A flicker of something soft shone in Sinadim’s eye for an instant before it was smothered by a scowl. “You failed. And now I’m left to salvage what I can.”
He took a step.
Renegade’s gaze flicked back—and she saw her future in the seething dark.
Sniffling back the pitiful tears, the heat of flushed cheeks and fatigue, she pulled her knees to her chest. Scrambled to her feet, and took a step back in retreat.
And despite the languor plaguing her muscles, that she swayed as she stood there, Renegade tilted her head back and tucked her chin.
They wouldn’t see her cry.
Not this time.
Her season was ended, the breeding hormones purged from her blood.
And she had the ear of the Alpha.
Time to make herself heard.
A foreign temper burned in her chest, making her ribs ache, but gave her the strength to meet Sinadim’s glare with one that matched. A shimmering wave of hatred boiled at the back of her throat.
But she smiled, showing teeth.
She had no strength to fight them. No great advantage aside from her ability to whelp hybrids and fill the ranks of a feral army born in the wild. Not worthy of consideration beyond what she could be made to do. Tainted by infection that had yet to fester. And yet, Sinadim had chosen the place where she’d trapped them all. The den she’d used to satisfy her needs, where she’d left them all wanting.
It was the birthplace of a queen.
And in that, there was power.
But with the war chief arguing for her destruction? She would have to choose her words with care.
She took a breath, picking at her short, Hathorian claws as if the right combination of words might be found in ragged, dirty cuticles. “He’s not a mindless brute—”
A derisive snort drew her gaze up. To the war chief, Balkazar’s mane fully risen. “And you know this because you’ve tasted his seed and found it sweet?”
Heat bloomed in her cheeks, hurt lashing at her heart, but still. She pressed on. Defying her training, she stood strong against Hadim’s son. Ignored Balkazar for the second he was, and said, “He could have torn me in half or eaten me alive. Easily.”
Sinadim turned to face her, then. The prince watching her from his good eye, gruesome scars on full display. Scars that matched her own, where she was marked from armpit to elbow. Linking them through Hadim’s cruelty. And arms crossed over his chest, Sinadim watched her fidget. “Even the simplest beast knows a warm cunt is better than a dead one.”
“Maybe so,” she said, and offered a coy smirk. “But a prison isn’t built for a beast.”
Chin tilted back, Sinadim’s lip curled. “Know that, do you? With all your worldly, Omega wisdom?”
Renegade shrugged, her breasts jiggling with the subtle action. “It’s true. I’ve been in a harem my whole life. Can’t read or write, and I know nothing beyond the art of taking a knot without being torn apart. The only thing I really know is the Anhur,” she whispered, and took a step closer to the prince. Nudity on full, spoiled display. Bold when she should have been contrite. “I know how you fuck. Know just how you fight… and I know how you think when it comes to hoarding something precious. Something to be guarded from theft. Or escape.”
“Enlighten me, then,” he returned, good eye glittering. Muscles held taut, yet he was unable to so much as look away.
“You dig deep under the earth,” she said, and took another step in spite of the way his chest swelled on a held breath. The threat shimmering in deadly extended claws. “You call it a harem, and fill it with pretty living jewels. Lock them away in the dark and kill any who dare touch what you’ve claimed, but that makes it a vault, prince Sinadim. Nothing more.”
Nostrils flared, Sinadim’s gaze flicked over her shoulder. To the pit where Giaus was entombed in agony—and she knew power over a prince.
“Your war chief wants to see me dead,” she said, and shot a coy smirk at Balkazar. Licked her lips. “Wants me strung up by my hamstrings, so I can never carry the precious Karahmet bloodlines,” she cooed, that wicked smirk growing wider. “But you deny his counsel to save a beast. Your entire pack left vulnerable to infection… and forwhat?” Grinning now, Renegade began to circle. Dainty feet silent on cold stone, her eyes fixed to the prince’s profile, she edged away from the pit. “Another chance at this worldly, Omega pussy?” She laughed, then, mocking herself. The bitter hurt lacing a voice roughened by abuse both wanted and not, she continued without waiting for an answer that would pick at this newfound confidence. “You offered Giaus brotherhood and progeny instead of death.” Behind him now, she stopped just inside his shadow. Not touching—close enough to steal his heat. “I think you see what I do,” she whispered, and traced the waistband of his pants. Not daring to touch his skin, it was a tease meant to taunt. “I think you see a gift from the Nine. One worthy of a prince, yet bound to a lowly Hathorian named ‘mate’ before a pack.”
A low growl echoed through the cave, Balkazar making his opinion known as he watched Renegade work.
But Sinadim shivered. A full bodied tremor. “You think a lot for an Omega.”
An altogether different sort of heat bloomed in her cheeks, then. One that made her heart lurch and her nipples peak—high on the flush of a point scored. “Tell me, Hadim’s son,” she said, low and spiked with bitter resentment. “Does it burn? Knowing that I’ve been given this gift before you? That I might be the only hope you’ve got of controlling him?”
