Poison Throne: A Dark College Romance (Royals of Arbon Academy Book 3) Read online

  Chapter 3

  The door clanged, and I didn't bother to lift my head. Same fucking routine, day after day, and there was no point in reacting.

  I’d been here for three weeks.

  Three weeks trapped in a cage, allowed out once in the morning for the bathroom—when they occasionally let me shower in freezing water—and once in the evening. Between those two outings, all I got was some nice torture as they attempted to break me. The orders to not hurt me had ended after that first day, but they had at least stopped short of sexual assault or rape. So far anyway.

  "Good morning, little bug," my toilet warden said. The woman was in her sixties and had a taser she was not afraid to use and a kink where she chained my hands and feet up so I wouldn't fight her. There was no reason to hurt her again though. The first time I'd knocked her out, I’d gotten into the next room—the only way out from here—to find thirty armed resistance members standing around like they were expecting me.

  Some of them hadn't been back the next day, but the number of these fuckers was limitless. They just kept replacing the ones I broke.

  Since then, I'd been learning as much as I could and cataloging everything. Brute strength wasn't going to get me out of here. I had to be smarter.

  "Is Jordan alive?"

  That was always my first question of the day.

  "Yep," she said in her heavy accent of indeterminate origin. I had no reason to believe she was telling the truth, I had not seen or heard him in twenty-one days, but it made me feel better whenever I heard that yep.

  "Where is Rafe?"

  Always my second question, and not because he was less important than Jordan but because I didn't even know if he was here.

  She didn't reply, the same as always.

  Fuck this place. Maybe I'd just knock her out anyway for fun.

  But by the time I’d been returned to my cell—clean, starving, and exhausted—I couldn’t be bothered attacking her. So she got a stay of ass-whooping today. Who knew about tomorrow.

  "Red East leader will be by shortly," the woman told me, shaking her ample hips as she wandered out the door.

  I didn't reply. What the fuck could I say?

  The Red East leader was a short man with pale skin, white hair, and red-rimmed blue eyes. He had a heavy, harsh accent, his words cutting off short and sharp. He also had heavy fists, ones he used when he chained me to the walls and beat the fuck out of me every day.

  Today he entered at the same time as my breakfast, so I didn't get a chance to eat before he was gesturing for me to walk to the wall. The large gun he had pointed at me, not to mention the second gun pointed by the man behind him—a different one each time—was enough to have me moving toward the cuffs.

  When I was there, he locked them on, and I braced myself. "Are you ready?" he asked.

  I tilted my head, for the first time not letting anger control me—instead staying calm and focused. "What is the point of this? You ask me no questions, you tell me no information, and you don't kill me. Is there an end game here?"

  He paused, fists elevated as he prepared to lay into me. "What do you know," he said in a similarly calm tone to what I'd used. "You might just be ready to talk now."

  "You were breaking me down?" I asked, my fuzzy brain trying to piece it together. "But you never even asked me any questions. How did you know I wouldn't talk before now?"

  He leaned in very close, voice a low whisper, breath foul as it washed over my face. "Your temper has always been your downfall, Violence. You will not survive this world unless you learn to ride the calming waves, the ebb and flow of the tides, the push and pull of the sword. Not everything requires a reaction. Sometimes it just is."

  My gut dropped, and if I could have moved my hands, I would have clutched at the pain in my chest. I’d heard those words before...

  "You know my sensei?"

  The Red East leader smiled, his teeth the least white part of him. "He wants to see you," he said, and just like that, my chains were released. "But if you cannot attend this meeting with a calm heart, you will go right back into this cage, for it's when you have nothing and are broken down to your base nature that you will find—"

  "Your true self."

  My tone was bitter. My sensei was here, and I had no idea what to think about it. There was no one I’d respected more when I was growing up, and in my mind when I referred to him as “sensei,” it was in remembrance of the person who had guided and half-raised me.

  But there was another side of him—the hard nature that made him a formidable fighter. He was as brutal as he was breathtaking, and I meant that in every sense. Not to mention the way he’d just up and left me when I was a naïve sixteen-year-old...

  Rubbing at the red welts on my wrists, I wondered if the marks might be permanent after all of these weeks of trying to fight against the handcuffs. “Has all of this been under my sensei’s orders?” I asked, following the Red East leader out of the cage. He didn’t say a word, just continued leading me through the lower levels.

  It was clear that most of the underground network here was for prisoners. I’d never seen anyone in a cell close to mine, but I’d heard plenty of screams in my weeks here. None of them had sounded like Rafe or Jordan—I doubted either of my guys would scream like that no matter what—but my heart still shattered every single time there was a shout.

  Not knowing if my princes were dead or alive was legitimately going to give me a heart attack.

  Nothing else was said as we continued on, and I finally got to leave the depressing pit of their underground rooms, emerging into fresh air and sunshine. Closing my eyes for a second, I breathed deeply and let the sun bathe my face.

  "Come," Red East leader said. "You can enjoy your freedom soon enough. Once you've heard our proposition, you will understand everything much more clearly."

  That proposition better include information about where my princes were, or this newfound calm they had been trying to beat into me would fade away in a whirl of fists and violence. My name, my nature after all.

  The building I’d been locked in looked like a huge shopping mall, short and wide, with a lot of gray dreariness to the design. It even had a parking lot, which was where they ushered me into a nondescript white van.

  "Not even going to offer me candy first," I muttered.

  He side-eyed me, but I was pretty sure he didn't get the reference. Fuck, he'd clearly never been a kid fighting for his life on the streets, and it showed.

  The car was silent and smooth, powering out of the mostly empty lot. We drove for what felt like an hour. Just me, Red East leader, and another armed, masked man. Finally, we left the urban landscape and entered a more natural setting until the car stopped in front of a gorgeous, ranch-style property.

  "Of course," I murmured. No way would my sensei find himself living outside of his comfort zone—he hated concrete and people. Not in that order.

  My door was opened by the driver, who left his gun inside the vehicle. Apparently they didn't fear me running from here. As much I wanted to remind them of who I was, there were more pressing things to worry about.

  I needed answers about Rafe and Jordan before I did anything else.

  Walking up the long, pebbled path, I headed for the grainy wood steps of the front porch. It took a lot of effort to move the last few feet to the door. I hadn't seen my sensei in a long time, almost two years to be exact, and things had not ended well between us. It was complicated and messy, our relationship, and in the time we’d been apart, I’d reached some dark conclusions about both of us. The respect I’d once held for this man was gone. But since he was the one standing between me and my princes, I had to suck up some courage and face my past.

  The door swung open, and just like that, he took the option away from me.

  Standing in the open space, wearing his trademark high-collared kung-fu outfit, was Uriel, my sensei. Many of the martial arts disciplines had lost their way after the Monarch War, disbanded so that commoners could no longer learn to fight. Uriel was of a secret, underground sect that still practiced in multiple disciplines. His training was second to none, and even I had never been able to come close to matching him during our sparring sessions.

  "I’ve been expecting you," he said, voice deeper than I remembered.

  I didn’t move, waiting for him to get out of the shadows so I could see his expression. His eyes actually. They were the only part of him that told me which Uriel I was facing today.

  “Come in,” he said, stepping back.

  Fucker. This, as everything with him, was a test.

  With a small exhale, I crossed the last few steps into his house, following him into the light. As he turned and faced me, I barely caught the gasp that tried to escape. It had been so long since I’d seen him, and in that time, if anything, he seemed even more striking.

  Uriel always reminded me of a fallen angel, and despite the fact that he was in his early forties, had a youthful appearance. White-blond hair, long and tied back in a thick braid, piercing golden eyes, that could stab with their intensity, and dark golden skin, that added to his overall "God-like" appearance.

  The man who taught me how to defend and save myself. The man I tried to never think about more than I had to.

  The man who’d stolen my innocence, even if I’d thought I was giving it freely to him at the time.

  That was why I never came back to him. This was what I’d come to terms with over the past two years: I had been groomed by a predator. But I was quickly coming to the realization that he hadn’t only been grooming me for sex, but for something much bigger. Something much more political. Apparently, I was finally about to find out his long-held secret.

  What did Uriel have planned for me?

  Chapter 4

  Silence reigned supreme as I sat on the edge of the chaise lounge with my back ramrod straight. Uriel was content to wait it out, though. He knew I'd break first, I always broke first. Such was the impatience of youth.

  After some moments, he gave an unspoken command to the black uniformed guards with machine guns standing inside the doors. They nodded and wordlessly left. The click of an old fashioned metal key turning in a lock echoed through the room in their wake, and then it was just the two of us.

  Uriel and me.

  He raked his gaze over me in a way that spoke volumes about how we'd left our last encounter. But still, he didn't speak. Just stared.

  Eventually the tension got to me, like it always did, and I let out a growl of frustration.

  "What am I doing here, Uriel?" I snapped the words with annoyance because I couldn't ask what I really wanted to ask. Where are Rafe and Jordan? Are they okay, or have you already executed them like Claudette?

  Seeing him, here, that mess at Arbon made more sense. I should have known my sensei was a member of the Society. He hated the monarchies to the point of weakness, and never missed an opportunity to remind me of the injustices they inflicted on us. Which was hypocrisy at its finest considering the wealth both he and the Red East leader seemed to come from.

  His eyes narrowed at me in silent reprimand, but I was done taking his shit. I wasn't that naive, love-struck teenager any more. I wasn't in awe of his strength and control, and I sure as shit wasn't blinded by my foolish, misguided, and utterly manipulated infatuation.

  I sneered. "I think I earned the right to use your name the night you took my virginity. Now, answer my damn question. What the fuck am I doing here?"

  He sucked in a deep breath, his mouth tight and his nostrils flaring. Once upon a time, that would have instilled deep, bone trembling fear in me. Not anymore.

  "I see the years of absence have done no favors for your discipline and respect, disciple." His voice was smooth and low, hypnotic, but I knew him better than that. He was pissed as hell at my brash manner toward him. "However they certainly made up for it in how nicely you matured as a woman." Again with that leering gaze.

  I shivered, and not with desire.

  "Are we just going to sit here and chat on old times, or did you have a reason to kidnap my friends, capture me then try and break me for three weeks? Spoiler alert, I'm not broken, Uriel. Try harder next time. Or, you know, just man up and tell me what you want." I kept my gaze flat and hard, my hands loose in my lap. I'd spent too many years under his often cruel training to forget everything so fast. Besides, much of what he'd taught me was invaluable to my place in the world now.

  He let the silence stretch between us again, predictably, but then leaned forward with his fingers steepled. His golden eyes studied me in his piercing, intuitive way, but I wasn't afraid anymore. I stared right back.

  "The Society would like to offer you a position within our ranks, Rose." He studied me for a reaction to this, and I couldn't help myself. I flinched.

  It had nothing to do with his "offer" to join the people's army, but his use of my middle name. He'd only done that on rare occasions, usually after a particularly brutal or cruel training session that had left me a broken, hollow shell. Most of the time we’d been sensei and disciple, but there had been these moments that he showed rare displays of kindness, holding me tenderly and whispering everything I wanted to hear. He always called me by my middle name then, like a term of endearment.

  I knew better, now. He was manipulating me, essentially brainwashing me to become his loyal, adoring soldier. As beautiful as a rose, with deadly, poison-tipped thorns.

  "You had to know you were always destined for a higher purpose, my beautiful girl," he continued, sensing my moment of hesitation like a shark on blood. "A strength like yours couldn't be wasted in the slums of America, thrown away on cheap underground fights for paltry bets. No, Rose, you've been trained by the best." He meant himself, arrogant prick. "And now it's time you fulfill your duty to us all. To your people. To me."

  My lip curled with disgust. "I don't owe you anything, Uriel. I paid my debt in full the last time we met."

  His mouth curved in a lascivious smile, and he dragged his tongue across his lower lip like he could still taste me there after two years. "Suddenly, I’ve found the need to charge interest."

  It took all of my willpower not to react. Not to leap out of my chair and wrap my hands around his throat, choking him into unconsciousness like he'd done to me a thousand times before. Then maybe not let go.

  "This is your opportunity for greatness, Rose." He continued speaking like he was oblivious to my murderous thoughts, but I knew he wasn't. Uriel could read me better than anyone. Better, even, than either of my stolen princes. "We, in the Society, have done our part. We've trained you, disciplined you, educated you. Our people have placed you in the perfect position, it's now your privilege to carry us into a new age. Starting with the death of the monarchies."

  His eyes shone with an inner light as he spoke, excitement glittering through his cool and calm facade. He reminded me of the cult leaders or serial killers of the twentieth century. I'd seen an old documentary on Ted Bundy, about how he used his looks and charm to lure in young women, then raped, beat, and murdered them. Uriel had that air about him, except he hadn't tried to murder me. Yet.

  I cleared my throat and licked my lips, forming words in my head before voicing them aloud. "Am I to understand you rigged the Princess Ballot to see me placed at Arbon Academy?"

  He grinned, pride radiating from his very pores. "It wasn't hard. That so-called lottery has always been rigged, since day one. You didn't know that, did you? It's not random at all. It's designed to provide royals with a genetically compatible breeding partner. Turns out that all the years of selective marriages have drastically reduced the royals ability to conceive, and heavens forbid they allow the line of succession to deviate out of their bloodlines."

  I did know all of that, actually. But I had no idea the Society had rigged it to place me as the winner. That was staggering in itself that they had grown so powerful behind the scenes to be able to pull that off. Nevertheless, I kept my face neutral and calm. No sense in showing my hand to the enemy—because that's what my sensei was proving himself to be. No friend of mine would set off an earthquake that killed innocents like Jordan's betrothed, Meghan. Nor would they kidnap the two people I cared for more than anyone else in this world.

  "Lay it out for me plainly, Uriel," I said bluntly. "Tell me what exactly you want, and I'll take it under consideration."

  His lips flattened, and I knew from experience that he was annoyed at me. He’d no doubt carefully thought out this dramatic presentation of what the Society wanted, and I was ruining it all for him.

  He frowned at me, then must have decided I wasn't in the mood for theatrics. With a sigh, he sat back in his chair once more. "You're to become the figurehead of the people's resistance, Rose. We're ready to go public and take the fight directly to the monarchies, and we need a face. You're that person."

  I stared at him. "Excuse me?"

  "You've been groomed for this since childhood, beautiful girl," he said with a coaxing lilt to his voice. Internally I scoffed, because he'd sure as shit groomed me for something. And I doubted that something was the resistance. "You're in the perfect position, from the perfect breeding, and with the perfectly mundane, impoverished upbringing that the vast majority will relate to. We did that for you, Rose. The resistance has guided every step of your life from the day you were born, and now it's your time to shine."

  My heart thudded a bit harder in my chest, and my stomach turned to ice. He wasn't just tossing around casual metaphors; he was totally serious. The resistance had been planning on placing me in the Princess Ballot since birth, which meant...

  "Who was my mother, really?" I asked, unable to help myself. Uriel was telling me they'd mapped out my whole life, meaning everything that had happened to me was due to their influence. The group homes, the foster parents, the abuse... it had all been by design. Forming my easily relatable upbringing, no doubt. Giving me a sob story that the masses of citizens below the poverty line would rally behind.