Darkmore Penitentiary (Supernatural Prison for Dark Fae Book 1) Read online

  DARKMORE

  PENITENTIARY

  Supernatural Prison for Dark Fae

  Book 1

  Caroline Peckham & Susanne Valenti

  Contents

  Here is your map of Darkmore Penitentiary.

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  BOOKS BY CAROLINE PECKHAM

  BOOKS BY SUSANNE VALENTI

  Here is your map of Darkmore Penitentiary.

  Your rights have been revoked, your punishment has been decided, your sentence is about to begin. Fight for your place like Fae, or die and be forgotten. This is your one chance for redemption. May the stars be with you.

  Click to enlarge.

  Keep out of trouble, Rosalie. Leading a pack is a big responsibility, Rosalie. You don’t always have to challenge the Alphas, Rosalie.

  My Aunt Bianca’s words echoed through my head a thousand times, mocking, taunting, chastising me. Because right now, in this moment, I just wished I’d goddamn listened to her.

  But this job had been too fucking perfect to turn down. And they’d needed the best. Which everyone knew meant me.

  Besides, I’d been waiting for an opportunity like this for a hell of a long time. There was a debt I needed to pay. A wrong I had to right. And it was long past time that I made good on my promises.

  I gritted my teeth and just kept crawling, using my earth magic to force the dirt and rubble aside as I went and channelling it behind us. And yes, that meant that I was filling in the tunnel as I created it. And yes, that meant I was effectively burying us alive. And yes, that was about eighty percent terrifying. But merda santa, holy shit, if I pulled this off I was going to be a motherfucking legend.

  Last night I ran beneath the light of the moon in my Werewolf Order form for so damn long that I thought my legs would drop off. But it had done what I’d needed it to. My magical reserves had been fully replenished by it and now in my Fae form I could wield the full extent of my sizeable power to get this job done.

  And what a job it was. The vault at the Solarian Bank was said to hold over twenty million auras. If I could do this, my name would go down in history. My entire Clan would howl Rosalie Oscura to the moon and dance naked beneath the stars in celebration.

  If I pulled it off.

  The bank itself was well protected from subterranean Earth Elemental attacks, but that wasn’t how we were going to get in. We were only crawling through the dirt to get close. And we only had to do that because the bank was deep into the Lunar Brotherhood’s Territory. And no matter what anyone said about the state of things since everything that had happened with the rival gang’s leader, Ryder Draconis, Oscuras were absolutely not welcome here.

  My cousin Dante cursed as he crawled behind me and a smirk twitched at my lips. “Can you make the tunnel wider, Rosa?” he growled. “I’m twice the damn size of you!”

  I twisted my head awkwardly so that I could look back at him, his dark features illuminated by the orange Faelight he’d conjured into existence so that we weren’t lost in the dark. As an air Elemental his job was to make sure we didn’t suffocate down here, which I was glad to say he was doing damn well. But as a Dragon Shifter, he was also one big motherfucker and he had a point about the width of the tunnel which was currently crushing his broad shoulders.

  “Are you sure you haven’t put on weight, cugino?” I teased as I wielded more earth away from him. “You know what they say about getting too comfortable when you’re married. If you don’t watch out, you might find your wife’s attention wandering…”

  “My wife’s attention is always wandering,” he joked as we crawled on. “But she’ll never grow tired of me.”

  “Maybe watch the pies anyway…”

  I yelped as he shot me in the ass with a spark of his Storm Dragon electricity and decided not to taunt the only Alpha I knew who was strong enough to rival me. Not that either of us had ever challenged each other. There were more than enough Oscura Clan Werewolves for us to run two packs within the family and I was happy to call him the head of the household, so long as he never actually tried to make me bow. Which he wouldn’t. Because despite what everyone liked to think about our pack having two Alphas, we made it work for the good of our family. And love could overcome our natures all the time we were never faced with a situation where we had to challenge each other.

  I clawed through dirt and muck until my GPS watch pulsed to let me know we’d reached our destination.

  “Here we go,” I muttered, my Wolf stirring beneath my skin, hungry for the challenge ahead of us.

  I growled as I drew the earth apart above us with my magic, breaking through soil and stone with a grunt of determination as I clawed my way up towards the surface. I kept going, sweat beading along my brow until my fist burst through the concrete above me and I was able to clamber up into the alley behind the bank.

  Dante cursed in Faetalian as he forced his way up after me and I quickly threw my magic out in a silencing bubble to make sure no one heard us.

  I offered Dante my hand as he breached the surface and he gripped me tightly as I yanked him up to his feet.

  He might have been twice my size, but I was damn strong after a lifetime of training in every kind of martial art and hand to hand combat I could perfect. I made plenty of money by participating in the underground cage fights in the rougher parts of Alestria, but I loved the rush of pulling off a real job like this. Not that I’d ever attempted anything quite as insane as this particular job before. But there was a first time for everything. And I wasn’t exactly known for being level headed anyway.

  Dante’s mamma called me a live wire and my pack called me a free spirit. But Dante was the only one who called it like it was. When I was thirteen years old, he’d caught me diving off of the cliff out by the flooded mine in Jerrytown. My Werewolf Order had Emerged by then so I was able to shift, but as Fae didn’t have their magic Awakened until we turned eighteen, I hadn’t had any real chance of surviving if the water had turned out to be shallower than I’d thought.

  So when Dante caught me with his air magic while I was only half way down the cliff, he’d cursed and threatened me, promised to banish me from the pack and make me into an Omega if I ever did something so foolish alone again… And then he’d jumped from the cliff right beside me. Because my cousin might have been responsible for the safety and well-being of our entire Clan, but he was also a straight up badass and the only Fae I knew who really understood me.


  When he flew me back to his mamma’s house out in the vineyards that night in his Storm Dragon form, he’d told me straight he knew what my problem was. You’re wild, Rosa. And you’d better make sure no one ever tames you.

  I smirked to myself at that memory as I pulled every scrap of dirt off of the two of us using my earth magic. I sent it back down into the hole in the ground before forcing the concrete to merge back over the tunnel again for good measure.

  Dante pushed his dark hair back like we were about to walk into a photo op instead of a heist and I rolled my eyes at him.

  “So vain, cugino,” I teased. “You’re worse than a girl.”

  “When my wife finds out where I went tonight, I’ll need to win her forgiveness,” he said with a shrug. “It won’t hurt to look my best while I’m grovelling at her feet.”

  I snorted a laugh. “Will the great leader of the Oscura Clan be in the dog house tonight then?”

  “Only because I didn’t invite her along,” he teased and knowing what I did about his wife, I had to agree with that assessment.

  “Come on then, let’s hurry before she notices you’re missing.”

  “She won’t for a while yet. I gave mio amico the job of keeping her thoroughly distracted for the evening.”

  “Oh hell,” I groaned, not wanting to know any more about it.

  Dante chuckled as he moved past me straight towards the fuse box on the back wall of the bank. It was warded against Elemental magic to make sure no one managed to shut off the power to the bank, but we were willing to bet they hadn’t thought to guard it against the electricity of a Storm Dragon.

  I moved to stand guard as Dante ripped the fuse box open, the hairs rising along the back of my neck as if my Wolf hackles tried to stand on end even in my Fae form.

  The wind whipped along the alleyway as Dante summoned a storm and my long, black hair was tossed around me in the maelstrom he created.

  Thunder crashed through the sky and electricity rose in the air as his immense power crackled all around us.

  People all over Solaria spoke about the Dragon born of Wolves, but feeling the strength of his magic was something you could never comprehend until you were standing by his side in the centre of one of his storms.

  Rain tumbled from the sky in a torrent and Dante laughed as the storm built in his veins. With a flash so bright I was half blinded, a bolt of lightning slammed from the clouds straight into the fuse box which Dante held open.

  His booming laugh rang out as the bank’s lights all went out at once. More lightning crashed from the sky, striking power lines all over the surrounding streets and the whole block was plunged into darkness.

  “That should have knocked out the anti-stardust wards!” I said enthusiastically as the rain plastered my clothes to my body. I yanked my drenched sweater off and dropped it in a puddle, leaving me in a black tank and leggings.

  “Let’s find out,” Dante said, pulling a little silk bag from his pocket as I moved to stand before him.

  Inside the bag, I caught a glimpse of sparkling black stardust as he drew a pinch between his fingers. He tossed the glimmering substance over our heads and the world around us melted away as we were surrounded by twinkling light and transported through the stars to the destination Dante had given them.

  My feet hit solid ground a moment later and an excited laugh spilled from my lips as we landed right inside the bank’s vault.

  Golden bars reached up behind us from floor to ceiling and the walls before us were lined with little doors for the safety deposit boxes which held all manner of dark, dangerous and wildly valuable magical treasures. This bank was well known for housing the secrets of Solaria’s most wicked and ruthless Fae, and I could only guess at the wonderful contents of those boxes.

  Each of them was magically locked with enough power binding them to make it impossible for us to crack them all open. But we didn’t need to open all of them. We were here for the contents of one box in particular.

  “Three eighteen?” Dante confirmed as he strode forward, hunting the numbers on the boxes for the one we needed. He was more than powerful enough to crack one of the magical locks and there was a nice big haul of aura notes just stacked up at the back of the vault to make up the rest of the haul.

  I prowled towards the bars at the front of the vault, sharpening my hearing by calling on my inner Wolf and using my Order gifts as I listened for the guards.

  Magic rippled over me as Dante threw a shield of hardened air magic up between us and the bars. If anyone came down here, they’d have to unlock the door to get to us. The adrenaline pumping through my veins ached for a fight and I was hoping I’d get one.

  As a Taurus, I’d been gifted the power of Earth Magic which I also liked to think of as the best Elemental power. All Fae could command Cardinal Magic to use spells for things like healing, creating Faelights or any number of other useful things. But Elemental magic was different. It was linked to the stars we were born beneath. This effectively meant that your star sign determined which Element you were blessed with the power to wield, though a few lucky bastardos ended up with additional Elements too. Not that I was jealous. Earth magic was a beast to wield and I was more than happy with what I’d been gifted.

  “Found it!” Dante called, barking a laugh.

  I glanced over my shoulder and spotted him with his hand pressed flat to the safety deposit box we’d come here for. His brow furrowed in concentration as he worked on cracking the lock and I started pacing to expel a bit of nervous energy from my limbs.

  “Shit,” he cursed a split second before an alarm sounded.

  “Did you trip that?” I accused with a frown.

  “I told you we should have asked Leon to come,” he growled.

  “I don’t need help from a Night to do my job,” I muttered. At least not that particular Night. Their family might have been made up of the greatest thieves in the whole of Solaria, but I’d planned this job out myself and I didn’t need their help. Though for the next part of this plan to go right, I would be needing his brother…

  Footsteps thundered toward us and I strained my neck to try and see further along the empty hallway beyond the bars.

  My muscles flexed with the desire to shift, but I ignored the pull of my Wolf. I wanted to give my magic a workout and use my fists. I didn’t need to shift into my Order form to take out a few guards.

  Dante kept working the lock and static crackled through the vault as his excitement built in the air around us.

  I kept my eyes on the bars and summoned whips of long, thorny vines to grow from my palms as I waited for the guards to find us.

  The sound of a door hitting a wall came half a second before eight guards rushed into the space beyond the vault.

  They didn’t waste a moment as they threw a combination of magic at us. Shards of ice, balls of flames, wooden arrows and blasts of air all slammed against Dante’s shield as they tried to penetrate it through pure force.

  Dante’s booming laugh echoed around the vault as each of their strikes crashed uselessly against the strength of his magic and a savage smile pulled at my lips. Dante Oscura was the Dragon born of Wolves, the King of the Oscura Clan and one of the strongest assholes I knew. If they wanted to get through his magic they’d have to try a lot harder than that.

  I stayed completely still, poised and ready to strike right before the gate as the guards continued to batter Dante’s magic.

  “What’s the matter boys?” I taunted. “Are you afraid to fight us like Fae?”

  A few of them balked at my accusation. True Fae fought one on one. In our society, power meant everything. Those with the most magic rose to the top and if you wanted to claim a higher position then you had to challenge another Fae for it. We didn’t attack each other in groups. It only showed weakness. But these guards were clearly battling with the pull of their nature and the rules of their job description. No doubt they were willing to sell out their Faehood for their paycheque.

>   One mean looking bastard squared up to me through the bars with fury blazing in his eyes. “Open the gates,” he snarled.

  “But Lee, protocol-”

  “Fuck protocol,” Lee hissed. “I’m gonna make this bitch bleed.”

  My smile widened and the vines in my hands writhed like snakes as my magic trailed through them.

  Dante was still working on the safety deposit box behind me and there was no way in hell that I was gonna let this job fall to shit. We needed the contents of that box. Everything hinged on him getting it. So it was on me to hold these stronzos back while he worked.

  The other guards hesitated and Lee shot a fireball at them. One of them damn near pissed his pants and my smile widened as I watched him sprint for the vault’s locking mechanism.

  My heart beat to a solid rhythm in my chest and I rolled my shoulders back as the thrill of the fight called to me. This was what I lived for. What got my blood pumping and my soul blazing.

  My gaze trailed along the line of guards as they positioned themselves before the gate. I’d taken note of which magical Element each of them possessed as they’d battered Dante’s shield. I was ready.

  I drew in a deep breath as the gate slid open, enjoying that one pure moment which always came right before violence broke out. That second where I assessed my enemy and they assessed me before one of us chose to strike first.

  This time it was me.

  I whipped the vines in my arms as hard as I could and released my hold on them as I sent the full force of my magic into their movements. They shot towards the guards, growing, lengthening, sprouting new shoots with thorns as sharp as knives before they collided with them.

  Three of them were taken down by the first vine and two by the second. They screamed as the vines kept growing, tightening, cutting, immobilising them despite all of their efforts to break free with their own magic. Dante may have been one of the most powerful Fae I knew, but I was his equal in that. Within minutes the vines would choke out the guards and render them unconscious, saving me the bother of having to restrain them.

  That was the problem with low paid jobs like security; you just couldn’t find powerful Fae who would take the positions. Which meant when a tough bitch with more than her fair share of magical brawn like me came along, the poor suckers didn’t stand a chance.