To ruin an Omega

Chapter 296: Dawn and Devastation

HAZEL

I released them and flexed my fingers, trying to get blood flowing back into them.

“You need to stop antagonizing me.”

“Maybe I’m just saying it as I’m seeing it.” He tilted his head and studied me like I was some interesting specimen. “Don’t tell me you expect love in this arrangement.”

“No.” The word came out sharp and hard. “I get what I want. I get back what I lost. I get my Luna title back and I get to marry into a prominent family. Love is the least of my worries.”

“I guess this conversation is done then.”

He turned to walk away. Really walk away. Like I was nothing. Like this conversation meant nothing.

“Did you get it?”

He stopped. His back went rigid.

“What?”

“My grandmother’s present to this pack. The reason Lily of the Valley agreed to this arrangement in the first place.”

I still had a mission. Aldric’s demands.

His head turned. He looked at me then he looked at the sentinel.

The sentinel immediately bowed and walked away fast. Like he couldn’t get out of there quickly enough.

Then Lysander moved. He closed the space between us in three strides and suddenly he was right there. Too close. Close enough that I could smell his cologne.

It was cloying. But not so much that it was sickening.

“There are some things you shouldn’t fucking say out loud.”

I blinked. The venom in his voice caught me off guard.

“It’s a healer. What’s the big secret?”

He stared at me. And something in his expression shifted. Like he was seeing something he hadn’t expected.

“Oh,” he said softly. “You don’t know.”

“What? Know what?”

He took a step back. The distance felt deliberate and calculated.

“Enjoy your tour.”

Then he walked away. Just like that. He left me standing there in the drive with questions piling up in my throat.

“Fuck.” The word slipped out before I could stop it.

What didn’t I know? What was I missing? What had Grandmother done that was so secret it couldn’t be spoken about in the open?

“Miss?”

I jumped. The Sentinel had returned. He stood a respectful distance away, his hands clasped behind his back.

“Are you ready for the tour?”

I took a breath, smoothed down my clothes and forced my face into something resembling calm.

“Yeah. Sure.”

He smiled. “Wonderful. The estate has quite a history. I think you’ll find it fascinating.”

I nodded and followed him towards the entrance.

But my mind wasn’t on the tour. It wasn’t on the estate or its history or any of the pretty artwork this sentinel was probably going to show me.

It was on Lysander’s face. On that look. That realization that I didn’t know something crucial.

I was already at a disadvantage here. Already powerless in ways I hadn’t fully grasped. And now there was something else. Some secret tied to my grandmother’s deal that everyone seemed to know—even Aldric in a way—except me.

The doors closed behind us. The entrance hall opened up before me. I saw marble floors, high ceilings, a chandelier that was made of gold.

The Sentinel started talking. Something about the architecture. About the founding of the estate. His voice was pleasant and informative.

I made the appropriate sounds. I nodded in the right places. Smiled when it seemed expected.

But inside I was screaming.

I’d lost my pack. Lost my title. Lost my father’s respect and my mother’s easy affection. I’d been shipped off to a territory where my future husband couldn’t even pretend to tolerate me. Where my own grandmother had made some kind of deal that everyone knew about except the person it affected most.

Me.

I was supposed to be Luna Hazel. I was supposed to be powerful, respected and feared.

Instead I was just Hazel. The unwanted bride. The political pawn. The girl who didn’t even know the full terms of her own arrangement.

The sentinel led me through a doorway into what looked like a gallery. Paintings lined the walls. Beautiful expensive things that probably had stories attached.

He started talking about one. Some ancestor who did something important.

I looked at the painting. At the proud face staring back at me from the canvas.

I wondered if they’d ever felt this powerless. If they’d ever stood in a place they didn’t belong and smiled while everything inside them crumbled.

Probably not.

People like that didn’t end up in paintings unless they’d won. Unless they’d conquered and claimed and taken what they wanted.

I wasn’t winning. I was barely surviving.

And the worst part was that I still had to smile. Had to nod. Had to pretend like this was all fine. Like I was happy to be here. Like Lysander’s coldness didn’t cut. Like my grandmother’s secrets and Aldric’s thinly veiled words didn’t terrify me.

Because that’s what I was supposed to do. Smile, Endure and fucking survive.

Even when survival felt like the slowest death imaginable.

The sentinel moved to the next painting. I followed.

One foot in front of the other.

That’s all I could do now.

Keep moving. Keep smiling. Keep pretending.

Until I figured out what the hell I’d walked into.

And how the hell I was going to survive it.

But when my gaze settled on the painting, the noise in my head went quiet. Every stray thought drifted aside until there was nothing left but the image in front of me. A woman floated in a sky that did not look real, pale clouds curling around her like smoke. In one hand she held a glowing blue orb, in the other a burning red one, the colors clashing and blending at the same time.

I found myself leaning closer before I even realized it. “What is this about?”

The sentinel followed my line of sight. “The Alpha favors pieces that honor the old world,” he said. “This one is also about the healers from the age of legends. This one is called Dawn and Devastation.”