“M-Micha?” she rasped, but it was little more than a whisper. Too quiet to make him stay or help or let her beg freedom from this internment.
He was gone before she could try again. Gone before she could think of a way to plead her case, before she could bargain or beg.
Tongue darting out, Renegade tried to wet dry lips and found herself too parched to succeed. Her mouth gummy from a sleep that had lasted too long.
Pressing her knuckles into her breastbone, she scrubbed at a sense of victory so jubilant, it hurt. Confused by what she felt, for it wasn’t her emotion surging through her.
It washis.
Theirs.
She felt the earth rumble before she heard it, and even then, it was secondary to the distracting clatter of falling pebbles as they were shaken free from loose shale at the rim of the pit.
Renegade glanced up, unsettled by the trembling beneath her bottom that was echoed in that writhing, barbed noose growing tighter about her soul.
They were footsteps.
Those of a giant trapped in a thundercloud. Sprinting ever closer in the heart of an earthquake, each heavy thud reverberated in her heart and her bones.
Disoriented, she staggered to her feet with all the grace of a newborn kit. Clinging to walls that crumbled beneath her fingertips, she tried to find her balance too late.
A second shadow eclipsed the light and did not linger at the rim of her prison.
He jumped.
Landing with a jarring impact that sent Renegade back to her knees, a mountain crouched before her. Poised on the edge of violence, reeking of sweat. Of blood and danger and potent male pheromones.
It was a scent that staggered. Left her reeling, even as she tried to react, to defend herself from something so obviously dangerous. A scent both colorful and wild, one that left her blinking with wide, mesmerized eyes as looked upon the male who knelt so easily before her.
Giaus.
But not as she remembered him.
This was a beast even the Nine had reason to fear. A conquering radical, every inch the king he claimed to be. Hair and mane matted in blood, in gore and bits of unspeakable horror, Giaus was still. Proud. Letting her look her fill, so she might see what it was she’d bound herself to. Letting her inspect at her mate through a new lens.
The Trax. It had bent her perception and let her truly see.
She’d been thrown into the darkness of a prison pit—and upon waking, found herself cloaked in shadows that shivered and shared their secrets. Instead of gloom, Giaus was painted in stark relief. Colors once muted, were now incredibly deep. Displaying a depth she’d never thought to wonder at.
Held in a stiff, proud arc, Giaus’ tail flicked just out of sight, the only hint of agitated restraint in a male so ridiculously capable of taking what he wanted. And yet, he remained still for her perusal. Shoulders hunched as if in a bid to appear smaller, less threatening to the fledgling queen trapped in the dark.
Utterly at his mercy.
So she looked. Seeing him with new eyes, and extreme detail.
Enslaved to her own nature, she grew slick with want. Lured by the drive to be the balm to his aches and pains.
The prize for his conquest.
The Omega to his Alpha.
“No.”
It was a word forced through clenched teeth. A denial and a challenge for the king who wished to claim a wildling queen—for her to stand at his sidewillingly.
She could feel it, just there. Giaus’ mark, seething in her heart, his every wild emotion flicking through her chest too fast to feel anything but the chaos of his excitement. Alien and wild, he was thrilled by her defiance. Aroused and enraged, his blood searing hot with need. Seeking an outlet in which to slake his bottomless lust.
A chalice he would overfill, just so he could prove his virility.
