Chapter 18

Elouera

I didn't move. My spine remained perfectly rigid against the heavy oak door of my bedchamber, my fingers digging so hard into the fabric of my dark cloak that my knuckles ached.

Archduke Holden didn’t shout. He didn’t call for the guards standing just fifty feet down the stone corridor. He simply sat in his wheeled chair, the bloody leather of Jace’s bracer resting on his lap right next to the torn strip of my cheap silk shirt.

"I am not a patient man, Elouera," Holden murmured. The use of my true name, a name that had been buried in the dirt of the royal cemetery eight years ago felt like a physical blow to my stomach.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I lied. My voice was a ragged, pathetic scrape.

Holden sighed. It was a hollow, disappointed sound. He slowly reached into the inner breast pocket of his tailored velvet coat and withdrew a small, dark glass vial. He popped the cork with his thumb and tipped a single, heavy black pill into his palm. It didn't look like the chalky, bitter white suppressants he had been supplying me for years. It looked like a drop of solidified tar.

"Commander Corowa is currently chained to a rusted iron grate in the fourth level of the deep cells," Holden said quietly, rolling the black pill between his fingers. "General Vane is standing by with a pair of heavy iron shears. I told him to wait for my signal before he begins amputating the Commander’s fingers. He has ten, my dear. Vane is eager to make the interrogation last until dawn."

The air in my lungs turned to completely solid ice.

"What do you want?" I choked out, my facade crumbling into absolute ash.

Holden held out his hand, offering the black pill. "Swallow it."

I stared at the strange drug, sheer terror rooting my boots to the floor. "What is it?"

"It is a newly synthesized catalyst," Holden replied, his warm green eyes entirely dead. "Your biology is mutating, Elouera. The white pills are failing. Callan and Stirling can already smell you. If you don't take this, your scent will breach the entire palace by midnight, and the Sovereign bloodline will tear you apart. Take the pill. Suppress the heat. And I will tell Vane to leave Corowa’s hands attached to his wrists."

He was backing me into a corner lined with broken glass. I had no choice. If I refused, Jace would be permanently crippled, or worse, bled out on a dungeon floor because he dared to protect me.

My trembling hand reached out. I took the black pill from his palm. I didn't ask for water. I shoved it to the back of my throat and forced a dry swallow, the heavy, metallic taste gagging me.

Holden watched my throat work. A slow, chilling smile finally crept onto his face.

"Good girl," he whispered. He turned his silver wheels, maneuvering past me toward the door. "Enjoy the transition, Your Highness."

He pulled the heavy oak door open and rolled out into the corridor. The door clicked shut, and the heavy exterior iron deadbolt slammed into place, locking me inside.

I stood completely frozen for ten seconds. Then, the side effects hit.

It didn't start as a sickness. It started as a drop of pure, boiling liquid fire igniting directly in the center of my stomach.

I gasped, my hands flying to my abdomen. The heat was instantaneous and catastrophic. It didn't spread slowly; it violently exploded outward, racing through my veins like a lit fuse. My knees completely gave out. I hit the expensive Persian rug hard, choking on oxygen that suddenly felt too thick to breathe.

"No," I whimpered, curling onto my side.

Holden had lied. It wasn't a new suppressant. It was the exact opposite. He had given me a biological accelerant.

A terrifying, agonizing hot flash ripped through my entire body. My skin felt like it was sitting inches from an open furnace. The heavy wool cloak I was wearing became a suffocating prison. My shaking fingers tore at the silver clasp at my throat, ripping it loose. I kicked the cloak away, but the blistering heat didn't stop.

My blood was literally boiling. Sweat poured down my forehead, stinging my eyes, completely soaking the heavy layers of linen binding my ribs. The tight fabric, already aggravating my fractured bone, now felt like a steel vise crushing my lungs.

I dragged myself across the rug, my fingernails digging into the thick wool fibers, crawling blindly toward the heavy mahogany desk. I reached up, my hand slapping against the wood until my fingers closed around the silver handle of my letter opener.

I collapsed onto my back, my chest heaving erratically. My vision was completely blurred, the edges of the room turning a sickening, hazy red. I shoved the blunt edge of the letter opener under the thick linen bindings and violently jerked upward.

The fabric snapped. Cool air rushed over my damp, overheated skin, but it offered absolutely no relief. The fire wasn't coming from the room. It was coming from inside my own bones.

And then, the scent breached.

It happened all at once. The harsh, medicinal bitterness of my usual suppressants completely shattered, entirely overwhelmed by a massive, intoxicating wave of wild honey and rain. It didn't just leak into the room; it flooded it. The smell was so thick, so heavy and aggressively sweet, that I could actually taste it on the back of my tongue.

It was the raw, unadulterated pheromone spike of an Omega being violently forced into her first heat.

A fractured, broken sob tore from my throat. My biology was screaming, clawing at the inside of my skull. It demanded a mate. It demanded the heavy, grounding presence of an Alpha to anchor the agonizing fever. My mind instantly, devastatingly flashed to Jace. The memory of his calloused hand, the heavy scent of ozone, the dark, protective fury in his storm-grey eyes. My body violently craved him, the physical ache settling low and deep in my stomach, making the hot flash spike into pure, blinding torture.

But Jace was chained to a wall.

I was completely alone. And my scent was leaking out from under the door.

Panic, cold and sharp, managed to pierce through the drug induced fever.

I couldn't stay here. The royal wing was heavily patrolled by Imperial Guards, all of them Alphas. Once the scent of wild honey hit the corridor, they would tear the door off its iron hinges. They wouldn't care that I was the Second Prince. They wouldn't care about treason. A feral Alpha in the presence of a completely unguarded, burning Omega had no rational thought.

I had to get to the catacombs. I had to get into the deep earth where the damp mold and the freezing wind would mask the honey.

I rolled onto my stomach, my muscles violently trembling, and forced myself onto my hands and knees. Every movement was a monumental effort. I dragged myself across the floorboards toward the massive, antique wardrobe built into the far wall. The false back panel led directly into the servant passages.

Just ten more feet.

I reached the base of the wardrobe, my fingers gripping the heavy carved wood to pull myself up.

Sniff.

The sound was incredibly faint, but in the dead silence of my bedchamber, it echoed like a gunshot.

I froze, the blood draining completely from my flushed face.

I looked over my shoulder.

Beneath the heavy oak door leading to the corridor, I saw the distinct, shifting shadow of a pair of heavy boots blocking the faint hallway light. Whoever it was wasn't just walking past. They had stopped directly outside my room.

The heavy brass door handle suddenly rattled.

It didn't turn smoothly. It was a violent, frantic jerking motion, the sound of someone desperately trying to force the locked mechanism.

A low, guttural growl vibrated right through the solid wood. It wasn't a human sound. It was the terrifying, primal noise of a predator whose higher brain functions had just been completely obliterated by the scent leaking under the door.

The heavy, suffocating smell of crushed cedar and woodsmoke began to bleed rapidly into my bedroom.

Stirling.

The door handle broke off with a sharp crack, hitting the stone floor outside .And then, the heavy oak began to splinter inward as a massive, heavy shoulder violently slammed against the wood.