Caged Kitten (All the Queen's Men #2) - Rhea Watson Page 0,137

other rioting inmates away on the way to fetch Rafe, but beyond that, I’d been helpless. Useless. Again. No more than a block of muscle—dead weight against the might of magic.

I hadn’t expected a blazing triumph, but I had hoped to at least make it to the ward before shit really hit the fan. But it made sense that they came for us so fast; at the first whiff of trouble, Guthrie would have secured his prize.

And he had.

He had stolen my mate right out from under me.

Hands cuffed behind my back, a trio of grim-faced warlocks in black escorted me down the hallway to the door that we had busted through for Rafe and Tully. All the locks back in place. The wood repaired—fortified, even, with thicker metal hinges and additional bolts, some with an iron hum, a few others made of silver.

A warning.

After the dozen locks slid open, an empty cellblock greeted me on the other side. I’d come to in the cafeteria with dozens of lesser shifters and supers, some bloodied and battered, but myself untouched. Honestly, I had expected to wake up in a hole, confined to solitary for the rest of my miserable days, buried and forgotten.

Instead, they brought me here.

Uncuffed me.

Shoved me inside and slammed the door.

Not another inmate in sight. Just… eerie silence. Someone had repaired the place, swept away all the dust and mopped up blood. Williams bled puddles of the stuff after Katja had shot twice as he reached for his wand. Then there had been Fintan with his broken nose, blood oozing, dark and rich. They had probably cleaned some vampire blood too from Rafe—my last true memory of my friend, my vampiric brother, with a wooden stake in his shoulder.

It was like nothing had happened.

Only everything had happened. Xargi Penitentiary, from what I’d seen, was in pieces. Inmates across the prison followed those from the greenhouse, arming themselves and rising up. Some did it for the sake of chaos. Others for freedom. I had done it for my clan of misfits on the slim chance that maybe, just maybe, they could get the fuck out of here and taste free air again.

And now I was alone in a stained jumpsuit, patches of dried blood splattered across the navy-blue, dust in my hair and Katja’s scent on my skin. Fading. Fading fast. My inner dragon bristled at the thought of losing that little piece of her, stalking around inside me, flapping his wings, stretching, bellowing such mournful sounds, calling for his mate.

No answer.

The silence stung.

Jaw clenched, hands in fists, I checked each empty cell just to be sure. Even Tully was gone, all the shadows abandoned. I lingered between Katja and Rafe’s cells after I’d made a few rounds, unable to stop moving, barely able to breathe. Where were they? What was being done to them? Who was I going to flay when all this was over?

Everyone.

I’d kill them all. For Rafe. For Katja. Hell, even for Fintan, who, while impulsive, had only wanted to help us—to save her.

With my inner dragon’s song thundering around my head, pounding through my veins, I veered left toward Katja’s cell, desperate to run my nose along her cot, bury my face in her pillow. Scent up, keep her with me even in my solitude—

Only the clinking of locks stopped me, and I whipped around, seething, ready to pounce…

On Rafe. Same as me, he lingered in the open doorway, backed by a trio of unfamiliar guards. They uncuffed him. Pushed him inside. Slammed the door behind him. Without hesitation, we marched to one another and embraced as brothers. My inner dragon stopped baying for Katja, just for the length of that hug, then started up again as soon as we broke apart, Rafe rubbing at his shoulder with a wince.

Besides the gaping hole in his jumpsuit where the stake had pierced, he also looked relatively unscathed—disheveled, yeah, but I probably didn’t look much better.

“Where were you?” I demanded, studying the slowly healing wound inside that hole, his flesh waxy and pink as his delayed healing abilities kicked in. The vampire assessed me with an equally keen gaze, looking me up and down with a shake of his head.

“They locked me and a few other vamps in the library closet.” He hesitated, black brows knit, everything about him hard. “I thought for sure they would have put me in solitary… or just tossed me in the sun. Guthrie had an excuse to take us all