Page 68 of The Demon Mark

“It seems to be the expectation for many human women. None of you deserve it, though.” Orphe’s feathers fluffed in anger. “What I mean to say is you seem to allow them this control over you and your life. When you could fight back against them.”

“Fight back?” she repeated with a scoff. “I don’t have any ability to fight. I never learned in the first place. Not to mention that I don’t have any power compared to so many of these people. My magic is seeing the future, and if I do not have the chance to do that, what am I?”

Orphe blinked at her. “You are an oracle.”

“Which means next to nothing,” she muttered. “I see Envy with all his powers and skill at battle and I want that. I want to be someone who is not only dangerous but also capable of protecting herself.”

“I was in the room when the chimera attacked you. Envy may have killed the beast, but you were the one who protected yourself. You may have yet more to remember about your time in training.”

The bird spread her wings and took off into the gloom, but Lilith remained right where she was.

After all, the bird wasn’t entirely wrong. She remembered little of her own training. The oracular order had made certain that she had someone to take care of her, but her memory hadn’t returned in full. Perhaps it would if she drank more of that tea, but she didn’t feel like she needed more of it. Instead, all she could think about were the things she had forgotten.

Years ago, she might have been a more powerful creature all on her own. Perhaps she would have been able to fight on her own or to use that magic for something other than just lingering here by herself.

And it was cold. Everything in this home was cold. She leaned against an icy wall, feeling it creep into the very parts of herself that she’d always protected. Her love of life. Her belief that people were deeply good, even if they didn’t seem that way at first. She’d once wanted all the people in this kingdom to know that she believed in them.

But there had always been a warning bell in her mind, screaming that being part of a circus wasn’t the way to do that. She was meant to do what she had done with Envy. Walking through the streets and finding people who needed to hear her voice. People who needed to know that they were on the right path, even if it was a difficult one.

In those moments, Envy had fulfilled his duty as her keeper far more than the circus master ever had. Envy had been the one to watch her. To make sure no one attacked her, but also to make sure that she didn’t stretch herself too thin. He had done an impeccable job, and she remembered that was the intent of a keeper.

They took care of their oracle. She wasn’t sure when that had gone so wrong.

But what else had she forgotten? If she didn’t even realize her master was supposed to serve her, not the other way around, how much more had he taken from her mind? Had he cast a spell to remove them? Or had it just been the effects of time wearing away at her psyche until she didn’t remember a single thing about who she was, where she came from, or why she was here?

It was all so concerning. And she stayed there, freezing on the stairs until footsteps echoed. Envy could have teleported anywhere he wanted in the kingdom, which meant he likely knew that she was on the stairwell. Otherwise, he would have showed up in his office without even realizing that she was missing. Instead, he gave her a warning sound with how loud he was being.

He gave her time to pull herself together until she was almost not in tears when he found her where she sat.

Envy crouched on a stairwell below her, his face even with hers as he looked her over. His eyes touched everything. Her nearly purple toes that she had tried to tuck underneath her skirts. The way she had wrapped her arms around herself to prevent the cold from sinking in further. Even the way her teeth slightly chattered when she looked back at him, although her teeth chattering had nothing to do with the cold and everything to do with how horrible she was feeling.

“Why are you on the stairs?” he asked, tilting his head to the side.

“Everyone keeps asking me that.”

“Because you are cold, and stairs are meant to bring you somewhere. One should not linger on them.”

She shrugged, the numbness of the cold settling deep in her chest. “It felt like a good enough place to think as any?”

“You want me to believe that you’re just sitting here, thinking?”

She nodded.

Envy rolled his eyes up to the ceiling, and she wondered if he was praying for patience. “What are you thinking about, Lilith?”

Her initial thought was to tell him everything. She didn’t have the right words, though. She wasn’t even sure where her head was at. But that wasn’t fair to him. So she sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know. How useless I am in all this? That my power is only good for one thing, and I cannot even give you that. Why should you keep me around when eventually I will lose this beauty and cannot even tell you your future?”

His expression softened and Envy reached for a lock of her hair. He wound it around his finger, watching the movement with almost rapt attention. Then he finally said, “You think your only use to me is your beauty?”

“The only use I’ve ever had is my beauty and my ability to see the future. I don’t need you to be kind and lie, Envy. I know what I’m good for.”

He tugged her by the hair, forcing her to lean closer. And then he pressed his lips to her ear. “You are worth so much more than your beauty, little love.”

She held her breath at the words. Because she wanted to believe them. Oh, she wanted to think that he could adore her for so much more than what she looked like or what power she had. She wanted him to hold her to his chest and tell her a million times that she was valuable.

But those feelings frightened her too. Shouldn’t she be able to stand on her own two feet? Shouldn’t she know her own worth without having to have someone tell her that she was worthy?

All her thoughts were so jumbled in her head, and she didn’t want them to be like this. She didn’t want to be the person who was afraid of everything and everyone.

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