Page 123 of Imprisoned with the Vampire King

"How long did he have?" she asked.

No one answered.

None of us knew.

"Probably the whole time we were in the hallway. Shit. Fuck. He probably had enough time to reach the ladder, if⁠—"

"There's a ladder?" Callum demanded.

"Yeah."

"Of course there's a ladder. We're too deep underground for there not to be a—" Jazz started.

Callum took off at a sprint.

I threw Ophelia over my shoulder and ran after him. River and Jazz were with me.

We skidded around a corner, and ran straight into a fucking battle.

Magic, claws, and fur flew around us.

A wave of icy magic rolled through the air, and the fight ended in a heartbeat.

Everyone who hadn’t come in with us suddenly hit their knees or staggered backward to grab the wall for support.

Screams and shouts of pain flooded the hallway, echoing off every surface, filling my ears and every other sense I possessed.

Ophelia buried her face against my shoulder as we followed a still-sprinting Callum to the elevator in front of us.

Inside the metal box, Liv threw a group of incapacitated prisoners backward with a pulse of her magic.

Still in his panther form, her mate tore through a massive werewolf who’d been lunging for Liv before Callum's magic hit.

The screaming didn’t stop.

Callum did, when he passed Liv and reached the center of the metal box. Then looked up.

We finally joined them, and I stared up through the hole in the metal along with them.

A few feet above us, Rae's shadows snapped around her while she took a massive male to the ground.

Redd. The violent dragon shifter no one had managed to kill yet, including the other prisoners.

Before he could fight back, he started screaming.

There was a massive bruise on Rae's cheek when she gave Callum an irritated look. "I had that covered."

"Merrily couldn't even kill that fucker. No one has him covered," Callum countered.

Rae stood up, her eyes immediately lifting to the fight above her head.

There were three other bodies piled off to her side, but my attention followed hers.

Halfway up the elevator shaft, fire, shadow, and icy tendrils flew wildly.

Darius, and Reaper.

Tortured screams still echoed behind us, but we couldn't see a damn thing through the flames and steam.