The sun starts to set beyond the walls of this entrapment. Cain's fingers trail down my spine carefully as I keep turned away from him. It's so relaxing that I almost feel asleep. I hear his nostrils inhaling into my throat and I laugh out quietly.

"What are you doing?"

"I still can't taste you," he says. "No reading at all." He turns on his back and sighs. "If I do ever feed from you again then I might have to wrap you in a dozen blankets."

I roll myself back over, he flicks his eyes to me but he stays on his back. "Do creatures ever. . . do that?"

"With each other?" he says. I nod. "Yes. We form couples just like humans."

"But you've never tried it?"

He smiles at the ceiling. "I've never found anyone worthy of it. Some of the females try and seduce me when they visit but I know it's a trick. They don't want me. They just want the position beside me."

"To be Queen," I whisper.

"I had a Queen once," he says. "She was at my side for a thousand years. Marina warned me about her, half of my entire kind warned me about her, but I didn't listen. She was taking the blade without my knowledge and killing anyone that opposed her. The greed of power grew inside of her until she didn't see us as equals anymore. She wanted to put another on the throne, someone she could be superior to because I was too strong for her liking. She conducted an entire plot to assassinate me but I outsmarted her. I've never trusted another female as a companion since then."

"What happened to her?" I whisper, wondering just how true Wendy's story was.

"I could not kill her," he mutters, his eyes narrowing with anger at the fact. "The completed soul she consumed made her too powerful. I locked her in a type of cage and dropped her in this. . . I cannot describe it in a human language. It was on another planet. That was three hundred years ago, her temporary immortality will end soon. I am waiting for that day so I can finally drive that blade through her heart. Or I will just let her starve to death."

"Saffron," I say. "That's her name, isn't it?"

He nods. "You remember."

"Zander must have really loved her," I whisper. "He could have consumed me and challenged you. He could have even released her himself. But he chose to offer you the deal instead."

"He didn't know where she was." Cain grins. "The planet I imprisoned her on is still inhabited, untouched by us. Her imprisonment, without feeding, will only make her weaker. So if she hasn't escaped by now then she never will."

"You're ruthless when you're scorned," I say.

He laughs. "As long as you don't betray me, you are safe."

I smile, running my fingers along his chest. I gently pull at the hairs, rubbing them in my tips. He closes his eyes and relaxes, his arms folding behind his head. "Cain," I say.

"Hm?"

"You will still protect Jackson after I'm gone, won't you?"

His eyes open, staring down at me sadly. "Why? Where are you going?"

"You know what I mean."

He catches my hand against his chest, he entwines them together against his skin. "When I said I couldn't ever hurt you, I meant it. I'll protect him for as long as I can."

"Thank you," I say.

"Enough of the sad talk," he says, dropping down the bed to be eye-level with me. "I'd like to do this with you every night." He runs his hand along my waist, making me shiver as he places it between my legs. "Do you consent?"

"I do," I say against his lips.

My tongue caresses his strongly as his fingers remain in the perfect place. I place my chin onto his shoulder, biting down to contain my squeal as the orgasm corrupts me. My legs shake and shake, my heart races so fast that he squeezes me tighter, like he's trying to feel it through our chest contact. It's not possible to be any closer to him but we both attempt to make it happen. His body is so strong, it could crush me in half if he doesn't let me go. I pant breathlessly against his shoulder, closing my eyes to allow the sensations to pass gradually.

"I love it when you tremble against me like that," he whispers. "You can't control your body, can you?"

"No," I pant.

"We'll continue this later," he says, looking up at the clock on the wall. "It's almost seven and my sister will be here soon."

"Okay," I say.

He kisses my forehead and leaves the bed. I lay on my back, trying to catch my breath as he puts his clothes on and crosses the room, leaving a moment later. I take one look at the clock and I jolt myself up.

I go into the bathroom first, patting my whole body down with a towel. I spray some scents around the room, trying my best to disguise the unthinkable things that happened here today. I can't concentrate. It takes me several minutes to get dressed because I keep pausing and replaying everything in my head. The way his body felt against mine, like we were always fated to touch, the way he made me smile in a way that I haven't done in eight years.

I am pacing in my black cocktail dress when the door knocks. I tie my thick hair into a band at my neckline, clearing my throat as I open the door. Marina smiles at me. She's wearing a dress too, a red one with tight straps. Her short, blonde hair has been curled slightly and she pins it to the side with a silver clip. Her red eyes sparkle as she looks over me.

"You look lovely," she says.

"So do you."

"Follow me." She turns around and I step out, locking the door. "I can only imagine how confusing this must be for you," she says. "The rest of our kind can be monsters."

"I guess there are monsters in every species," I say, following her down the staircase.

She chuckles. "True. I don't spend much time around them so I'm more of an outsider. I like being a planet hunter and I am the only one that Cain allows to do that. Well, he likes to think he's allowing me but he has no choice in it."

"You don't feed when you're here?" I ask her.

She cringes. "Absolutely not. I adore humans."

Adore them so much you brought your species here to kill us all, I think to myself.

"My preference is strange to my kind," she says. "I don't taste the same specimens for too long. I move on quickly. I report my findings back to Cain and he chooses where to go next. If I like the planet a little too much then I don't recommend it, but don't tell Cain that."

"But you recommended this planet," I say, moving against the wall to let a guard pass. "If you adore us like you say you do then why did you tell him?"

She stares at me sadly, her walk becoming slower as she sighs. "I adore the children. The innocent. When I visited your planet a century ago, Aurora, it was at war. The entire world was at war with each other. I've never seen anything like it. All other planets and all other lifeforms live together in peace, they live as one species. Your kind acted as though there was an invasion. And I wasn't it. Maybe if they hadn't been so busy killing each other then they would have noticed me." She turns a corner and we climb down the big staircase. "I saw this world for what it was. Destructive and selfish. The disguise I am projecting, the woman was a victim of one of the bombs. I found her crying on the ground in the middle of the warzone, her legs were torn from her body. She begged me to end her life, she was that close to death that my true form didn't even startle her. She thought I was an angel. I consumed her and saw her entire life through her eyes. Her son was hiding nearby, I held that little boy in my arms and I took him to safety. Actually, I flew him to safety. I told Cain about the children, that no matter what they should be spared."

I think she's talking about the second world war. I remember reading about it in one of the history books. So many innocent lives were killed over those years, so many have been killed throughout our whole time here. To an outsider like the creature, we must have looked insane. Evil. Just as evil as her own species.

"I stayed here for a few months," she says. "Observing each and every corner of the world closely. The more children I met, the more of them I touched, the more I realized that pure souls were very strong here. Too strong to ignore. I knew it'd only be a matter of time before the adults destroyed this world completely with their wars and bringing my species here seemed like the only option to save it."

"My parents hated wars," I say quietly. "Not all of the adults were like that."

"This time is different to then," she says softly, looking at me apologetically. "Very different to a century ago. I didn't know the humans would change so much, that the wars would lessen. I never believed you could actually live together in peace. I saw such cruelty and sadness. Families ripped apart, entire cities reduced to rubble. But take away the greed and the power and the governments, and there is hope."

"If you say so."

We turn a corner and a group of girls wave at us from the bottom of a staircase. Bella is among them and she narrows her eyes.

"Hi, Marina," they say.

"Hi, girls," she says back.

She opens a set of doors and I follow her into a small dining room lit with bright lanterns. Jackson is sitting at the round table, laughing at something that Natalie is saying as she leans into him.

"Cain said I have to return you in one piece or he'll kill me," she says, grinning at me while she holds her hand out the table. "He doesn't make that threat often."

I laugh as I slide into a chair beside Jackson. "Hey," I say, pulling him by his head into my chest to cradle him. "You okay?"

He nods. "You're not going to quiz me about the corn, are you?"

"No," I say. "I'll save that for tomorrow."

"I'll be right back," Marina says, before vanishing through a door at the other side of the wall.

I meet Natalie's eyes across the table, she leans back into her seat and smiles at us. She's paler than the last time I saw her, small spots are appearing along her jawline. I release Jackson and glance over the table, becoming interested in the soft plate mats and golden candle sticks. I pick up a glass of wine that Marina must have poured for me and I take a sip.

"I heard she's making us steak," Natalie says, licking her lips. "The others are so jealous."

"Why? What's so special about her?" Jackson says. "She's still a creature."

"Jackson," I hiss.

"Sorry."

"She's the only creature that doesn't treat us like food," Natalie tells him. "You'll understand in a moment."

Jackson yawns into his hand. I smile down at him.

"How can you be tired?" I say. "You slept for most of the afternoon."

"How can you know that? You weren't even there. You left me."

"I'm sorry," I whisper. "But I didn't want you to listen to that."

"The law reading?" Natalie says. "Why?"

"I already know that there's breeding centres," Jackson says. "I know that girls were forced to give up their babies to creatures. Stop treating me like I'm a kid."

I groan and turn away from him, taking another sip of the wine. We sit in silence until Marina returns, carrying four plates separated between her arms. Who else is joining us? It might be Christian. I hope it's Christian.

Marina sets the plates on the mats in front of us, I stare down at the delicious-looking steak cooked in a pepper sauce with potatoes and leaks.

"Thank you, Marina," Natalie says.

"You're welcome."

I nudge my shoulder into Jackson's.

"Thank you," he says.

Marina smiles and places the last plate on a mat beside Natalie's and then she takes her seat there. She is the fourth diner. She reaches over to the bottle of wine at the end of the table, filling her glass up full. She looks back to me with a grin, noticing my shock.

"What? Never seen one of my kind eat?"

"No," I say.

"Go figure," she mutters. "They hate doing anything that makes them feel different to the all-powerful creations that they are."

"Why do you dislike them so much?" I say.

"Because they're boring, predictable and as bitter as this wine." She scrunches her face up but takes another sip. "Their entire existence revolves around hunger. What is the point to that? They don't have the capacity to enjoy what the worlds truly have to offer. The food, the music, the scenery, the beautiful colour of the sky when the sun rises in fall. The mighty animals, the soft calls of birds in the early morning. There's an entire ocean at their disposal to explore and they prefer to stay in the sky, the one thing they're used to I suppose."

"I've never seen the ocean," Natalie says sadly. "I was transferred close to here so I never crossed it. I heard it's magical."

"It is," Marina says. "We've never been on a planet with this many different types of species before. The ocean is a very curious place. Once they're done with land, the animal-eaters will move there indefinitely."

"Animal-eaters?" Jackson asks.

Marina smiles at him gently. "All lifeforms have souls. The human is the strongest but there are hundreds of my kind that tend to defer from the norm. Cain has no laws regarding the animals so they either follow his laws with humans and become obsessed with hunger or they consume animals and live freely. They wouldn't grow any more powerful but they enjoy their existence away from all the greed."

"So they're like vegetarians," Natalie says.

Marina laughs as she chews down a piece of her steak. "Yes, I suppose they are. But I wouldn't call them that. In my mind, animals are no different to humans. All lifeforms are precious."

"I wish the others could see it that way," I say. ""Up until a few weeks ago, the humans were kept in cages."

"And now they are not," she says. "You have an influence over my brother, Aurora. Something that not even I possess. But there are things he hasn't told you, things he will never tell you. I have been waiting a very long time for you to exist."

I drop my fork slowly, swallowing my food uneasily. "What do you mean?"

She flicks her eyes to Natalie and Jackson, taking a deep breath. "Another time."

I continue eating, wondering what that was about and if I should be worried. The awkwardness is broken by Marina herself, she asks the kids about their favourite things to do in the day and they have many conversations, mainly to do with who they like and dislike the most. Marina announces that she's going to get some dessert and Natalie frowns, checking her watch.

"I have to leave," she says. "My curfew is at nine and my owner doesn't like it when I'm late back to his room. He feeds on me at night."

"Nonsense," Marina says. "You can stay with me tonight and I'll have words with your owner in the morning if he doesn't like it."

Natalie's eyes light up. "You can do that?"

"Absolutely I can do that," she says. "They know better than to question me."

"Did you hear that, Jackson?" Natalie says excitedly. "No feeding tonight, you don't have to worry."

Jackson drops his eyes sadly and my body tenses. I reach over and take his hand beneath the table, trying to comfort him because I know what heart break looks like. Jackson has always been so much smarter than all the other kids that I raised, he knows that Natalie is dying. He knows there's nothing he can do to stop it. I thought Marina had left but I look up to see her staring at us from the door. She leaves a moment later.

"Jackson," I whisper. "It'll be okay."

"How will it be okay?" he demands. "How will anything be okay? He'll feed from her tomorrow night and the night after that and the night after that."

"Don't ruin this." Natalie wipes the tears from her cheeks. "You promised."

Jackson angrily takes back his hand from mine and folds his arms, breathing heavily down at his empty plate. I don't know how to help him. I turn away as my own tears cloud my eyes.

"I made one of Wendy's favourites," Marina says as she bursts back through the door. "I was deeply saddened to hear of her passing." She drops the desserts to the table and takes her seat, smiling at me. "But I am glad her soul is free."

The dessert is a creamy slice of ghetto chocolate with hazelnuts. Jackson turns his nose up at it, Natalie folds her arms and breathes heavily to herself as she tries to resists bursting into tears.

"What time is it?" Marina mumbles.

"Quarter past nine," Natalie whispers.

"Any moment now." Marina stares at the double doors across the room. "It unnerves me how well I know them."

We all look at her in confusion, but then the double doors burst open. A male creature with a teenage boy disguise walks through, his red eyes lowering with anger at the sight of us eating.

"Forgive the intrusion," he says. "It is past Natalie's curfew and I am hungry."

I take Jackson's hand again, keeping him still as his body trembles. Natalie drops her fork and slides her chair back. Marina's hand sharply reaches out and stops it, making Natalie flinch.

"We are eating some dessert," Marina says. "The girl is under my care for tonight, you may leave."

"I thought you'd say that." The creature grins. "Which is why I brought the King." The creature steps to the side and Cain enters slowly, rubbing his head.

"Marina," Cain says. "The girl is owned. You have to respect their curfews."

"I don't have to respect anything," Marina growls. "I heard him talking earlier, he's planning on killing her tonight."

Jackson shoots up from his chair and I use all of my strength to push him back down and keep him there. Cain stares at us from across the room before he looks back to the creature at the door.

"So?" the creature demands. "That's none of your business."

"Do you even care about her at all?" Marina demands. "How frightened she is? How alone she will feel when you take her life without her consent?"

"What is the meaning of this?" the creature says, looking at Cain. "The girl is mine."

Cain folds his arms. "Marina, you do this every time you visit. Let him take the girl."

"No," Marina says.

"That's an order," he says.

"You think I'm afraid of you, brother?" she mutters, leaning over the table with a smirk. "You don't command me."

"Guards!" Cain shouts.

Marina straightens with a hiss. Natalie lets out a soft cry as two guards enter the room and remove her from Marina's side.

"No," Jackson says, trying to break free from my grasp. "Leave her alone!"

"Stop it," I say.

Natalie turns and hyperventilates through her sobs. "Goodbye, Jackson. Take care of my plants."

"How can you just sit there and watch this happen!" he screams at me. "Do something!"

I look at Cain first but his eyes are down, refusing to even glance at me because he knows what will happen. I meet Marina's eyes across the table and I rise up. "Make a trade," I say.

"What?" she says.

"Give him something he can't refuse."

Natalie is returned to the creature and he places his arm around her, moving her towards the door.

"Wait," Marina shouts. "I'll buy her from you."

The creature halts, spinning them back around. "What could you possibly offer me that I haven't already tasted? You don't even feed from humans."