Candescent

by Zoey Ellis

  Call­ing strands of magic, she weaved a por­tal, di­rect­ing it low to the ground next to the horse, and be­fore any­one could draw the gen­eral’s at­ten­tion to it, she slipped un­der­neath his arm and pushed her­self off the horse.

  The Al­pha bel­lowed, and his fin­ger­nails scraped her an­kle, but he was un­able to grab hold of her. Fall­ing awk­wardly, she braced for im­pact just in case the por­tal dis­ap­peared sud­denly, but the cold rush all over her body told her it had worked.

  The hard, dusty ground hit her on the other side, but she jumped to her feet as quickly as she could. Be­cause of the in­con­sis­tent magic in the area, she’d only man­aged to cre­ate a por­tal that would take her a few feet away. Look­ing around, she saw the Al­pha was al­ready slid­ing off his horse, his grey eyes stormy as he landed on the ground, and he was glar­ing di­rectly at her.

  Ria turned and ran as hard as she could away from him, but she knew he was al­ready run­ning af­ter her—she heard his heavy boots eat­ing up the dis­tance be­tween them. Call­ing on magic again, she fo­cused her mind as she ran and weaved an­other por­tal di­rectly in front of her. When she jumped through it, it took her an­other few feet away, length­en­ing the dis­tance again be­tween her and the Al­pha.

  The gen­eral roared as she landed and con­tin­ued run­ning; his voice was like a war cry. He was ex­cited by this chase, and as much as she was con­fused by the emo­tion, his ex­cite­ment was in­fec­tious. An­noy­ingly, her slick gath­ered as she ran, and she fought hard to ig­nore the hard­en­ing of her nip­ples. What the fuck was hap­pen­ing to her body? She didn’t have time to think about it, but she knew the flut­ter­ing in her stom­ach wasn’t caused by fear alone.

  She an­gled to­ward the near­est field, head­ing to the farm­house on one side of the land. Hope­fully, the pres­ence of green­ery and an­i­mals sta­bi­lized the magic there, and she could cre­ate a por­tal that could main­tain a longer dis­tance.

  Glanc­ing over her shoul­der, she re­al­ized she couldn’t hear the Al­pha. She held her breath as she con­tin­ued to run, lis­ten­ing care­fully for any sound of him, the gruff ex­hales of his ex­er­tion, or the heavy clomp­ing of his foot­steps. But there was noth­ing.

  She turned to look and was sur­prised to find that he was to no where to be seen. That couldn’t be right. Glanc­ing around her as she con­tin­ued run­ning, she knew he wouldn’t have given up. If he’d stopped chas­ing her, then he prob­a­bly headed some­where to cap­ture her—al­though from the lit­tle she knew of him, that didn’t seem like his style. Be­sides, she could feel him watch­ing her.

  Slow­ing to a stop, she eyed the farm­house. Maybe head­ing there was a trap. What if he’d some­how ar­rived ahead of her? Qui­eten­ing her mind, Ria felt for magic. To her dis­may, the en­tire area was patchy.

  “Shit!” If she couldn’t find a way out of there im­me­di­ately, there was no doubt the gen­eral would catch her. An­noyed, she reached out as far as pos­si­ble and found a large mass of magic sev­eral yards away be­hind a run­down build­ing near the farm­house. She could def­i­nitely cre­ate a por­tal to get out of Ariyon en­tirely from there.

  Ria glanced around again, look­ing for any sign of the gen­eral, be­fore call­ing on magic. Magic re­sponded quickly and freely, al­low­ing her to weave a smooth, lay­ered pat­tern, in­fused with a lo­ca­tion in Ashens. As she weaved, she started run­ning again, push­ing as much en­ergy into her legs as the por­tal came to­gether be­hind the build­ing.

  She grinned as the por­tal glis­tened ahead, then pushed her­self harder to get there.

  As she neared the build­ing, a flash of grey in the cor­ner of her eye made her mouth go dry.

  Be­fore she had time to reg­is­ter it, a heavy weight bar­reled into her, knock­ing the breath from her lungs. She spun in the air be­fore it crushed her to the ground, rolling over with her a few times.

  Ria gasped, try­ing to catch her breath, but the weight that rolled on top of her was sub­stan­tial.

  “That was fun, lit­tle chal­lenger.” The gen­eral’s voice was close to her ear, ladened with ex­cite­ment and gritty with de­sire. He ripped open her tu­nic, tear­ing away the fab­ric as he pinned her to the ground.

  “Re­lease me!” she de­manded, lift­ing her head to glare at him, but even as she said it, she knew she didn’t mean it.

  His beau­ti­fully po­tent scent as­saulted her as vig­or­ously as his body. Weighty and thick, it pressed in on her, smoth­er­ing her senses and set­ting off a chain re­ac­tion of ur­gency and need through­out her body. No! Ig­nor­ing her senses, Ria fought him as hard as she could, dig­ging her nails into his skin, lift­ing her knees to dig into his stom­ach, but it only served to ex­cite him more.

  Thick fin­gers threaded into her hair and scratched her scalp hard, push­ing her head down to the ground as his warm, wet mouth closed over her sen­si­tive nip­ple. Ria strug­gled to main­tain her fight as the jux­ta­po­si­tion of the pain and plea­sure made her gasp and keen for more. His hard suck­ling sent shock­waves of prickly plea­sure all over her body, con­cen­trated at her clit. She arched into his mouth for more. His sat­is­fied groan around her nip­ple made that stupid part of her jit­tery and tingly with de­light.

  His mouth low­ered to lap ev­ery bead of sweat un­der her breasts and con­tin­ued to her stom­ach, where he sucked, nib­bled, and dragged his teeth along her skin. He stopped to mur­mur some­thing at the area be­low her belly but­ton, be­fore con­tin­u­ing down be­tween her legs. She grabbed at him, try­ing to yank him away, but it was as though her body didn’t con­nect with her mind, be­cause her fin­gers threaded into his curly, sil­ver-dusted, brown hair, and stroked his scalp. And when his tongue grazed her clit, she thrust her hips up into his face.

  The Al­pha didn’t hes­i­tate. He sucked, nib­bled, and licked, groan­ing in plea­sure as he feasted on her, and she could do noth­ing but spread her legs and take it. She had never felt any­thing like it; his tongue and mouth built a cas­cade of in­tense plea­sure through her body she had never known was pos­si­ble. His tongue stroked her so ex­pertly that it al­most be­came too much. She squeezed her thighs against his head, but he pried them open.

  “You will let me in, Omega,” he mur­mured, be­fore push­ing his tongue into her.

  Ria bucked, moan­ing as he wrig­gled his tongue in­side her, but be­fore she could even reg­is­ter that, he was suck­ing again at her clit. His hand brushed up her body, back to her breasts, and as he pinched her nip­ples, palm­ing her breast in his large hands, her body ex­ploded in a vi­o­lent shud­der­ing sen­sa­tion of ec­stasy.

  Be­fore she could re­cover, some­thing thick and blunt was push­ing into her, open­ing her wider than she was pre­pared for.

  She gasped, grab­bing the Al­pha’s cloth­ing as she tried to push him away, shak­ing her head as she tried to find her voice, but he didn’t stop.

  Sharp, bit­ing pain shot up into her as his cock stretched her wide. She fought and yelled as he con­tin­ued, the length of him seem­ingly never-end­ing.

  Fi­nally, he stilled, and Ria breathed rapidly, try­ing to deal with the feel of him in­side her. He was so deep. She had to be break­ing in two from the in­tru­sion.

  She gripped his thick grey tu­nic, her eyes wide. “Please,” she panted. “I can’t—”

  The Al­pha dropped on top of her, smoth­er­ing her mouth with his, push­ing his tongue in as he be­gan to move his hips.

  Ria squealed as he moved, the ex­cru­ci­at­ing pain wors­en­ing for an in­stant, but as he slammed heav­ily back in, some­thing changed. He pulled out again, and the pain wasn’t as sharp this time, but when he slammed in, some­thing glo­ri­ous hap­pened. A wild, coarse rush spi­raled deep in her core, shoot­ing through her stom­ach and spread­ing to her ex­trem­i­ties. She couldn’t call it plea­sure—it was much more than that. It burie
d into ev­ery fiber of her be­ing and ex­ulted in the most volatile, and sav­age, and eu­phoric way… she needed more.

  Ria moaned around the gen­eral’s tongue as he set a steady pace, drag­ging his cock to the en­trance of her pussy, be­fore slam­ming roughly in again, shunt­ing her along the ground.

  “Your pussy is bet­ter than I even imag­ined,” the Al­pha mur­mured into her mouth. She in­stinc­tively clenched, and he groaned again, in­creas­ing his speed as he fucked her rougher.

  Ria spread her legs wide, suck­ing ea­gerly on his tongue and grab­bing onto his cloth­ing. This ex­pe­ri­ence was be­yond any­thing she had ever known, and as the hunger for more took over, ev­ery last re­main­ing sen­si­ble thought was pushed aside.

  She hummed in de­light as his strokes in­creased, tilt­ing her hips to take him as deeply as she could, the squelch of her slick loud in her ears as he slammed in. Her sur­round­ings faded away as she rev­eled in the feel and scent of the Al­pha feed­ing her body ex­actly what it needed. But soon, his pen­e­tra­tion was too slow. She humped her hips up to meet his thrusts, ea­ger for more. She wasn’t sure ex­actly what she wanted from him, but she knew that some­thing wasn’t quite right yet. There was more the Al­pha could give her, should be giv­ing her, and she didn’t un­der­stand why he was with­hold­ing it.

  The Al­pha pulled back, the hint of a smile on his lips, his eyes dark as he stared down at her, but it was all a waste of time to Ria.

  Grab­bing his head with both hands, she dug her fin­gers into his scalp, scratch­ing along it in her ur­gency to ex­plain to him what she needed. But his smirk only grew wider.

  An­noyed, she slapped his face and snarled at him, but his head barely moved.

  “Yes, fight me, lit­tle chal­lenger,” he growled, his tone al­most tor­tur­ous as his gaze deep­ened. “Make me earn it.”

  She barely heard his words. She slapped him again, this time dig­ging her nails into the side of his face and scor­ing along his jaw. Why was he talk­ing? Why wasn’t he fuck­ing her the way his cap­ture of her promised he would?

  Dis­gusted, she turned, claw­ing the floor and el­bow­ing him in his chest as she crawled out from un­der him.

  She hadn’t reached even a foot away when he grabbed her leg.

  “Where do you think you’re go­ing?” he snorted. Ria snarled back at him, snatched her leg from his grasp, and aimed a sharp kick to his face. He dodged her, bark­ing out a yell of sur­prise, then pinned her hips and climbed over her.

  “You want it?” he bel­lowed. “Do you know what you’re ask­ing for, lit­tle Ria?”

  Ria didn’t have to an­swer. Pin­ning both wrists be­hind her back with one hand, he yanked up her hips and slammed in­side, forc­ing his way in un­til she was stretched bliss­fully wide again.

  She howled as he plun­dered her, fuck­ing her hard and reach­ing depths of her she never knew ex­isted. He was re­lent­less, his flesh smack­ing hers as she jerked on the stone ground, rough grit cut­ting into her cheek as she cooed and moaned at the bliss­ful dev­as­ta­tion that fi­nally dom­i­nated her. Yes, this was it. This was what he had been hold­ing back.

  The raw, sin­ful stench of them height­ened ev­ery­thing; her de­sire, her sen­si­tiv­ity, her aware­ness of him. Her nip­ples stung as they hard­ened fur­ther, and the suc­cu­lent sounds of her slick eas­ing his way turned soppy as it splat­tered on them both.

  Widen­ing her legs to ac­com­mo­date him, he tilted her hips and when he slammed in again, his cock grazed a bun­dle of sen­si­tiv­ity deep in­side her. She saw stars. A bru­tal erup­tion seized her limbs, par­a­lyz­ing her while she screamed into the dirty ground.

  When her senses crept back to her, an­other breath­tak­ing erup­tion was al­ready close, and the Al­pha’s grunts and groans were the per­fect tit­il­la­tions as he worked in and out of her, squeez­ing her hips so hard she knew it would bruise.

  Ria lost track of all but the Al­pha. She didn’t know how long she was on the floor, only that he fucked her like a man pos­sessed in the most con­sum­ing and hun­gry way. The com­plete ex­plo­sion of plea­sure over her body hap­pened twice more be­fore he fi­nally jerked er­rat­i­cally, and let out a gruff ex­hale as he slammed in­side her one last time. Ria screamed as some­thing broad and firm scraped her, burn­ing as it wedged in and locked them to­gether. His knot.

  Re­gard­less of the pain, Ria clenched around him, need­ing what was spilling in­side her, but not quite reg­is­ter­ing why. She was too ex­hausted to even think prop­erly.

  The gen­eral dropped on top of her, pant­ing heav­ily, and Ria inched her head up to press her nose into his sweaty neck, seek­ing re­as­sur­ance. The Al­pha chuck­led, his chest rum­bling. “You did well, lit­tle chal­lenger.” His fin­gers found her hair and stroked through the now sweaty, messy, dirty strands. “But you will learn; you will never win against me.”

  * * *

  Chap­ter Three

  RIA

  When Ria came to, ev­ery­thing was pain.

  She was be­ing moved, jolted, in a strange way, forc­ing her to hiss at the bursts of agony fir­ing through­out her body. When she inched her eyes open, the Al­pha loomed above her, and she stiff­ened. Glanc­ing around, she re­al­ized he was car­ry­ing her. Her tu­nic was ripped to shreds, she was prac­ti­cally naked, and her skin was marked with bites, bruises, smears of grime, and white fluid. Her limbs screeched and her head pounded, but noth­ing could com­pare to the pain be­tween her legs. It felt like she had been ripped apart, torn, and mu­ti­lated.

  Glar­ing up the Al­pha, she watched him as he strode with her in his arms, her jaw so hard she was sure she would break a tooth. He had done pre­cisely what she had ex­pected him to—mate with her, force­fully. But much of her anger was re­served for her­self. She couldn’t ex­pect any­thing less from an Al­pha, but she should have made sure she never found her­self in such a po­si­tion.

  What sur­prised her the most was how much she had en­joyed it in the mo­ment. She knew that her in­stincts would work against her, wasn’t that what she’d had al­ways been told—if caught with­out mag­i­cal blocks, an Omega could turn into a needy breeder for an Al­pha. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know. But the level of sat­is­fac­tion and plea­sure she had ex­pe­ri­enced was alarm­ing. She hadn’t even en­tered her Haze—it would’ve been more un­der­stand­able if she’d lost her mind in her breed­ing state.

  Ria shook her head, firm­ing her thoughts. She had to get away from him at all costs.

  The gen­eral glanced down at her, but she couldn’t read his ex­pres­sion. “There is no need to give me that look,” he said as he lifted his eyes again. “You may pre­tend you didn’t want it or en­joy it, if you pre­fer. I hear many Omegas do that.”

  Ria didn’t say any­thing. She wouldn’t say any­thing more. He seemed to en­joy her re­sponses, goad­ing her, com­mand­ing and de­mand­ing an­swers from her. But that was over with now. She needed to fo­cus on her task, her own per­sonal mis­sion that she had promised her­self she would com­plete. She had spent her en­tire life com­plet­ing mis­sions to sup­port Omegas, but even with the Omega em­press in power, it didn’t stop things like this from hap­pen­ing. Granted, she was caught un­aware from the dis­rup­tion of magic in the moun­tains, but this gen­eral had no right to fuck her like he owned her. And she didn’t know who else he would en­cour­age to use her—there were sto­ries that it was com­mon in the past for Omegas to be used and passed around.

  Ria closed her eyes as the gen­eral con­tin­ued to walk, try­ing to ig­nore the pain that as­saulted her body. She would bide her time, and then she would es­cape.

  Af­ter a long while, the Al­pha slowed to a stop and bent over slightly. Crack­ing an eye open, she saw he was climb­ing into a car­riage. She let him fold her into his lap as the car­riage lurched for­ward, but in­stead of al­low­ing her­self to be lu
lled by his scent, that was still en­tic­ing her, or the feel of his fin­gers stroking the side of her face, she de­cided to fo­cus on the croak of the wheels as they trav­eled, and the clop­ping of the horses hooves nearby.

  When the car­riage came to a stop, he lifted her back into his arms as he climbed out, and the sud­den dis­ap­pear­ance of the cold breeze told her they had en­tered a build­ing.

  She kept her eyes closed as he laid her down on some­thing soft and pulled the re­main­ing shreds of her tu­nic from her body. When he lifted her again, his lips brushed against her fore­head and down her neck, and she couldn’t ig­nore the shiv­er­ing an­tic­i­pa­tion that his touch in­spired, but she forced her­self not to re­spond to it.

  When warm wa­ter lapped against her ass, she gasped, her eyes shoot­ing open.

  The Al­pha was low­er­ing her into a deep bath, filled with soapy, warm wa­ter. She jerked in sur­prise, but as the wa­ter en­veloped her, sooth­ing her pains, she sighed heav­ily with re­lief. A rum­ble came from the Al­pha’s chest, as though he felt the re­lief that she did, but she chose not to meet his gaze.

  As he lath­ered her up with a spice-scented soap, she tried not to wince from the pain in her mus­cles, but sur­pris­ingly the ex­pe­ri­ence was a pleas­ant one. The Al­pha was thor­ough and gen­tle, wash­ing her hair and scrub­bing ev­ery part of her un­til she was clean.

  Af­ter he dried and mois­tur­ized her, he lay her down on an enor­mous bed and left the room. Once she re­al­ized he had gone, Ria sat up and took in her sur­round­ings. The room was sparsely dec­o­rated, with only a bed, a ta­ble and chair, and a mir­ror on the two-toned blue wall. It did, how­ever, have a broad set of win­dows that looked out onto a field. It was a strange room for a gen­eral’s base. Even though she knew the build­ing was pro­tected from magic, her heart still dropped when she reached out for it and felt its ab­sence.