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Can she feel it too? The walls watching us?
I glance around the edges of the cave.
“We have some time,” the man says, his voice a calm, gentle lull, much like the waves lapping in the lake. I glance across it, searching for the exit, but the mist is so thick I cannot see the far shore.
I jerk as an invisible pull draws my attention up to his eyes like a hook to the chest. It pains me, though his eyes are brown and kind enough to soften the sting of it. His skin is tan. I don’t know how young he is. Or how old. He looks like…like a kid, with skinny arms and soft lips. But his hair is matted, brown streaked through with grey, and his skin is wrinkled and bruised all over.
Freya tsks. “We don’t. The animals are restless. There is something coming. Something big. I need to know how to defeat the Beast Fate. If I can defeat her, I can stop the dead army…”
“No, Freya, you cannot. We’ve been through this before.” He speaks to her like he might a child.
Freya’s lips open. Her fist clenches on her bare thigh. She’s still not dressed. Over the last two days I got used to it, but seeing her now next to this man who’s fully clothed, I’m reminded. His clothes are deep red and look like they were, at one time, expensive. They’re tattered now, covered in dirt and other dark things and, in places, shredded.
“Who turns them does not matter…I can still destroy the Fates. Not just my own.”
“Not alone.” He coughs into his hand, his lids batting slowly, making them look heavy, making his every movement seem pained. “Never alone.”
I’m so confused, I don’t understand the conversation being had. A whimper escapes my throat when I mean to voice a demand. “What’s…what’s going on?”
The man raises a hand and Freya settles, even though her own fists remain clenched and her eyes continue to blaze. “There is a war brewing. Mirage City is coming for the world and is using a dead army to do it.”
“He wants to take over the world?”
“He…” The man smiles. “Yes,hewants to take over the world.” He chuckles to himself until a look of pain crosses his face. He places the orb of light on the ground at his right hip, but keeps one hand resting on it.
“What can he possibly hope to accomplish? Claim new territories? He already has the largest city, outside of Shadowlands.” Then again, wanting more land has never stopped an Alpha male before. “Besides, the cities are well established. They won’t be easily taken.”
“No, not easily, but theycanbe taken by force.”
Freya cuts in, her expression sharp as she flits her gaze to me dismissively. “The more Alphas fall, the stronger the dead Alpha army becomes. Eventually, there will only be undead. Undead and us. The survivors…no, the Omegas will be killed for the Fates…the Betas who survive will serve Mirage City. Alphas who survive will be enslaved…as they should be.”
The man nods, but his gaze never leaves mine. “Yes, as they should be. Don’t you agree, Fallen Earth Omega?”
I frown at the moniker and at his words. “No one should be enslaved. Not Fates. Not Alphas. Not even Berserkers.”
And then a shiver of a thought enters my mind and it’s terrifying because I know one thing with absolute certainty — this thought doesn’t belong to me. Sibilantly, it says,“Yes.”
“Alphas have no purpose,” Freya spits, like she didn’t hear it, too. “Berserkers aren’t worth their skins.”
I shake my head, trying to snap out of it.. “I, um…” Fail. Total fail.
“Alphas…Alphas are the scourge of Gatamora. Breeding is all that they’re…”
“Enough.” I round on her. “Alphas can hurt and destroy and hate, but they can also be hurt and be destroyed and be hated. They can alsoloveand be loved. All Alphas were Betas once.” My voice cracks and I struggle to meet Freya’s gaze with the hate — or something — I feel towards Adam still weighing on me so heavily. I swallow hard. “They may not be birds, but they can still be loved.”
Freya hisses and speaks to me, but all I can hear ishisvoice in my head, echoing there like a summoning.“I was right to wait for you.”
“Alright, Freya. Calm. I will tell her about the Fates and the Fallen and then I will tell you all that I know about the Beast Omega,” he says aloud.
Freya settles, though her nails are now digging into her legs just above the kneecap. She looks like she’s a second away from pouncing on me, and I have one hundred percent confidence that she’d be able to kill me in one of her animal forms with a swipe of her hand.No.A small doubt pierces my line of thinking. No. I don’t lie down. Not for Berserkers or for Alphas and not for Omegas.
I am not owned because I am my own.
I stare Freya down, even as I speak to the man. “The Fates are the ones responsible for making the Berserker’s dead army.”
“You are mostly correct.”“The Fates are responsible forresurrectingthedead army.”“The first of the Fated Omegas was discovered by the Mirage City Berserker three hundred years ago. That is as long as they have been in his service. Together, they are the Fated Omegas of Fire, of the Mind, of Beasts…” He tips his head towards Freya and then towards me. “…And of the Earth.” He rests his gaze on me and it is filled with an implication I don’t like.“And there is one other of which they do not speak. The Omega of Death.”
I wince at the conflicting and overlapping words, without understanding what he means — spoken or unspoken — and why I’ve been brought here to hear this. “What does this have to do with me? I…I’m not a Fate.”
