There was blood on my hands.

Not from pain. From power.

The corridor still buzzed with tension as the guard’s broken whimpers echoed off the walls. A warden, an Alpha who once struck me like I was beneath him, was now crumpled against the stone, his eyes glazed, his mind shattered.

I hadn’t touched him.

I just looked at him. And he submitted.

“You’re dangerous now,” Kael murmured behind me. His voice, dark velvet, frayed with hunger, coiled through my spine.

I turned slowly, the heat still pulsing in my blood like a second heartbeat. My hands trembled not from fear but from ecstasy. I was drunk on the power, on how effortless it had been. The Bloodheat had not consumed me.

It had crowned me.

Kael approached, his gaze burning. “You haven’t even tapped the bond. Haven’t used your voice. Yet look what you’ve done.”

“My voice?” I asked.

He circled me like prey, but his reverence betrayed him. “There’s magic in it now. One command from those lips, and they’ll drop. Crawl. Worship you for the scent alone.”

My lips curled. “Like you did?”

His breath hitched. Just for a moment. But I saw it submission.

My heat flared in response.

I stepped closer, slow and sure, pressing a palm to his chest. His heartbeat thundered beneath my hand.

“On your knees.”

Kael’s jaw clenched. For a moment, I thought he’d challenge me.

But then with a slow, feral grin he sank to his knees.

Not like a slave. Like a beast offering his throat.

My breath caught.

“See?” he murmured. “You’re already wearing your crown.”

I circled him now, letting my scent coil around us, thick with dominance and hunger. Kael tilted his head, baring his neck the sacred place of the Alpha mark.

“Claim me,” he said. “If you want me bound, I’m yours.”

The old me would’ve hesitated.

The new me bit him.

Not deep. Not yet.

Just enough to make him groan.

“Good girl,” he rasped. “Now tell me what you want.”

I dragged my fingers through his dark hair, the strands soft and wild.

“My mouth,” I whispered.

“Where?”

I smiled wickedly. “Everywhere.”

He moved like lightning. One moment, I stood above him. The next, I was wrapped around him legs, caging his hips as he slammed me into the cold stone. His mouth devoured mine, tongue pushing deep, teeth scraping my lip.

“Say it again,” he panted between kisses.

“My mouth?”

“No. Say you want me.”

“Say it like you’d burn without me.”

“I want you,” I gasped. “I need you.”

“Louder.”

“I want you, Kael!”

He growled raw, possessive and a bit down beside the glowing mating mark. My body arched, slick pouring down my thighs.

But he didn’t fuck me.

Not yet.

He worshiped.

Lowered me to the stone like a holy offering. Kissed my knees. My thighs. My hips. Everywhere but where I was aching.

“They think I broke you,” he murmured, lips grazing my belly.

“They’re wrong,” I hissed. “You unleashed me.”

His silver eyes gleamed.

“Then show me.”

I flipped him. Straddled him. Gripped his cock thick, hot, throbbing and lined him up.

He groaned.

“Ride me.”

“No,” I said calmly.

His smirk faltered.

“No?”

I leaned closer, lips grazing his ear.

“You don’t get to command me anymore.”

Then I sank down onto him.

We both gasped.

His cock filled me stretching, claiming, but I set the rhythm. Slow. Torturous. Each grounds a lesson. Each moan, a reward.

He tried to grip my hips. I slapped his hands away.

“No touching,” I whispered.

He growled. “You’re cruel.”

“Then praise me for it.”

He shuddered.

“You’re divine,” he breathed. My Queen. My ruin. My religion.” “Please fuck don’t stop.”

As I moved on with him, our bond surged. Not just everything.

I saw his past. His pain. The betrayal. His exile.

And then me.

His salvation. His flame. His mate.

“You’re in my head,” I whispered.

“And you’re mine,” he said. “We’re not just mated. We’re fused.”

The power of it made me cry out.

“Use me.” “Break me.” “Burn your name into my soul.”

And I did.

I climaxed with a scream, my body pulsing around his knot as he spilled into me hot and thick, his cock swelling, locking us together.

We lay there knotted, breathless, undone.

Kael kissed my ribs. My jaw. My lips.

“Punish me again sometime,” he murmured.

I smiled, running a thumb over the mark I’d left on his throat.

“Only if you beg.”

I knew something was wrong the moment I woke up alone.

The air was too still.

Too quiet.

Too… empty.

Kael’s scent of wild pine and dark musk was gone.

My mating bond pulsed in warning, but fainted. Like his presence was muted, muffled behind walls too thick for me to penetrate.

I sat up, heart pounding. “Kael?” I called out, my voice echoing off the walls.

No answer.

I stood. Naked, vulnerable, still sore from the delicious wreckage he left me in. But something in my chest twisted, fear gnawing at the edges of my confidence.

And then I saw the blood.

A smear on the wall. A trail. One that ended where the hidden guard corridor opened behind the stone.

They took him.

The moment I realized it, my heat flared again, but this time it wasn’t arousal.

It was rage.

“You took him?” I whispered to no one.

The stone beneath my feet trembled.

The walls hummed in response.

Power radiated from my skin in violent waves, and the floor cracked like an eggshell beneath me. My body pulsed not with need but with hellfire. The Bloodheat wasn’t a curse anymore. It was a weapon mine.

I screamed, but not aloud. My fury vibrated through the bond, sending shockwaves of fire into the heart of Iron Howl.

I dressed fast, grabbing Kael’s torn cloak and wrapping it around myself like armor.

Then I followed the blood and his scent like a huntress.

When I reached the corridor above, I saw him: the Warden General, flanked by two Alphas in reinforced riot armor. Kael hung between them in silver chains, bloodied and limp, a dart still lodged in his neck.

“What are you doing to him?” I snarled, my voice trembling.

The Warden sneered, “Caging the monster. You think we’d let a feral Alpha rut an Omega weapon and walk away? You were never meant to bond. Just to bait him.”

My stomach turned. My blood boiled.

“He’s mine!” I screamed.

The Warden’s eyes gleamed. “You’re not a queen. You’re a bomb. A bomb we built, and now you’ve gone off-script.”

Something broke in me.

I felt Kael through the bond, his pain, his slipping pulse, his helplessness.

And I burned.

Flames erupted across my arms, black and red and wild. They licked at the surrounding stone, twisting the air with heat and pressure. My body became a living inferno.

“You shouldn’t have touched him,” I whispered.

The guards stepped back. Too late.

With one step forward, I roared. The walls of the corridor exploded outward. The stone cracked. The chains melted. The air warped with magic.

A concussive blast rippled through the prison.

The Alphas screamed as their armor fused to their flesh.

The Warden tried to run. I didn’t let him.

One flick of my hand, and he was jerked midair, choking, thrashing, his limbs pulled by invisible claws.

“You thought I was weak,” I hissed, stalking toward him.

“You thought I was just an Omega in heat.”

My flames wrapped around him, devouring the air. His flesh peeled in layers.

“I’m not your experiment. I’m your execution.”

With one final pulse of power, I shattered every bone in his body.

He collapsed in a heap, bloodied, broken, forgotten.

I dropped beside Kael, trembling. His chains had already begun to melt, the silver hissing away from his skin.

His eyes fluttered open, dazed. “You came for me,” he whispered.

I cupped his cheek. “Always.”

He gave me a bloody grin. “I told you… your fire would burn the world.”

I kissed him hot, desperate, wild.

And I poured my magic into him.

Light shimmered between our bodies. His wound began to knit itself closed. The dart fell free. The chains crumbled to ash.

He grunted, shifting upright with effort.

“We’re not done,” I said, helping him up. “Not until this entire pit is ash.”

His arm wrapped around me, pulling me close.

“Then let’s finish it.”

And I saw it in his eyes reverence, love, and fury.

We rose together. Two monsters. Two mates.

And as the howls of prisoners rang out through the blood-soaked corridors, we knew:

We were never meant to be saved.

We were meant to conquer