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He kneeled beside me and pressed his head to the packed earth of the longhouse floor. “I fell. I am yours, Rada, no matter if you want me or hate me. I serve you. I love you, though it means I will burn in Her hells for eternity after I die.”

My heart was racing so hard, I wondered if it might fly out of my chest. “Is love a sin, then?” For the first time, I examined him openly, the way I used to when he was asleep or turned away. Like all of my mates, he’d lost weight and wore dark circles beneath his…

What in the hells had I just thought? Like all of my mates.

My wrist fell to my side as I sat in shock for a moment. A few drops of blood spilled outside the bowl. Alexios tsked and straightened from his bow, in that fluid motion he’d perfected from years of praying to the Goddess.

He took my arm in one hand and tenderly held it over the bowl again, scooping up the spilled droplets from my arm with one fingertip. He moved as if he would wipe the blood off on his shirt, but I reached over with my other hand and grabbed his wrist. Then, slowly, I brought his fingertip to his lips and pressed it there for a moment, until his tongue crept out, and he licked the blood away.

“I loved you, too, Lex,” I whispered, knowing the Omegas were listening. It didn’t matter. I’d loved him in secret for too long. “I loved you, and wanted you, and would have given anything to know how you felt.”

“But now?”

I’d felt my own heart break more than once, beginning when my mother left me long ago. I’d never seen a heart break, though. His dark, expressive eyes showed me exactly what was going on in him.

“It’s too late,” I whispered. I wasn’t sure he would survive the next two days, but I knew if he was at my side, he would die. I couldn’t save the others, the Alphas who were fated for me. But this Beta, who embodied honor and purity, no matter what he said about breaking vows to the Goddess, had to stay alive when the final ash from the battle had settled.

He knew where all the Omegas were, all over the continent and beyond. He would be there for them, to keep them safe as Her lines were remade. He had never been just my friend, or just a Beta.

He was my strength.

“It’s too late.”

RADA

“Does it have to be your blood?” Alexios asked when the first bowl was full.

The sardines long gone, I chewed on the last withered carrot Mirrim had scrounged from somewhere. It had been two hours since Lachlan had gone to Lusca, and the Omegas were taking turns at the door to watch for his return. The fresh, salt air swirled around the room on a cool breeze, cleansing it somehow of the terrible scents.

Of course, that was easier now that the Omegas had decided to clean up for the journey ahead. The approaching escape had changed the mood in the longhouse drastically, and the air itself felt charged with hope. Of course, that may also have had something to do with the near-constant prayers Alexios had spoken over all the tonics I’d made.

“We’ll die clean, if we die,” one of them said as they carried laundry out the door. Somehow, they’d found old buckets and scrub brushes and were using the laundry water to scrub at the longhouse as well, though Rielle’s section remained untouched. I heard the children’s voices outside at one point, and even one short burst of laughter.

So many changes.

Some that were uncomfortable. The women all dipped into curtsies when they passed me, making the sign of the Goddess in my direction, their eyes moving from Alexios to me before they went back to work.

I asked Adiah what was going on. “From what the guards were shouting, the Alphas on this side of the island have turned up dead, except for Frol. For today, we can be clean.”

I knew more than a few thought they’d drown in the attempt, and I couldn’t assure them that wouldn’t happen. It might. If Lusca was as weak as Lachlan said, who knew if he’d have the power to keep them afloat?

The Omegas had surrounded Lachlan, but they treated Alexios differently. Not like he was some lapsed priest who should be ashamed of his earlier words, though. Each time one of them passed by us in the longhouse, they made the sign of the Goddess to him and sometimes joined in with his prayers, learning the words to the ones they didn’t already know quickly.

Mirrim had been the only one to stare with anything approaching censure, but when he’d quickly used a flint and some dry palm fronds to make the small, clean fire in the center of the room, and she saw the color of the flame—a blue-white that was closer to moonlight than fire—she’d relaxed. When she listened to his prayers, she actually started smiling at him.

Two of the others approached him as he was stirring a second bowl of my blood with the available herbs over the fire. A deeper fire burned in the eyes of the older woman, Margit. “You’re Her priest.”

Alexios nodded slowly. “Not necessarily a good priest, but I’m the one She has here.”

“We want to be married. Mated, in Her sight.” She lifted her lover’s hand and kissed her reddened knuckles.

I swallowed, not certain what he might say. I’d never seen him preside over a mating or marriage, but he surprised me. After a few murmured instructions, he handed Adiah the stick to stir the mixture, then rose. “I’m honored to be chosen for the ceremony. Normally, you would be joined under the moon, in Her sight. But I believe She is here, in every moment. The temple I was raised in taught that She is fully present where Her children are. But She is closer than your own breath when you show love to another, and choose to allow a mate into your heart.”

He held out his hands, and the two placed theirs on his. “As a priest of Her temple, I ask you in the name of the Goddess of the Moon, to make this vow: that you will love your mate from now until the moon falls. That you will hold her when the wind blows cold, and comfort her when the night grows long. That you will place her above all others on this earth, and welcome her into your nest, your heart, your soul, from this moment unto eternity.”

“I vow it,” they both said breathlessly.

“Then in the sight of Her priest and in Her name, I witness your marriage and mating and proclaim you mated in Her sight.” A flare of golden light from out of nowhere, brightening the hazy sunlight in the longhouse, had us all narrowing our eyes. When I blinked the glare away and looked at Alexios, he had his lids carefully lowered, but his words had an echo as he finished, “Daughters, you have chosen well.”