Eva reached over, snapping her hand back as the intense vibrations stung her fingertips.
“They’re designed to weaken you,” Augustine said as he stopped at a thick metal door, slowly unlocking the deadbolt. “Wild magic that can take your strength away, remove the ability to shift as well as strangle your chi, if you were a magic bearer. Perfect for what we need, but like many Fae stuff it interferes with modern equipment and electricity. Good thing I came from a time where we didn’t have those luxuries.” A smirk. “Through here.”
The room Augustine stepped into was in complete darkness, large if she guessed by how the sounds of crying echoed, Eva’s eyes taking a second to adjust as random bursts of light brightened in the corners. It distorted her vision, her ability to see somewhat in the pitch black flickering every time there was a new random glow.
It was only when she stepped further inside that she stopped, able to make out the cells that surrounded the entire room. Men and women stood behind thickened bars, floor to ceiling that criss-crossed. The light veins tracked beneath the bars, forcing whoever was inside to carefully move in the tight space. Most were dark, but some brightened when the occupants moved closer to the door.
“What is this?” she asked.
The prisoners’ cries and angry screams became louder. She couldn’t distinguish their words, their voices a confusing muddle. Augustine’s hand snaked around her wrist, yanking her further inside, closer to the bars.
“These are my Units. Each one will fight for their survival on the sands, and if they outlive one-hundred fights they can negotiate their freedom.” He shoved her forward, straight into the bars. “Not that many of them will survive that long.” The prisoners shrunk back, further away.
Eva tried to pull back, but he held her there. “Please!”
“Look at them,” he whispered. “Look at the faces that are about to die a painful death for my and my clients enjoyment.” Augustine stepped behind her, pressing her further into the bars, his body flush against hers. “My patience is wearing thin, if you embarrass me in public, or try to escape I’ll put you in there. Because even if you do escape, you’ll be returned to me where I’ll make you fight on the sands, and then be auctioned off afterwards when you lose. You won’t die, because I won’t allow it. But make no mistake, you’ll beg for death that will never happen.”
Chapter14
Kace
Kace recognised the decrepit townhouse despite the garden having overgrown to the point the rose bush partially concealed the broken front door. It had been condemned, which wasn’t all that surprising considering the damage he had witnessed the last time he was there. The official sign had been repurposed, blocking a window either from the sun or the cold, nails haphazardly secured into the thickened cardboard. Smashed glass and hypodermics crushed beneath his boots as he ascended the steps, having to step over someone passed out in the doorway.
“Hey, you can’t just come in here,” a man growled from the corner, a rucksack open beside him full of various powders and pills in neat little plastic bags. “You gotta…”
The dealer shut up as soon as Kace turned his head, the blade that flashed hidden quickly beneath a sleeve. “Miss Smith, she here?” he asked in an irate tone.
“Upstairs,” the dealer replied quickly. “Think she’s servicing.”
Kace couldn’t stop his growl, fists clenched as he found the stairs at the back of the house. Each room was full of dirty mattresses and blankets with used food cans laying forgotten bar the flies, mould and shit a heavy odour.
Fake cries of pleasure echoed down the upstairs hall, and Kace didn’t bother to knock as he searched each individual room. There were no locks, nothing to stop his kick as the final door on the hall opened to reveal a naked couple.
“Fuck off, would ya?” the man snapped, not stopping the pumping of his hips. “I paid for an hour.”
The man yelped when Kace yanked him by his hair, slamming the door shut when he shoved him out into the hall cursing. The woman barely let out a cry, trying to hide herself with a sheet, the material hardly covering the track marks that decorated her arms like a red siren. Hunter’s mother was slimmer than before, more bone than flesh.
“When was the last time you saw your son?”
Miss Smith frowned, reaching over for a cigarette that was balanced in an ashtray. She flicked the lighter three times, Kace’s patience wearing thin before it finally brightened with a flame and she took a deep drag.
“I don’t care what he’s done, it’s not my problem,” she said with a splutter. “That’s exactly what I told the other prick who came looking for him a few days ago too.”
“Answer the question.”
Her eyes narrowed, lip tipping into a smirk. “If you want to talk, you gotta pay.”
Kace threw some cash on the bed, careful not to get too close as she shuffled forward to count it, the sheet long forgotten. If she was beautiful, she wasn’t now, her skin shrunken and scarred from abuse. There were fresh bruises across her shoulders, deep bites that looked infected on her throat. It took serious effort to look like that when a shifter.
“Hunter was around here a few days ago,” she said, licking her lips. “Was all upset about something, said he knew a way to get some quick cash. He was meeting with someone that night.”
“Do you know where he went or who he met?”
“Look, I’ve already told the other guy this shit,” she said with a huff, her eyes slightly glazed. “I don’t know, and I don’t care. I’ve told him to stay away, I don’t want him here after what he’s done.”
Kace breathed through his anger, knowing how fine an edge he walked. The woman naked on the bed should never have been made a mother, not when she would rather hand off her child to known abusers rather than skip a high. It was Hunter who reached out to the Vaults once the dealers turned their eyes to his younger sister. And it was Hunter who was blamed when his sister was beaten to death by the same people his mother fucked for money.
“Do you know how to contact The Vault if he comes back?”
