Teeth chattering, cold and unable to stop shaking, Morgaine refused to swallow the offered water. He tipped the glass. When she began to sputter and water ran down her chin, he gripped her hair in his fist again.
He didn’t pull; he just made it clear he would correct her if he had to. “You will drink this water.”
Their eyes met, inflexible yet equally forgiving, and Morgaine knew she’d lost whatever battle had just taken place.
She would lose all battles. He wanted her to know that.
He wanted submission.
And it felt like that was worse than death.
Again, she started to cry.
The Alpha’s purr increased significantly. His point had been made, and the slump of her shoulders was concession enough. He refilled the glass and lifted it to her lips a second time.
She didn’t fight him, let herself be lulled by the purr enough to manage the rapid gulps required before he might tip the glass back further and drown her in it. Once drained, he pulled it away, and set it on the table.
Sucking in air, Morgaine stared. Sergeant Uriel was old enough to be her father. Gray marked the brown hair at his temples, there were creases on his face, and the hands that had touched her were callused from years of use. This was a man hard through and through.
And yet he purred.
Morgaine wilted under his unflinching gaze. Hopeless, exhausted, and scared, she whispered, “I want to go home.”
He ran a pat over her tangled hair and held back any cruelty as he asked, “After what you just saw, knowing that would be your fate?”
Her eyes closed and she shuddered, shrinking further into herself. Of course she didn’t want that. Even now she saw the mass grave and it was as if the faces in it were people she knew, grew up with, loved.
Pathetic, Morgaine could not help but call for the one thing that might make it all go away. “I want my mother.”
The weight of his hand left her hair, just as the gentleness left his voice. Gruff he said, “Soon you will have a mate. A night with him and your mother will be forgotten.” The Alpha straightened, pointing at the table before her. “Now you will eat. When you have finished, bathe yourself in that corner over there. If these two things have not taken place by the time I have returned, there will be another lesson.”
Chapter 4
The bizarre toilet, the deep, gilded tub—both items of such a personal nature were exposed to the room.
No screen, no curtain… they were just there out in the open.
Sergeant Uriel had warned her, presented two clear commands, and then he had taken his purr and his presence away. Curled in on herself, she had not even seen where he’d gone.
Having slid from the chair the moment the weight of his hand had left her back, she’d crouched down on the floor, trying to make herself as small as possible.
Lessons.
Her mind would break if another lesson had to be endured.
That poor Omega. From what Morgaine had seen, the girl had done no evil. Evil had been done to her.
Why? Why would her townsfolk commit such a heinous act?
The questions came out unbidden, muttered brokenly to the air the same way Morgaine had prayed to the spirits. And just like when she prayed to the spirits, no answer came.
The only response she received was the room growing colder.
Skin prickling no matter how she ran her hands up and down her arms, she began to shiver, and would have given anything for a blanket.
Naked, utterly exposed to an empty room, feeling the cold seep into her bones… was messing with her head.
She let out a frustrated breath and saw fog hang in the air before her eyes. Seeing the mist dissipate, knowing the room had been made cold on purpose, pushed her over the edge.