Bitten (The Vampire Legends #3)(10)
Author: Emma Knight

Part of Hunter felt scared and nervous, but another part of him felt that he would make it out alive. He felt that he knew too much information for them to kill him, so he figured he’d put up a fight, and they wouldn’t do anything to him. At least not yet.

All of a sudden, he heard a loud creak as the big iron gate opened at the end of the hallway. In walked four security guards in black suits, with the Greslin crest embroidered on their left breast pockets. Hunter watched as they walked down the long hallway with their dark sunglasses on, heading straight towards him. He hoped they weren’t coming for him, but this time, figured they were. There was no escaping this troupe. He looked up as the four men approached his cell. He waited for them to speak, and knew this wasn’t the time to disobey law number one.

“Are you Hunter?” a large guard said, looking his square in the eye.

“Yes, that’s me,” he said, and suddenly a pang of panic hit him. He suddenly realized the power of the Greslins and what could happen if he misstepped.

“You’re coming with us,” the guard said back as he took out a large ring of keys and started fumbling around, trying to find the right key to fit into the large padlock on the outside of his door.

After five minutes of trying out different keys, his door opened with a bang and in marched the four men. They immediately cuffed his hands behind his back and grabbed his arms, squeezing firmly so he didn’t try to run. They put a blindfold over his eyes and the guards dragged him down the long corridor and out through the big iron gate at the end, which slammed shut behind them.

Hunter could feel them winding around and going up and down steps. At one point Hunter tripped, but the guards caught him before he hit the ground. As they passed other guards, they kept saying, “Prisoner 11201 reporting to the head leader.”

Hunter got a chill down his spine. He didn’t know who he was going to see, but he knew it wouldn’t be pleasant. He continued walking through what he thought must have been more iron gates as he heard them creak open and slam shut as he walked through. Then a loud buzzing sound rang through his ears and the sound of a vault door opened.

The guard ripped off his blind fold, and there, before his eyes, sat Violet, looking meaner than ever as she hoisted herself up into a throne like chair in the front of a large room, filled with stained glass and pews. It looked to him like they were in an old ancient church, but he knew they were in the jury room of this castle.

Hunter stood in front of her throne silently, waiting to be addressed, as Violet looked him up and down and began to take notes on a piece of paper. He couldn’t imagine what she was writing, but stood there quietly.

“You did it to me for the last time!” Violet screeched, opening up the conversation.

“Did what?” Hunter asked, confused.

“You know what you did. Don’t play dumb with me.”

Hunter paused, and thought for a moment, “I’m sorry Violet, please tell me.”

“At school—you led me on for the last time,” she said.

Hunter realized she was probably right, but didn’t want to admit this to her, not here, not now.

“That’s not entirely true, Violet. We had fun, we had some good laughs.”

“Good fun? Good laughs?” she repeated. “Is that what you thought I was after?”

Hunter knew he was doomed to be imprisoned forever. There was no way out of this.

“Listen, Violet. I didn’t mean to hurt you,” Hunter said.

“And all this time you loved her?” Violet retorted, louder than before.

“Her who?” Hunter asked. Now he was really confused.

“Oh, don’t go playing dumb with me, kid. You know exactly who I am talking about.”

Standing there thinking, racking his brain he couldn’t think of one person.

“I really don’t know who you’re talking about. Could you just tell me? I swear. I don’t know.”

“The girl from Westchester. What’s her name again?”

Hunter immediately thought about Rachel. He couldn’t believe that she thought he loved Rachel. This must have been a major miscommunication.

“Violet, it’s not me that loves her. It’s my brother. My twin brother, Benji.”

“Don’t try to pin it on someone else, Hunter. I know your ways. I know your tricks,” Violet sneered.

“I’m not, you have to trust me on this one. I have no feelings for her. NONE. She’s with my brother, not me. And besides, I think you might have misheard one of our conversations, since that is where you got this information to begin with. Maybe you got it confused?”

“DON’T QUESTION ME!” Violet screamed.

Hunter shuddered as her voice echoed loudly in the room. He stood there, feeling introverted and shy all of a sudden. He didn’t want to speak. He felt scared.

He waited for a few minutes until Violet could catch her breath and compose herself up on the throne. Looking around, he saw the guards standing there watching, looking as stern and serious as ever he’d seen them.

After she took a sip of water, she said, “Hunter, I really don’t think this is going to work out between us.”

Hunter couldn’t believe his ears. Had she gone mad? Was she delusional?

“You might be right,” he replied, pretending to look sad about it.

“I can’t trust you, I really can’t. One moment I feel like I know you and that we are close and the next, you are a total stranger from another coven. And speaking of coven…” she paused and looked at Hunter. “Where is the rest of your Vladdicus kind?”

This was the question that Hunter feared. He didn’t want to tell her where they were all hiding. If he told them, they would surely die. Especially with no warning of the Greslin’s coming, they had no shot of protecting themselves against these evil vampires.

“Um, you know, I really don’t know what happened at the end of the night,” Hunter said quietly.

“SPEAK UP!” Violet shouted.

“I’m not sure,” Hunter said again.

“What do you mean you’re not sure? Of course you know where your coven base is?”

Hunter paused and thought to himself about this situation he’d gotten himself into. She was right—what vampire doesn’t know where the rest of his coven lies.

“Listen Violet, I don’t know and even if I did, I couldn’t tell you,” he said boldly.

A loud noise crept up behind him. He turned to see who it was, and he saw the guards marching towards him with their swords out, ready to execute.