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Both dread and admiration crept up his spine as he watched her fury unfold.

She was in a beautiful rage, similar to the one he’d been in when he found out what his family had been doing.

But the way she looked at him now wasn’t with the growing trust they’d been building.

It wasn’t even with the hate she had when he first took her.

It was accusation, disappointment; there was mistrust in her face, and it cut him to his core.

The wind whipped, carrying stinging grains of sand that found every gap in his armor, reminding Akoro of the constant danger surrounding them.

“These Sands will kill us both if we stay here,” he said, his voice rough with urgency. “We’ll talk once we’re back at the palace.”

Naya’s chin lifted, that familiar stubborn tilt that had both maddened and entranced him from the beginning. “No. I want to know why you lied about the Omegas. Why you kept that from me.”

Heat surged through his veins, frustration mixing with the primal need to get her to safety. “It’s not important right now. Wait until we get back to the palace, where you’re safe.”

“It’s not—” She stared at him, shock and anger warring in her expression. “How can you say that it’s not important?”

The wind picked up again, howling around them with increasing violence. His every instinct screamed at him to get her out of here, to carry her to safety whether she wanted it or not.

Without warning, he bent and swept her up, throwing her over his shoulder in one fluid motion. Her gasp of surprise barely registered over the roar of wind and the pounding of his heart. She was his to keep safe, and he would not let these damn Sands claim her.

To his surprise, she didn’t fight him. No fists pounding against his back, no shouted protests. But somehow the silence was worse than any struggle would have been, settling over them like a shroud as he began the trek back toward the sand drift where his men waited.

His boots sank into the shifting ground with each step, the sand seeming to grab at him, trying to drag him down. But he pushed forward, his grip on Naya firm and unyielding. She was a warm weight against his shoulder, alive and real, and that was all that mattered.

Then her voice came, so quiet he almost missed it over the wind.

“Did you ever truly want to be with me? Properly, the way my parents are together? Or was that a lie too?”

The words struck him with devastating force, stopping Akoro in his tracks.

The simple question, asked in that soft, broken voice, fractured something in him .

He stood frozen in the midst of the hostile Sands, her weight across his shoulder, as the implications crashed over him.

He was losing what little he had of her.

Carefully, almost reverently, he lowered her to the ground. His hands found her face, tilting it up to his, and the sight that greeted him tore at him.

Tears. Glimmering in her beautiful brown eyes. In all their time together—through her capture, her escape, her return—he’d never seen her cry. Not once. The sight of those tears roused something deep in his chest, something he hadn’t known could be touched.

“Of course I want to be with you the way your parents are together.” The words tore from his throat, raw and honest. “But our lives cannot stop just because we’re mates.

I still need to do what I promised. So if I can’t have that with you, I will live with it.

But I’m still having you, tmot zia . I’ll have you in any way I can, even by force. I’ve always been clear about that.”

Her eyes crinkled up at him. “But you didn’t like it when you had me by force.”

Akoro’s jaw tightened. That was true. When she gave him her body and nothing else, it had been almost unbearable. No matter how much he drowned himself in her, it wasn’t the same when she touched him, and looked at him, and took comfort in him. He couldn’t say anything in response to that.

“I thought we were making progress,” she said after a moment. “When you told me about your family, about what happened to them, I thought you were opening up to me. Helping me understand you.”

“I was.” A frustrated growl bled into his tone, mixing with something that felt dangerously close to desperation. “And I thought you would understand my need to redress what your people did to mine.”

“You can’t separate yourself from the parts of history you don’t like.

” Her voice gained strength. “I’m not saying they were perfect in what they did, but you can’t ignore why they did it.

” She paused, her eyes searching his face.

“Can’t you see that what you’re doing to me is exactly what your family did to those Omegas all those years ago? ”

Fury exploded through his veins, hot and immediate. How dare she accuse him of being like his family! “Don’t.” The word came out with the remnants of fury and indignation that he’d buried deep. The shame he still lived with. “Don’t compare me to them.”

“How am I supposed to not?—”

“Because they took Omegas for profit!” His voice cracked like a whip across the desert air. “I took you because you’re mine. Because every instinct I possess screams that you belong with me. That’s not the same thing.”

She looked up at him. The tears fell from her eyes and tracked paths down her cheeks, catching the dying light of the sun.

When she spoke, her voice was steady. “You took me from my family, just like the Sy Dynasty did to the Omegas of the ssukkǔrian . You wanted to use my knowledge and my skill to give you a way to enrich yourself, just like the Sy Dynasty did to the Omegas of the ssukkǔrian . You marked me with a deadly proximity wound so I couldn’t leave, just like the Sy Dynasty did to the Omegas of the ssukkǔrian .

You even put me in the same fucking dungeons. ”

Each parallel she drew was a blade to his chest. She paused, her gaze never leaving his. “Which part of any of that demonstrates that we’re mates?”

Her words struck deep, and for a moment everything in him stilled.

The wind, the sand, the shifting momentum—all of it faded at her words.

Then he stepped closer, looking down at her, drinking in the beauty that never failed to steal his breath, the fierceness that had captured him from the moment he closed his arms around her in her forest.

“You’re leaving out the powerful and undeniable connection we had during your heat,” he said, his voice dropping.

“And the attraction between us that has always been overwhelming. You’re leaving out that for no other woman would I watch her every moment in my land to make sure she sleeps at night, ensure she is eating well and dressed like the queen she is.

For no one would I accept defeat at the point of their weapon.

” He stepped closer still. “For no other woman would I agree to wait for weeks and not touch her, simply to get her kiss.”

He reached up, his thumb tracing the path of her tears.

“There has been no other woman who has captured me the way you have, Naya, and there never will be. You’re in constant denial about that.

You blame your instincts and your attraction to me on some supposed faulty part of yourself, so you have no right to lecture me about separating myself from parts of history I don’t like.

You separate yourself from your attraction to me every moment you can. ”

Naya was silent, her eyes thoughtful as he wiped the remaining tears from her cheeks. The sight of her was achingly vulnerable, and something in his chest clenched that she was in this state because of him.

“I’m here because I’m still not letting you go,” he said finally, his voice low in his chest. “I’m still going to fight for you with everything I have, Naya.

” He was an Alpha, and she belonged to him—the very idea of letting her go was fucking impossible.

But while indignation simmered in his chest, he found himself unable to completely dismiss what she’d said. “But I want you to want me too.”

The question that had been burning in him during those nights he watched over her finally escaped, almost without him realizing. “Would you ever give me a real chance to be your mate?”

The question hung between them, heavy with dread. Because he knew, with crystalline certainty, that if she said no then she would be his prisoner forever. He couldn’t let her go.

Seeming to read his mind, she asked quietly, “Does it matter? You’ll keep me prisoner anyway, despite the agreement we made.”

The words struck him, the disappointment almost overwhelming.

Because she’d only be a prisoner if she said no.

So her answer was no. Akoro breathed deep, the tightness in his chest expanding.

He pulled his thoughts back and allowed himself to consider for the first time since he’d claimed the throne, for the first time since he’d decided what he wanted and taken it…

Could he bear to keep her and not have all of her?

Could he let her go? Could he release the woman he’d been ready to go to war for?

Before he’d even finished thinking it through, Naya pulled herself together with visible effort. Blinking away the moisture in her eyes, straightening her spine and swallowing hard.

“Regardless of how you treat me, we made an agreement, and I’m honoring it,” she said. “I might be able to find answers about the nnin-eellithi with these people that could help with the coming storm. I need to stay. Go back to the palace, I’ll follow in a few days.”

“No,” he said firmly. The idea of leaving her here sent every protective instinct he possessed into violent revolt. “You cannot stay in these Sands, Naya.”

“If you and your men progress any further, you will damage my discussions with these people.” Her tone was firm. “If they feel you’re a threat, they may not help. And they are powerful, Akoro.”

She gestured to the sands around her feet, and suddenly he noticed again that the shifting sands, the very ground that had tried to swallow him with every step, lay still beneath her feet. Perfectly, unnaturally still. Even the wind swerved around her.

“Who are they?” The question came out sharp, edged with suspicion and growing alarm.

“I can’t say.” Her words and demeanor were iron-firm, unyielding. “But I promised them you wouldn’t progress further.”

“You expect me to trust them with your safety?” he growled.

Naya watched, her gaze wary. “I expect you to trust me, Akoro. We made an agreement, and unlike you, I won’t break it.”

Every muscle in Akoro’s body tensed, his competing instincts threatening to tear him apart.

Naya should be on his nnirae galloping the fuck out of here, yet she was holding herself to a contract that he’d forgotten about the moment she vanished.

Whoever these people were, they possessed power he couldn’t ignore—the ability to control the Isshiran Sands was beyond anything he’d imagined possible.

They also knew too much about Sy history to dismiss as irrelevant.

If everything with Naya wasn’t at stake, if it wasn’t her asking him, he would charge ahead and find out who the fuck they were.

But this was his mate. She was asking him, pleading with him, and the trust that had been building between slowly was crumbling like sand through his fingers.

Something in him wanted her to want him back, wanted her to be proud to be his.

Just like he was proud of everything she was.

In the past, he’d thought it would never happen.

But he’d seen the possibility in the last few weeks, he’d caught glimpses of how it could be between them, and he couldn’t ignore that it.

“You are safe there?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said firmly.

Akoro exhaled, brows drawn down as he looked at her. “I cannot return to the palace and leave you here. But I won’t progress further into the Sands either. I’ll wait in the sand drift for you and we’ll leave together.”

She paused, studying his face. “I’m not sure they’ll be happy with that.”

“They will have to be, Naya.” His jaw clenched. “And none of them are to touch you again.”

Naya nodded.

“I also want to know you are safe and well. You will come and see me here every day you remain in this place. If you don’t come, I will come and find you. I will not agree to anything else.”

Her brow furrowed and she looked past him, squinting behind him. “How can you stay here?”

“We found a sand drift to camp in. It’s free of… this.” He gestured around him and the swirling Sands.

“Is it stable?”

“For now, yes. I don’t know how similar these sand drifts are to the ones we normally use.

” He stepped closer to her, breathtaking in that scent he needed so much, and he spoke with finality.

“But I’m not going anywhere without you, Naya.

If it means I have to stay in the sand drift until the end of time, then that’s what I’ll do. ”

Naya said nothing, simply watched him with those beautiful brown eyes as his promise settled.

Akoro couldn’t stop himself from reaching for her one last time.

His arms circled her waist, pulling her against his chest with raw need.

She didn’t resist, and warmth flooded through him as he buried his face in the curve of her neck, breathing in her scent again until it filled his lungs.

He held her tight and finally her body relaxed into his embrace.

For one stolen moment, the distance between them vanished, and he could pretend nothing had changed.

Then she stepped back. Her movements were gentle but firm.

She turned and walked into the shifting sands, and the treacherous tiny grains that had tried to swallow him whole settled beneath her feet like tamed beasts.

The wind that clawed at his armor with stinging particles parted around her as she moved away, her figure growing smaller until the golden wasteland claimed her.

Akoro remained rooted at that spot, watching his mate disappear into the Sands.

Frustration burned through his veins, but beneath it lay something harder, more resolute.

She would return to him and when she did, he would be waiting.

No matter how long it took, no matter what came between them, he wasn’t going anywhere without her.