Page 33 of ColdIron
The naked cadets snapped their hostile gazes toward me—the filthy newcomer standing in the doorway, fully clothed, staring. I turned and fled before anyone could call me out, their coarse laughter chasing me into the corridor.
Shit, I needed a plan.
Maybe I could wait them out. But there’d always be someone coming and going. A place like this never fully emptied unless everyone was sleeping or training.
I could shower with my chest-binding and clothes on. That would make me not just a laughingstock but a target. Or I could sneak into the women’s shower room on the third floor. Right. If I wanted to risk being beaten by some tough soldier woman who’d take one look at myframe and assume I was a pervert. Then again, maybe they wouldn’t mind. Soldiers were less modest?
Wild thoughts churned. No solid solution came. If I knew the compound better, I could find a way to sneak around, get myself cleaned. But this was an airtight military fortress, and I’d spent my first three days in an underground holding cell and the interrogation room.
Two more cadets glared at me in disgust as they passed. They sniffed pointedly. Shifters—I could feel it. All of them had sensitive noses, and I must have smelled like a walking dumpster.
I couldn’t stand here, and I couldn’t go back to the barracks either.
Just then, a figure approached from the other end of the corridor.
He was backlit by the Stormglass lanterns behind him, his silhouette tall and broad-shouldered. His presence filled the space like a current. The cadets who’d just passed me straightened and pressed themselves against the wall, dropping their eyes.
They knew exactly who was coming.
The vampire heir.
Nikolai walked with unhurried strides, his long legs eating up the distance. As he drew closer and the light caught his features—sharp cheekbones, square jaw, full lips set in an expression of perfect aristocratic boredom—I saw his crimson eyes were already fixed on me.
He’d known exactly where I’d be.
My breath locked in my throat. Every nerve from my collarbone to my knees pulled taut, like a wire someone had just plucked.
Shit. Shit.
This wasn’t normal. Why the fuck did my body keep having this kind of unholy reaction to the vampire?
He tossed a rucksack—I caught it on reflex—and gave a sharp tilt of his chin.
Then he turned on his heel and kept walking toward the exit.
I fell into step behind him silently.
14
MAX
Iswiftly jammed everything into the rucksack, the casual wear, the toiletries, the boots. It’d be less conspicuous than strolling through the compound hugging a change of clothes to my chest like a lost child.
In the midst of my dilemma, my solution had arrived.
Nikolai didn’t glance back, confident that I’d follow. He ducked out a side exit.
I trailed after him, keeping enough distance that no passerby would think I was following royalty, but close enough not to lose him around a corner.
The evening air hit my face, cooler than inside and carrying a faint mineral tang from beyond the fortress walls. Soldiers and support staff moved along the wide stone pathways between buildings, some in fatigues, a few in civilian clothes, all with the purposeful stride of people who had places to be. Stormglass lanterns flickered on along the walkways, casting circles of light on the flagstones.
Nikolai turned left, past the vast domewhere the vampire army quartered—dark stone and reinforced metal, narrow slit-windows angled to admit only threads of daylight. Harrow had explained: vampires were night creatures. Intense sun could harm all but the most powerful. They lived, trained, and ventured out only in darkness or near-darkness.
The dome’s shadow stretched long as we passed. Even from outside, I sensed the dense weave of protective spells woven into its surface.
The vampire led me past it to a building that stood apart from the rest. The Sanguine Tower was part dome, part spire—a wide, rounded base of gray stone giving way to a slender upper section of dark, gleaming material that pierced the sky.
Two guards in oxblood and navy uniform flanked the entrance. They bowed as we approached. He didn’t acknowledge them.
