Page 12 of Fangs

“Back to our rooms,” Mag murmurs. “The servants will escort us. We’ll be locked in until dawn.”

“Locked in.” The phrase leaves a bitter film on my tongue. “Like prisoners.”

“Like guests,” Mag corrects, her smile flashing bright in the candlelight. “Prisoners don’t get silk gowns and feasts. We do.”

“Because we’re investments,” I repeat, the harsh reality tasting like ash.

“See? You’re learning.”

The words drop between us, sinking down like lead weights into a well.

I survey the grand hall—the blinding wealth, the obscene luxury, the impossible, curated beauty of it all. I look at the twelve girls flanking me, each one polished and conditioned until she shines like a new coin.

Then I stare back up at the Masters, each one so ridiculously handsome they hardly seem human.

This is a bargain I made.

My body traded away to erase my father’s ledgers. My soul bartered for his safety. I refuse to let this golden cage lull me into a stupor.

I scrape my chair back against the stone, shoving myself upright.

“Where are you going?” Jenny asks, her eyes widening.

“To my room,” I reply, my voice flat, deliberately devoid of the trembling fear clawing at my ribs. “If I’m expected to survive whatever training they have planned for tomorrow, I need sleep.”

Before I can take two steps, maids materialize at my flanks, their touch deceptively gentle as their fingers curve around my arms. They shepherd me out of the cavernous hall, steering me through a labyrinth of winding corridors, hauling me right back to my gorgeous, gilded prison cell.

They dress me in a long white linen nightgown, short-sleeved, with see-through lace around my breasts—an old-fashioned style that looks as though it belongs in a museum. But the fabric is soft against my skin.

Sitting at the dressing table, they braid my hair and tuck me into bed.

I lie stretched across the mattress, suffocated by silk and heavy velvet, staring blankly at the vaulted ceiling.

I will survive this. I’ll survive the training, the auction, whatever twisted spectacle they throw my way.

And when I get out…

The internal promise fractures, stalling dead in my mind.

When I get out. What then? What will I do?

There is no when I get out. There’s no future. I squeeze my eyes shut, letting the hot, traitorous tears finally break free.

Yet even as I weep, a strange presence bleeds into the darkness behind my eyelids.

A shadow. A hunger that has nothing to do with food.

And from somewhere down the long, empty corridors of the estate, a voice rolls over me.

“You belong to me now.”

My eyes fly open. The room is dead silent.

Yet those words cling to the corners of my mind, echoing with a sickening, absolute certainty that crawls straight down my spine.

I’m not alone in this room.

I curl inward, dragging the heavy silk covers up to my chin, biting down on my lip as I fight desperately against the rising tide of terror.