Page 27 of Shadowlands Omega

“The windows,” I whimper, doing nothing to keep the tears from my tone, just as my palms do nothing to keep the tears from my eyes. I cry. Tightly and terribly, I cry.

“The windows,” he says, voice stilted. “You’d like the windows…to…” It takes him a while to figure it out, but I don’t help him. “You’d like the window curtains opened?”

I nod.

He balks. “You’ve been here three days. After the first, your injuries were more than healed enough for you to walk this short distance to open them yourself. Why have you…” Another realization changes the accusatory nature of his inflection. I don’t know what to make of it when he says, “Have you left the bed for any reason? Other than to use the washroom?”

I shake my head.

“Have you even washed?”

I shake my head.

“And you’d like now…to look out of the window.”

He doesn’t seem to be asking a question, but I still nod.

Rage pulses out of him again, this time like a cold wind against the Cliffs of Oblivion, carrying hints of frost. “Don’t do this to me,” he says, voice all but a whisper. I have no idea what he’s talking about. He comes right to the edge of the bed, thighs pressed against its elevated platform. He reaches for me, as if to touch my shoulder, but I wince.

He snarls and pulls back, whirls around on his hard-soled heel, advances to the window like it’s a traitor he’s been itching to strike down his entire reign, rips the curtains all the way open and then leaves. He doesn’t look back as he storms out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him.

I turn to face the window fully and notice how huge it really is. Nearly twenty feet tall, it stretches two thirds of the way up the outer wall and it looks out over the entire courtyard of the keep, down the rolling hill — I can even see Orias Village in the distance. Smoke rises from chimneys. The village square is bustling, people whisking their wares to and fro. I can even see horse carts disappearing over the rise of the hill, climbing the Orias highway line towards the ports.

My mouth drops open as I realize where I’m sitting, relative to the castle. My vantage is from a position that I know well. That everyone knows. I’m currently positioned in the east tower of the castle that stands slightly taller and slightly apart from all the rest, in the tower that everyone knows no one is allowed to enter. Because this is Lord Yaron’s private wing and I’m in it — not in his guest quarters, but inhisquarters, in his private area, in his bed…

I’m his prisoner, but I’m sitting where his queen should be.

11 | Yaron

Shadow Dungeons

I crouch in the central corridor wearing the legs of my beast, at least the lower half.My trousers torn open at the knees and around the upper thighs. Her family was moved to a lower rung of the dungeons after they were found where daylight does not exist. It was not an order I gave, but I would have given it. Only a fool would return them to the dungeons they escaped from the first time. I am impressed that they are all still alive.

Their escape attempt was riddled with difficulties — a hard fall, a long swim, a sharp climb, and that’s all before they began running for their lives across the farmlands and fields, then through Paradise Hole. Then, the rains got to them and forced them to stop and seek shelter. They made it to shelter, or so I’m told. They hid for a full day in the abandoned ruins of the former Shadow Keep’s church — not the one I burned, but one found within Paradise Hole that was abandoned generations ago, a fact I found rather…sadfor reasons I have chosen not to explore further.

Though they were in poor shape when I last saw them, they were alive, but they seem to be deteriorating now. Out of the elements, out of danger’s direct path, in the dry cells in which they have been placed. Each one occupies a different cell and each cell is four walls, no windows and a heavy wooden door. The only truly salient difference between their first arrest and now is that they were together then. They have been separated now.

Fed and watered, offered paltry linens to sleep beneath and rushes to sleep upon, yet it is now that they fall apart. I can hear their sobs, their cries for each other through the thick walls. No, my beast can hear them. The walls down here are well insulated. There is no chance they’d be able to hear anything other than distant sounds of sorrow.

I rub my face roughly, feeling uncharacteristically uncertain, and sit there a moment more. Then I rise on two human legs and walk up the way I descended, back up the narrow, jagged stair. And as I eventually emerge into the light of a torch-lit castle, I carry with me a dangerous thought:mercy.

12 | Yaron

Shadow Keep

“I understand your anger…”

“You don’t understand anything, m’Lord!” the boy shouts at me. His father tries to hold him back, but I lift my right hand, signaling that he should let the boy rage. It is his right in the face of the wrongs I’ve committed.

Robert advances on the throne, his face splotchy with anger, yes, but also an even more powerful grief. He comes within ten paces of where I sit, only elevated by two simple stone steps on my throne seat, yet still lording over him in a way I ordinarily find useful. I do not find it useful now.

I stand and he freezes in his advance, wavering where he stands as if uncertain whether or not to move forward. Pride begs him to do so, but self-preservation keeps him from it. He is a young Alpha, yes, strong and large for his age, but he is also not stupid. His father and mother are both present, both looking fearful as I descend the two short steps from the throne. I advance on their son and his mother winces, turning her face into her husband’s shoulder, seeking comfort. His father curls his arm around his wife’s shoulder, hugging her close, and I feel…pain lance across my chest at the picture they make.

Not pain,longing.

“You need not fear,” I tell them, voice strangely hoarse, as I place my hand on the boy’s shoulder and give it a squeeze most gentle. “And you are right to rage,” I tell him privately. His gaze is downcast, though he tries to hold mine. It will be difficult. He is only sixteen and he loved the Alpha daughter very much. With his whole heart, a heart so unblemished as to have space for such a thing. To love something wholly. After this, after what happened and what the Omega’s family took part in and even perhaps caused, he will no longer have such an ability. After this, his heart will be missing a piece. It will eventually scar over, but it will always be lost.

“You will have your revenge. My Crimson Riders will not stop hunting for the culprits responsible for the killing of your mate — and so many other Alphas within the Shadowlands. Trash City will be found.”

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