I hand it to him. He slashes his palm without hesitation—deep, vicious, matching the wound on my hand. Then he's stepping into the circle with me, pressing his bloody palm against mine, our fingers interlacing.
"Speak the words." His gold eyes bore into mine. "Whatever happens, don't stop."
Behind him, his father is shifting. Rising. Human form now, naked and blood-covered, reaching for a blessed blade that lies in the rubble.
I start speaking.
The words pour out of me—harsh consonants and guttural stops, the old tongue I've been practicing for weeks. Each syllable resonates with power that vibrates in my bones. The silver circle flares beneath us, bright enough to hurt.
"No." Valdris has the blade now. He's staggering toward us, holy fire dancing along the edge. "I won't let you destroy everything?—"
Rhystan moves to intercept. But he's too slow, too wounded, and his father is driven by three hundred years of conviction.
I keep speaking.
The words are the only thing that matters. The ritual is the only thing that matters. Whatever happens outside this circle, whatever violence unfolds around me, I have to finish.
The curse responds.
I feel it like a hook in my chest—something vast and ancient and furious, pulling at the blood connection between Rhystan and me. Three centuries of divine punishment, coiled in his bones, suddenly unspooling.
And pouring into me.
The agony is absolute.
It's not pain the way I understand pain—not injury, not damage, not anything physical. It'swrongness. Divine rage flooding into a vessel that was never meant to hold it, forcing itself into spaces that don't exist, remaking me cell by cell.
I'm screaming. I know I'm screaming because I can feel my throat tearing with it. But I can't stop speaking the words. Can't stop the ritual now that it's started. The curse is a river and I've opened the dam and there's nothing to do but let it pour through.
Images flash through my mind—not mine. Rhystan's. Three hundred years of memories carried on the current of the curse. I see omegas dying in his arms. See his mother's blood on his claws. See decades of isolation, guilt, desperation, the slow erosion of hope until nothing remained but endurance.
I see him wanting to die. Over and over. Climbing cliffs to throw himself off, letting enemies get too close, refusing food for weeks at a time. The curse wouldn't let him go. Kept him alive for this—for the chance that someday, someone might be strong enough to take it from him.
I'm strong enough, I think at the curse, at the divine punishment, at whatever War God created this horror.I'm warrior omega. This is what my bloodline was made for.
The curse doesn't care.
It just keeps coming.
My body is changing.
I can feel it happening even through the agony—scales erupting across my skin, not gradually like before but all at once. My nails darkening into claws. My teeth sharpening. My eyes burning as they shift from human brown to draconic gold.
The transformation the mystic warned me about. Forced. Accelerated. Minutes instead of months.
Most hosts die, the texts said. The curse is too much for mortal vessels to contain.
I am not most hosts.
I am the last of the warrior omegas. The wild bloodline that was supposed to be extinct. My ancestors metabolized divine power while dragons were still learning to fly.
I can do this.
Iwilldo this.
The last word of the ritual tears from my throat—more roar than speech, more dragon than human. The silver circle blazes white-hot. The curse slams into me like a fist, like a mountain, like three centuries of compressed rage finally finding its target.
And I hold.
