Chapter 15

Elouera

My lungs were tearing themselves apart.

The imperial training yard was coated in a thick layer of crushed red ironstone, a brutal, dusty homage to the unforgiving Outback territories we had violently conquered. Right now, most of that red dust was ground into my bleeding knees.

"Get up, Elian."

Callan’s voice was a dark, gravelly command that echoed off the high limestone walls of the sparring pit. He was circling me, his heavy steel broadsword resting entirely too casually against his massive shoulder. Despite the punishing midday sun baking the yard, he wasn't even sweating.

He was punishing me.

Ever since he had broken into my sickroom ever since he had pinned me to my mattress and felt his Alpha biology violently respond to my suppressed scent Callan had been completely unhinged. He couldn't reconcile his hatred for the weak "Second Prince" with the raw, possessive lust that had gripped him when he tore my shirt open. So, he was doing the only thing a warlord knew how to do with confusion.

He was turning it into violence.

"I said, get up," Callan snarled, the heavy scent of cracking glaciers and raw leather rolling off him in suffocating waves, meant to force my biological submission.

I clamped my jaw shut, tasting copper and dirt, and forced my trembling legs to straighten. My ribs screamed in agonizing protest against my tight linen bindings. I raised my wooden parrying blade, my knuckles white.

"You're pathetic," Callan murmured, stepping into my space with predatory grace. His icy blue eyes were dilated, locked onto the bruised line of my throat. "You hide behind suppressants. You reek of bitter herbs and fear. What exactly are you burying, little brother?"

He swung.

It wasn't a training strike. It was a vicious, horizontal slash of solid steel aimed directly at my head.

I threw myself backward, throwing my wooden blade up to deflect the blow. The sheer, devastating force of his broadsword shattered my wooden weapon into splinters. I stumbled, my heel catching on the uneven gravel.

I didn't fall fast enough.

The blunted edge of Callan's steel caught the side of my face. The impact felt like a whip cracking across my cheekbone. Searing, blinding heat tore through my skin. I hit the dirt hard, gasping as a warm, heavy bead of blood instantly welled up from the gash, sliding down my jawline to drip onto the red earth.

The sharp, metallic scent of my blood hit the heavy air. Beneath the chemical bitterness of my suppressants, the raw, undeniable sweetness of wild honey and rain flared violently.

Callan froze.

The aggression vanished from his massive frame, replaced by a dark, terrifying hunger. His chest heaved. He dropped the tip of his sword to the dirt, taking a slow, involuntary step toward me, entirely captivated by the scent of a bleeding, vulnerable Omega.

"Elian..." he rasped, reaching out.

He never touched me.

A shadow eclipsed the blinding sun, moving with the silent, terrifying lethality of a striking viper.

Commander Jace Corowa didn't shout a warning. He didn't ask for permission. He simply vaulted the iron railing of the royal sparring ring, a sacred circle restricted entirely to the bloodline under penalty of death and stepped directly between me and the Crown Prince.

Callan let out a furious roar, instinctively raising his broadsword to strike the intruder.

Jace didn't draw his own weapon. He didn't even flinch.

He reached out and closed his bare, calloused hand directly over the naked steel of Callan’s blade.

Absolute, suffocating silence slammed into the training yard. The thirty Imperial Guards lining the perimeter stopped breathing.

Fresh, dark blood immediately spilled from Jace’s clenched fist, running down the steel fuller of Callan’s sword. But Jace’s face was carved from granite. His eyes were fixed on the Crown Prince, completely devoid of fear, burning with a quiet, catastrophic violence.

Protocol dictated that Jace should be executed on the spot. He had interrupted a royal duel. He had laid hands on a sovereign's weapon. It was the highest form of treason.

Callan’s eyes widened in sheer disbelief. "Commander," he snarled, his Alpha dominance flaring wildly as he tried to yank the blade free. "Remove your hand before I sever it."

Jace didn't let go. If anything, his grip tightened. The muscles in his thick neck corded as he held the Crown Prince's blade entirely motionless.

"The match is over, Your Highness," Jace rumbled. His voice was terrifyingly calm, but the heavy, electric scent of ozone rolling off his body was lethal enough to choke the air from my lungs.

He slowly turned his head, his eyes dropping to the blood dripping from my cheek. A muscle feathered in his tight jaw. For a single, agonizing second, the impenetrable wall of the Imperial Commander vanished, revealing the desperate, fiercely protective Alpha underneath.

He was looking at me like I was his.

And as Callan stared at Jace’s bleeding hand, then down to my trembling form, I saw the horrifying realization snap perfectly into place behind the Crown Prince's eyes.