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From the corner where she stands, Lilith snorts, the sound testing my patience. “Yet, when we came upon you in the cabin, the two of you were engaged.”
“That’s because I’m incapable of carrying a pregnancy to term. But if I was, I wouldn’t come within a foot of his cock.”
“Seems you’d have to stand farther than a foot to miss it.”
Clearing my throat of the urge to throttle Lilith, I direct my attention back to the more reasonable, elderly woman. “Titus is what’s known as an Alpha. He’s a genetically superior breed.”
“Obviously.”
“Can you zip it? For one minute?” I rub my hand down my face, thoroughly irritated with this woman and the girl behind me who’s pulled my hair three times in the last five minutes. “He has incredible reflexes, can walk among Ragers. He’s not your average male--”
The older woman holds up her hands to silence me. “Wait. You say he walks among Ragers?”
“Yes,” I say, a thought striking me. “He’s known throughout the Deadlands as the God of Monsters.”
“A god … And who is it that worships him?”
My next response will either be intriguing enough to spare him, or will fast track him to a horrific death.
“The Ragers, of course.” Frowning, I tip my head. “You’ve seriously never heard of the Alphas?”
“I want to see this.” The dubious tone in Lilith’s voice is enough to make me want to test that left hook Titus taught me two days ago.
“As do I.” Freya waves Lilith over and whispers something in her ear, but no matter how much I strain to listen, I can’t make out a single word.
Eyes narrowed, Lilith makes a growling sound in her throat before exiting the cabin, and I set my attention back on Freya.
“What’s going on?”
“We’re going to test this.” With the help of the young girl who’s stopped fanning her, Freya gets to her feet and waves for me to follow. “Let’s see if your companion is indeed a god, as you say.”
I follow her out of the tent to where Titus stands waiting, the leash at his throat only goading my anger, particularly when it’s Lilith at the other end of it. Surely, he has to have a clue what these hyenas have in store for him.
The two of us follow after Freya and Lilith, with two more of their soldier women taking up the rear.
As the group leads us beyond the camp, I lean into Titus and lower my voice. “If you had any idea what these women intend to do, you’d surely find it in your heart to bend the rules.”
“I would suffer torture before I’d consider raising a hand to a woman.”
“Well, depending on your definition of torture ...”
Freya comes to a stop before what appears to be a dried up quarry that’s surrounded by walls of rock and stone. At the base of it, a hoard of Ragers, the biggest I’ve ever seen, pace in the small space where they’ve been corralled like cattle. Maybe a thousand of them. Or more, even. The sounds of their growls converge into a low humming that reminds me of a bees’ nest.
“What … the hell?”
“Sisters who became infected during our hunts. Seems the numbers are tipping out of our favor, as of late. More hives falling to infection, or at the hands of marauders.” Freya shoots me a sad sort of smile over her shoulder. “Finding a mate has proven fatal for some of us. We keep them fed with animal carcasses and, of course, the men we bring into the camp. But their numbers keep growing, and their appetite doesn’t seem to wane.” Waving her hand in dismissal, she nods toward Lilith, who removes the rope at Titus’s throat. “So … I understand you’re a god.” As soon as she says it, I can feel Titus’s stare boring a hole in my temple. “Prove it. Make your way down there and mingle with our girls. Arms tied.”
“You try anything tricky, and we’ll add one more to our collection.” Lilith taps her finger against the gun at her hip, and though her words seem directed at Titus, her eyes are on me.
Titus frowns down at the Ragers pacing in the quarry, who haven’t seemed to catch sight of us yet, and he huffs, as if he’s suddenly nervous.
As if he has any reason to be nervous.
At this point, I’m just glad he hasn’t disputed her and destroyed my plan.
Without a word, he makes his way down the path to the pit of the quarry and, once at the bottom, casts his gaze toward me. He strides toward the crowd of female Ragers, who hiss and growl at him, and stops on the periphery of the fence.
“Inside! If you will!” Freya’s voice carries down into the canyon and appears to stir the infected, whose excited twitching reminds me of a cluster of bugs crawling over each other.
