Giaus scowled down at the other male, his slumped and tangled form no longer the stature of one who’d been a prince, Sinadim was broken. Battered and bruised, his golden flesh hidden beneath layers of vibrant blues, greens, and purples, he lay unconscious as the virus worked great change were few but Giaus himself could see it.
But most hideous of all, a mark at the base of Sinadim’s throat. The delicate imprint of a Hathorian mating bite.
“She’s claimed a second mate…”
No matter how much it hurt, Giaus knew it was true—it was in her scent. In the way her chin tipped toward the other male, even in her oblivion. She was hungry for Sinadim… aching for themboth.
Behaving exactly as Sinadim had said she would.
Giaus snarled under his breath, breaking the hypnotic cadence of his purr. The tiny female in his arms twitched and frowned at the lack, squirming against the heat of his chest.
But her breathing remained shallow. Wet. Her eyes fluttering behind lids he had to pry open only to find orbs stained a bloodshot white, gleaming with a nauseating hint of yellow.
She was dying.
Succumbing to the deadly thrall of the Trax virus before his very eyes, for she was Hathorian. As precious as she was coveted, she’d been a harem breeder before he’d made her a queen. Trained to submit to her master’s every depraved whim, to accommodate the needs of a predatory species not her own.
Smaller…
Weaker…
Less.
Her kind had been engineered to lift their tails and breed for the Anhur. Meant to take nothing for themselves. To whelp legions of sons who’d die for fathers who’d never learn their names, and birth hybrid daughters they’d never know. Hybrid females whose only purpose was to nurse Anhur babes and spread their sterile cunts for Anhur males not important enough to have the privilege of owning a creature like his Renegade.
His mate.
A Hathorian Omega.
“What do you know of keeping Omegas, oh mighty king of the beyond?”the prince had asked through a sneer, goading Giaus with everything he didn’t know about his precious Hathorian queen.“I know everything you’ve never thought to ask… every weakness and secret strength… You won’t last three days without me, and for your failure, you’ll suffer unimaginable agony...”
That was the impassable threat. The blade’s edge Sinadim held him to, even as he too succumbed to the Trax.
Sinadim lay there absent any hint of sense, and yet, every drop of power was hooked between the other’s claws with a single ominous promise.
“She can feel everything… Mutilate me,”the prince had whispered through cracked and bleeding lips,“if you want to torture her…”
There was no risking it. No way to test the bounds of his noose without harming the creature Giaus loved so dearly.
Or worse.
Giaus’ queen, dead from neglect before she ever had a chance to step into her incredible potential.
“We’re mated. Even as she milks your knot, she’ll beg for mine. To deny her is a death sentence more cruel than killing her here and now… and shewilldie without the attention of her mate, Giaus. And now, either of us will do…”
Born of pure defiance, his purr rumbled back to life, and with a careful touch, Giaus ran the tips of his ruined claws through her hair. Combing through the snarls of glorious black silk made wet with sour sweat, he traced the shell of her delicate ears. Scratching at the base, he traced the cone to its pointed tip, then worked his way down. To the space between her brows, where a frown had marred that perfect skin.
“You are equal to this suffering,” he murmured against her clammy skin, rubbing at the joint hidden in her hairline, where her ear was anchored to her scalp. Forcing one expressive ear to lay flat, as he’d seen her do so many times before. Her temper was a wholly unexpected thing to see in a creature so small and dainty. A temper Giaus had seen and matched, taken as direct,deliciouschallenge to his own relentless need to have her spread and submissive before him. He’d meant to watch her fall, seduced by her nature. Her tail lifted to please him.
But she’d fought him with every last scrap of might she possessed. Made him earn his place above her. Inside her.
By the Nine, how she’d rewarded him with her choice! The imprint of her teeth a wound he would worry with his claws until it festered and scarred, no matter that it was a gift he now had to share with Sinadim.
It was a treasure.
Head dipping, he pressed his nose to her hairline and took her in deep. Breathing against damp hair, his tongue flicked back to paint the roof of his mouth. To taste her in a way no other might.
Sick.
