**The Monster You Made**
**Chapter 13: The Public Gift**
**Stiles**
The ballroom lights burned like judgment. Dozens of eyes—vampires, wolves, witches, every ally the Mikaelsons could summon—watched as I stood in the center with my three mates. Klaus sat rigid on his raised chair, Elijah and Kol beside him. The guilt roared the second the silence stretched. *You see, I slaughtered my entire family. You see, I looked at their bodies and felt nothing. You see, I woke up one day and became this.* The Hollow surged, greedy for the gray again.
The colored threads flared brighter under the pressure. Gold. Crimson. Midnight blue. They braided into visible ropes of light that wrapped around all four of us. I grabbed Hope first, crushing her against me. My mouth claimed hers with centuries of hunger and fresh remorse. She tasted like forgiveness I didn't deserve.
"If this is the test," I growled against her lips, loud enough for the entire room, "then watch what they do to keep me here."
My hands tore at her clothes. Fabric ripped. The bond answered with white-hot need. I didn't care who saw. The monster in me needed to claim what was his in front of the world so the guilt would shut up for five minutes.
**Hope**
The gold thread detonated the moment Stiles' fangs grazed my tongue. Every eye in the ballroom was on us, but the mate bond turned their stares into fuel. I felt Stiles' guilt spike—bloody memories of his slaughtered pack flooding the connection—so I bit him back, drawing his ancient blood and pushing pure hybrid fire down the golden strand.
"Feel me," I whispered fiercely, loud enough for Klaus to hear. "Not the gray. Not the dead faces. Us."
I dropped to my knees right there on the marble floor, taking him into my mouth while the room gasped. His hand fisted in my hair. Through the bond I felt Freya's magic rising and Hayley's wolf howling in approval. The triple bond glowed so brightly the entire ballroom lit up in our colors. The Hollow thrashed, but my love—raw, immediate, sexual—slammed it back down.
This was the gift. One man with three mates, claimed publicly so no one could deny it.
**Freya**
Midnight blue magic poured from me in visible spirals, weaving through the ropes of light so the entire audience could see the bond at work. Stiles' guilt was a hurricane inside the connection; I felt every flashback as if the slaughtered family were my own. I stepped behind him, pressing my bare chest to his back, my hands sliding over his skin while I poured centuries of control and desire into the midnight strand.
"Let them see," I said, voice steady and carrying across the silent ballroom. "This is what it takes. Blood. Magic. Love. The triple bond chose him the moment he walked in and monologued about boredom and shattered time. We kept it secret. We dragged his humanity back with everything we had. Now we keep it on the same way."
I sank my fangs into his shoulder while Hope worked him with her mouth. My magic amplified every sensation, feeding it back through the closed circuit. Hayley moved to Stiles' other side, claws raking red lines down his chest that healed instantly. The four of us became a living, glowing spectacle—bodies moving together, power and lust and devotion so raw the audience couldn't look away.
The Hollow screamed. I felt it try to flip the switch again. Our combined assault drowned it in color.
**Hayley**
Crimson thread burned hottest of all. My wolf was fully at the surface, eyes gold, claws out, fangs dripping. Klaus looked like he wanted to murder everyone in the room. Good. Let him watch what his daughter, his sister-in-law, and I were willing to do for our mate.
I shoved Stiles down onto the wide marble steps in front of the throne so the whole ballroom had a perfect view. "You wanted proof?" I snarled toward Klaus. "Here it is."
I straddled Stiles and sank down onto him in one brutal motion, taking him deep while Hope moved to his mouth and Freya kept her magic and fangs buried in his neck. The bond flared into a blazing triangle of light—gold, crimson, midnight—wrapping tighter with every thrust, every moan, every shared drop of blood. I rode him hard, claws digging into his immortal chest, pushing every ounce of feral love and possessive need through the crimson strand.
His guilt tried to rise again. I felt the memories clawing at him. I growled loud enough to echo off the walls and bit his throat, reopening the mate mark. Blood spilled. The four of us drank and touched and fucked in perfect sync while the Hollow was beaten back by sheer overwhelming sensation.
This wasn't private. This was declaration.
**Stiles**
The guilt fractured under the weight of them.
*You see, I killed them all.*
The thought tried to repeat. It died when Hope's thighs tightened around my head, when Freya's magic lit every nerve on fire, when Hayley clenched around me with wolf strength and love so fierce it hurt.
I roared as release tore through all four of us at once. The colored ropes of the mate bond exploded outward in a dome of light that blinded half the ballroom. The Hollow was slammed so deep into submission I wasn't sure it would ever rise again. For one perfect moment the guilt went quiet, drowned in gold, crimson, and midnight blue.
When the light faded, I sat up with all three of my mates still tangled around me—naked, marked, glowing. I looked directly at Klaus, voice hoarse but steady.
"I woke up one day empty. I slaughtered everyone I loved and felt nothing. You saw what I was that first night. Now you see what they make me. The bond is a gift. It keeps the monster leashed. Try to take them from me again and I stop caring how many of you I have to kill while I feel everything."
The ballroom was silent except for heavy breathing and racing heartbeats.
Klaus stood slowly. His face was unreadable. For the first time since I arrived in New Orleans, he didn't attack.
He simply said, "The test… is noted."
But his eyes promised this wasn't over.
My mates pressed closer. The threads between us pulsed with satisfaction and renewed hunger. The guilt would return. The Hollow would test its cage again.
We would answer the same way every time—together, in color, without shame.