Page 85

“Can I help you?” I asked him.

“Just checking on my favorite prisoner,” he said with a taunting grin. “I heard the princess got tired of you and sent you down here. What happened?”

I strolled to the bars, holding his gaze.He really thinks he’s getting somewhere with this.

There were a mere few feet between us. So close, I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

“Do you always drink on the job?” I asked, tilting my head. “I bet your head guard will have something to say about it when I tell him.”

He shook his head and let out a laugh before leaning forward and dropping his voice to a whisper. “You’re never getting out of here. You came here thinking you’re hot shit, but look at you now. Do you even remember what you did to me?”

I raised my brow at him. “I don’t even know you,” I admitted.

His entire expression changed. The playful smirk dropped and was replaced with a sneer.

“The prince’s palace,” he said. “You and I were set to spar. You’re the reason I was pushed to the lower ranks and am now stuck in this hellhole.”

I racked my memory trying to remember his face, but the time at the prince’s palace was such a blur. All I did there was attempt to move up as high as I could in the ranks before being given to the princess.

I huffed. “You must have sucked pretty hard to bethatunmemorable.”

He let out a growl and pushed his hand through the bars, the sharp sound of electricity drowning out everything else. I maneuvered to the side, the current zapping me on the bicep.

I let out a groan and took a step back. The human guard looked awfully fucking pleased with himself.

“But nowI’mthe one in charge?—”

I lunged at the bars, my arm slipping past them and grabbing the collar of his shirt, and I used my body weight to slam him against the metal. He let out a pained moan as his face wasforced against the dirty bars. There was nothing for him to grab on to, and his arms flailed.

I used my free hand to grab the offending stick and threw it far inside my cell.

“You have anything else to do other than annoy me?” I growled and twisted the collar of his shirt, cutting off his air supply. Then, I remembered an image of him under me as I flipped him in front of the head guards at the prince’s palace. “Idoremember you. You didn’t even last a second. Even behind these bars, I can make you regret everything you just did and beg for your mother to come save you. Shall we find out just how much I can do with these bars between us?”

His mouth flopped open and closed like a washed-up fish. The fear was finally starting to show in his eyes, and he was realizing just how much he had fucked up.

It felt good.

I used to hate my job. Hated that I was good at it. Hated that I made people suffer. But people like him? I wanted to watch it all.

“Just kill him, why don’t you?” a familiar, grating voice called from down the darkened hallway.

I could.It was very tempting. But the intruder reminded me just how short my leash was and just how easily the king could kill me if he so chose to.

My eyes drifted to the intruder.

With bright red hair casting an orange shine due to the oil lamps that lit the dungeon’s hallways, she took up most of the hallway, and her presence was almost hypnotic with the way my eyes were all but forced to look at her.

Cedar.The fucking witch who proved to be a pain in the ass. There was something about her that alarmed me. She knew too much. Even before Aurelia told me about what the prince and her stepfamily were doing, she seemed to know it all.

But how?

She said she wasn’t a seer…Had one sent her here?Princess Aurelia was never my job.So who was? Witches worked in covens. Had other people had the vision? And just how much had they seen?

All this time, I had been focusing on Aurelia…but maybe I should have been focusing onher.

She had her hands in her pockets and walked at an alarmingly calm pace, her eyes traveling around the dungeon, and that little smirk on her face told me just how much she was enjoying the show I was putting on.

I didn’t let the guard go until he finally passed out from lack of oxygen. I didn’t need his interference. Not when I had so much to question the witch about. His body fell to the ground in a heap.