Chapter 21
Naya paced across her room, trying to work out the agitation that had gripped her.
Guards had escorted her back to her room hours ago and it had gone dark outside, but her anger and upset hadn”t cooled. When she’d agreed to give Akoro information about the empire, that did not, in her mind, include information about her personally or her dead sister.
Maybe it was foolish to think they wouldn’t want that information, but she”d assumed that they’d done their fucking research.
Lili had been dead for six years, the same amount of time that Naya stopped visiting the countries around the empire and withdrew from her duties. How is it they knew so much about the empire, but didn”t know that specific thing about her? She thought back to the way the empire had grieved during that time. She wasn”t sure what had been put into the Records Keep about the event—had no idea what had been recorded or publicized. Her parents had controlled that, but it was public knowledge. Where were Akoro and his people getting their information from if they missed that?
Regardless, it didn’t have any relevance to Akoro”s invasion. There were some things that she would not do, and that was provide them with any intimate information, knowledge, or details about her family that wasn’t public knowledge—that was off-limits, and she would tell Akoro that. He could kill or torture her—whatever he wanted. There were some things she just wasn’t willing to do, even if it hurt her plans to escape.
An hour after Meiro had brought in food that remained untouched, the door opened again. Akoro stepped in. He had calmed down from earlier, but there was still a smoldering anger in the way he moved—his bulky shoulders still tense.
Naya crossed her arms and glared at him.
It was strange that he didn’t know about true mates, but since it appeared he didn”t, it was likely he wouldn’t find out she lied about the Omega Haze, and even if he did, it could be that things worked differently in her empire. Either way she had a safety net.
His eyes ran over her. ”Have you calmed?”
”Have you?”
Akoro”s face soured. ”I have looked into what you said about Omegas’ true mates. It isn’t accurate.”
”How so?”
”The Haze isn”t always present when true mates meet each other.”
”That’s what is supposed to happen.” That wasn”t a complete lie—things like Omega blocks impacted the Haze. “If it doesn’t, you can’t be sure.”
Akoro approached and examined her face, his expression somber. Naya stared back at him and let him look.He couldn’t boldly claim they were mates just because he had an attraction to her, especially if she didn’t claim an attraction back.
He spoke low, gravelly. “Are you in the habit of fucking your own fingers in front of men you don’t know?”
“What?” Anger reared up again. “You threatened to break my hip! Or did you forget?”
“But you were so wet, Princess,” he said softly, “and so eager to show me.”
Heat crawled up Naya’s neck and her stomach fluttered hearing him call her princess. It was the first time since since he’d captured her that he’d said anything remotely close to her name. She stepped back, her tone resolute. “You’ll never see between my legs again.”
Akoro scowled. He grabbed her and dragged her to him, his voice gruff. “If I want to eat your cunt every day for the rest of my life, you will let me. And your precious Lonn? When we invade, he will die first.”
Naya twisted out of his grip and backed away, but he was already walking to the door.
”We will continue your questioning tomorrow.”
“I want your assurance that my sister will not be brought up again.”
Akoro stopped at the door, irritation skittering across his features. “Any question you don’t answer will be taken out on your people. That’s what you agreed to.” Then he left.
* * *
Naya spent the rest of the night practicing her sequences again, but some of the quieter, sustained sequences that her father had been learning in recent years with High Chief Kardos required strength, balance, and focus.
After she”d calmed down, she realized just how emotional and triggered she”d been about Lili. It’d been because she’d been unprepared, but she shouldn’t have been. Getting upset about it wasn”t going to help her or her parents. She knew within her deepest self that she was going to escape from this place, so if she didn”t answer questions about Lili, it didn”t matter. There was nothing Akoro could do about it once she was gone.
She still had her goals, and she needed to focus on the matter at hand and not get distracted by everything else.
So far, she learned they had an army of one hundred thousand warriors, according to Nrommo”s boasting. Even conservatively, that would be seventy to eighty thousand, which was still more than the Lox. The Lox had the benefit of being placed all over the empire and they knew the various terrains and cities, and if her father”s allies joined, together they would be serious resistance against Akoro. The other thing she”d learned was that Akoro was a multi-weaponed close-combat fighter, similar to Papa, and he could fight equally well with weapons in both hands. He had made assumptions about her on their first fight, but their second fight he had been a lot more versatile and demonstrated a range of skill. She suspected he still underestimated her in the second fight, but against her father, he would take it more seriously.
The more reserved sequences of her training aimed to quiet the mind and seek opportunities for furtive attacks—ones that could allow her to disable or kill quietly and escape without notice. She hadn”t practiced these skills in a long time but now was the perfect time. Since they’d altered the way his council was meeting with her, she was in the strategy room with only two people at any one time, so it was possible that an opportunity might arise.
She should be prepared. And she would be.
* * *
The next day she went back into the battle strategy room and calmly answered the rest of Prillu’s questions. When Prillu asked about Lili, Naya just didn”t answer. Prillu glanced at Akoro but simply moved on to the next question.
Akoro stood in his normal position, but this time there was a dark determination on his face, as though she was a challenge he was intending to beat. There”s no doubt he was planning something for her, but since she”d been in the palace, his scent hadn”t impacted her in the same way as when they were in the desert. Maybe it was because she”d been in more pain and eating less, but things were different now and it had to be the same for him. He barely approached her anymore. Whatever his Alpha outburst was about Lonn, it was an exaggeration of leftover possessiveness from the desert. Still, his determined stance made her uneasy.
In the afternoon after lunch, Akoro took her to the rooftop grounds and they battled again using different weaponry.
The next morning, Meiro didn”t arrive with her breakfast or her clothes, and there was no fresh tmae laid out. It was strange but Naya did her sequences and waited.
A different woman came in and dressed her. Breakfast was simply bread and the strong-smelling kermo, which Naya had become quite accustomed to. Afterward Prillu came to collect her as normal.
That morning most of the council were discussing the best way to infiltrate Lox Palace. Naya barely contributed. This was one discussion she could learn more from than give information about, and it became a lively discussion, because Nrommo couldn”t help but argue with everyone.
After he presented his idea, Naya scratched the bands on her wrists. ”That won”t work,” she said. ”There are warriors who pay attention specifically to that part of the city.” She turned to Akoro, rubbing her neck. ”The City of Ashens will be the most difficult place that you will attack. It is the capital of the entire empire. It’s extremely busy and lots of people visit the city every single day. It is the most watched and guarded in the whole of the empire.”
Akoro simply stared at her.
Naya exhaled held in annoyance, scratching her neck. It was itchy and hot all of a sudden. The heat increased, burning her underneath the material wrapped around her. ”Is it hot in here?” she muttered, glancing at the windows. Had their devices to cool the air suddenly stopped working?
”Whose method would you go with?” she asked Akoro, who was still staring at her strangely.
”Everybody out,” Akoro announced abruptly, ignoring her question.
Naya frowned, and the rest of the council froze, turning to look at him. But Akoro”s eyes did not leave Naya. ”Everyone out,” he suddenly roared.
Naya jumped, his voice burrowing into her core, breaking open something molten and wild and erratic.
The council left quickly, muttering their farewell to Akoro, even though he barely paid attention to them.
”What is happening?” Naya asked, her nerves hot and cold.
Akoro slowly rounded the table between them.
”What are you doing?” Naya breathed, panic crashing into her.
He came closer, slowly. ”I can smell it.”
“What are you talking about?” But even as she said it, the erratic wildness within her twisted and spread across the lower half of her body, making between her legs tingle. Horrified, she realized what it was just as he spoke again.
”Your heat has arrived.”
”No!” In desperation, she gripped her clothes, scrunching the fabrics hard in her fist. ”No. This can”t be happening.”
Akoro said nothing, his expression was turning into something hungry and….
She backed away from him. ”Stay away from me. I need…” A mist of awareness entered her mind, nudging her that her Alpha was right in front of her, ready and waiting and willing. She shook it out of her mind. ”I need a room. With blankets and I-I need to be locked in. Y-you can”t come in. No Alpha can come in. I just need?—”
The look he gave her was so intense and piercing that she felt like a babbling fool. She backed away, moving back around the table and keeping it between them. ”Y-you said that you would—you wouldn”t touch me.”
”I said no such thing.” Deep and growly, his voice shuddered right to her core.
She tried to think back to her time in the tent, but the memory was hazy. ”You said… You said.”
”I said, I would treat you in accordance with your dynamic.” The Alpha slightly raised a brow. ”I have… And I will.”
”No!” Naya shouted, his meaning suddenly seeping into her. ”No. I do not want you to take advantage of my Haze.”
”Take advantage?” he said. ”I am your mate. It is my responsibility.”
”No!” Naya shook her head wildly. ”No, you don”t get to claim responsibility now. Not after everything you”ve done to me.”
“I would have claimed it a long time ago if not for my brother,” he growled.
Naya rubbed her neck. It was getting too hot for clothes. “What?”
“My brother has been keeping you blocked.”
Naya’s mouth dropped open. “Who is your brother?”
“Your healer.”
Naya moaned. The tmae. There was no tmae this morning. “Why did he stop?”
“Because I fucking found out!” the Alpha bellowed.
Naya whimpered, his displeasure clanging through her.
”I told you I will treat you like an Omega, tmot zia, but I also must treat you like you’re mine, because that”s what you are. You cannot go through your heat without your Alpha.”
”I can,” Naya insisted, even though every instinct in her body screamed that was a lie. ”I can, I can,” she muttered, trying to convince herself more than the Alpha in front of her.
Tears sprung to her eyes, clinging to her lashes as they fluttered. This was the worst nightmare she could ever have imagined, and she knew he was behind it. He’d done something. She didn’t know how. All she knew was that she did not want, could not want him after everything he’d done, after everything he planned to do.
It wasn’t as though she hadn’t been through her heat without an Alpha before. Her mother had insisted that she experience it three times before permanently creating her blocks. Mama wanted Naya to understand how it worked—the fact that she would have no memory of her Haze until hours after it had finished, the fact that she would be a completely different person during it, someone who only wanted an Alpha at the detriment of her own safety, someone who only wanted to be bred constantly, someone who had no care for food or drink sustenance or hydration. All needs became less important except for the need to breed.
Mama had experienced it on her own when she was younger and she knew what to do. Each of the three times, she’d locked Naya in a room and had given her water and food. It had been a shocking and horrifying experience, but Naya understood after going through it that who she was during her Haze was not who she was in her right mind.
Instead she was a needy cock-seeking Omega who just wanted to find an Alpha, who would bring her to orgasm after orgasm in an attempt to sate the frenzied need that was never fulfilled. She was grateful to Mama for making her experience what it was like, but she never wanted to go through it again, at least not without her true mate. And now her true mate was going to use it to abuse the opportunity in front of him.
She was so horrified by the situation that she didn”t realize he had moved closer, stalking around the table to get to her, until he was right next to her and sweeping her into his arms.
Instantly she fought him, but his scent surrounded her. It had changed too and, damn it was so good—the deeper, pungent headiness of Alpha going into a rut.
He carried her out of the room, and each step he took brought her nose closer to his neck. Grabbing his clothes, scrunching them in her fists the way she had with her own, trying to hold off. She couldn”t so easily submit to him, but she knew that by the time she sank into her heat, she wouldn’t even try to resist.
Her heart sunk into a wild despair. This was the worst outcome that could have happened from her being captured by him. Everything that happened in the desert was better than being out of her mind and a willing participant in what was about to happen.
”Please,” she whispered, her nose nestling directly on his neck now. ”Please… Please….” She didn”t know what she was begging for—for him to let her go, or for him to find somewhere that he could pin her down and fuck her.
Heat between her legs spread up to her stomach, butterflies trembling, the wetness smearing her thighs, increasing at her center preparing her for him. ”No,” she mumbled.
People were talking, hurried voices around them as he strode down the corridor. The Alpha didn”t respond. He turned down a few more corridors before barking at someone and entering a room.
He gently put her down, tilting her head back to look into her eyes.
He was looking for her golden sight—the golden sheen that entered an Omega’s pupils when she was fully in her Haze. The golden sheen that helped her to see which Alpha would breed her successfully, the Alpha who was most suited to her.
She blinked, gaining clarity now that her nose wasn’t against him. ”Let me go,” she rasped. ”Please, I am begging you. Let me stay in here on my own. Just provide me with water. I will be fine in a few days.”
Akoro”s eyes searched hers. ”You think I will deprive myself?”
Naya’s eyes widened in horror. She slammed her hand against him, pushing him as she backed away from him. ”I am a treat?” she yelled. ”My Haze is something for you to indulge in? A fucking reward?”
Akoro said nothing, simply watched her.
”This is why you do not deserve it!” she hissed. “You are using me… You’re not fit. I—“ She lifted a trembling hand, rubbing her forehead, trying to remember what she was angry about.
”You will be locked in here while I go and get water and food,” Akoro said, turning toward the door. “I don’t want anyone coming to the door. Behave.”
”Don”t come back!” she yelled, even though her body screamed with dissatisfaction that he was leaving.
When he left, she looked around the room, realizing that she was in a bedroom. It was smaller than the one she’d been using, but blankets and bedding covered most of the floor, as though it had been prepared for her in advance.
Tears tracked down her face and she wiped them away. He had prepared for her heat. This was what he’d been doing since she told him about them. He was using it to take advantage of her again to discard her after he’d taken everything from her. And there was nothing she could do to stop it from happening.
She sucked in a breath and exhaled slowly as her heat came over her, fiery, hungry, desperate. She tried to focus. Yes, she might go into a heat, beg and plead for him, be a completely different person. But he would never have the real her, he would never have his actual mate. No matter what he did, she would never give her real self to him.
The best thing she could hope for was that she didn”t come out of her Haze pregnant. It was doubtful that she would, but she couldn”t trust anything. All this time she thought that her blocks were intact, but for some reason the healer had been protecting her. Her blocks had also provided her with pregnancy prevention in case she was ever assaulted, but whether that was even a factor now, she didn”t know. All she could do was hope.
She backed up against the wall, curling up tight as her heat crashed over her, turning her into a quivering mess of need, want, and sexual frustration.