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Story: Feral Beauty

Prologue

Fire lickedVivian Laurent’s sweat-slicked flesh. With every breath she took, heat scorched her lungs. The walls of her prison burned down around her. She eyed the spreading flames, despair threatening to paralyze her. She was trapped.

No. I’ve survived too much to die this way.

Blood coated her hand, her palm becoming sticky. She clenched her fist, forcing her blood oath through gritted teeth.“This will not break me.” For vampires, it was an unbreakable vow, one born of pain and suffering. Not unlike her mockery of a relationship.

At least Vivian had remained true to the promises she’d made.Until death do us part, mon amour.

She eyed the concrete cell behind her. The iron door she’d come to loathe remained open, never to close again.

Her prison.

His tomb.

Between her and the stairwell, tables of glass beakers and bubbling chemicals gleamed with a threatening light. Shelves teeming with hundreds of black-spined journals lined the walls. Pages upon pages of a madman’s endless experiments filled them, every detail recorded with the scientific precision he was known for. All the heinous acts he’d performed to benefit the underworld.

To benefit them both. Or so he’d claimed.

Before her was the culmination of her lover’s many achievements. The life’s work of a monster. Every word, every discovery, reduced to kindling for the fire. The journals, paired with the toxic chemicals, were an explosive combination.

Again, not unlike her tumultuous relationship with the mage.

Burn, damn you.

She pressed her palm against the bloody wound in her chest and staggered to the stairwell. Tonight would be the last time he laid his hands on her. The impending explosion would destroy all traces of her crime while the flames would burn the evidence of her naivety, her hopes and dreams to the ground.

Never again would she be so vulnerable.

At the base of the steps, she grasped the iron railing and jerked her hand away, crying out. Blisters painted her palm. She’d suffered far worse over the years.

Behind her, the fire spread, impeding her escape. Smoke filled her lungs, and she coughed, gasping for breath. The roaring inferno threatened to consume her. To drag her deep into that merciless hell.

I will not die here. Not with him.

She staggered up the steps on bare feet, flames nipping at her heels.

Up. Up. Up.

Out of his lab. Out of his pit of depravity.

Finally, she broke free of the stairwell and stumbled into the living room. Heat scorched her thighs. She patted the flames, snuffing out the tattered remains of her virginal gown. He’d dressed her in sacrificial white. Sick bastard. If she survived, she’d never wear white again.

The path between her and the front door was so near and yet so far away. She was almost there. This was the closest she’d ever come to freedom.

Over the years, she’d made many attempts to escape, and yet each time, she’d failed.

Bells chimed.Clang. Clang.

Across the room, the porcelain clock on the mantle counted down the hour. Her knees threatened to fold at the sound. It had been so long since she heard its familiar song.

Clang. Three.

She used to track the time with those chimes.

Clang.Four.

How long had he kept her underground? Days, months, years? After a while, she’d stopped counting. But never, not once, did she stop plotting, stop scheming, stop fighting.