The elevator door slid open smoothly and I stepped out into a long corridor with metal walls. I passed the turning that led to the Fate Room then hurried past the medical bay to the main entrance into the prison.
Another heavy steel door barred my way forward and I headed through it, spotting a guard behind a grate to my left and a set of wide elevator doors to my right. That was the single way in and out of this prison. There were only four authorised staff in the whole of Darkmore who could open those doors and, as a Commanding Officer, I was one of them. They were locked tight with magical scanners, bio scanners and a master key which was locked up tight in the guard’s booth beside me when it wasn’t in use. The guards could head out of here when they weren’t on shift, but every exit was recorded and filed. To put it simply, once you were down in Darkmore, you didn’t get out again unless the Warden said so.
“Evening.” Officer Lyle scratched at his red beard, his eyes skipping to the CCTV monitor beside him. The angle it was at meant I couldn’t see the inmate in their magical holding cell, but Lyle’s concerned expression made me frown.
“She’s a wild one, the FIB almost didn’t want to risk healing her on the way in, but she was burned real bad,” he commented, signing something on a form before placing a lightning taser in a tray for me to take.
“I won’t need that,” I tsked.
Lightning tasers were for the crazies. Ten thousand volts zapped the magic right out of them and left them completely unconscious. When they came around half a day later, they were disorientated and tended to be pretty fucking compliant, but it wasn’t without risk. Those fuckers could kill and if I offloaded one, I’d be filling out paperwork for weeks to come over some dead delinquent. They were three times as powerful as the shock batons we carried around and that was saying something.
“Warden’s orders,” Lyle said with a shrug. “Apparently she’s a biter.”
I snatched the lightning taser with a sigh and moved to the security door. It slid open and I stepped into the space before the next door while the first slid closed behind me. A buzzing noise drilled into my ears then the door opened and I marched into the processing room.
The first thing I noticed was that the girl was tit-to-toe naked, standing in the centre of the room between glowing blue bars which reached from the floor to ceiling around her. The cell containing her was barely a meter wide which meant she must have been climbing the walls in here before they’d caged her. The magical cell could be set to any width and the crazies always ended up in the smallest space.
The glowing blue cuffs on her wrists kept her magic locked down, but she flexed her fingers like she hoped to fight her way past the barrier blocking her power all the same.
Her body was lithe, and lean muscle clung to every inch of her, her waist tight and her skin bronzed. A flowering rose vine tattoo curved up the left side of her body from her thigh to her neck and ebony hair fell around her like a sheet, covering her tits but her pussy was bare and I wasn’t Fae enough to stop my reaction to that. My jaw tightened as my dick swelled shamelessly for the wild-looking girl in her cage. I was way above fucking inmates, but more than one had tried to seduce me for the sake of a few privileges. I never caved. Was never even tempted by a prisoner before now.
“What’s your Order?” I demanded, pulling out my Atlas to fill in her intake form. The small, top of the range tablet fit in the back pocket of my pants and was just one of the perks of working here.
“Werewolf,” she said, a growl leaving her throat and I didn’t let her see my surprise at that. I would have guessed she was a Siren based on her allure; they were built for temptation and lust. “I’m Rosalie Oscura, Alpha of the infamous Oscura-”
“I don’t care if you were the Vegas’ personal bodyguard or you gave Lionel Acrux blowjobs for a living. You’re nothing more than a number in here now. Twelve to be precise. And do you know why you’ve been assigned that number?” I strode forward, surveying her through the bars and forcing her to look up at me even more so as I drew closer.
“Because it’s your favourite number?” she asked sweetly.
“I don’t have a favourite anything, Twelve,” I said with a sneer. “The last inmate to wear that number got shanked in the night. Forty eight puncture wounds to the lungs. Bled out in less than a minute. You can’t rely on your magic in here, the physically weak and the terminally stupid end up in body bags faster than it takes to process them. So if you’re going to cause me all that paperwork, I suggest you be a doll and slit your throat now to save me the hassle.”
Her jaw tightened but she didn’t pale at my words. I liked when they squirmed, but she was holding firm.
“I hope they got me a new jumpsuit then, it sounds like the old one was ruined,” she said lightly, giving me one of those apple pie grins again.
I wonder if her blood is as sweet as her smile.
“Element?” I demanded, raising my Atlas once more.
“Earth,” she answered.
I filled in the box then tapped the controls on my Atlas, dissolving the cage around her and pointing to the glass shoot across the room. An orange jumpsuit slid down it, her Order and Element now magically printed on it in silver alongside her number. Plain black underwear, a white tank and black boots already waited for her beside it.
“Get dressed,” I commanded.
“What’s a girl got to do to get a drink around here? I’m parched.” She ignored my order, walking toward me with her hips swaying and her eyelashes fluttering. She tossed her hair back to expose her pert breasts and desire rose its head in me like a deadly animal.
“Get. Dressed,” I growled, taking a wider stance. “Do not test me, inmate.” I coaxed flames into my hands with my fire Element but she didn’t back off, still moving toward me like a seductress, all long lashes and naked perfection. I was hard as stone and furious as hell as she closed the gap between us. She was about to find out exactly what happened to people who tried to bribe me.
I waited for her to move up into my personal space, letting her grind her body on me and enjoying the feeling of those hardened nipples pressing through my black shirt.
“Just a little glass of water,” she breathed, giving me the bed eyes which had probably worked on men her entire life. But she’d picked the wrong officer to try and wrap around her little finger.
I caught her by the throat, wheeling her around and threw her against the wall. She gasped as I slammed my chest to her back to hold her in place, wrenching her head sideways with a fistful of her hair. She went to retaliate and I pressed against her harder.
“Fight back and you’ll earn yourself a month in isolation, is that really how you wanna start your sentence?” She fell still and a satisfied smile pulled at my mouth. “If you refuse a direct order, Twelve, you pay the price. If you try and seduce a single officer in Darkmore again, I’ll have you sent to magical interrogation and perhaps Dr Quentin will stitch you right up so you can’t ever spread your legs for a favour.”
“I’d cut your dick off before I ever touched it!” she snapped.
A smile pulled at my mouth as I held her in place, wrapping my hand tighter in her hair. I secretly loved a rebel, especially when I got a drink out of them. But I couldn’t do it here with four cameras pointed at me.
“Looks like I let the wild animal out of her cage at last. Try to bullshit me again, Twelve, I dare you,” I growled in her ear.
I couldn’t do much about the fact that my cock was pressed to her ass and throbbing with need. The best I could hope for was that she mistook it for my shock baton because it was kind of undermining my fucking point.
She laughed manically, throwing her head back and resting it against my shoulder to look up at me. “That’s a very professional boner you’re sporting, Officer. What will the Warden think of that?”
She looked straight up at one of the cameras in the corner, but Lyle was the only one watching and he was under my thumb. Besides, he probably didn’t have the volume up, he�
��d be too busy listening to some romantic audiobook and taking notes on how to spice up his sex life with his boyfriend.
“Get dressed!” I roared, throwing her across the room with my Vampire strength. She stumbled into the table, before snatching her clothes and pulling them on. I watched unblinkingly, folding my arms and waiting until she had the jumpsuit in place and tugged her hair out from under the collar.
“Now what?” she asked, that fucking smile back on her face. I had a feeling that smile was going to taunt me a lot during her time here.
My breathing was heavy and I tried to drown my desire for her by sheer force of will. She probably wouldn’t be a problem for long anyway. New inmates often ended up dead while trying to fight for positions of power in the prison. She wouldn’t even get a cell if she didn’t force someone out of their bed for it.
“You’d better learn to keep your mouth shut and your head bowed around me, inmate. You don’t want to make an enemy out of me.”
“No, Officer,” she said in a low voice, all her girlish charm abandoned as she strolled toward me with a sinister look in her eyes. “You don’t want to make an enemy out of me. I ran half of Alestria back home. I rose in the ranks faster than any of my siblings or cousins. I’m a queen where I come from, an Alpha of the most powerful Werewolf pack in Solaria.”
I smirked down at her. “This is Darkmore Penitentiary, Twelve. Alestria might be the most dangerous city in the kingdom, but it’s not the most dangerous place. You’re about to be locked up with vicious murderers, Fae who take pleasure in cutting off pieces of pretty little Werewolves like you.” At last, she paled and my heart swelled with victory as I wound my way under her skin. I dipped my head to get right up in her face. “And if you think I’m employed to protect you, you’re wrong. I’m here to keep you inside these walls. I‘m here to punish you when you break the rules. I’m here to carry your dead body out of your cell piece by piece when a monster crawls into your bed and guts you in the night.”
She wet her lips, blinking hard as she lifted her chin. “Not if I gut them first though, right Officer Cain?” she read the name on my badge then turned away, rolling her neck and stretching her limbs like she was preparing for a fight.
I didn’t respond but my lips were tempted into a smile. I lifted my Atlas, wondering what this girl could have done to land herself in here as I flipped back through the form the FIB had filled in. She already had a sizeable criminal record, but it looked like she’d gotten away with most of it by paying fines. Bribes more like. If she really was from the Oscura Clan, she and her Wolf gang would have had law enforcement paid off on a regular basis.
Tonight, she’d gone too far. She’d robbed a Solarian Bank of twenty million auras and murdered an innocent security guard in the process.
Fucking killer.
Twelve crept closer in my periphery and I caught her glancing at the screen. “Stand back, inmate,” I snarled.
“I just-” she started.
“Stand back!” I commanded.
She laughed, snatching the Atlas from my hands and I saw red. There was only one way to teach a rogue Fae like her the rules. And I was done playing nice.
I snatched her arms into my grip, letting my fire magic sear out of me and scorch her skin. She yelped in pain, dropping my Atlas and I bared my fangs at her.
“You obey or you pay,” I growled in her face.
“Stop!” she cried, trying to yank her wrists free as I continued to burn her, the first sign of fear flickering in her eyes. I swung her around, losing all sense of myself as determination invaded me and speared through every nerve ending in my body. I needed utter compliance, and she was going to learn how to submit the hard way.
The door flew open and Lyle raced in, throwing out a hand and knocking me off of her with a gust of air magic. I squared my shoulders at her as she stared at me in shock, rubbing the blisters on her arms.
“If you disobey me one more time within these walls, Twelve, you’ll find out how much pain I can really deliver.” I shot from the room with my Vampire speed, leaving Lyle to bring her down into the main prison.
If an inmate made an enemy of me, I became the devil in this underworld. I had a blaze of hellfire living in my veins which could make a Fae’s time in here insufferable. And it looked like Twelve had chosen her fate already.
I stood in the wake of psycho Officer Cain, my skin flaring in agony along my wrists where two huge hand prints had been burned into my flesh. I’d done my research before coming here. He’d seemed like a straight up power hungry asshole. A little into rough sex with women he met online and didn’t have to hook up with twice. And a little into the underground hunting scene where he paid other Fae to let him hunt them using his Vampire skills so that he could delve into the darker urges of his Order. But nothing I’d found out about him had suggested he was a full on sadist. Sure, there were plenty of rumours about the guards in this place being rougher than necessary with the inmates, but I hadn’t expected him to flip on me like that. Maybe he’d just been pissed about the fact that it had been obvious how much he wanted to fuck me and I’d pointed it out. Not that it would ever happen. I mean, sure, he was hot in that dark and unattainable kind of way with his I’m-the-big-I-am attitude, and under other circumstances I might have even been up for letting him push me about a bit. But was I going to start screwing a guy who could literally cut my food rations when I got bored of him? No.
Officer Lyle ground his teeth as he closed in on me, releasing his shock baton from his belt as he raised a radio to his lips. “Officers Nichols, Rind and Hastings to the holding cell,” he said in a firm voice, eyeing me like I might just bite him.
“You having trouble with the CMF down there?” came a response which was accompanied by a dark chuckle.
Lyle didn’t respond but he muttered something beneath his breath that sounded like damn newbies.
“So, Lyle, are you going to be healing this shit on my arms or do I need to take it up with your boss?” I asked, holding my hands out towards him to showcase my blistered wrists. They hurt like a bitch but I’d had enough experience of pain in my life to know how to lock it away. I’d been left to bleed for days from wounds worse than this before and it was really just a matter of focus. If I ignored the sensation with enough determination then I could block it out. Mostly.
The blue magic restraining cuffs which encircled my wrists slid down an inch as I presented my arms and I bit my tongue against cursing at the pain of them hitting the burns.
“If you behave for the transfer then I’ll give you a medical before you go into gen-pop. And I can assure you, you really don’t want to go mouthing off at the Warden on your first day. She doesn’t take kindly to visits from pouting little pups,” he said calmly.
“I’m no pup,” I growled, my shoulders tensing at the insult.
“Every untested newbie is a pup. You wanna drop that nickname? Then I suggest you prove yourself amongst the big boys in your cell block the moment you arrive. Because if you can’t assert yourself, they’ll eat you alive in there. Literally. We have more than one inmate who’s in for eating another Fae while in their Order form. And a few that just like the taste of Fae flesh even when they’re not shifted.”
Ew.
I smiled darkly at the challenge in his tone. I wasn’t afraid to prove myself, I did that on a daily basis back home. I hadn’t lost a fight since I was eighteen and I sure as shit on a Sunday wouldn’t be doing it now.
The door buzzed loudly behind him and three burly guards crowded into the space. I recognised two of them instantly from my research. Rind and Nichols. Both Minotaurs, both fairly weak magically and as strong as an ox physically. Neither of them held any deep and dark secrets that my research had uncovered, though Rind had a thing for wearing women’s underwear.
Guard number three was unknown. Which had to equal new. I cocked my head, locking my eyes on him as he assessed me with his chest puffed out and a show of bravado which I was pretty sure I co
uld crack with a few rounds in the ring…or the right kind of manipulation…
“Well don’t you just look like a choir boy dipped in idiota?” I purred, biting my lip as I dragged my eyes over him. He was a little taller than me with beach blonde hair and the kind of pretty face that would make nice girls swoon. I tended to prefer my men with a touch more utterly corrupted to them, but he didn’t need to know that. And bedazzling was one of my crimes after all, so it would be a shame if I didn’t implement my skill set during my incarceration. Technically, using my allure to charm other Fae into committing crimes on my behalf was illegal, but I liked to think that it was a kindness to let them do things for me if it made them happy. I couldn’t help it if the strength of my magic and alpha nature drew weak little Fae to me like moths to a flame. And it would have been a total shame if I didn’t make use of that from time to time.
His uniform had the name Hastings sewn onto the lapel and I made a mental note of it, wondering if I could mould him into the weak link I needed.
“I don’t speak Faetalian,” he replied, raising his chin as he kept a hand on his baton. So the idiota couldn’t figure out what idiota meant? How sad.
“Ti farò diventare la mia cagna, ragazzo del coro,” I purred, twisting my fingers through a lock of my ebony hair and widening my eyes seductively. I’m going to make you my bitch, choir boy.
His lips twitched and his gaze slid over me slowly before he glanced at the other guards. “Now what?” he asked.
“Now we take her to gen-pop and hope she doesn’t flip out again on the way there,” Lyle said, seemingly unimpressed by my act.
Darkmore Penitentiary (Supernatural Prison for Dark Fae Book 1) Page 3