The men stopped and stared at her. Continuing, she spoke up, despite the consequences. “Lucas, we must go to the barracks. Do you wish for Vash to die?”
Lucas sucked in a deep breath and exhaled. “No. The pack’s legacy is important to me.”
“Then, we will go. When we buy the kits, we will head to a safe place where you can knot, and then I will nest. I know where we can go,” she said.
The three alphas lurched over her. “Where?” Vash asked.
“My hometown, Varikar,” she said. “There is a doctor there. You can get the treatment you need.”
“You will not be reunited with your family,” Lucas warned.
Most of the villages had been overrun with traders and the like. Varikar, wherever the hell that was, would be no different.
“We talk later,” Killian said. “For now, we should keep moving forward.”
Her wreckage and ruin had been cleaned and tidied. All trace of their squatting had been cleared with the utmost attention. If another pack of traders found the abandoned home, they would come out empty-handed.
After the men dressed her in thick robes to mask her identity, they left the house, never to return.
Screeching, the train came to a sliding halt near the crowded platform. “How many more stops?” Lucas asked, eyes searching the passengers who boarded.
“Just keep your hoods up and stop talking,” Killian muttered.
Vash dug his fingers into the omega’s waist as he eyed two possible traders boarding the rundown train. Looking at his feet, he paused until their scent wafted into the back of the car before speaking up. “Sixty seconds before we get into the barracks.”
Every movement was a risk. Omegas could move freely with their owners, but with Cassian’s brand, any authority could see that they didn’t own her.
As the train sped forward, Lucas stared through the crowd of fetid alphas, hand on his holster.
Wren watched him curiously but did not say a word.
True, Wren had only spent a few weeks under their control and care, but she had a general sense of how they worked. The bond of their pack connected them, but she wondered how far that went.
“Hey, you.” A cold-blooded alpha stood before Wren. Her glossy eyes rolled upward to face the man.
Killian stood up and removed his revolver, pressing it into the man’s gut. “Get moving.”
Smiling, the man revealed his rotting teeth. “Persuasive, aren’t you?”
“One blast is all it takes to remove you from history,” Killian growled.
But the man didn’t seem to care. Forcing his hand around the barrel, he stepped forward. Still, he looked at Wren, and not the men.
“All I want is your forgiveness,” he whispered.
The ringing of her ears seemed to occur before the gun actually went off, but Wren knew it to be a trick of the mind. Strangely, Wren noticed that the rest of the passengers had lowered their heads
. She was the only one still staring at the man’s exploded head. His body, a sunken mass near the moving doors, spilled more blood.
Killian quickly holstered the dripping and blistering weapon. “Fuck me,” he grunted.
Vash cursed under his breath and stood up with his hand in his jacket pocket. A stale attempt at rectifying the pitiless murder, he pulled out a small badge that flashed Cassian’s insignia with neon cathodes. The ones who peeked at the logo, quickly looked away in fright.
When the train car stopped for a second time, Vash yanked Wren up and onto the platform. The station itself was unlike anything she had seen, though that had become a trend for her.
Wren couldn’t stop thinking about the man in the train. “Why did he ask for my forgiveness?”
Ignoring Wren’s badgering questions, Vash pulled her through the front doors. Outside, a group of drunken traders bumped Wren’s frail body, causing her to fall to her knees. She gazed up at the tall arena that stood a short walk away from the station.