Page 17 of Bargain with the Demon King

Adraya

The servant girl bleeds black where my breakfast tray caught her temple.

"Forgive me, miss." She scrambles for scattered fruit that rolls across stone, glowing softly in the eternal twilight. "I shouldn't have startled you."

I watch her hands shake as she gathers the mess. Demon servants don't usually shake. But then, I don't usually throw things. The old Adraya would be helping, apologizing, making jokes about my terrible aim. The old Adraya is dead in a cottage with Chad's grunts still echoing in her ears.

"Leave it."

"But the King insists you eat—"

"The King insists on many things." I turn back to the window that shows nothing but canyon and shadow. "Tell him I'm not hungry."

She flees. The fruit continues glowing on my floor, little fallen stars I can't be bothered to pick up. Time passes. Maybe minutes. Maybe hours. Time moves differently when you're hollow.

The door opens without knock or permission. Only one person in this fortress has that audacity.

"You're terrorizing my staff." Azzaron fills the doorway, today's black coat making his ash-pale skin look carved from marble.

"She startled me."

"She brought you food."

"I didn't ask for it."

He enters fully, and I track his movement in the window's reflection.

Three days since Chad. Three days since anything mattered.

He looks wrong—every line of his body is held unnaturally still, the muscles in his jaw locked tight.

There is a violence in his stillness that is more threatening than any movement.

"You haven't eaten in three days."

"Your counting skills remain impressive."

"Get dressed. Court convenes in an hour."

"Pass."

The silence stretches until it snaps. He crosses the room in two strides, spins my chair to face him. His hands grip the armrests, caging me, and this close I can see the gold threads in his black eyes burning brighter than usual.

"This stops now."

"What stops? Existing? Too late. I already don't."

"Self-pity doesn't suit you."

"Nothing suits me. Ask Chad. Oh wait—you can't. He's too busy fucking someone who actually fits in his hands."

Something flickers across his face. Not pity. Something sharper. "Get. Dressed."

"Make me."

The words hang between us, challenge and invitation and threat all tangled together. His jaw works, and I count the muscle twitches because counting keeps me from thinking. Four. Five. Six.

"Don't test me today, Adraya."

"Why? What's special about today? Another demon holiday where you torture mortals for entertainment? Oh wait—that's every day."

He pulls back, and I immediately miss the cage of his presence. Wrong. Everything is wrong. I shouldn't miss anything. I'm nothing. Nothing doesn't get to miss things.

"One hour." He moves toward the door, then pauses. "Wear the green dress."

"Chad's favorite color is yellow."

"I know. That's why you'll wear green."

The door closes with finality that sounds like punctuation. I stare at the fallen fruit, still glowing, still ignored. The servant's blood has already vanished—demon blood never lingers. Unlike betrayal. Betrayal sticks to everything.

I wear the green dress because rebellion requires caring and I don't. The fabric clings in ways that would have made me self-conscious before.

Now it's just cloth on flesh that wasn't worth keeping eyes open for.

The twilight necklace sits cold against my throat, a weight I've forgotten how to remove.

Court feels different when you're empty.

All the politics and power plays wash over like water on glass.

Lord Vex discusses border expansions while sneaking glances at me.

Lady Morinth requests three new human pets to replace ones who "expired.

" The words would have horrified me before. Now they're just sounds.

"Your pet looks unwell." Raziel, recovered from his last encounter with Azzaron, addresses the King with barely veiled satisfaction. "Perhaps mortal constitutions aren't suited for our realm."

"Perhaps you should mind your tongue before I remove it." Azzaron's voice carries that particular tone that makes demons step backward.

"I merely observe what everyone sees." Raziel gestures toward me. "The light has gone out. She's broken."

"Broken things can still cut." I don't remember deciding to speak. The words just exist, flat and sharp. "Want to test it?"

The court goes silent. Not the respectful quiet of attention, but the held-breath pause before violence. Raziel's antlers catch the soul-stone light as he tilts his head.

"The mortal speaks."

"The mortal threatens." I stand, and somehow my legs hold. "Azzaron already removed your colleague's throat for touching me. Imagine what he'll do when I tell him you've been sending lesser demons to my door at night."

"I haven't—"

"Haven't you?" I move closer, and it's strange how empty makes you fearless. When you're nothing, nothing can hurt you. "Night before last. Scratching. Whispering. 'The King's whore should learn her place.' Your voice carries, Raziel. Even through doors."

Azzaron goes still. Not the stillness of attention but the pause before slaughter. "Is this true?"

"She lies—"

"I don't care enough to lie." I meet Raziel's eyes.

There's no heat in my gaze, no anger. Just a flat, dead calm that promises nothing left to lose.

He flinches as if I'd struck him and takes a step back.

"Lying requires investment. I'm divested of everything.

Including giving a fuck about demon politics. "

"Adraya." Azzaron's voice holds warning.

"What? You wanted me at court. I'm at court." I turn to face the assembled demons. "Would anyone else like to discuss my broken state? How I'm no longer entertaining? How the King's pet has lost her sparkle?"

Silence.

"Good. Then conduct your business and stop staring at me like I'm a wound that won't heal."

I sit back down, and the court resumes with forced normalcy. But the undercurrent has shifted. They expected broken to mean weak. Instead, they got broken like glass—sharp edges everywhere, cutting anyone who gets close.

Azzaron's hand finds my waist, thumb tracing patterns that meant something three days ago. "That was unexpected."

"Everything about me was unexpected. Past tense. Now I'm exactly what everyone expected—another mortal who couldn't survive your world."

"You're surviving."

"No. I'm persisting. There's a difference."

Court drags through border disputes and soul-stone valuations. A young demon presents a particularly bright stone—purple-white, pulsing with desperate love. The kind of stone I would have called beautiful before. Now it's just another reminder that everyone trades their soul for lies.

"Tell me about the whispers." Azzaron's voice stays conversational, but his hand tightens on my waist.

"Nothing to tell."

"Adraya."

"What do you want me to say? That demons scratch at my door? That they whisper about what you do to me? How the King's whore must be exceptional to earn such privilege?" I laugh, and it sounds like breaking. "They're not wrong. You did fuck me in front of everyone. Might as well wear the title."

His claws extend slightly, pricking through fabric. "You're not—"

"Not what? Not your whore? Then what am I? Your pet? Your entertainment? Your proof that even demon kings make mistakes?"

"You're mine."

"Right. Your nothing." I pull away from his touch. "Court's almost over. Can I go back to my room and continue not existing?"

He doesn't answer. When the session ends, I leave without dismissal. The corridors blur past, stone and shadow and soul-light all running together like watercolors in rain. My chambers offer no relief, just familiar emptiness with better walls.

The green dress pools on the floor where I drop it. I pull on something shapeless and crawl into bed though it's barely midday. The ceiling has thirteen stones. I count them because counting is safer than thinking. The thirteenth has a crack that means nothing. Like everything else.

Through the wall, Azzaron paces. The sound should comfort—proof someone exists nearby. Instead, it reminds me that I'm keeping the Demon King awake with my persistent nothing. Even my emptiness inconveniences others.

A knock at the adjoining door. Soft. Almost hesitant.

"I'm asleep."

"No, you're not." He enters anyway, and I don't bother sitting up. He stands at the foot of my bed, this creature of impossible power reduced to watching me count ceiling stones. "This can't continue."

"Watch it continue." Stone nine has a weird discoloration. "I'm excellent at continuing things that should stop. Ask Chad."

"Stop mentioning him."

"Why? He's the reason I'm here. The reason you own me. The reason for everything." I finally look at him directly. "Did you know? When you took my soul, did you know he was already fucking her?"

The question lands like a blade. He goes still, and that tells me everything.

"You knew." Not an accusation. Just truth. "You knew I was trading everything for nothing."

"I knew he pushed you toward danger. I knew he was a coward. I didn't know about the woman."

"But you suspected."

"I suspected he wasn't worth your soul. No one ever is."

"Then why didn't you stop me?"

"Because you wouldn't have believed me. You needed to see it yourself."

The logic of it sits heavy. He's right. I would have defended Chad, painted Azzaron as the liar, found silver linings in gold-threaded warnings. The optimist in me would have twisted truth into palatability.

"I hate you for being right."

"I know."

"I hate him for making you right."

"I know that too."

"I hate myself most of all."

"That," he moves closer, sitting on the edge of my bed uninvited, "is where you're wrong."

"Don't." I turn away, facing the wall. The vacuum where my soul used to be is a cold, dead weight. "Don't try to fix me with demon logic. I'm not broken. I'm gone. There's a difference."

"You threatened Raziel today. Gone things don't threaten."

"I didn't threaten. I stated facts."

"You lied about the whispers."

"Did I?"

Silence. Then: "No."

I roll back to look at him. "You knew about the whispers?"

"I know everything that happens in my fortress."

"Then why—"

"Because you handled it yourself." His hand hovers near mine on the cover, not touching. I see the slightest tremor in his claws, quickly stilled. "Even hollowed out, you show more spine than half my court."

"Spite isn't spine."

"Sometimes they're the same thing."

We sit in this strange bubble of honesty, him perched on my bed like it's normal, me counting his breaths because they're steadier than mine.

Sixteen. Seventeen. His hand still hovers, and I wonder what would happen if I reached out.

If I took that offer of touch. If I let someone who knows exactly how worthless I am pretend otherwise.

"I bought you something." He produces a small box from nothing, demon magic or sleight of hand. "At the market."

"I don't want—"

"I know." He sets it on the nightstand. "It's here when you do."

He stands to leave, and something in me cracks. Not healing. Just breaking differently.

"Azzaron?"

He pauses at the door.

"Do you think—" The words strangle themselves. "Never mind."

"Ask."

"Do you think anyone ever loves someone enough? Really loves them? Or are we all just Chad and his convenient flesh, pretending until something better comes along?"

He's quiet so long I think he won't answer. Then: "I think love is just pretty wrapping on selfishness. But sometimes the wrapping is so beautiful we forget what's underneath."

"That's the saddest thing you've ever said."

"No. The saddest thing is that you know I'm right."

He leaves, and I'm alone with thirteen ceiling stones and a crack that goes nowhere. The box sits on my nightstand, wrapped in paper that shifts colors like the twilight necklace. I don't open it. Can't open it. Opening it would mean wanting something, and wanting things is what got me here.

But I don't throw it away either.

That's something. Or nothing.

With me, they're starting to look the same.