By the glassy look in his eyes, his followers’ ghosts shroud us without him needing to tell me that they died for following his dream of freedom.
Just like mine did.
“The Blood Lovers in this Guild are here willingly,” Barnabas admits like it hurts him. “They wish to be hunted and caught. It is the highest honor to them to serve their dark gods. Omegas in the villages who aren’t selected fucking weep. Can you believe that?Weep.I warn you, they will use this Hunt as an excuse to execute us both. What knavish Blood would trust either of us in their nest? They would be not only foolish but crazy.”
Why am I thinking of wine-red eyes and a nest that smells of incense?
Lanlin wasn’t a fool or crazy.
He threw me out of his nest because he couldn’t trust me. It tears up my heart, but the fact is, he was right.
I cock my head, catching Barnabas’ gaze.
I force myself to smile, revealing my sharp teeth. “I’m no prey. So, let’s make a deal. You will teach me tonight everythingyou know about the Hunt. You’ve seen how I can fight, and you’ve killed with those antlers. Then on my side, I swear to stick together with you during the Hunt. If they plan to use the event as a way to execute us, then they’ll be shocked when we fight back.”
Barnabas leans closer, resting his forehead against mine. “Never make a deal with a fae…unless times are truly desperate.Deal.Live or die tomorrow, we’ll face the Hunt together.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Dream Bond
Aurelius
Where are they?Why isn’t this fucking dream bond working?
I pace from one side of the vast cavern to the other, swishing my crimson cloak as I turn. The cavern is set in the side of Mount Primo, which overlooks the south of Bael. At least, the version is that my mind has created for the Dream Bond, which will summon Freya and Daire tonight to share this dreamscape with me, as long as our bond is still deep enough.
I pray to the Shadow Gods that it is.
I swore that I wouldn’t leave my consorts alone in Blood Kingdom. I won’t break my promise.
The dreamscape is precisely as it was the night that the three of us shared a rut and bonded. The walls are rough with sparkling gold like dragon scales.
It is bittersweet because this is the reincarnated emperor who prowls beneath my skin’s memory, and Hadrian is darkly smug with that knowledge. Yet when I woke up the next morning in control again, it still felt likemybite that I could see on Freya’s neck.
I hoped then that there was a way to make our pack work.
For one brief moment…
I growl in frustration.
My hand wanders closer to Hadrian’s Dagger, as it has for days, as if magnetized.
Take me out, the dagger whispers, temptingly.Lay waste to the Blood Kingdom, burning it to bones and ash. Rut your mates on a sea of the dead.
I waver, before I clasp my hands smartly behind my back.
I’m shaking.
How can I hold onto my training to be emotionless and lock Hadrian’s cruelty inside, when it’s my Omega who may be dead?
Surely, I’d have felt it if my fiery Goddess was….gone?
I know that I would.
If my Omega had flown to join her ancestors in the moon, then the golden threads would have snapped, and my own soul would have screamed in agony and bled out.
Yet after Lucius’ father secretly carried out that attack in the Borderlands, breaking the peace treaty on the same night that I made it, who knows how Freya and Daire are being treated in the Blood Court?
