want.
“Careful what you wish for, Riona Dark,” he murmurs, and at the same time, his tail quickly moves, cutting me just under my chin, and I flinch from the pain. I hold my hand to my chin to stop the bleed, glaring at him as he walks to the door, stopping just before it. The man licks the end of his tail, his red eyes flashing brighter as he tastes my blood and looks at me once more. “Delicious. I can’t wait to buy you in the auctions. My name is Prince Reign Borealis of the Vampires, and you will be mine to buy.”
After yesterday…he might have to get in line.
“How many royals are there?” I question, making him pause at the door. Is he really going to walk away without trying to kill me? Or killing someone here?
“Just my brother and me,” he drawls, turning around and leaning against the door frame. “I believe he has met you, Riona.”
“Your brother wants the world to believe he is mad, when he is lost, and you…” I pause, seeing how his body tenses. “You want to be seen as perfect and strong, but you do not have a violent heart like your brother. You’re like a ticking time bomb, and he is your fuse.”
“How can a human see so much in such a short amount of time?”
“It’s simple really,” I reply. “You are both easy to read. Who fucked you both up?”
“Magic and blood,” he smoothly answers. “Both are alluring and disastrous. Much like I suspect you are, Riona.”
“Why is your name Reign? Why are there two princes and not one king? Is there a king?” I question as he stares at me.
He doesn’t immediately answer, instead he steps out of the gate into the corridor of cages full of screaming and desperate people. “I was chosen to reign, and my brother was chosen to destroy.”
He walks away…but I know it isn’t the last I’ve seen of Reign, and I hope he wins, because I think there is a chance I could escape his grasp.
His brother? That’s a whole other topic. I don’t think anyone could escape the Mad Prince.
Chapter Eight
I know the second the auction begins because of the cheers and shouts that outweigh the screams that have haunted me for hours, merging into a noise that I can’t block out. Eachann opens the cage door and waves me forward and none of the other girls who cower in the corners of the cage. I should feel a little bit relieved to be leaving the cage, but what is ahead of me seems much worse.
I’m about to be sold to a vampire. Of all things I had planned for my future, being a vampire’s snack was not one of them. Trying to find humour in the darkness doesn’t work, not when every step I take feels like I’m walking into a nightmare.
I follow behind Eachann, who never looks back or seems to worry at all about me running away, which would make sense with how fast and strong these vampires seem to be. I make the harrowing mistake of looking into some of the cages we pass, seeing the desperate eyes of so many. Hearing their screams is one thing, seeing their faces is another. And I want to save them, to break them free...but saving myself is impossible enough right now.
We turn around a few corridors, the sound of crowds cheering getting louder until we come to a large red wooden door with silver spikes around the edges. Eachann pushes the door open and holds it for me, waving for me to walk out into the night. The sun set hours ago, leaving only the night sky full of stars and the moon as I step out onto a wooden platform. The stage is a square shape with hundreds, if not a thousand, vampires crowded tightly in the space around it on a plain field. We are in a rocky, circular area with large gates letting more vampires in and out. So many of them, so many faces to look at. They cheer and call out names I mostly don’t recognise, but I’m sure I hear the princes’ names every so often. Red drops of snow fall across the sky, mixing with bits of white until they fall into the crowd. It smells like blood out here, that metallic tang I never thought I’d be getting used to smelling. My feet feel weighted down with each step across the