Candescent

by Zoey Ellis

  Heat crept up her neck, and Ria averted her gaze. She couldn’t deny that.

  “You bat­tle for what you want…” His voice was quiet. Her eyes drifted back to him, and he was look­ing at her strangely again. “It is one of the things that makes you so ap­peal­ing.”

  She didn’t know how to take that. Self-con­scious and con­fused, she re­mained quiet for a while, en­joy­ing his heat again her, un­til she re­al­ized she was sup­posed to be get­ting in­for­ma­tion from him. “Do you think most Al­phas would join the Lox if they had no fam­ily?”

  “Yes. Al­most all Al­phas who didn’t have a fam­ily and nowhere to call home would have tried to join. And I think Em­peror Drocco would take the ones who are promis­ing.”

  “What would make him refuse an Al­pha from join­ing?”

  “Most are in­vited to go through the ini­tial train­ing,” the Al­pha said, the rum­ble of his voice sooth­ing her. “But most do not sur­vive it. It is bru­tal.”

  “So they die?” Ria sti­fled a yawn and blinked rapidly so sleepi­ness did not over­come her. She did not want to fall asleep in the Al­pha’s arms.

  “Po­ten­tially. It tests their phys­i­cal and men­tal abil­i­ties, test their lim­its, and stretches them fur­ther than any­thing they might ex­pe­ri­ence at the hands of an en­emy. But the fi­nal test is loy­alty, and if they fail that they do not get to keep their lives.”

  Ria made a noise of dis­ap­proval in the back of her throat. “It seems like it would be hard to get in.”

  The gen­eral nuz­zled the side of her face. “You would be per­fect for the Lox, my chal­lenger.”

  As much as she wanted to find the idea of­fen­sive, she knew the gen­eral was com­pli­ment­ing her, and she couldn’t help feel­ing both em­bar­rassed and pleased. “I would never join.”

  “You might find hav­ing a home more plea­sur­able than just liv­ing,” he mur­mured, his lips against the side of her face. He lifted his hand to turn her chin to face him. “I have an­swered many ques­tions for you. It is time you an­swer more of mine.”

  Ria’s stom­ach tensed for some strange rea­son, but she nod­ded.

  “You say you’ve never had a home, how can that be?”

  Ria half-shrugged. “When I grew up, my life was in­tended to serve one pur­pose, to do one spe­cific thing, and it was not meant to be a com­fort­able life.”

  The Al­pha growled. “You mean, you were be­ing primed as an Omega breeder?”

  Ria shot him a look but was pleased he found the idea of­fen­sive. “No. But my dy­namic as an Omega was im­por­tant. I never con­sid­ered whether that place was home or not, I just knew it was some­where that I could learn to be the best in what I was told I needed to be the best in.”

  The gen­eral rum­bled his dis­sat­is­fac­tion but didn’t say any­thing.

  “Then I found out that the world wasn’t what I thought it was. My place in it be­came un­cer­tain. I re­vis­ited the places that I had been, to see the peo­ple that my ef­forts had touched, to see if I had done good or ill.”

  “And what did you find?”

  “I found that I saw peo­ple dif­fer­ently. They had hob­bies and in­ter­ests, home and fam­ily, con­cepts I knew noth­ing of, and had never seen be­fore. And I didn’t re­ally know who I was. Ev­ery­thing that I had learned wasn’t re­ally me. So I de­cided to find out who I am.”

  “How did you do that?”

  Ria smiled at him. “I have an­swered as many ques­tions for you now. I think it is my turn to ask again.”

  The Al­pha lifted onto his el­bow and leaned over her, his eyes locked to her smile. “I am not in need of any more ques­tions right now, lit­tle Ria,” he mur­mured as he low­ered his mouth to hers. “I am in need of you.”

  His mouth crushed hers, dom­i­nat­ing her as pow­er­fully as be­fore, and Ria melted un­der the des­per­a­tion of his kiss, his need to claim and own her mouth. She sim­ply loved it.

  When she whim­pered, he growled at the sound, shift­ing her un­der­neath him, their skin pressed to­gether.

  “I haven’t had the plea­sure of hav­ing your slick drench­ing ev­ery inch of my body,” the Al­pha said as he slipped his hand un­der her thigh and spread her open.

  Be­fore Ria could even for­mu­late an an­swer, he was suck­ing on her, stroking his tongue into her folds and groan­ing like a man starved. She tried to protest, but there was no point. Within mo­ments, the de­sire had risen in her so sharply, she had to suc­cumb to it. She didn’t know how he was able to do this to her so quickly, and so com­pletely. Is this what Al­phas could re­ally do to Omegas? Was this their power over her kind? If so, it was dan­ger­ous, and so de­struc­tive. As he stroked her clit, work­ing a thick fin­ger into her as he fon­dled her breast and flicked the nip­ple, the dev­as­ta­tion be­gan to build, and Ria knew she had to get away. She was en­joy­ing it too much. She started this jour­ney seek­ing the one thing that could make her whole, and it was not this Al­pha. It didn’t mat­ter how good he made her feel or how arous­ing she found him.

  Her hips jerked, and ev­ery­thing tensed as the vi­o­lent rush took over her body, thrust­ing her hips up to ride his face as he stroked her through it. When he lifted from be­tween her legs, the lower half of his face was soaked with her slick.

  Mor­ti­fied, she turned her head, but he dropped over her, lean­ing on one el­bow and turned her face to him. “Tell me it isn’t sat­is­fac­tory to see me like this, lit­tle chal­lenger. To see your­self on me.”

  Ria breathed hard, her or­gasm fad­ing as she took him in. She couldn’t deny it. Her scent on his face was highly ap­peal­ing, and not only that but the plea­sure that he ob­vi­ously gained from it made her nip­ples hard.

  She let her eyes wan­der away from him, as he chuck­led at her lack of re­sponse.

  “Don’t worry,” he said as he nudged his knee be­tween her legs, climb­ing on top of her. “There is still the rest of my body to go. You can de­cide later.”

  The Al­pha gen­eral “bat­tled” with her for hours. He twisted her body in so many ways to fuck her, she lost count. Ria just kept urg­ing him on, al­ways need­ing more.

  Their cou­pling turned feral when he teased her with slow strokes, ca­ressed her nip­ple lightly with his tongue, and mocked her in­abil­ity to es­cape him. Ria kicked a well-aimed heel into his shoul­der and used the mo­men­tum of his own weight to roll on top of him. The Al­pha’s roar thun­dered through her body, mak­ing her hair stand on end, and his beau­ti­ful eyes flashed with fu­ri­ous de­sire. Ria didn’t hes­i­tate. She sunk down on him and rode him hard un­til her eyes rolled back in bliss, and then all sense of time and place was swal­lowed in pure, sub­lime tur­moil as the Al­pha grabbed her neck and took over. He wrecked her with mag­nif­i­cent, mer­ci­less or­gasms, and in his low, gritty, growl­ing tone, told her she was beau­ti­ful, and strong, and made so per­fectly for him.

  When Ria woke again, the Al­pha was heavy on top of her. It had been a few days now of re­lent­less at­ten­tion from him, and she re­mained sat­u­rated in his sweat, seed, and saliva, no mat­ter how many times she bathed. He made it his pri­or­ity to coat her in him again, as soon as she was fed. But as much as she com­plained, deep down she en­joyed it.

  She sighed, rel­ish­ing the feel of him, tak­ing com­fort in the way his weight set­tled her. She’d never felt so com­fort­able or more trea­sured than when he held her tightly and nuz­zled his nose into her skin—or trailed his fin­gers over her hips, her thighs and her shoul­der in won­der. But the best mo­ment with the gen­eral was when he pressed her to his chest and purred for her. The rum­bling vi­bra­tion rip­pled into her so deeply, she had never known such peace. She’d fallen asleep im­me­di­ately, with­out any fear or thought of es­cape.

  The ex­pe­ri­ence un­set­tled her. She could see her­self get­ting lost in this Al­pha—spend­ing days
and nights un­der him un­til she was a shell of her­self. She turned her head and saw bed­sheets and pil­lows built up in a pile next to them, and her heart sank. She’d be­gun to ar­range a nest, and she didn’t even know when she’d done it.

  Fear rose so sharply, it al­most choked her. She couldn’t let this Al­pha turn her into a breeder. This was a chance to get out, and she would not waste it.

  Very slowly, she shifted her­self from un­der­neath him, mov­ing inch by inch so she didn’t dis­turb him. Un­for­tu­nately, that didn’t work. Rum­bling, the gen­eral pulled her back into his arms and lay on his side, co­coon­ing her with his whole body. Ria stilled for a long time, wait­ing to make sure he was sleep.

  Star­ing at him, she won­dered what it would be like to truly be with Al­pha—with­out be­ing a pris­oner, with­out be­ing ma­nip­u­lated or used. What it would be like to have a real re­la­tion­ship? Did such a thing even ex­ist any more? She had hoped the em­peror and em­press set an ex­am­ple, but when she thought about it, she didn’t know how real their re­la­tion­ship was. Was the em­press truly happy with her mate? Ria didn’t know. If Em­peror Drocco had found her in­stead of the em­press, would she have been happy with him? She stared at the rugged fea­tures of the older Al­pha who held her in his arms. Maybe if Em­peror Drocco looked, sounded, and smelled like Thorec she would…

  Alarmed, Ria pushed the thought away. Shit. What was she think­ing? Be­ing with this Al­pha was twist­ing her thoughts, and he was to blame. Yes, she en­joyed the things he did to her, but of all the con­trol Gen­eral Thorec claimed the Lox gave him, he’d been un­able to con­trol him­self when he’d found an Omega. If she in­deed was his pris­oner for tres­pass­ing, she shouldn’t be in his bed with her legs con­stantly spread and her throat full of his come. Leav­ing now was the best op­tion she had. Once she was out of his grasp, he would move on to the next thing that caught his eye, and she would re­gain some sem­blance of the life she was sup­posed to have—the life that was taken from her.

  As soon as the Al­pha’s steady breath­ing sug­gested he was in a deep sleep, Ria inched her­self out of his hold.

  It felt like it took hours. She was sur­prised he didn’t wake up, but when she fi­nally shifted en­tirely away from his touch, he stirred. She stilled for a long while un­til he set­tled again, be­fore she slid off the bed.

  Search­ing the closet, she found grey uni­formed tu­nics that were clearly the gen­er­als and much too large for her, but that was the only thing avail­able. She dressed qui­etly and picked up her boots. Af­ter star­ing for a long mo­ment at the Al­pha on the bed, she slipped out of the room.

  The house was quiet, but it was un­likely the gen­eral didn’t have some kind of se­cu­rity in his home. Ria headed down the flight of stairs, lis­ten­ing for any sound un­til she reached the ground floor. Tip­toe­ing through the liv­ing room, she peered out the win­dow and saw a guard stand­ing by the front door. She care­fully moved around the whole ground floor, check­ing through the win­dows where the guards were sit­u­ated, but there was only one win­dow that was clear. Thank­fully, it faced to­ward the field. Us­ing a pin that she kept in the heel of her boot, she started to pick the lock on a win­dow.

  It took longer than she would’ve liked, hav­ing to be quiet while learn­ing the lock­ing mech­a­nism, and Ria was alarmed to see sun­light stretch­ing into the sky as she fi­nally man­aged un­lock the win­dow. She would have much less time to get as far away as pos­si­ble be­fore the gen­eral woke up.

  Open­ing the win­dow, she grabbed her books, climbed out, and jumped.

  Land­ing on her feet, she crouched low and lis­tened for any sound, but all was silent. She pulled on her boots and ran to­ward the mid­dle of the field. She didn’t bother to be quiet. Any­one glanc­ing in her di­rec­tion would see her run­ning; sun­rise was im­mi­nent.

  The fur­ther she trav­eled from the house, the more she kept feel­ing for magic, but it didn’t ap­pear un­til she was pant­ing from ex­er­tion, and the sun was graz­ing the hori­zon. Pulling on it, she wove to­gether a por­tal, bril­liant and gleam­ing in the mid­dle of the field.

  Ria was so re­lieved, the tears prick­led at her eyes. She turned to look at the house in the dis­tance and won­dered if the gen­eral had wo­ken yet. Deep in­side, the in­stinc­tual, needy, and in­nate part of her mourned greatly at the idea that she was leav­ing such a pow­er­ful, sexy, Al­pha, but she couldn’t let her Omega in­stincts con­trol her. That part of her would en­slave her, and make her life a liv­ing hell. Si­lenc­ing it, she turned to­ward the por­tal and stepped through.

  * * *

  Chap­ter Four

  THOREC

  Thorec al­most killed one of the guards that was sup­posed to be pro­tect­ing his house.

  He’d taken his tem­per out on nearly all of them by the time he re­al­ized he was wast­ing pre­cious time he could be us­ing to catch up with Ria. Af­ter calm­ing down, as he pre­pared to leave, his anger turned on him­self. Af­ter all, his guards were trained to keep peo­ple out, not se­cur­ing a woman who was es­cap­ing his bed.

  How could he have been so pro­foundly com­fort­able, so con­tent that he was un­able to tell when the Omega slipped away from his arms? He had wo­ken to find her scent so strong on both him and the sheets, but the beau­ti­ful lit­tle Omega was nowhere to be seen. They’d had such a per­fect night to­gether, and she’d even be­gun to nest, sig­ni­fy­ing she was pre­par­ing to breed with him. He never thought he could be more sat­is­fied and hap­pier and… deeply taken with a woman. For a short mo­ment, his life had looked like it was be­com­ing what he’d al­ways hoped for.

  Thorec ex­am­ined his room for clues and iden­ti­fied the win­dow she used to es­cape on the lower floor. The only thing he didn’t know was how long ago she’d left. He needed to find her im­me­di­ately.

  Bark­ing out or­ders to his guards, he climbed into his car­riage and headed back to base to col­lect his horse, his rage seething in his chest. Ria didn’t seem to un­der­stand when he said that she was his. She didn’t ar­gue about it, which prob­a­bly meant she had dis­carded the very idea. Thorec wished he had drummed it into her more. She didn’t un­der­stand that he had been wait­ing for his Omega since join­ing the Lox. And she was it. Gor­geous, smart, beau­ti­fully fierce with per­fect sub­mis­sive Omega traits; there was no other who ex­isted for him but her.

  As soon as he reached his horse, he checked him over for travel, then spoke to his men be­fore head­ing back to­wards the moun­tains. That was the only place Ria could pos­si­bly be headed.

  The ride was long and hard, but Thorec pushed him­self and his horse hard. He hadn’t found out why Ria had gone to the moun­tains in the first place, so he didn’t know where she might go af­ter­ward. He may be able to in­ter­cept her since she couldn’t use magic. He’d told the war­riors at the base to lock down all ports and bor­ders. There were lim­ited ways Ria could leave Ariyon, and he was go­ing to make sure he caught up with her be­fore she did. If he had to cuff her to his body, that was what he was go­ing to fuck­ing do.

  The blaz­ing rage in him height­ened as he thought of his in­cred­i­ble Omega, and he roared as the wind rushed past him, whip­ping past his ears as he thun­dered to­ward the moun­tains. He wasn’t just an­gry that she had slipped through his fin­gers, he was con­cerned for her. She was putting her­self at risk by en­ter­ing the moun­tain range when un­able to block that she was an Omega. There must be Al­phas among the moun­tain peo­ple who would pin her down and fuck her im­me­di­ately if they were to smell that rous­ing sent, and the idea of that fanned the flames of his fury and dread.

  He may have cap­tured her as a tres­passer, but she was his Omega. There was a dif­fer­ence. And he would never be let­ting her out of his grasp again.

  Fi­nally, the moun­tain range came into view; it’s lu­mi­nous glow shone
brightly in the gloomy morn­ing sky, a peachy pink this morn­ing, but Thorec was not in the mood to stop and ob­serve. He pushed his horse harder, know­ing that his steed had a few more miles in him, un­til they fi­nally reached the en­trance to the moun­tains.

  The guard who had sum­moned him sev­eral days be­fore stood up and greeted him, con­fu­sion on his face. “Back so soon, gen­eral?”

  “Yes,” Thorec said to grit­ted teeth. “Any prob­lems? Any dis­rup­tions?”

  “No. It has been quiet since you left.”

  Thorec dipped his head sharply. “Good. Tend to my steed, I drove him hard. I shouldn’t be long.”

  The guard nod­ded as Thorec made his way into the val­ley.

  Thorec headed straight to where he’d first seen Ria, stay­ing alert. Ev­ery­thing felt too quiet, too nor­mal, for Ria to have come back, and for a mo­ment, he won­dered whether he had made a mis­take. What if she had gone else­where?

  He stood in the cen­ter of the town, watch­ing and lis­ten­ing for any sign that some­thing was dif­fer­ent. The peo­ple of the moun­tains went about their reg­u­lar daily rou­tine, barely look­ing at him. Most of them had got­ten used to his pres­ence in the val­ley, al­though some re­mained on edge be­cause he was an out­sider.

  “I will get the moun­tain con­tact for you,” said a woman passerby.

  Thorec sim­ply nod­ded. He didn’t know if Ria would have spo­ken to any­one in par­tic­u­lar, but an out­sider would typ­i­cally be re­ported to the moun­tain con­tact. If Ria had been here, she might know.

  “Gen­eral,” the moun­tain con­tact greeted. She didn’t smile, but then she never did. “You are back very soon.”

  “Did the in­truder I took from here re­turn?”

  The woman frowned. “Did you not de­tain her?”

  “I did,” Thorec said, ir­ri­ta­bly. “I want to know if she re­turned.”