What the eff-ing fuck.

My first look into Morana’s chamber brings to mind a scene from a horror movie.

Bruised and bloodied bodies litter the entire coliseum like room. It reminds me of an outdoor theater, but underground. I focus on what I can comprehend. The entire room is made of stone. The walls, the benches forming a circle leading down to a dais, everything. Below us, a petite woman has her thin arms wrapped around a fully-grown man, her face buried in his neck. Behind her, two more dementor looking men flank each side of a throne. At the right-hand side of the massive throne, the same boy who welcomed us at the entrance stands there watching the woman. He’s enraptured. He licks his lips, his hands in fists at his sides.

Carver tugs at my hand, and we start forward. I take a deep breath and try to calm my nerves. I regret it almost instantly. Blood and death spoil the air. There is still a hint of lilac and peony, but as we walk past discarded bodies covered in blood, not even the most heavenly of smells can drown out the stench of decay. My legs feel heavy, my vision as though I’m in a tunnel. Each step I take is halted and clumsy.

We descend the final stair and step onto the dais. Carver lowers his head and cuts me a glance out of the corner of his eyes. Hastily, I lower my own head and stare at the floor beneath my feet. I bend as much as the corset will allow me to, and breathe as shallowly as possible. I try focusing on the hem of my dress rather than the pools of blood inching closer and closer to the toes of my pointed boots.

The sounds of slurping and sucking stop, and my vision goes black. I tremble from head to toe. I can feel her gaze on me. She’s powerful. No, she’s charismatic, I remind myself. There has to be a logical explanation to the carnage around me. It was like this when she got here. That has to be it. Someone this small can’t create carnage like this. And if I play nice and impress her, I can probably make it out of here without becoming her next meal.

A thump and the swish of fabric jerks my attention upwards, and I watch as the man she was holding sprawls on the floor. His chest isn’t moving. I flick my gaze up to her under my lashes. She’s covered in blood. From her mouth, down her neck, to the tops of her breasts. Blood drips from her thin lips, her fangs drenched in the thick liquid. She’s smiling around her fangs, and one by one, she licks each of her fingers clean of the blood staining them with a hum of contentment.

She moves, and I jerk my head down and focus my attention to the reflections of light in the pools of blood on the floor at my feet. A shadow appears, blocking out the light. I stop breathing and dig my nails into my palms as a rabid need churns in my belly.

“So, this, this is who you brought to me Carvell? Mon ami, je suis déçue.” Her accent is thick while she speaks. Her French is perfect, but her accent sounds eastern European.

I don’t remember much French from school, but I think she said she wasn’t happy about something. I bite my lip while I stand here.

“Je suis désolé, Majesté.” Carver keeps his voice low and even while he apologizes to her.

“ J’en attendais plus de vous. N’ai-je pas été claire quand je t’ai dit que je voulais sa mort ? Her voice is cold and harsh. Her words lashing out like a whip. Something about expecting more and the word death.

Each word from her mouth clenches my chest tighter and tighter, and I bite my lip to muffle a whimper. If I can just hold on and make it through this, I can still walk out of here alive. Whatever she’d just said doesn’t matter. I just want to get the fuck out of here.

“Majesté, I agree this is quite rare, but I think you will find her much different for the usual candidates. I beg you consider her as I think she could prove more than useful while serving you.”

She hisses in response, and I flinch and jerk back a step before I can stop myself. Pointed shoes enter my field of vision, and I curse myself for my flinch. I had only brought attention to myself.

I’d never thought it possible to have such disdain for a total stranger.

“Look at me, girl.” She issues the command with two quick snaps of her fingers, her accent heavy.

I lurch upwards, my breathing choppy. I avoid looking directly into her eyes. My gaze bounces from her sharp cheekbones, to her jutted chin, and back to her small upturned nose. For the barest of seconds, our eyes meet, and I stop breathing. Her eyes are the palest shade of arctic blue. So light that her irises are barely discernible from the whites of her eyes.

She tilts her head at my gasp, and I drop my gaze to her chin again. She slides closer to me, and I hunch my shoulders.

“Spin.” She twirls a finger in a tight circle.

Spin? Seriously? Was I five-year-old at a beauty contest? No. But I also know there is no other option but to do as I’m told. I spin in a circle for her, the hem of my dress flaring slightly at the movement.

“She is not too horrible to look upon, non, Charles?” She turns her head to the kid behind her as she talks. The child dressed like a man from before steps forward and appraises me. His name is Charles. I resist the urge to shake my head in disbelief.

“Oui, she cleans well.” Jesus, they all have issues with common sayings.

I bite my tongue hard to avoid opening it to correct this freaky teenager in front of me. She cleans up well, idiot. Strangely his mistake with the saying calms me. Even vampires make mistakes. I studied real people for my degree in anthropology. If I can determine what drives them, I can figure out the best way to get myself out of here in one piece.

Charles continues his assessment of me. “If I may speak freely, Majesté?” At Morana’s regal nod, he continues. “She is very… American. Very… from the south.” He wrinkles his nose like he has a bad taste in his mouth. “What makes her so special?”

The silence suffocating the room is deadly.

“Spécial?”

Charles shrinks as far as he can into himself. “Non, Majesté. That is not my meaning. Forgive me.”

Shit. I don’t think anyone is supposed to be called special when in the presence of the queen. I take two steps backwards out of Morana’s direct reach.

“A spécial Kresova?” She taps a finger to her lips. “Is that right, Au-ro-ra.” She reaches out and touches the end of my hair twirling it in her hands. “Are you spécial?”

“No.” The answer is automatic for me. “I’m—I’m your servant. There can’t be anything special about a servant. Especially when there’s such a beautiful, powerful queen to admire.”

Morana’s joyful laugh breaks the silence, and Carver takes a step towards me. Ever so subtly, he angles himself just a hair in front of me.

I hope he knows that the fuck he is doing, because I highly doubt Morana would be cool with him acting defensively of me.

She clutches her middle with one hand, her other rising to cover her mouth as she chortles. “Oui, très American, indeed. Oh, ma chère, you couldn’t be more wrong.” She waves a hand back at a scowling Charles and giggles again. “Charles is over five hundred years old. He was turned when he was un adolescent, oui? So, at times, his mouth makes many mistakes.”

I raise a brow and smile as she expects me to. I look at the young vampire with new eyes. I couldn’t imagine being stuck in puberty forever and stuck with her, no less. She’s looking at me expectantly as though she’s waiting for me to answer a question I haven’t been asked.

“I—" I glance at Carver and then back to Morana. “Human or not, men always say the wrong thing.” God, I hope that was what she wanted to hear.

Carver, who is still standing slightly in front of me turns his head slowly and gives me a pointed look. The message is clear. Shut. Up. After the longest thirty seconds of my life, she replies.

“Oui, Aurora. This is truth.” She raises her hand and pats my cheek.

“My apologies, Majesté,” Carver says. “She has never met anyone of such importance before.”

I scowl at Carvers back but stay partially behind him just in case.

Morana waves a hand and starts speaking rapidly in another language I can’t make out. Carver responds, and they continue to speak at a fast clip.

Keeping her eyes on me, Morana circles Carver as he speaks. She reaches a hand to the middle of Carver’s back and strokes from between his shoulder blades down to the small of his back. The only sign of acknowledgement from him is a blink, but he doesn’t move away or act dissatisfied with her behavior. She makes one last circle than prowls toward the enormous throne in the middle of the chamber.

Morana purses her lips and waves me forward. I look to Carver for a cue as what to do next. Do I just walk up to her and stand there? Do I go to my knees? Do I bow, what do I do?

“Go to her,” he says. No help from him then.

I move forward slowly and approach Morana with trepidation. I’m a step away from her when she jerks forward and wraps her bony fingers around my arm. Instinctively, I try to jerk it back, but she holds steady. “Let me feel you, chèrie.”

Feel me? She wants to feel me? I look back at Carver, but he stares straight ahead like he’s looking right through me. Betrayal nudges into my chest. I know we aren’t friends, but I was almost certain that we weren’t enemies.

I turn back to face Morana and keep my gaze low. I stand there as she focuses past my shoulder and keeps her fingers wrapped around my forearm.

After what seems like eternity, she lets me go.

Still breaths away from me, she speaks in that foreign language I can’t place to both Carver and Charles. Carver speaks in an exasperated tone his hands moving as he talks. Charles on the other hand is smiling and shaking his head. He jumps into the conversation, and it seems as though Charles and Carver are arguing, but the language is so pretty, I can’t tell happiness from anger.

Just as suddenly and rapidly as their conversation started, it ends. A low hiss comes from Morana, and my entire body tenses, readying for assault.

Morana chuckles darkly. “You are a foolish, foolish girl.”

Right now, I’d give anything to know what the fuck just happened between the three of them.

She settles her petite frame further into the massive stone chair and crosses one leg over the other. Her stare bores into me, and I hunch my shoulders a bit under the weight of her might. Her eyes flick from me to Carver and back again. Does she see my desire for him? Can she sense it? Is she angered by it? Shit, I could speculate for the rest of my life and still come up clueless.

She curled a finger out toward Carver. “Come to me, mon assassin.”

Mon assassin? Holy shit. Was Carver one of her assassins? Was he going to kill me? Was he supposed to? Calm down, Aura.

Carver didn’t hesitate as he walked toward Morana, his movements neither too fast nor too slow, and took the hand she offered to him. Instead of tugging him down, she stood and leaned into him, her eyes never leaving mine as she licked at the side of his neck. “Oh, Carvell, Mon chérie. How I have missed your touch.” She ran a finger slowly down his chest, “Have you missed me?”

“Of course, Majesté.”

Morana spun until her back was to Carver’s front, and slowly, languidly, with an entire fucking audience present, she rubbed her ass into him. WTF.

“So, Aurora, you are quite the beauty.” She grabbed Carver’s jaw and pressed kisses along it. “Wouldn’t you agree, Mon bien-aimé?”

Carver’s eyes are dark and heated. “She is simple, Majesté, and nothing compared to you.”

Ouch.

Was I supposed to watch? Look away? I doubt there was a code of behavior for this sort of scenario, even for the Kresova, so I kept my gaze on them.

Morana laughs as she shoves him back onto her throne and sits on his lap. She rolls her hips and ass over his crotch, pushing herself into him in sort of wave-like motion. Carver’s teeth lower, and his eyes slip closed. He appeared to be enjoying himself, but I was utterly disturbed.

When his eyes open again, the blue-hue is luminous and alight. She thrusts herself up and down over him, both of them practically panting from the faction of their bodies pressed together.

“I think, mon assassin,” she says rising and falling into him again, “she should join my court ladies . . . if she survives her transition.”

“Oui, Majesté.” Carver’s voice is heady with desire. “Whatever you want.”

This entire situation is beyond fucked up, but it’s like two trains about to collide—I can’t look away.

“Would you like that, Aurora?” she asks.

I don’t nod or answer.

“Infinite blood every day, and of course, you’ll travel with me. Paris, Rome, Italy.” She waves a hand through the air. “Everywhere and anywhere we want.”

Carver is watching me again, but I don’t feel desire.

No, I’m fucking livid, but my instincts are screaming for me to keep it the eff together.

This sickening display continues on for god knows how long until Carver shutters against the queen, fondling her breasts and . . . other areas.

Morana taps Carver’s cheek and rises off him. He won’t look at me, and honestly, I don’t think I can look at him. That felt strangely like a betrayal. But he’s not mine, so why do I care?

Morana adjusts her gown again, but not out of a need for propriety. “I will see you again, Aurora.” She smiled. “Very soon.”

Fuck no. “Of course, Your Majesty.”

I wait for Carver to join my side. He wraps his large hand around my bicep and pulls me back towards him. I don’t want his fucking hands on me, but I also don’t want to cause a scene. He continues to back away, and I try to pull out of his grip as we reach the door.

One of Morana’s dementor looking guards steps forward and unlocks the chamber for us. Just as we are being ushered out, a family with two children and a baby are being welcomed inside the queen’s tomb.

“Aw, my guests have arrived.” She claps her hands. “Très bon!”

Guilt, dread and anger slam into my chest, making it difficult to breathe.

Morana, my eternal queen, is about to eat an entire family, and no one is acting bothered by it. I glance up to see that she is watching me. Searching my expression for the pain she knows I’m hiding. I don’t know how I manage to do it, but I keep my gaze empty and void of any emotion. She’s looking to see my despair for these people—and to know I can do nothing to stop it. I refuse to give her the satisfaction.

We turn and cross back into the path leading for Morana’s chamber to the crypts entrance. Carver appears behind me, but I try to ignore him.

When we reach the last exit, I burst through the small opening and run. With tears streaming down my face, I run as fast as I can, and I ignore Carver shouting after me.