Sold to the Yiling Patriarch ✔️(a Yizhan Omegaverse AU Fanfic)

Lesson 8: Never Run From an Apex Predator

Outside Zhan's room, the hallway was so quiet, even Yibo's sneakers seemed to echo on the stone floor. He supposed no one else was awake as the sun was still up.

That thought sent him downstairs. Still, no one presented themselves. Which meant... no one to stop him.

He chose a side door off the kitchen and stepped out into the afternoon sun. It felt good on his face - warm and exhilarating. The smell of the tall pines beckoned to him, and he felt the urge to shift. 

The full moon would be in two days, and that was close enough. This might be his only chance. He stepped into the shadow of the house, stripped off his clothes, and shifted into his wolf form.

Then he ran full tilt toward the stone wall that circled the house - it really was a fortress - and leaped to the top before heading into the woods.

As he ran, he breathed in deep and felt his muscles respond to propel him forward. Even if one of the other wolves gave chase, he was sure he could outrun them. And the vampires would be house-bound until sunset.

He might actually escape!

To go where? his wolf asked. Don't get me wrong, I'm enjoying the run, but you've got no clothes and no money. We can't run all the way back to Gusu.

I can if I have to, Yibo said, feeling more confident than he had in weeks. He blindly picked a direction, knowing it hardly mattered so long as it got him down the mountain.

After an hour, he felt like he'd made good progress, so he stepped inside an empty cave to rest. As the sun was still up, he allowed himself to close his eyes.

***

When he opened them, he felt his heart drop through the floor. At the entrance to the cave, silhouetted against the dying light, stood the Yiling Patriarch.

How had he found him? How was he outside the fortress with the sun still up?

"Shift." One word, deadly quiet, and Yibo found himself standing naked in front of the man he'd been trying to escape.

"How-"

"You have questions?" Zhan's voice was low, each word dripping acid. "Pray tell, what questions can I, the four-hundred-year-old Patriarch of Yiling and all the allied vampire clans, answer for you - a lone juvenile wolf with no clan, no fortune, whose very life is forfeit outside of my protection?" 

Yibo gulped and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, also dropping his gaze from Zhan's mirrored sunglasses. He didn't want to see his own reflection right now.

"You seem to have forgotten you belong to me." 

Zhan's footsteps came closer, then stopped, and Yibo heard him sniff the air. Did he sense danger? Yibo's nerves already had him trembling. Then he realized no one was more dangerous than the one who was already here.

Two more steps brought Zhan directly in front of him, but Yibo didn't raise his head. He couldn't. But he did suck in a nervous breath, and with it came the scent of fir trees and night-blooming jasmine. 

Strange, he thought. He sniffed deliberately this time and grew more confused. It was a wolf scent. A good one - one that made his mouth water and his body suffuse with heat.

Was there another wolf nearby?

Zhan grabbed his chin and forced him to raise his gaze. Then he removed his sunglasses, slipping them into his jacket pocket. 

And Yibo could see that around his dark irises bloomed a ring of glowing red. Alpha red.

Yibo's lips parted, his nose twitched, and he began to pant. "You? Wolf!?!" He couldn't make sense of what he was seeing.

"My hybrid status is not widely known," Zhan said. "But you've forced me to show you. I don't like to be forced, Yibo."

"I..." Yibo's voice trailed off into a whimper and he bit his lips. God, why did he have to smell so good right now? That scent was making him crazy.

"It's almost the full moon," Zhan said. "So I can walk in daylight like any wolf. And my alpha presence is stronger."

No shit, Yibo thought.

"I thought it only fair to tell you since I'm going to use it against you."

"What?" Fear made his voice squeak.

"Turn around and bend over."

His body obeyed the alpha over his mind's screaming objections, and he found himself grabbing his ankles and trying to stop shivering so that he wouldn't fall over.

He heard Zhan drop to his knees behind him and couldn't imagine what he intended.