Tell me, Omega… did you think your mate would be kind?
1702 Words
Killian's POV
Our eyes locked.
And something… snapped.
A spark.
A flare.
A violent shudder rolling through him, through me, through the invisible thread connecting us—like a blacksmith's hammer striking hot iron, sending vibrations deep into the forge.
His pupils blew wide, swallowing the silver until his irises were pits of endless night. I could feel it then, the full onslaught of his wolf slamming against mine: a battering ram of dominance, raw power, the scent of pine and storm and unyielding command flooding my senses until I swayed on my knees.
My scent hit him fully—Omega heat edging into bloom under the bond's merciless nudge, adrenaline sharpening it to a knife's edge, helpless want threading through like veins of gold in ore. Raw and unmasked, it rose from me in waves: salt-sweat and crushed wildflowers, the faint musk of my untouched slick that shamed me even as it betrayed me.
His wolf surged forward like a storm breaking free of its chains.
*MINE.*
The growl wasn’t spoken aloud this time.
No—this one reverberated inside my skull, inside my bones, inside the marrow of the world. It wasn't a word; it was a possession, a brand seared into my soul, echoing with the thunder of his pulse syncing to mine, heartbeat to frantic heartbeat. My wolf yipped in response, a desperate, eager sound that made my cheeks burn with humiliation. *Mate strong. Mate claims. Yes!yes!yes—*
Adrian staggered.
Just half a step.
Barely noticeable to the guards frozen along the walls, their faces pale masks in the torchlight, breaths held so still I could hear the distant hoot of an owl beyond the battlements.
But I saw it.
The bond saw it.
That infinitesimal c***k in his armor—a falter, a flinch, as if the goddess had yanked her chain and caught him off balance. His free hand twitched at his side, claws half-extended, scraping furrows into his own palm. Blood welled, dark and deliberate, dripping onto the stones with soft plips that mocked the silence.
He recovered instantly, fury igniting in his eyes like oil tossed on fire, flames leaping high and hungry. His grip on my jaw tightened, nails biting crescent moons into my skin, and he yanked me closer—nose to nose, breath mingling in a toxic kiss of rage and restraint.
“Pathetic,” he spat, the word a lash across my face, hot spittle flecking my lips. He shoved me backward with a force that snapped my head on my neck, vertebrae popping in protest.
I fell hard, palms scraping the stone as I tried to catch myself, gravel embedding in my skin like angry fire ants. Breath knocked out of me in a whoosh, ribs compressing until stars burst behind my eyes again. My wolf yelped as the bond recoiled, stinging like a slap from an open hand—sharp, humiliating, a reminder that even in rejection, he owned this pain. I curled instinctively, knees drawing up, arms wrapping around my middle as if I could shield the fragile thing blooming inside me from his scorn.
Adrian began to pace.
Not fast.
Slow.
Measured.
Like a caged beast deciding which part of me to tear open first—throat for the quick kill, belly for the prolonged agony, or heart for the poetic irony. His boots crunched over the spilled linens I'd dropped earlier, now sodden rags twisted in blood arcs, the white fabric blooming red like obscene roses. Each step echoed in the courtyard, a metronome counting down to whatever verdict he'd render. The air thickened with his scent—alpha musk sharpened by fury, undercut by that treacherous undercurrent of arousal the bond forced from him, a dark spice that made my traitorous body clench.
“Of all the warriors,” he snarled, voice rising like a gathering gale, “all the Alphas, all the bloodlines, all the powerful females the Goddess could have placed at my side—she gives me a trembling little maid?”
He passed behind me, close enough that the heat of him ghosted my nape, raising gooseflesh down my arms. The shadow of his form eclipsed the moonlight, plunging me into temporary darkness, and I swear I felt the brush of his cloak against my shoulder—a whisper of wool and concealed daggers.
I froze.
Every instinct screamed: *Don’t move. Don’t breathe. Don’t turn your back.* My muscles locked, breath shallowing to panicked sips, the world narrowing to the scrape of his soles on stone, the distant drip of blood from Thorne's corpse. My wolf went utterly still inside me, hackles raised, ears flat—*Predator circles. Wait. Endure.*
His voice slithered down my spine then, low and insidious, like oil pooling in cracks.
“Tell me, Omega… did you think your mate would be kind? Some simpering beta from the outer packs, with soft hands and sweeter words? Did you dream of moonlit runs through the meadows, pups at your feet, a den warmed by his body instead of my wrath?”
I shook my head frantically, curls matting with sweat and blood against my forehead. “I—I didn’t— I never—” The words tumbled out in a babble, high and reedy, my voice cracking on the edges like thin ice. I'd never dared dream of a mate at all—not with my station, not with the scars from my first heat that the healers had cauterized shut to "spare the pack's honor." Kindness was a luxury for those who weren't born to serve, to scrub, to vanish into shadows.
A boot pressed between my shoulder blades, pinning me to the stone. The weight wasn’t crushing—not yet—but it stole my breath all the same, grinding my chest flat against the cold, unyielding ground. Gravel bit into my cheek, my palms, a thousand tiny teeth drawing beads of blood that smeared beneath me. The pressure forced my spine into a painful bow, ribs straining, lungs burning for air that came in ragged wheezes. His sole—studded with iron for traction in battle—dug in just enough to bruise, a deliberate mark of ownership.
“Do you think you’ll soften me?” he continued, voice low and mocking, laced with a bitter laugh that rumbled through his frame and into mine. “Turn the monster into something tame? A lapdog for your pretty green eyes and that scent that reeks of surrender?”
“N-no,” I croaked, chest burning as I fought for words around the vise of his boot. “Alpha, I would never— I swear by the moon and my blood, I don’t want— I’m nothing, just a servant, please—” Lies and truths tangled on my tongue, desperate pleas spilling like water from a cracked jug. I didn't want to soften him; I wanted to survive him, to slip away unseen like the ghost I was meant to be.
“You already have.”
The shock of those words slammed into me harder than the boot on my back, a physical blow that left me gasping, vision blurring.
What?
Adrian leaned down, his weight shifting, the pressure on my spine easing just enough for me to drag in a full breath—tainted with his scent, with the charnel reek of the dead. His voice brushed the shell of my ear like a blade’s kiss, hot and precise, sending involuntary shivers racing down my limbs. Strands of his dark hair fell forward, tickling my nape, and I caught the faint scent of cedar oil beneath the blood—something almost human, almost vulnerable, that made my wolf whine in confusion.
“I hesitated,” he said quietly, the admission dragged from him like a confession under torture. “Just now. When your scent flooded me. When that pathetic pull yanked at my wolf like a pup on a leash.”
My blood iced over, veins turning to frost even as heat pooled traitorously between my thighs. Hesitation? From *him*? The Alpha King who'd once beheaded a rival pack's envoy mid-negotiation, his jaws dripping as the head rolled across the parley table?
“You made me stop,” he whispered, the words laced with such venom they burned where they landed. “For a heartbeat. For a breath. For the first time in years, I paused mid-kill—claws buried in Harlan's ribs, his screams still wet on my tongue—and thought, *What if the Omega sees? What if he breaks?*”
The disgust in his tone was almost tangible, a thick fog that choked me worse than his boot. He pressed down harder then, grinding my sternum into the stone until a whimper escaped me—high and keening, echoing my wolf's frantic pleas. *Mate confused. Mate fights. But Mate needs…*
“Do you know what that makes you, Omega? What that flicker of weakness brands you in my eyes?”
I swallowed hard, throat constricting around the lump of terror lodged there, tasting bile and blood. “A… a curse,” I whispered, the word barely audible, scraped raw from my chest. A curse upon his throne, his legacy, the iron rule he'd forged from the bones of his enemies.
His laugh was a cold, humorless scrape of sound, like rusted chains dragged across slate. It vibrated through his leg, into my spine, a mocking tremor that made my teeth chatter.
“Worse,” he murmured, breath fanning my ear in a parody of intimacy. “A weakness.”
He pressed down harder, forcing a gasp from my lungs that bordered on a sob, my fingers scrabbling uselessly at the stones, nails breaking on the grit. “And I will carve every weakness out of myself. Even if it bleeds you dry. Even if it leaves you a hollowed shell, whimpering in the dark for a mercy I'll never grant.”
My wolf trembled then, a full-body quake that rippled through me, her form curling small and tight in the recesses of my mind. *Mate… will kill us… Mate angry… Mate hurt… But Mate's hurt too. Fix. Heal. Submit.*
- Writer
