Page 68 of The Demon Crown

“We don’t ever do much talking,” he replied with a wry grin. “But we will talk when I come back. There’s much to say.”

Why did that make a worried expression cross her features? Varya had to know that wasn’t the only thing she would get out of him. She’d wrapped a demon king around her pretty, talented fingers. She wasn’t getting away that easily, not with a quick suck on the ballroom floor. No, he wouldn’t be satisfied for a long while yet.

Raising an eyebrow, he left her alone with her thoughts as he left the room.

His twin guards were right where he’d left them. Both of them staring at him with no small amount of disapproval, as if he needed their permission to entertain himself with another woman.

“What?” he grunted. “You two aren’t usually right in front of my room without something being on fire.”

“Gluttony’s here,” Ivo said, worry already marring his handsome brow. “A day early.”

Not just a day early. Greed glanced up to see the red streaks of a sunset already above their head. Gluttony was supposed to be here in a day and a half, in the middle of the afternoon, with an entire entourage warning everyone that another king was coming to visit. He wasn’t supposed to sneak into Greed’s home with dusk crawling across the sky.

Grumbling, he stalked away from the room. Both of his guards followed him, but he pointed at Ivo with a snarl. “Stay here. No one gets through those doors without my knowledge. Understood?”

“Yes.”

“Not even the little thief who has snuck past you enough times.”

Ivo’s cheeks burned bright red, but his guard stayed where he was.

Morag followed close on his heels, both of them racing across the platforms and stairwells to the front of his home. But apparently, even this spirit couldn’t help but jab at him. “You should be more gentle with Ivo.”

“He lost her once already.”

“Because he was distracted. You can hardly blame him when you’re the one who has been teaching us to be more human.”

Greed snorted. “More human, Morag. Not for you to both fall head over heels for the first human that gives you any sort of attention. Ivo knows better than to be distracted.”

“Is love not the most human emotion we could feel?”

“He’s not in love.” The mere thought made him chuckle. Ivo didn’t know how to love if he didn’t know what genuine happiness felt like. Or sadness. Or all the other emotions that humans flipped through on a daily basis and didn’t even recognize they were feeling it. “None of us can feel love.”

“Lust did.”

“Lustislove, now. That’s different.”

But he’d seen the way his brother had softened around Selene. He’d seen how Lust had fallen under her spell and desired to be a better man for her. Was that what love was? Was that what he himself was feeling?

Surely not. He didn’t know how to be anything but greedy, and that was the way it was going to stay.

Before he could answer, they were already at the front gates. They stood wide open to the desert, sand already blowing into his home around the single black horse and tall, dark man standing beside it.

Gluttony hadn’t changed at all in the many years since they’d seen each other in person. His brother’s dark hair fell below his shoulders, framing an angular and handsome face. Of course, most humans found him unsettling. Red eyes set deep into his skull were perturbing to look at even when he was smiling, like he was now. Though he was the smallest of all the siblings, Gluttony’s lithe body was made for speed.

He’d seen his brother gut a man in the blink of an eye and then tug out his entrails in the next. He’d been laughing while he did it, threatening to taste the thick ropes as though that was a normal thing to threaten.

Apparently, Gluttony had gotten a little too close to that threat these days.

“You’re early,” he snarled.

“And you haven’t changed a bit. Ever the warlord, aren’t you?” Gluttony eyed the castle behind him with all the glass domes and beautiful trees. “Although this is much better than the tent you used to cart around. Nomadic, isn’t that the word? That’s what you were the last time I saw you.”

He had been nomadic, because this castle hadn’t been finished yet, and he had to keep traveling through all the small towns and cities because they were constantly falling apart. He had seen Gluttony before he’d set up the system of his advisors, and why was this all making him feel lesser? Gluttony barely had a kingdom to his name.

“At least I don’t eat my subjects,” he snarled with bared teeth.

“Oh please.” Gluttony waved a hand in the air. “Settle that tail of yours. It was one person, and I hardly ate the woman. She enjoyed herself immensely.”

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