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I barely slept. By the time I got back to one of my sleeping spots—it wasn’t good to stay in the same place too many nights in a row—it was hardly three hours until I needed to be awake. As usual, I fell asleep quickly. No matter what kind of day I had, I couldn’t afford to skip a chance to sleep.

But my dreams were haunted by unnerving red eyes.

Greymere was quiet when I finally woke. My morning routine consisted of tucking away the one threadbare blanket I’d managed to keep from the others for the past year. It also meant I was nowhere near the warmth of the kitchen .

The cold stone of the prison floor always left me sore, even after all these years. My back ached. My shoulders were tight. Grooming amounted to little more than cracking my neck and running my fingers through my hair to clear out some cobwebs.

The hollow hunger was a frequent companion. There was no point trekking over to the kitchen for breakfast. If I tried to get some when it was fresh, I inevitably got elbowed away, delayed from starting my chores—which got me in trouble—and usually didn’t even succeed.

I was scrawny. I couldn’t elbow back. It was better to keep my head down and stay away, so that’s what I did.

I didn’t have time to waste. At least the witch prisoners had the luxury of sleeping in.

I wasn’t so lucky. Voids convicted of crimes unlucky enough to be sent to Greymere didn’t sit in cells—they served.

Born without magic, we were the only ones who could physically tolerate working in Greymere.

No void volunteered to live without the comforts magic offered.

The witches weren’t the only prisoners here.

I set off to check my rat traps.

I’d devised the traps from pieces of half-rotted wood, some spare twine, and metal scraps. They would’ve worked leagues better if I had any food to bait the rats with. Without, I caught at most three on a good day.

I’d gone to Nelson when I’d devised the first prototype. I was young then, maybe nine years old. I’d cast Nelson into the role of a guide, a leader. I’d thought he might be proud of me.

Instead, he snatched the prototype from my tiny hands and threw it on the floor, crushing it under his foot. Of course, that just set off the trap, catching his foot. He yowled, and I’d been so surprised I had actually laughed.

He beat me after that. And I learned not to ask Nelson—not to ask anyone —for anything.

Today, the first trap I checked actually had a rat. I made quick work of it, snapping its neck with practiced ease. It should’ve been a fortuitous start to the day.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

To start, aside from the first, the rats were harder to find than usual.

The screams of the prisoners resumed, amplified when the whipping began.

The halls of Greymere must’ve been engineered to carry sound especially easily, because no matter where I went, I couldn’t escape it.

It wasn’t that the screaming was so unusual.

After all these years, I could normally ignore it.

But not today. Instead, one question ricocheted back and forth over and over.

Was he screaming?

I couldn’t picture it. Even when he tried to order me to release him, his voice had barely risen above its low purr.

Did he really think I would throw everything away to help him?

Perhaps he was simply desperate to escape his fate. They were whipping him. That, I didn’t doubt. The wounds on his back would be barely sealed with the salve. A single stroke would tear apart any healing that had come from last night. Could you kill a vampire that way?

Why even capture a vampire? In all my years at the prison, I’d never seen one. All I had seen was every manner of witch be driven mad.

If he doesn’t die, will he go mad too?

“Look who finally decided to show up.”

I stiffened at Nelson’s voice, cursing the vampire for dominating my thoughts so completely I’d failed in my main task.

My official job was to find the rats. The real one? To avoid Nelson by any means necessary.

I couldn’t say what Nelson did during the day, except that it seemed to be the same thing he did during the evenings: make everyone around him miserable. The air soured from the scent of alcohol on his breath. Nelson had gotten his hands on some spirits. That always made for a worse encounter.

He saw the rat in my hands and snatched it from me. I forced my fingers to loosen, letting him take it.

He lifted it, testing the weight.

“Scrawny.” He gave me a look. Did he want me to seem impressed at his powers of observation? We were coming out of winter. All of us were starving. “You’ll need to find more. Fatter ones.”

“There aren’t any more. They’re all scared of the damned bloodsucker! ”

The words flew from my mouth before I could stop them. For a moment, we just stared at each other. When was the last time I’d talked back to Nelson?

“Oh yes, the bloodsucker you spent the evening with. The guards have been busy with him again today. Maybe you should pay another visit to him tonight.” He gave me a meaningful look.

This time I said nothing. I forced myself to lower my eyes. I didn’t need another sleepless night. Nothing could be worse than another evening in the cell with that awful creature.

He tightened his grip around the carcass. “I’ll take this for my luncheon. Maybe it’ll make you realize you can’t slack off under my watch.”

A whole rat for himself. My entire morning’s work.

I bit down on my tongue so hard it bled. Nelson turned, and I should’ve been relieved it wasn’t worse. Instead, anger rolled through me. Indignation. Feelings I’d do well to forget.

“It’s not forever.”

I meant the refrain to comfort myself, but Nelson heard it even over the choir of screams that rolled down the hall.

“What was that?”

Nothing . That’s what I should have said.

But this time I raised my gaze, forcing myself to really take a look at my bully.

I’d spent the night in a cell with a vampire, argued with him, defied him.

Somehow, Nelson didn’t seem quite as scary by comparison.

Where the vampire was tall, Nelson’s shoulders slouched like he was always falling towards you.

His hair was matted, the same dark dirty brown like all of ours was, because even his elevated position among us didn’t allow for bathing.

“It’s not forever,” I repeated. “My sentence. I only have three years left. Then I’ll be released from this place. You’ll still be here, still taking rats, but I’m going to be free.”

I braced for the slap. For the fury. In that moment, I even convinced myself it would be worth it.

But Nelson didn’t slap me. His face didn’t contort with rage.

He laughed. He laughed so hard the rat he’d stolen dropped to the floor; he clutched his stomach, rolling his head back with laughter.

“Free?” he said between laughs. “You, free? That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in years.”

“Fifteen years. That’s my sentence. I’ve served twelve already.” My words were clipped, quick arrows trying to cut through his laughter.

They bounced off Nelson’s chuckles uselessly. If anything, they made him laugh harder and harder, until he coughed, and his spit flew at me.

Choke , I thought. I pictured it, wrapping my hands around his neck the way I did the rats. Pictured myself twisting.

“You’re too funny. You really think they’ll let you walk out of here? Caria’s tits, that’s a good one. I’ll have to tell Robbie. You’re so simple, Sam.” He loved the sound of his voice dearly. “There’s no end .”

“There is,” I protested. “Three more years.” Just three more, and I could leave these dark, scream-filled halls behind and join the Monastery .

He smirked. “Who d’you suppose is keeping count? Anyone who knew you has forgotten you exist. No one is going to come get you. Think, Sammy.”

My normal revulsion to his assigned nickname was drowned out by the roar in my ears as the implication hit me.

Forgotten by everyone.

“Someone has to sign off on your release. And that someone is me. Your sentence is done when I write to the king and say it’s done.”

My gut twisted. Technically, Nelson wasn’t a prisoner like the rest of us. He was a noble, and while in high society he would’ve been as valuable as a gutter rat, here he had absolute power.

He grinned at my obvious distress. “Who knows? In another ten, twenty years, Sammy, we could be friends, and you’ll talk me into letting the royals know your sentence is finished. But mark my words, you will never leave without my blessing, and you’re nowhere close to earning it.”

Acid boiled in my stomach, a mix of fury and nausea.

“You can’t do that,” I protested, even though reality was forcing the walls to close in on all sides. Because yes, he could .

My future hinged on Nelson’s charity.

I was doomed.

“And who would stop me?” He shrugged, as if it was just a fact of life.

“Besides, you’re better off in here than out there.

Even if ol’ King Stormblood himself came down to pardon a gutter rat like you, do you know what kind of life you’d have?

No one would hire a filthy thing like you.

Even the brothels wouldn’t take you, except to have something cheap on the menu.

When they used you up, you’d be on the streets.

See how much you make begging with your ugly face. ”

Nelson laughed again, then turned, collecting the rat once more.

This time, I didn’t say anything.

His words played on a loop over and over. Twelve years I’d been here. I’d be here ten more. Twenty. Forever, if it was truly up to Nelson. Until either he grew so tired of me he killed me.

Or I killed myself to make it end.

I bent into a corner of the hall and heaved, vomiting up what bit of precious food my stomach had held.

The smell, foul as it was, actually drew the rats forward.

I killed them with only half a mind, still turning over Nelson’s speech.

Even as I killed their brethren, they came forward.

They were starving, and any chance of food, at survival, however disgusting, was worth it to them.

Did they know they were doomed ?

One came slower, dragging a trap half caught on its neck, squealing, squealing. I snapped its neck. Put it out of its misery.

I collected the last of them and brought them to Cook.

Nelson left me alone. Apparently, he’d had his fill of tormenting me today.

But there would be tomorrow.

And the day after. And the one after that.

He’s lying. He has to be. I nearly vomited again in the sink, but there was nothing in me but the barest bit of water. The acidic taste clawed my throat while I forced myself to swallow it down. Now was not the time to show weakness.

Nelson’s taunts played over and over in my head.

My life.

Forever.

If Nelson had his way, I’d never make it to the Monastery.

I’d never see the sun again.

I can’t do this. I can’t.

Death on my terms would be better than a life like this. A life of dark hallways, of killing rats, of Nelson’s taunts.

I took my time with the dishes, my mind clouded and hot. Even when the kitchen emptied, I kept scrubbing dish after dish, my mind turning over what I’d learned. I’d thought about escaping before—it was impossible. Especially for someone like me.

But maybe not for everyone .

Once everyone else had gone to sleep, I tip-toed behind Nelson’s desk and slipped the skeleton key into my pocket. I hid in the shadows and kept my footsteps silent, counting the cells until I hit number 48.

The key slid into the oiled lock without a sound.

Red eyes flared open, meeting mine.

“I’m going to let you out.”