To ruin an Omega

Chapter 75: Long Live the Queen

FIA

I looked at the door. Then back at Bo.

The distance between us was maybe ten feet. She was small. Slight. I had trained with warriors. I had sparred with guards who outweighed me by a hundred pounds. I could take her.

But what did I really know about this Omega?

She had lied to my face for days. She had smiled while she poisoned. She had held my hand while she plotted murder. Everything I thought I knew about her was a story she had written for me to read.

“Why would you ally with anyone but your Alpha?” I asked. My voice came out steadier than I felt. “You swore oaths. You made vows.”

Bo’s smile twisted. “I do not owe you anything.”

“But I know what I know now.” I kept my eyes on her hands. On the blue staining her fingertips. “So what happens? What are you going to do?”

Something shifted in her face. The playfulness drained away. What remained was something harder. Colder.

“I did not want to have to do this,” she said. Her voice dropped low. Almost sad. “But Goddess, you are so nosy. Nothing seems to escape your eye.”

She took a step toward me.

“Nothing,” she continued, “except the fact that your own sister and stepmother tricked you into a marriage to Alpha Cian. And of course you believed I gave a fuck about you.”

The words landed like blows. Each one struck something soft inside me. Because it was true.

Then she dropped the plate.

It shattered against the stone floor. The sound was sharp and sudden and it made me flinch. Before I could react she bent down fast and snatched up a shard. The edge caught the light. Long, jagged and fucking wicked.

“New stories can be spun,” she said. She straightened slowly. The shard glinted in her grip. “I just need to take you out.”

I stepped back. My heel caught on the edge of a rug and I stumbled but did not fall.

“You do not need to do that,” I said as I raised my hands in front of me. I hoped to look open and pleading. “You fell for this Alpha Gabriel’s propaganda. You believe that he will—”

Bo laughed. The sound was sharp and ugly.

“Shut the fuck up,” she said. “Jeez, just shut the fuck up!”

“Bo—”

“Do not fucking psychoanalyze me.” Her voice rose. Her calm mask cracked and something raw showed through. “You do not know me. You want to know why I aligned myself with Alpha Gabriel?”

She advanced another step. I moved back. My shoulders hit the wall.

“I did it because he is infinitely better,” she said. “Cian is rough and young. He does not know what the fuck he is doing so he lashes out. You saw how badly he treated you for the longest time. Why do you think that is?”

I did not answer. I could not. My throat had closed up.

“Because most of them already see us Omegas as scum,” she spat. “The lowest. Manipulative. Worthless. You should see the disgust they have for us when we are in heat.” Her lip curled. “It does not stop them from using us though.”

She was close now. Too close. The shard hovered between us like a promise.

“Ask yourself why ninety-five percent of the Omegas here are female,” she said. “Think about that, you fool.”

“Cian was cruel to me because he believed he was played,” I said. The words tumbled out fast. Desperate. “And the Omega rule was made because men will always distrust other men. It was a quiet law that Alphas carried out because they could not trust their women to not want what they deemed lower Omega male flesh. Over the centuries the reason behind it has changed even if it is very slow—”

Bo chuckled. The sound was dark.

“Now that Luna Morrigan does not have the rot,” she said softly, “and Alpha Cian does not have to fear that the Goddess will punish him for defying her hand in your marriage… do you think he will stay with you?”

She tilted her head. Her eyes glittered.

“When his heart belongs to another?”

The words hit me like a punch to the stomach. I could not breathe.

“Maybe if you knew,” Bo whispered, “you would have let that bitch Morrigan fucking die.”

She lunged.

I saw it coming. Some part of me had been waiting for it. I twisted sideways and her first strike missed my throat by inches. The shard whistled past my ear.

I grabbed her wrist. Twisted. She hissed and tried to pull free but I held on. My other hand came up and caught her shoulder. I shoved hard and she stumbled back.

But she recovered fast. Faster than I expected.

She came at me again. Low this time. Her body slammed into mine and we went down together. My back hit the floor and the impact drove the air from my lungs.

She scrambled on top of me. Her weight pressed down. The shard flashed up.

I caught her wrist with both hands. Held it back. The point hovered above my face. Trembling.

“Get off me,” I gasped.

She did not answer. She just pushed. Her whole body leaned into it. The shard inched closer.

I was stronger than her. I knew I was. But she had leverage and position and something else. Something that burned in her eyes. I could not pinpoint what it was. Hate, fear or desperation. Perhaps it was all of it.

The shard crept lower.

I tried to buck her off. She shifted her weight and stayed on. I tried to roll. She hooked her leg around mine and pinned me flat.

“Just hold still,” she said through gritted teeth. “It will be over soon.”

I twisted my head to the side. The shard slipped past and drove into the stone floor next to my ear. Sparks flew.

She yanked it free and struck again.

This time I got my hand up.

The shard bit into my palm.

Pain exploded through me. White hot. Blinding. I screamed. The sound tore out of my throat raw and ragged.

Blood ran hot down my wrist. Down my arm. I could feel it pooling beneath me on the cold stone.

Bo wrenched the shard free and raised it again. My injured hand grabbed at her weakly. But it slipped and just left red streaks on her sleeve.

“Help!” I screamed. The word ripped out of me. “Someone help me! Please!”

Bo leaned in close. Her breath was warm against my face. Her eyes were empty.

“Every sentinel will be focused on who matters now,” she said. “The Alpha.”

My heart stopped.

Cian. Of course they were going to be with Cian.

Something cracked open inside me. Something I had been holding back without even realizing or acknowledging it. A door I had kept shut because I was scared of what lay on the other side.

The mate bond.

I reached for it. Not carefully. Not gently. I threw myself at it with everything I had. Every scrap of strength. Every ounce of desperation. Every bit of fear, pain and need.

The bond flared to life like an ember in fucking dry paper.

It was like touching fire. Like plunging my hand into ice water. Like standing in a storm and feeling lightning strike right next to me.

I felt him.

Distant. Occupied. His attention elsewhere.

I screamed down the bond. Not with words. With everything. With the terror clawing at my chest. With the pain burning in my hand. With the weight of Bo pressing me into the floor.

CIAN.

The shard came down again.

I caught her wrist. Barely. My grip was weak. Slick with blood. Sliding.

CIAN PLEASE.

I could feel him turning. Feel his attention shifting. Feel something like confusion and then alarm rippling through the bond.

Bo pressed harder. The shard touched my throat. Cold. Sharp.

“Goodbye, Luna Fia,” she whispered.

I closed my eyes and reached one more time.

HELP ME.