Betraying Destiny (The Omega Prophecy Book 3)

by Nora Ash

  Too exhausted to fight anymore, I lay on top of my mate, my knot buried in her depths and my face pressed into her hair—and I let them in.

  They saw everything. Every weakness, every bitter, petty thought. Every wound. And every dark deed.

  Grim.

  My name was a sorrowful whisper in my mind. It came from Bjarni; I knew that from the warm, bright blue shimmer in my consciousness as my deceit was laid bare. But no anger followed—not even from the Thorssons—because they saw too the overwhelming devotion and desperation that had forced me to align myself against them.

  They understood. And they forgave me.

  I shook in Annabel’s arms as they watched my complete and utter capitulation brought on by the love for her that I had tried and failed to fight. Only warmth and amused empathy met me from the four men who had surrendered their own hearts.

  And when they saw the moment I realized my mate—our mate—was pregnant, saw my gut-wrenching understanding that I had sparked a life, and the agony of knowing that I had doomed my daughter to the same darkness that had swallowed me whole…

  “Ha! A daughter!”

  “You’re pregnant, pet?”

  “You’re giving us a baby girl, sweetie?”

  “Truly? Even here, the Fates have blessed us? Anna, this is wonderful!”

  They drew away, the four of them, pulling from the intimacy of our union as their excitement echoed in the glade. Several palms clapped my shoulders, even as they focused their words on Annabel.

  Her daughter. Fathered by me, yes, but… they saw her as theirs too. Ours.

  I blinked my eyes open, too dazed to speak as my mate smiled up at me before her gaze darted to the alphas surrounding us, pure joy crinkling the corners of her eyes.

  The connection between us was still wide open, and her gratitude and love swelled around me. I felt them too, through her—not as clearly as before, not as intimately, but I felt them.

  Mine. They were all mine. The understanding was crystal-clear and shocked me to my core.

  I should have been furious. Should have fought tooth and nail to lay claim to what was mine—my mate and my child—but I wasn’t. Because they… they belonged to me too.

  I kept waiting for my alpha instincts to kick in, but the primitive part of me was… soothed. Content. Safe in his pack.

  My family.

  Annabel’s gaze flicked back to mine as if she’d heard that thought through our bond. Perhaps she had. She placed a hand against my chest, over my heart, and whispered, “You were the final piece. You complete us.”

  The spark came of its own accord, a dark kernel pulled from the very depths of my being, glowing faintly as it passed through our bond and into Annabel to light up her eyes from within.

  “What—?” Her voice died as she moved her hand from my chest to her own.

  “A part of me,” I murmured, placing my fingers above hers. “Forever yours.”

  “I feel you in me,” she whispered, eyes wide. “Your power. I can…”

  She tugged on something, and my magic answered, hers to command as much as I was.

  Hesitantly she released her grip on it, letting it retreat back into me.

  “This is how we can beat Hel. This is how we stop Ragnarök,” she said. “It’s why the Norns wove us together.” She looked up at the others. “I need you to do that too. Right now.”

  Saga lifted his eyebrows. “Oh, you do, do you?”

  “Someone should teach that demanding little girl some manners,” Magni drawled. The heat in his voice was unmistakable, and it dawned on me that they all had yet to sate their desires the way I had. The thought of them taking her had infuriated me before, but now it seemed almost… natural that I share my mate with my brothers—old as well as new.

  Annabel huffed. “It’s always about sex with you lot. I’m telling you I figured out how to save the nine goddamn worlds, and you just want to get laid?”

  “Yes. Yes, we do,” Bjarni said matter-of-factly. He looked at me. “How’s that knot coming?”

  “If Grim gave you his kernel after a climax, it would seem plausible that we would require similar circumstances to give you ours,” Modi said. “After all, I know of no spell to make it happen, and I suspect if one did exist, Mimir or Verdandi would have provided it.”

  Annabel quirked a brow at the redhead. He only smiled in return.

  “Fine,” she sighed, sounding nothing like the wanton woman who had writhed between the five of us only moments ago. “If you insist.”

  “That’s the spirit,” Magni chuckled.

  “Poor Annabel, having to spread her legs for all her alphas, one after the other, until we’ve had our fill,” Saga said. He reached for her and stroked a couple of fingers over her cheek. “How ever will you get through this, hmm?”

  “It’s a good thing our mate likes her cunt sore and used,” Magni purred. “And her pleasure forced.”

  “I do not!” Annabel lied, the indignation in her voice almost enough to block out the glazed look of mounting desire at their taunts.

  “Your knot?” Bjarni asked again, impatience lacing each syllable. “If you need help, the thunder god’s sons know a handy trick.”

  Saga snorted and lifted his chin at Modi, who was shifting to move around Annabel’s still-prone body. “I wouldn’t. He’s not as mild-mannered as the rest of us.”

  I gave Modi a withering stare that made him settle by Annabel’s side with a grimace before I returned my focus to my mate. She reached up to brush a hand along my cheek and asked, “Are you good?”

  I only managed a hum in response. I didn’t have the words for anything else.

  “Good,” she said, giving me a soft smile that turned mischievous at the corners. “How is your knot coming, baby? Because the last time we did this, there were some very… intriguing suggestions on how to settle one quickly.”

  I quirked an eyebrow at the decidedly wicked smirk on her lips, but before she could clarify, Saga said, “I’m not shoving a finger up my brother’s ass, sweetling. I can’t fuck you if I’m dead.”

  “I didn’t know you were a scaredy-cat,” Annabel huffed as she stuck out her plump lower lip in a pout, earning a chuckle from him.

  “Hmm,” Modi hummed as he eyed me up. “I suppose it’s good you have far braver mates, then.”

  I blinked as he moved around me, the implication of his words slow to set in. So slow it wasn’t until I felt his hand on my lower back that I realized what he had planned.

  Shock rocked through my body, alpha instincts flaring in a heartbeat. I snarled and whipped my head around, baring my teeth at the male who sought to penetrate me. He only flashed me a knowing grin, popped his middle finger between his lips, and sucked it lewdly.

  I snarled again, but instead of reaching for him to tear his head off—like I should have wanted to—I only clutched Annabel’s shoulders. Because despite the alpha instincts roaring at the unnaturalness of getting penetrated, that new emotion in my gut, that sense of family and belonging and home, whispered of something more. Something I didn’t understand, even as I turned my gaze back to Annabel’s and held my body perfectly still, waiting.

  Modi brushed his hand from my lower back to my ass, spreading me none too gently. And then the wet touch of his finger rubbed across my exposed anus, making my entire body shudder and another snarl rip from my throat.

  But my eyes stayed locked in Annabel’s, and I drank in the look of excitement on her pretty face and her fast, shallow breaths as she waited with me.

  When he slipped his fingers into me, it was like nothing I’d ever experienced. The stretch was small but entirely alien and wrong, yet so… so right. I threw my head back and hissed a curse as Modi shoved in deeper, angling the tips of his fingers against a too-tender spot.

  “No!” I roared, the alpha in me finally breaking through, but it was too late.

  Modi pressed down and rubbed that spot hard—and the deepest release of my life grabbed me by the throat and ch
oked off my roar until it was a long, drawn-out wail. I came so hard I shook, clutching onto Annabel as if she were the only thing that could anchor my soul through the onslaught of sensation.

  “Fuck, Grim…!” my mate mewled underneath me, and for a horrifying moment I thought I was hurting her—but the flutter of her pussy on my cock told me the truth. I rocked mindlessly against her, groaning like a wounded beast until I had nothing left to give. Modi slipped his finger from my ass, leaving me trembling and not entirely sure what I had just let happen.

  He had once been my sworn enemy.

  No one spoke as I slowly eased off Annabel. My knot had retracted completely, and both my mind and my nerves were raw with the overload of sensation that had washed over me since we’d returned to the glade—but my cock was still hard and made Annabel squirm as I pulled out of her.

  “Well. I guess no one’s gonna to crack any more jokes about how Magni and I mended fences,” Saga said, interrupting the silence. He looked from me to Modi, then down between Annabel’s still-splayed legs where my abundant release flowed. “Though from the looks of it, it’s a more pleasurable alternative to your little lightning trick.”

  “I will never not crack jokes about the two of your milking each other’s knots,” Bjarni rumbled. He reached for Annabel’s hand and brought it back to his still-throbbing dick. Obligingly, she wrapped her fingers around it.

  “I didn’t milk anything,” Magni growled. “I was entirely incapacitated. He molested me.”

  “You’re welcome for saving your ungrateful ass,” Saga said, his attention more on Annabel’s slow movements over Bjarni’s dick than either Thorsson. He shifted languidly, moving to her hip, ensuring their focus was on the argument rather than his intentions.

  “Will someone explain what happened between the two of you?” Modi asked, frustration lacing his words as he turned to Magni—giving Saga the in he needed. “Enough with the hints!”

  My eldest brother moved quickly, grabbing Annabel by her hip and rolling her toward himself and away from me and Modi. She squeaked and laughed—and then groaned deeply when he seated his cock to the hilt in her still-open pussy.

  Modi’s head snapped to them, eyes widening with outrage. “You thieving bastard! You have no honor!”

  “None,” Saga moaned, eyes closed with reverence as he shuddered in Annabel’s embrace. “Not when… it comes to this. Fuck, sweetling. I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you too,” she said, voice dying on a whine when he rolled his hips, filling her anew. She let go of Bjarni and wrapped her arms around Saga’s shoulders, clutching him to her. “So, so much. Oh, Saga… Yes. Please, yes.”

  Bjarni grimaced at the loss of her touch, but didn’t try to force her hand back. We all felt Saga pulse through our connection with Annabel—his yearning, his relief, and his desperation. I finally understood then why Annabel had been so adamant that I couldn’t break their bonds to her without irrevocably damaging them. No matter what I had been told, no matter the power needed to destroy something as eternal as a mate bond, I saw the foolishness of my convictions as Saga gave himself to our woman. He would love her until the end of time itself, and no spell would ever change that.

  We all watched in silence as my brother coupled with our mate—heard his gasped whispers of love and felt his eternal gratitude that she was back in his arms. That she hadn’t been lost to him like he had feared in the darkest parts of his mind while they had searched for her.

  He laid himself bare—not only to her, but to us as well, allowing himself to be as vulnerable as I had been in her embrace. Memories fluttered through our connection, some muddled, some clear. Every weakness, every fear was laid out for us as his defenses drowned in the pleasure of making love to his mate once more.

  I wasn’t conscious of moving. I only realized I had when my palm connected with his shoulder and my darkness wove through the bond, through Annabel, and into Saga, soothing his raw soul like they had done for me. The others joined me, and when Saga gasped out in pleasure and allowed his tie to swell into place, we felt his climax like a storm crashing through our connection.

  Annabel’s whine as she took his knot, and her subsequent cry of completion, sent ripples through that blasted bond, chasing Saga’s pleasure. I groaned through gritted teeth at my cock’s responding throb, tightening my grip on Saga’s shoulder to stem the urge to rip him off and mount her again.

  Even through the onslaught of four other alphas’ desires, Saga only had a mind for Annabel. He groaned softly as he rocked his hips into her, ensuring his knot kept her trembling in one, long climax, and peppered her neck and jawline with kisses and sweet words of devotion.

  And then it came, a fleck of flint traveling through their connection from him and into her, glowing softly as it settled within Annabel’s soul. It lit up her eyes from within until, some long moments later, her body finally stilled underneath his and peace flooded our bond.

  “Thank you,” she croaked.

  Saga smiled gently at her. “For you, I would give everything.”

  “I know,” she murmured, turning her head to rub her forehead against his arm. “As I would for you.”

  “I know,” he echoed. “My fierce little mate.”

  They lay in silence for some long moments, and despite our combined urgency to have her, none of us interrupted their quiet afterglow.

  Until somewhere in the region of twenty minutes had passed and Magni had seemingly run out of patience. He got to his feet and asked, “Finger or lightning?”

  Saga finally looked up to give him a nasty glare. But instead of threatening violence, he growled, “Finger.”

  Magni grinned—with more than an edge of maliciousness to the curve of his mouth. “My pleasure.”

  Saga snarled at the emphasis on pleasure—a sound that only deepened when Magni knelt behind him and reached down.

  I didn’t see the moment of penetration, but Saga’s hissed, “Fuck!” and the stuttering of his hips made it plenty obvious.

  “Want a cum like your brother’s?” Magni asked, that evil note to his voice mirroring the smirk on his face.

  “Don’t you fucking dare!” Saga snarled, twisting his head to glare at Magni over his shoulder. “Stop! Gods, stop, you fucking bast—!”

  The rest of his sentence died on a long, deep groan as his eyes rolled back in his skull and his entire body quivered.

  The echo of his release shuddered through us all.

  Magni only pulled his hand away once Saga had stilled completely. The moment he withdrew, my brother collapsed in a boneless heap on top of Annabel.

  “Godsdammit,” he muttered breathlessly. “You’re going to regret that, Thorsson.”

  “Don’t care,” Magni said. “Get off her. You can have your revenge later.”

  “I will,” Saga growled, only managing to muster an edge of a threat through the aftermath of his orgasm. He placed a kiss on Annabel’s lips, then managed to push himself off her body and roll onto his back on the grass by her side. He made no move to get up as Magni crawled in between Annabel’s still-splayed legs.

  “I’ve missed you, pet,” the redhead murmured, a hoarseness to his voice that wasn’t only from sexual urgency. “Every second of every day.”

  “Don’t cry,” Annabel whispered. “I’m right here, Magni. You found me in time.” She cupped his face with both hands, and I saw the single tear trailing down his cheek as he closed his eyes to savor her touch. “I’m right here, my love.”

  Magni groaned and bent for her lips. He kissed her slowly at first, savoring every brush of her mouth over his, until the need for her turned too painful to resist. When he buried his cock inside her, his groan of pleasure shuddered through their bond and deep into all of us.

  I closed my eyes at the reverence vibrating through that bond—at the relief and wonder he felt now that he was finally reunited with his mate. He’d been lost without her. His pain flowed freely through our connection, followed by images of him
sobbing on his knees at night, pleading to the stars above to return her to him.

  Claiming her was the first time he had ever felt like he truly belonged. She was his home, much like she was mine—his center—the only one who could drive away the agony of a life lived feeling unwanted. Unloved.

  Magni didn’t hold back any of his painful scars as he made love to our mate. For me, I dimly realized—he wanted me specifically to see, because he wanted me to know he understood, and that I wasn’t alone with my festering wounds carved from the darkness of a past not too dissimilar to his.

  Home. This was home. My safe place.

  I pressed my palm to his shoulder, allowing some of my cool darkness to flow through Annabel and into him, soothing the echo of that raw pain.

  Magni grunted in response, amusement and gratitude filtering back to me—from him and his brother.

  Modi’s pain still tinged our connection, even as Magni refocused on the pleasure of mating. He had watched his brother’s mistreatment and been powerless to stop it, and that old ache still festered. Seeing Magni like this, surrounded by love, by his true family, went a long way to soothe it.

  Annabel’s moaning turned sharp, pulling my focus from the Thorssons to her just as Magni pushed his knot through her pelvis and roared his release.

  His kernel was blue-flecked green and came eagerly on the rush of his climax, embedding itself deep within Annabel even as she was still writhing on his knot. It illuminated her, that blue-green light glowing through her eyes for several long seconds until the two of them collapsed, panting and spent.

  “I will love you through the end of the world and beyond, woman,” Magni said softly. He found the strength to lift onto his elbows and planted a couple of gentle kisses on Annabel’s lips, smiling as she didn’t manage more than an exhausted groan in response. “You can have every ounce of my power, so long as you let me remain by your side.”

  “By her side is fine. But if you remain inside of her for much longer, you’re going to experience what the Lokissons have already,” Modi growled, shattering the peaceful moment. One look at him made it plenty obvious that watching Annabel come again had pushed his patience over the edge for good.