Текст книги "Scars of his warth"

Автор книги: Zoey Ellis

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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

For some reason, the Alpha had woken her up early, dressed her, and taken her out on the nnirae. It was too early, out of their normal routine, but she went along with it.

She missed waking up arching into him, pressing her nose into his neck and sighing at the dominance he always established first thing in the morning. But riding in the early morning was nice too. They left the city, riding past the ruins for the first time and crossing rocky terrain. After a few hours, they stopped to stretch their legs and let the nnirae rest. The Alpha fed her food he’d brought along with him, and then they continued their journey.

In the afternoon they reached their destination, a forest. It was enough to push Naya’s mind into sharp focus, but as the thoughts crowded her mind, she silenced them. This was not her forest, just a forest.

They dismounted, and the Alpha held her close as they walked among the trees.

Naya’s mind wouldn’t be silenced, however. She couldn't help but compare it to her own forest, but there was something very strange about it. They walked for a while until she figured it out. It was dead. An eerie silence hung among the black trees; no animals scurried, no birds sang or flapped in the trees, even the sun struggled to reach the soil. The branches weren’t as tangled as in her forest, but there was no life. Something strange happened here. It was almost like a museum forest graveyard. It was as though it had been frozen in time, imitating life. Naya looked around, absorbing everything she could see. It wasn't her forest, but her heart ached for the forest it had once been. She looked at Akoro. "Why did you bring me here?”

The Alpha’s expression was unreadable, but she thought she’d caught a look of triumph. “I wanted to show you someone else's trauma."

She looked around. “Whose?”

“Mine.”

She snapped to look at him. His eyes tracked her closely. Those eyes… she’d forgotten how intense they could be. “How?”

"I was here when this happened." His eyes darted around the dead forest before returning to her. "I used to train here when I was very little. My parents didn't approve of me learning how to fight. They thought it was too vulgar and of no use in cultured life. So I used to hide in here, I wanted to learn something from people. One day I was practicing with about fifteen other children and an incredibly powerful magic rippled through the forest, killing everything and leaving it like this."

Naya frowned. "How did that happen?”

"That is what happens in this world. We are attacked by magic."

"The entire forest?"

He nodded.

"How did you get out?"

"I ran," Akoro said. "As soon as I heard the magic, I started running and shouting, but the other children were slow."

Naya gasped, her hand covering her mouth. "Are you saying the children died?"

Akoro nodded. “All of them. No one made it out of the forest apart from me."

Naya looked around. "I saw you in my forest before you took me," she said quietly. "That morning. You were standing against a tree, and it looked like…" She shrugged. "I couldn't tell what you were doing."

"I was savoring the life," Akoro said. "That forest is very similar to how this one used to be.”

“And this caused you trauma?”

“This is one of first the things.” He gestured back to the nnirae, and they made their way out of the forest.

Naya nodded, her mind whirling. “How many more are there?”

Akoro glanced at her. “A few more. Some much more serious.”

When they got back to the palace, she struggled to banish her thoughts so she could withdraw into the blurred experience again. Her mind kept going over that dead eerie forest, similar in so many ways to her forest. She couldn’t imagine not having the feel of her favorite magic in her forest—that it would be just a shell. Maybe the reason why magic behaved differently here was because of these disasters.

That night, Akoro eased her on top of his chest, giving her direct access to his delightful, comforting purr and Naya settled herself on top of him, still unable to make her mind blank. He grabbed her hair, lifting her head up. “Do you remember your Haze?”

Naya stilled and then shook her head. She hated how she’d been during her Haze and was still trying not to think about it. He grunted and released her, his hands lowering to squeeze her ass, allowing her to settle back onto him.

When the nightmare came that night, she was standing in the empty Great Hall, her father's weapons bloody and gleaming in the almost darkness. She tried to clean them, but no matter how much blood she wiped away, more kept dripping. Then she saw in the semi-darkness that the hall was full of mutilated bodies. Silent, mutilated, but alive corpses of her family swaying in the hall.

When she jerked awake, Akoro was already purring, pressing her down into the bed with his weight and giving her the comfort she needed while she gasped for breath in horror.

Akoro stroked her, burying his fingers in her hair to run them along her scalp and calm her. "Tell me."

Breath halting, Naya told him the dream.

"You dream like this all the time?" Akoro said, displeasure on his face. “With blood and gore?”

Naya nodded. "Ever since… what happened."

"With your sister Lili."

Near nodded, trying to keep her breathing calm under the power of his purr.

"Your sister died," he said.

Naya nodded. "I killed her."

Something shifted in the Alpha. Naya couldn't tell exactly what it was, whether it was a hint in his scent or the slightly tense muscles. But something changed in the way he held her.

"I'm a monster," she agreed.

"You are not a monster," he said. "I do not believe you killed your sister."

"I did," she insisted.

"How?"

She hesitated, inhaling a breath. "We have a… wasteland area in the empire. We call it the Wasteland because nothing can live there, no person, no plant, no animal. It is ravaged by wild magic so savage, it scorches the sky and there is a white fire that exists across the whole area. It has always existed in a particular area in the south of the empire. No one goes near it, but it is in one of the southern regions.

“Six years ago, the white fire started to stray beyond its boundaries. My people asked me to intervene. As someone who is the most comfortable with magic in the Lox Empire, it made sense for me to attempt it. But this isn't the kind of magic that exists everywhere. It is concentrated and unpredictable.”

Naya took a breath, halting and unsteady. "Lili was my littlest sister, the youngest. She was already a powerful Omega. At five she could already do more complex things magically than I could at that age, and at seven there wasn't much I could do that she couldn’t. She looked up to me, and I doted on her. She was my favorite person in the world." Naya swallowed, tears stinging her nose, but she kept going. “She always had lots of questions about what I did when I went out into the empire—what I’d learned, what magic I tried. Sometimes it was too dangerous to bring her, but if I could, I did. If not, I’d always talk to her about what challenges I faced. She was the only person I could talk to about magic at the level I used it, and I supposed I relied on that. When I was asked to deal with the Wasteland, I knew it was too dangerous for her and I told her she couldn’t come with me.

“I had to decide if I was going to destroy it or confine it back to the area it had always existed. I did my research and decided to confine it. Destroying it was too risky and unpredictable. Anyway, Lili followed me to the Wastelands—she came by portal so she could watch me.”

Naya’s voice started to shake, so she took another breath. “When I realized she was there, I decided to let her stay. She was far enough away and among the general crowd that I didn’t think there would be any danger to her, and I knew she was so excited to watch. I had factored in all aspects of the environment, but I didn’t factor in there being another Omega as powerful as Lili in the vicinity. As soon as I started to wrangle with the white fire, it was drawn to her.”

The smell of burning flesh started to fill the air, and Naya steadied her breathing, trying to push the memory away. It wasn’t real. "The fire tore her apart, and I couldn't do anything about it. It was completely out of control and burned across the country. I still hear her screams, all their screams.”

Naya stopped, words unable to form and Akoro pulled her close, squeezing her into him. “You did not kill her,” he said.

“I should have known better than to tell a seven year old that she could stay and watch something like that,” Naya said sharply. “It was a fucking foolish thing to do.”

“Other children must have been watching.”

“Yes. And they died too. I shouldn’t have allowed an audience to gather. The whole area should have been evacuated. I don’t know what I was thinking. They paid the ultimate price my arrogance.”

“You couldn’t have known,” Akoro growled. “Magic isn’t as unpredictable in your world. You didn’t intentionally cause her death.”

Naya pressed her lips together. No one could tell her that she didn’t.

“Some of us have intentionally caused the death of our family members. You shouldn’t take on the burden that we carry.”

Naya started, and looked at him. “What?”

He held her eye. “It’s a scar that will never fade. Yours will if you let it. It can make you strong.”

“I don’t feel strong,” Naya whispered, looking down at his chest. “Not any more. I don’t see how I can rule if I can’t even remember to think about risks to others.”

“Why do you think I took you, tmot zia?” he said, hooking her chin and drawing her head back up. “You are the strongest person in the Known Lands.”

Naya searched his eyes for any hint of amusement or mocking and there was none.

“And now you are mine.”

The next morning, Meiro came with a message for Akoro. It seemed urgent—he dressed quickly and had her dress too.

“Come, I need to show you something,” he said to Naya. He led her to the stables where a group of his courtiers were waiting on their own nnirae. After they mounted, they trotted through the courtyard and out onto the streets of the city, navigating to the west.

The roads that led from the palace were wide and well paved. Impressive buildings on either side of the road, many citizens walked the streets traveling between the buildings, some dressed in ways she’d never seen in the palace. The streets were quiet, though many clashing scents surrounded them, from harsh and bitter, to mellow and sweet. Naya couldn’t tell where they were coming from until they turned into a much busier street with traders calling from either side of the road, advertising their wares. The smells were more intense, and the streets were bright. People milled about everywhere, talking and negotiating.

It reminded her of Ashens, and a pang of loss stung her chest.

Akoro increased the speed of his creature, until they were galloping through the city. People quickly moved out of the way when they heard the hooves. The farther in they traveled, the streets became less paved, dust kicking up under the hooves of his animal and creating a smog in the air.

"Put on your face cloth," Akoro said into her ear.

Naya twisted to look at him. "What?"

"Here." Akoro tugged on a piece of cloth on her shoulder in her outfit. She pulled at it, and it came away from the outfit. She recognized it. It was what they had covered her face with when traveling on horseback in the desert.

She covered her the lower half of her face with it and found she could breathe easier.

They traveled on, and although she’d seen it from her lattice window, Naya was surprised how big this city was. They must have traveled for at least an hour before slowing, and they hadn’t reached the ruined outskirts yet.

This area of the city was less populated, but huge buildings had been erected here. Some of them are incredibly old.

Akoro slowed down to a trot and stopped by a group of yellow-robed people standing at the corner of a large square. In the middle of it, a building stretched up to the sky—old and worn, but beautifully designed. Its design was different from anything else she'd seen in the city.

Akoro dismounted. He lifted her off the nnirae and set her down next to him. Naya ignored the sweep in her stomach of his hands on her as her feet touched the ground. She followed him as he stalked to the group.

They bowed their heads to him, hands on their chests and then began to converse in their language. The yellow-robes talked fast and hard with clear urgency. The rest of Akoro's courtiers joined, and a discussion ensued, getting louder and more fraught as each moment went by.

Akoro turned to look at the building, as though studying it. Naya followed his gaze, unsure what he was staring at. He stepped toward it, and although his security immediately followed him, the yellow-robes, and even his courtiers cried out, as though calling him back.

Naya frowned and followed as well. "What's wrong with it?" she asked, staring at the building.

"It's about to collapse," Akoro said. “It holds culturally significant documents that will be lost when it does.”

Naya nodded. It looked old enough that it could collapse. "What happened to it?"

Akoro exhaled heavily. "You said one of your duties is making your people feel safe."

Naya looked up at him, apprehension on the edge of her nerves. "Yes."

"Have you ever had to deal with the sudden collapse of a building?"

"I don’t think so," Naya said hesitantly.

"How would you prepare or deal with that?"

Naya stared at the building, her eyes running up and down it, trying to draw as much detail from what she could see. "This isn't sudden," she said. "You could’ve easily prepared for this if it was eventually going to collapse."

"This was only built three months ago. It’s one of our newest buildings. It was designed by one of our most celebrated new architects."

Naya inhaled, shock hitting her. She looked back at the building. It was old and weathered, as though it had been standing for hundreds of years. It was chipped and worn with weathered corners and stress fractures running up and down it. Even the surface was peeling. “How could it get like this in three months?"

“An attack.”

Naya nodded in understanding. “A magical attack?”

“Yes. This is recent but we’ve had attacks like this for years. People were working in this building. Now they are dead inside it.”

Naya exhaled in horror. “Is someone directing these attacks? Who would attack a building?”

Akoro looked at her. “Your people. It’s your people who are responsible.”

Naya’s brow rose. She shook her head. “No. That’s impossible.”

Akoro turned back to the building and said nothing more.

Naya watched him, her disbelief holding her in its grip. He had to be lying. The empire wasn’t at war with anyone, let alone causing this kind of damage to a world so far away. Was vengeance why he was planning to conquer the empire? Was this why he’d taken her—he thought her family was responsible for destroying their buildings? “My father doesn’t know you exist. You know that.”

“He doesn’t have to know I exist to cause this,” Akoro said. “He knows this land exists.”

Naya frowned, returning her gaze to the building. She’d never heard her father talking about a land like this. Could this be something that’d happened within the last six years that she didn’t know about? No. She’d been to every major meeting and briefing about empire business and all concerns across the Known Lands. If her father was aware of this place, she’d would have heard about it. Besides, her father wasn’t the kind to shield her from a serious threat regardless of what she might have been going through.

“How could it be attacked when some of the other buildings around it are fine?”

Akoro gestured to the ruins further away. “There was a problem. It’s being fixed now, but we never expected to have to replace this building so soon.”

Naya nodded.

After a few long moments, Akoro beckoned her. "Come."

They mounted his nnirae and rode once again out to the ruins, this time right up to the edge of the city, where the stretch of desert started. Akoro came to a stop near one of the stones and sat there. He said nothing… just waited.

Naya stayed alert. It didn't take long.

In the distance, right in front of them, dark clouds appeared with sand swirling up underneath, the same that she’d seen when they were coming back from the desert.

"What is that?" she murmured.

"We call that the nnin-eellithi. It means wild magic bolt."

Naya squinted at it as it inched closer, and she gasped. It looked exactly like the white fire from the Wastelands. Crackling white bolts shot down at incredible speed and it moved quickly. It didn’t have the cracked sky above it or the cracked ground like in the Wastelands. But it looked like the same thing. How could it be the same?

It came closer still, and Naya found she couldn’t breathe. She hadn't seen one directly since she had tried to tackle it six years ago.

Akoro bound his arm around her middle. "Don't worry," he murmured. "It cannot get to you.”

"Has it come into the city before?” Naya was unable to stop her voice from shaking.

"That is how these ruins were created," Akoro said. "It has destroyed entire regions. Much of what was in the city has been rebuilt, but we repel them here on the outskirts."

They watched the white fire coming closer still, and Naya became even more tense.

“This entire region used to have great power until these arrived. We cannot travel over the sands without having to contemplate how to deal with them. It has changed the way we live. And it was caused by your people.”

“What would be the point of us attacking you like this?” she asked, after the silence between them had stretched. “I don’t even know how we would do it. It looks like the white fire that killed Lili. How would we create it here if we can’t control it on our own land?”

“It’s possible to unleash a power you can’t control on your enemies.” He glanced down at her. "We are not aware of this white fire in your lands. Where is it?"

"It is in the southern region, the very southeast next to Saderthorne.”

He grunted. "We are not able to go there. When we saw reference to the Wastelands, we thought it meant that it was a desert or an abandoned land. We did not assume it was dangerous.”

With a horrible feeling in her stomach, Naya realized she shouldn’t have talked about Lili. If he hadn’t known about the Wastelands that could have been an advantage for the Lox.

“I don’t understand the attack, but I cannot guess the motives of a culture I don’t understand,” he said.

Naya breathed shallowly. So his insistence on all the different questions about her culture and people… he was trying to understand them. But he then was going to use that to destroy them.

For the next few days, they didn’t leave the nest.

Akoro kept her sated and in the aftermath of constant sex, clearly very pleased that she was present again.

Naya took comfort in her Alpha, pleased that she’d been able to unload what happened to Lili, even though he was still her enemy. It made her feel like she was making progress dealing with her past, even though it didn’t change anything between her and Akoro. In just the right mood, she could almost forget that she could never be with him. When he looked at her a certain way, took his time dragging his tongue on her skin, when he purred for her and chuckled at her obsession with fixing the nest. In those moments, she could push reality to the edge of her nest and hold it there. And just enjoy her Alpha.

She learned he liked when she stroked his hair or twirled it around her finger. He liked when she dug her nails into his skin as she orgasmed, when she crouched over him with her feet pressed into the soft bed, her ass smacking down onto him furiously searching for the rapturous high. He liked when she was tucked into him, when he could feel her breath on his neck as she slept, and he liked that she nested with him, plumping pillows, drawing the blankets around them, and positioning them just right. That was the reason he didn't take her back to his bedroom. He wanted to be in the nest she’d created organically.

As time wore on, she suspected that he was delaying the meetings, frequent knocks on the door that forced him to get up and speak to visitors annoyed him, so much so that she had to soothe him afterward. Obviously they needed him, and he was distracted.

To a point, she didn't care. If she distracted him so much that his invasion fell apart, that was a win for her and her people. But she was clinging to what she had right now… the bliss she may never have again.

Finally, one evening after Akoro had slammed in his knot and spilled inside her, he drew her into his arms and told her the next day they would be meeting with his council again.

Naya just nodded, her bubble deflating. She’d been expecting he would go back to using her to plan his invasion eventually. But if he was going to act like fucking her was inconsequential to who she was and where she came from so he could continue with his plan, then she should do the same.