I gave my Naga three babies — and he told me he wished he’d never brought me home. Naga are known for low fertility.Most females are lucky to carry one. I gave him three. But the man who once guarded me with an almost obsessive possessiveness now looks at me with cold, distant eyes. “Honestly? I regret it.” I look up at him, confused. His gaze sweeps over my full breasts, my curved waist, my hips. “I never should’ve let my fight with Aria push me into taking you. Looking back, you’re just another empty-headed female who’s only good for breeding.” “Meanwhile, my Aria has suffered for years because of me.” My whole body goes rigid. My eyes sting red. I whisper back — tell him he can’t live without me. But Caspian doesn’t flinch. If anything, he gets more animated, already scheming to bring his true love home. He shoots me a look of disgust. “You think I stayed for you? If it weren’t for that body of yours, I wouldn’t have looked twice.” “Relax. You gave me snakelings, so I won’t throw you out. My brother still needs a female. When he gets back, you’ll move into his room.” Naga males are driven by primal need. Once they’ve had a mate, they can’t go without one. And that brother of his? He’s been sneaking around, trying to get his hands on me for longer than I can count. … “You’re sure you want to transfer your female’s registration to your brother’s name?” The clerk at the Bonding Registry thinks he’s heard wrong. He stares at me — curves, full-figured, soft in all the right places. Then he stares at the woman in Caspian’s arms — bony, frail, like a stiff breeze could snap her in half. “Once the record’s changed, you can’t reverse it without the other male’s consent.” Caspian doesn’t even seem to hear him. He frowns impatiently. “Obviously. Could you hurry it up? My female just got here. She’s still adjusting. I need to take her home and get her settled.” The clerk chokes on his words. With a grunt, he scratches out the name next to Caspian’s and writes in a new one. My name gets filed under a different Naga — someone called Caelen. “Done. When’s your brother coming back? He just needs to press his mark on it.” Caspian is too busy soothing the woman in his arms to care. “Tomorrow,” he says absently. Outside the Registry, I stand alone. I watch Aria pout and press herself against Caspian, whining about how he abandoned her all those years ago — how he bought another female right in front of her face. Caspian coos and comforts her. When he’s done, he glances back at me. In the cold wind, I must look small. Thin. Hollow. He hesitates. Something catches in his throat. Before he can speak, I do. “Do I need to move out today?” Caspian frowns. “You don’t have to rush—” “Your name’s Amber, right?” Aria cuts in, her jealous eyes raking me from head to toe. “I remember you. The most popular female at the Auction.” “Shifters just love your type — big chest, big hips. But seriously, aren’t you embarrassed walking around with those two watermelons strapped to you? If I had those, I wouldn’t even leave the house.” She turns to Caspian with a pitiful little pout. “Caspian, you like that kind of thing too, don’t you?” Caspian tenses immediately, rushing to deny it. “Who said that? I think it’s disgusting.” I freeze. My eyes burn. Disgusting? Every single night, he coiled his tail around me and pulled me into his arms, pressing against me, wanting more. When the heat took over, his scales would drag slow and heavy down my spine. Sometimes once wasn’t enough. Twice. Three times. Until my body went limp — only then would he stop. And now he calls that disgusting. Aria smirks and hooks her arm through his, gazing at me with pity. “Don’t be upset. If Caspian hadn’t bought you, could you have lived this well? You should be thanking me, really. If I hadn’t had that fight with him, you’d never have had a chance.” I glance at Caspian. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t react. A bitter sound escapes my throat. “Mm.” When Aria sees I won’t fight back no matter how hard she pushes, she loses interest and tugs at Caspian to leave. He smiles — soft, indulgent — and lets her pull him forward. After a few steps, he turns back. “Amber, since you want to move, go ahead.” “Don’t take it to heart. We’re still family.” Family. Right. We’re still family. I’m just not his anymore. I belong to his brother now.
Aria drops the act the moment she walks in. She barges into the bedroom Caspian and I share and starts hauling everything that smells like me out into the yard. The little woven rings I braided myself. The protection charm I slipped under his pillow. I spend weeks on that damn charm — every stitch counts. Now she crushes it under her heel like it’s garbage. I stand there frozen, watching her rip my life apart like she’s gutting a bird. Caspian stands right beside her. He doesn’t stop her. He laughs softly and helplessly, like he thinks this is just some cute tantrum that means nothing. Then he glances at me, casual as breathing. “Let her blow off steam,” he says. “I owe her. If she breaks something, I’ll replace it.” My throat tightens. “…Don’t bother. It’s nothing.” My voice is thin. For a second he actually looks at me — really looks. Irritation flickers across his face, but he can’t name why. He says nothing else. Outside, the little row of vegetables I planted sits trampled. He used to tease me about the garden, told me it was silly to spend time on dirt when we could just buy food. Still, he goes out one morning and quietly puts up a low fence around it to keep deer and kids from wrecking it. Aria stomps right over the seedlings. She snatches my bra off the clothesline and holds it up between two fingers like it’s something disgusting. “You actually hang this out?” she snarls. “You want the whole settlement to see what you’re packing?” She drops it in the dirt and grinds her heel into it. Caspian laughs. He watches her like a man watching a favorite toy. He never looks at me. I pull my shoulders up without thinking. For the first time, I feel ashamed of my own body. She’s still not finished. Aria prowls the yard again, hunting for the last piece of evidence that I exist. Her eyes land on the wicker basket in the corner — the one I bring out so the snakelings can nap in the sun, because I’m afraid it’ll be too stuffy inside. My stomach drops. I shout before my brain catches up. “The snakelings are in there — don’t—!” She already has it over her head. I lunge. Too slow. Aria flinches, trips backward, about to fall — A dark shape flashes past and catches her. The basket tips. My snakelings tumble out like fruit shaken from a branch. They are so tiny. So small they make no sound when they hit the ground. Only the biggest one — startled awake — lets out a thin, scared hiss. “My snakelings!” I drop to my knees. I’m scooping them up, fingers shaking, pulling all three into my arms. They’re shaking too. Tiny tails curl around my fingers like lifelines. The biggest one has a scrape on his forehead. A bead of blood seeps through his skin. I can’t breathe. Caspian was closer to that basket than me. He could have gotten to it first. He could have stopped her. But he doesn’t. He reaches for Aria. He catches her. He lets our snakelings hit the dirt. He doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t even blink. Until now, I keep telling myself the nights matter. The hunger. The way he wraps his tail around me. I cling to those memories like a life raft. I think they’re proof of love. But now my hands are shaking, my snakelings’s blood warm against my skin, and I can’t pretend anymore. Maybe I was wrong about everything.
My voice trembles and my eyes blur when I look up. “Caspian, please,” I say, my voice cracking. “Don’t let her throw everything away. I’ll pack it all. I won’t leave a single thing.” For a beat he doesn’t move. Then his arm loosens around Aria, like something inside him finally gives. The snakelings are still hissing — small, wounded sounds that slice through the air. They look at him with those bright, wet eyes, the same ones that used to make him come running. They want him to scoop them up the way he used to, to press their little scaly heads between his hands. Before he can answer, Aria’s face snaps shut. Her eyes go red. Her voice sharpens to a knife. “So you feel sorry for her, then? You feel bad for her and those snakelings — admit it!” She spits the words at him. “I knew it. You say you think it’s disgusting, but you can’t let her go.” Caspian’s jaw tightens. He starts to say something, but Aria cuts him off. “You promised to take me home. What happened to that?” Her tears come fast and ugly. “You bid on her in front of everyone. They laughed at me for months. Said I was delusional. Said a male like you would never pick me.” She sobs into his chest. Her fists thump weakly against him. Her voice drops to something small and desperate. “Caspian, we’ll have snakelings too. I’ll give you a whole nest of them.Just stop looking at other females. Please?” He goes rigid, then slowly lets go. He looks away from me and the snakelings like turning a page. Then he reaches up and wipes her tears with the back of his hand. “Don’t cry,” he tells her. “I’ll do whatever you want, okay?” The snakelings watch him. Their hisses quiet down into tiny, confused murmurs. One of them nudges my finger with his little snout. His eyes reflect my face — bright, black, and searching. Why isn’t Daddy looking at us? Their question lands in my chest like a stone. I stand there like a statue. My face won’t move. My mouth is stuck. I put my hand on the smallest one’s head because the motion steadies me. Because if I stop moving, I will break. “It’s okay,” I whisper, forcing a crooked smile that tastes like ash. “It’s okay, little ones.” I bend down and start picking things up. I scoop a bundle into my arms. It slips. I pick it up again. It falls. Over and over. My hands are clumsy, thick with tears. The sun hits the dirt and my hot drops disappear like nothing. Aria fusses at Caspian in that syrupy, triumphant voice she saves for winning. “I want a brand-new bedframe,” she coos, her nails raking the air. “I am not sleeping where you slept with her. Pull up those ugly plants — I want flowers. And take down that fence, is disgusting.” Caspian follows her finger out of habit. His eyes pause on the little green patch I planted — the seedlings I watered with my own hands, the ones he used to pretend to mock. He looks at me for a long, frozen moment. Then he tucks his chin against Aria’s head like the choice was never really his. “Okay,” he says, voice quiet and flat. “Whatever you want.”
I move into Caelen’s room and it smells like mildew and old straw—the kind of place that’s been closed up too long. I clear a small patch of floor and lay down old clothes over dry hay. It’s ugly and quick, but it’ll do. The snakelings curl into the nest and I tuck them in like they’re the whole world. Night air slides in through the cracked window, sticky and heavy. There’s a sickly-sweet flower scent riding it—Caspian ripped out my vegetable beds and planted blooms for Aria. The smell should be pretty. It tastes like betrayal. The babies whimper against my chest, restless. Their little bodies tremble. From the day they were born, their father has never been this cold to them. I lean down and kiss each tiny forehead. My eyes sting before I can stop them. Somewhere outside, a muffled crying starts. I cover my ears, but then—there’s a loud crash. Footsteps pounding. Everything tightens. The door slams open. Caspian fills the doorway, all coiled muscle and that terrible, slit-pupiled green stare. His eyes burn into me, slow and hungry. Then they drop to the loose edge of my shirt. I know that look. I know it like I know my own heartbeat. A dozen nights of him watching me, then dragging me into darkness, tail wrapping my waist, taking and taking until there was nothing left. He’s in heat. I back into the corner before I even realize I’m moving. His jaw tightens like a trap. He doesn’t know why he’s angry, exactly—just that something animal in him is roaring. Thought narrows to a throatless, simple command: She’s his. No one gets to take her. I shake my head hard. “No—no, I don’t want this.” My voice is thin. Whatever I say seems to burn him. He stops, hurt splitting his face. It’s almost comical—like I’m the one who ruined him. “Don’t look at me like that,” his face says. “You’re the one who left me.” “I won’t—” I try to speak, but the word dies. His hands clamp around my wrists and pin them over my head before I can finish the sentence. A sharp hiss cuts the air. The biggest snakeling scrambles forward, tiny tail braced, and plants himself between us. He trembles so hard his whole body shudders, but he raises his head and bares his baby fangs at Caspian. The little mouth is a furious, ridiculous, brave thing. The other two snap awake and copy him. Three snakelings—no bigger than my palm—line up like a wall. My tears fall hot and fast. “Babies, no—stay back!” I lunge for them, but Caspian’s grip is iron. I can’t move. Caspian’s face has gone somewhere cold and sharp. The heat fogs his brain. He reaches with slow, ugly purpose. The little snakeling thrashes, tail whipping, trying to bite free. “Don’t! Caspian, let him go! You’re hurting him!” I scream. I claw at his arm like a wild animal; my nails rip his skin. He frowns, annoyed, and then—throws the snakeling like he’s nothing. The tiny body bounces off the wall and slides down crumpled on the floor. “No!” The sound tears out of me. “My baby!” The pain is white-hot in my chest. I can’t breathe. My hands shake so hard I can’t stand. For a moment, Caspian blinks—like someone hit him. He looks at the snakeling curled in the corner, then at his own hand. For a second his eyes clear. Then something darker pulls the line back over his face. He mumbles my name, the sound broken: “Amber…” A shout from the doorway cuts through everything. “What the hell are you doing?!” Caspian snaps his head. Aria stands there, barefoot, eyes wide as saucers. He shoves me away like I burned him. His face twists, guilty and frantic. The words spill out of him before he can stop them. “She—she seduced me.”
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