My stomach sunk a little. Why would he sleep with me? I wonder if the other vampires know he has a live human in here with him.

He barely stirred as I rolled off the dirty old bed and slipped my bare toes onto the slimy stone, wincing with each step, balancing my hands over the empty space in case the dizziness sent me to the ground.

What a gloomy room.

I tried to make out the lines of a chest of drawers or picture frame, anything to give this room an identity, but couldn’t see a thing. As the last of sleep eased out of me, I extended my arms to the roof and stretched deeply, yawning, and when I brought my arms down, crossing my hands across them, gasped, feeling a thick, sticky substance there. My fingers drew slowly back across my skin, covered in dark muck. Blood? Is this blood? I touched my arm again, tugging the shredded strand of my lace sleeve, dangling helplessly over my forearm.

I looked back at Jason, still sleeping soundly, then hurriedly spun on my heel and continued forward in search of a door, a window, anything.

A tiny light filtered in through a hole in the roof then, orange, as though the sun had just risen, and as it brushed the walls at the same time my fingers did, I gasped, seeing what my touch recognised first as cold iron. Bars. A cell!

I spun around to look at Jason—gone.

“Feeling better?” he asked, suddenly in front of me—on the other side of the bars.

“Jason! What’s going on?” I could hardly see his face, only a faded silhouette to show his movements.

“Right now, nothing.”

“What am I doing in here?”

He looked down and toed a white foam box.

“What is that?”

“Look closer,” he said and squatted down to lift a small, fat bag, about the size of a hand, filled with dark red liquid.

“Blood bags?”

“Yes.” He looked at my arm then, at the small wash of colour running the length of my wrist. “It seems you’ve reopened the wound.”

I held my arm out and studied it; it wasn’t bleeding before. I didn’t even feel any pain. My head spun, watching the gushing flow run down my skin and discolour my fingertips.

Jason wrapped his fingers around mine as I grabbed the bar to steady myself. “No passing out on me, Amara.”

“What happened to me?” I swallowed the bile in my throat, steadying my stomach with a few breaths.

He pressed his face between the bars. “I drained you.”

“What? Why?”

“I needed you to be weak.”

“Why, Jason, what’s going on?” My stomach sunk, my whole upper torso lifting with each panicked breath.

“Sit tight, girl—the Blood King will arrive soon, then I shall take you to see him.”

“The what?”

“Honestly, Ara, don’t you know anything? The Blood King—head of the World Council, ruler of all vampires—he wishes to meet you.”

“Me? Why?”

“Because you’re special.”

Special? “Jason? What have you done?” I grabbed the cold, gritty bar with my other hand.

“I told him what you are.”

“And what exactly is that?”

“You’re a Lilithian pure blood.”

“What? No, I’m not.” I tried to shake my cage. “Why would you do that? Why would you tell them that?” My memory flashed a conversation between Eric and I; Lilithians, how vampires killed all but the created ones. “You told them I’m a pure blood?” I yelled. “Don’t you know what they’ll do to me?”

“Yes. They’ll kill you—after they punish you.” His smile trickled with malevolence.

“They won’t believe you, Jason. I’m a human, not Li—”

“Do you see how much blood I drained from you?” He looked down at the box. “I cut through your entire arm, and you’re not dead,” he said each word slowly, with detest. “So if you’re not a Lilithian, then what are you?”

“They—they didn’t change me yet. I—”

“No, exactly, and you didn’t change when I bit you. But you heal fast—you crave blood.”

“No.” I backed away from the cell door and fell against the bed.

“Yes. It makes sense, doesn’t it?”

“I—” I reached up to touch my locket, feeling only flesh where it should be. “When you kidnapped me last year, it was never about revenge, was it? It was always about me? You were setting me up to look Lilithian.”

“Not everything is about you, Ara. But did it ever occur to you that maybe I was testing you—to see if you were human?” he snickered. “Oh, it’s bitter-sweet, the revenge I sought on my brother is so much greater now he’s accused of harbouring an enemy.”

“Wait! No! He didn’t know,” I cried.

“It matters none,” Jason continued, “he committed a crime by keeping you from us; a crime punishable by death—a death now possible by your hand.”

“Death—but—?”

“Yes. He told you once, didn’t he, that only an original Lilithian can kill a vampire?”

“No.” I shook my head, eyes wide. “I’ll never do it.”

“Yes—you will.”

“No.” I shook my head again, touching where my locket should be.

“When we’re finished with you—” he looked down at me, his lip lifting over his teeth, “—you won’t even know who he is. You will kill him, and then I will dispose of you.”

My ice-cold fingers hid my lips. “Jason, please, don’t.”

“I am sorry that it had to be you, Ara. I meant what I said when I said I love you. But my hate for him and my desire to see him dead far outweighs any affections I have for a filthy Lilithian.”

“What are they going to do to me?” I ran for the bars and grabbed them as he turned away. “Jason. Please, what will they do?”

He turned back and clutched my hands, pinning them in place. “You are an abomination. You must die. But first, the king wishes to test the strength of your endurance. After all, there has not been a pure blood since the original Lilithian queen was alive. We need to see what a modern day Lilithian can survive, and then, we’ll extract your venom, so it may be used for our own purposes.”