Page 46 of Griffin Food

Fenix side-eyes me. Darrion’s lips twitch, bastard.

I force my wings to retreat.

Aldric grumbles and turns his back… for all of a second. He is far too curious about the little omega. “I approve of her,” he announces. I want to roll my fucking eyes.

Instead, I steel myself for this period of adjustment.

Violet

I’m naked, save for a pelt wrapped around me like a poor excuse for armor. Lark and Rafe are likewise naked.

The griffins, though, are clothed.

Atlas stands like a warrior lord in his dark, well-worn leathers. Darrion could be mistaken for royalty, dressed in a knee-length silk jacket embroidered at the collar, lapels, and cuffs. His pants are black and fitted to his muscular thighs, tucked into his highly polished boots. Fenix is different again with his vibrant red hair. His loose shirt hangs half-open, and his leather pants are tucked into scuffed boots.

They are all distinct. All are powerful; their state of dress adds yet another layer to our vulnerability.

I wanted to see a griffin. A dream I carried since childhood, a pull I could never explain. It drove me from my home and family, across the world, through one portal and then into another world. Worse still, I dragged two men with me, tore them from their ordinary lives and quiet routines. They didn’t choose this. I made the choice for them, blackmailing them, threatening them with my sister’s wrath, and leaving them no way out. I told myself I had no choice either. And now… I love them.

And I’ve brought them here.

My lips tremble—a knot of dread twists in my stomach. Something terrible is coming. I can feel it, the silence before a storm.

Lark steps in front of me, protective as ever, but my eyes slide past him to the one whose mere presence dominates the room.

Atlas.

The leader.

He stands at the center of the room, a dark axis around which the others orbit. His wings have gone now, snatched back into the magical ether, but I can still see them in my mind’s eye. Glossy, dark gray feathers. His eyes are silver, and they pin me, predatory and unblinking. The air of grace that surrounded him, his movements when he swept into the room so deliberate, coiled with barely leashed power. He doesn’t need to shift for me to feel it. His dominance hums in the air.

I shouldn’t look. I shouldn’t want to. But I can’t stop either. On a deeper level than human intellect, my body recognizes my mate.

I’ve met shifters before. They are all predators of a kind. But griffins… griffins are distinct. Different. Enigmatic. If there’s a hierarchy of predators, griffins would be at the top, and Atlas is at the top even among their kind. And now, I’m in their den—or eyrie, as Master Pugstone called it—deep inside, under stone, trapped, a heat pressing down on me.

I want to run.

Worse, I want him to chase me when I do.

I’ve just gone through a heat. In the wake, my world has been tilted, a dizzy blur of sensation and memories crashing together so fast I can hardly breathe. My body still aches, and between my legs is tender, the legacy of what I let Lark do—what I wanted him to do—burning through me.

There’s no easy way to take that in, no tidy way to fold it away in my mind. And it’s not even the first time. The memories are sharp, startling, and shamefully vivid, layered over one another until I can barely tell the past from the present.

And now a new terror waits beyond the walls of this room. My skin prickles with awareness, and even though the ache, the hunger, and the confusion linger, I know, deep in my soul that whatever comes next will not be gentle.

My lips tremble. The enormity of the moment is a mountain pressing down on us. Maybe this is fate or destiny. Or perhaps I’m just a foolish omega.

I rest my hand on Lark’s forearm, fingers curling against his warm skin. “Let me step forward,” I whisper.

He growls low, the sound rumbling through him. His eyes glimmer, almost supernatural, like something peers out from inside him at me. But then it passes, and they are blue again, the blue I know so well. Only now do I recognize how bright they are. Startling, almost otherworldly. Maybe it is this place, this room, with the strange light emanating from the very rocks themselves. He’s young. Younger than me by three years. And in that moment, a terrible guilt claws through my chest.

“I am sorry,” I say, looking between Lark and Rafe. “I am sorry that I brought you here. That I made you follow my foolish dream.” I turn to Atlas. “Please release them, I beg you. I will do anything you desire.”

Rafe’s growl is every bit as animalistic as Lark’s was.

I silence him with a hand on his arm. “This is not your quest. This is mine. And I forced you both to come.”

“Forced?” Rafe glares at me. “When did you force me, lass?”