I carefully worked my way through the rows of women, not that anyone tried to stop me.
No one wanted to be on that front row.
Except idiot me.
I stopped at the edge of the platform and stared out into the inky darkness, desperation clawing at my throat. If I could just get a look at them, maybe this awful terror would subside a little. Just when I thought I couldn’t take it another second, one of them stepped forward into the light. My mouth opened and closed soundlessly as I stared down at a man I’d seen all too often in my dreams.
Eyes the color of dark chocolate, hair as black as midnight, a face that could surely have been carved into stone by Michelangelo himself…
In every dream I’d had of him, I’d run. He’d always caught me, his hands around my throat, his anger palpable, even in my sleep.
Worse than all of that . . .
Fangs, gleaming in the light like polished pearls, sharpened and honed for murder just peeking past the bottom of his top lip.
“Oh, fuck,” I whispered.
Any hope I’d had evaporated as horror rolled through me. Not only was I being sold off to the most sadistic creatures in all of the Empire of Magic. Now I knew that the monster of my nightmares had been brought to life.
And I couldn’t escape him by waking up.
Chapter two
Dominic
Her hair was matted and so filthy it could have been any color. Her body hidden under a ragged dress that looked as if it had once been a sack, was lush and curvy, nothing like what was currently trending in the kingdom. Those thoughts faded as her eyes locked on mine and her mouth dropped open in a soft ‘O’.
Eyes of gold, liquid honey that drew me in.
“Oh fuck,” she whispered, her husky voice driving deep into me like a spike to the chest.
My heart rate skyrocketed and I held my breath to literally stop it in its tracks. My fangs dropped of their own volition as if I were a teenager again, unable to control myself. I tore my gaze away in just a split second, but it was enough to burn her into my mind.
A bell tolled, signaling the start of the auction, and the honey-eyed girl was shoved to the back of the group of women. Gone from sight, but certainly not forgotten.
What the actual fuck had just happened?
Had Anthony spiked my drink with something? I whipped around to look at him, but he was chatting with Raven, a vampire who currently ruled the Seattle area.
Anthony, Earl of DuMont, represented everything that was wrong with our territory—the pomp and circumstance, the excess and extravagant entertainment. Even knowing we’d be tromping through mud, shit, and piss to get to here, Anthony wore shiny, leather unsealed boots, velvet pants, a silk coat with an ascot at his throat, and a bright blue cloak. I’d pay good money to see him sitting on a horse, about to go to battle, while rain poured from the sky. I bet he’d piss his pants before the first bugle sounded.
As he ended his conversation and moved to join me, his foot slipped and he reached out for Raven’s arm to right himself. I rolled my eyes in disgust. Vampires were supposed to be fast. Graceful. It had been fifteen years since the Veil had fallen, unmasking the supernatural creatures that ruled the world in secret for so long. Fifteen years since we’d gone from hiding to living in the open, and those fifteen years had made my brethren lax, none more so than Anthony.
“This should be fun,” he said when he finally picked his way through the dreck to take his seat beside me.
I let out a non-committal grunt by way of reply.
In my opinion, this place was a perfect example of the changes that had not been in our favor since the falling of the veil. Before, we’d come to the mainland to find food and servants, but we’d been more discreet. We’d chosen the best and taken them away without anyone knowing. Now, we and the other supernatural factions made no secret of using humans as food, servants, and entertainment. Rather often, simultaneously.
I hated the market and view of humanity at its lowest. I hated the stench and the filth. I hated the pleading and crying, for reasons I didn’t want to explore. It would take an hour to get the mud out of the cracks and crevices of my leather boots, a task I would be doing myself, not a human servant. A warrior depended on his equipment to be in top-notch condition, and boots were an essential part.
I hadn’t wanted to make this trip, and I definitely didn’t want to spend time with Anthony. We’d arrived the day before, and last night he’d insisted I join him for dinner with his friends. I’d turned him down, and he’d pulled out the responsibility card in his sniveling tone.
“I thought your purpose was to guard me, General. Are you shirking your duties?”
I very nearly pointed out that I was there to guard the shipment, not him, but I kept my mouth shut and joined his “soiree” as he’d called it, eating the rich food, which included a series of women for dessert.
Anthony and his companions liked to fuck their food, but that had never been my style, and Anthony knew it. So I’d drank the wine spiced with human blood and I watched the debauchery around me with thinly veiled disgust. I finished off my wine, then got up to leave. Studying maps of the sea, determining where a threat might attack on our return trip home seemed like a better use of my time.
As I’d strode for the door, I’d felt Anthony’s eyes on me. With his dick in the woman on his lap and his fangs in the vein on her neck, he looked to be in ecstasy. I couldn’t help wondering if part of his joy was watching me leave.
I was Dominic Blackthorne, General of the Crown Prince’s army and bastard son to King Stirling. Men like Anthony would not let me forget that I would never be legitimate. We had never been friends, and never would be, but I had to wonder what game he was playing. Because if there was one thing I knew about the man, he was always scheming and looking for his next step up in the ladder of our society.
When he’d made their last trip to procure humans, the ship had been raided on the return voyage. All the humans had been taken and four of my guards had been killed—a feat in and of itself for anyone not supernatural. Anthony had returned to court with a tale of the danger he’d faced but with no actual visuals on the killers, as he’d been hiding in his room. His only clue was that he was sure he’d heard animalistic growling. Which of course not so subtly pointed at our werewolf neighbors and added fuel to an already tense situation.
He’d demanded I accompany him on this trip to protect his life—of all the people he could have asked for, it surprised me when my name had even been mentioned.
I’d agreed to join the next trip, not to protect Earl Dumont’s life as he’d like to believe, but to make certain I didn’t lose any more of my troops—and to see if those responsible would attack again.
While it was possible that the werewolves were behind the incident, I doubted it. My money was on Vanators. The vampire hunters had been on the rise in the last fifteen years. Still, they didn’t tend to attack by ship, instead preferring the cover of darkness on land. And why had they stopped? If their forces were strong enough to kill four of my men, why not take everyone on the ship out, Anthony included?
There were too many unknowns to suit me, and I was left with an overall feeling of unease. The same feeling that I’d had before every battle in my life.