Risky Wishes Read online

  I beat at his back until he barks, “For fucks sake,” the male growls out, “fucking restrain her hands.”

  Clara screams, the sound piercing and sharp, sending me into a flurry as the need to protect her consumes me. Another male manages to snag my wrists in a harsh grip and jerks them behind my back, tying them so tightly it hurts. I can’t see which male it is, strung over a shoulder as I am with my ratty hair covering my face, but I vow to get revenge on them both somehow.

  On all of them.

  Another scream and I thrash wildly, hoping to upend myself, even knowing that if I succeed in getting free, I’ll land on my head. But for Clara, it’s worth it.

  “Leave her alone, damn it!” I yell with a fierce growl distorting my words. For all it does, my warning just makes the four males laugh.

  Clara screams for a third time and red coats my vision as I envision the worst. Not being able to see what’s happening to her is sending my head tail-spinning into horrible visions of violence and assault.

  “Fucking muzzle her!” The male below me bellows like a beast.

  “No!” My sister screams. “Cam help! No! Don’t touch me! Cam! C–”

  Her words are cut short and her piercing voice is silenced. Since I didn’t hear flesh striking flesh, I’ll have to assume they didn’t beat her until she was silent. The images already tearing through my head are damning enough for these bastards just based off of how scared my sister sounded, so I’m trying hard to picture a less violent approach in order to keep my sanity.

  “Her too,” the male suspending me over his shoulder says with an irritated sigh.

  It takes me a moment to understand what he’s talking about, but by the time I realize that he means me, it’s too late. Cloth is slipped between my teeth with no hands to guide it and it seems to seal itself to my mouth without needing to be tied. And unlike normal fabric, this one completely muffles the sounds of my growls. This must be what they used on my sister and why I can’t hear any muffled screams. I initially thought the sound was drowned out by my pounding heart and the roaring buzz of my blood rushing to my head from being held upside down.

  How can there be magic here though? Only the witches in the High Ring have that kind of power.

  The more I learn about these males and about the Borderlands itself, the more confused I get. First, they’ve been slaving further north than the reports state. Then they have at least one alpha here they are willing to trade with. And now? At least one of them is capable of casting magic or is at least in possession of magical items.

  What the fuck have my sister and I gotten into and how the fuck do we get out of it?

  The male holding me groans as if exasperated and says, “At least pretend to have attached it yourself Raith.”

  The man in question just chuckles darkly and says, “Where’s the fun in that Balstor?”

  Balstor growls out, “We aren’t here to have fun.”

  “Perhaps we should be.” A new voice cuts in with a dry voice, as if he’s heard all this before and it bores him.

  “Shut it, Damian,” Balstor barks out between what I’m sure are gritted teeth. “Enough. Let’s go. Zaylen, grab her.”

  Zaylen scoffs and says, “Fine.”

  Balstor is storming out of the room, with me still tossed over his shoulder. I can’t see a damn thing from where I’m hanging upside down so I somehow manage to lift my head just enough to see a pair of legs hanging down the front of another large males chest, in a position that mirrors my own.

  Before I can try to look further up and see the bastards face, I’m sliding down Balstor’s firm chest to stand on my feet. I wobble for a moment and Balstor’s hand on my upper arm is the only reason I don’t fall down as the blood rushes back to my head. He gives me a moment to collect myself and I take the opportunity to glance up and take him in.

  The faint glow of the moon highlights the hard angles of this male and the stern expression on his face as he studies our surroundings with an almost savage intensity. His hair is pulled back into a bun, the color impossible to discern, and too dark out to make out his eye color. He glances down and our eyes met so suddenly, I startle. He raises an eyebrow in question but it’s a mocking sort, as if he’s asking if I’m finished staring.

  I flush, I can’t help it. I look down at my toes before I can think better of it and nearly growl at myself for my stupidity and submission. By looking down as I just did, I submitted to this male and that infuriates the shit out of me because the last thing I want to do is appear weak in front of an alpha. His little chuckle of amusement tells me that my actions didn’t go unannounced either.

  Fuck.

  I jerk my head back up with a glare, but it’s too late, he’s not looking at me anymore. He yanks me up and over a horse I hadn’t noticed standing behind me. How I missed the massive beast, I don’t know but it’s just another thing to be pissed at myself over.

  What’s wrong with me? I’m better than this. I’m stronger than this. Snap out of it, Camia.

  I wiggle, situating my legs over the horse, just as Balstor jumps up behind me. His arms come around me as he grabs the reins, pinning my tied hands between us. With a soft click, the horse starts to move and I panic.

  Clara!

  I whip my head around, trying to spot her and come up empty. My chest grows tight and my eyes burn with the threat of tears. How could I have lost my head so much that I lost sight of my twin? This male’s presence is too distracting and I hate it.

  I struggle in the saddle, trying to throw myself from the damn horse in search of Clara but Balstor releases the reins in his left hand and wraps his arm around my waist and tightens to the point of pain. He barks out a harsh, “Calm!” but it does nothing to calm me and his answering growl only has me pausing for a brief second before I continue thrashing on top of the horse.

  “Calm!” He barks even louder and I flinch at the aggression I can practically taste in his command. Balstor’s entire body seems to tremor with it and I allow the moment of weakness as the tears slip down my cheeks. I know he’ll think he was responsible for the salty trails and he’s right to an extent, but he’ll assume it’s from his aggressive manner and not because Clara is out of my sight.

  Let him think what he will.

  Balstor does nothing to comfort me and I’m beyond grateful for that. I don’t think I could handle any soft words or gentle touches right now, otherwise I risk falling apart and I can’t have that. As it is, I’m trying my damnest to stop crying so I can think logically and come up with a new plan now that the old one fell apart so spectacularly.

  I pinch my eyes closed and take in a deep breath through my nose. My exhale is noisy and stuttering, but I keep it up until my tears have dried up, removing all the evidence of the damned things completely. And once I feel as calm as I can feel with my life falling to pieces around me, I open my eyes and think.

  Step one is to escape from the four males, starting with the one at my back. Step two is securing water and food before my sister and I dehydrate and starve in this forsaken desert. Next, I need to find out which direction is home. Then step four is staying alive and out of sight from any other bandits as we make our way back over the border and into Low Ring. Step five... we need to move houses. We’re no longer safe in our village if the bandits found us once already. If they’re able to get that far into Low Ring, then my sister and I need to head further north.

  It sounds easy, but it will be anything but. We aren’t wealthy and we were already hiding from High Ring. As omegas, the alphas of High Ring lay claim to our bodies, our heat, and our womb. The law states that any omega is to report to the High Ring and service the alpha’s they choose for us and breed until the day we die. They claim our service to alpha’s is for the betterment of our race but it’s utter bullshit. My sister and I would just be pleasure slaves and breeding mares.

  It’s not the life my father wanted for us, so he fled Mid Ring where his family originated from and hid amongst the poor v
illagers of Rasmond. We’ve been there ever since, long after he died and left us to fend for ourselves at the tender age of fourteen.

  Father used to say that our mother would have wanted the same for us, wanted us to have our freedom, but he was glad she had died during our birth, if only to save her from this sad life. She was a woman from decent wealth and would suffer greatly under the conditions we lived in. Mother was also a woman who craved attention and friendship, something none of us got in Rasmond. This life of hiding would have snuffed out her light and left her a miserable shell of a woman, or so my father had claimed.

  “Are we stopping at Nenon?” A male voice cuts into my somber thoughts like a knife.

  “No,” says Balstor at my back. “We’ll head straight through to the Seven Sinners.”

  My heart stops.

  I had to have misheard him. There’s no way they’re bringing us to the Seven Sinners themselves, that’d be suicide for the alpha at my back. They’ll kill him without question. It’s a death sentence.

  Does he plan to trade us to the Seven in hopes of gaining favor with them? He does know the Seven are betas and have no use for an omega? What use does a beta have for an omega heat they can’t get lust drunk on? He’d have better luck selling us to the alphas in the Upper Rings than a city full of beta bandits and criminals.

  And with my mouth gagged there’s no chance of me warning Balstor that this is a very, very, bad idea that might just get us all killed.

  Chapter 4

  We rode long and hard for many long hours. I spent the entire journey worried for my twin. Balstor kept to the front of our little procession which meant I couldn’t see if the other three males were behind us and which one of them had Clara. I heard at least two other horses racing through the sand alongside ours, so I had to assume that all three males and my sister traveled with us because I couldn’t tolerate the alternative...

  That Clara and I were separated.

  Eventually though, exhaustion crept in and I somehow managed to fall asleep against the beast at my back. Now we’ve pulled to a stop and the sun is glaring into my gritty eyes as I crack them open. From the looks of it, nearly six hours had to have passed since the sun is nearing nine or ten in the morning from my guess.

  Balstor dismounts behind me and pulls me from the saddle in the span of a breath. I grunt as my stiff legs threaten to buckle beneath me. If not for the alpha’s grip on my waist, I’d have crumbled into the hot sand. The breath leaves my body as I’m suddenly flipped over Balstor’s shoulder and secured with a thick arm against the back of my calves. I curse him from behind the gag and not even a whimper of sound escapes.

  Balstor storms off and my body jolts in time with his steps. Within a few moments the desert sand gives way to shiny marble floors and the oppressive glare of the sun dims and the air grows cooler. Balstor seems to endlessly walk along the opulent floor as we take turn after turn after turn.

  Balstor finally draws to a stop and drops me down onto my knees. He slips behind me before I can get a good look at his face in the light of day and I have to stifle the flare of disappointment at the missed opportunity. I try to tell myself that it’s only so I know the face of my enemy, but deep down I know that’s not the real reason I desire to look. I’m intrigued with the idea of laying eyes on an alpha for the first time.

  A soft thud on my left has me turning and I see Clara being held to the floor just as I am. The relief is instantaneous and overwhelming but it’s gone in an instant as Balstor grips my nape and turns my head to the front, holding tight, keeping my gaze forcefully pinned forward.

  It’s then that I notice the males before us, sitting in seven opulent thrones where only three are occupied, the remaining seats empty and abandoned.

  The Seven Sinners.

  “The betas did a decent job it seems.” The beta on the far-left throne remarks with a wicked glint in his emerald eyes. He sits there with his leg tossed over his knee, his wavy black hair reaching his chest. A male looking nearly identical to him sits beside him, only his eyes are a deep blue instead of green.

  “They did,” another beta male remarks, a blonde on the far right. This one has stunning light blue eyes and it’s the color I envision a lake to be. Though it’s merely a guess since I’ve never seen the vast bodies of water the ruling alpha in High Ring laid claim to nearly a hundred years ago. Only those residing in High Ring have that privilege and even then, you need to receive permission from the alpha himself to be let past the massive walls he installed around them.

  And speaking of alpha’s... why haven’t they killed Balstor yet? He’s an alpha encroaching on their territory, in a land that despises alpha so completely.

  Two males from our kidnapping party stride to the thrones and I gape at their nerve. The Seven Sinner’s will tear them apart for the slight. All the rumors tell tales of their brutality and their cravings for violence and blood.

  Both these stupid males have chocolate brown eyes, though one has short black hair while the other is a blonde. The black hair is shorter on the sides with a longer length on the top, leaving his bangs to flop carelessly into his eyes. Carless like his current actions. The blonde has shoulder length hair that’s halfway pulled into a bun, showcasing the fierceness of his jaw and chin. He looks like he has more sense then his friend but here he is, going along with this insanity.

  My eyes widen as the two males approaching the thrones don’t stop at the base of the steps leading to the thrones. No, they keep going. They climb the short steps and each claim a throne for themselves.

  No.

  No, this can’t be.

  “Bring the serum Lero. It’s time.” A shudder works its way down my spine at Balstor’s command because none of the four we traveled with were called Lero.

  Oh god.

  My stomach churns and I struggle to my feet. Balstor tightens his grip and I wince at the flare of pain in my neck, stilling instantly.

  “You’re hurting the little omega, brother.” The blonde male with blue eyes says with a smirk. Lero I assume, based on the fact that he’s the only one up and I assume to be Lero says as he stands, moving off to the side and rummaging through a cupboard for this serum.

  This alpha... Balstor... he’s... he’s one of the Seven Sinners. Did I get it wrong then? Is... is he just a dominant beta?

  “She’ll get used to it,” the male in question grumbles at my back.

  “The poor thing looks like a fragile little bird. Don’t break her,” the green-eyed twin remarks with a straight face and flat gaze.

  His brother snorts. “It doesn’t matter if she’s broken now or later Imir. When we are through with them, neither omega will remain unscathed.”

  Imir contemplates this for a moment before saying, “You’re right, Sira. The end result remains the same.”

  Lero comes down the steps and stands before me as I peer into his face. This close up I can see a scar bisecting his left brow, just missing his beautiful blue eye. “This is nothing personal omega.” His words don’t make sense.

  I don’t understand what he means. I don’t understand what’s happening or why.

  Lero pulls his arm out from behind his back, brandishing a needle. “Who wants to be first? I’ll let you two pick as a gesture of good will.”

  His expression is too sadistic for me to believe it’s a kindness. If anything, I’d say he’s enjoying this far too much. Maybe he wishes us to betray each other for his amusement. Maybe he wishes to frighten us further.

  Lero’s head cocks to the side as he studies me, waiting for an answer that will never come, gagged as we are. His smile stretches and he leans forward. I try to flee the nearing serum, but there’s no point. Balstor is too strong to fight. He turns me around and brandishes my tied limbs. The needle slips into the skin of my upper arm and I flinch. Whatever is in that needle burns, spreading violently fast through my veins. I’m turned back around just as a tear slips down my cheek.

  Lero crouches down to meet my eyes.
“Don’t be afraid little omega.” His finger ghosts against my cheek, catching the tear before it can slip off my face and dirty their shiny floor. “If you do as we say, we won’t hurt you.”

  The cloth drops to my lap and I suck in a shocked breath.

  More magic.

  “What–” My voice breaks and I try to clear the dryness from my throat. “What do you want?”

  “Hmm...” Lero hums to himself, sapphire eyes searing into my own dark brown. “That’s the winning question now isn’t it? But I’m afraid that’s a question I can’t answer just yet.”

  “What was in that?” I nod my head towards the empty syringe in his massive hand.

  His grin is feral, there’s no other word for it. It’s terrifying. “I suppose there’s no harm in answering this question. In a matter of minutes, you’d have found out yourself.” Lero leans in until we are nose to nose. “Tell me little omega, have you had your first heat?”

  “No.” My stomach drops as dread sweeps through me.

  “Now you will,” he says on a chuckle that’s just as dark as his grin. Lero leans back and climbs to his feet as I struggle to accept the bomb he just dropped in my lap.

  “Please,” my sister whimpers, making my heart clench with fear.

  I turn my head and suppress the shock I feel when Balstor actually lets me move. I’m under no illusions that I was strong enough to break his hold. The only reason I’m able to look at my sister now is because the alpha allows it. And what I see horrifies me. I was so focused on Lero that I missed one of the Seven Sinners coming for my sister. One of the twin’s towers over Clara with a frown and a syringe in hand.

  “This one is weak,” is all he says with a frown.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Balstor growls out, “administer it.”

  “No!” Clara screams.

  “Leave her alone.” I demand without thinking. Balstor’s grip tightens even more and I grit my teeth against the pain.