Rite of the Omega
Rite of the Omega
Contents
About the Author
Also by Eva Dresden
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Excerpt
Back Matter
Rite of the Omega - Blood Rites Duet Book One
©2020 Eva Dresden
All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Rite of the Omega
Blood Rites Duet Book One
Eva Dresden
About the Author
Eva Dresden writes dark romance that lives up to its name with every turn of the page. Her heroines are tragic and strong, her heroes are anything but, and tearing characters apart to see what makes them really tick is a favored past time. Her cat is her staunchest supporter, provided there are treats involved.
Connect with Eva Dresden at:
www.evadresden.com
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Also by Eva Dresden
Omega’s Destruction Trilogy
Broken
Damaged
Destroyed
Blood Rites Duet
Rite of the Omega
Oath of the Alpha
Prologue
After years of constant battle, the last war seemed too easy.
Otaso stalked through the charred halls, crumbled bits of stone clattering across the ruined floors as he went in search of his ultimate prey. The bloody waves of his robes fluttered behind him, snapping in an unseen wind as he gathered his power to him.
One last foe remained.
He would destroy the would-be king of the realm this day.
The cavernous room he arrived at showed a roiling oily black sky etched in bloody lightning through the gaping maw that opened up the great domed ceiling. Thunder cracked and rumbled to shake loose more debris from splintering cracks reaching into the rest of the dome. There Otaso found dozens of his warriors, well-armed and with the protection spells glowing with the eerie light of his magic where they etched the heavy armor. It had taken months to find the right combination of symbols, and the amount of power needed. Time well spent, if the numbers of black suited men ranging around the castle now to clean up whatever souls remained were anything to go by.
Otaso’s target lay in a broken huddle at the foot of his throne, the cerulean robes stained rust and vermillion where they splayed across the dais. The imposter’s woman sprawled behind him, rivulets of wine dark life pulsing between slick fingers as she clutched at the wound that would end her.
Standing over the other male, sneering at the waxy paleness of his golden skin, Otaso felt a surge of disgust. It had been easy, this victory. Years of battling with this now weak adversary, to win because he was drunk on his new woman and the offspring she had given felt hollow. Empty.
The once worthy opponent shielded a female that even now slipped into the Abyss. Not that Otaso wanted her. No, there was a prize far greater than some bitch.
“Where is it,” Otaso asked, voice a grinding rumble that echoed after the roar of more thunder.
“Vrazys take your soul.”
“Now, now, Kistsam. We both know your goddesses have abandoned you here. Tell me where it is, and I’ll make your end swift.”
“Do what you want to me,” Kistsam said, blood spattering over his lips and chin. The fine white rays of crystalline eyes brightened as they met Otaso’s gaze head on. “I will never tell you.”
“My warriors are searching even now.” Otaso lowered into a crouch, drawing the blade from its leather sheath to let it soak in the crimson lightning arcing through the midnight sky against its sinuous edge. “We will find it, and its end will come.”
“Your search will be in vain.” Another choking cough sent a wash of blood to stain Kistsam’s throat, trickling down to the red ruin of his chest.
“I bet you think yourself so clever,” Otaso said through a crashing landslide of mirth, twirling the blade to catch the glint of fear buried in the roiling fury of Kistsam’s eyes. “Let me guess. Servants swore an oath to see it gone from here before I even took the walls. A trusted maid to raise it as her own in the wilds of the countryside. Ah, you people are far too predictable.”
Confusion flickered through Kistsam’s eyes, amber brows coming together before pain twisted his features. Teeth bared, he managed to growl, “You will never—”
The squalling of a furious infant cut Kistsam’s vow short. By the widening of Kistsam’s eyes, Otaso knew. His smile was brimming with feral delight, the flash of crimson fire behind the midnight shot darkness of his eyes a glimpse of the horrors to come.
“Did you not know my men breached your walls long before I knocked upon your gate? She must have been something otherworldly,” Otaso said, blackened gaze sliding to the female behind Kistsam as the light flared and died behind pale eyes. “To make a man who kept me at bay for so long forget that he can trust no one. Least of all the stable boy with the lame leg willing to do much for a bit of coin and sport.”
A swift roll of his wrist brought the dagger down in a vicious arc to split the would-be ruler open, spilling blood and dark, wet gore over once regal robes. Gathering Kistsam’s entrails in his hands, Otaso pulled them up to his face. Let the full strength of his power show in his eyes as the other male looked on in horror.
Tipping his clenched fists, Otaso took in Kistsam’s blood. Power straight from the source seared along his veins, crackling and flaring across the back of his eyes as he swallowed again and again. It slithered along his spine, tangling in the vertebrae in charged pulses. Crimson, black, the pure blue of a summer sky as the fallen king’s power battled to be free. Freedom it would never find as Otaso swallowed it down into the endless abyss of his soul, burying it in the wildness of his dark energy.
Kistsam was the only Alpha within range who might have defeated him, and now his magic belonged to Otaso.
Releasing the slick clumps of flesh from his fists, Otaso roared to the sky and the Abyss beyond. Lightning sizzled through the air, the boom of thunder rattling the castle down to the foundations as that bloody fire pierced through the too thick air to grab hold of Otaso. Winding around his fists, entangling his limbs, it slashed through his heart with an ear shattering shriek.
Night gripped him, the shadows swallowing him until even the thought of light vanished. All that remained were the screams and cries of the fallen, all of them flowing through the brimming darkness into him. Shredding away that much more of his soul, the very things that made him human.
Otaso gloried in it, basking in the bloody haze as he relived every death. Taking power from their violent ends, soaking in their fear and anger as luscious ambrosia. Their wails building to a deafening crescendo that threatened to force Otaso into the blackness as he channeled it all into his reserves. Alarm flaring and dying as he allowed some of it to spill, scattered into the darkness as an offering to the Abyss when he could not contain it all.
Sensations overwhelming him, snippets of memories not his own swarmed through his mind. Battering his senses as it inundated him with information reaching back years. The newest and freshest burning bright enough to sear the backs of his eyes, blinding him for a span of moments that felt as long as eons. Then night swallowed all those vivid colors, darkening them to dusky hues before they became lost in the shadowy power crackling through his veins.
Panting, Otaso came back to the here and now. Knee to the ground, he braced with both hands to remain upright as the last of the power trickled through him before settling into an uneasy murmur that would take weeks if not months to calm.
Surprise registered somewhere in the eerie shadows that trailed through his mind. He had not expected the lofty morals Kistsam proclaimed to allow for a blood oath from his people. They were all of them bound to the dead ruler, and so now belonged to Otaso.
That was the least of the shocking details revealed to him as the corpse’s thoughts unraveled within him.
“Bring her here,” Otaso rasped, letting his other knee drop with the heavy clamor of gleaming black armor to sit on his heels. Ignoring the narrowed gazes of his general and vizier, he pulled the still screaming child into his hands. Cradling the loose neck and rounded bottom, Otaso peered into the red-rimmed eyes that would never change from their starlit blackness.
He could feel it coursing through her, tangled in every beat of her raging heart. Even in the slippery tears that soaked through his shirt cuff as the infant made known her indignation. It tingled against his skin and crackled along his senses. Power unlike anyt
hing he ever dreamed.
An Omega.
So rare as to be near extinct. Their numbers so diminished that what he knew of them came from dusty tomes and whispered rumors. Otaso had no idea this was the secret Kistsam kept. No wonder the announcement of the child’s birth had been so guarded. Even the sex kept hidden from the populace, not even Otaso’s spies able to glean the information.
It would be too much for him to take in, even in her current state. At such a young age, her power was wild, unrestrained. Not even at its full potential. It would kill him if he tried to perform the proper rites here and now and even sacrificing her as he had Kistsam would be beyond him with so much chaos crowding under her skin.
His men would also see it as a weakness if he did not do this now.
“I’ll prepare it for the rite, Imperial Majesty.”
Otaso growled, pulling the shrieking girl to his chest. Cradling her small body, guarding it. His prize. Having fought long and hard for this, he would not see it taken from him so soon. Not until he figured out a way to get what he wanted without destroying himself.
With an effort of will, Otaso climbed to his feet. Shoulders squared, he pulled a sneer across the thin slash of his lips and turned to the trusted advisors he didn’t trust at all.
“If you think I’ll be wasting all of this in some half-destroyed temple to those bitch goddesses, you’re mistaken, Molaro,” Otaso said, long strides carrying him past all the destruction and mayhem as he left the large hall. Each footfall felt up the entire length of his spine, it landed in a crimson burst of energy behind his eyes. Blinding him until he landed the next and begin anew.
“But Imperial Majesty—”
“You dare to question me,” Otaso roared, turning on a heel to stalk towards General Varazi. A gust of blistering wind buffeted them, snapping his ropes and sending power arcing through the air in crackling scarlet bursts.
“I would never, Imperial Majesty,” Varazi ground out, head weighed down by the strain of remaining upright in the face of Otaso’s strength. He didn’t keep his feet for long, crashing to the worn stone on his knees before his emperor. The smooth metal of his gloved hands scraped across the floor, gouging it as Otaso forced him to prostrate himself.
“See that you don’t.” Otaso turned, head held high as he cradled the burbling girl against his chest. Thumb rubbing endless circuits over the chubby length of her thigh as he moved past scenes of destruction and chaos.
It would take time to round up the people who needed to die this day. More still to pick the ones he might wish to take with them back to Aeslomor. He did not have to be present for most of it, could leave the others to have their way with the pretty prisoners and add strong ones to their ranks. Kill the rest.
A hard huff of breath left his lips as a realization came to him.
“Molaro. Find a wet nurse for her,” Otaso added a slow roll of his wrist, two fingers spinning in a lazy circle. “Something with this ridiculous hair they have. Something pleasing to the eye.”
“At once, Imperial Majesty,” Molaro murmured. The quiet rustle of his robes buried on the rattling clank as men fell in behind Molaro for his search.
Hours later in his tent, sated for the moment with the whimpering female who huddled before him as she gave the child her breast, Otaso pondered his predicament. Energy still raged in his veins, molten and painful. As much as he gloried in it, reveling in the intense rush, the more he watched the infant, the more he understood he would not be getting his hands on the chaotic tempest of her strength anytime soon.
Trouble was, he knew she would only grow in power as she aged. This violent storm would become a veritable force of nature. He could feel it down to the very marrow of his bones. It would also become more refined, a honed sword versus the smack of a fist. He could wield her with the same precision. More so if he let her mature to puberty. The time when all things find their true potential, an Omega promised exponential growth.
Eyes the soft velvet of night peered up at him as she fed, glimmers of blue-white pricking all that darkness. Full lips working, holding the tangle of golden locks in a vice like grip, she stared at Otaso as if to accuse. Blaming him for her plight of a low slave to sup on, the softness of her dam lacking as the woman continued to flinch and sob with fat tears.
“Quit your sniveling,” Otaso ordered with a placid smile that held the razor-sharp edge of a warning.
Confusion flittered over the female’s face, uncertainty followed fast by miserable resignation. She stank of it as she bowed her head and gained some control over her display.
“Do you know what they named the child?”
He waited for a span of moments, tolerating the woman’s trembling lip and quavering form for at least that long after what he’d forced her to endure. These people were soft, in mind and body. Fat on the excess of wealth the fertile valley provided, pampered by the false security of the mountains that ranged around them. They’d lived too long in the shadow of their king and his protection.
It was time they understood it had been no protection at all.
She’d bear the marks long after he tired of her, both body and mind. He was nowhere near finished with her even for this night, and it was a long road back to Aeslomor.
He had only so much patience, though. Hand snapping out, he caught the bitch’s chin. Jerking her forward by the grip on her jaw, upsetting the jostled infant whose suction ceased. As her angry wails began, the woman’s mewling cries joining, Otaso smiled.
“I asked you a question. You will answer now.”
“Strissina,” the woman breathed, too terrified to even whisper.
Otaso made a grunt of disgust, shoving her back. Sprawling in his chair, he eyed the child whose puckered frown admonished him for disturbing her dinner. To think a months old child would dare where full-grown men cowered.
She would dare, though. Some part of her must know the power she wielded even now. Knew of her importance and that she could brave much before he lost his temper.
“Hurry it up.” Fingertips measuring a slow rhythm against the intricate carvings of his chair, he watched. Waited as the girl’s eyes drifted. Lips pressed into a hard line each time they fluttered open to keep him in view as he shifted.
The longer he watched her, the more certain he became that she knew. Those midnight black eyes following his every movement, tracking him. Too aware for something so young. She wasn’t a simple child though, he reasoned. An Omega, and in a powerful Alpha’s presence. One of magnificent power even before tonight, the force of it raging just beneath his skin. Staring at one another, measuring the other, Otaso’s lips curled into something of a smile.
Something he hadn’t done in a very long time.
Releasing the wet nurse, the girl continued to watch. Finished with her meal, there was no excuse for her to remain awake. Yet she did, watching Otaso. Meeting his gaze as if she were equal, the inky length of her lashes wide against the tawny gold of her skin.
Pale amber eyes darting towards the bed, the woman held the girl closer. Urged her lips back, trying to get her to begin again.
“She’s finished.”
Tales said Omegas were immune to magic, that a force such as his couldn’t control them. Otaso thought to try it, but when he stood and took the girl with careful hands from the woman’s faltering grip, those dusky lashes began to slip shut. A contented gurgle bubbling up from her lips as she caught the edge of his robe in one fist. He shouldn’t show her such reverence as he held her against his chest. Shouldn’t let on that he had thoughts not involving her death, even in front of the slave.
Too important to be part of the long train that followed him, they had placed a rough cradle in his tent. A convenience considering he would slake his needs on the wet nurse for now, until she became too broken to withstand it. He had to have a care with that one for now, at least until they could find another, but you could do much to a woman before she shattered.