Her throat closed. “No matter the reason, what you’re doing iswrong.”
“Is it?” His brow arched, a challenge.
Wasn’t it?
How many times had she wished she could shed her own instincts, the scent that betrayed her weakness? To never have to worry about Heat suppressants ever again?
Tedric leaned back, eyes alight with the heat of conviction. “Wrong is chaining people to their castes. Wrong is serving fools simply because they happened to be born with the right kind of blood. This”—he flicked his hand toward the cavern beyond—“thisis the rebirth. When Omegas are no longer pieces on the board, the whole game falls. And when it falls, there will be no Sunborn Alphas. No Moonfire Omegas. No more perfect matches bred to preserve Alpha’s dominance.”
“But Alphas are—” She stopped herself, the words dying on her tongue.
What? Born to lead? Stronger, better, meant to be followed? She almost said them, and the horror of that reflex struck her harder than his rhetoric.
And Omegas—they were born to bow, to submit.
“Go on,” Tedric prodded mildly, as if he already knew shecouldn’t.
JingYi swallowed. Those beliefs had been carved into her the way they’d been carved into everyone—a truth so deeply rooted it was law. Immutable. Unquestionable.
And here was someone—a Beta, no less—who dared to imagine tearing it all down.
And why . . . why did her chest stir at such thought?
She should’ve shut him down. Told him his methods were vile and his vision a lie dressed in righteous robes.
But she couldn’t. Because a small, shameful part of her had wondered the same thing.
The greasy smell of the beef, which she’d been ignoring, now soured her stomach. Her hand moved to push the plate away, but she stopped, knowing full well her body needed the food.
“No matter your goal,” she said, voice low, “these Omegas didn’t come here by choice. You kidnapped them. You tore them from their homes and loved ones.”
He leaned back in his chair, wine cradled loosely in one hand, eyes tracing her like he was mapping a truth she hadn’t meant to reveal.
“Do you hear yourself?” His voice was soft enough to pass for gentle, but there was a knife hidden beneath it. “You don’t even consider yourself an Omega, do you?”
The words were a slap she hadn’t seen coming. She straightened, chin lifting on instinct. “I?—”
“Throughout this conversation, you’ve referred to Omegas asthem. Notus.” He let the pause stretch, giving her nowhere to hide. “And no wonder. Your life as an Omega has been nothing short of dismal.”
Her pulse jumped, but she forced her features to remain composed. Still, the truth of it scraped her raw. Shehadsaid ‘them.’ Not ‘us.’ And shehadmeant it.
Because what did she share with Omegas like LinXin, radiant in her silks, or Reiyana, secured by the devotion of two princes? JingYi’s Awakening had brought no adoration. Her Heat hadn’t made her desired—it had made her prey. She was an Omega in name only, stripped of every advantage the title might’ve offered.
Her mind twitched. But what about . . . Aliz?
Her maid at Parandor—cheerful, competent. An Omega who was neither celebrated nor terrorized. Perfectly ordinary. And safe.
In her own pain, JingYi had crafted a binary: Omegas were either gilded or broken. She had never allowed herself to imagine a life in the middle with simple purpose, unhaunted by fear or spectacle.
It waspossible,for all Omegas. Ithadto be possible.
Tedric was looking at her as if the fracture in her identity was the lever he’d been searching for, something to weaponize.
“If I told you it was possible to eliminate your Omega traits, would you take that path?”
Her pulse jumped.
“No,” she rasped.