, skulking back to his tent. Jaeha follows, even
though he’s not his Omega. “You know that.”

“No,” Jaeha retorts, voice sharp. It’s so unlike him that Sungu looks up to blink at him in
confusion. “No, I don’t know. And neither do you. You think he doesn’t like you because he
hasn’t asked you to sleep with him. Well, is he accepting courting bracelets from the other
Alphas that he’s slept with? No! He isn’t! You have ​no idea​ whether or not Wangho likes you!”

“I know he doesn’t, Jaeha,” Sungu says, lying down on his bed and covering his face with his
sheets.

“You’re so- ​Infuriating!​ ” Jaeha rolls his eyes, annoyed beyond belief at this point. “Fine. If you
want to sit here and cry in your own puddle of tears because of Wangho, then fine by me. I have
better things to be doing than trying to convince you otherwise.” He storms out, presumably to
go back to the tent that he shares with Gyeonghwan, leaving Sungu alone with his thoughts and
insecurities.

Sungu groans into his pillow.

It’s night by the time he finally gets his face out of his pillow. He’d fallen asleep overthinking, and
it’s a miracle that he hadn’t suffocated to death. His stomach is grumbling, but the storage shed
is probably closed, so he settles for going to the lake to wash himself off for the day.

The lake is his sanctuary.

It’s one of the brighter nights: No clouds in the sky and a full moon lighting up the forest around
him. It’s a relatively cool night as well, and Sungu forgoes wearing a shirt as he makes his way
towards the lake.

He’s just about to run straight for the leg when he hears someone humming. The sound and
tune are both familiar, and he steps past the clearing to see Wangho sitting on the ground,
leaning against the trunk of a tree.

His footsteps are not the lightest of the pack - especially with people like Wangho and Haneul
running around - but they’re light enough that Wangho doesn’t seem to have noticed his
presence. There’s no one around them, and Sungu doesn’t have any malicious intent, but it’s
dangerous to be out here alone at night and have the awareness of a newborn child.

“You’re alone,” Sungu states the obvious.

Wangho jolts out of what must have been a reverie, eyes wild as he glances around for the
source of the voice. He relaxes when he sees that it’s just Sungu, but there’s tension in his
shoulders, a wariness in his eyes that’s out of place.

“Is that a problem?” Wangho asks, eyeing him.

“It is when you didn’t even notice me come close,” Sungu replies. “I could’ve been a member of
an enemy pack and you wouldn’t have known it. You’d be dead by now if I were.”

Wangho sighs and hides his face in his arms, knees tucked up to his chest. Sungu stays silent
as well, thought of taking a dip in the lake all but forgotten. He just stands there, unmoving,
watching Wangho. His hair is dyed a dark shade of blond that suits him very well, Sungu thinks.
He wonders what it would be like to be able to run his fingers through Wangho’s hair, lulling him
to sleep.

He hears a mumble coming from Wangho’s direction after a while, and his head snaps towards
him in attention. “What?”

“Tell me to say no,” Wangho repeats, voice muffled with how his head is still buried in his arms.
“To Kyungho hyung.”

Sungu’s entire body stiffens when he hears the name ​Kyungho​, face clearing of all expression.
“What for?”

“He asked to court me,” Wangho informs, not knowing that Sungu had been there when the
proposal had occurred, that Sungu had almost drawn his own blood with how hard he had dug
his nails into his palms. “This morning. Tell me to say no, Sungu, and I will.”

Wangho’s eyes are beseeching, everything about his body language screaming for Sungu to do
what he’s telling him to do.

There’s a storm of conflict raging within Sungu. Why is Wangho asking him to tell him to say no?
He thinks back to that morning, how Wangho hadn’t given an answer straight away, and
hesitates. Jaeha’s voice rings in his mind: ​You have no idea whether or not Wangho likes you!

But his insecurities surge up the next second, drowning his hopes and eating away at his
confidence. If Wangho did like him, why had he never asked to sleep with him, then? He’d slept
with almost every Alpha except him.

He’s just using you​, a voice in his head whispers. ​He doesn’t like you. Why would he? Who
would like you, of all people, when they have all the Alphas vying for their attention?

Sungu falters, something sour - something like tears - clogging up his throat. He looks back
down at Wangho, who’s still staring up at him with wet eyes, begging.

“No-” He starts, stuttering. He backs away, and watches as Wangho’s face starts to fall. Hope
surges up but is just as quickly stomped out. He hears a sob tear from Wangho’s throat and
stumbles over a root, but whips around and runs.
Sungu gets woken up the next morning by a jug of cold water to his face.

He jerks out of bed, sputtering. Some of the water had gone up his nose, causing him to choke.
He looks around wildly, bewildered, to see Haneul standing next to his bed, holding said jug in
his hands.

“What was that for?” Sungu shouts, shaking his head to get his wet fringe away from his eyes.

“You,” Haneul starts, looking angrier than Sungu had ever seen him. “You fucking ​imbecile​!”

Sungu’s jaw drops. While it wasn’t rare for Haneul to curse, for him to look this angry - and he
looks ​furious,​ more so than Sungu had ever seen him. Cliche as it might sound, the term ​if looks
could kill​ had never rang truer in Sungu’s mind. He’d be dead three times over by now if it were
literal.

“What?” He asks, perplexed. He sees Sanghyeok, Haneul’s Alpha, sitting on his chair, legs
crossed and trademark kitten smirk on his face. Something about his expression sounds alarm
bells in Sungu’s head. “What did I do? I didn’t take your underwear, I ​swear,​ that was
Sanghyeok hyung, remember?”

“​Who the fuck cares about my underwear right now? ​ ” Haneul shouts. Sungu flinches back at the
intensity of the exclamation, eyes widening in fear. He scoots back a little, glancing at
Sanghyeok in desperation. The only response he gets is Sanghyeok’s smirk widening even
more, as he leans forward to put his chin on his palm and watch. “Wangho’s been in Bumhyeon
hyung’s tent crying his eyeballs out for the past night, you ​idiot​!”

Sungu stiffens at the mention of Wangho, turning his head away from Haneul and glaring
defiantly at the side of his tent. “What does that have to do with me?”

Sanghyeok’s smirk widens into a grin as Haneul screams and launches himself at Sungu.

Sungu, not expecting it, topples off of his bed. His head almost hits the ground but he lands
heavily on the tarp of his tent instead, tugging the entire structure off of its pegs.

“You’re such a fucking idiot!” Haneul yells, drawing his arm back and punching Sungu in the
face. “Why do you keep hurting him when you love him?”

“It’s not like he’s a saint, either!” Sungu fires back, trying his best to throw Haneul off of him. For
someone so thin, he’s a lot heavier than Sungu expected. “He’s the one who’s been going
around sleeping with the other Alphas and he-”
“And he ​what​?” Haneul asks, arm already pulled back again.

Sungu looks away, then, almost ashamed of what he’s going to say next. It’s something that
he’s never told anyone except Jaeha, and even then that was an accident. It’s all his insecurities
bundled into one reason. “He’s never asked me.”

Haneul, who had been faltering a little when Sungu’s face had fallen, punches him again.

“​What​ were the both of you thinking?”

Haneul and Sungu are both kneeling on the ground, sitting back on their heels, heads bowed.
The elders of the pack are staring at them in disbelief, some with disappointment and others
laced with anger.

“You are comrades, brothers-in-arms. How could you start a fight with each other? You even
took an entire tent off of its pegs.”

“It was my fault,” Haneul mumbles, eyes downcast. “I was the one who started the fight.”

“Would you care to explain ​why​?” Junggyun asks, eyes harsher than either of them had ever
seen them. Even when they screwed up a hunt or were defiant, Junggyun usually just glared at
them with a tenth of the ferocity that he was now.

They both kept silent, unwilling to share the reason. How were they supposed to tell the elders
that they were fighting because of a courtship proposal? Courtship proposals were not to be
trifled with, an ancient tradition that had been passed down from their ancestors. To mess
around with it was enough to get you kicked out of the pack.

“We’re sorry,” Sungu says softly. “It won’t happen again.”

“You’d better ​make sure​ it never happens again,” Byunghyun is the one to say this time. He’s
usually more of the father figure amongst the elders, the type to go ‘I’m not angry, I’m
disappointed.’ so to see him this furious is terrifying in itself. “Got it?”

“We understand,” They answer simultaneously.

“Go now,” Yunsung says, waving his hand.

The two of them scramble to their feet, almost racing out of the elders’ tent. It always sucks to
get in trouble with the elders, but this time it’s definitely their fault so they can’t even bitch about
it to anyone. It’s already late evening, a testament to how long they had spent inside the elders’
tent with the sun having already set.

“Hey,” Sanghyeok slinks out of the shadows, smirk on his face like always. “Got yourself into
huge trouble this time, didn’t you?”

Haneul huffs at him but steps close to him anyways, letting Sanghyeok wrap an arm around his
shoulders. Sungu watches them, feeling a little bitter.

“You know,” Sanghyeok says just as Sungu is about to turn away from them to try to put his tent
up again, or try to convince someone to let him bunk with them until the next day since it’s going
to be hell to try to put it up without any light. “There’s a reason that Wangho never asked to
sleep with you.”

Haneul turns his glare on Sanghyeok, who shrugs at his Omega. “He’s never going to realize it
if we don’t tell him, you know. Then we’ll have to deal with him moping for the rest of our lives
because Wangho’s going to accept Kyungho’s courtship proposal.”

The younger boy sighs and nods in agreement. While he would’ve liked to keep Wangho’s
secret - if you could call it that - he was done watching the both of them mope because neither
of them could keep up a conversation with the other long enough to communicate anything of
substance.

Sungu’s listening intently, almost wanting to yell at the two of them to just ​tell him​ the reason.
“What is it?” He finally asks, losing his patience.

Haneul redirects his glare back on Sungu, and it still weirds Sungu out. Haneul is usually so
happy and amicable that to be the focus and target of his anger is something Sungu has never
experienced. Sanghyeok sighs and nudges Haneul, who glances up at his Alpha and sighs
again, softening his gaze. “He’s never asked to sleep with you because he thinks you deserve
more than that. He doesn’t want you to sleep with him because he’s an attractive Omega
throwing himself at your door, either. He wants all or nothing.”

“And he- He couldn’t have told me this?” Sungu fires back, bewildered. All this time, he had
taken Wangho’s decision to never ask him as a testament to the fact that Wangho had no
interest in him whatsoever. It was why he often got into arguments with Jaeha about it.

“The same way you couldn’t have just told Wangho your feelings for him?” Haneul shoots back,
voice edging on vicious. He steps forward, almost as though forgetting that they had just been
warned about fighting again. “You didn’t see Wangho last night, Kang Sungu. You didn’t see
how despondent he looked.”
Sanghyeok doesn’t say anything, just guides Haneul away from Sungu lest he let his anger get
the better of himself again and pounce onto Sungu. Sungu’s left frozen where he stands, staring
into the distance but not seeing anything. Haneul’s words are echoing in his mind, again and
again, that Wangho thought that he deserved more than a casual fling.

Wangho​ thought that. Wangho ​likes h

​ im.

The realization dawns on him suddenly, and he bolts. The elders’ tent is rather far away from his
own, considering he was still one of the younger Alphas, and it takes him at least a minute,
sprinting at full speed, to get to his collapsed tent. He rummages in the mess that is his
belongings, desperate to get to the wooden box that he kept on the highest shelf.

“Where is it, where is it?” He mutters, frantic. When he finds it, he forces it open and retrieves
the bracelet within.

It’s made with leather of a boar that Sungu had taken down, skinned and cured by himself. He
had braided it, all the while thinking of Wangho wearing it some day. Back then, when he had
just presented as Alpha, all he thought of was giving it to Wangho, never thinking about the fact
that Wangho might not want to be his Omega. In the center of the bracelet is a piece of howlite,
carved and polished, bought from a travelling merchant. It hadn’t come cheap, Sungu having
had to trade an entire hunt’s worth of meat for it, but he had wanted it for Wangho anyway.

He stares at it for a couple of moments, reliving the time that he had spent making it only to
stash it away when Wangho started to sleep with other Alphas. He closes his palm around it
and swallows. Wangho likes him, Haneul had said.

He rushes to Wangho’s tent. It’s late, but not too late. Sungu understands Wangho enough to
know that he won’t be asleep at this time. The tent is dark and Sungu slows down as he
approaches it. Wangho’s asleep already, he thinks. Maybe he didn’t know Wangho as well as
he had initially thought.

He starts to walk back towards his collapsed tent, but something in the back of his mind is
nagging at him. ​No​, it says. ​Trust yourself. You know Wangho. You’ve wanted to be with him
since before the both of you presented. You ​know​ Wangho more than anyone. He’s not asleep.

“He’s not asleep,” Sungu whispers to himself. “He’s not asleep. If he’s not then where-”

I’ll give you my answer tomorrow night.

“Fuck.”

He rushes back towards the outer ring of tents where Kyungho’s should be. He’s never really
paid attention to where the other Alpha stays, not being close to him. “He’s friends with
Gyeonghwan hyung,” He reasons, rushing towards the one tent he knows the exact location of.
He comes to a halt right in front of Gyeonghwan’s tent.

“Hyung?” He calls, hesitant.

Gyeonghwan pokes his head out after a couple of seconds and stares at him. Sungu can smell
Jaeha’s unmistakeable cinnamon scent on him, and he makes a face. As much as he likes and
appreciates Jaeha, he ​really​ doesn’t want to know what he gets up to with Gyeonghwan.
“W-Where’s Kyungho’s tent?”

Gyeonghwan, with one eyebrow raised, tilts his head to a tent that’s three tents over from his
own. Jaeha’s head peeks out from just below Gyeonghwan’s, an impish smile on his face.
“Finally manning up, huh, Sungu?”

“Yeah,” Sungu breathes, so worried he doesn’t even respond to Jaeha’s obvious taunt. The
other boy softens at this, tilting his head the same way Gyeonghwan had. “Go. Good luck,
Sungu.”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay,” Sungu says, more to himself than to Jaeha this time, as he runs towards
Kyungho’s tent.

There’s no one in Kyungho’s tent, either, but when Sungu rounds the tent he’s met with a wall of
Wangho’s vanilla scent. Wangho’s hand is outstretched, wrist bared, and Sungu panics.

“No!” He shouts, and Wangho jumps, arm quickly shooting back to his side. Wangho looks
around, confused, eyes locking onto Sungu. His mouth immediately presses into a straight line,
and he looks like he’s trying not to cry.

“What do you want?” Kyungho asks, stepping in front of Wangho.

Sungu ignores him, talking to Wangho instead. He can’t see him, but he knows, at least, that
Wangho can hear him. “Say no,” He says, desperate. “You asked me to tell you to say no. I’m
telling you to say no, Wangho. Say no.”

Wangho stays silent, and Sungu chokes on a sob, voice cracking. “Please,” He begs. “Say no.”

Wangho steps out from behind Kyungho, looking at Sungu’s distraught face and glancing up at
Kyungho. The older Alpha is tight lipped, as though deciding if he should punch Sungu or not.

Sungu watches as Wangho turns back to Kyungho and closes his palm for him, rejecting the
courtship bracelet. “Someday,” Wangho starts, a little awkwardly, as resignation starts to dawn
on Kyungho’s face. “You’ll find someone who’s worthy of this bracelet. I’m sorry, hyung.”
In disbelief, Sungu can only watch, in a daze, as Wangho walks towards him, coming to stand in
front of him. He raises a trembling hand to Wangho’s face, as though to make sure that he’s real
and this isn’t a dream. A cry tears from his throat and he wraps his arms around Wangho’s
torso, dropping to his knees and sobbing into his stomach.

Wangho’s crying, too, Sungu can tell, from his shaking frame. He quickly gets up to wipe the
tears from Wangho’s cheeks, taking his own courtship bracelet out.

“Be my Omega?” He asks, voice thick with tears.

Wangho doesn’t reply verbally, just holds out his wrist, and it’s all the reply that Sungu could
ever need. He ties it around Wangho’s wrist, the dark of the leather contrasting against his skin
and the gem of howlite matching it. He smiles at it stupidly, then looks up at Wangho, who’s
blushing as he looks at the bracelet.

“I love you,” He says, for the first time.

Wangho looks up, eyes wide before they narrows into crescents accompanied by his signature
heart shaped smile. He throws his arms around Sungu’s neck, laughing, then whispering into
his ear: “I love you too.”