Chapter 24
JUDGE
Isat there longer than I care to admit as Diana slept against me, our thread completely wide open and full of love. She doesn’t have to admit those words to me for them to be understood.
It’s this moment I’ll likely visit during my last breath, knowing that I got to taste even a fraction of time with a life that looked like this. And that I did right by my omega.
Getting up to relocate back to my room was like breaking away from the most people memory I’ll probably ever have to get back to the fucking stain that is life in the wastes.
She settled so deeply into the bed that has only ever known me, officially turning it into a nest of sorts. It’ll be more paramount to make it perfect, come closer to her heat.
My chest constricts slightly, not knowing what to do with this misery. I likely won’t be here for that, or any future heats. For that, I feel remorse that the only fucking heat I helped her through was in a stranger’s home when we just met and she was afraid.
The noise around me slowly comes back to reality as I sit in the long hall that smells of bread and hearth smoke, an undertone of pheromones lacing through that smells of Dominion.
There’s a cohesiveness here that feels like potential.
Maybe one day we can reintroduce suppressants as they were before the bloom, especially since the flower grows so steadily.
Require the unmated to take them if they wish to integrate, or remain in their sanctioned zones medicine-free.
For now, I need to see who is who when unmedicated. Witness the raw versions of themselves.
Whatever comes after that will be for Beast to handle.
Laughter cuts through my miserable mind, sitting alone. My own version of a throne is made of motorcycle parts and leather seating, so people can travel here to meet me. To ask for help, like a fucking king.
I want Diana to live in this.
I want her to laugh without it sounding like a mistake. I want her to believe, really believe, that she belongs here without having to bleed for it.
It’s why I gave her so much of me yesterday and the past week.
I wanted her to know what she meant to me in the small time we had together, for her to know that what I felt was genuine.
I have a letter written for her in case I don’t return to fill in more of those gaps if she needs it, something Beast will give her.
I had Kitty learn how to make those swans that Diana loves, and made her turn the letter into one.
I hope to hell and back she will never know it exists, because if she does, then it means I’m never coming back.
Roxy has been handled, as well. She sat across from me, eyes hard but wet, jaw set like she was bracing for impact. I told her she’d be relocated to a new territory where we will likely never cross paths again.
I hear another laugh that makes my spine straighten, glancing over to see my omega among a few others, sitting there with her arms crossed, laughing at something someone said.
Diana.
She’s wearing my leather jacket, because she deserves a day where I sit here, right across from her, feeling wholly invited and not a bit rejected or used.
She looks so real.
The sight of her hits me so hard I have to breathe through it.
This is the future I rarely let myself imagine. An omega who worries when I’m gone. Who looks for me in rooms. Who believes I’ll come back. Who isn’t surviving me but choosing me.
The thought does something dangerous to my chest. The image of her belly swelling with my child is visceral and uninvited. Her body heavy with a life I put there as she softens and prepares. Mine in a way that isn’t just teeth and scent and survival.
My gaze drops down, a sense of burning in my throat and eyes making me so damned off today.
I cut off the emotion, as there’s no point to it. I can’t change that things are the way they are. I can only live this hand that I’ve been dealt.
Sensing her through our bond, I glance over to see she’s looking at me. Her mouth curves, small and uncertain, but genuine.
I stand without realizing I’ve decided to. As I near her, the energy around shifts slightly as if the mated omegas next to her don’t want to risk anything. They even give a small nod and leave as I sit next to Diana.
“Hey,” she says, soft, looking me over with concern. “You look tired.”
I huff a quiet laugh. “You have no idea.”
“You okay?” she asks.
That’s new too, and I love the way it feels. The way it’s just directed at me, and not what my state of being can or can’t do for her. “Yes,” I say after a beat. “Today, I am.”
The Scarlet Offering waits in the quiet part of my mind, patient as a blade on a table. Diana deserves to live in the light.
Even if I have to burn to keep it lit.