"Tell me." His golden-brown eyes held mine, unflinching. Tears were still tracking down his face, but his jaw was set with determination. I shook my head. Some things I couldn't say. Some things I'd only heard whispered about, never seen, but the whispers were enough to give me nightmares for years.
"You don't have to tell me." He moved closer, and his hand found mine. His grip was gentle, but I could feel the tremor of rage running through him—a fine vibration that belied his soft touch. "I can imagine. And I want you to know—" his voice broke, and he had to swallow twice before continuing. "I want you to know that I would find every single one of them. Every person who has ever hurt an omega. Every person who thinks they have the right to 'correct' someone for wanting to be free."
He brought my hand to his mouth and kissed my knuckles. Soft. Reverent. His tears dripped onto my skin. "I would make them understand what it feels like to be helpless. To be at someone else's mercy. To have no control over what happens to their own body." Another kiss to my knuckles, his lips trembling against my fingers. "Then I would show them no mercy at all."
I should have been frightened. They meant it. All of them. I could see it in their eyes—they were already imagining it, already planning exactly how they would tear apart everyone who had ever hurt me.
I wasn't frightened.
I feltsafe.
"Okay, but there’s also more that you don’t know about," I whispered.
Taking a deep breath, I told them about breeding houses, the places where unclaimed omegas were kept until someone bought them. Rows of beds in cold rooms. Omegas bred over and over until their bodies gave out, then discarded.
I told them about ‘correction’—what happened to omegas who resisted. I didn't explain the details. I didn't have to. They understood. I told them about heat suppressants that were deliberately unreliable, so omegas couldn't control their own cycles. About alpha guardianship laws that meant we couldn't go anywhere, do anything,beanything without permission. I told them about the ‘honor’ of being sold to a wealthy alpha. How my father had actuallythankedme for securing such a valuable match. How my mother had cried but said nothing.
"I was supposed to be delivered to him two weeks after my eighteenth birthday." My voice was empty now. Hollow. I stared at a spot somewhere past Kaelan's shoulder, unable to look at any of them. "The contract was already signed. My father had already spent the money. Everything was arranged."
"But you ran." Kaelan's voice was terrifyingly calm, the kind of calm that came before catastrophic violence. His dark eyes hadn't blinked in what felt like minutes. His charcoal tail drifted motionless behind him.
"I ran. Before I turned eighteen, I stole some money, bribed my way onto a ship, and disappeared." I finally looked up, finally met his dark eyes. My chin lifted with a defiance I didn't entirely feel. "That was eight months ago. I've been hiding ever since."
Silence.
Kaelan was so still he might have been carved from stone. His face was expressionless, but his eyes, his eyes were black with cold fury, an abyss that went down and down and down. Not asingle muscle moved. Even his ink-black hair seemed frozen in the water.
"This is normal?" he asked, his voice was flat, dead. He tilted his head slightly, studying me like he was seeing humans for the first time. "For humans? This is how your entire species treats omegas?"
"Yes." The word was barely a whisper.
"And you've been hiding on that ship. Working.Laboring. While the alphas around you would have done the same thing to you if they'd known what you were." Each word was precise. Clipped. Like he was containing something vast and terrible.
"Yes."
He was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was soft. Almost gentle. And far more terrifying than any roar.
"I used to feel guilty sometimes. About the sailors we've killed. The ships we've—" He stopped himself. Something flickered in his eyes, there and gone. "I used to wonder if we were monsters for taking human lives so easily."
He reached out and touched my face. Cupped my cheek in his pale hand, his thumb brushing away tears I hadn't realized I was crying. "I don't wonder anymore."
"Kaelan—" I reached for him, my fingers brushing his wrist. He caught my hand, held it against his chest where I could feel his heart beating, slow, steady, predatory.
"Your species treats its omegas like livestock." His voice was ice, as I flitched back at his sharp words. Absolute zero, cold enough to burn. His dark eyes held mine, unblinking, ancient, full of cold judgment. "They sell their children. They cage the ones who resist. They force them to breed until their bodies give out." His thumb traced my cheekbone with impossible gentleness, such a contrast to the murder in his voice. "Thenthey wonder why creatures like us have no qualms about dragging them into the depths."
"Not all humans—" I tried, though even I could hear how weak the defense sounded.
"Enough of them." His dark eyes bored into mine, and I saw something vast behind them. Something that had watched humanity for centuries and kept a tally. "Enough of them that you had to run. Enough of them that you've spent eight months hiding on a ship full of alphas and betas who would do the same thing to you if they knew what you were. Enough of them that the idea of being caught makes you shake with fear."
I couldn't argue with that. He was right. He was absolutely right.
"I will never let them touch you,." his voice dropped lower, rougher. A vow carved in stone. His hands on my face were steady, but I could feel the barely leashed violence in the rigidity of his arms, the tension in his shoulders. "Do you understand me, Lily? Never. If I have to kill every human on that ship, I will do it. If I have to sink every vessel in this ocean, I will do it. If I have to drag your father and that merchant into the deepest trench and keep them alive foryearswhile I make them understand exactly what they did—" His jaw clenched, muscle jumping beneath pale skin. "I will do it. Gladly. Without an ounce of remorse."
"You can't kill everyone who—" I paused but the words felt small. Inadequate.
"Watch me."
Simple. Absolute. A promise written in blood and salt water. His dark eyes never wavered from mine. "I have lived for centuries, Lily. I have killed more humans than I can count. And I have never—never—had a reason to kill as pure as this." His other hand came up to cup my face, both palms warm against my cheeks, holding me like I was the most precious thing in theentire ocean. His thumbs brushed away tears I hadn't realized were still falling.
