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Lachlan and I caught up before he pushed it into the water. “Where are you going?”

He stared toward Pict again. “She gave me a command. To help Alexios. I swore to obey her. I have to go back.”

“You’re leaving Dustin to escort the Omegas back to Starlak,” I said slowly, thinking it through. “Dustin and Lachlan.”

He nodded. “You should stay here for Rielle. Wait to be called north.”

“This is madness, Goran,” Lachlan insisted. “We saw him fall. Edan fell on top of him. Alexios is dead.”

“Is he?” The Warlord’s eyes glinted for a moment, a fleck of gold there and gone before I could move to see if it had been real. “We shall see.” He took a step and stumbled, grabbing his arm where his mate mark lay.

Lachlan and I had fallen against each other at the same moment, as a flare of agony had shot through us all. “Was that her?”

“Lusca, maybe?” Lachlan gasped. All we could tell was that one of the connections between us was failing fast.

Not five minutes later, Goran was gone, pushed back to the northeast against the current by a pair of orcas and followed by ten more.

The next morning, the larger boat had left for Starvale. I stayed on Menthera with Mirrim and the boy Tally, who insisted on guarding the cottage where Luten and Rielle were sequestered.

For the next four days, I learned about Pict and the lives of the ones who had been trapped there from Tally and Mirrim. I couldn’t always keep from weeping as I learned the horrors they’d survived.

On the fifth day, Rielle and Luten emerged, ready to sail to Starvale. “Where will you go?” Mirrim asked me.

I had no pelt, so I could not swim at speed. “With you,” I replied at last. “The Emperor’s servants are still here to escort us to the mainland. I’ll find Lachlan there and wait for the Emperor’s commands.” I wasn’t sure they would come. I could feel Rada in the mating mark she’d given me. She was in heat, her lust a fire that burned night and day.

But it wasn’t Lusca who came for me, before the canoes were even loaded. It was a dragon.

RADA

I’d been stabbed by Alphas, tortured and tormented by Guild assassins, and half-burned at the stake by Mirrenese nobility. I’d poisoned myself for years, and been poisoned, too. More than once, the only thing that had kept me alive was the presence of the Goddess inside me, Her blood giving me enough power to survive almost anything. I’d been trained to withstand pain from before I could read.

But I’d never imagined this much agony. Even when Lusca dragged me to the lowest trench, even when Skadi packed his coldest ice around me, only the outside of my body cooled significantly.

My blood boiled inside me, with pain and with lust. That I could deal with, if it wasn’t accompanied by the knowledge that I had lost the man who I’d recognized as my mate before any of the others.

Serak, my soul whispered. I’d hoped I could save him somehow. I’d saved Omegas all over the world, women and children trapped by evil Alphas and governments. But I couldn’t pry him out of Edan’s grip.

And Lex. His dark eyes swam before my face.

Lex. My heart tried to speak his name out loud, call him from the other side. Lex, come back to me.

I kept seeing them, falling. Imagining their screams. Knowing they were lost to me forever.

A voice interrupted the pain with a shock of cold. “Consent, brother.”

“She’s dying, Skadi.” Fire raced through me, then power. “Beloved. Allow me to sing to you. We cannot heal your body when your mind is trying to leave us. Please allow me to take away the memories. Please let go of that pain, at least.”

I couldn’t speak, but I wished I could. I would do anything not to feel the emptiness inside. Lex. Serak. If I could forget… what a gift that would be.

“She consents.” Something moved on my chest, settled around my throat. A song wrapped around my thoughts.

Some of the pain receded. The burning, though… it kept going. Moving in me. Altering me.

Time passed. I wasn’t sure how much of it. I felt the outside of my body growing colder, the sky brighter. Icy hands touched the sides of my face. “Little spy. Wake and speak with us.”

I still couldn’t move. A thread of annoyance worked its way through the burning in my core.

“Lazy spy. Open your eyes and speak to us. Brother, I had no idea our little mate was such a weak thing.”