The Omega’s Hidden Revenge

CHAPTER 3: THE INSTINCT OF THE ALPHA

Lira’s POV

The woods were quiet, the sort of quiet that squeaks inside your ears and causes all the noises to be more powerful than they are meant to be. I was pacing slowly through the woods, humming my wolf-song under my skin, with my eyes on every shadow, every breaking branch. The silver light that poured through the branches by the moon above gave the world a cold, gentle light. I did not know what I was seeking;I just had to feel the night, to touch that power that had awakened in me.

Then, as I have no idea, I struck something hard. My herb basket fell on the ground, and showered leaves and broken stems on the ground. I fell backwards, my heart racing, when I knew who was standing in front of me.

Alpha Kael.

He was there in such a great way, more so in the woods than he had been in the pack hall. He approached me slowly, with every step very cautious, very deliberate, as though he were gauging my demeanor. My chest tightened, and I knew I had a hard time composing myself. I was forced to be invisible,though my heart was stormy.

“Lira,” he said, almost a question, his voice deep and low. “What are you doing here alone?”

I instinctively bowed my head and kept my voice low. I was picking herbs, my Alpha. To the pack. “I… I was gathering herbs, my Alpha. For the pack.”

He scowled, but something was wavering in his eyes. His wolf is pacing under his skin. I could have touched it with my hand; there was a tension so distinct that I had never felt before. I attempted to brush aside the shiver it gave me.

“On his own,” he said, and his voice was sterner. “The forest is dangerous. Wolves disappear here all the time.”

I said yes, but in a shy voice. I am cautious, my Alpha.

But there was a gentling in his expression, an interest awakening in his piercing features. My pulse quickened. Why then was his wolf so quiet around me when I had always been terrified of him? Something was drawing me which I could not describe, and I needed to struggle to conceal identification.

He drew a hard breath, and my stomach turned.

Something changed. My smell--the air itself felt as though it was turning me about. Not omega. Not an ordinary wolf. Something familiar. Something lost. I stood still and was indecisive whether to run or not.

His hand went up a little, like it wanted to touch me, but Kael halted halfway, his golden eyes agape, and his instincts, which he could not yet comprehend, held him. I heard a voice in my ear, deep and unignorable. Mate.

I swallowed and blinked. I had to keep calm. This was dangerous. Too dangerous.

We both tensed as there was a rustle in the shadows. I was anticipating a foe, one who had come to try me or to kill me. Instead, a tall man came out of the trees, dressed in dark leather, with eyes keen and cold.

“Be careful,” said the man, and his voice was low, but authoritative. Something I could not take my gaze off. Recognition. Surprise. Respect.

Darius Night.

A rogue warrior who is familiar to the majority as a ruthless killer of packs, and feared even by the bravest of Nightfall warriors.

“You are not supposed to be here,” he said, and his voice was little more than a hiss, and I had the message in the pit of my heart. No, not here, not now.

“I can take care of myself,” I said with a low sigh, and I had to make the steel I was feeling inside be reflected in my voice.

He shook his head. “Not against them. Not when they are watching, not when their wolves are awake.”

I looked at him, bewildered and awake. Why was he taking my side? Why warn me? His gaze shot back at Kael, and then at me, and then he was gone as swiftly as he had arrived, leaving only the sound of leather and foliage.

Kael interrupted the silence with a voice. “You were not the only one?”

I dropped my eyes, attempting to conceal the thought thatflashed through my head. Just. Just picking herbs, my Alpha. “Just… just gathering herbs, my Alpha.”

Farther into the forest, the wailing of training wolves was heard. Soldiers screamed like trees. Kael stared in the direction of the sound, and his jaw clenched. Then he suddenly turned and looked full at me.

“You were under me,” he said, as though he were repeating a fact and not a claim. “Nobody is to ask about your presence here.”

I blinked, stunned. His lines struck me like a blow. He was protecting me--an omega he hardly knew, one he was supposed to have regarded as weak and invisible.

alpha kael. I started to say, barely above a whisper.

His golden eyes blazing, he cut me off. Ask me no questions. Go out of the forest now, but bear in mind this: you are under my protection.

My knees were shaky, and I bowed my head unconsciously. My mind raced. Why should he do so? But why should the Alpha, the same man who had condemned me to death in my former life, be my protector now?

The woods we were in seemed to be holding their breath. Shadows were long and threatening, but he was a shield.

And yet the danger was less than the questions.

What was it he felt in me? What had his wolf known that he had not? And above all--what would become of him when he should know who I was?

I made my way very slowly back, my wolf shifting impatiently under my skin, feeling the tension, the unfamiliar, the strength wakening within me.

Because this was no longer the forest of yesterday. This was the commencement of a game upon which I had just commenced to reason, and both the Alpha and I were playing pieces which we could not then manage.

And I was aware, in some way, that there would be nothing like the same as soon as Kael would see me.

Why then was the Alpha shielding an omega that he barely knew, and what would be the outcome when the truth finally dawned?