Page 84 of Demon Monster's Little Human

He takes a step back.

A sharp ache lodges itself in my heart.

My pulse skips, my breath catching as he pulls away from me like I am something tainted.

“No.” My voice shakes. “You don’t believe this, do you?”

His fingers twitch at his sides, his expression locked in something dark, unreadable. His eyes flicker with something vicious, torn, lost.

His voice breaks.

“What are you? Who the hell are you?”

A tremor racks through me.

“I’m me,” I whisper. “I’m Liora.”

His gaze darkens.

A muscle jumps in his jaw. His fangs glint in the torchlight, his wings spreading just slightly, as if preparing for something.

A warning. A threat.

My breath comes too fast, too sharp. “You don’t mean that.”

He does not move.

He does not speak.

He bares his fangs at me.

The dark presence laughs, but I do not hear it. I hear only the ragged, broken sound of my own heartbeat.

Dain steps forward, slow, deliberate. His claws flex, his gaze burning into mine.

I stumble back, my body screaming at me to run.

But I don’t.

I stare at him, and I understand.

This is not Dain, the monster who saved me.

This is Dain, the monster who was meant to kill me.

35

DAIN

Liora stands before me, defiant, trembling, alive when she should not be.

The truth has splintered through my mind like a jagged blade, cutting through every lie I’ve told myself. I had thought, hoped, she was something else. Someone else. But the dark presence has spoken her name, and the moment it did, I felt it.

Amara.

The syllables are a curse, a wound, a chain tightening around my throat.

Liora shouts something, denial, anger, I barely hear it. My thoughts are drowning in old memories, in rage I’ve held for centuries. I see her standing there, but it is not her.

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