Page 4 of Imprisoned with the Vampire King

Then, chaos erupted.

Three men lunged for me.

Dante reached me first, taking me to the ground, and a set of fangs sank into my jugular.

That was unexpected.

I was too shocked to react.

Vaguely, I heard an alarm blaring around us, and the intense feeling of my own dark magic flooded the air.

I grabbed Dante's shoulders, wrapping my legs around his waist so he couldn't get away from me. I'd just found him—and been bitten by him, not that I was ready to process it. I wasn't letting him escape. He was half the reason I was in the prison at all.

The penitentiary's magic couldn't affect me, but if I let go of the vampire king, I had no idea if I would find him again.

I had created the prison… but that didn't mean I could control it.

two

OPHELIA

The prison's magic forced Dante to his feet, and made him walk stiffly down another hall that looked like the first one I'd gone through.

"Where are we going?" I whispered, as the glaring and/or confused prisoners disappeared from my sight.

Dante and I hadn't exchanged greetings, but having his fangs in my throat seemed like greeting enough.

"Solitary confinement. Twelve hours there is the consequence for drawing blood."

I blinked. "You didn't draw blood."

"The magic of this place considers a vampire's bite as drawing blood. It only gives you long enough to manage one or two swallows before it kicks in."

Oh, shit.

I hadn't factored that in when I was weaving the magic.

"How do vampires survive?" I asked.

"We get used to hunger, and spend most nights in solitary."

"Will the prison let you carry me in there?" I asked, as a door opened in front of us. The magic had opened it, of course. There were no guards in my prison. They weren't necessary. They probably wouldn't have survived, either.

"Yeah. The magic generally doesn't stop anyone else from going into solitary with you. Some pairs use it as a way to have privacy while they're fucking. There's a mated couple who lives in one of the solitary cells almost permanently."

Dante stepped through a door and into what basically resembled a closet. There was a tiny bed inside, with a toilet beside it, and barely enough room to walk to both. It wasn't glamorous, but I guess it served its purpose.

Magically, I was the one who built the prison. Physically, there had been a team of other people in charge of it. The Cabinet had paid them, and given them orders.

I'd seen a map of the place while it was being built, and used it when I was creating the framework. When I wove the magic into place, I had to walk through it, but I'd been focused on the magic.

My power continued functioning after I released it. I could unravel it with enough effort, but there was no reason to do that. Not when it kept monsters like the blue-aura psychopath and the creepy green-aura dude away from the rest of us.

"A couple lives in solitary confinement?" I asked.

"Yeah. More privacy that way."

"Wow. Romantic," I said.