"You're coming back with me."
"Coming with you? But…where?" I managed to speak but my mouth was so dry it came out as a croak, the cold and fear already managing to get to me.
"Do you think you're in a position to ask questions, Maeve?" He asked, smirking dangerously.
"No…Sir," I squeaked, but barely above a whisper.
It was obvious. He wanted me to come with him for the slaughter. He was going to take me to his torture chamber and use me for his rumored experiments so he could find easier ways to kill the Varcolac. Or–
"Calm yourself, Omega," he rolled his eyes. "Your emotions are all over the place and it'll give me a headache if you keep at it. You're coming with me to my residence at the Centre. From this moment on, you will be living with me. You stay under my roof, under my watch."
"What?" I finally looked up, stunned, my mouth flying open, and somehow my anger had decided to make an appearance when I should have been trying hard to suppress it. It felt like something was finally snapping into place. Because I was done. I was done with people ordering me around, making me do things for their benefit as if I were just a doll to be played with and killed and discarded when it became useless.
"Well, you can't just order me around like that," I said looking straight into his hazel eyes despite the tremor on my lips.
"Oh, I can," he said softly, his voice dropping even lower. But there was nothing soft in his expression now. "You're a newly mutated Lycan who just showed unusual strength, and not to mention shifted into her wolf on the same day, even with such a weak, inexperienced body. So, if you are turning into a Varcolac, little Omega…" He leaned in just enough so that his hot breath blew against my ear. "...I need to be there to watch it happen. And of course, to end it when it does."
I exhaled as the threat climbed and slithered over me. I didn't have a choice in this.
"Then why not just kill me now?"
Shit. What was I saying?
If he wasn't just standing there glaring at me, I would have probably wacked myself in the head.
"Because, Maeve, there's been a slight complication," he said slowly, amused.
"And what's that?"
"You're my mate."
I stilled. Surely that couldn't be true. But even when I was trying to convince myself otherwise, I knew. I'd probably known it for some time.
"But…I don't even know you. Maybe it's a mistake of some kind."
"There is no mistake. You don't have to know me. Because your body already does."
That's when I realised the full extent of it. That magnetic pull that I've been feeling in his presence, his rich scent, all of which I've been trying to push away into the pits of my stomach. It was even more potent now, the mist coiling around both of us, stronger when he was close, driving up all of my senses.
He stepped even closer, his shadow swallowing me until my nose almost touched the heat of his bare chest.
"You feel it, don't you?" He murmured as his large form towered over me, every line of his face even more visible, so close. His hot breath blew against my ear and I didn't know if the tremble that ran across my body was because of the cold or something else.
I said nothing, because there was no point in lying. I could feel it. I've been feeling it since the moment I saw him. My heart was hammering so loud he could probably hear it too. In fact, I'm sure he could.
I swallowed hard and looked down at my shivering body again. There was no way I could walk back looking like this, the cold would just eat me up and give me a bad case of hypothermia. I glanced up at him again, my cheeks hot even though it was freezing now.
He sighed like I was somehow inconveniencing him.
"We'll shift," he said finally. "Wolves run faster anyway."
His gaze dragged over me one more time, like he was trying to commit it to memory and then he turned his back, his body already shifting back into his enormous wolf form.
"Shift, Maeve."
I heard his voice again in my head, smooth and commanding. It all made sense now. It was because of the mind link, which could only occur between two mates. It's how he knew my name too.
I took a deep breath and concentrated again. My bones cracked and my body grew and folded in on itself until I felt the wolf form completely. The process was so much better than the first time, in fact, it even felt good. More powerful. Like new life entering my body making me capable of anything and everything. The cold vanished completely, replaced by cool wind grazing against my thick fur.
The moment I shifted, he didn't wait for me. Just leapt back into the darkness like a streak of silver and black.
And despite every instinct telling me that maybe I should just turn around and flee the other way, take the chance that I'm getting right now, I didn't. My paws followed him rapidly until the trees thinned out and the rest of the city opened up.
The glowing heart of Parthenn sprawled in front of us, bathed in even bigger towers and buildings specially made for the Alphas and the elitists. The Omegas lived away from here towards the North of the area, and only some of them were allowed to enter this part of the Parthenn for work as maids or for menial labour or during the mating ceremony.
That's when I realised with a shiver…I was just a new Omega, now running straight into the most ruthless Alpha Commander's world.
As his mate.