Chapter 3
Chapter three
RUN
Listening Companion:
Welcome to the Jungle—Guns N' Roses
I sprinted down the corridor, my bare feet slapping against cold concrete.
The red emergency lights pulsed in time with my heartbeat.
The classical music cut out and a new song roared through the speakers.
Guitar.
Raw and snarling.
Welcome to the Jungle.
The song was chaos distilled.
Drums pounded.
Guitars shredded.
The band’s singer Axl Rose’s voice laughed, screamed, and promised violence all at once.
Rook is orchestrating this.
The alarms screamed.
The lights strobed.
I reached the door at the end of the corridor and slammed through it.
Thank God!
And then I froze at the sight.
No!!
Warden Harker lay spread-eagle on the floor. His thick neck was opened from ear to ear. Blood poured from the wound in sheets, pooling beneath him in a lake so wide I couldn't step around it. His eyes were open, glassy, staring at the ceiling with an expression of permanent surprise.
Someone had placed a purple paper heart on his chest.
BE MINE was painted on the wall above him in dripping red letters. They'd used his blood as paint.
My nervous system shattered. It was as if a thousand glass butterflies had taken flight within me.
The two guards flanked him in death as they had in life.
Both had been gutted with their intestines spilled across the polished floor in wet, glistening ropes. Paper hearts had been tucked into their chest cavities.
Blood sprayed the walls in arterial arcs.
BE MINE.
Now those two words were everywhere—painted on the walls, on the floor, on the bodies themselves.
Valentine's Day in hell.
I gagged and stumbled back.
So much blood. The smell hit me—copper, bile, and the sweet-sick stench of death.
And underneath it, still, Rook's scent.
Pine, smoke, and musk, threading through the carnage.
Even through the gore, my body responded. Heat pooled. My nipples ached.
A shriek echoed from behind me. "THERE'S THE QUEEN!!"
I spun.
Three massive Gammas of the Broken Court rushed my way with wild eyes and their hands dripping in blood.
I ran.
"Don't hurt her!" one screamed. "She's for the Trickster only!"
Pure, animal instinct drove my legs forward, pushing me through the strobing red lights, past cells with open doors, past inmates wrecking the halls and screaming at me.
"The Queen!"
"Bless me!"
"Touch me, please!"
"ALL HAIL!"
Their voices blurred into a wall of sound. The alarms. The music. My own ragged breath tearing through my lungs.
My heart hammered so hard I could feel it in my throat, my wrists, between my legs—that swollen bundle of nerves throbbing with every pulse, reminding me that my body didn't care about survival.
My body wanted to stop running and go back to Rook.
Shut up!
A hand closed around my arm.
I screamed and spun, and there was a man—huge, bald, Diamond brand on his cheek—and his grip was iron, and he was grinning. "Got you, little Que—"
I drove my knee up into his groin with every ounce of strength I had.
He made a sound like a deflating balloon. His grip loosened.
I slammed my palm into his nose, felt cartilage crunch, felt hot blood spray across my fingers, and then I was running again before his body hit the floor.
The corridor split ahead.
Left or right?
Left.
I went left.
The music roared through the speakers—guitars wailing, drums crashing, Axl's voice howling about knees and bleeding.
My lungs burned. My thighs were slick with arousal and sweat.
Another hand—this time from behind, fingers tangling in my braids—yanked my head back.
Pain exploded across my scalp.
"I'VE GOT THE QUEEN!" A woman shrilled. "I'VE GOT THE QUEEN!"
I twisted in her grip and raked my nails down her face. I felt her skin tear, felt the wet heat of blood, heard her scream.
Oh God.
She let go.
I ran.
Faster now.
Desperate.
The corridor stretched ahead of me.
Endless.
Identical.
Door, after door, after door.
And I didn't know where I was going, didn't know if there was an exit, didn't know anything except that I had to keep moving.
You've got this. You've got this. Keep going. Keep—
The speakers crackled.
The music cut out.
And then Rook’s voice filled the corridor, warm, amused, and everywhere at once. "It's useless, Beloved."
I stumbled but kept running.
"Don't tire yourself out." A low, dark chuckle came over the speakers next. "There will be other ways to burn that energy."
No.
His voice did something to me. Even through speakers, even distorted by static, it slid down my spine and settled between my legs. A fresh pulse of slick betrayed me, hot and shameful.
I hate you. I hate you. I hate you.
My body didn't care.
I pushed harder. My bare feet were bleeding now—I could feel it, the sting of cuts from debris on the floor, the wet slap of blood with every step.
But I didn't stop.
Couldn't stop.
A door was ahead.
Heavy steel.
The emergency exit sign glowed above it.
Yes.
I slammed into it, hit the release bar, and burst through.
And then stopped.
No!!!
Ten members of the Broken Court stood in a loose semicircle, blocking every exit. They were huge—Gammas and Alphas, muscles corded beneath asylum uniforms, faces marked with brands, scars, and expressions of religious ecstasy.
One of them held rope.
Another held chains.
They didn't move.
They just watched me with patient, hungry eyes, the way a cat watches a mouse it planned to catch.
I screamed. The sound tore out of me as I spun back toward the door I'd come through.
FUCK!!!
Six more of the Broken Court were coming through the doorway behind me, moving slowly and herding me like livestock.
There’s no way out!
And then all of them began to chant. "All hail the Queen! All hail the Queen!"
The sound surrounded me.
"I'm not your Queen!" My voice cracked. Broke. "Leave me alone! I'm not your—”
Arms closed around me from behind.
Massive.
Inescapable.
Pinning my own arms to my sides with terrifying ease.
“Get off me!!” I thrashed.
Kicked.
Screamed until my throat was sore.
"Shhhh." A man's voice hit my ear. "Don't fight, Queen. You'll hurt yourself."
"Let me GO!"
"The Trickster wants you unharmed." He tightened his grip, and I could barely breathe or move. "We would never damage what belongs to him."
His scent was on them. All of them. Rook's pine and smoke clinging to their skin like a brand.
My body softened against my will. My inner walls clenched around nothing, desperate and aching, even as my mind screamed to fight.
No. Not now. Not with them watching.
But biology didn't care about dignity, and the words wouldn't come. My throat had closed. Terror, arousal, and exhaustion crashed together, and all I could do was shake.
Another figure approached. A thin Beta woman with kind eyes and steady hands.
She was holding a syringe. “Good job catching the Queen.”
"No." I tried to pull away, but the arms around me were iron. "Don’t stick me with that. Please don't—"
"It's just to help you sleep, Queen." She smiled like a nurse preparing a vaccination. "When you wake up, everything will make sense."
"Nothing about this makes sense!"
She got next to me and the needle’s end slid into my arm.
Cold.
Then warm.
Then nothing.
Oh. . .no. . .
The world went soft at the edges. The chanting faded to a distant hum.
The red lights blurred into smears of color, and my legs stopped working, and the arms around me were the only thing keeping me upright.
"All hail the Queen. . ." The words echoed, stretched, distorted.
And then, cutting through the fog, through the darkness, through everything was Rook's laughter. It poured from the speakers.
Rich.
Warm.
And utterly delighted.
What’s going to happen to me?
And then there was nothing at all.