Page 120 of The Demon Court

“Then you are a fool,” she hissed. Selene wrapped her arms around her waist like she needed someone to hold her. His fingers itched to do just that. “Let me die, Lust, if that is what it takes to keep them away from your castle and your throne.”

He shook his head. “Tell them everything about me, then. Give away all my secrets and let me shoulder the pain.”

“You do not know what they would do to you.”

“After a thousand years, I don’t care.” He took another step closer and touched her again. He slid his fingers along her strong jaw and deep into her hair. “I can finally feel more than just lust. I can feel you, Selene. No sorceress will change that. No pain could end that. We’re connected, you and I. I know you feel the same.”

Her breath shuddered in her chest. Selene stood on her tiptoes and pressed their lips together, a soft kiss that seared him to the bone. “I have always known who you are, Lust. And I have accepted that you can feel nothing more than what you were made to feel. You don’t have to lie to me just because I’m dying.”

She slipped out of his arms and disappeared back into the castle, leaving him standing on the edge of the world. The tattered edges of his heart ripped open in the wake of her words.

He hadn’t realized how afraid he was that she might be right.

ChapterForty

She hated to lie. Especially when that lie was for him.

Selene knew there was only so much time she had left. The curse Minerva had struck her with was an unfamiliar one, and that meant there was very little she could do to prevent it from growing stronger.

Already she could feel it underneath her skin. It slithered like snakes, thick and rolling inside her, so they made it hard to sleep. All she could think about was the vile nature of them, consuming her as they moved slowly throughout her body. Spreading until they would all strike as one, and then she would know what it felt like to die.

It was not a comfortable death. Nor a quick one. The same death that Minerva had promised her enemies time and time again. Hadn’t Selene listened to her rants more than any other sorceress?

She’d been Minerva’s closest daughter. Her mother had trained her from the very first moment that she remembered, and likely before that. As Lust had said when he first saw her, Selene was her puppet.

And once those strings were cut, Minerva had no more use for her.

The only way to live and get out of this situation once and for all wasn’t to waste time trying to figure out how to break a curse that could not be broken. It was time to go home. To beg her mother’s forgiveness and to prostrate herself on the cold stone floors of the Tower.

It took a bit of finagling to figure it out. Lara had been particularly helpful. She’d originally thought the other woman would only give her the servant’s map of the castle to get rid of her. Without Selene, Lara could slip back into his favored position.

Now she suspected a second explanation. Lara didn’t love him, and she didn’t want Lust in her life any more than she wanted any other. But her daughter needed looking after, and she had more family back home that required payments from her every month, so they didn’t die. And Lara was the only one working. Being in the favor of the king certainly helped with all those matters.

Selene didn’t blame her for trying her best to survive. Wasn’t that what they were all doing?

Map in hand, then she only had to distract Lust so she could slip away. Lara had offered her a warm cloak, and Selene didn’t think there was much else she’d bring. It was all too easy.

Selene barricaded their door for a night, though keeping him out proved to be very difficult.

They argued through the door for hours. Lust grew more and more angry before all of that emotion seemed to seep out of him.

“I don’t know how many more nights you have,” he whispered through the door. The sound of his voice was wrong. Broken. “I won’t waste a single one of them.”

Perhaps he gave up at that moment. He said nothing else after that. But she could only imagine the thoughts running through his head. She fed his fears while keeping him away from her. Selene didn’t need or want him anymore, and wasn’t that what she had said to him so many times?

Except she did.

She needed him more than she wanted to admit, and it hurt to her very core to do what she had to do. Tears burned her eyes until she couldn’t take it anymore. She wanted to throw all those emotions back underneath the magic she’d always used as a crutch and never think about them again.

But then she remembered him. She remembered how Lust had begged her to feel those emotions and she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t tuck them away when he would want her to feel.

And so she felt them throughout the entire night and into the early morning. Until the silence on the other side of the door finally let her know he had gotten up and left her alone.

Now was her moment. She had to sneak out through the servant’s quarters and through the hidden corridors in the walls.

Selene opened the door with a creak, peeking outside her room to make sure Lust wasn’t leaning against the wall like he’d done all those months ago.

He wasn’t. No one waited for her. Perhaps he’d gone to get her breakfast, or hidden himself back in the library where he thought he might find a secret about her malady.

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