Page 15 of Hell’s Secret Omega (The Court of the Hollow King #2)

CYRUS

Cyrus’s heat fades, and it leaves him hollow in a strange way. As if in compensation, more and more of Mezor’s emotions become clear to him. He doesn’t understand how it’s possible, but he can tell they’re Mezor’s, not his. Satisfaction is primary—the pleasure of servicing a vergis. Every time he notices it, his insides quiver and he gets the urge to fall on Mezor’s cock again. Even though his hole is rapidly verging on too sore.

Next is pride, which Cyrus experiences as a muddle of proud to make him so tender and fucked-out and proud that he took my cock so well , both of which make him want to crawl away and hide and demand praise at the same time. Neither are desires he’s comfortable with.

It’s just instinct, he assures himself.

He wonders if Mezor is telling himself the same thing.

“Have you been with other vergis through their heats?” he asks, propping himself up on Mezor’s chest.

Mezor wraps his hands under his head. “I haven’t. I’ve known a few vergis—angels used to visit this realm, long before the cataclysm, and among them were a handful of vergis. But my desire for them was little, even when they were unmated.”

“Why?”

“Well, we were worlds apart. Of course I was curious, but I was never… interested .”

Cyrus hums. “So there haven’t been any vergis among your people?”

“My people are sexless. I’m the only one with a designation.” Mezor shrugs, his muscles rippling.

“You’re like me, then.” He sits up.

“Hmm,” Mezor rumbles. “In that, you’re right. We are alike. But why the curiosity?”

Cyrus shifts, suddenly worried he’s overstepped. “I don’t understand why I’m the only vergis demon in the Court.”

“Ah.”

Mezor’s scrutiny makes him squirm. He feels exposed, which is silly because he’s just spent countless hours pinned open on Mezor’s cock.

Still. This is different. This is about the secrets of his mind, not his body.

He gets to his knees and presses Mezor back onto the plinth, biting his muscular chest playfully. Mezor allows himself be distracted and his cock rises to the occasion. Cyrus makes it slippery with saliva and precome before he sinks down on it and is blissfully full, mind empty, nothing left but mutual pleasure.

He can’t quite let it go, though.

Mezor knows more about him than anyone now. More than the King, even. He can’t help the fear that pricks at him when he lets himself remember this. They need to part soon—he can’t keep up the pretense that he’s not stretching out his heat as long as he can possibly get away with. Though Cyrus doesn’t believe, deep down, that Mezor has any reason to expose him, the habit of fear is hard to shake.

Someone else holds all the power and Cyrus is left wrong-footed. It’s a familiar pattern, and one he chafes at.

“You’re disturbed,” Mezor rumbles above him.

The torches are out and it’s pitch black, but Cyrus is intensely aware of Mezor’s presence. The hairs on his arms rise as Mezor sits up. The connection between them feels hyper-real, so acute it makes his heart pound.

“Tell me something,” Cyrus says into the dark. “I want to know a secret of yours.”

Mezor shifts, his leg swinging down to brush Cyrus’s shoulder where he sits at the base of the plinth. He could break Cyrus in half with no effort at all—but he won’t. He might refuse to say anything, though.

“A secret for a secret. I guess it’s only fair.” Mezor hums, his deep voice reverberating off the gallery. The seats are empty now, the imaginary audience dispelled. It’s only the two of them alone. “I’ll tell you the truth about my kind—they’re gone. All but me. Once they called us gods. My brothers guided souls through Hell to their last resting place, and I protected them all, keeping the guideways safe. But even gods aren’t invincible. They lay down in the earth to sleep and their bodies turned to stone.”

“ All of them? You’re the only one left?” Cyrus wraps his arms around his knees.

A flicker of pain stings him—it’s Mezor’s pain, his loneliness. “They couldn’t bear to watch Hell be destroyed by the cataclysm. When the corruption came there was nothing they could do. They shut their eyes and turned away.”

Cyrus gets to his feet abruptly. He feels around for Mezor’s knees, parting his legs. He only comes up to Mezor’s belly like this. His soft cock presses warmly into Cyrus’s chest.

“And you?”

“For some reason, my soul persists.” Mezor chuckles bitterly. “More than anything, I long to join them. But when I lie down I don’t sleep. It’s my curse. So I made a deal with the Hollow King, just like you—once the contract is fulfilled, he will end my loneliness.”

Cyrus wraps his arms around Mezor’s broad form in the dark and nuzzles the coarse hair that springs up around his navel. “They left you alone.”

“You might say that,” Mezor rumbles. “There you go, bright flame. A secret for your secret. Now you know something about me that only the King knows.”

“I’ll accept it,” Cyrus murmurs.

Mezor’s hand comes to the back of his neck and his claws scrape Cyrus gently, making him shiver. Mezor’s heartbeat pulses in his ear, slow and steady. They stay like that in silence for a long time.

Mezor leaves first. He’s calm and collected, whereas Cyrus feels horribly like his world is imploding. There will be none of the lingering hours of togetherness that were described in his little book. It was an arrangement, and now it’s over.

At the door, Mezor pauses. It’s alarming to see him clothed, almost a stranger again. It’s worse to wish he could wind back time to when Mezor was gloriously naked and rising above Cyrus as he pounded into him like the god of fucking.

Don’t be a fool, Cyrus tells himself.

“The fourth meeting,” Mezor says.

Cyrus’s heart hammers. He looks away, fumbling with his buttons. “I know. It’s the last.”

Mezor is silent. When Cyrus peeks, he’s frowning.

“Yes,” he says finally. “Until you find me.”

I won’t. He doesn’t say it. He won’t give up—it’s not in his nature. But by now he’s pretty sure the search is futile.

In a way, he understands Mezor’s challenge better. Every minute the Hunter spends away from his work for the King is a minute longer he has to bear his burden of solitude. His time is precious.

“Did it help?” he asks, suddenly needing to know. “My heat?”

Mezor’s lip curls into a smirk, eyes gleaming. Behind the smirk there’s true gratitude. “Yes, Cyrus. It helped.”

Cyrus looks back down at his buttons to hide his answering smile. Smug satisfaction blooms in his chest. The door closes behind Mezor, leaving him alone.