by LeAnn Mason
At least, my bunk had been vacated, so I made my way gingerly up the sparse ladder without giving the intruders any more of my attention. They didn’t deserve it, and I wanted to relish a few moments of blessed silence now that I seemed to have put them into some kind of stupor. Thank the gods for small mercies.
I didn’t even bother kicking off my navy prison flats before making myself cozy-ish on the bumpy mattress. With the addition of my arms beneath my head, there was the illusion of comfort.
“So, now we know that Michaels…” the pointy-toothed one murmured in that sultry southern drawl.
“See? We can get what we need out of her without words. She’s hardwired to give away her secrets,” Raven sneered.
I rolled my closed eyes.
A few more hushed words were exchanged, but I tuned out, too busy humming a favorite song to worry about the harpies in my midst. Ignorance was bliss.
There was no need to inform them that the nightmare I’d had the night Raven tried to smother me had given me more information than just their target. I also had a location and cause… kind of.
Like my father always said: Don’t tip your hand until your opponent has no choice but to follow you in.
I’d hold onto the slight edge I had over these harbingers. Bargaining chips were handy things to have after all.
The cellblock was barren with no signs of life as I drew down the corridor. No faces peered out at me from behind bars. No clinking or chattering provided any soundtrack. It was silent… and eerie.
And familiar.
I picked up the pace on my current trajectory, waiting until…
Yep. There it was: the dull din of angry voices.
I knew these walls now. This walk was one I made several times each day.
The sound picked up, becoming discernable. My heart rate kicked higher in response. My breathing became labored as I anticipated what I’d see.
As I waited to watch a man die...
My eyes didn’t want to open, and my feet dragged across the linoleum floor in annoying squeaky clicks the following morning, neither my mind nor body having received a restful night’s sleep.
I’d managed to extricate myself from the foreboding nightmare before the uncontrollable screaming part. I’d failed to return to sleep but avoided another attempt by my roomie to asphyxiate me. I wanted to call that a win.
The amicable Raven had been nowhere to be found when I’d ventured a peek over the side of my bunk. I hadn’t thought about how being able to turn into a bird would lend certain freedoms that the rest of us just didn’t have. If she were a nicer person, I’d consider asking her what it was like. Alas, my cellie was a raving bitch, who also happened to be a raven bitch. Ha!
Oh, Aria. At least you can make yourself laugh. I chuckled at my commendation.
Finally rounding the corner that would take me into the cafeteria, I thought about the dream again. If it was true that I was a harbinger—a banshee—and it looked like I was, then death would probably be coming sooner rather than later. My other… instances all occurred within moments of the victims’ deaths.
Until now.
I’d had two dreams within days, telling me that CO Michaels was going to bite the big one. But how soon? And to add a new flavor of crazy to my life, every time I even saw the man, I started screaming.
How had I lucked into this life? It’s like I’d won the fucked-up-for-life supernatural lottery or something. A gift that just kept on giving.
Absently, I grabbed a metal tray and slid it along the serving counter, not even worrying about moving it into the line of fire. The sloppy piles of goop still found their way to my plate even if they did mingle with one another a bit more than I would have preferred. This morning, I wasn’t hungry, so I didn’t really care. I snagged a milk carton and ambled to a table in the corner that looked to be mostly empty… for the moment, anyway. Nothing stayed empty and quiet for long in this place.
“Mornin’, sugar.”
Case. And. Point.
“Morning, siren. Raven. Phoenix.” I dipped my chin at each as I said their respective alter egos.
“Pieced that one out, did you, Einstein?” Ember scoffed, sticking her finger into one of the gelatinous masses adorning my tray and licking the goop from her finger.
I cringed at the move, which was a weird cross between menacing and seductive, but covered it when I chuffed a humorless laugh. “You birds don’t seem to be too clever with your names.” Probably wasn’t smart to challenge the supernatural creatures affiliated with death, but I was one too, right? Also, we were in full view of human eyes. I figured that probably bought me some room to be dumb.
“You have no more leverage, Screamer,” Raven gritted through clenched teeth. Her large black eyes, inches from my own, regarded me with zero humanity peeking from their depths.
“How does anyone believe you’re human?” I muttered. Now that I watched them, there were plenty of indications that they were different. The way Raven would shift her weight or her head. Ember’s unblinking and rather round eyes, not to mention the heat she exuded. And Jessica… well, the siren was too perfect—an embodiment of the term “blonde bombshell” and the perpetual sexual vibe she gave off wasn’t something even the sluttiest of women could pull off.
“Look around. You think anyone in these places is in their right mind? Every human in here is fucked in the head in one way or another. We don’t even stand out,” Ember answered plainly.
I couldn’t fault her logic, actually. Hadn’t I only truly noticed once I’d had my eyes forced open to the fact that they weren’t human?
“And Cole is always around to cloak us a bit if we get too… shiny,” Jessica said with a perfect pout, tapping at the corners of her lips with a rather honed manicured nail.
That thing was probably a weapon. She’d use them to help peel flesh, fileting meat for her scary-ass shark teeth.
“Do you glamour your teeth, or can you put them away at will?” The question just kind of popped out, but now that it had, I wanted to know.
The blonde leaned in close, invading my personal bubble as much as Raven had previously. “I have many tricks in my bag, sweetie. Maybe I’ll show you sometime when we’re alone.” She winked, settling back after I didn’t cow.
“Anyway,” Raven interjected with an exaggerated slowness to her drawl as she rolled her black eyes and crossed her arms, elbows on the table. “Now we know our target. You need to stay out of the way and let us do our jobs. We don’t need, or want, your help. You’d only hinder us.”
“Cole said you people look out for each other.” supes looked out for supes, right? “Or is that just Cole?” Dogs were often protective guardians.
“We watch out for each other,” Ember circled a finger between the three of them. “No one else.”
“Wow, no honor among non-humans. Got it. I’ll give you ladies one piece of advice and then ‘stay out of the way’.” I air-quoted. “Stay alert.” Winking, I rose to discard my tray of uneaten slop, assured in my knowledge of two facts. One: the hallway between the cafeteria and rec room was the location of Michaels’s demise. And two: the goosebumps on my skin gave me an inkling that it would be very, very soon.
I continued my dramatic exit, head held high and a bit of swagger in my step, ready to empty wastebaskets as long as it meant being away from the deathly three. I cast my eyes to the side briefly, my vision landing on a dark-haired, stuffy, self-important guard, and next to him...
My eyes rounded as I realized my folly.
I couldn’t escape Michaels, not here. And now, every time I saw him, that crazy-ass banshee wail crawled its way from the depths of my soul. An announcement that his time was nearing an end. I was this involuntary messenger, and again the sound burst from my lungs. This couldn’t be how it was supposed to go!
Before I knew it, Cole was wrapped around me from behind, his strong arms restraining my own. My back pressed firmly into his solid chest, a hand over my mouth.
But the bigger surprise was that the Deathly Trio had all scurried up to the scene. I relaxed a little, thinking maybe they’d actually come to help, seeing a fellow non-human in a predicament bringing forth their sense of allegiance…
“CO Michaels, Inmate Aria just threatened your life. We heard it, not ten minutes ago,” Raven accused deviously, speaking loud enough to carry over my wail.
The bitches! Cole must have told them I’d already gotten in trouble for that once. I doubted a second offense would be met with a mere warning.
“Said you were going to die. I heard it.” Ember nodded in agreement.
Michaels’s mouth opened and closed, gulping like a fish. Again. I’d have sworn it was the guy’s go-to look. It wasn’t a good one.
I wanted to refute the claim, but my scream was just beginning to taper. The whole of the room was posed like statues as they waited to see the outcome of this freakishness. I really needed to get a handle on my powers.
Michaels’s wide eyes searched past me, and Cole’s grip tightened. “What do we do, sir?” Michaels asked.
Cole’s growl reverberated through my body where it pressed against his. I couldn’t see him, but the lifted eyebrows and twisted mouths of his teammates told me I was screwed.
We look out for our team. I should have known.
“Inmate Aria, a threat to a corrections officer is a serious offense. Repeated threats on an officer is punishable by three days in isolation. No yard or free time. Let’s go.” Cole tugged on my arm, turning me away from the viciously triumphant faces of my nemeses. Raven’s little sardonic finger-wave was the last thing I saw before Cole pushed me out the doors and away from his girls.
“Teammates trump all, huh? I see where I stand,” I growled at Cole as he led me down hallways I hadn’t navigated before. If I’d thought the normal prison space had been bleak, the one I was in now was downright depressing. “I’m surprised your target isn’t in here. Looks like hangman heaven.” I joked but secretly worried my words were true.
“I told you to keep your head down. You are a liability to the safety of my team in your current state. This will keep you out of the way and safe so we can do our jobs.”
“This place looks like literal hell!” My voice pitched high with my rising worry.
Cole stopped amidst the dim hallway in front of one of the individual doors. These ones were solid, only a small plastic window and a thin slit for meals to be delivered. He inserted a key, and I heard the bolt clanking ominously as it unlocked and echoed throughout the hall. My tunneling senses threw the sound at me on repeat as I took in the dingy walls of a room that was even smaller than the cells I’d become accustomed to. “Trust me. This is nothing like hell.”
I’ll have to take his word for it…
My body resisted moving forward. I didn’t want to go in there. I realized I’d wanted some time alone, but with nothing to do to occupy the time… “Can I get some books or something?” I was going to hyperventilate. This was the time when I would normally resort to my lip rings for nervous energy. Couldn’t do that in jail.
“Sorry, newbie,” Cole said, even managing to sound somewhat regretful.
“Fuck,” I muttered, taking small, hesitant steps into the prison within the prison.
These were the rooms for the worst of the worst. So how did I come to occupy one? I turned on my heel when Cole’s warm hand left my elbow.
His stern features seemed strained like he was trying to keep his asshole persona intact. “I’ll be by to check on you every four hours… I’ll try to find some reading material. Your personal items will be brought in around lunch.”
“Come on, Cole. You know I didn’t—”
The door slammed, and those smoldering golden eyes stared back through several inches of scuffed and scratched translucent plastic. It made him look even more menacing, and I turned away, ready to get the next seventy-two hours done and over with.
Maybe I’d figure out just how long it took to sing Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer…
17
“Six-hundred-forty-one bottles of beer on the wall, six-hundred-forty-one bottles of beer. You take one down, you pass it around, six-hundred-forty bottles of beer on the wall.”
Forgoing ninety-nine for nine-hundred-ninety-nine probably wasn’t a large enough number to start with. I thought I’d get bored long before hitting the six-hundreds. But, staring at the ceiling, hands resting on my belly, I had nothing else to do… so I counted imaginary beer bottles. It totally made me yearn for a real beer.
Beers hadn’t been plentiful in my diet prior to my foray as a convict, for three reasons: one, they were a luxury for the rich; two, they tended to loosen my tongue, and keeping my secrets was a necessity; and three, I’d been a bartender once.
I’d christened that job with my third scream-death and an Irish exit. The experience, one of the first times the urge to shriek had overcome me, spooked me into hightailing it out of the city prematurely, speeding up my timeline, and quickly moving onto the next.
The difference between that death—well, all of them before the alley guy—was that there’d been a crowd. Surrounded by other patrons, no one could accuse me of being the culprit. You’d have thought the bar was full of banshees with the number of patrons who’d been screaming their heads off at the blood and shattered glass.
Never stand out. Hiding in plain sight is best accomplished when you can fade into a crowd.
The alley had been just me and the mugger... and the victim, at least until the witnesses showed up. There’d been no one else to help him like at the bar. It was being alone, on my own, that had really screwed me over. I missed my parents.
A pang of grief struck between the ribs and deep into my heart. We’d been a close-knit, if unconventional, family. They’d been more than their constant paranoia and protection training. I hadn’t hated them—besides those early teen years, right before I’d lost them, when they kept dragging me place to place, right when I’d make friends. And they had imbued me with a lot of wisdom, maybe not about their pasts or my own true nature but street smarts.
If I really was a banshee, cursed with screaming myself hoarse when people around me died, it was a wonder I hadn’t been caught before now. The screaming hadn’t really started until about a year ago. Maybe it had a delayed onset thing, like puberty—a much later supernatural puberty? Was I going to live longer than a human? Maybe an extended life meant a more stretched biological timeline.
I had so much to learn about being a supernatural.
Never rely on anyone else. You can only trust yourself. Even those who have been loyal to you before can be bought.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. My new friends had really proven that one. But I was beginning to suspect I, at the least, needed a mentor to teach me how to keep myself out of these situations.
Seke had inferred that he could educate me. He seemed infinitely wise, composed, and comfortable navigating the prison system. And he was fun to spend time with. Real easy on the eyes. There were worse babysitters out there.
I’d take him.
In fact, if he’d joined me in this cell, I might have preferred that my confinement be extended. That could have been a much better way to spend my time than counting bottles. But his team had turned on me, gotten me stuck in this claustrophobic closet. I didn’t think he’d be popping around anytime soon to give me something more pleasant to scream about, hopefully, multiple many times…
I snorted at my dirty joke and began to toy with my hair just for something new to do that wasn’t digitally oriented. The sexual joke I’d made with Seke truly tempted me in that moment.
I wound the strands in spirals around my fidgety fingers. My hair already felt greasy and gunked, but my internal clock indicated that I’d only been in here for a few hours. It was impossible to confirm that without a window…. Or clock. No meals had yet been shoved through the little slot, and Cole hadn’t returned with any reading material. A tangle of contradictory indicators, for sure.
How many years had it taken Cole to curate his dreads? I’d have asked him if I thought his doggy side wouldn’t bite my head off. I was praying to the gods—even Seke—that he would keep his word and come back with the books. I’d seen a slip of compassion and pity at the end there, despite him slamming the door in my face.
When the odds are against you, find the weak link and loosen it any way you can.
I decided to grill him on supernatural facts when he did come back. Not just hair styling tips for the shower-less and bored but things about me, about banshees. If there were others. Where I could find them.
My thoughts were going in circles. But fuck, what else was a girl to do when that’s all she’s got for company? That and six-hundred-forty bottles of beer on the wall…
Or was it forty-one?
“Shit. Now I have to start over,” I muttered, rolling onto my side and taking a deep breath. “Nine-hundred-ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, nine-hundr—”
I sat up on my hard bed with a gasp, my heart hammering and senses firing. Holding my breath, I felt my eyes widen as the faint sounds of feral yells and screaming penetrated the thick walls of what I was quickly envisioning as my tomb.
The screams weren’t mine.
Clangs, bashes, shouts, and cries rose from the world beyond my little prison within the prison.
Rising, I padded quietly toward the door as if I needed stealth. As if I wasn’t already locked away from whatever horrors were going down in some other wing of the prison. Pressing onto the tips of my toes, I could only see a barren cement wall across the hallway that spanned maybe ten feet across. The view was blurry and without details as a result of the scratches and initials etched onto the window from the inside.
It sounded like every woman in the ward was engaged in a fight, but some were shouting instructions to each other, working together as if…
My dream flashed in my head. But this wasn’t how it had happened in my dream. I’d been standing over CO Michaels. I’d seen his disfigured face. Apparently, there was more to learn about my abilities.