Page 31 of Caged Kitten

Had he been in prison before?

Was this old news?

Did he play the political game behind bars?

The thought of Deimos acquiring a fae underling didn’t sit well with me, and from the way both Elijah and Rafe watched the situation unfold, their smiles gone, the feeling was mutual.

Deimos and the fae stopped at his usual table, his tattooed hand sliding seductively down the fae’s arm, lingering over his fingers. Right. Apparently seduction was his only angle. Rafe and I exchanged a quick glance before I fully turned around on my stool to shamelessly stare, the cellblock silent save for the ever-present tick, tick, tick of a wall clock over the door. The air thickened, even with our collars muting magic and shifting, and I all but held my breath when the fae moved in and murmured something in Deimos’s ear. Over the demon’s shoulder, he caught my eye, shamrock-green eyes twinkling with mischief and mirth.

When he stepped back, the fae did so with an apologetic smile and a hapless shrug. Deimos’s entire demeanor suddenly tightened, his hands in fists, his shoulders rigid. Even the guards seemed to sense the impending fallout, loitering by the door with an eye on the scene, just Cooper and some new warlock who picked his nose and ate the findings when he thought no one was watching. Thompson had disappeared at some point, the one glimmer of sanity amongst our captors gone. Not good. Not good at all. Not the oppressive quiet. Not the fury twisting across Deimos’s face. Not the way his gang were all rising off their stools, hackles up and teeth bared.

The storm broke when Deimos threw the first punch. His fist cracked hard and furious across the fae’s jaw, and the entire crew pounced. Avery and Blake ripped the fae off his feet and dragged him onto the table, all of them closing in like a pack of wild dogs tearing into a carcass.

No, not a carcass. A very much alive animal, one who felt every bite, still kicking and bleating and begging—

Only he didn’t beg. In fact, as I shot up, heart in my throat and ears ringing, panicked like I’d never been for another prisoner before, I swore I heard the fae laughing. High, clear, melodious belly-aching laughter. No. That couldn’t be right. It was just a trick of the acoustics, another lie in Xargi Penitentiary.

Six on one was hardly a fair fight, especially after the disorienting experience of check-in—the strip search, squatting and coughing, shoved in a jumpsuit by strangers who had just examined you naked. It wasn’t fair, and it definitely wasn’t right. I staggered forward, eyes wide as I searched the pile for the fae, but there were so many bodies in one place, and Constance wouldn’t stop shrieking with absolute delight, dark fae blood under her talons…

“They’re going to kill him!”

“No, they’ll be stopped just shy of that,” Elijah insisted when I whipped around to my guys, who, while standing, didn’t seem keen on making a move to stop anything. Not that I blamed them: getting involved only made things worse. But… But…

The fae didn’t deserve to die—or end up in the infirmary just for pissing off a jerk like Deimos. In fact, he should get a medal for whatever he had said that sent the demon into a rage. None of us had been able to really trigger him yet.

“Yeah, well, it shouldn’t come to that either,” I snapped, marching around the circular cellblock and searching out the guards. Cooper and the other warlock lingered at the door, arms crossed, mouths stretched in cruel smiles. They chatted amongst themselves like they were watching a damn basketball game—probably taking bets on the fae’s odds of surviving the attack. Pathetic. All of them. Absolutely pathetic.

Even though I had spent my life on the sidelines, always taking a back seat, never involving myself in anyone’s business even outside of prison, something about this place made me want to fight. I’d seen brawls between inmates. I’d witnessed guards slam supers against the walls, scream in their faces, make them wriggle and squirm in agony with hexes that ought to be abolished. I’d met others torn away from their lives, their families, their homes—all to fill the cells of Xargi Penitentiary. It had happened to me: kidnapping, abuse, violations of my body and my mind and my magic.

And…

Enough.

Just—enough.

I clicked with Elijah and Rafe’s way of doing things because we were so similar. Don’t make waves. Don’t draw attention. Just sit back and survive. I understood that—lived it, breathed it. Heck, it was practically my family’s motto, the dwindling Fox coven’s code of conduct. Keep to yourself, take care of each other, and everything will be fine.

Only it wasn’t fine. I was the last Fox witch left, alone in the world and shouldering my dad’s paranoia to this day.

Elijah had broken the rules. He had made waves, drawn attention to himself—fought for me. Protected me from Deimos. Kept the demon off my back and beat a guard bloody for leering at me. Shorter and weaker, I couldn’t defend him like he did me, just a witch nobody saw as a serious physical threat, but I could pay his actions forward. I could step in for someone else.

I could make waves, just like my dragon.

“Stop!” My shout fell on deaf ears, and I waved furiously at the guards, pointing to the dogpile, incredulous—but not surprised—that they were just letting it happen. “What are you doing? Stop this!”

The pair chuckled and nudged each other in a look at this hysterical woman kind of way, and the moment quickly spiraled into just another incident where I felt helpless and lost and so very small.

“Keep your panties on, Fox,” Cooper ordered, his tone harsh—like I was the one out of line.

“A little hazing never hurt nobody,” the second warlock told me, his wolfish smile making my stomach turn. Ugh. I shoved down the desire to flip them both off and marched toward the writhing pile of fists and fury and feet, the fight in full swing.

Fight. As if this was a fight. It was a mob attack and nothing more.

I stuttered to a halt just on the cusp of it, fire in my belly that sparked and hissed like it never had before. Only for all the fight brewing in me, I had no idea where to put it—what to do, when to dive in, who to set my hands on first. I’d never been in a fight before. It never even crossed my mind. Not on a rare drunken night out at the club when someone cut in front of me for the bathroom or spilled their drink down my back on the dance floor. Not when customers at the café belittled my staff right in front of me. Not when some neighborhood kids threw rocks at Tully for kicks. Using my fists or my wand to settle things had never been my style.

And I’d like to think it wasn’t because I lacked courage, but because I could solve problems with words instead…

Words didn’t matter in here.

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