by Pearl Foxx
The captain turned to Rayner. “How did they get away?”
“I guess they walked,” Rayner growled. “Now get the fuck out of my face.”
He had to prepare.
Saving Vera would cost him, but he would pay the price in a thousand reams of silk if that was what it took to see her safe once again.
17
Vera
Vera huddled alone in a stone cell, her voice raw and aching from screaming for the Vilkan guards to release the other women. No one listened. No one even heard her. She’d been isolated from the others, and the separation had percolated her fear into something suffocating and blistering.
The Vilkas had learned their lesson. All the women had been separated once the shifters realized the humans weren’t as mild as they’d thought.
She shivered in her still-damp clothing. To distract herself, she glanced around her tiny cell, which could have been the exact same one she’d been placed in upon arriving on Kladuu.
The dim lighting strained her eyes until she had to clench them closed, wrapping her arms around her knees and resting her forehead against her damp pants. She faced the door and told herself she was only going to rest her eyes for a moment.
She jerked awake some time later, momentarily disoriented in the dark silence of the cell. To keep herself from trembling, she rose from the hard floor and paced. News or food or movement on the other side of the barred door never came. Eventually, when the hunger pains in her stomach became unbearable, she curled up on the ground and slept some more.
Winding through her nightmares was the memory of Rayner’s heartbroken face as she’d been arrested. He’d looked at her with so much fear and regret. She’d needed more time to explain her actions, to convince him she wasn’t going to leave.
But could he really believe her? He knew she hated her role as a servant. He knew she needed her freedom. She didn’t even believe herself when she thought she could stay here.
Not that it mattered now. She’d been caught. Exile would be her fate.
She woke to heavy clanging outside her door. Wood scraped heavily across the rock, and a sliver of light spilled into the cell.
Vera scrambled to her feet, dizzily swaying. “Rayner?”
“It’s me, miss,” a young voice said. A boy, barely ten, scampered into her cell, his baggy servant clothes dragging on the floor. As he moved, he gripped the ground with his grimy toes as if he was used to being constantly knocked over. The cell door banged shut behind him. Vera recognized him as the boy she’d helped with his laundry, the one whose benefactor hit him.
The scent of baked bread hit Vera right in the chest. She rushed over to meet him. “This is for me?”
“Yes, miss.” The boy offered her the basket of bread and nuts.
Vera didn’t want to overthink why the servants had even thought to bring her food, especially when they hated her so much. She scooped it into her arms, sinking to the ground, her teeth already ripping off a piece of bread. Barely chewing, she swallowed. “Thank you,” she whispered, meeting the boy’s eyes. “Thank you so much.”
The boy shot a glance over his shoulder toward the waiting guard. In a voice so quiet Vera barely caught it, he said, “Thank you, miss. You’ve done a wonderful thing.”
“What do you mean?”
“Your escape. You gave us hope.”
From outside, the door’s lock banged again. “How long does it take to drop off food?” the guard yelled.
“But I was caught,” Vera said quickly to the boy as the door scraped its way open.
“What was it like? Being outside?” The words tumbled off the boy’s tongue too quick, too loud. “What did the sky look like? And the Draqons! The other boys say their scales are magic. Were—”
The guard shouldered into the cell with a growl and swooped the tiny boy up under his arm. He kicked over the basket of food, sending bread and nuts scattering.
“Careful!” Vera shouted. She rushed after the guard, reaching for the boy’s hand. “Don’t hurt him!”
The guard pivoted and slammed a fist into Vera’s belly.
The wind whooshed out of her so fast she fell to the ground, gasping and choking.
Her cell door slammed shut.
Rayner
It had taken nearly two full days for Rayner to get time with Kaveh. Two days. Two days of Vera sitting in a cell, cold and hungry, with those idiot guards smacking her around. It had taken every ounce of Rayner’s control, Gerrit’s strong-arming, and the contingent of guards who followed his every step to keep from shoving his way right through the donjon and demanding to see the Alpha.
Even Gerrit hadn’t seen much of his father. It didn’t bode well. They both knew what it could mean, but they never spoke the thought aloud.
Kaveh was in the last stages of his moon madness.
Meeting with Kaveh, seeing the old Alpha on his wide seat in the throne room of the donjon, had only confirmed Rayner and Gerrit’s fears. The Alpha could barely form a sentence. The madness was taking him. It wouldn’t be long now.
But he’d been clear on two points. Rayner was no longer Beta of Clan Vilka. He wasn’t anything. No title. No authority. He was a disgraced clan member with nothing to his name.
If Kaveh had thought to cripple Rayner with the announcement, he’d thought wrong. Rayner stood tall, having expected it, and waited for Kaveh’s response to his plea for leniency toward Vera and the three other women.
There would be none of that either.
Her trial would be held tomorrow at noon, her fate to be decided by Kaveh and his new Beta, Ansel. Rayner would not be privy to any other information about the human prisoner.
Vera’s treatment went beyond trying to escape. She would receive a worse punishment than exile. Rayner guessed it would be a death sentence. A public line in the sand, an example made of her. Because her escape attempt had triggered something inside the mountain. Something all the Vilkas felt.
Even deep in his madness, Kaveh felt it too. The ripple of unrest, like a brisk winter wind blowing across the mountain range. It was the winds of change, and they’d started gusting after Vera’s escape attempt.
It had been decades since a servant had tried to escape, much less nearly succeeded. Decades of subservience and obedience. Rayner had mistaken it for peace, but it wasn’t. It was repression. Oppression. Everything he’d hated seeing his mother live under.
He’d fooled himself.
But the servants had seen, and they were changing.
Rayner finally saw now too, and in the time it had taken Kaveh to meet with him, Rayner had been planning.
Gerrit met Rayner outside the throne room. He straightened off the wall where he’d been leaning and waiting, staring down the new Beta with a blank stare. “How did it go?” he asked as soon as the door had closed behind Rayner.
“As we thought,” Rayner said to the young heir. He turned to Ansel. “If you need any help in the transition—”
“I won’t,” Ansel said with a smirk. He’d always resented Rayner, a younger, smarter version of himself, for taking the position he’d thought he was entitled to.
“Fine, but you need to keep an eye on Savas.”
Ansel snorted. “Why? He’s Omega. I heard they won’t even take his bets in the oihook fights.”
Rayner felt that stiff breeze of change at the back of his neck. His skin prickled in warning. “You don’t know where he is?”
The derision in Ansel’s eyes faded. For all his resentment of Rayner, he couldn’t deny the previous Beta had been effective. “I should have him followed? What for?”
“He won’t settle into his rank easily. He’s not going to just take that lying down,” Gerrit answered before Rayner could. The young man glanced at Rayner for confirmation. Through his fear and rage, Rayner felt a spike of pride. He nodded at the future Alpha. Gerrit turned back to Ansel and said, “The Omega Selection was a great offense. His loyalists will be rallying around him right now. You need guards on
Savas and his closest men at all times.”
Ansel glanced back toward the throne room. For a second, Rayner thought they’d actually convinced him. “You’re overreacting,” he told Rayner, even though Gerrit had spoken. To speak down to the young heir would have been a crime. “Savas has sunk into the depths of the mountain where he came from. Take it from me, we won’t ever see that old bastard again.”
“That,” Rayner said quietly as he turned to walk away with Gerrit, “will be your first and last mistake as Beta.”
“Why will it be my last?” Ansel called out before Rayner and Gerrit had gotten too far down the hall.
Without glancing back, Rayner said, “Because it will get you killed.”
18
Vera
The time that passed since she’d been shoved in the cell could have been hours or days, and when a familiar growl rumbled down the hall outside her cell, she thought it was a figment of her imagination.
Rayner.
A key rattled in the cell door. She scrambled to her feet, heart pumping. It wasn’t her imagination. He was here. This was real. He could be coming to get her and take her home.
Home.
The door slid open, and his massive silhouette filled the frame. Vera stared, her eyes soaking up the familiar lines of his face. Her hunger and anger and fear made her want to sag against his chest and let his arms hold up her weight. But she rooted herself in place by her own strength; she remembered what he’d said on the deck right before she was arrested. He couldn’t protect her this time.
“What are you doing here?” she asked quietly.
“Get up, bitch,” the guard spat from behind Rayner, lifting a glow torch and illuminating the space.
Rayner’s skin rippled as he slowly turned his head to stare back at the young guard. But the guard just smirked at him.
“Rayner,” Vera whispered, “what’s happening?”
“You’re coming back to my quarters.” He stepped into the cell and swung a heavy blanket around Vera’s shoulders.
“What about Niva and the others?” Vera asked in a rush of relief.
“They’re at Nestan’s.” Rayner steadied her against his side with a strong arm wrapped around her waist. He guided Vera forward and shouldered the guard aside, keeping his body between them.
“I’ve heard nothing about this allowance, sir.” The edge of derision in the guard’s voice made Vera’s skin crawl. She’d never heard anyone speak to Rayner like that. What had happened since she’d been arrested?
“Take it up with Ansel. He’s your Beta now.” Rayner never stopped walking, but when Vera looked up, his jaw was clenched and the vein on the side of his neck pulsed.
“You’re not the Beta anymore?” Vera asked, horrified.
Rayner shushed her. “I’ll explain when we get home.”
As soon as they stepped out into the massive underground city, Vera felt herself let go of a breath she hadn’t meant to hold. The air was so much fresher, and the bright lights stung for a moment before her eyes adjusted to the vibrant colors and activity.
Vera was shocked to realize how much she’d missed it.
As they walked back to Rayner’s home, a young girl in servant attire lifted her head and smiled at Vera. The gesture was so quick, so fleeting, and the girl disappeared so soon after passing Vera that she thought it might have all been a figment of her overtired, hungry imagination.
A servant had smiled at her? What had happened to their glares and barely concealed hatred? And the young boy with the food who’d said she’d given them hope.
“What’s going on, Rayner?” she asked, looking around. She spotted scant few servants.
“I’ll tell you everything when we’re alone, I promise. Just keep your head down and use the blanket as a shawl. We don’t want to draw too much attention.”
“Why? Where are the others?”
“Dammit, Vera, can you just listen to me this one time?” Rayner stared down at her, but she didn’t see anger or rebuke. She saw fear. He was afraid.
“You’re in trouble, aren’t you? Because of me.”
“It doesn’t matter. Come on.” He gripped her arm, tighter this time, and pulled her forward. Instead of demanding the answers she wanted, she lowered her head and tugged the blanket tighter around her.
Vera watched her feet as they walked, careful not to look up as they passed people, and listened to her heart as it thrummed in her chest. Rayner walked with the same steady gait as always, but something in his touch and the way he kept flicking his eyes at her told Vera things had changed because of her.
At Rayner’s house, she shed the blanket and turned to ask him all the questions she had been accumulating during the walk back. But the words didn’t come out as she watched him lock his door with two bolts—something she’d never seen him do before. He checked the servant tunnel entrance and his bedroom, leaving her watching from the center of the room, mouth agape.
“We’re alone,” he announced, his shoulders dropping. It was possible he hadn’t slept any more than she had in the time she was gone.
“What’s going on?” she whispered. “How long was I in the cells?”
Rayner closed the distance between them in two long strides and pulled her tight against his chest. “Two long, horrible days. I couldn’t get you out any sooner. Believe me, I tried.”
“And your position in the clan? What happened?”
She stepped back to read his face. He turned his gaze away from her, letting it fall to the bedroom door. “I’ve lost favor with Kaveh. He announced a new Beta.”
She gaped at him. “No. Rayner, no.” She grabbed his arm and forced him to focus on her. “Is it because of me? The escape?”
“You would do anything for those women. It’s who you are.” He cupped her cheek, his thumb warming a path along her skin.
He seemed about to say something else, but he stopped himself with a shake of his head. He moved over to the small table where plates of fruta, cheese, and dried pryll had been laid out and poured her a glass of water from a pitcher, the same way she had just a few days ago. “Come, sit. You have to be starving.”
She crossed the room and grabbed a hunk of bread, pulling some off with her teeth as she sat and took the glass Rayner held out to her. “Why are you being punished?”
“I’m responsible for you. Your actions are my responsibility.”
Vera dropped the bread and nearly the glass too. “That’s completely ridiculous! I’m my own person with my own thoughts! How can you be held responsible for that?”
He smiled, a sad pull of his lips that never reached his eyes. “You’re a force of nature all of your own.”
For one moment, Vera allowed herself to look at him as a man. To forget where they were and why she was in his home and just soak up the feel of him. There was no denying her attraction, but the ache in her heart that urged her to reach out and take his hand and lead him back to the bedroom was more than attraction.
It ran deeper. Stronger. More real than anything Vera had ever felt before.
“What happens now?” This time, she did reach across the table and place her hand on his.
He stared at her hand for a moment before turning his over, palm up, to clasp them together. “You will be put on trial.”
A surge of hope thrilled through her. “Good! I can defend myself.”
He raised his gaze to meet hers. “That’s not how trials work here. It’s a public decree of your crimes and the punishment Kaveh has decided on for you.”
Her previous hope extinguished faster than a candle in water. “What about the other women? Will they be punished too?”
“When I spoke to him today, right before I came for you, he was going to let the others off with a warning.” He shook his head at Vera’s obvious relief. “That isn’t a good thing. It means your punishment will take the place of theirs, but I don’t know what he has planned. He’s shut me and Gerrit out. I think his … his mind is about to fail complete
ly, and he thinks, for some reason, the unrest in the clan is my fault.” A muscle along his jaw ticked. “Perhaps it is my fault.”
“Rayner,” Vera breathed out. He looked so lost. So confused.
But she saw the moment he shoved the worry aside. His eyes blazed bright as he stared at her. “I will keep you safe. I won’t let them hurt you.”
Vera was already shaking her head. “You don’t have to do that. You don’t owe me anything.”
Rayner’s face shuttered, his eyes cooling into an icy darkness as he unfurled his body from the chair. The telltale ripples rolled beneath his skin, and the sharp points of his canines sank into his lower lip. Vera quivered at the thought of how those teeth liked to nip at her skin, at the swell of her breasts.
“This isn’t about my position or anything else. It’s about you. Kaveh is talking about a harsher punishment than exile.
“Oh,” she breathed out. But surprisingly, it wasn’t fear or regret she felt at his words. Just a yawning hole deep in her heart. “I stand behind what I did to try to free my people. I’m not going to apologize for it. Even if it’s death they want for me.”
A growl ripped from Rayner’s throat. He grabbed her up, nearly lifting her off her toes as he loomed above her. “I won’t see you touched! Don’t you understand? That would kill me. I’d give my own life before I sat and watched you die. I wouldn’t have a choice. It’s impossible for me not to defend you, to love you. You’re mine.”
They were so close she could see the yellow ring circling his pupils. His chest heaved against hers.
“Rayner …”
“I won’t let anyone kill my mate,” he finished, his eyes glinting with truth.
My mate.
“Did you—” Vera had to swallow her heart back down into her chest before she could finish. “Just call me your mate?”
Releasing her, he paced across the room, shoving a hand through his hair, his broad shoulders flexing beneath his shirt. He turned back toward her and took a deep breath. “During the battle, when I transformed into my Vilkan form, I smelled you through a more primal filter. Shifters here on Kladuu are built to find mates—true mates—someone we’ll spend the rest of our lives with. It’s a forever bond.”
