Something definitely not a tongue, or lips, or any of the other body parts I’d imagined kissing might involve.
Whatever this was, it tasted like a… My eyes flew open, and I spat out a muslin bag filled with something crinkly and pungent. “What isthis?”
Thorn’s face was as placid as ever, and he blinked slowly. “Herbs from Valerie. She found them while you were packing. Said not to take them unless it was an emergency.” His voice ended higher, like he was asking a question.
My cheeks caught fire. “Um, thanks.” I stuffed them into one of the interior pockets of my cloak.
“Herbs?” Kavin asked, reaching for the pocket as if to study them.
I stepped back. “They’re private.”
“Private herbs? Are you ill? I studied cures and have even performed some minor surgeries—”
“I’m not ill,” I squeaked.
Kavin took a breath to argue, but Thorn cut him off. “She said they’re private. Leave it alone, boy.”
Kavin’s brow furrowed. “I would, but Omegas react very differently to herbs. Especially herbs to control your, um, responses.”
“Well, I have to keep my stupid lure from bringing around throngs of Alphas, right?” I joked, wishing this conversation to the lowest of the Goddess’s hells. “Too many more and this boat will go under.”
Kavin frowned down at me, and I stepped over to the porthole, since Thorn was blocking the door. “If these are what I think they might be,kralovna, you could end up—”
“Infertile, I know.” I turned on them both, a strange growling sound escaping my throat. “I’ve been taking them since I was eighteen. They’re a mixture of wild carrot seed, fermented yam powder, something Valerie called neem, and papaya seed.”
Kavin’s expression was grim, but possibly not as dark as Thorn’s glower. “How much and how often, little queen?”
I shrugged. “Two pinches a day, morning and night. Since I was eighteen. I’m twenty-two now.” Kavin sucked in a sharp breath. “I know. Valerie told me I’ve probably taken too much already.”
“Since you were eighteen?” Thorn’s voice was utterly emotionless. “Valerie sent them?”
“Yes.” My face felt like a lava flow. “That was when I first, you know. Started feeling like an Omega. You might remember the time.”
Thorn looked away, probably embarrassed at the memory. It was one in a long line of attempts I’d made to get him to notice me as a woman, not a child.
I’d slipped into his bedroom late one evening, wearing nothing but a loose cotton shirt, unbuttoned to my navel to show the small breasts I had finally grown, that I had been so proud of. My first hint of Omega scent had surprised us both the day before in our private poisons class.
It had shaken me to the core to discover I was not “failed” or broken. Queen Vali and I had kept up a patchy correspondence over the years. In one of those letters, she had shared the ways she had changed at eighteen when her Omega nature had revealed itself. So I knew what was happening, and while Thorn had been shocked, he had calmly informed me that it would remain our secret. He would help me disguise the changes as they occurred, and he’d reached out to Valerie for help, with my permission.
I’d been terrified at first, but then saw it as a sign that we were meant to be together. He was an Alpha, the only one I could stand to be around. I was an Omega. That was how it worked in the fairy tales, right?
So I’d planned a romantic night straight out of a storybook. I’d picked hundreds of flowers, decorating his room with them. I’d laid out piles of blankets and sheets on the bed to make a nest for him, like I’d read about in Queen Vali’s letters. Everything was perfect.
Except I hadn’t expected Thorn to come home that night half-drunk, and with a friend. A lady friend, who had breasts the size of large melons and wore a corseted top that showed them off.
He had been livid to find me there. She had been kinder than expected, whispering in my ear that I’d be better off with a moderately-sized Beta. Then she’d shared some very privileged information about the size of Thorn’s equipment, especially his knot, which had shocked me, made me green with jealousy, and done the opposite of scaring me off.
Kavin’s hand on my arm brought me back to the present. “You should not take any more of those,kralovna. They can alter your reproductive health, yes. But they can also damage your internal organs. Omegas are not meant to take suppressing herbs for more than a few months.”
“How do you know so much about Omegas?” Thorn’s tone dripped with suspicion. “And why are you on this boat to Mirren? A boat that my friend Valerie said would be populated entirely by Betas.”
“Except for you.” Kavin’s eyes were filled with just as much distrust. “I might ask why you, an Alpha who hides his face, would take an Omega on the cusp of her annual cycle onto a boat without any other males who could help her through her heat.”
My annual what?
Thorn’s breath hissed out, and his cloak twitched slightly. He had palmed at least one knife. I stepped between them. “I’m sure we’re all very curious about each other. But for now, I need to know where my room is.”
I could literally hear Thorn’s teeth grinding together. “It’s here.” I waited for him to finish his sentence, but he fell silent.
