Chapter 3: A Cage of Velvet Chains

The carriage stopped, but the thudding within my chest didn't. It was a war drum in my ribcage—every beat screaming, Run. But I had nowhere to run.

The door groaned open, and a giant stepped behind fire carried in torches. Kael. The vampire prince with coal-scorched red and smoldering coal-colored eyes that looked as if they could dissect skin and bone as if he could dissect the veins that converged me into a human.

"Out," he told me, not nicely.

I hung around, hoping the anger would rage enough to kill me. Briefest this dream then would be.

He presented me with an extended hand in place of it.

It wasn't gentleness—courtesy masquerading as strength. I accepted it because there was no choice. His flesh was cold, almost grained, but not dead. It had a strange throb beneath—sluggish and ancient. It stole my breath away.

Outside the carriage was a warped fairy tale world. Black spires pierced the storm-cloud sky, their peaks brushing against stars that dared not sparkle. The castle in front of me was not large—it loomed, shrouded in darkness and mystery.

I swallowed.

Kael took me over the rock bridge. I noticed that the guards on both sides were not human-shaped. Silver eyes. They did. Their faces. too stiff. Too straight. Not breathing.

This was not a structure for beings like myself.

Inside, it was quiet except for the echo of my footsteps against marble. The golden, warm candles down the halls—but no light could dispel the shiver climbing up my spine. All the artwork along the walls glared at me. All the statues seemed just a little too near.

"Where are we going?" I finally asked, my voice small but firm.

"To your quarters," he told me. "Until you sign the contract, you're a guest."

That word—guest—winced like acid.

"You bought me."

His eyes flashed to mine. "I rescued you."

"No," I panted, standing in front of him, holding him back. "You bought me. Let's not try to call it something else."

He regarded me, face tranquil. "You hear. Good. That'll make you live longer."

Live longer.

Not safe. Not free.

He turned around and just walked away, and after a breath too long, I trailed behind him, though.

He brought me into a wing from the rest, too opulent to be anything but a golden gilded cage. Doors opened into a suite larger than any house I'd ever lived in—deep red velvet drapes, a four-poster, and a chandelier that seemed to be made of stars.

Terrible. I don't want that," I breathed, looking at the silk sheets as if they would suffocate me at midnight.

"You'll get used to it," Kael had thundered over his shoulder already.

But boiling inside me is. "Do you ever give a thought to what it is like? To be hunted, branded with shame, sold as a slave for a cattle brute? Or are you too high on your pedestal to care?"

He remained transfixed in the doorway.

For a moment—I'm certain of it—I detected something in his eyes. Guilt? Contrition? But it was gone before it materialized.

"I don't wonder," he snarled.

"Because already I've known what it's like to be owned."

And he was gone.

The door creaked open on a silent scream behind him, its sound deafening like a gunshot.

I slept with my eyes wide open that night.

Every time I blinked, I could feel Kael's eyes upon me like a weight. His words hung in my mind like smoke—bitter and choking all at the same time.

As if I didn't already know the feeling of being owned.

What was he saying, anyway?

A prince. A hunter. A man who could own whatever or whoever he wanted.

What does a man like that have?

I walked back and forth across the room, waiting for cameras to pop out or for poisoned wine poured into my cup. But what I found was a closet filled with gowns—one after another, one prettier than the last. All dark reds, blacks, and silvers. Vampire royal colors.

No suggestion of blue.

It was such a small thing, and I cried on the floor.

The next morning, someone knocked on the door to alert the arrival of a maid. She was youthful, her skin pale, her eyes ash-gray.

"Prince Kael is waiting for you for breakfast,"

"Do I have to?" I growled, hating the weakness in my voice.

"You don't need to eat," she said, the curve of a smile on her lips. "You do need to look."

I wore the bare minimum I had on—again silk, again pricey. The dress hugged me, tight at the throat and low around the hips, as if to show vulnerability.

Kael was sitting in the dining hall when I came in.

There was no one else there. A large table stood between us, but he sat at the head, sipping something dark from a goblet.

"Sit," he grunted, not glancing up.

I had done my best, as I knew it.

"You did say something last night," I started. "Something about being owned."

He curled forward, arms up, and finally faced me for the first time. "You want my story?"

I nodded.

He laughed—wet, no sense of humor. "No one is going to get my story. Not even you."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Then why here? Why not put me in jail with the others like the rest of them?"

He got up, moving slowly to come towards me. Every step was a countdown.

When he was standing next to me, I could sense him towering over me like thunderheads.

"Because you're not like the others," he growled, his voice low and menacing. "And neither am I."

I didn't move.

"You'll sign a contract soon," he went on. "A personal one. Your blood, your silence, your presence. And for that, you'll be taken care of. Fed. Dressed. Brought inside from other people who'd hurt you a lot, a whole lot more."

"And if I don't?"

He leaned in closer, his mouth to my ear. "Then I'll send you to them."

I cooled down.

"I told you you were spared."

"I did," he panted. "But that pity won't last."

When he turned away, I shook.

Kael turned away again, as he always did. But not today.

"One day," I said to him, voice firm, "you'll regret the way you treated me."

He stood stock still.

Then turned back over his shoulder, his bloodred eyes burning in the moonlight.

"Maybe," he said to me. "But then it will be too late."

To be continued….