“The General is an alpha,” he said. “None of them are sensible.” I smiled back at him.
“I could be an alpha,” I told him. “I’m stubborn enough.” He raised another eyebrow at me. He had quite an amusing look on his face when he was mocking me. It was open and carefree and he appeared to be doing so in jest.
“You are quite stubborn,” he responded. “But you were in heat.”
This wiped the smile off my face. I thought he might have known what happened over the past few days. I scarcely remembered a thing from those days. It was stupid of me to think the people who brought me my meals would not notice what was going on. I suspected for a moment that it was Espen who told General Axel about it, but I quickly dismissed the thought. Axel was drawn in by my scent. I knew that instinctively.
“I do not want to give him the satisfaction of knowing what magic I have,” I told him honestly. “I enjoy driving him up the wall.” He laughed at this.
“You will have plenty of chances to do so as a free man.”
I took a moment to consider this. I did not expect General Axel to let me go back home. I could not go back home even if he did. The empire was not safe for me anymore. Yet, there might be a chance for me to enjoy some freedom in this strange country. Maybe one day I could sail off to start another life. If the General is the only way for me to get my freedom back, was it not worth a shot?
“Tell Alain,” I said. “Tell him I am ready to talk.”
Fifteen Nights after Meeting the General
The binds in the Oaklands were made of metal, while the empire used rope. All the riches in the world could not have made that wicked king use a method that did not mark a prisoner's body. My metal binds only left marks when I resisted. I never had such ambitions. I wasn’t dense enough to try and fight steel. Where the binds grabbed me, my skin got close to frostbite, but my wrists burned more than they ached. It might have been a sign that General Axel was merciful, despite his lack of decorum. I had no wounds littering my body, and I was well-fed compared to even my life at the seashore. I had nothing to complain about.
A linen tunic, more modest than the rags I arrived in, covered me from my neck to my knees. My bare feet touched the rough stone floors that led to the Grey Hall. Two guards with mild scents flanked me on each side. Not alphas. Not omegas. Just werewolves of the more common sort. They all but dragged me to my fate, hoisting me up by my armpits. All I could do was steady myself. The wooden doors that would lead me to the General's verdict came into view—a grand entrance carved with gruesome battles no one lived to remember. Bile rose from mystomach to my vocal cords, burning a hoarseness into my voice that I would have to repress.
Two guards tugged on those doors as if they were as light as the flimsy little shutter in the tower. The doors opened to reveal grandeur and emptiness. Imposing and glorious, stone blocks so massive that humans could not have carried them. A hall only werewolves or giants could have made. Scattered throughout the place were guards in their leather armour and advisors decked out in furs. The stone chair in the back of the hall could have actually been made for a giant, yet it did not manage to make Axel look any less imposing. He should have drowned in the vastness of that throne. Why could he not give me that small satisfaction? Why did he have to look so comfortable, so proper, seated there in a fur coat that was as white as a snow leopard? Perhaps it was a snow leopard. He certainly seemed the type to boast of his prowess as a hunter. I could not imagine wearing the skin of a beast I had ripped apart with my own claws. His advisor Alain stood to his left, holding a scroll. His purple silk robes were nothing like the furs that adorned other alphas. A beastly man that was tall even for an alpha werewolf stood to Axel's right. Fresh scars as well as healed ones decorated his face. A single canine tooth stuck out of his lower left lip. Behind the men hung a tapestry as crimson as the scar on the big man's chin, embroidered with an oak tree.
General Axel was staring at me as he had two nights ago. I couldn't tell if he wished to murder me or wished for something else entirely. I met his eyes as much as I could, but it was impossible for me to relentlessly stare at him, the way he stared at me. Something pulled my gaze towards the floor. An invisible force that I knew was a curse that came with being an omega.
"Approach." Axel spoke louder than he had in the tower. It reminded me of the speech I had overheard—chilling and rough. There were comfortable tingles running down my spine. Iwalked towards him, stopping a few steps shy of the steps leading up to the throne.
"Speak." For someone so adamant about not being a king, he sure loved to give commands.
"I wish to be unbound first, my lord." I was not sure what came over me when speaking to the alpha like this in his own throne room. Surely he would be less charmed by my insolence in front of so many of his most influential subjects. Alain’s widening eyes seemed to agree with me on that. There was no movement anymore from any of the alphas scattered around the hall, nor were there whispers. I half expected to be berated or sentenced to death. When I met the General's eyes, I saw only amusement.
"You’re a prisoner." Axel was humoring me. It was certainly better than the alternative. In a way, it was quite exciting, speaking to an alpha—not being seen as just another man, as much as an omega. At least, now that I was in my right mind. I was treading a thin line, but certainly a line I had never been able to tread with anyone before.
"The metal is cold." I scarcely recognised my own voice. I was whining like a child. "That is no way to treat an omega." For a moment the tactic seemed to work, when Axel's eyes no longer showed amusement as much as interest. Before I could make use of his lack of self-control, he went back to being stoic. It was preposterous how he was pretending to be nothing but a werewolf when I affected him so.
"So youarean omega?" It was Alain who spoke. He made me break eye contact with the Flaming General. Such a fitting nickname. The worst kept secret in the Oaklands.
"Yes," I admitted. I made myself sound pitiful. I purposely addressed each and every one of the advisors in that room, looking them in the eyes, just to get a rise out of the General. TheOaklands treated their omegas well. General Axel himself had a reputation for protecting them fiercely.
"Although you knew that already, my lord," I added. And I could make things worse. "Seeing how you accosted me in my chambers two nights ago."
The whispers grew louder, and General Axel frowned at me. It was a weak moment for both of us, that night in the tower. Him, an alpha who had probably never met an omega made of magic before. Me, a virginal omega barely out of an early heat. He gripped his armrest until his fingers turned pink.
"This is my castle," he said, peering around the room as he spoke, addressing his alphas as much as me. "I do what I want."
Alain disagreed, judging by the glare he sent his Lordship's way. The General raised an eyebrow at Alain when he should have been paying attention to me. That certainly wouldn’t do.
"I wonder how it is you could tell I was an omega when no one else could," I said. A full-blooded werewolf certainly couldn't have known my rank. Everyone in the hall was aware of this fact.
"Silence!" Axel's voice cut through the air. "Don’t waste my time." Even if the General enjoyed discourteous omegas, I knew of his reputation. Powerful men are prone to mood changes and temper tantrums, and I wouldn’t lure him out if I couldn’t put him back in his place. I weighed my options. Honesty was the best course of action, seeing as I had committed no crimes.
"As you know, I am from Auriyonne, my lord."
"Why keep prisoners here who have come from the empire?" the burly alpha with the wounded face said. "It is safer to sentence him to die."
"I am also from the empire, Boris," Alain was quick to point out. At least there was one person here who would rathernot see me hanged. "So is our General." This came as a surprise to me.
"But this boy is not a wolf," the other alpha, Boris, said. A moment of silence fell over these halls. With his chin resting on his hands, General Axel was inspecting me. He was yet to make a decision on my fate, but he sure seemed interested in me thus far. His dark eyes never left me for any reason other than a brief glance at his advisors.
