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The silver chains burned.
Not like fire. Worse. Like something crawling under my skin, looking for bone. I tried to pull my wrists apart but the metal just dug deeper, and the lead hunter—tall guy with the scar bisecting his left eyebrow—smiled like he'd been waiting for me to try that.
"Don't," Silas said. His voice was quiet but it cut through the room. "The chains feed on resistance."
I shot him a look. "You could've mentioned that before they locked me up."
"I was bleeding out on your floor. Forgive the lapse in manners."
The hunter with the scar stepped between us. His name was Kael. I caught it when the other two called him sir. He had that military vibe—straight spine, dead eyes, probably slept in his boots. "Your Highness," he said, and the title sounded like an insult. "The Council wants you back by dawn. Both of you."
Silas was still sitting on the floor, one hand pressed to the wound I'd reopened. Blood seeped between his fingers, dark and too thick. He looked at Kael the way you'd look at a parking ticket. Annoyed. Bored. "Tell the Council I'll come when I'm ready."
"You don't have that luxury."
"I'm the heir. I have whatever I want."
Kael's jaw tightened. For a second I thought he might actually hit Silas. Then he just turned and nodded at the other two hunters. "Bring them both. If she resists, drag her."
I opened my mouth to tell him exactly where he could shove his orders, but Silas spoke first. "Touch her and I'll have your rank."
The room went silent.
Kael's hand froze halfway to my shoulder. He looked back at Silas, and this time there was something else in his face. Not fear exactly. More like... calculation. "You're protecting a human."
"I'm protecting my contract partner," Silas said. "There's a difference."
"The Council won't see it that way."
"Then the Council can explain why they let three hunters break into my quarters without clearance." Silas pushed himself up off the floor. He was shaking but he didn't let it show in his voice. "We'll go. But she walks free until we're inside the gate."
Kael stared at him. Then he made some kind of hand signal and the chains around my wrists went slack. Not off. Just loose enough that I could move without feeling like my bones were melting.
"Thank you," I said to Silas.
He didn't look at me. "Don't. You're only useful alive."
Right. Of course.
Kael led us out into the hallway. My hallway. The one I walked every day on my way to twelve-hour shifts and instant ramen dinners. Except now there were two more hunters flanking us, both armed with those short silver blades that looked like they'd been pulled out of a museum. Or a nightmare.
We took the stairs. Fourteen flights. My legs were screaming by the time we hit the ground floor, and Silas looked like he was about to pass out. His face had gone gray and he was leaning hard on the railing, but every time one of the hunters tried to steady him he pulled away.
Pride. Or stupidity. Probably both.
When we got outside I expected a car. Maybe a van. Something normal. Instead Kael walked us three blocks south and stopped in front of a subway entrance I'd passed a thousand times but never used. The sign above it said **Closed for Maintenance**.
"You've got to be kidding," I said.
Kael pulled the gate open. It didn't even creak. "After you, Doctor Moore."
I looked at Silas. He was watching me with that unreadable expression again, the one that made me want to punch him and ask questions at the same time. "It's safe," he said.
"You're a terrible liar."
"I didn't say it was pleasant. I said it was safe."
I went down.
The stairs were old. Older than the building above them. The tile on the walls had that turn-of-the-century look, white with green trim, except half of it was missing and the rest was covered in some kind of slick black residue that I really didn't want to identify. The air smelled like rust and something else. Something organic.
"What is this place?" I asked.
"Transit," Silas said behind me. He was taking the stairs one at a time, his breathing shallow. "The old city had tunnels before the subway. Most of them were sealed off in the fifties."
"Most."
"The Court kept a few."
We reached the platform. It stretched out into darkness on both sides, no lights except for a single amber bulb hanging over a bench that looked like it had survived two world wars. The tracks were down below, but I couldn't see them. Just black.
Kael checked his watch. "Two minutes."
"Until what?" I asked.
Nobody answered.
I felt it before I heard it. A vibration in the floor, low and rhythmic, like a heartbeat. Then the sound came—metal on metal, wheels on rails, something big and old moving fast. Wind hit my face, warm and stale, and then the train came around the corner.
It didn't look real.
The cars were black, no windows, no lights except for two burning orange slits at the front that might've been headlights or eyes. The brakes screamed when it stopped and the doors opened with a hiss that sounded too much like breathing.
"Get in," Kael said.
I didn't move. "What happens if I don't?"
"The contract burns you both out before sunrise," Silas said. He stepped past me onto the train. "Your choice."
I got in.
The interior was worse. Red leather seats, most of them torn. Brass fixtures gone green. And that smell again, stronger now—copper and decay and something almost sweet. There were other passengers. Four of them. They didn't look up when we entered. Just sat there, hands folded, heads down.
Kael pushed me toward the back. Silas followed, moving slower now. When we sat down he slumped against the wall and closed his eyes.
"You're still bleeding," I said.
He didn't open his eyes. "I know."
"Let me see it."
"No."
"I'm a doctor."
"You're a liability."
The train lurched forward. I grabbed the seat to keep from falling and my hand came away sticky. I didn't look at what was on my palm. Just wiped it on my jeans and tried not to think about infectious diseases.
We picked up speed. The walls outside blurred into black and then into something else—shapes, shadows, things that moved wrong. I looked away.
"How long is this ride?" I asked.
Kael was standing near the door, one hand on a leather strap. "Twenty minutes."
"To where?"
"You'll see."
Helpful.
I looked at Silas. His breathing had gone shallow again and there was fresh blood soaking through his shirt. The wound I'd reopened. My fault. Sort of.
"Silas," I said.
Nothing.
"Hey." I reached over and shook his shoulder. His eyes snapped open and for a second they weren't gray. They were black, all pupil, no iris. Then he blinked and they were normal again.
"Don't touch me," he said.
"You're going into shock."
"I'm fine."
"You're dying."
He smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "That's what the contract is for."
I didn't think. I just moved. I grabbed his face with both hands—chains and all—and kissed him.
It wasn't romantic. It wasn't even smart. But the second my mouth touched his I felt it. The pull. The same thing I'd felt when I signed the contract, except a thousand times stronger. His pain slammed into me like a freight train—burning, tearing, everything on fire—and under that I felt something else.
Hunger.
Want.
Fear.
I pulled back, gasping. Silas was staring at me. The wound on his chest had stopped bleeding. The edges were already starting to close.
"What the hell was that?" I said.
He touched his mouth. His fingers came away clean. "You healed me."
"How?"
"The contract." He was still staring at me like I'd just pulled a gun. "Physical contact accelerates the bond. Especially..."
He didn't finish. He didn't have to.
Kael was watching us from across the car. His expression hadn't changed but his hand had moved to the blade at his belt. "Interesting," he said.
I ignored him. "You knew that would happen."
"I suspected," Silas said.
"And you didn't tell me."
"Would you have done it if I had?"
I wanted to hit him again. Instead I sat back and tried to slow my heartbeat. I could still feel the echo of his pain in my chest, and under that, the other thing. The want. Except I didn't know if it was his or mine.
The train started to slow.
Kael straightened. "We're here."
I looked out—not that there was anything to see through the black walls—but I felt it. A change in pressure. A sense of space opening up. The train stopped and the doors hissed open.
Light poured in. Real light, warm and gold, nothing like the dying bulb on the platform. Kael stepped out first. Then the other hunters. Then Silas, still moving carefully.
I followed.
And stopped.
We weren't in a subway station. We were in a city. An entire city, hidden under the streets, carved out of rock and darkness and something that glowed. Buildings rose up on either side of a wide stone avenue, their windows burning with that same golden light. People walked the streets—dozens of them, maybe hundreds—all dressed in clothes I couldn't quite name. Old-fashioned but not historical. Just... other.
And every single one of them turned to look at us.
At me.
Then they dropped.
All of them. On their knees, heads bowed, like I'd just walked in wearing a crown.
I looked at Silas. "What the hell is happening?"
He was staring at the crowd. His face had gone pale again. "They can see it," he said quietly.
"See what?"
He turned to me. For the first time since I'd met him, he looked afraid.
"Your blood," he said. "You're not just a human, Ivy. You're a vessel. Royal bloodline. And now every court in the city knows you're here."