Chapter 10

She showed me a storage room containing cleaning supplies, then explained where I could collect fresh water and where the dirty linen needed to be taken. I had experience doing all of this so I wasn’t terrified of the hard work . Knowing I would just be working most of the time and keeping my head low gave me a little bit of hope at survival.

By the time she finished, my head was aching.

“Do you understand everything I’ve told you?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Good. You can begin with the western corridor.”

She handed me a bucket and a brush.I stared at them for a moment before taking them.

“Thank you,” I muttered.

Arissa looked surprised, as if she hadn’t expected me to thank her.Then she gave me a small nod and walked away. Arissa had this sort of kindness to her but I did not want to get my hopes high at the end of the day the woman was a vampire , she drank human blood and she could probably kill me in an instant if I got on her wrong side however I was just glad that she wasn’t too hard on me .

I spent the rest of the day doing exactly what I had been told. I swept floors, dusted shelves, and polished silver until my fingers ached. Whenever a vampire passed, I lowered my eyes and kept working.

Nobody thanked me.Nobody spoke to me unless they needed something done.By the time I was returned to the dungeon, I was too exhausted to think straight. My feet were swollen ,my hands were bruised from all the laundry I had done and my head was pounding. I had hardly gotten any water to drink and my stomach didn’t help either considering the hunger I was already feeling .

The guard locked the door behind me.

I sank onto the straw and rubbed my aching hands.

I had no idea how I was supposed to survive this place, let alone escape it. Every corridor had guards, every door seemed to lead somewhere I wasn’t allowed to go, and I couldn’t even get a decent night’s sleep.I felt tears burning in my eyes as I felt every shred of hope I had fade away. I was going to probably die in here and I would not even get a chance to say goodbye to Emma. Oh what I would give for just one minute to see her , to make sure she was happy and healthy .

I closed my eyes, hoping exhaustion would finally win.

Then I heard voices.

Two guards were talking somewhere outside my cell. They sounded close enough that I could hear them without moving.

“Her last name is Night.”

I opened my eyes and sat up straight slowly.

There was a brief silence before the second guard spoke.

“The vampire hunters? You think their bloodline still exists? Do you think that’s why she’s still alive? Maybe he wants to see their bloodline suffer.”

My body went completely still.Hunters?

The first guard let out an irritated sigh.“You ask way too many fucking questions. If they hear you speaking about this, they’ll have your head.”

“Fine. I’ll take first watch.”

Their footsteps moved away.I sat up straight, staring into the darkness.

Night.

The vampire hunters.

For a moment, I couldn’t even make sense of what I’d heard.

My surname was Night. That much was true. But what did that have to do with vampire hunters? Surely there were plenty of families in the world with the same name.

There had to be.

I pressed my hands against my knees, trying to calm the sudden pounding in my chest.

My parents had never been vampire hunters.

I remembered them clearly. I remembered my father teaching me how to track animals and handle a knife. I remembered my mother scolding him whenever he let me wander too far into the forest.

They had been ordinary people. We lived a peaceful and quiet life away from all the vampire danger and civil wars in the village.

I was sure of it.

So why was a guard in the royal castle talking about my surname as if it belonged to a family of killers?

I tried to find a reasonable explanation, but the more I thought about it, the less sense anything made.

The guard had asked whether that bloodline still existed.He had wondered if that was why I was still alive.My eyes widened.

Was that why Vladimir had chosen me?

I remembered the way he had watched me in the hunting grounds. The way he had claimed me before I could escape. The way he had refused to let the guards punish me after I stabbed him.

He could have killed me.He could have ordered my execution in front of the entire kingdom.

Instead, he had brought me to his castle and kept me alive.My stomach twisted. Was I really being kept here to punish my bloodline , as some sick way of revenge ?

No fucking way.

It couldn’t be.

I shook my head, trying to force the thought away.

Maybe the guards were wrong. Maybe they had heard a rumour and decided to make up a story. Perhaps there were other Nights who had nothing to do with me.

I wanted to believe that.

I needed to believe that.

But I couldn’t ignore the possibility that my surname meant something to the royal family.

And if it did, I had no idea what that meant for me.

I pulled my knees against my chest and stared at the locked door.

If my family really was connected to the people who had hunted vampires, then I wasn’t simply a human prisoner anymore.

I was a reminder of something the royal family might never have forgiven.And Vladimir had me right where he wanted me.

I swallowed hard. I needed to stop overthinking and figure out a way out of this hell hole . There had to be a way and I also needed to figure out what the hell those guards meant .