A Violet Fire (Vampires in Avignon #1) - Kelsey Quick Page 0,16

Every hint of humor has left his face, mild horror replacing it. His expression is nothing short of intimidating, but I can’t help myself. The feeling of openly unbinding years of pent up anger is too addicting.

“You’ve already cost everyone enough time and headache keeping me alive, so why keep it going? There’s no way in hell I’ll ever apologize to you or to anyone else for my suffering.”

His face. That same smug face that promised me safety, and that made me feel like the worst was over back then; the one that manipulated me and locked me within the cold walls of Nightingale to mold me into his blood slave. That face now offers me only an expression of disappointment, maybe even a hint of concern, or distress. I knocked him off his pedestal, and it feels so good that I can’t stop.

“If you think for even a second that I have any intention to beg you for my life, you’re wrong. Because I would rather be torn to shreds by the fallen than be forced to serve you!”

I look to Giomar, the bastard, and then to the rest of them. “That goes for all of you, too!”

Dead silence.

There she is. There’s the Wavorly that scaled the walls of Nightingale yesterday. The same Wavorly that is apparently hell-bent on dying, but she is brave and unrelenting. I would rather die with those traits than remain alive as a subservient, mindless idiot. What was life anyway, without the freedom to decide?

Everyone turns, looking from me to Zein. My dorm mothers hunker back—one trying hard not to grin while the other nudges her forcefully. Narref stands off to the side on the right set of stairs, glaring at me, while the other four military rulers of Cain whisper among themselves. Reluctantly, I return my eyes to Zein’s, dreading the same, antagonizing smirk that he started wearing again. It takes one gulp and my heart shoots into overdrive. For the longest time he sits there, leaning his face upon his knuckles, until—

“You make a very persuasive argument.” His tone turns cold as ice as he expertly re-ascends his pedestal. He side-glances the vampire who stands complacent on the stairs.

“Narref. I’ve made my decision.”

“Y-yes, my lord?” Narref responds, a bit taken aback, apparently still in shock.

Zein looks me over, the line of his mouth finally stoic before he announces, ”Feed this girl to the fallen, if they will even take her. She holds no greater value within Cain.”

Everything crashes down; all of it becoming real as Narref makes his way over and pulls me by the arm, forcing me left toward another set of doors. I throw one last look up at Zein, who is already refocusing his attention elsewhere, likely trying to think of how to put out the fire on his reputation that I just started.

Despite my desire to cover up such weakness, I can’t help the tears that brim when he shoots me one last glance; a result of betrayal. Betrayal because for the longest time I didn’t hate Zein. For the longest time, he was the only being who gave me a sense of purpose in this cruel world. Every day for the first two years, I thought that was the day he’d return.

Back then, he promised he would come back for me when he left me at Nightingale and that everything would be okay. That I would be okay. I thought he was different from the other vampires who slaughtered my parents. Not once did he say anything about me becoming a part of his infantry supply, about how I would be treated like an animal, or about how I would eventually have no motivation to live. And because of my crushing naïveté at that point in my life, I actually, deeply cared for him. But it was all an illusion. One that I was forced to see through on my own.

Though tears of remembrance line my lashes, my mind falls too far into oblivion for them to drop. It becomes difficult to think clearly. Basic thoughts and concepts, clouded. My breathing, erratic. It takes everything in me to walk, and even then Narref pulls on me to speed up. I nearly pass out from waves of panic, from the thought of where I’m about to be, from imagining the feeling of rabid teeth tearing into my flesh.

The first one.

I’m the first human Zein has sentenced to death.

My escort’s voice distracts me. “You sure don’t know how to