Chapter 3
DANTE DOMINICO
Four Weeks Ago
When I rose to consciousness, heat hit me in the face, followed by consuming pain.
This wasn’t the gentle warmth of an Italian summer, but the hungry kind that sucked every drop of moisture out of my skin, leaving it cracked and bleeding.
Then there was the stench. A reek that coated the inside of my mouth and crept down my throat, a bitterness tasting of something far worse than death.
Sun-baked stone. Blood spilled for sport.
Suffering and fear and piss. The metallic tang of rusted iron, and beneath it all, the acrid smoke of torches kept burning too long in air that never saw the sun.
The Fossa.
I braced myself against the pain, then opened my eyes, already knowing what I’d see.
A familiar rough-hewn ceiling hung low, iron bars formed the front of the cell, and containment sigils were etched liberally into the metal, humming with power. Chains hung from the walls, bolted into the stone, and the shackles on the other ends… I lifted my hand.
Banded around my wrists and ankles.
Cold iron, leaching any residual power from me like water down a drain.
Above the horror, my fingers smelled like my wife. A faint stain of her blood was still beneath my nails, and I closed my eyes, letting that scent ground me to reality. Citrus and lavender.
Kisses in the dark.
Something worth living for.
I pushed myself up onto my elbows, every muscle screaming. My head pounded in time with the thumping of the cell’s wards, a dull ache gnawing at the base of my skull.
I’d never fully escaped this throbbing migraine, not even in Venice.
Like the pain of this place had been permanently etched into my marrow.
The cell was small. No bed, no furniture—just a stinking drain in the center of the floor and old stains radiating out like petals of a rotting flower.
Even braced against them, old memories stirred—the crack of bone, the roar of the crowd, the Overseer’s laughter as he pitted me against monsters and men alike. The Fossa had been my crucible, the forge that changed me into something other than a vampire.
Once, I’d clawed my way out of this hole with fangs and fire and sheer rage.
Now, I was back.
“Well, well,” a familiar voice purred. “Prisoner 1445. Home at last.”
It took me a second to catch my breath, to fortify myself against that fucking voice I still heard in my nightmares. Smoothing every bit of emotion from my expression, I turned toward the bars.
The Overseer stood beyond, hands folded behind his back.
He was unchanged—brutish shoulders filling out his worn leather coat, pale, almost white hair slicked back from a face carved in cruel lines.
His eyes were colorless, a creature who thrived in darkness, and they lit up with unholy delight when they met mine.
But my eyes fell to the brand around his throat, pulsing faintly. He’d bound himself to this place completely over the years. This was his kingdom.
We were his subjects.
And I’d been his favorite target.
“Miss me, boy?” he asked.
I forced myself to sit all the way up, back pressing against the rough wall.
“I’d say I missed your ugly fucking face,” I rasped, “but I’d be lying.”
Not my best comeback, but his lips thinned out, so it hit hard enough.
“You always did have a smart mouth,” he said. “Even when you were bleeding out on the sand.”
He stepped closer to the bars, leaning in slightly.
Two of his guards gripped my chains and yanked, spreading my arms until my chest strained.
The torchlight throwing his features into deep relief, he reached out and ran a finger down the line of tattoos, concentration on his scarred, battered face.
“I’ll admit, I was disappointed the day you showed up with these.
” His gaze flicked down, taking me in—the pagan tattoos, ash smeared across my clothes, blood crusted at the corner of my mouth.
“After I went to all the trouble to turn you into my pet monster. Sealing an immortal demon away under a network of pagan magic… clever, really. Then you escaped. Built yourself a nice, respectable life in a pretty city. Got yourself a bride, I hear.”
Bride. The word landed like a blow.
Emberline. What happened to my fucking wife?
He saw the flicker of doubt in my eyes, and that cruel smile sharpened.
“Ah,” he crooned, “The DiRavello ice princess, wasn’t it? Fiery little thing. Shame about the… accident. Heard no one got out alive. Burned. To. A. Crisp.” My eyes never left his. “At least, that’s what my source tells me.”
I lunged for the bars before I could stop myself.
The guards yanked, chains snapped taut, slamming me to a halt.
Pain flared as the manacles bit into my skin, cold iron sapping my strength in an instant.
But this pain…was only a taste of what would soon be inflicted on me.
Power surged through the metal bars, identical to the containment circle that had dropped me.
The Overseer laughed.
“Does she know?” he asked softly. “Does the little princess recognize the monster locked beneath your skin? Does she know how much danger she is in every night she sleeps beside you? Does she know you would consume her if only those marks were gone?”
“Kill me,” I snarled. My voice was raw, shredded. “Get this over with.”
“Oh, no, boy.” His smile vanished, replaced by something that chilled me to the core.
“You and I will play a game. I’m breaking open those seals and letting the monster back out to play.
And this time, there is no one to seal you back up.
Albrecht… Prisoner 5 is long gone. I peeled the Druid’s skin off and set him in the sun to rot, and now… ” His eyes flashed with unholy delight.
“Now I’ll see if my experiment has paid off.”
Experiment. Dread, bone-breaking dread, took hold, the kind of fear that had me thrashing, even the magic in the shackles unable to restrain my panic.
I’d arrived in this place a young, pampered male, only trained in the kind of fighting that benefitted my father’s empire, used to soft beds, good food, and fine clothing.
The Overseer had a room deep in the bowels of this place where he turned prisoners into weapons. He’d turned me into something else entirely.
A demon, hungry only for flesh, blood, and screams of pain.
For decades, that was all I was, until a kindly Druid took pity on me and tattooed an ancient pagan spell over my body with iron and his own blood. A cage to keep the monster contained.
These tattoos covering my scars weren’t for vanity.
They were to keep the rest of the world safe.
My nemesis spread his arms.
“Now that you’re mine again, you’ll become a lesson to the others. You will suffer and bleed, and then, when I’ve released the monster, I’ll throw you back into the pit. See if you’re everything I remember.”
“Do your worst,” I shrugged, as if none of this mattered. “You won’t keep me here long. I escaped once. I’ll do it again.”
“Look around you, Dante.” He leaned in until his pale eyes were level with mine, the bars the only thing between us. “You’re mine,” he said softly. “And you will never escape again.”
The words echoed, each one driving deeper than the last.
Never. Never. Never.
I met his gaze and let him see my hatred, the cold, simmering rage that grief hadn’t managed to extinguish, and all he did was chuckle, as if I’d given him exactly what he wanted.
“How I’ve missed that defiance. It’ll make breaking you so much sweeter.” The ugly bastard snapped his fingers.
Two more guards stepped in—bigger than the black-clad soldiers from the crater, thicker, their eyes flat. They carried clubs weighted with spiked and metal caps, the ends stained dark.
The chains bit as I was stretched until I thought I might come apart, bracing myself for that first blow slamming into my already broken ribs with a meaty crack.
Pain exploded, driving the breath from my lungs.
The second followed an instant later, smashing across my chest, my collarbone shattering.
I tasted blood.
I stayed on my feet.
“So… are you ready to get started, or what?” I chuckled, spitting a mouthful of bloody saliva onto the guard’s boots. “Let me know when you’re ready, you fucking pussies.”
They lost their shit. Every strike grew wilder, more unhinged. Meant to break bones and rupture organs, skin splitting, along with the tattoos. I could almost feel it, the way the spell shuddered beneath every blow, as if the fragile edges of my soul were already fraying.
Through it all, I clung to a single image.
Ember’s eyes, bright with fury as she challenged my father. The way her fingers had curled against my skin the last time she’d fed from me. The smell of her blood, still on my hand, was proof that I’d escaped this place once.
The world narrowed under the rain of blows, my vision spotting black, the edges of reality blurring in pain. The last thing I saw was the Overseer’s satisfied smile, hovering in the doorway like a specter.
Then I hit the ground, blood pooling warm under my cheek.
Praying if the Overseer succeeded, I would never escape this place again.