Page 96 of Shadowlands Omega

I frown, uncertain. How can she mean that? “I…we’ll stop you,” I correct. And something about that correction sparks something inside of me.We, I said we.

Before I can lift my hand to stop her, she’s already pummeled me with a fiery blast. I feel it against my skin, a sublime heat that hurts, but doesn’t burn anything except my clothing. The force of her strike has taken me off of my feet and I tumble over the ground, the dirt on the highway line luckily putting out the flames before they can render me completely naked. When I come to, I’m lying on my back and a white face shielded by goggles is staring down at me with a smirk.

“Well, come on then, killer,” she says with a laugh. “Let’s get you to the cliffs.”

“Cliffs?” I croak, trying to sit up. But Merlin steps on the center of my chest, her boot heavy and caked with dirt. She leans her weight onto that foot, squeezing the breath out of me.

“‘Course,” she replies. “Cliffs of Oblivion. We need your beastly friend to meet us there so he’ll be nice and out of the way when we take the city. And you’re the bait.” She grabs me under the armpits and hauls me upright. She drags me so that I can’t catch my footing and when I try to fight back, try to bring fire and flame and strike them both down, I can’t. I wasn’t built to kill anybody. All I can do is struggle feebly when she drags me to a wagon that’s pulled out of the woods by horses with rotten pelts and matted manes, driven by riders that have bones sticking through leathery skin in places and guarded by more of the undead.

The undead, wearing tattered crimson cloaks, drag me away.

26 | Yaron

The Ports

The wind is warm against my skin, which is on fucking fire.My rut is raging in my bones, exacerbated by the fact that my beast and I feel eerily apart in our wants but in sync in our sense that something is very wrong.

The ports are typically a hive of activity, but not today. Today, there is no laughter, bartering, buying or selling. Today, there are only murmurs and whispers and fearful gazes and retreating backs seeking shelter. The mood is that of a city right before an impending storm. I glance up at the sky again and feel my lips curl back, as if I might fight the shadows. A low-hanging cloud casts more than a shadowy pall over the harbor, because beneath it, there is a terrible gloom.

Something is coming.

But from where? I’ve already stationed every guard that I could spare on the northern border, I’ve sent out patrol ships, I’ve had black cloaks inspecting every crevice — the black markets, the illegal fishing villages, the beaches, and even further south than that in case the undead come up from our disputed borders with Hjiel or on the Gold City side of the island. Even Owenna, for all of her promises and desire of a black cloak, too, has yet to deliver. I have yet to even hear from her and Sipho.

Nothing.

It has left my nerves frazzled and shot. My guards don’t speak to me. They cannot. I am surrounded by Betas, having sent the Alphas among my Riders in separate platoons so as not to further agitate me, but it doesn’t help. I am agitated. I amobsessed. I cannot even use my beastly senses to root out the undead because if I draw my beast forward, all he wants is to sprint back to the keep as fast as he can. She’s pulling me that way. She’s pulling me. She’storturingme. And I do not have time for this.

I should never have broken the mandate. I should never have bedded an Omega. I should never have presumed to take a Lady.

The thought screeches to a stop, the wrongness of it assaulting me like ten thousand undead. My beast surges against my breast, my heart throwing itself against my rib cage, desperate to fight the thought that’s taken root. Thoughts of forsaking her beneath the blood of the red moon.

I would rather fall on my own axe than break that oath to her. I would rather offer up my crown.

“Is there, um…something wrong…uhh…my Lord?” Jesús pulls his horse next to mine as my contingent begins to convene at the mouth of the highway line.

I am defeated. I am horrified. I amneedy.

“We will need to source wood from Glass Flats,” I mumble, turning Brega around.

“My Lord?”

“The highway line,” I say, pointing behind us to the dark fucking woods and the swampy highway line attempting to be made visible through it.

“The builders added gravel, sand and stones at your request,” Jesùs offers. “It is an improvement.”

“Now the mud has become so thick we will need to build bridges — gangplanks and a raised walkway,” I snarl. “It will be an effort, especially now that wood is so scarce on the South Island. We will need to import it and that is impossible with Mirage City holding both ports. Dark City will be no help until they erect the new port — if they are even able. It will be difficult to hold both Dark City and a new satellite port so far away. But if they are successful, Paradise Hole is too thick surrounding Dark City. I’ll have to go further north than that even to source wood enough to rebuild the highway line through Paradise Hole.”

“Ah. To Glass Flats?”

“Yes,” I reply gruffly, welcoming the distraction of tallying costs and coin to avoid thinking about Kiandah.Kiandah would enjoy traveling to Glass Flats. The castle is magnificent.And suddenly I’m spiraling. Picturing her expressions in my mind as she saw the Night Market… She is magnificent.

She is mine.

I am no coward. I will rule the Shadowlands, defeat the undead, kill the Fates and then I will sate myself like no Berserker has ever been sated.Fangs sunk deep into her neck. Knot fisted high in her sex.

My mind thrashes with unease and insecurity while Jesùs continues to blather on, engaging me in this mindless prattle about wood when it is likely the least of our concerns at the moment. “Rebuilding the highway lines through Paradise Hole seems prudent. Especially now. We could clear out more of the forest. It might make…occurrences like these less common. And of course, the merchants will be pleased. Well, once northbound trade resumes, of course.”

“Yes,” I grunt. My mind races, my toes curl. I want to be back with her. I never want to see her again. I want to ship her far, far away from me until the night of the red moon so I am not tortured like this. I want to keep her close, sear her to my skin. Brega stirs beneath me, neighing and stamping his feet. I correct him with a hypocritical huff, feeling restless and unsettled myself.

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