Page 143 of Psycho Pack
Warm, herb-scented water cascades over my skin as they wash away the last traces of our journey. The soap they use smells like honeysuckle, and I wonder if they chose it deliberately to match my natural scent. Nothing here seems accidental.
"Your hair is beautiful," one of them murmurs as she works some kind of oil through the tangled strands. "Like living flame."
I tense at the compliment. I'm not used to it. But she just continues working, her fingers careful not to pull too hard as she smooths out the knots.
"The queen will be pleased," another says softly. "It's been so long since we've had an omega guest."
"Let alone one with such fire in her spirit," the first adds.
They speak as if I'm not here, their musical voices drifting around me like smoke. But there's no malice in their words. No judgment. Just a sort of strange reverence that makes me deeply uncomfortable. They don't even comment on my scar.
I'm not used to being treated like something precious, other than by the Ghosts.
Something to be treasured.
At the Refinement Center, the betas always treated us like we were scum beneath their carefully polished shoes. Like our very existence was somehow an affront that needed to be punished. Even though the Vrissian scientists weren't as brutal, they clearly saw me as little more than a lab rat.
These betas are… different. Kind.
The dress they help me into feels like wearing starlight. The fabric is impossibly soft against my skin, flowing around me like water. Golden threads shimmer as I move, making the embroidered birds seem to take flight. The beaded veil settles over my lower face with surprising weight, the tiny gems cool against my cheeks.
"Perfect," one of the attendants breathes, adjusting the fall of the fabric. "You look like you stepped out of the old stories."
I want to tell her she's wrong. That I'm just a feral omega who got lucky. That all this beauty feels like a lie wrapped around my scarred soul.
I touch the soft fabric of the dress, still not quite believing this is real. The attendants' quiet chatter fades into background noise as I study my reflection. Despite the finery, I can see the marks our journey has left on me. Faint bruises dot my skin like constellations, telling stories of everything we've been through.
"Your pack must care for you very much," one of the attendants says softly as she adjusts the fall of my veil.
"They're... complicated," I mumble.
She laughs, the sound like silver bells. "Love usually is."
Love.
"You're thinking too hard," another attendant says, her veil swaying as she moves to light more of the brass lanterns. The dancing flames cast shifting shadows across the walls. "Your brow is knotted up. It's funny… you're a lot like him."
"Like who?"
"The prince." She pauses, head tilting. "Though I suppose you didn't know him as a prince until today."
No. I only know him as the cold yet compassionate alpha who held himself at a distance even as we grew closer. Who kissed me like he was afraid I'd shatter in his hands. Who's been carrying the weight of another world on his shoulders, and none of us had any idea.
"There," the first attendant says, stepping back to survey her work. "Now you look ready to dine with royalty."
But I'm not. I'm a feral omega who grew up in the wilderness. Who learned to survive by tooth and claw. Who still flinches at sudden movements and sleeps with one eye open. All this silk and gold can't change that.
Can't change what I am.
What I'll always be.
But for tonight, I can pretend.
For Plague.
For Hamsa.
Chapter