Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Violet
One year later…
It is late in the day, and the sun is setting when we arrive at the village of Acton Trussell in the foothills of the Askrigg Mountains.
As one might expect for a community of gem traders, it is the image of prosperity, with immaculate cobbled streets and brightly painted dwellings that glisten in the setting sun against a thickly forested backdrop.
It is a quaint community that, with a population nearly two thousand strong, is not far from reaching town status.
Still, the isolated nature of being cut off from the more populous parts of this continent for a large part of the year keeps it locked at this size.
It is no small amount thrilling and terrifying to be here, a place so steeped in mystery that even the people in the towns far to the south make the sign of the Goddess when they mention it in hushed whispers.
Traders come every spring with an armed escort, pay fair coin for the gems, and go on their way. The rumors of griffin protectors are enough that they do not linger.
It is not a place for sightseers and lore tourists, or visitors of any kind at this time of year, when we are closing in on the end of summer.
But to my great surprise, the community is warm and curious.
When I explain that I have exchanged correspondence with Master Pugstone, a resident griffin scholar, I am welcomed like a long-lost friend and offered free lodgings in the best tavern.
“Don’t get many scholars this way,” the tavern proprietor, Jim, announces as he shows us up to our quarters, a day room with a table and chairs, and two bedrooms, one with a double bed and the other with two singles.
“Master Pugstone will be delighted to receive a visitor—could talk the hind legs off a centaur! I’ll have the stable lad pop around and let him know you’re here.
Bound to have an invite come the morning. ”
“Oh, that would be wonderful,” I say, beaming.
A young maid arrives with a tray bearing dinner. The proprietor shows himself out.
“I’m not hungry,” I say. My belly is aflutter, not a chance I will eat a bite.
Rafe grunts, his eyes narrowing on me.
Lark is also unnaturally still, his bright blue eyes taking on an almost predatory air.
“It’s not that,” I say, blushing. I’ve had several false heats since we left my family home.
Or fever episodes, as I still doggedly call them.
The first sign is usually picky eating. They have been my companions for all that time, but it still makes me uncomfortable discussing this with them…
Talking about going into heat is a little like announcing that I’m available for breeding.
Not that anyone could breed me since they’re false heats and they’re not alphas and are assuredly not interested in me in that way.
“It’s just the excitement. I’ll see you in the morning! ”
I dash off to my room before either of them can offer an opinion. Here I strip out of my travel clothes, wash up, and put on my nightshift. It has grown dark outside the window by this time, and I take my quill, ink, and diary from my satchel.
But instead of writing, I find myself skipping back to the start, skimming over entries, remembering how it felt at the beginning so long ago.
My mind stretches back, aware of the passage of time and the many miles traveled to get here. They are here. I can feel it, sense it. My belly is full of butterflies, like I am caught on the cusp of something momentous.
In my mind, I picture the younger me sitting at my desk, making my list of things needed for an adventure.
Now look at me, taking lodgings in a tavern so far from home and everything once familiar, nowhere one might expect to find a Hydornian princess.
That is what I am, although it has been a long time since I embraced the role.
It was questionable whether I had ever fit the princess mold.
Somehow, my family, once the pillar of decorum, has found itself embroiled in many very indecorous adventures and happenings.
My own have gone unnoticed. Not that I am inherently adventurous, more that I have become so out of necessity.
What I am is scholarly by nature. The kind of woman overlooked by suitors for the prettier among the flock, the kind who is more enamored with ancient texts than the perfect shade of ribbon for a dress.
My princess skills are woefully undernourished.
I can neither dance nor sing, and I swear I don’t have a maternal bone in my body—the thought of mothering a screaming brat when I so love quietness and study makes me shudder.
I was passably average at horse riding, but have improved out of necessity.
I cannot abide the small talk one is expected to engage in during high-society gatherings. Slide an ancient tome about mythical creatures in front of me, and I come alive.
It is perhaps the only time I do.
I have never needed nor aspired to be married or mated. I am not like other women. Put simply, I do not fit into the ordinary world.
Am I broken?
I have wondered that many times.
There are two sides to me that never meet.
The dark fever that consumes me on occasion.
The intellectual scholar who views the world through a lens.
As I stare out of the leaded window into the dark cobbled streets of this quaint village nestled in the foothills of a mountain, poised to realize a dream, I feel the past reel me in.
Regrets? For certain. Yet my obsession is as potent tonight as it was when I slipped from my familial home in the dead of night.
I can never go back.
My hand trembles as I fiddle with the thin silk ribbon in my diary before I gather the lamp and head for the bed, pulling the thick covers back and slipping inside.
Adventure.
I left my home and everyone I knew, choosing self-preservation at the risk of finding myself mated to an alpha, or worse, in some dungeon at my sister’s behest. Yet regrets fester, telling me that this path I chose is coming to an end in more ways than my elusive goal to finally see a griffin.
What after?
I wish I could bury my omega side and let my appetite for knowledge win the battle once and for all, find a quiet position in a great library somewhere, and dedicate the rest of my life to research.
Is that possible?
I don’t really remember what happens when I go into a false heat, other than I trust Rafe and Lark, and they have always kept me safe through those times. Afterward, it’s much like waking from a dream, which soon fades and does not trouble me at all.
Yet something is building inside me, an urgency, an inner voice that tells me that my heat episodes are getting worse and that my next one will be harder still.
Nature always finds a way—I read that in a book somewhere once.
I harbor a terrible feeling that my adventures and travels, so far from all I know, which at their heart are my attempt to run away from inevitability, will come crashing down on me.
How do I stop?
How do I get off the ride and escape this terrible premonition?
I know only that I must fight it for as long as I can. Tomorrow sees the culmination of a dream, following lore and rumors, traveling here and there, following trails that more often end in disappointment.
This time, I’m certain, in a way I have never been before, that I shall finally get my wish and see a griffin.
Rafe
A year, halfway across the known world, and through a portal into another one.
I would follow Violet into the maw of hell itself—there have been a few hairy occasions when I felt much like I did…
What is that noise? “Are you jerking off, asshole?”
The sticky noises continue.
I grimace.
“Did you see when she bent over this morning, putting her diary in her saddlebag?” Lark says from his bed on the other side of the room. “Gods, that woman has fine buns. Firm, pert, and begging for a man’s hands to hold as he plows her. All that horse riding makes for a fine ass.”
I grunt and roll over, putting my back to him, disgusted as my cock wakes up and jerks. “I don’t need the fucking commentary.”
“It won’t take long,” Lark says confidently.
“I mostly think about her sucking my cock. That has always been one of my favorites. Pretty cheeks hollowed, and eyes closed in bliss. She barely even gags unless you go really deep. As for swallowing, there is never a doubt that the lass is greedy for it. I came on her tits once, and she nearly shredded me with her nails, bemoaning how I was wasting what was hers.”
I twist onto my belly and thrust my face into the pillow, trying to block the fucker out.
“There you go, lass. I’ve got something to fill your belly.”
“For fuck’s sake, Lark!”
Lark grunts, and the sticky noises reach a crescendo before they suddenly stop. He grunts again, and his labored breathing follows.
“Are you done?”
“Aye, I feel better now.” He sounds fucking perky and sleepy all at the same time.
“Well, I don’t!”
“You should knock one out. I always sleep like a baby after. Not always easy when we’re on the road. I swear the nosy brat can sense when I try to find a quiet spot for relief.”
I roll onto my back and take my cock in hand despite my better judgment.
Lark chuckles.
“Shut the fuck up.”
“No need to get grouchy. What’s your favorite fantasy while you rub one out?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why not? I can always use something new for my spank bank.”
“Stop talking.”
“What about that time when you took her ass? She didn’t even remember it, although Gods, she had to be sore the way you were plowing her with abandon, your fingers up in her cunt at the same time.”
I come. I cannot fucking help it. That memory is particularly vivid, and I can admit to revisiting it often.
“You’re welcome,” he says.
I huff out a breath. Lark is a weird bastard at times, but I have gotten used to him.
I don’t have a fucking choice. We are both besotted with our mistress, a princess and an omega. We would follow her to the ends of the world and beyond, literally, for we have.
Yet we are betas. It can never be forever between us. One day, an alpha bastard will come along and bewitch her with his scent. They will ride off together into the sunset and have lots of brats.
Bastard.
I do not even know him, but I already hate his guts, this mystery alpha who will snatch my heart’s desire away.
I love her.
Lark does, too. We are both hook, line, and sinker for Violet.
Lark, unlike me, does not linger upon the looming future where Violet will be snatched away. He is a live-for-the-moment kind of man, and how I envy him.
The sounds of his snoring fill the room.
I lie awake much longer, tossing and turning before I finally fall into a restless sleep.
It is only when I rise the next day that I recognize the signs. I am more sensitive to her cycles than Lark is, although he was the first to notice her scent. Soon, Violet will go into heat. I will get my chance to fuck her until my dick is raw and my legs shake, and then I will fuck her some more.
Afterward, she will forget.
I will remember. One more memory to bind me to her. One more shattering experience with the woman I love.
Her heats are getting worse, longer—this is coming to a head.
I should warn her, maybe encourage her to seek an alpha who can give her what her body needs.
I already know I shall not, greedy bastard that I am.