Scarlet Prison

Chapter 26

"Did...did you just swallow that?!" Camoof sputtered, gaping at where I had bitten off from the granola bar.

"Why? Were you hoping I'd chew it for you and spit it into your mouth? I'm not your mamma bird." I sure was enjoying the stupefied look on his face.

"But you're a vampire. Vampires don't eat food."

I reached into the fridge and pulled out one of my blood bags. "Would you rather I drink this?" I asked.

He made a look of disgust.

"Good. Because I'm more in the mood for granola bars, you know?" I grabbed another granola bar and tossed it to him. "You may as well eat before we leave. We have to wait until the sun is close to rising, anyway."

Camoof looked at the granola bar in his hand. Then he looked at me. "Are you, like, half vampire/half human, or something?"

I wondered if that sort of thing was even possible. I smiled as my only response. He could interpret that as he wanted. I definitely wasn't about to admit to being human in such an insecure location.

Camoof glanced around my room, as if someone might be hiding in the corner to listen to our conversation. Then he whispered, "Are you part of the Dragonfly organization?"

"Yes," I said, deciding to let him think that such an organization existed.

"So this was all part of the plan to get me my freedom?" he asked.

"Yep."

"Are we gonna go to the Dragonfly headquarters?" He had an excited gleam in his eye that I had never seen in him before.

"Um, yeah." I wondered what sort of expectations he held for these "headquarters." I was sure he would be disappointed by the mere four people occupying them. "Listen. Don't get your hopes up for what you're going to find at headquarters. There's no magic that comes with freedom. If you ask me, you would have been better off staying put. You had a good life there, and you had an exceptional amount of freedom to do what you wished in your spare time."

Camoof considered that for a second. Then he asked, "Have you heard of Stockholm Syndrome?"

I thought back to my school days, which now seemed so long ago, and tried to remember if I had learned what that meant. "Isn't that when a person gets kidnapped and they start to feel positive feelings toward their captor?" I asked.

"Pretty much. Those feelings are considered to be irrational, but they feel that way because they've been brainwashed. I refuse to be brainwashed by you stinking vampires. You'll have to throw more than a few board games at me if you want me to succumb to a false sense of happiness and gratitude toward you. Not when you're feeding my blood to a bunch of vampires at the same time, against my will."

"Maybe you will like your new life better. You won't have to waste so much energy trying to be unhappy."

"You've got Oksana wrapped around your finger, you know. She's got Stockholm Syndrom bad. She fears you, but she also feels grateful toward you. She defends you whenever anyone says a word against you." He pitched his voice higher to make it sound more feminine. "'Nova's not all bad. She lets me help her with the cooking.' She never even considered that she was being used."

My cheeks flushed with the heat of anger. "I wasn't trying to use her. And you can't blame her for trying to be happy with what she has. She didn't grow up in the same type of environment that you did."

"You mean she didn't grow up free? Letting herself be brainwashed is the only type of contentment she's ever known."

"Were you any different? You grew up with only the illusion of freedom. That's the same thing as being brainwashed."