Free Blood Legacy by Vanessa Redmoon

nails. As her wails grew and grew, fangs emerged from her teeth. Her face collided with the glass, leaving a trail of gleaming venom on it.
    She shuddered, her whole body rippling with visible pleasure, then slowly, carefully, the man withdrew the rod from her, slick with her juices. The crowd of Vampyrs applauded softly, though there were a few murmurs and gasps that left me with little doubt as to what some of the audience members were themselves doing.
    But I couldn’t blame them. The way the woman’s fangs emerged as she surrendered to complete and total delirium . . . I envied it. I tried to think if there had ever been a moment in my entire life when I’d surrendered such control, or when I’d bared myself so utterly to even one person, let alone a room full of onlookers. The life of a human in the Sanguine Republic meant forever watching your back, and your front, besides; it meant always being observed, not for pleasure, but to see how hard you could be pushed until you broke. And in my dealin gs with Finch and the Resistance, that pressure was double—I felt it welling inside me now, thinking of the absurd contortions that constituted my every day as I stole information and kept tabs on the Vampyr families and assisted in their small, symbolic, and ultimately meaningless acts of rebellion that often as not got innocent humans killed . . .
    How would it feel, for just a few hours, not to care about anything beyond the four walls around yourself? Even if they were made of glass, at least the darkness could let you pretend the world wasn’t watching and holding its breath. (Among other things it might be holding.) How would it feel to let myself go, to ride that wave with no fear of what might happen when it pulled me under?
    “Enjoying the show?” a man asked, his breath hot and metallic on my neck. I knew the smell that laced his words, and it wasn’t just alcohol he’d been drinking. I took a step to the side, only to back into a second man.
    “We hear you might be able to put on quite a show yourself, if it’s true what they say.” The second man ran a finger down my bare arm. “A real, proper agonie .”
    “Where did you hear that?” I asked, turning to face the first man. He was an olive-skinned Vampyr with too-perfect black hair that hung straight around his face. There was something familiar in his haughty look, though I couldn’t place it exactly.
    “Our darling ‘sister’ told us,” cooed the man behind me. He grabbed a fistful of my curls and breathed in loudly. “You certainly smell like one.”
    “Maybe you can give us a private show,” the first man said. “I promise we won’t tell His Lordship.”
    “Not that it’s his business anyway. I reckon you’re our sister’s property as much as his anyhow.” And at that, the second Vampyr cupped his hand around my breast, the one wrapped in the shimmering gauze, and gave it a crude tweak.
    I twisted away from him, trying to duck under his arm, but his Vampyr reflexes were too quick. They both pressed against me, pinning me against a curtained alcove, one man’s forearm against my throat, nearly crushing my windpipe, as the other jammed his knee between my thighs. The pain was nothing like what I’d felt under Victor’s cruel hand that morning—this was hollow pain, without the sweet barbs of pleasure to alleviate it. And the terror pounding through me was all too real, with no promise of relief.
    “Oh, look, Bernard, she’s scared of us. I can smell it on her blood.”
    “Blood always tastes sweeter with a dose of fear.”
    I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to pry myself free of the two men. They were too strong, and I was outnumbered.
    “Now, now, you know he wouldn’t like us making a Donor of her.”
    “Better to ask forgiveness than permission.”
    I couldn’t move, I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t feel anything except the hot breath against my exposed neck as one Vampyr’s mouth moved toward my throbbing carotid