Chapter 11
Naya submerged into cool water and savored the weightlessness.
Her skin tingled, some parts of it stung, but she ignored it and absorbed the relieving sensation of hydration. After a long moment, hands pulled her up to the surface and lathered her hair and face. Naya let herself be turned and rotated while she tried to take in where she was. This tent was larger than her usual one, and had furniture, but she didn’t remember how she got there.
After the horrifying realization about the beast, things had dissolved into a hazy existence. Her mood had sunk so low, she couldn’t tell if she was awake or in a nightmare. Exhaustion had finally ripped its way to the core of her, and she couldn’t bear to think anymore. She just shut herself away, refusing to speak or even look at anyone who entered.
But the feeling of water couldn’t be ignored. Neither could the act of being bathed, if that’s what it could be called.
She floated in a fat tube of water that extended vertically into the ground, but she couldn’t see how the structure was possible. This tent had a hard wooden floor instead of sand, but the tube would still have to extend down past the wood and into the sand. After a moment of difficult thought, she gave up trying to work it out and enjoyed the soothing sensation of water on her blistery skin.
Two women floated alongside her, scrubbing her hair and carefully cleaning her body. Then they pulled her out, dried her, and applied an ointment to her cracked lips and the sores and welts across her body.
They gave her one of the knobby plant stems to drink, gesturing that she sip it slowly, while they coated her burns with a sticky salve and rebound the dark red bands to her forearms, this time forgoing the one around her torso.
After she drank half of the stem, they led her over to makeshift bed in a corner of the tent and forced her to lie down. A powerful drowsiness pulled her into darkness within a few moments.
When a loud commotion bled into her consciousness, she woke, her mind refreshed and sharp.
Naya lay for a moment, listening to the racket. Her mood had lightened, no doubt due to being clean and rested, but the unpleasant shadow of her conversation with the beast remained. She forced him out of her mind and sat up swiftly. Her focus now should be figuring out who these people really were and how she’d alert her father when she got back home.
Carefully she pushed up onto shaky legs and was surprised that there was no pain. A tacky residue covered her burns and the bruises on her torso had almost faded. The bands around her forearms were looser but stiff, more like armor cuffs instead of skin-tight like before. She tugged them down to her wrists, but as they slid over the heel of her hand, they tightened instantly—clearly being a “guest” of the beast didn’t mean being free from magical bindings.
The commotion outside grew louder. Lots of voices called to each other, layered with conversations and commands. Some shouted while others spoke normally, but none of them seemed aggressive, and yet it was the most noise they’d made in all the time she’d been here.
She glanced around the tent, wondering if she’d have a chance to slip away in the commotion, but hesitated. She still didn’t know how to get out of the desert. Running across the sand hoping she wouldn’t be seen wasn’t a plan that would get her home. It didn’t work last time, and she couldn’t afford to make mistakes when her home and family were at risk.
Papa always told her not to let information go to waste, that something seemingly insignificant could be the piece of information to turn the tide in a war. So she sat back on the bed and listened to the people outside, even though their language was so different from anything she’d heard before.
The Known Lands, which spanned across the three continents, were united by the common tongue. Each region, and in some cases individual countries, had their own native tongue but for trading, official, and legal purposes, the common tongue was used. In the Lox Empire, it was used almost exclusively, which was why she was only fluent in three other languages, and she rarely had the opportunity to speak them.
She closed her eyes and listened, hoping she could figure out a few words, but they were speaking too fast and the accent wasn’t familiar. Most languages in the Known Lands had developed together, so they used words or dialects that were similar enough to figure out. This sounded completely different.
It was a hard, guttural language softened by frequent use of the sh sound and lots of variation of the n sound. They used their voices in ways she hadn’t heard much before, and the more she listened, the more rhythmic and harmonious it sounded.
She was so focused on listening, she didn’t notice anyone had entered the tent until a brush skimmed her arm. She tensed, her eyes snapping open, and two women jumped back, watching her warily. They wore the same unusual tunics that everyone else wore, one brown and the other tan. They were larger than her, with toned arms and lean frames.
“Please stand,” the woman in brown said slowly, the Common Tongue words heavy with her accent.
Naya rose to her feet, watching them just as warily.
They pulled a calve-length tunic dress over her head. The other woman clasped her hands together, fingers interlocked, and held them out in front of her. “Like this.”
Naya repeated the action, then the woman in brown reached out to touch her fabric bands, and Naya watched closely.
The woman rubbed a quick, complicated pattern on the edge of the fabric, alternating between the pads of three of her fingers, and soon enough Naya’s wrists were restricted from moving apart. The other woman wrapped the same fabric around her knees and rubbed another complicated pattern into its edge, using two of her fingers, restricting Naya’s ability to walk too quickly.
Naya stared at the fabric, dismay sinking into her. It would be almost impossible for her to figure out those patterns.
They escorted her out of the tent, one in front, one behind. As they crossed the tent, Naya noticed that the tube of water had disappeared. The tent floor was intact, with no sign that it had ever been there. Maybe she’d imagined it.
The hot, bright glare hit her as soon as she stepped out of the tent, and Naya pressed her lips together to avoid a whimper escaping. Even though she knew she wasn’t going to the stone to be tortured, the fabric, the sun, being escorted outside… the familiarity sent a sharp unease through her chest. If she never spent another day in the sun, she doubted she’d miss it.
Outside the commotion was even louder, and the camp was in disarray. People rushed in different directions and there was a quickness about it that alarmed her, but it didn’t bother the two women. They led her to a large wheelless cart that sat flat on the sand next to the group of the non-horses. The inside of the cart was similar to an open-air carriage—soft brown material lined its floor and sidewalls and a ledge ran along one side to sit on. Cushions and blankets had been placed in one corner and in the other was a squat metal pot with a lid.
Motioning, the women made her step inside and sit down, and then they removed the fabric from her knees and wrists. They moved to opposite corners of the cart and stood guard.
Naya surveyed the camp ground, finally seeing what the commotion had been about. Almost all the tents were dismantled with the one she’d been in and a few others remaining. The people were packing their materials into carts similar to the one she was in, all lined up next to the strange-looking horses. So many people darted about, many more than she recalled seeing when the tents were up.
While they worked on the remaining tents, the stout healer approached her with a knobby stem. It had been cut open, but part of the rounded disk of the root remain attached, like a lid. He handed it to Naya and then pointed to a bracket on the inside wall of the cart.
Naya nodded.
He then imitated drinking from the stem, pointed to his mouth, lowered his finger down his body to his groin, and then pointed to the metal pot in the cart”s corner.
Naya half-smiled. So now they cared if she soiled herself. “I understand, thank you.”
He inclined his head and walked away, and the two women moved to either corner of the cart. It looked as if they were both working on something, speaking quietly in their language and then a flash of shimmery magic covered her cart, arced like a clear dome, and the air around her cooled, removing the intense bite of the sun.
Naya sighed in relief, then settled into the cushioned corner of the cart, sipping the delicious liquid in her stem, and watched dismantling of last tent.
The carts were all lined up in rows that extended far behind her, most of them piled high with materials and equipment while others carried people. There were more rows that she could count, and a shimmering magical dome covered each cart. The strange horses were positioned in front of a line of two or three carts, and similar to horse-drawn carriages, the animals’ saddles were attached to rods connected to the carts.
Several people approached the side of Naya’s cart and unfolded long rods that they attached to the saddle of a beautiful non-horse that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. With a rich tan coat that lightened to a creamy beige underside, brown hooves, and short spikes along the back of his neck, Naya had never seen such an animal before. He was striking. This odd-looking horse behaved differently from the others of his kind, too. Slightly bigger, his thicker muscles were more defined, and his long ears stood still on his head, unlike the others whose ears constantly flicked and twitched and rotated. Similarly, his long thin tail, with a tufty tan curl at the end, didn’t move constantly like the others.
After examining him as much as she could, Naya turned back to the camp people, absorbing every detail she could. They used magic over the carts to protect their cargo, but how could they travel at any speed dragging carts along the sand? Surely they’d tip over at some point. She eyed her own cart—maybe it would too. That had to be why they were all checking and rechecking the carts and rods.
As the final checks were made, the beast appeared.
Surrounded by a group of men and women, he walked through the procession of carts and animals, nodding and exchanging words with the people. The group that strode next to him seemed important, too. The stout healer was one of them, but the others she didn’t recognize.
As the beast reached the front of her cart, he strode directly toward her and her heart lurched. She didn’t want to speak to him, not so soon. But he wasn’t heading for her. He swung up onto the beautiful, strange horse, settling into the saddle as the entire camp gathered around him.
There was a moment of silence. Then he spoke, his voice rising into the air.
Naya tensed at the deep, strong tone of his voice. It wasn’t just deep; it was smooth with a distinct richness that made him sound seasoned and wise. The undertone of that smoothness had a textured, gravelly depth that carried the demanding growl of a powerful Alpha.
Naya swayed in the cart, drawing her knees in to protect herself from the fluttering of arousal that appeared just from hearing his voice. She tried to focus on how he was addressing his people in his native tongue.
He spoke with passion, his words rhythmic, with repetitive sounds and emphasis similar to how her father spoke to his people en masse. She watched the surrounding crowd. They were enraptured. Their eyes locked onto him—no one glanced away or fidgeted. All attention was on their leader.
Her knees relaxed back down. His impact on her may be because he was her true mate, but his people’s behavior told her he was a captivating speaker. Naya’s heart sank. Without understanding a single word, she could tell he had the presence of a leader—one who riveted others and compelled them to follow.
The beast glanced in her direction, and the entire crowd turned their heads to look at her.
Naya stilled but didn’t shrink from their gaze as the beast continued talking. Whatever he was saying about her, it didn’t inspire anger or contempt. His people looked at her with determination and a tinge of curiosity, while a tremor of fear flashed in some of their expressions.
As he continued speaking, their attention was drawn back to him. He ended his speech with a crescendo of a repeated phrase that peaked into a roar that tore the air, gritty and textured just like his voice, and pulled on the hair on Naya’s arms and neck. The crowd joined him, everyone still cheering when they made their way back to their carts.
Naya watched the beast’s broad back as he settled on his non-horse and fixed material around his head. Of course, she would be attached to his animal. If her cart tipped over, he would know immediately.
After a few moments, the odd horses began to move.
She braced herself against the side of the cart as it jerked across the sand, but as his animal picked up speed, the cart floated upward. Naya shifted her position to look over the edge of the cart. It was hovering a few feet above the sand!
She stared at the sand rushing by before lifting her gaze to see the other carts all hovering behind their animals as well. It was an incredible sight. Even though the beast said that magic wouldn’t help her here, they’d harnessed it in ways she’d never seen. It was fascinating.
The horse-creatures increased to a full gallop, shooting across the sand at an incredible speed. They moved beautifully and quietly. For all their twitchiness when they stood around, their muscular bodies transformed into a beauty of motion when they ran. Naya marveled, watching them. If she was ever going to travel in this place, she’d probably need one of these creatures. They moved fast and seemed relatively simple to ride. Their gait was slightly different from a horse but she couldn’t see any major differences. She’d love to learn to ride them, but the beast wouldn’t allow that. It would be a fantastic way to escape, however. They were quiet and fast.
Their ears pressed down flat on their heads while they ran and flicked up intermittently as if listening for instructions. Their tails behaved differently on each of them—either straight behind them or flicking side to side.
All the people riding the horse-creatures covered either their whole head or most of their faces, and Naya could see why. Moving at this speed, sand hit the magical dome that covered and protected her.
The sand rushed by underneath her cart, and yet the golden landscape remained the same for miles. It made Naya feel like she was moving quickly and slowly at the same time.
She settled into the cushion, looking for some kind of landmark she could use for reference if she had to find her way back. But only sandy hills were visible in all directions all the way to the horizon.
It was only when the horse-creature slowed and her cart bumped down on the sand that Naya realized she’d fallen asleep. The skies had darkened, and a sharp wind scraped loose sand across the magical dome over her.
The horse-creature trotted to a halt, as did the procession behind her, and a quiet flurry began as soon as the riders slid off their animals and people climbed out of their carts.
By the time daylight had faded, they’d set up campfire structures that surrounded the fleet. The horse-creatures had been detached from their carts and fed, and the people were sitting in groups around flickering fires. Domes of magic covered each group as they ate and chatted, stretching out on blankets to settle for the night.
Naya folded herself into the corner of her cart, shivering, her knees drawn up, her arms wrapped tightly around herself. The heat of the sun had faded with it, and the magic dome had turned the air icy cold. She covered herself with the blankets and let her thoughts simmer, watching the twinkling sky so different from the one she used to watch over Ashens.
What were her parents doing? Had they found her spot in the forest? She wasn’t sure how long it’d been since she’d been taken, but they would be searching for her by now. The question was whether they’d find her.
While she wanted to cling to the idea that she could be hidden somewhere in one of the three continents, she had to face that she wasn’t in the Known Lands. It wasn’t just the desert or the language, but also the design of the clothing and strange items they possessed—the horse-like animals, the use of magic and the behavior of magic, the fabric that reacted to distance. Even the lantern on the table of her tent had been a strange design; fat, gold, and round rather than the usual tin rectangular.
Everything was too different. The stars weren’t the same ones she was used to seeing. When she’d arrived, it had been bright—daytime, even though in her forest it had been night. The days here were either ahead or behind her time.
It was hard to believe she could be beyond the Known Lands, but ignoring the obvious signs wouldn’t help her get back. Hopefully, her parents would find a clue in the forest, but whatever the beast used to interrupt magic and bring her here had to be extremely powerful—more so that any portal created in the Known Lands.
If her father couldn’t find her, he’d ask the other rulers for help once he eliminated their involvement, which should happen quickly. Between the three of them, they should find her—she just didn’t know how long that would take.
Muffled footsteps interrupted her thoughts. The stout healer approached with another stem of the knobby plant. Three women accompanied him; one held a tray with bowls on it, and the other two bent to do something at the corners of her cart.
The healer smiled at her nervously as he waited, nodding his approval that she’d finished the previous stem.
When the dome disappeared, an ice-cold breeze whipped Naya’s hair into a frenzy. She inhaled sharply, the cold so bitter it sent relentless shivers skittering through her.
The healer checked her wounds and reapplied the ointment and salve. He replaced the empty stem in the holder with the new one and then took from the tray a bowl of something steaming, a small bread and two round, furry items that were either fruit or vegetable.
After handing her the food, he stepped back and the dome reappeared, this time heating the air to a comfortable warmth.
Naya sighed in relief, nodding her head to the healer. “Thank you.”
He dipped his head, a quick smile bracing his lips.
Naya thought quickly. She pointed to the stem. “Thank you for the….”
“Tmae,” he finished for her. “Ell tmae.”
She nodded. “Yes, the tmae. thank you.” After a beat, she pointed to the beast’s horse-creature. It stood a few feet away, chewing slowly. “What is this?”
The healer glanced over and then back to her.
“In my land, it is like a horse,” she added, speaking slowly. “This is different.”
“No horse,” he said haltingly. “We call nnirae.”
Naya leaned forward. “Ne-ray?”
He nodded. “Nnirae.”
Naya frowned. The way she said it didn’t sound the same, but when she repeated the word again, he nodded. It must be her accent.
He gestured to the landscape. “They are from… tikshon… the sands.”
She lifted her brows. “They are native to the desert?”
A low, threatening word came growling along the twisting wind from the nearest campfire. “Oppo.”
The healer tensed. He turned and his smile dropped away. The beast stood next to the campfire, watching them both. The healer turned back to her but didn’t look her in the eye. “Sleep,” he instructed, before shuffling away.
“Thank you,” Naya called as he retreated. Dropping all kindness in her face, she turned back to the beast, who still watched her. A warm shimmer spread through her lower stomach—her deep Omega instincts reacting with pleasure that he was looking at her and had intervened in her conversation with another Alpha. Naya exhaled, clenching her teeth. This was going to be a problem.
She had to figure out how to deal with these instincts giving her incorrect signals. They were known to be compelling and powerful, even when attempts were made to block them, and in this case, her instincts were reading her Alpha incorrectly. He didn’t care about his Omega, he cared about his prisoner and using her to overtake her own empire. If she wasn’t careful, she would be pulled under, submerged in the depths of her natural submissiveness, and her home and all her people would fall.
The flavors wafting from the hot bowl drew her eyes away from him, breaking their stare.
It was too dark to see what kind of stew was in it, but it smelled delicious. Using the bread, she scooped up the stew and sighed with delight at the incredible herby, spicy flavors in her mouth. When did she last eat? She couldn’t even remember. But soon she was scraping the last of the food out of the bowl and reaching for the furry produce. Beneath the skin was a sweet, juicy, soft flesh unlike anything she’d tasted before. Both of them were gone in moments, and she hummed as she licked the juice that dripped down her fingers.
After packing away the bowl in a corner of the cart, she drank from her tmae and watching the campfires. The groups ate and drank, talked in low voices and laughed with the familiarity of people who knew each other well. They didn’t seem like an army, but things were too different here for her to make assumptions. They could be a different kind of army from the Lox.
Soon all the campfire groups settled down to sleep and everything went quiet, except for the muffled crackle of the flames. The magical domes were an ingenious idea, especially if they protected against animal attacks and controlled air temperature.
The night wore on, most of the camp fell asleep, and eventually she yawned. After using the squat pot, grateful the sides of the cart were high enough to hide her, she settled down to sleep.
As usual, the nightmares crashed in.
In the first one, Lili was running. She loved to run. An excitable, giggly little Omega, she ran almost everywhere. But running across the Wastelands was dangerous. Along its blackened, cracked, and dry ground, the large cavities existing there had become big, jagged mouths, snapping at Lili’s feet as she ran past. One of them always caught her, breaking her little foot, and then it was only a matter of time until the others joined in. This time another four mouths each ripped off a piece of her and churned her in their mouths until all that was left was thick, oozing, stinking gore.
Before Naya could even scream, Lili was behind her, standing in the middle of the Wasteland, her copper-brown hair flying wildly about her head while she tried to say something to Naya. Her small face was contorted, her mouth moving quickly, urgently, but Naya couldn’t hear her. The cracked sky of the Wastelands was too loud.
Fissures opened up around Lili, lower than normal, and shot their usual blots of white fire to the ground. They cracked and boomed, drowning out any other sound. Lili became more animated, waving her arms frantically, pointing, yelling, and trying to tell Naya something.
Desperate to get to her, Naya ran toward her, a frightening sense of doom gripping her as the white bolts crashed down. But no matter how fast or how long she ran, she got no closer to Lili. The urgency increased and Naya knew she was running out of time, but nothing she did helped her reach her sister.
Lili threw her head back and roared at the sky, a booming roar that couldn’t normally come out of a little girl. It erupted from her with unstoppable force. Naya clamped her hands over her ears but she still heard it.
A thick bolt of white cracked through the air and straight into Lili’s open mouth. More bolts latched onto her and slowly tore her limbs away, one by one. Then they obliterated her torso and face, until only Lili’s bloody mouth was left, still furiously trying to warn Naya.
Naya jolted awake, chest heaving like she was still desperately running to Lili, sweat trickling down her temples. She sat up and wiped her face with one of the blankets in the cart, forcing her breathing to slow.
She didn’t expect the nightmares to stop just because she’d been taken and tortured—she hadn’t actually thought about them at all—being reminded about how gruesome and terrifying they were was a shock. Since she hadn’t been sleeping properly, they’d had no chance to creep back, but they clearly would not let her escape their torment.
“Explain what just happened.”
Naya started, shocked to find the beast standing by her cart, barely visible in the dark. She drew herself into a ball, trying to abate the shivering. “What?”
His eyes flitted over her but he said nothing else, clearly not feeling the need to explain himself.
“It was just a dream,” she muttered.
His gaze narrowed. “I told you what would happen if you lied to me.”
Naya tried to force away the lingering unease before answering. She couldn’t allow her nightmares to impact her situation. Taking a deep breath, she said, “I’m not lying. And I thought you only meant that about my empire.”
“I mean it about everything.” The hint of gravel in his voice somehow made the words feel more serious, and that made her shiver. “Will that be a problem, or are you prone to lying?”
Naya straightened, glaring at him. “I don’t lie. But I also don’t share my private life and thoughts with strangers. Or people intending to raid my home.”
“That will change today.”
Naya bit down the response she wanted to throw at him. Glancing around the camp, everything was quiet, just the crackle of the campfires as they continued to smolder low. The slight sheen of the magic domes whispered in and out of sight, but it was too dark to see anything else. She looked back at the beast, frowning. “Why are you awake? Were you watching me?”
“Do not ignore my question.”
“I answered your question. You just didn’t like the answer.”
The beast’s eyes narrowed. “It was a lie.”
Naya huffed out a breath. “It wasn’t a lie. I had a dream, a bad one. Don’t you have bad dreams?”
His soft growl made the hair at the back of her neck prickle. “No questions. You do not ask any questions. Not to me or any of my people.”
Naya made a face. “You said I’m a reluctant guest.”
“You are.”
“So youwant to ask me silly questions in the middle of the night, but I can’t ask you a single thing back?”
He stepped forward, his face hardening. “I said, no questions. That was your fourth one. There are no exceptions to this rule. If you ask again, you’ll be punished. Do you understand this?”
Naya glared back at him. What the fuck was she doing talking to him anyway? Turning her back to him, she lay down in the cart.
The Alpha growled again, this time loud and rough. Goosebumps flared across Naya’s arms at the sound but she thoroughly ignored him. He was displeased. Good. Luckily, she couldn’t scent him from inside the dome, so the impact on her wasn’t strong.
It was quiet for a long while and Naya relaxed, her mind wandering to her brothers and her sister. Drocan, the second oldest, would be as furious as Papa. He’d be in the thick of helping with whatever investigation Papa was running and doing his own research into the other rulers. He was fiery just like Papa and he didn’t trust the other rulers. Azarn, her other brother, would be more upset but then become enraged once he realized the implications of her disappearance, and Idaya, her sister, would want to tear the whole forest down looking for her, in denial of any notion that Naya had been taken and insisting that she was probably still in the forest somewhere.
They all had Papa’s temper and Mama’s curiosity, and when they were younger they were a force of nature for their parents to try and control. Naya would use magic to sneak them all into restricted areas of the palace, play tricks on the Eiros twins, and hide them all when Papa was furious at something they’d done. If it wasn’t for Mama’s ability with magic, Naya would’ve gotten away with wreaking havoc, and her siblings were always right beside her. They were all so close, and even though they understood what she was going through after what happened in Saderthorne, she could barely look them in the eyes. Idaya always left her favorite fruits outside her quarters, and Azarn would leave history books with highlighted passages he loved and wanted to share with her. Drocan would simply force his way in to see her every now and then, just to give her a hug. They never gave up on her, and now they might all die before she could tell them how much she loved them.
When the drowsiness of sleep beckoned again, Naya abruptly sat up, forcing herself awake. She couldn’t go through any more nightmares tonight.
“Humph.”
Startled, Naya turned to see the beast still standing by the cart. Why was he still here?
“You avoid sleep because of bad dreams.”
Naya tensed at his words, but was more annoyed by the satisfied way he’d said it, as if it’d been a challenge to figure out.
“That’s why you’re always in the forest at night,” he concluded.
Naya examined him, her voice quiet. “How many times did you see me in the forest?”
A gruff sound came from his throat. In an instant, the fabric around her neck tightened, solid and hard, just like it had before around her ribs. Within moments, she couldn’t breathe.
“I said no questions.” Though his voice was calm, anger darkened his features. “This is no jest. You do not ask me anything.”
Naya clawed at her throat trying to speak, but though her mouth made the shapes, nothing could come out.
He said nothing more. He simply watched her, and she glared at him back, until she gripped the side of the cart and keeled over, clawing at her neck and gasping for air. Heat encased her head, and light prickled at the edges of her vision. And then everything went black.