are like offerings to a wild beast. A rack of lamb slathered in sauce.”
“I’m not a lamb.”
“Saying it doesn’t make it true.”
“Two minutes,” a guard yelled out, causing me to jolt.
She burst out laughing at me.
“See you around, little lamb,” she snickered, strolling away, heading for the toilets.
Anyone would be terrified in my position, being thrown in a place called the House of Death, knowing no one ever made it out. But no matter how scared I was, showing it meant weakness here. Blood in the water. And as the demon pointed out, it only made me nourishment for fae.
The mess hall was huge, allowing all the prisoners in the space at once. The cafeteria-style setup was along one wall, the line winding all the way around the room, guards stationed every few yards. Inmates already sat down and ate at tables in the middle.
“Te geci! Don’t fuckin’ cut in front of me!” A man bellowed to several people ahead of me, shoving another man in yellow crashing into a table. The shrill clatter of trays hitting the floor had me stepping back, sucking in sharply. Guards moved to stop them as other inmates raced to take their space in line, causing more squabbles to break out.
“Move!” Someone yelled behind me, jolting me forward, my nerves already a wreck. My stomach grumbled. The last thing I recalled eating was a few shrimp at the party, which was more than a week ago. Any nutrients since then had been through my veins or from magical herbs while I laid unconscious. But knots of stress and fear still twisted up into my throat, blocking my appetite.
The gala already felt like a lifetime ago, where my evening had gone from hope to grief to hell in a few hours. When I put on that gorgeous dress complaining about the stuffiness of the party, little did I know soon I would be wearing a used prison uniform and sleeping on the ground next to a urine hole in one of the most feared prisons in the East.
To go back and do it over. The notion tugged at my heart. But would I have traded one prison for another? Marriage to Sergiu would have been another level of hell. One I would have had to suffer through for years, breaking every part of my soul until I was an empty shell.
The line moved faster than I thought. As I inched closer to the food, the scents of shoddy coffee, burned toast, and hot cereal drifted up my nose. Nothing smelled good, but my stomach still grumbled with the need to fill it.
From my place in line, I could see the food dwindling to a few ladles of porridge.
Grabbing a tray, I set it on the rail and slid it down to the worker scooping out the food. A shoulder slammed into me, a wide frame cutting in before me, shoving me back. I stumbled into a body behind me.
“Hey!” I pushed back onto my feet, glaring at the guy in front of me.
The line cutter was several inches taller than me and built wide and thick in the chest. His torso barreled, tapering farther down, reminding me of a bull. He had deep olive skin, a broad nose, and skinny legs.
His nostrils flared, brown eyes almost the color of his pupils, his black hair flopping in one eye. “What did you say, human?” he snarled, tilting his head.
“I was next,” I spurted back at him.
“Really?” He chuckled. “Looks like I am, and oh look, I get the last of the breakfast.”
“No.” My voice came out soft and pliable. “It’s mine.”
A nasty smile lifted his thin lips as he stepped up so close to me, his chest touched mine. “You’re new, aren’t you?” He leaned in, taking a deep whiff of me. “So fresh I can smell the disinfectant on you. No matter how much they douse you with decontaminator, you little human fuckers keep surviving…like cockroaches.”
“Rodriguez.” A man’s voice sounded low but firm behind me. “Leave her be.”
The bull-shifter’s eyes flicked to the man standing behind me, his lids narrowing in a glare.
“What if I don’t, old man?” he huffed, his foot pawing the ground like an animal’s hoof.
“She didn’t know. Let her be this time,” the man said. Every word he spoke was like a warm bath. Soothing and calming.
Rodriguez snarled, his head wagging. “You take far too many liberties, Tadhgan. Someday you will see you aren’t as untouchable as you think you are.”