Chapter 14
Chapter
Fourteen
Afist smashed into my skull, and pain sliced across my vertebrae with a blast as my wounded face smacked the floor. My nerves lit up like fireworks as my bones thumped on the rough ground.
“Bitch!” A boot struck my torso, hitting the bullet wound. I jackknifed into a ball, forcing a groan from my lips. My head swirled with confusion, agony slowing down my thoughts, making it harder to understand what was going on.
“This kurva is already acting like she owns the place. Thinks her pretty face will get her everything as it did on the outside.” A woman’s voice spoke over me.
I twisted my head to see the attacker. The blonde human from the laundry room stood over me, her unpleasant face scrunched with hate.
Two other women in gray stood on each side.
One was of what I guess to be Japanese descent, stocky with graying black short hair; the other appeared to be of more Slavic origins with weedy light brown hair in a tight braid.
“You think you’re already a big fish here?” The blonde snarled down at me. “First day and getting in cozy with the Druid and a demon?” She snapped her fingers. “Girls. I think she needs to learn her place, don’t you? Where she is on the totem pole here . . . where the stanky fish belong.”
Her two minions nodded in agreement.
The brunette minion stepped up, her boot treading over my hand.
Cartilage and bones cracked and popped under her weight.
A scream bubbled in my throat, but I pinched my lips together, a grunt huffing through my nose.
She looked to be in her forties, rough and worn.
Leathery. She was very lean from lack of nutrients.
Her sagging expression showed she had nothing left and nothing to lose.
“That’s not how it works here,” the blonde snarled, brutal energy dancing off her. Clearly, she loved the power trip, especially having her backup team. She wanted me to cower. “You earn your place here, fishy, and you have yet to earn anything.”
“She looks fuckin’ familiar.” The brunette shoved her boot to my neck, leaning over, her lids squinted, trying to figure out where she knew me from.
The fear I might be recognized locked up my expressions.
Being in Istvan’s world made me very known; images of Caden and me along with Istvan and Rebeka circulated in the society gossip magazines and papers in Leopold Weekly.
I hoped with no dress or makeup, far from the elite world, no one would recognize me, not placing the charity princess in Halalház.
But my unique features could be the very thing that outed me.
“Doesn’t she?” She peered over at the leader, her voice harsh and coarse.
“All privileged bitches look the same to me,” Blondie snarled, cracking her boot into my stomach wound again.
I shoved down the unbelievable pain screaming over every inch of my body. This was the first time anybody had ever successfully snuck up on me. Ever. And it pissed me off that it was this common bitch.
Suddenly, my injuries, lashings, the fact I had only eaten a slice of bread for dinner, and my blood loss didn’t matter.
Like Bakos had told us, enemies waited to attack when you were at your weakest. There was no excuse. I let my guard down. My mind circled the scenario, assessing all the places they had me at a disadvantage.
Use your weakness against them.
“I don’t need to earn.” My gaze met hers.
“I. Take.” I waited a second to let her absorb my intention.
My fingers wrapped around the foot on my neck, and I yanked hard.
Using the energy of her fall, I swung my legs up and kicked out, my boot cracking against the blonde’s face, flinging her back into the rail.
“Mio, get her,” the blonde screamed at her Asian friend.
As I tried to scramble back to my feet, Mio’s stubby leg slammed into my gut, knocking my ass back to the ground with a gush of air. The lean chick leaped back on her feet and rushed me, kicking and scratching at me.
“You bitch!” I heard the blonde snarl, joining in with her friends.
Come on, Brex! Get up. I tried to conjure energy from the depths of my soul, knowing I could take these three, but it leaked out of me like a blown tire. The lesion from earlier had torn open again, spilling blood down my side and face. My gunshot wound burned as my skin tugged.
A kick to the gut curled me over with a cough, my brain shutting down. They continued to beat me until I was coughing blood.
From a distance, a whistle snapped off the metal, shrilling the air. “Stop!”
The three paused, looking down the walkway.
“Enough,” a man’s voice boomed down to us.
“Grab it,” the blonde hissed to the brunette. She slunk past me into my cell.
Steady footsteps running down the metal catwalk vibrated beneath me.
“Come on, Dee.” The blonde motioned to her friend, who was already running away.
Dee leaped over me, her arms filled with my blanket. The three of them bolted off. My lids fell closed, my body no longer able to fight the pain coursing through me.
I could hear the guards yell after them, their footsteps stopping when they got to me.
“Damn. They broke her good.” The sultry voice reminded me of the guard on the front gate when I first arrived, the pretty one who resembled a horse-shifter.
“Human-on-human crime.” Another one snorted. “Like we give a fuck. Just drag her in.”
“She looks in need of a healer,” the first man replied. “She came in with a bad injury. Looks like she’s already been whipped and beaten since.”
“Why do we give a shit? Just a human. One dies, we get ten more,” the second one with a nasal voice huffed. “Just think of it as a test. She makes it through the night, then she’s a survivor. She doesn’t? Oh, well.”
The sounds of the noisy prison echoed around me, but the first guy kept silent.
“Such a fuckin’ bleeding heart, Zander,” the second man snarled. “We had to hide for centuries because of humans. They deserve everything they get. Come on, help me drag her in.”
I was in so much pain it all blended together as they dragged me in.
“Fuck. They took her blanket too.” Zander’s voice drifted over me softly.
“Not been a good day for the human. Tomorrow is not lookin’ any better.
” Nasal laughter drifted from my cell, but every sound and feeling started to slip through my fingers, my body letting go, wrapping darkness around me.
Right as I drifted off, I thought I felt a hand smooth across my temple, words drifting over me like a wisp of wind: “Fight. You need to survive.”
“Dammit, Bitzy. Stop sticking your fingers up her nose.” A yelled whisper fizzed in my ear, dragging me quickly to consciousness.
And agony.
The pain swept in instantly, forcing a groan from my lips before my eyelids even opened.
Vomit pooled in my stomach, and I had to suck in slowly to keep it from coming up.
I felt no central point of pain. It drenched every cell, every muscle, every nerve.
My head pounded, sharp daggers piercing my brain every time my pulse thumped.
A chirp echoed in the cell, and I willed myself to open my eyes.
“Don’t bitch at me. You’re the one who woke her up.”
Opie. My brain clasped on to awareness at the same time it wanted to shut back down and hibernate for months.
I licked my lips. All moisture had been sucked from my mouth, which tasted like I drank battery acid while something died in there. Forcing my lids open, the face of a brownie and an imp’s two huge eyes took up my entire field of vision. I yelped.
“It’s a-live!” Opie raised his arms, laughing crazily as if he was acting something out.
Don’t vomit. Don’t vomit. Cringing, I rolled onto my back, a loud whimper puffing from my lungs.
A chirp came from the imp.
“You enjoyed the movie too. Don’t act like you don’t.” Opie sighed, waving his arms at her.
Chirp.
“Please, you could not do better,” he replied.
Chirp.
“Okay, then go for it. I want to see you do it as well.”
Chirp.
“Oh . . . well . . . that was pretty good.”
There was so much talking—so much noise. I curled back into a ball.
“Clearly not a fan.”
One eye peeked open at them. Bitzy glowered at me. Raising her hand, she flipped me off.
“Really, Bitz. Is that necessary? Don’t be sore because she liked my performance better.” He shook his head. “I mean, I am the true artist here.”
Chirp.
“I am not a wannabe.”
“Please,” I grunted, the effort to speak zapping at my strength. “Stop talking.”
“You really did the first day with gusto, didn’t you, little fish?
” Opie stepped back up to me, touching my face with a cloth he held in his hand.
Gently, he wiped away the dried blood around my mouth and nose.
The whiff of rubbing alcohol bled into my nostrils.
“I mean, if you’re going to do something, do it with flair. Am I right?”
My notice dropped down to the outfit he was wearing. He made a bikini top with steel pot scrubbers and cut leg holes in a pink scouring pad that he wore as briefs.
“What the hell are you wearing?” I croaked, trying to lift my head, my fingers pressing into my forehead as slowly I sat up.
“It’s pool day.” His smile lit up his grumpy face.
Chirp.
“Okay, fine. It’s my day to scrub dishes in the sink.” He touched his homemade outfit like Bitzy had burst his pretend bubble. “I enjoy having a little fun with it.”
A grin inched up my face, but I flinched in pain.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t smile, blink, move, or even breathe deeply for a bit.” Opie motioned to all of me. “You are a mess, fishy. Looks like you got the advanced new fish orientation. What happened?”
“Bitches happened.”
“You just described everyone here. Narrow it down.”
“Three human bitches.” I rolled my fingers into my temples. “Trying to show me my place in the hierarchy here.”
“Ahh. Mio, Dee, and Tess.” He nodded. “They love to think of themselves as the leaders of the humans, put anyone new in their place right away.”
Chirp.
“I’m sure she fought hard.”