Page 16 of The Demon Mark

“Oh, little one. You can’t hurt yourself to get away from me. I simply forbid it.”

She didn’t care what he forbid. She wanted him to leave her alone! What was so hard for him to understand?

“I can’t leave you alone.” The words made it sound like he’d read her mind. “I will not leave you alone until you are mine.”

“Why?” she whispered, her lips trembling and her legs shaking.

“Because when I see something others want, I take it.” There was that heat again, bearing down on her, pressing her farther back into the wall. “When I know someone else possesses something so beautiful, so unique, I cannot help myself. I have to take it from them.”

“Please.” The word wheezed from her lungs like she was already dying.

“Please what?” His voice came right by her ear, and with it the pressing heat of desire that flooded between her legs. “Use your words, little one.”

Why did that make her entire body ache? She pressed her thighs together, trying to ease some of the ridiculous pulsing that made her mind spin. “Please let me go.”

“Oh, I’m not going to do that. I think I’ve already gotten you right where I want you, and now I’m going to take you back with me. Your master can’t follow you to the castle, and if he tries, I’ll make sure he regrets it.” He leaned down and she could hear him inhaling her scent. “It breaks my heart to frighten you.”

Relief. That’s all she could feel at those words. Humanity tinged the darkness in his voice and she thought, for a second, she felt some measure of hope.

“Really?” she asked, her voice trembling.

Then his voice pitched low, and he replied, “Not really.”

Her stomach dropped at the same moment he leaned into her. She should warn him not to touch her like this. She was so frightened, the mist must be pouring off of her like they stood beside a waterfall. He should fear what she would do.

But some part of her wanted to see if the first touch had been real. She wanted to know if she actually couldn’t see his future, and if he was just as hidden as he made it seem.

He grabbed her chin with his thumb and forefinger, pinching a little too hard as he forced her to look at him. But she couldn’t see his face in this darkness, and certainly not with the black future barreling toward her.

“Finally,” he groaned, his voice trembling with some emotion she couldn’t name. “Now you are mine, little oracle.”

She wasn’t his anything. She was bound to the futures of everyone and everything.

But as she crumbled into the nothingness of his future and fell against the weight of his body, she wondered if that was a lie. Because snuggling against his warmth made her wonder just how much she controlled herself, and how much he already controlled her.

7

With her in his arms, captured as she should have been long ago, Envy could feel the ache in him fading. Finally, he had what others did. He was the only one who had access to this oracle, and no one else could use her powers but him.

Not that he intended to use her. No, he would hoard these prophecies for himself. If she had to tell them, then he would document them just like her old master. But he would not tell a single soul.

Every prophecy would be for his eyes alone. Everything was his to keep and his to cherish and his to covet.

Soon enough, the entire kingdom would beg at his feet for their futures. And, if he was lucky, his brothers would as well. They, too, would wish to use her power as their own, and he would make them beg him for it.

The thought of Greed on his knees, gritting his teeth and asking for something from his brother, who had never been deemed equally powerful, brought so much pleasure that it nearly sent him to his own knees. Every one of the demon kings wished for power. Every one of them jostled for who was the next in line after Pride and Wrath.

Now it was his time to come into power. It was his turn to say that he had something the others did not.

Even though he had much, they did not. The magic and power he had claimed was infinite, and yet, he still wasn’t the same as the others. He still wasn’t worthy of their admiration or their dedication.

In this, he disappointed himself.

He’d already planned to allow her to live. This woman made something in him burn that he hadn’t felt in a very long time, and it was important to him that he feel it again. He wanted to indulge himself in that emotion, even if he wondered why it was this woman who made him burn.

Envy decided he would let everyone believe he was going to keep her as a pet, just as her previous master did. That she was safe in his castle, nestled away in the lap of luxury. Eventually, though, he would consume her.

He would devour all of her magic and take it into himself. He would know what it was to have an oracle’s power and he would take it for his own. Only then would he be more powerful than any of his siblings.

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