Page 107 of No One’s Daughter

“That’s enough now,” he said, pulling my head back, forcing my mouth to open and my fangs to leave his flesh.

“Beautiful,” he murmured, brushing the corner of my mouth with his thumb to wipe away his spilled blood. “A shame. In this instance I would have been happy to oblige, though I expected no less from a queen.”

My eyes snapped to his. It was a test. To see how I’d react to his blood.

And sure, it healed me, tasted fucking heavenly, but I wasn’t in a puddle at his feet the way Davien had been with mine.

It was an indication of power.

He chuckled darkly, “Clever girl, but let’s keep this between us, shall we. No need for these storm troopers to know.”

Then he left the room.

I grunted aloud, fury taking root below my skin.

***

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed, a day? Maybe two? Time had a way of dissolving in this hell hole, bleeding into itself until it became unreadable. After Besian, I’d had no other visitors. I wondered if that was at his direction, and I couldn’t decide if that was a mercy, or something far more calculated. I suspected the latter. He didn’t seem to be fully with the Ninth, not in the way the others had. He was playing his own games.

What those were, I had no idea.

But with everything else going on, I really didn’t care.

​Besian’s blood had nourished me and then some, meaning no matter how hard I tried to sleep or shut off my thoughts, I couldn’t.

​The most deluded part of all of this was that the past day—or however long I’d been in this place—had been almost peaceful in a way. No expectations, no conversation, nothing but comfortable silence. Of course though, I had been trapped with my own spiralling mind. My thoughts took it in turn to delve on Davien, worry about Claire and to argue with myself about who I really was. That familiar old feeling of inadequacy and self-loathing took root. The demons that I had never quite shook crawled out of the corners of my mind to do the real torturing.

​The cell didn’t help.

​If that’s even what it was.

​It was too clean to be a dungeon, too sterile to feel real. Smooth walls, no visible seams, no windows—just a low, artificial light that never dimmed, never shifted. There was a narrow bed bolted to the floor, a metal basin, nothing more.

​Nothing to break, no weaknesses to exploit.

​A perfect cage.

​Until suddenly, everything changed.

​They came again, but this time hands gripped my arms, firm but not rough, guiding me out of the cell for the first time since my arrival here. The corridor beyond was blindingly bright, polished floors and glass walls, the kind of sterile perfection that made my skin crawl. The deeper they led me, the more it felt like I was being pulled into a different kind of control, a threat different from the brutality I’d been shown, but no less harmful.

​They took me into a room that looked more like a fancy hotel room than a prison. They took a vial of my blood like it was nothing more than routine. I didn’t fight, not because I couldn’t, but because there was no point. I was finally out of that cell, maybe this would be my chance to get to Claire and somehow make it out of here. I had to be patient.

Without explanation, they stripped me of the ruined clothes I’d been left in, replacing them with something soft, expensive, and entirely not me.

​That was after they’d cleaned me. Thoroughly. Every trace of blood, dirt, and struggle erased like it had never existed.

​My hair had been scrubbed clean, dried and styled with an unsettling level of care. When I stepped in front of the mirror, I didn’t recognise the woman in front of me. She looked elegant, composed, in a dress that fitted perfectly as though it had been made for only her.

The dress clung to me like it had been conjured rather than tailored, a deep crimson that caught the light with every slight movement, scattering it in a thousand fine, glittering reflections. The material itself was soft, impossibly smooth against my skin, skimming my figure before cinching neatly at the waist and falling in a long, elegant line to the floor. A high slit cut up on one side, revealing just enough to make it feel tempting rather than delicate, while the neckline dipped low. The back was the most striking of it—bare, almost entirely, save for the delicate straps that crossed just enough to keep it in place.

I couldn’t help but wonder who had chosen this dress.

When they were satisfied with what they’d done, they swapped my current anti-magic cuffs with ones that looked like expensive bracelets instead of the shackles they truly were. Then they led me again, through more corridors, up a lift that climbed higher into the building, into another room.

Until finally, they left me.

Alone.