“I am your king.” Schneider declared softly.

In any other context, I would have laughed in his face and asked him for his mushroom dealer’s phone number. But knowing what I knew, what I’d heard in the form of morbid rumors and malicious promises being echoed across this hellhole, I would have sooner cried than laughed. 

“You… you’re him? This king everyone’s been talking about?” I asked warily in a voice that quivered, much like my quivering spine. I hadn’t missed the multiple mentions of a supposed king that reigned supreme in this prison of horrors, of course. Just as I’d run for my laugh, someone had thrown it at my face.

He’s got you now, white boy! There ain’t no running away from the King! The inmate had yelled as he’d run past his cell. He’d sounded so sure that Schneider, the King, was going to catch up to me. And he’d been right. 

By all accounts, Schneider was dangerous. Formidable. More so than any other murderous, vicious marauder, murderer or villain in this entire prison, enough to have been crowned their king. 

And I’d gone and hit him with my handcuffs as I fled my cell. A lot of good that had done me; this was a maximum security prison. On an island. There was no escape. 

But at the time, my fight or flight instincts had kicked in, and, faced with the looming threat of a convicted murderer who’d snuck into my cell with the help of the prison staff, I’d chosen to flee, if only to delay my… execution. 

Well, I hadn’t delayed it by much. 

Here I stood now, facing my firing squad. 

The end. 

“Yes.” The King answered, his eyes fluttering to the ground momentarily. And then he looked up and it was all I could do to keep his brilliant gaze. I wanted to break the intense stare and look away, but I feared taking my eyes off this terrifying man for even a second. He was the first to catch up with me, moving so quickly, so agilely, so nimbly that I’d almost begun to think I was being chased by an actual panther. And the way he’d leapt from the catwalks and landed right in front of me with nary a sound, his muscles straining beneath the flimsy uniform, showed strength and a lifetime of discipline as he’d commanded each of his limbs with precise control. 

It was painfully clear to me that I was no match for the king. If he wanted, he could crush me in an instant, if he so wished. 

So why hadn’t he already? Why had he instructed the guards to lower their tasers? Was he playing games? Was I to be the mouse and he the cat? 

The thought instilled me with newfound fear. It was one thing to be killed, and it was entirely another to be cruelly toyed with and humiliated in front of an entire prison. The inmates’ eager gazes still bore into my back and front like arrowheads, as they awaited my inevitable undoing, hoping I’d give them a show as I went down. 

A hush had descended over the cellblock. It was unnerving to say the least.  

“W-What do you want from m-me?” It was said cautiously, almost breathlessly. My heart knocking against my ribcage was making it difficult to speak coherently. My state of mind was nowhere near coherent either. Alarms were sounding in my head, nearly loud enough to drown out the sound of blood rushing in my ears. 

Schneider narrowed his eyes on me and I flinched. 

He was fearsome indeed. He was the kind of person you wanted to cross the street to the other side when you saw him coming, while simultaneously wanting to pass him by just so you could bask in his aura. He was a paradox. 

“Do you want to survive this place?” 

The question blindsided him. It was the last thing he’d expected to be asked by Schneider. 

“I…” Of course I wanted to survive this place! But at the moment, I was more worried about surviving this encounter. My chances weren’t looking very good so far. I eyed the guards surrounding me warily. They looked like a trigger-happy bunch to me. 

“Come now, Julian,” he purred my name, and off his tongue it sounded like a sweet call. 

The sweet call of death. 

“Surely you want to live, don’t you?” He cocked his head to the side, watching him through an unreadable gaze. 

I blinked once, then twice. “Yeah, I want to live,” I answered honestly, confused as to why he’d ask such an unexpected thing. As if I’d answer any differently, especially after what I’d gone through these past few weeks. Where was he going with this?

I got the distinct feeling I was being toyed with, just like I’d suspected. Well, I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. 

“If you’re going to kill me, just do it. I’m not going to play your games.” 

Schneider, the superb actor that he was, looked stricken. “Kill you? Why would I want to kill you?” 

I opened my mouth to retort, but quickly closed it. The lawyer in me knew better than to throw baseless accusations around; I’d be asking for a slander suit. I wasn’t sure why he’d want to kill me. I suspected he’d been paid to do it by the vindictive guards who blamed me for their colleague’s death. But how could I know that for sure? 

“You… don’t want to hurt me?” A sliver of hope sliced through the dark cloud of fear like a column of light. It was my turn to narrow my eyes at him in blatant suspicion. What was he trying to say? 

Had it all been just a major misunderstanding or something? 

“Of course not! But if you want to survive this place, you’re going to need protection.” 

“Protection?”

Holy shit. I knew exactly where this was going. How could I not? I’d seen the movies, heard the rumors and urban legends. A few acquaintances of mine who’d gone inside for one crime or another had mentioned it once or twice. 

Fucking protection. The secret to surviving a prison sentence smoothly, surviving and smoothly being the keywords there. An insurance card and a cape of protection rolled into one. 

My breathing grew ragged as my mind worked double time to pinpoint what exactly Schneider would ask of me. Money? I had some money saved, but how was I going to sneak it into prison? Or would he have me transfer it to him? But what would Schneider want with the money? He was serving a life sentence -multiple life sentences, in fact. And from what I’d gathered, he didn’t need it. Someone who could afford my previous firm’s retainer wasn’t someone who was short on money. 

Then what, then, did Schneider want? 

Well, there was only one sure way to find out. 

“What do you want?” I asked him. 

He stared at me for a very long time. Meanwhile, my nerves were getting the best of me, eating me alive. The anticipation was killing me. Even the guards looked like they couldn’t wait to hear why Schneider had ordered them to lower their tasers and batons, their eyes flying between us curiously. 

Finally, when I couldn’t take it anymore, I demanded loudly, “What the hell do you want from me?!”

Schneider started coming toward me. 

Involuntarily, I took a couple of steps back, my flight response kicking in again. Until I remembered that I was surrounded on all sides and there was nowhere for me to run. 

So, with my heart thundering in my chest, I stood my ground and watched the King approaching. I hastily searched his face for any signs of anger or resentment to tip me off, but it was an unreadable mask. 

I inhaled a sharp intake of breath and held it in once he was standing right in front of me. We were so close that he could definitely hear my pounding heart, probably smell the nervous sweat seeping out of my pores. 

He held up a key and I nearly jumped out of my skin at the movement. I eyed it with suspicion -until I realized what it was.

It was my handcuffs’ key.

Schneider said, “I want you to be my bitch.”