Page 75 of The King has Fallen

I was reminded again, then, of my own life. My ownplans. I found myself washed in grief and tension, compassion… and relief.

The Covenant Days.

I had a life—had had a life—before I was taken here. My people celebrated the Covenant with great abandon. And I had had plans for a great celebration at this time.

My chest tightened and it must have shown on my face because Melek’s face went serious.

“What?” he asked.

Nothing I could speak to you about.I shrugged to hide my discomfort. “I suppose I just assumed the soulless wouldn’t honor such a life-giving covenant,” I said slyly, then grinned at him.

Melek rolled his eyes. “Perhaps just for these days we can stay away from references to thesoulless?”

“I don’t know,” I said seriously. “I mean, peace? Certainly. But I’m not going toliefor you.”

He growled, and it made me giggle, and then I was cautiously walking out of that fucking cage—no hand clamped on my arm, or in my hair. No imminent threat. Nothing. Just a table and a meal and a huge General sitting across from me as I looked at him suspiciously.

“Did you poison this?” I asked, only half-joking.

He huffed. “Only one way to find out.”

“That’s not reassuring.”

“I said I was going to bless my enemy, notindulgethem,” he muttered, one brow arched high.

So, I took the seat and had dinner with General Melek Handras. Or rather,Ihad dinner, and he sat with me.

It was… a surreal experience.

Melek had a bowl of grapes in front of his seat and he ate them one by one as I dug into the meal and tried to tell myself this was actually real.

Our talk moved from Gall to the war. Then a jibe from me that I could confidently help Melek defeat our neighbors because the Nephilim would never survive the Shadows of Shade led our conversation to the differences between our people and how they would celebrate the Covenant Days.

That subject turned my mind back to the stark realities of how differently this night would have been spent if I hadn’t been here with Melek. And that was… uneasy.

Melek must have sensed that I was shying from something.

“You don’t speak of your own traditions much,” he said quietly, watching me closely as he popped another grape into his mouth.

I took another mouthful of the juicy beef dripping in gravy before I answered.

“There didn’t seem to be much point.”

He gave me a skeptical look, but didn’t press the point.

“Are you married?”

I shook my head, then watched him, alarms jangling in my head as I realized I didn’t know. “What about thegreatGeneral Melek Handras? Has he a mate back home awaiting his return?”

He shook his head without hesitation. “No,” he said emphatically. “I wouldn’t wish a soldier’s life on a mate. Our only females are humans. They are… fragile.”

I raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t correct himself. But it did give me an opening to ask him about the women among them, which I’d been curious about from the beginning.

“How do they come to be here?” I asked carefully. “The women, I mean. Is there a human population among the Nephilim, or—”

“They are mostly slaves,” Melek said, his eyes dropping to the grapes. He took another and chewed it before continuing. “Generations of slaves. And more taken when they’re needed. We have males as well, though very few.”

My blood went cold. So, the rumorsweretrue. “You really do steal human slaves from Meyrath?”

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