Page 63 of Sanctuary with Kings

"Stop, Evanthia!"

"Enough!"

Asterion's fingers clenched on my arms, and the room spun briefly as I sucked in a lungful of air—the first since I'd started to spout the bile inside of me.

Over Asterion's shoulder, a glimmer of gold winked in the doorway.

"Release her," Laszlo said, words stern but quiet.

For once, Asterion seemed to refuse the notion. He drew me closer, my body having to arch back to look up at him. His eyes were wide enough to glimpse white at the edges, nostrils flared.

"You are none of those things,théa," Asterion whispered. "You are—"

"Asterion, I will speak to you," Laszlo cut in. Asterion sighed, his head drooping toward mine. "Now."

Asterion's head lifted and he stepped back, hands gentling and then releasing me entirely. I stumbled around his side, lurching toward Laszlo at the door. How much had he heard? Did he know now? Know how unworthy I was for everything he'd gently offered the night before?

But Laszlo was as difficult to read as he had been when I arrived. His eyes were on Asterion, but his hand reached for mine, rubbing his fingers over my numb palm.

"Go up to the nest, dear one," he said softly. "There will be dinner there. I will join you shortly."

I opened my mouth, not sure what might fall out. An apology? Or more horrifying confessions?

Laszlo's gaze met mine, and it was too soft, too tender. He'd heard it all, and he would be gentle with me, whisper reassurances, promise me that time would change me, heal me.

I slipped away, letting the castle lay out the path to the nest ahead of me rather than trying to hunt and find my own way. It should've made my legs burn as I climbed the stairs up to the nest. It hadn't been a brief flight up from the terrace, but I arrived at the arched door far quicker than it had taken for Laszlo and me to come down this morning.

The room was dark, all shadows, barely lit by a low, smoldering fire in the fireplace. There was a table, the scent of food, but I ignored it in favor of the bed. The sheets smelled like the oils Laszlo had anointed me in, like sex and salt and sweat. There were a few stray feathers, their roots pinned into the mattress, and I pulled them free, pinching them in my fingers as I climbed into the blankets and pillows.

I'd been happy this afternoon. Yesterday too. There were fragile, jeweled moments in the past weeks that fooled my tired mind into brief seconds of peace, not of forgetting, but imagining that there was ruin behind me and new growth ahead.

If I'd let Asterion leave without a word, it would've been a bitter taste in my mouth, but notthis—this horrible maelstrom of self-pity and disgust. But I hadn't let him leave. I couldn't release him, couldn't let him. I wanted to leash him at arm's distance.

I'd set aside a whisper of happiness in favor of throwing myself down a rough mountain, making rubble out of my body and emotions once more.

I needed to wait for Laszlo, have another slow and painful conversation that would leave me raw but not ragged. Apologize for taking what he offered last night when I wasn't prepared to reciprocate.

Weariness added weight to my eyelashes, made my eyelids sink and flutter. If I fell asleep, I would dream. I didn't fool myself. I knew what would come.

But I was craving punishment, so I gave in to sleep.

CHAPTER21

WAKING, CRASHING

On the fourth floor of The Seven Veils, the walls were painted green for envy. The staircase opened to a single hall with three doors on either side, and they were the first rooms filled for the night, never left empty when customers were in the house. There were no windows in the rooms, no view of the quiet woods surrounding the dark house. If the occupants of the rooms were quiet, which was rare in a house like that, they might've heard rustling from those empty walls. Might've noted the rooms were too narrow to add up to the building.

But of course, they already knew they were being watched. We were always being watched.

Two more hallways existed on the fourth floor, hidden staircases leading to the long corridors at opposite edges. Dark, enchanted windows looked through gilded mirrors onto beds and settees, where humans were used roughly and regularly. Staff passed through those quiet places, as well as curious newcomers and clients who liked to look but not touch.

In the early hours of the mornings, those rooms were emptied out at last, the hallways cleared. All except one room.

Someone had to answer to the appetites of the monsters who kept the house in working order.

For a time, that had been me.

The door clicked shut behind them once, twice, three times, and a final, snapping fourth. A guard for each floor of the house.

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