Oath of the Alpha - Eva Dresden Page 0,74

of the earth the night Er’it thought to teach her how to make a fire… and all of the chaos that ensued. Craning her head back, Aida found Er’it staring at her. His features as stern as ever, it was the glimmer of something other in his topaz gaze that horrified her.

Distrust and fear lingered under the warmth of those eyes she’d admired so often now. The golden brilliance of his power and the intensity of his emotions was shuttered away behind a heavy wall of dull circumspection.

Aida shoved up to her feet, slapping at her legs to clear the crusted ice clinging to them. It did nothing to stall the chill seeping through her veins and making her teeth chatter as reeds in a storm. Drawing her spine straight with a monumental effort, she looked from Tyssa to Er’it, lifting her chin as she met his darkened amber eyes.

“We must help them.”

Chapter 14

Er’it

An entire mountain.

She’d felled an entire mountain with nothing more than a fit of temper.

The long range of knifelike peaks and craggy outcroppings ended and began again with such an abrupt finality that, if not for the still settling destruction, one would think it had always been this way. Er’it scanned the path before them once more as if somehow the vision would change. Littered with boulders the size of some of the smaller palaces he’d known and all manner of rubble and ruin, the thatched huts tucked into deep crevices these people favored were in broken shambles. Off to one side burned a pyre, but it was not for the lost who lay in the earth under mounds of stone. They burned what wood they could find in effigy to their goddesses. The custom was so much like the Hat’or that he found himself murmuring the well-worn prayers as he watched the people stand with upturned faces around the raging fire, not in anger or hatred but with the serene calm felt only by the devout.

It was strange to see on these faces, with their pale gold skin and mismatching hair. From the deepest brown to the brightest red, their uncovered heads bobbed and weaved as they milled about with purpose. Winter was here and would remain for some time in these mountainous regions.

They were attempting to flee in the middle of it, with none of their stores or belongings intact. The addition of an entire goddess’ damned mountain just obliterated into pebbles seemed to be of little concern to them now that they had their foolish plan.

“Your Majesty, I will not argue my point again, but may I please insist that you hold back while we assess?” Ath’asho murmured at his right.

“Assess what? The boy could take these weak people without breaking a sweat,” Er’it said, snorting a bald laugh that had many heads turning his way. Again, he was amazed by the myriad of colors, all the while refusing to notice how very much like them Aida looked.

“Listen to your general, boy,” Tor’en huffed under his breath, eyeing the chattering group of Elders that held a smattering of Common between them. “They may not have much power, but neither do you.”

“I have all the power I need.”

They all turned to find Aida among the villagers, her shy smile infectious to those around her as she strained and sweated alongside them. He’d reprimanded her more than once for acting like anyone’s slave but his, but the tight clench in his chest when she looked up at him with those wide, star-strewn eyes made him relent each time.

Er’it still didn’t know what made him agree to aid these people. The villagers numbered less than even their small party, but sharing what stores remained in the carts would starve them all. Yet, Aida cared nothing for the sound reasoning behind his argument. The roundness of her cheek had ticked as she clenched her jaw, her night-black eyes narrowing as she flung an arm toward the trees that had erupted in an explosion of growth and fruit. Limbs cracked and fell under their new, heavy burdens to send all manner of fruit and nut to the forest floor.

His little Omega did not waver for an instant as she gave him her back to march toward the villagers and soldiers, directing them to go forth with baskets.

“She is spending herself too easily,” Tor’en said through a half-hearted growl, the wide sleeves of his robe snapping as he crossed his arms over his chest.

“She is,” Er’it agreed with a calm