Heart pounding against his ribs, the Alpha snatched the shaft with careful fingers. Inspecting the carving with a critical eye, he breathed deep of a scent he thought he’d never know again. Committing it to memory, he grew familiar with her on an intimate level. Knew the scent of her… the taste…
Mouth watering, his tongue darted out to lick the wooden dildo from base to tip.
At the first hint of that precious flavor, his sack tightened. The rut threatening to consume him in a rush—mind growing hazy with ecstasy. His cock surging against his inseam.
It was enough. Enough to know that she was near, in the wild, her quim dripping and swollen. Needy.
A young Hathorian female, escaped from her cage. Running free in the beyond.
And the little runaway was recklessly close to a natural season, her slick already flowing. Ripe and potent. A rival to the very best of any female his harem had once boasted, the Alpha knew the sheen of quality for what it was.
Her bloodline was ancient and robust. The bouquet of her slick crisp, the flavor buttery, hers was a treasured lineage—one he recognized by scent alone. A gem worthy of the Sultan’s private stock, she was a female equal to whelping the next generation trained to die in defense of their sire. Her traits hand-chosen to protect royal blood, she’d been bred from noble, beloved Omegas horded by the elite.
By him, once.
In the Silver City, she would have been a treasure.
But out here, in the wild beyond? She was the breath of the Nine, a cleansing wave of molten earth. A beacon of hope where diseased males roamed, her womb slavering for a knot to stuff her full of Anhur seed.
The Alpha smiled, his scars doing nothing to soften the edge stark need that spread across his features.
“What’s all this?”
Startled, the Alpha whirled, a snarl erupting from curled lips. Reeking of the rut, his hormones spiked as the war chief drew near. Balkazar. The only other male capable of fighting to claim this mysterious female. Of taking what was his by birthright.
A male with perfect depth perception, but who’d never run a harem before. Loyal and beyond reproach. A deadly Anhur male in the prime of his life, who didn’t know rut like he knew rut.
Even now, he felt it. The familiar rush as it began—a drug he’d long been addicted to, as all Anhur with large harems were addicted. Trying for subtlety and failing, he adjusted his swollen, dribbling prick. Sack drawn tight, dumping testosterone directly into his bloodstream. And so he would remain, teetering on the edge of violence until he’d hunted her down, filled her to overflowing, and ridden her through her season.
Only when that slight female belly began to swell with a litter of his kits, would he relent. His work done, until her scent grew thick and ripe once more.
Hackles rising in spite of himself, the Alpha took a breath and forced, “We’ve got ourselves a runaway,” through bared and clenched teeth.
Excitement gleamed in the war chief’s eyes. “Caught the scent of another hunt? Anhur this time?”
“Better,” the Alpha said, and pressed the wooden cock into Balkazar’s hands. Fighting to uncurl clenched fingers.
The war chief’s eyes went wide, his nostrils pinched white. “Lord and Lady All-Gods, what—that smell—”
“Slick,” the Alpha said. Hackles raised and bushy, the back of his neck and shoulders tight.
“Breeder,” Balkazar returned, pupils shrinking as the rut threatened to consume him, too. Her scent a powerful lure. “And a crafty little bitch to make such a thing!” The war chief grunted, knuckles going white as he took in the faceless female’s scent. “But how is that possible? How could she be here at all?”
The Alpha shrugged. “A runaway from the foundling colony. Or perhaps a wealthy lord took one of his bitches into the wood to rut like the ancients, and the wilds fought back,” he said, teeth gleaming white in the firelight. Grin growing feral, his cock throbbed at the thought. Of taking her in the old ways, triggering her cycle without the aid of oils and herbs. “It doesn’t matter,” he rasped. “She’ll be mine soon.”
But it was Balkazar’s turn to smile, the gesture making the Alpha’s nape tighten in wary preparedness. “No, brother,” the war chief said, passing a cautious thumb over the tip of the wooden phallus. “She’ll be ours. From her womb, an army will march on the Silver City.”
Chapter 11
Taking a deep breath, Balkazar turned his mind to the task, pleased.
A hunt.
A proper hunt for the most valuable treasure in the beyond.
And what a hunt it was turning out to be!
Not only had the saucy little minx left them a wild trail to follow, she’d done it in slick. The forethought alone was enough to boggle the mind, for he’d seen enough of the vacant glassy eyes to know—Omegas in heat were gluttons for but one thing. Denying food, water, and sleep until they’d gotten stuffed and sealed.
Mindless drones who’d do anything for a knot.
On the cusp of a natural season, this female had the nerve to taunt when she should have been begging.
Balkazar grinned, rolling his neck until it popped.
This was what he did best. Hunt. Before he’d been recruited, his skill had made him infamous in the black markets. Specialized in trafficking drugs, goods, and of course, females.
It was what had brought he and the prince together, all those years ago. He, born without standing, a smuggler of precious goods, supplying breeding females to the Firstborn Son of the Karahmet bloodline.
He’d expected the prince to be yet another of the fat and lazy Alphas lounging in the safety of a palatial home. Those who promised a better life, access to females, to a future that didn’t end young and bloody. Enslaved to the perfume of hope, Balkazar and his pack had kept those insatiable gluttons supplied with a steady diet of pussy and illicit goods. Ensured their ranks continued to swell with hybrids whelped from stolen breeders.
Every single one of the upper class guilty of the exact same crimes. Who punished the common folk for daring to exist in the system they’d created.
But the prince was different. He saw the hypocrisy for what it was, knew all the grimy details commoners could only guess to be true.
Not a one of the most beloved conspiracy theories came close to the horrible truth. None might guess how deep the rot had crept into the Silver City.
The laws designed to protect them all, little more than wisps of fragile lies that hardly bothered to be convincing. All but undone by the wants of a ruling class that had armies of hybrids to die for them. Who squashed rebellions before they became more than whispers, no matter that one male claiming dozens of females had unbalanced the gender ratios and created instability for the young males not in a position to simply take what they wanted. That in doing so, roving packs of unattached males were forced to hunt together. Kill together. And though it wasn’t spoken of, some were even known to fuck each other to relieve the misery of being utterly without options.
These were the problems of peasants. Of those too weak to compete for resources.
So males like Balkazar did what they had to do. They adapted to the misery of the way things were, or they died before their undesirable genes could be passed down.
Simple.
Unavoidable.
Brutal.