Chapter 37 Rada
RADA
Iwas pretty sure I’d done a good enough job hiding my pain. Not the pain of Alexios’s betrayal; that seeped from my fucking pores like Haviran toad poison. But after I’d made love with Goran, things had changed.
The fire that had torn at me was back, as if the proximity to its owner melted the numbing ice Skadi had given me. By the time the Pictish priests reached my boat, the cramping in my abdomen had gotten so bad, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to stand.
Luckily, I didn’t have to. Three of them jumped into my boat without invitation and wrestled me to my feet. They were Alphas, all of them, but they wore masks over their faces so the only way I could tell was their burly physiques and the acrid scents wafting off them.
Were they feral? They smelled a bit like it, but their actions were quick and decisive as they tied up to the boat, secured me, and checked the cabin, not one of them so much as sniffing at me.
The largest of them snarled something at me in a language I didn’t know, which I assumed was Pictish. I pulled away from the ones holding my arms, holding up my hands in a gesture of incomprehension.
He grabbed my wrists and wrapped a length of rough hemp rope around them in another unmistakable, unspoken sign, then dragged me over to the canoe.
I was very glad I’d sent everything of value or use with Goran, because instead of taking any of the boat’s supplies, the Alphas dumped everything into a pile in the center of the hull.
They yelled at me when I resisted giving them my cloak, but after the leader cut long strips in it, ruining almost all the pockets, and found nothing, he let me keep it.
They made me take off Alexios’s shoes and threw them overboard, one of them snarling at me when I hissed.
I had to remove Dustin’s spare trousers and lift Goran’s shirt to prove I was fully unarmed, but not one of them looked at me with lust, and they allowed me to dress again.
Before he stepped back to the canoe, the shortest of them threw a small stone on top of all the ship’s piled-up rigging and the wooden bowls and cups from the hold. It lit on fire like magic and burned unusually hot as we pushed away.
I supposed it could’ve been magic, but I saw the Alpha pocket a small mechanism that had an odd side plate.
A striker? I brushed against him and managed to slide it into one of my better concealed side pockets.
There was something small in that pocket already.
Pebbles? I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t have time to peek, with so many eyes on me.
The heat grew more intense as the moments ticked on, the water around us steaming and churning as if something far below was trying to force it to boil, though the waves stayed calm. Within minutes, I was sweating like it was midsummer in the tropics as the men finally took their places.
There were no rows in their canoe, only long sticks that might have been fishing rods if they had line or hooks, but instead had a sharpened end like a very rudimentary spear.
The current pulled the boat away from my burning one, and we rode in silence, the water around us so murky, it looked like the sea had turned to ash.
I looked for weapons, but the only ones I could discern were their knives.
Each of them had one hanging on a length of hemp rope from their dark gray robes: crude, black obsidian daggers nothing like the one I’d lost.
I kept my eyes lowered and decided to whimper a little, like I was afraid. I was afraid, of course, but I would never let them see my real fears.
I feared that I was wrong about the new moon.
I feared that I wouldn’t be able to rescue the Omegas here and that the Goddess had really left me.
That I might never see Alexios and Goran again, or that my idiot kraken mate might be injured or killed by Skadi and be unable to rescue me, if this all went to shit faster than I could figure things out on Pict.
That Lachlan would follow me into death if it came to that, thanks to our bond.
That Dustin might not reach Starlak, and if he did, that the plan I’d shared might not work, and I’d die without accomplishing my life’s goal.
That I’d never have the chance to apologize to Kellin for leaving him, without making sure he knew that he was not a mistake.
I might not have chosen him as a mate at first, but once I’d spent those days in his company, I knew he was right for me.
His subtle, competent courting had stolen some part of my heart.
Water sloshed against the hull of the boat, and I sucked in a sharp breath. Something was moving there, just below the water’s surface. A long, dark shadow slid from one end of the boat to the other.
It wasn’t Lachlan. I could sort of feel him in our bond, far away. Was it Kellin?
I’d already defeated the knots the Alphas had bound me with and replaced them with a complicated slip knot I’d used in a similar situation more than once, so I had my hands free to use if I needed.
But before I could think of how I could safely check without giving him away, one of the Alphas had taken his stick and stabbed it into the water.
My heart stuttered as the ashy water clouded even more with blood.
But then the Alpha lifted the spear and grunted at the large wriggling sea trout on the end.
The fish was oddly shaped, with patchy scales and clouded eyes, but the Alphas all made complimentary noises at the one who’d caught it.
It flopped in the bottom of the boat that had slowed, but now picked up speed.
I had a hard time concealing my unease as the boat grew closer to the beach, and the priests faced the smoking crater of the volcano and began chanting. I could only make out two words: Alldyns Vug.
I shivered, even in the heat. Everything about these males was creepy, especially their masks. However, when we reached the beach and stepped out onto the rocks a fair distance upwind from the volcano, and they took the masks off, I wished they hadn’t.
Their faces were all disfigured. Mangled, as if their noses had been carved away from their faces. Why would… My stomach churned as a possibility floated into my mind.
“Varnicht,” one of the Alphas said, throwing something toward me.
It was a pair of slippers, made from a sort of gray leather that felt like sealskin.
I suppressed a shudder and put them on. There was a decent-sized shoal of black sand at the water’s edge where we now stood, but the rocks on this beach looked every bit as sharp as the ones on Skadi’s island, and I didn’t want to walk bleeding into the Alldyns Vug.
One of the men went in front of me, and the rest behind as we followed a pathway through the jagged terrain to the base of the volcano.
There wasn’t a bird in the sky, or even a mosquito buzzing to break the rhythmic crunch of our feet on the path.
Nothing changed until the Alpha in front stopped, and the pain in my gut suddenly eased.
The Alphas all moved to the sides of the path and kneeled, their heads down as a familiar voice called out, “At last.”
I sucked in a breath, choking on ash and surprise. “Serak?”
He didn’t answer as he walked closer. I’d suspected he would be here, but I hadn’t been prepared for how he looked.
He was gaunt, his skin paler than before, though dark veins broke up the pallor.
Like the priests, he wore a gray robe that sported scorch marks from hem to waistline, but he had no dagger.
His dark hair flowed down his back, and his mouth stretched into the same wide smile I’d seen before.
But his previously dark blue eyes held red flames I’d seen only in my nightmares. And when he reached out and ran his hand down the side of my jaw, my skin burned at his touch.
“I’ve missed you, my bride.”