Page 11 of The Omega Thief

The sound that told him if he so much as breathed in the wrong way, he would lose his jugular.

“Start talking.”

“Y-you can’t t-touch me,” Gilbertson squeaked. “There’s a law. Shifters can’t break—”

“Do you know who I am?” The prince almost garbled his words, and Attiker realized his fangs had dropped. Fortunately, so did Gilbertson, and he shook his head mutely.

The prince took a step forward and grabbed Gilbertson’s throat. Attiker peered around him, suddenly not minding being shorter.

“You have to let me go,” Gilbertson rasped. “I didn’t do anything to you.”

Thakeray took over from the guard holding Davey and dragged him close to the prince. “Maybe this one can tell us?”

Davey mutely shook his head but looked terrified. Attiker heard lots of boots clatter down the alley as more guards arrived, and the prince let the guards take Gilbertson off him.

“Wait,” the prince said before Davey was hauled away. “Get rid of the others. Thakeray, stay with me. You remember the way you couldn’t get that thief to talk last year, and we tried my claws?”

Thakeray grinned. “I’ve never heard a man sing so sweetly.”

“You can’t touch me,” Davey cried, struggling. “There’s a law. The last king—”

“You mean my father?”

Davey scoffed. “Nice try. There’s no way any royal would be—”

“Your Highness!” Two new guards ran into the alley. “Sire, are you injured?”

The prince didn’t reply, just raised a very autocratic eyebrow at Davey. “Prince Raz’mar Kinsharae, at your service.” He bowed.

Attiker didn’t know it was possible for Davey to go so white and still be vertical unless the guards now holding him for the prince were keeping him upright. “Y-your Royal Prince, umm, Raz,” he stammered.

The prince extended a long claw from the tip of one of his elegant fingers, and it pressed into Davey’s neck. “Only my friends get to name me. You will address me as Your Highness, and then only when you’re on your knees. Now, where do we find Attiker’s mother?”

Davey shook his head, and the prince extended a second claw. “I have another eight, or I can show you my fangs instead.”

Davey trembled, and Attiker turned his head away from the sudden awful smell as Davey pissed himself. The prince never so much as flinched. He simply extended the claw on a third finger. Blood ran from where the first two were cutting into him.

“You c-can’t.”

The prince tutted. “Haven’t we just established I’m the prince and can do what I want? Guards? His breeches seem to be wet. Strip him.” He stepped back.

“No,” Davey almost shrieked. “I meant you can’t find her because—” Davey shot a look at Attiker, and Attiker felt a chill race through him. “Because she’s dead. She died of the fever. Wouldn’t wake up. That’s why Gilbertson came for his money tonight. He couldn’t risk Attiker finding out and refusing to pay.”

There was a short silence, and then the prince glanced at the guards. “Take him out of my sight.” And Davey was dragged from the alley.

Attiker gazed at the men being dragged away, but he was seeing something else. She used to laugh when his dad was alive. His dad would come home and take his ma in his arms, and they would twirl around the room to music only they could hear. Then they’d drag him into the middle of them, and Dad would lift him off his feet, and they would all dance.

The little house always smelled so good. Of flowers or of fresh bread on baking day or of spring rain on washing day.

But she was dead. Dead, and Attiker hadn’t known. He drew his thin jacket closer, feeling suddenly chilled, and tried to work out why he felt like such a failure when he’d done his best to protect her for years, even when he was young enough she should have protected him. He stared down at the cobbles under his feet and tightened his arms around himself, trying to block out the last time he’d seen her when she hadn’t even known her son.

“Two jacks for such a pretty boy.”

Attiker went cold as he recognized the voice coming from the alley, even if he didn’t want to believe it.

“Ma?” he whispered in horror. It had been two months since he’d seen her last. The last time, he’d needed to pay her debts to Gilbertson, but as he stared in shock, he understood the ravages the fever white had wrought on her. So thin, her clothes hung off her. The telltale chalky appearance around her mouth. The glazed look in her eyes that meant she probably didn’t know or didn’t care. He took a step closer, ignoring the rank smell of an unwashed body. She hadn’t been this bad when he’d seen her last. “Please come home with me,” he begged as he’d done countless times before.

“We don’t need to go that far.” She giggled. “I have a mattress down the alley.”

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