The bond hums in my chest, a constant presence now, and I can feel Rhystan somewhere below—his presence like a warm weight at the end of an invisible chain, always there, always pulling. His study, probably, or the throne room, dealing with whatever kings deal with when they're not breaking down doors to claim their omegas.
He knows what's happening to me. He has to know.
And sooner or later, one of us is going to have to say it out loud.
I look down at my black nails, hiding the purple underneath, hiding the evidence of what I'm becoming.
Not today.
Tomorrow, maybe. Or the day after.
One of us has to break first.
I just don't know which one it will be.
14
Kess
He findsme in the training yard when the afternoon sun has turned everything to gold.
I'm running drills alone, the practice sword cutting arcs through crisp autumn air that smells of woodsmoke and dying leaves. Carter had to report for guard duty an hour ago, but I wasn't ready to stop—couldn't make myself stop, not when each movement feels more fluid than the last, not when my body is becoming something new with every passing day and I need to understand what it can do. The wooden blade feels lighter in my hands than it did last week, like it's losing weight while I'm gaining strength, and my feet know where to go before my mind finishes deciding.
I sense him before I see him, the way I always do now—that pull in my chest like a hook beneath my ribs, the bond humming to life as he draws closer. His scent reaches me on the wind before his footsteps do, smoke and stone and something wild underneath, something that makes the omega part of me want to bare my throat even while the warrior part wants to bare my teeth and fight.
I don't stop my drill. Strike, recover, pivot, strike again. Let him wait. Let him watch. Let him wonder what I'm thinking while I make him stand there in the golden light like a supplicant waiting for an audience.
"You've been avoiding me." His voice comes from the edge of the yard, rough and careful, a man picking his way through a field of broken glass.
"I've been busy." Another strike, the impact singing up my arms and settling into my shoulders with familiar warmth. "Training. Reading. Thinking."
"Thinking about what?"
I finish the sequence and turn to face him, letting the practice sword hang loose at my side. He's dressed simply today, no crown weighing down his brow, no formal robes making him look like a statue instead of a man. Just dark clothing that makes his golden eyes burn like embers against the shadows of his face, like coins at the bottom of a deep well. The claiming mark on his throat is visible above his collar—the crescent of tooth marks I tore open in the armory, still healing pink and raw.
Still mine, whether I want him to be or not.
One of us has to break first, and I'm tired of waiting.
"Contamination," I say, letting the word land between us like a blade dropped on stone. "I've been thinking about contamination."
He goes still the way only a dragon can—utterly motionless, not even the rise and fall of breath to prove he's alive, like he's turned to marble between one heartbeat and the next.
"The texts in the archives are mostly destroyed," I continue, walking toward him with the practice sword still loose in my grip, each step deliberate, measured, giving him time to squirm. "Burned pages, torn sections, whole chapters reduced to ash by someone who wanted that knowledge erased. But I found enough to piece together what they were hiding. Alpha bloodentering through wounds instead of being swallowed cleanly. Fatal within days. Purple fingernails first, then a red ring around the pupils, then skin hardening where the blood entered."
I stop close enough to see the tension carved into his jaw, the way a muscle jumps beneath his eye like something trying to escape.
"Your blood is in me, Rhystan. Has been since the first claiming, since you buried your claws in my hips on that altar." I hold up my hands, nails painted black as a moonless night. "I have all three symptoms. According to everything I've read, I should have been dead weeks ago."
Silence stretches between us, heavy and thick as honey, sweet with everything we're not saying.
"I know," he says finally, quiet as a confession whispered in the dark.
"You know." I keep my voice level even though something hot and sharp is building behind my ribs, pressing against my lungs like a scream trying to get out. "How long have you known?"
"Since the beginning." He holds my gaze without flinching, giving me that much at least—the dignity of looking me in the eye while he admits to keeping secrets. "I saw the signs after the first claiming. The way your wounds healed wrong, too fast and too hard. The texture of the scars when I touched them in the dark. Then the red ring appeared during your heat—just a flash when your rage peaked, a circle of fire around your pupils that vanished as quickly as it came. But I saw it."
"And you said nothing."
