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Chapter Three

Vail

Samara was in so much pain, she was delirious.

I knew this because she was currently curled up on my lap—a place she would never have been if she weren’t out of it.

It was the second day of her cycle. The first hadn’t seemed too bad, although that was most likely due to the fact that she’d chugged the tea I’d brought her like it had been the answer to all her problems before asking for more.

I’d traumatized the kitchen staff with the way I’d barged in there repeatedly throughout the day, demanding more of the tea brewed specifically to dull cramps and help with pain.

When Samara had thanked me after the fourth cup instead of threatening to cut my balls off, I’d known things were about to get bad.

But bad had been an understatement.

Samara had barely moved all day. She’d just curled up in the corner of her cell on the pile of blankets I’d stolen from every vacant bedroom I could find. She’d practically bitten my head off when I’d suggested she ask to be moved to a bedroom just until this was over.

“I’m a prisoner,” she’d spat. “Carmilla will want something if I make such a request.” Then her eyes had flashed black. “She will get nothing from me.”

I thought about going behind her back and asking Carmilla directly, but she had to know the state her niece was in.

Even if she hadn’t been to see Samara herself, Carmilla was the type of leader who always knew everything that was going on under her roof, and given how I’d stormed into the kitchen demanding the tea . . .

If Carmilla wanted to ease her niece’s suffering, she could have done it at any time, which meant Samara was right. If she asked for a room and a more comfortable setting, she would have to agree to something.

Samara was frustratingly stubborn but not without reason. If the situation were reversed, I would have remained in the cell too.

Which was why I was sitting here with Samara wrapped in several blankets and tucked against my chest. She’d been drifting in and out of sleep, mumbling something about a crown that I couldn’t quite make out. My arms tightened around her soft body.

This was the first time she’d allowed me to touch her since everything that had gone down in the throne room. Since I’d chosen Carmilla over her. At least, that was the way Samara viewed it.

I hadn’t known this was how things were going to go though.

I’d thought that once Carmilla and Samara spoke, everything would be okay.

That they’d work it out and everything would go back to how it had been—the two of them working together.

I mean, they both wanted the same thing—for the Moroi to survive.

It was Draven’s fault. Samara had fucking lost it when that prick, Lucian, had stabbed him through the chest, and now it felt like there was a growing divide. Carmilla and her followers—myself included—on one side. Samara with her lot on the other.

I didn’t know what Kieran, Alaric, and Roth had been told, and Carmilla requested that I not inform them of anything for now because she wanted to manage what information got back to House Harker.

But the rumors about Velika’s downfall and Carmilla’s rise had to be spreading throughout the Moroi realm, so I wasn’t really sure how well her plan would work.

Nobody was better at collecting rumors than Kieran, and he would have shared whatever he’d discovered with Alaric and Roth.

I would’ve thought they would have been here already, demanding her release.

But then . . . they knew about the crown.

Surely Carmilla wouldn’t use it on them though?

Roth was a bit of an unknown, but Carmilla had known Alaric his entire life, and she liked Kieran.

Maybe if they were here, they could talk some sense into Samara.

Because she sure as shit wasn’t listening to me.

She let out a pained whimper, and I slipped one of my hands beneath the blankets to rub her back. “It’s okay, Samara,” I said roughly. “I got you.”

“Vail,” she murmured, turning her face into me to inhale my scent.

I bent my head down to nuzzle her hair. She’d be back to either ignoring me or trying to stab me in a couple of days, so I had to take what I could get.

I hoped she’d go for my throat honestly.

When she’d looked at me with hate in her eyes after everything that had gone down in the throne room, it’d hurt, but that was nothing compared to when she’d coldly blocked me out.

The violence, I could handle, because at least I knew she was feeling something towards me. I’d happily take that over pretending I didn’t exist.

Samara had always consumed my soul. Love or hate, it had always been her.

I spent every waking moment thinking about her, and the fact that she could so easily cast me away pissed me off beyond reason. It was exactly why she’d done it. Samara could be a vicious fucking cunt.

And gods, I loved that about her.

My body went still as I heard someone coming down the stairwell. The guards did regular sweeps of the dungeon levels, but they never stepped foot inside this one if I was here.

They never went into the room where Draven’s cell was either, just looked through the small window in the door to make sure he was still there. Even imprisoned, the Moroi Prince was feared.

Aside from me, the prince’s only visitor was Lucian.

I hadn’t told Samara that though. While I didn’t approve of her devotion to that half-Fae bastard, I wasn’t going to tell her that the man who had tortured him for most of his life paid him regular visits.

He currently wasn’t able to do him any physical harm, but Lucian did enjoy bringing a bottle of wine down to Draven’s cell and recounting the many ways he had tormented the fallen prince over the years.

It was fucked up. I didn’t understand what Carmilla saw in him. It was on my growing list of things that just didn’t add up.

It wasn’t Lucian who walked through the door though—it was Demetri.

Another mystery I didn’t fucking get. Why was Carmilla working with him? And why was she so keen on Samara marrying him again? She’d never mentioned that to me, and when I’d asked her about it days ago, she’d just brushed me off.

“Is there a reason you’re groping my wife?” he asked idly as his sharp hazel eyes scrutinized the blankets covering Samara, as if he was trying to figure out where exactly my hands were.

A warning growl rumbled from me. Samara was half delirious.

What type of person would take advantage of her in a situation like this?

Even when I’d been moving her around, I’d been careful to keep my hands over her clothes They were currently resting around her lower back and ribs, but he couldn’t see that.

“Ex-wife.” I gave him a cold look.

“Not for much longer. She’ll be mine again soon.

” He shrugged and moved closer to the cell.

I’d closed it when I’d stepped inside to be with Samara, and despite how much Carmilla wanted Demetri around, she hadn’t given him the ability to open Samara’s cell.

Which told me, at least on some level, she didn’t trust the Laurent Heir either.

“She was never yours to begin with.” Tension coiled within me.

I wanted nothing more than to rip out Demetri’s throat.

He was a threat to Samara, and despite how much she currently hated me, I would protect her.

Unfortunately, Carmilla had been quite clear that I wasn’t to lay a finger on him again.

The little prick had mentioned me losing my temper and slamming him into the wall days ago.

“Your marriage to her was nothing but a political move to strengthen the alliance between our Houses. Samara never belonged to you.”

“And you think she belongs to you now?” Demetri skimmed his fingers across the bars of the cage. “Do you really think you’ll get her in the end? After everything you’ve done to her?” He gave me a knowing glance. “She’ll never choose you. Not now.”

The deep pit that had opened up in my soul when I’d handed over that cursed crown cracked open a little more. Demetri’s eyes glinted in the dim lighting of the dungeon, and he smiled at seeing his barbed remark strike true.

Samara hissed and tensed in my arms. Another cramp must have been hitting her.

The tea that dulled the pain was also a light sedative, and she’d practically chugged the kettle earlier.

Her eyelids fluttered for a second, and she turned her head away from my chest, inhaling deeply.

She started to settle back down, but then she abruptly went completely still in my arms.

“Samara’s a smart girl. She’ll eventually come to realize that marrying me again is in not only her best interest, but that of our Houses—and the Moroi realm as a whole.”

I stared at him. Moroi tended to be arrogant, but Demetri was taking it to a whole other level.

Samara started to shift her position, her movements slow enough and hidden by the blanket that I didn’t think Demetri noticed as he paced on the other side of the bars.

“You cheated on her,” I said flatly. “All you had to do was not be an asshole and she’d still be married to you right now.”

Because Samara always did right by the House.

I’d doubted her for a long time, but I knew that now.

Carmilla wanted what was best too. They just needed more time to come to an agreement, but Demetri would not be part of that agreement.

That was a line in the sand I knew Samara wouldn’t cross.

She might hate me, but she loved Kieran, Alaric, and Roth—and Draven, but I was ignoring that for now. She would never leave them.

And they’d slit Demetri’s throat before they ever let him lay a finger on her again. If I didn’t do it first.

“That was a misunderstanding.” Demetri waved a hand dismissively.