Strong hands landed on me— several pairs. The guards pulled Edwin and me apart, but I was still out for blood. I yanked an arm out of one of their grasps and swung at Edwin again, but he was too far from me now.
“Filthy Elementai!” Edwin sneered, before he spit at my feet.
“You’re headed back to the Institute,” a guard with a deep voice snapped. “All three of you.”
Chancey sucked in ragged breaths. He didn’t even fight the accusation that he had anything to do with the brawl. Instead, he simply said, “Charlie’s with me.”
“You’re coming, too,” the guard barked back at him.
Shit. Did I just drag Chancey down with me?
Someone yanked my hands behind my back and slapped noxite cuffs on my wrists. I stopped struggling as the guards began dragging me away. Reality sank in, and I realized where the guards were taking me. I’d started a fight within the prison, which meant I’d have to answer to the Warden. I’d end up in Cellblock 9, just as Edwin had threatened.
Fuck, what had I done?
I chastised myself the whole way back, out of the mines and onto the bus that transported inmates to and from the school. I’d just ruined everything good I had going on at the Institute. And Ava and Oberi…? I didn’t know when I’d see them again. No one who went into Cellblock 9 got out. They either died down there or were transferred to the adult penitentiary. All for… what? A fight that barely brought me satisfaction? I’d have done a lot more than draw blood if I were given the chance.
The guards led Chancey, Edwin, and me inside the school. Edwin yelled profanities, like that would somehow convince the guards the fight wasn’t his fault. They dragged him down a hall away from Chancey and me, until his voice faded. Maybe theydidbelieve him, seeing as he wasn’t going wherever the hell we were.
“Keep walking,” a guard snapped, shoving me forward.
I quickened my pace and heard the sound of a heavy door open.
“Stairs ahead,” Chancey told me.
The air was damp as we stepped into a wide stairwell, which went downward. Fuck... we were headed straight to Cellblock 9.
“Don’t I get to appeal to the Warden?” I asked.
One of the guards chuckled. “The Warden doesn’t deal with cases like yours. Consider yourself lucky.”
“Lucky?” I practically choked on the word.
No one responded. They kept leading me down hall after hall, until I couldn’t make out where we were anymore. It was somewhere in the basement of the school, but a place hidden so deep in the maze of hallways, I was sure I’d never find my way out.
The Institute’s basement consisted of several chambers— one of them being the pool for merpeople, the other being Cellblock 9. But wherever the guards were taking me didn’t seem to be either of them. I didn’t hear the splashes of the siren pool, or the screams that I was certain had to be the background for Cellblock 9.
A door opened, and I was sure it was my new cell. But I realized immediately this was no cell at all. The air expanded to a large room. I heard the sound of various footsteps shuffling around, along with ongoingthudsthat sounded like fists hitting a punching bag. Voices overlapped one another.
“Give me all you’ve got, Damien,” a gruff voice said. “Mama didn’t raise no pussy.”
“Your punch is weak, Deuce,” one student said to another.
“You hit like a little bitch! Think you’ll win your next fight with that technique?”
Holy hell. This wasn’t Cellblock 9. This was a fuckingtraining center.
“Don’t quit on me now, Damien—” the man with the gruff voice said, before cutting off abruptly. “Chancey,” he greeted— like the two were great friends. “What have you brought me today?”
“Elementai, sir,” Chancey announced. “He’s blind, but one hell of a fighter.”
The guard who’d been dragging me along released the noxite cuffs on my wrists. I leaned over to Chancey and growled, “What the hell is this?”
Chancey clapped me on the shoulder. I wasn’t sure he’d ever been wearing cuffs to begin with. “This is the greatest opportunity of your life, my friend.”
The man with the gruff voice approached us, his footsteps heavy against the concrete floor. I could tell he was huge by the way the air moved around him— definitely the body-builder type, or perhaps ex-military. He was a vamp, best I could tell. He sounded thoughtful, like he was sizing me up. “I recognize you. Charlie Wahkin, is it? You nearly won the Darke Games.”
I cleared my throat. “Yes, sir.”
