by Sofia Daniel
My eyes shuttered, and a pained breath escaped my lungs. This was ridiculous. “But what if he says no?”
“He won’t if you tell him your offspring can also burn his vampire enemies to dust,” she replied.
I raised my head and avoided Micalla’s hateful, dark eyes. “That doesn’t stop him from taking you as a consort.”
“Let me deal with that. Your job is to charm Lord Lilin the way you charmed Dante, Nero, and Raphael. If you don’t, I’ll have your family killed.”
“Professor Proust—”
“Who do you think ordered the death of Zarah’s family? Commander Shanks? Any humans who witness the collection of a frumosi can’t be left alive to inform the hunters. Your family only lives because you were away from home when the guards found you.”
Shaking my head, I backed into the wall. “Why kill Zarah’s aunt at all? Now she’ll resent vampires—”
Micalla threw her head back and laughed. “Your little blood-whore friend told me her aunt’s death was for the best.”
I clamped my lips shut. Mesmerism. Either Nathaniel or someone else had twisted her mind. Maybe that’s why she never complained about the Coven of Bitches feeding on her and why she never withdrew her invitation when told it was a possibility.
My throat spasmed, and I rubbed at my neck to force a semblance of control. Nero was my protector. I could tell him Micalla had threatened my family.
Before I could bring up the subject, she added, “Knockers aligned to House Mantis have weapons trained on your mother, half-brother, and stepfather. One word from me, and they all die. If the boys move against me, they all die.”
Dread, as heavy and as dark as leaden weights, settled in my stomach. I couldn’t trust Micalla as far as I could spit, but what choice did I have? If I told the Stryx Brothers she had threatened my family, she’d arrange for their deaths quicker than the boys could organize protection.
One hand clapped over my mouth to stifle a sob, and the other clutched at my belly. Micalla’s eyelids lowered in an expression of lazy satisfaction. She had me exactly where she wanted. Completely at her mercy.
After catching my breath, I asked, “If I do what you say, what’s stopping you from killing them?”
“I can make a blood oath never to harm or kill your family directly or indirectly as long as you obey my commands. How about that?”
“But you might find a loophole and kill them, anyway!”
She rolled her eyes. “Blood oaths aren’t like human contracts.”
I nodded. “A-and I want you to leave Zarah alone.”
“Fine.”
My tongue darted out to lick my lips. “What happens now?”
She stuffed a bottle of pills in my pocket and said, “In exchange for Alicia Stephens following my instructions and doing her utmost to become the concubine of Lord Lilin, I, Micalla of House Mantis will not harm or kill Alicia Stephen’s family or Zarah Peridot, directly or indirectly. This blood oath implies no relationship of vassalage.”
A bead of blood appeared on the tip of Micalla’s finger. “Suck it.”
I parted my lips, and she placed her finger in my mouth. Her blood tasted like spoiled apple juice, weak and sour and rank. With a grimace, I swallowed.
“Wonderful,” she purred. “I placed purgatives in your pocket. We want that nasty anti-conceptional out of your system, so you’ll bleed nicely for Lord Lilin. Now, take your medicine like a good girl.”
Despair squeezed my heart in a punishing grip. Nurse Sora had mentioned that frumosi could take purgatives to restart their periods. But they would also negate the effect of the onion woman’s herbs. My chest caved in on itself, and all the air left my lungs in a pained sob. Where was Nero, my supposed protector? I gave my head a mental shake. Not even he could protect my family from Micalla’s machinations. Even if these pills were poisonous, I had no choice. She held their lives in her clawed hands.
I pulled the bottle of purgatives from my pocket, unscrewed its top, and slipped a capsule between my lips. Micalla handed me a bottle of water, and I gulped down what I hoped was a purgative.
“Can I go, please?”
Micalla smirked. “Not yet.”
“Why are you keeping me here?”
She leaned against the door with her arms folded and a grin stretched inhumanly wide. “You’ll see.”
A moment later, sharp, dagger-like pains lanced through my stomach, making me double over. Heat flushed through my veins, and sweat beaded down my brow.
“Now, you may leave.” Micalla stepped aside.
Clutching my stomach, I rushed to the nearest bathroom.
Hours later, Dr. Grannus found me on the toilet seat, drenched in sweat and too wrung out to rise. I had expelled the entire contents of my stomach through both ends, along with bodily fluids I didn’t know I’d even possessed. The vampire covered the lower half of his face with a light gas mask and ordered two male knockers to lift me onto a stretcher.
The knockers’ jostling made every inflamed organ flare with pain. Dry heat seeped through my skin, and a new round of sweat broke out from every single pore. A hand reached into my pocket and pulled out the bottle.
“You should have come to the infirmary to purge your anti-conceptional,” said the doctor. “but what on earth did you consume to create that terrible smell?”
I groaned, and a line of drool seeped from my lips and gathered on the stretcher. Even if I wanted to mention the onion woman’s herbs, I had no energy left. Vampires coughed and gagged as the knockers wheeled me through the hallways. I closed my eyes and lost consciousness.
By the time I awoke, the infirmary was empty save for a knocker dressed in the white coat of a medic. She walked across the room and opened one of the doors leading to what I believed was the lab.
A sob from the other side of the room caught my attention. I turned to find Zarah two beds from mine, her face as pale as milk in the dim light. She cast me a tired glance and turned away.
“Z-Zarah?” I tried to pull myself up, but my muscles trembled and strained, unable to support my weight.
“Micalla cast me out.” Her voice was flat.
“Isn’t that good news?” I croaked.
“She’s withdrawn her protection.”
My brows drew together. “But Micalla and her friends fed from you. Aren’t you pleased?”
“She said this was your doing.”
My heart sank. Was this more mesmerism or some kind of bizarre Stockholm syndrome? Zarah had never needed any protection until the Coven of Bitches had recruited her as their blood slave. A wave of nausea swirled in my gullet, and I leaned over the edge of the bed and threw up bile.
Hours later, footsteps awoke me from a fevered doze. Kat and Annette walked into the infirmary. Each girl cast me a dismissive glance before sitting at Zarah’s bedside. Resting my head against the pillow, I stared straight ahead.
“Did you hear about the Preta twins?” Annette whispered in a scandalized voice. “Kush went missing, and the guards her found ashes in a basement cupboard!”
Zarah whimpered.
“Shh,” said Kat. “That was her friend.”
I closed my eyes and exhaled. So the news had broken that Pigtails was dead.
My mind drifted in and out of slumber, and the girls continued their relentless chatter. “You’ll find someone at the ball,” said Annette. “Everybody does eventually. Just take the iron you’ve been prescribed and get the color back into your cheeks.”
When they told a Cinderella-like story about an anemic girl who was now the consort of a wealthy vampire in Switzerland, I turned around and croaked, “Why are you so blindly optimistic?”
“Why are you judging us for making the best of our situations?” Kat stormed over to the foot of my bed, her fists balled. Her auburn curls were held back by a headband, revealing the veins protruding from her temples. “The vampires always win. If we don’t fall in line, what do you think they’ll do to us? And who will protect us from hunt
ers who want to kill frumosi?”
Her raised voice made me wince. “How do you know—”
“Because hunters slaughtered my family!”
My throat thickened, and I lowered my gaze. Maybe Kat had also asked Nathaniel to help her sort through the shock and grief of their murders. Fiddling with the edge of my bedsheets, I asked, “Did they say they were hunters?”
“Of course not, but vampires don’t go out during the day.”
Something pushed itself to the forefront of my mind. Gates told me something about getting caught escaping the academy during the day, but his transformation into a werewolf had made me forget until now. I raised my head and asked, “How do you know they weren’t knockers dressed up as hunters?”
Kat’s mouth opened and closed.
“Or werewolves doing the vampire’s bidding?” I added. “They’re regular people all month long except for the full moon.”
Annette gasped from where she sat beside Zarah’s bed and clapped her hand over her mouth.
“Why do you have to ruin things?” Kat’s voice trembled, and tears filled her eyes. “What makes you think I haven’t considered those ideas? If I could leave, I would, but they own us. Just shut up and let the rest of us find what happiness we can get in an impossible situation.”
My mouth fell open. I wanted to say something, but only a shocked breath slipped out.
Kat clenched my footboard. “Look at Gates. He fought and fought against the vampires and now look at him. They beat him up every day and turned him into a werewolf. Now he lives a cursed life in the woods, guarding the academy and has no chance of ever leaving.”
Guilt settled on my shoulders like a leaden cloak and wrapped around my neck. It had been easy for me to resist the vampires, but the moment Micalla had threatened my family, I caved in to her demands. I rubbed the base of my throat and said, “I’m sorry for—”
“Save it for someone who cares.” Kat walked out of the infirmary with her nose in the air and Annette whispered goodbye to Zarah and rushed out without casting me a glance.
A knocker stepped forward and placed a glass of water on my bedside. Blank eyes aside, he was about my age with hair cut in that feathered style all the male Instagram models favored last year. What if he was a rebellious frumosi who had been deemed too troublesome to keep as a student?
I muttered my thanks and brought the water to my lips. Maybe the girls were right, and the vampires always won. Micalla had bested me by threatening my family. A moment later, a spasm seized my stomach, I threw up the water over the front of my hospital gown, and sweat trickled out of my pores.
I hurled what was left of my guts, then a knocker closed the curtains around my bed and stripped my gown and my sheets. Another one entered with a bowl of warm, lemon-scented water and scrubbed me down with an abrasive cloth. I groaned into the side of my bed while the knockers bathed me, changed my sheets, and wrapped me in a new hospital gown. Why the hell was purging so drawn-out and damned painful?
Later, Raphael rushed into the infirmary, wearing a white karate suit. He had regained even more muscle mass since I’d last seen him in the infirmary. His green eyes shone with concern. “I just heard you were brought in by the doctor.” His nose wrinkled. “What happened? Were you poisoned?”
I shook my head and drew my knees into my chest. “I took a purgative.”
His brows rose. “Why?”
Dante and Nero strolled in after him, dressed in the same martial arts uniform. I examined their features. Naked worry marred Raphael’s pale face, while Nero held his dark features in a blank mask. Dante, who usually sneered, raked his gaze over my form as though he suspected that something else had caused me to end up in a hospital bed.
My fingers rose to rub my dry throat, and Raphael brought a water glass to my lips. The cool, flavorless liquid slid over my tongue, washing away the remnants of bitter bile clinging to my throat. He grabbed a towel from a knocker and wiped my brow.
Guilt lanced through my heart. All this effort for me. After I had hurt him, too. In a moment, I would hurt him again.
“Why did you take a purgative?” he asked in a whisper-soft voice.
I gulped. “For the ball. If I could bring on my period—”
“It would give you an edge over your fellow frumosi,” said Nero, his voice hard.
“Why would you want to do that?” Dante sneered.
I raised my head and met Dante’s scowling, aquamarine eyes. If I looked into Raphael’s worried gaze, I would never complete my sentence. “Lord Lilin will be there.”
“That butcher?” asked Raphael. “I don’t understand.”
“He’s the head of the Lilin clan and one of the oldest beings in existence.” I gulped. “W-why would I want three schoolboys who live on pocket money when I can have an established and wealthy vampire?”
Dante’s nostrils flared. “After everything, it turns out you’re just as vacuous as every other girl in this academy.”
I clenched my teeth but held my silence. Let him think I was only seeking a life of luxury and protection.
“Alicia?” asked Raphael.
“Leave her alone,” said Dante. “She’s put you through enough.”
The Stryx Brothers walked out of the infirmary and out of my life. Only the thought of Mom, Daniel, and Steve kept me from racing after them.
“Alicia?” said Zarah.
I closed my eyes and rolled away from her. Right now, I just wanted to curl up and wither away until Micalla returned with her next set of instructions.
Chapter 18
There was no time to be regretful about lying to the Stryx Brothers because purging was a nightmare of excruciating proportions. I lay in that hospital bed for days, sweating, vomiting, and shitting out my guts. The knockers served easy-to-digest foods, such as broths, soups, and custards, while piling me with fluids to stave off dehydration.
Dr. Grannus examined me each sunset, just after the knockers had administered one of my multiple-times-a-day bed baths. Any feelings of embarrassment I had about the spanking incident washed away in the torrent of body fluids I had expelled.
Two days after the doctor discharged a rosy-cheeked Zarah, I received my next visitor. Micalla and Juno strolled into the infirmary, each wearing floral kimonos. Blood rushed to my ears, and my muscles tensed. I wanted to plunge a dagger right into Micalla’s smirking face, the cold-hearted bitch.
Micalla tossed her long, silver hair and flashed me a triumphant smile. “Ready for the ball?”
My stomach plummeted, and ice filled my veins. “I-it’s today?”
“Four hours.” Juno’s sullen expression told me she hadn’t fed on Zarah or anyone else since Micalla’s blood oath.
“One minute, girls.” Dr. Grannus strode across the infirmary with a knocker in tow. “Let me give my patient an invigoration tonic.”
“What’s in it?” I asked.
His dark brows rose. “Given the toxins you’ve ingested, you’re the last person I would expect to be picky about the ingredients of a tonic.” I stared into his eyes until he let out an exasperated huff. “A mild amphetamine to keep you alert for the ball and an antiemetic to combat any residual nausea. These are all pharmaceutical grade and available at any human drugstore.”
A sigh slid from my lips. It wasn’t like I had any choice. If I wasn’t fit to offer myself to Lord Lilin, Micalla would have my family killed. I downed the contents of the vial, which tasted more like a sports drink than a pharmaceutical drug. The liquid fizzed down my throat, into my gullet, and cooled my stomach, making me lie back and close my eyes with relief.
“Shouldn’t she spring out of bed with a burst of energy?” asked Micalla.
“Give the tonic time to work,” said the doctor, his voice dry.
“Put her in a chair so we can at least style that rat’s nest into something presentable.”
Warm, knocker hands eased me off the bed into a cushioned wheelchair.
“It’s a pity you reject
ed the Brothers Stryx, Miss Stephens,” said the doctor as a knocker wheeled me out of the infirmary. “They would have made a wonderful match. I hope you find what you’re looking for at the ball.”
Regret encased my heart like a stone sarcophagus, and a dull ache spread across my chest. I bowed my head and stared into my lap, the doctor’s words ringing in my ears as the knocker wheeled me through the hallways. With Micalla holding the lives of my family at ransom, the chances of ending up with the Stryx Brothers were infinitesimal. At best, Lord Lilin would keep me as his concubine and force me to birth a tribe of day-walkers until my body collapsed, and at worst, I’d end up in the same hellish situation, but with Micalla lording over me as his consort.
Eventually, we reached the beauty room, where the two knockers from before stood at their stations behind their sinks. One of them positioned me at the water, while the other’s warm, strong hands massaged my scalp, making the muscles around my neck and shoulder melt into goo. I dozed through the shampoo and the rinsing until Micalla shook me awake.
My eyes snapped open. “What?”
“Your dress.” She held up a slinky, strapless, silver ball gown with a train that swept over the floor like starlight.
A breath caught in my throat. “I couldn’t possibly—”
“You can, and you will. I went to a lot of effort to have something made to complement your figure. When you walk into that ballroom, every vampire will salivate over you.”
I stood, and blood trickled into my panties.
Her nostrils flared, and a happy flush settled on her features. She handed me a sanitary towel and smirked. “It looks like the anti-conceptional has completely left your system. Happy bleeding.”
The girls pulled off their kimonos and changed into their gowns, while a pair of knockers helped me into the heavenly vision and fastened each tiny hook around its back. With the precision of dressmakers, they adjusted the gown to mold it to my figure and made delicate stitches into the shimmering fabric.
When the knockers finished with my dress, Micalla placed her cool hands on my waist and turned me to the full-length mirror. My hair was styled in a messy updo, held in place by diamanté hairpins, that made me look like I’d just been fucked. Thin curls trickled down to frame my face and draw attention to my long, unadorned neck. Dread lined my stomach. This hairstyle was close to how Raphael had arranged my hair, which had, according to Nathaniel, made me look ‘delicious.’
