Page 99

“I don’t understand it either. But I have to try.” I took his hand, and he helped me stand. Slowly, I stood and began to take off my clothes.

Serak was already naked, but he kept his gaze averted. “The Goddess spoke to Edan back in Rimholt, when you were unconscious. I heard Her. She told him, ‘You cannot take my daughter. She is not yours.’” He stood beside me, his side to me, as I removed my boots. “If you feel this is wrong, don’t do it. Your mates would never ask it of you. Your Goddess wouldn’t.”

“Wouldn’t She?” I glared up at the moon. “She isn’t speaking to me right now, so I wouldn’t know.”

“Ah, Rada. You know better. Omegas cannot be forced to take a mate. That’s always been Her law. It was the one Edan broke and bent and struggled against for his entire existence. He never understood consent. True consent.”

“Is this what that is?” My stomach lurched at the thought of what I was about to do. “It doesn’t feel like I have much choice. If I want the ones I love to live, if I want to live, I have to do this.” I reached to undo my trousers, but a snarl stopped me.

“Not like this. Not here.”

I snarled back. “We don’t have time for anything else. Lex is suffocating. My mates are dying. Hells, I’m dying. Let’s not pretend this is anything but what it is. An act of desperation.”

“It cannot be that, Rada,” Serak murmured. “You know the Goddess would never allow it.”

I sighed. “Am I supposed to fall in love with a monster in the next hour?”

“You’ve fallen in love with two already,” he teased. “Keep the collection going?”

“How can you joke about this?”

“I learned long ago to laugh when I could. And to believe that even if it all didn’t work out the way I’d planned, the Goddess would make it right somehow. And if She didn’t, or couldn’t? At least I had those months with you in Rimholt. The days here on Pict.”

His hope stung me right in my cynical heart. I hung my head, less certain than I’d ever been on what to do. I was good at a lot of things. But accepting my fate had never been one of them. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“Have faith, little enemy.” Skadi’s voice was a rasp, ice on ice. “Have faith in the ones who love you.”

Staring into Serak’s eyes, I knew he was one of those. “I love you,” he said, as if it needed to be spoken aloud. “I have always loved you. I will do everything in my power to protect you.”

It had to be enough. I took a moment to stagger to each of my mates and kiss them, though not one of them was awake now, not even Skadi. Every drop of their energy was being channeled to me.

I hesitated at Lusca’s side. I could still hear him in my mind. Hear his humming, and snatches of a song I’d heard before, until it faded away. I clutched the pendant around my neck.

The ones who love me. Faces flickered in my mind. Wren, my mentor and friend, who had taught me how to dye cloth and weave, and how to use my blood to keep Alphas from going feral.

Queen Vali, who’d trusted me to watch over her children and shown me how a small, poor Omega could grow up to rule a kingdom, as well as the hearts of five Alphas.

Haven, who’d loved me even when I was covered with street grime and blood, who had adopted me and helped me soften some of my edges.

Vilkurn, the Master Spy of Rimholt, who’d taught me to sharpen them. He’d saved my life as a child, then put me on the path I’d claimed as my mission. He’d given me the weapons and the training to survive a harsh world that wanted to kill or control those like me. “Weapons and ways out,” he’d told me the first day I’d met him, as he fed me bread and cheese from a bag at his waist, one I’d pickpocketed a few minutes later. “Never stop looking for them, little street rat.” I’d taught my crew that lesson, to always be aware of every way out, every possible weapon.

The moon above blinked for a moment.

“I’m ready,” I lied to Serak, a tremor in my voice. “Can we… Can we do this somewhere else? Down by the shore or something.”

“Of course.” A rush of air tangled my hair over my face, and then Serak had me in his arms. He’d changed. His face was sharper, somehow, and his expression pensive. Dark gray wings jutted out from his back, though they were tattered. “Don’t be afraid,” he ordered. The voice was Edan’s, but the sentiment was Serak.

He leaped into the air and carried me down to a beach, to a patch of soft, warm sand not far from the edge of the jungle. The silent volcano loomed over us, the moonlight reflecting off its glossy surface. It made the horrible place where so many had died look almost beautiful.

“Are you, ah, hungry?” he asked after he set me down. “Thirsty?”

I narrowed my eyes. He still sounded like Edan, but why would that arserag care about my comfort? The moonlight on his cheeks revealed twin ruddy patches, though.

“I am.”

“Priest!” he called out. “Attend me!” Definitely the arserag.

Who was he calling, though? A smiling Alpha jogged out of the closest trees, carrying a basket in one hand and an enormous bundle of something in the other. “Frol!”