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“Yes. The Ongahri found their Omega bride.”
I searched my memory for some truth in her words. It was true that the Fealty meant the joining of a woman outside the Ongahri with a male from its own. If the point of the Fealty was to procure the Omega, then that must mean this Omega wasn’t common in the Ongahri. But weren’t they rare in any people?
“I’m so confused.” I was getting irritated. Her words were almost cryptic, too vague, and seemed so far removed from me, Sierra Linden. There were too many words that refused to become coherent in my head. What she was saying had nothing to do with me, the Constant’s daughter. But wait, I thought. That was no longer my role. I was technically married to an Ongahri. Their prince, in fact.
“Why am I here, then, and not with them?”
“It was for your safety,” Demos said.
I turned to the now open door and saw him standing there. My heart did a little flip at the sight of him. It had been so long since I’d seen him in his Servant robes, and now he seemed both stranger and lover, a mix of older memories and new, and my mind couldn’t keep up with the dichotomy, what he should be to me.
By his expression and the way his eyes swept over the room, so indifferent, made it clear that the Demos I had spent all those fevered days and nights with was gone.
“She has been told, Servant. I’m afraid I just muddled things. You’ll be able to it explain it better.” Auria walked over to the kitchen and filled a pot with water. “Have a seat, I’ll make us some tea.”
Demos took the chair Auria had left and folded his hands on the table. “How are you feeling? You look a little better than last time I saw you.” His blue eyes swept over my face, then steadied on my hair before meeting my eyes.
Gods, how hearing his voice sang to my very soul, yet I knew he didn’t belong to me, nor I to him. The awkwardness of the situation was like another person in the room, screaming. I both wanted to touch him and wanted to run away. And yet he sat across from me, composed, wearing a mask of indifference. How could he not be affected too?
A dark thought crossed my mind.
“Wait. You knew about this. This Omega thing, didn’t you? Since before we left Providence.” Slowly, pieces began to fit, forming a glaringly bright picture. “That night, at the festival… I’d felt so strange…” I couldn’t finish the words. His tonics, those blasted berry-tasting drinks he had been giving me for weeks now. Then another thought occurred. “Did you steal me away from the Ongahri? Did you plan all this?” My hands swept over the room, gesturing to the cabin, this strange meadow, even Auria. “A friend,” he had said.
“Sierra, sit down. Please,” Demos said.
I realized to my surprise that I was standing, almost out the door. “Tell me you didn’t plan this. Tell me you didn’t… use me. Oh gods, please don’t tell me—”
“Please, Sierra. Sit. I will tell you everything.”
But his tone wasn’t inviting enough, his words too patronizing. The Demos I wanted was gone and in his place was a stranger that had power over me, power in the form of knowledge. I was a fool.
I needed to leave, needed to be far away from him. I couldn’t bear having him see how I was putting it all together now, him playing me the fool.
So I left the cabin before the tears could come.
Chapter 22
Sierra
I wanted to run but my legs could only go so fast; my stupid body was still recovering. I hated my body then. Hated everything that had led to this moment. Hated the passion he had ignited in me. The touching, the kisses, that never-ending wanting. My body was a traitor. It had taken over my mind, and now that it was done and had gotten what it wanted, it had left me to deal with the repercussions. Heartbreak. Shame.
It had stolen my choice and had possibly ruined my future.
My feet seemed to know exactly where they wanted to go as I walked and walked, pushing past the aches and fatigue, until I stopped right in front of the nest under the tree. The place where Demos and I had spent so much time before, now only an impression in the grass, mingled with traces of our blended scents, echoes of pleasure, and snippets of words said.
“You are my sun. I need you, Demos.”
“By the wind, Sierra, you are so beautiful.”
I laid down on the ground anyway, my heart crushing me so hard I felt I couldn’t breathe.
Why was this happening? I wanted to go home. I wanted my mother, my father, Lucinda. Oh gods, where was Lucinda?
I should have stayed in the cabin and gotten answers. Instead, I had only thought of myself, my loss. I needed to face the fact that Demos didn’t care about me. It wasn’t love. He wasn’t even mine to love! I was promised to another man. I had been used.
I should have been asking about Lucinda, how she was. About Fadon and Jon. Were they searching for me? A sliver of memory came to me then. Of the cave, the snowstorm. Yes, that was the last time I had seen them. I remembered being out of sorts, burning with fever. I remembered snow, wind. Wild animals appearing, then fighting. But nothing was clear, and whatever happened from then until the day Demos had brought me inside the cabin was too muddled.
Was it possible I was this Omega? All those fevers, the cramps, the…. lust. And what did any of that mean now? And how on Titus did Demos play a role in all this? Was he even a Servant of the Owl?
