5. Hostile Acquisition Attempt #2
Every time Cass’s mind drifted—which was happening more and more as the day wore on—it drifted there. To green eyes with flecks of gold. To that impossible height and those freckles. To the way Riot’s scent had cut through all the marketplace noise like a clear note in a symphony of chaos.
Elysian training said that earthly attractions were spiritual dead-ends—paths that led away from transcendence rather than toward it. Especially after the compatibility matrices had been so clear and unambiguous about who he was meant to be with.
“Well, well. What have we here?”
The voice came from directly behind him, close enough that he could feel breath stir the fine hairs on the back of his neck. Cass spun around to find the woman in the leather jacket standing there, her expression somewhere between amused and predatory.
Up close, she was striking—sharp cheekbones, dark eyes, hair pulled back in a sleek ponytail. Her scent hit Cass like a slap: something cold and expensive and aggressive that made him want to take a step back even though she was technically an appropriate distance away.
“Can I help you?” He tried to keep his voice even, the way Brother Matthias had taught him. Calm in the face of challenge.
“Actually.” The woman smiled, showing too many teeth. “I think we might be able to help each other. I’m Mei.”
Her eyes tracked over him slowly, lingering in places that made Cass’s skin crawl for reasons he couldn’t articulate. It wasn’t the way people usually looked at his robes.
“I’m having quite a day,” Cass admitted, taking a step back only to bump into something solid behind him. A large man with the same sharp smile as the woman, standing close enough that his breath was hot against the top of Cass’s head.
“Running a bit hot, aren’t you?” the man said, leaning down to inhale near Cass’s hair. “Getting achy? Sensitive?”
The accuracy of the description made Cass’s stomach drop. “How did you know that? Is the flu going around? Do I look that sick?”
Mei and the man exchanged a glance.
“The flu,” Mei repeated slowly, something strange in her voice. “Is that what you think this is?”
“I’ve been feeling strange for days,” Cass said, confusion overriding his discomfort. Maybe they knew something about the illness? Maybe it was a common Neutral Zone ailment with a simple cure? “I believe I have a fever.” He touched his own cheek, feeling the heat there. “It’s getting worse.”
The man laughed—not a kind sound. “That’s precious.”
“We could help you with your symptoms,” Mei offered, stepping closer. Her hand closed around Cass’s wrist, her grip firm enough to hurt. “We can take you somewhere more comfortable.”
Something about her tone made his stomach drop further even as her words sounded helpful. The way she said symptoms. The way her eyes kept tracking over his body like she was assessing merchandise.
“That’s very kind,” Cass managed, trying to pull his wrist free without success, “but I should probably just rest—”
“First, though.” Mei’s grip tightened. “Tell us about your Berserker friend.”
“I don’t have a Berserker friend,” Cass said, and the words came out heavier than he intended, weighted by disappointment. “He told me to stay away from him.”
Mei’s eyebrow rose. “And yet he follows you everywhere.”
“Riot has been following me? Why would he do that?”
“That’s what we’d like to know.” The man’s hand landed on Cass’s shoulder, heavy and confining. “What does he want with you? What’s he planning?”
“I don’t—I don’t know what you’re talking about. He helped me once when I was hurt, and then he told me to stay away.” Cass tugged against Mei’s grip, his heart hammering. “Please let go.”
“Come with us.” All pretense of friendliness dropped from Mei’s voice. “We’ll explain everything about your condition and help you through what’s coming.”
“I don’t want—”
“At least you’d survive our help,” the man added. “A Berserker catching an Omega in your state? He’d tear you apart.”
“I need to go,” Cass said, panic rising in his chest, making his voice go thin and high. “Please, I need to—”
“You’re not going anywhere.” Mei’s grip turned painful. “Not until we—”
“He’s not going anywhere with you.” The voice cut through the marketplace noise like a blade—low, cold, and instantly recognizable.
Cass’s head snapped around, and everything inside him went simultaneously tense and loose, fear and relief tangled into a ball.
Riot stood a few feet away, his expression carved from stone. But his eyes—
These eyes were wrong.
The gold had swallowed almost everything—bright and luminous and glowing in a way that wasn’t natural.
Then Riot blinked, the muscles standing out in his neck like he was fighting against something inside himself.
Slowly—painfully slowly—the gold began to recede.
Green bled back into his irises like ink spreading through water, until his eyes looked almost normal again.
Almost.
There was still more gold than Cass remembered from before. There was still that faint luminous quality lurking just beneath the surface, threatening to swallow the green again at any moment.
The marketplace seemed to freeze around them. People who had been pretending not to notice the confrontation suddenly found urgent reasons to be elsewhere, creating a wide bubble of space around the four of them. Cass could hear whispered conversations dying mid-sentence.
Everyone’s afraid of him, Cass realized. Everyone except me.
And that didn’t make sense, did it? Riot’s eyes had just glowed, and the man behind Cass had just said he would tear Cass apart.
But all Cass felt, looking at Riot’s carved-stone face and tension-rigid shoulders, was a desperate urge to go to him. He wanted to press close and breathe in strawberries and cream until the fear went away.
“Just making conversation with our new friend,” Mei said, her smile returning even as she released Cass’s wrist. Cass could see the red marks her grip had left and half-moon indents from her nails. “He’s having a confusing day, aren’t you sweetheart?”
“He’s not your concern,” Riot said. His voice was so low it seemed to vibrate in the air, resonating in Cass’s chest in a way that made his breath catch.
“Isn’t he?” The man behind Cass finally stepped away. “An Omega in his condition, wandering around without protection? Someone should be concerned.”
There it was again—condition, state, as if everyone knew something about Cass’s body that he didn’t. As if his flu symptoms meant something more than just illness. But before he could ask, Riot made a sound. Low and rumbling, almost like a growl, and every hair on Cass’s body stood up in response.
“We’ll be seeing you both again,” Mei said, already backing away into the crowd. “Soon.”
Then they were gone, melting into the marketplace like they’d never been there at all, and Cass was left standing frozen as Riot turned toward him.
“Are you hurt?”
The question was gruff, almost harsh, but Riot’s eyes were scanning Cass from head to toe, his hands hovering near Cass’s shoulders without quite making contact, but close enough that Cass could feel the heat radiating off him.
Close enough that the strawberries and cream scent wrapped around him like a blanket.
I’m fine, Cass should have said. Thank you for your help. I’ll go back to the hotel now.
Instead, what came out was: “Why have you been following me?”
“Because people like that exist. Because you wander around like you’ve never heard of self-preservation. Because—” He stopped. “It doesn’t matter why.”
“That man said you’d tear me apart.” Cass hated how his voice wavered. “Is that why you’ve been following me? Because you want to hurt me?”
Pain flickered across Riot’s face—there and gone so fast Cass almost missed it.
But Cass was good at reading pain. He’d seen enough of it at Springfield Gardens, in the meditation rooms where people cried through their spiritual breakthrough.
This was real pain. The kind that came from being seen as something he didn’t want to be seen as.
“If I wanted to hurt you,” Riot said quietly, “I’ve had plenty of chances.”
Around them, the marketplace crowd maintained its distance, staring openly. Cass caught whispered fragments carried on the wind:
“—poor Omega. Berserker’s got his scent—”
“—surprised it hasn’t just taken him already—”
“—look at that one, doesn’t even know what’s happening—”
“I think I definitely have the flu,” Cass said miserably, “and it’s making everyone act strange around me. Do I smell sick?”
Riot stared at him for a long moment. His expression was doing something complicated that made the gold in his eyes pulse brighter for a moment before he visibly forced it down.
“You don’t have the flu,” he said finally.
“Then what’s wrong with me?”
Riot didn’t answer. Instead, he glanced around at the watching crowd, his expression hardening in a way that made Cass’s stomach do that strange swooping thing again.
“Not here.” Riot said. “Back to the hotel. Stay close.”
The walk back was tense and silent, but not uncomfortable.
Riot’s presence carved a path through the crowded streets—people moved out of his way, mothers pulling their children closer, vendors went quiet until they passed.
Some of the more dangerous-looking regulars gave respectful nods that Riot returned.
It was so different from how people reacted to Cass. His Elysian robes earned him suspicion at best, hostility at worst. But Riot commanded respect. The kind of respect that came from being genuinely dangerous and everyone knowing it.
“You saw me try to recruit people?” Cass asked quietly, breaking the silence as they navigated a narrow alley between stalls. “You saw me fail?”
Riot didn’t answer immediately. His jaw worked for a moment, like he was choosing his words carefully. “I saw you help that kid with the scraped knee,” he said finally. “And the old man who couldn’t reach something under the stall.”
Heat that had nothing to do with his flu crept up Cass’s neck. Those moments hadn’t felt special—just obvious things that needed doing. The child had been crying. The old man had been struggling. What else was Cass supposed to do?
“You saw me give away my lunch too, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, princess.” Riot’s voice was soft. “I saw that too.”
The nickname landed differently this time. Brother Matthias would have said it diminished Cass’s spiritual identity—reduced him to something frivolous and earthly. But there was no mockery in the way Riot said it. If anything, it sounded almost... fond.
Cass’s stomach did that swooping thing again. He pressed a hand against it, frowning.
They reached the hotel without incident, Riot checking the hallway carefully before allowing Cass to enter.
The building was quiet now—the sick person must have exhausted themselves, because no retching echoed through the thin walls.
Just the hum of the building’s ancient climate system and the distant murmur of the marketplace through grimy windows.
They stopped outside Cass’s door, the tension between them almost tangible.
“We need to talk,” Riot said.
Cass knew he should say no. Berserkers were dangerous—the training materials had been very clear. Riot had told him to stay away. Brother Matthias would be disappointed if he knew Cass was associating with someone so far from the path of spiritual evolution.
There’s nothing wrong with accepting help, whispered the voice that sounded less like Brother Matthias and more like Honey. Even if the person offering it doesn’t fit the approved categories.
“Okay,” Cass said, unlocking his door. “Come in.”
As Riot stepped across the threshold, Cass had the strange feeling he was crossing a far more significant boundary than just a doorway. That something was shifting, changing, moving in a direction he couldn’t predict.
The door closed behind them with a soft click that somehow sounded very final.