Page 11 of The Veil of Hollow Gods

My eyes sting as I run down the black hallway, away from Sinea, away from the terrible pit in the bottom of my gut at violating those women’s privacy. Away from what Sinea expected me to do.

If that’s what?—

If she thinks?—

The thoughts splinter before they form, snagging on the image of the women in the bath, women I’m meant to compete with. The people I’m supposed to become . My pace falters, nausea rising with every bottled-up feeling clawing its way up my throat.

"You’ll want to make the next right," Sinea says, her voice infuriatingly light, as though none of this matters. As though she hadn’t just thrown me headfirst into a nightmare.

The singsong tone burns through the shame and guilt and everything that witnessing those Maidens dredged up.

She should have told me. Should have warned me.

I round the corner blindly, breath jagged, and run face first into a guard .

Sinea sucks in a startled gasp as I remove my nose from the guard’s chest.

"Majesty!" she whispers and folds into a deep bow next to me.

I look up at the demon. There’s an air about him, impossible to ignore, a weight that presses into the hall as if the walls themselves bow in submission.

"Do I know you?" I ask, startling myself. Why would I ask that? I don’t recognize him, not the dark eyes or snow-white hair.

A spark of something gleeful shines in his black, mirror-like gaze.

Sinea clears her throat, collecting herself.

"Majesty, this is Amara." Her tone makes me bristle—too sweet, too contrived. But it’s the way he looks at me—like my name is a weapon he already knows how to use—that makes my stomach twist. Something about him tugs at the edges of my mind, a thread I can’t quite grasp.

I ignore it, but the sensation lingers, unsettling as whispers in the dark.

"No introductions necessary, Sinea." His eyes meet mine. "I rule where I stand. That is all you need to know."

A haughty demon king. Who could have guessed?

The king shifts his focus to Sinea, and I can’t pull my gaze away from the perfect symmetry of his face or the scar over his eye marring that perfection with such delicious contrast it seems like a secret just for me. I sense her stiffen next to me.

"I’ll chaperone the potential Maiden back to her bedchamber," he says, smooth and light, an order in casual attire.

"Of course, Majesty." Another deep bow, and I think I catch a tremble in Sinea’s voice.

I want to look at her, make sure she’s well. But I simply cannot pull my gaze from the demon king in front of me. And, with my eyes covered, I see no need to do so. No shame in taking in my fill.

He crooks his arm, an offering. I don’t take it. Not until I have some damned answers.

"Why am I here?" I ask, pointedly.

He smiles, and I don’t like the way it fits his face. "Why are any of us here, Maiden? In my case, it’s because the old gods saw it fit to rip us from our home and send us here. Yours, I’m sure, is just as dis-illusionary."

Either he’s a dense king or…

"Are you baiting me to see how I react?"

He takes my hand, places it atop his elbow, and guides us down the hall. "You’re here because you were caught tending a snow-kissed garden, as my guard reports it."

I snatch my hand from his. The last thing I need, after seeing what waits for me behind that aetherglass, is to listen to this smug demon king dance around the topic. Especially when he looks as though he already knows what I’ve just witnessed.

"Tell me what the first Trial is, or I’ll find my back to my room alone."

The demon king lifts a brow at me. "Leveling ultimatums already, I see. I thought you might have a wild streak."

I pay no mind to his words, flattering as he’s trying to make them. "Sinea refuses. She thinks not knowing somehow prepares me better, but that makes no sense to me. More knowledge is always better."

A stillness falls over him, strange, unnatural, like the air itself stilled to watch.

His gaze sweeps over me, head to foot, slow but insistent, and for a moment I feel laid bare, even more so than these scant bits of lace could ever manage.

The silence stretches, pressing against my nerves until finally impatience wins.

"Are you going to give me an answer or just continue to st?—"

"The hood suits you," he says, his quiet words stanching the ones on my tongue.

He steps closer, and I’m grateful he can’t see how my eyes widen. My slippered feet stay rooted. I won’t give ground to this demon, king or not. Immeasurably beautiful or not.

He touches the lace draped over my mouth, his finger trailing down it slowly, almost reverently. My breath hitches.

"You seem more yourself under it," he whispers.

I press my lips together, swallowing the retorts begging to be loosed: How would you know? We’ve only just met. He’s baiting me. Again.

That alone doesn’t trouble me. He’s a demon, and I expect nothing less. No, what unsettles me is that I can’t work out why. What game is this, and what does he stand to gain?

When I stay silent, his hand finds mine, placing it back on his elbow as if nothing’s happened. Without a word, he leads me farther down the black stone hallway.

"I had the windows spelled opaque in your chamber, but I think it’s time I show you the real world."

If he can pretend nothing happened, so the bloody realms can I. "Yes, I wondered about that. As opulent as the room is, it seemed odd not to have a single window."

"The guard thought it best to slowly integrate you into the world outside the frozen lands."

The frozen lands. He said it so casually, as if the weight of that phrase weren’t his to bear. As if those frozen lands weren’t his creation. If not by his hand, then by his permission—by allowing the Frozen King to condemn us to such inhumane conditions.

"Those frozen lands are home to resilient, unyielding people, who?—"

His free hand covers mine, steadying it, as if he could anchor me to his version of truth. "I mean no disrespect, Amara."

"Then call the land by its name— Tiriana —not the snowy graveyard you’ve made it."

He nods. "The guard suggested you slowly acclimate to the world outside of Tiriana. It’s quite a shock if you aren’t prepared."

Still bristling at his carelessness, I can’t imagine whatever sun-drenched scene he’s hidden away could be so startling. "I’m sure I can manage."

The demon king lets out a muffled chuckle, soft, low, and unexpected. I’ve never seen a demon laugh before, hardly thought them capable, yet something about it stirs a flicker of familiarity.

"As you desire, Maiden," he says softly. Shadows along the curving obsidian walls seem to shift and glide with us as we round the corner.

"A thousand years ago, when the Old Ones cast us from our native realm and stripped us of the breadth of our power?—"

"Yes, yes, I’m well aware of the tragic tale your kind has been feeding us for generations."

The last syllable tumbles from my lips, and my breath catches. I’ve never dared speak to a demon with such brazen disrespect before.

"Amara?" My name is soft on his lips, and a shudder ripples down my spine. "If you’ll keep those pretty lips of yours closed for just a few moments, I’ll make my point."

Heat blazes up my neck and cheeks. Don’t look at me.

But it’s not the usual embarrassment heating my face. It’s not guilt or shame at being seen—really seen—by a demon.

It’s something else entirely.

His words, the silk in them, the implication …

I stare straight ahead, willing my heart to slow and the fire to leave my cheeks. "Such wicked words from a forked tongue. And so original, complimenting the only part of my face you can see."

The demon king tucks my hand into the crook of his elbow, trapping it against the warm silk of his shirt and the hard muscle beneath.

I inhale sharply at the feel of him. Unbidden images skate across my mind’s eye—what his skin and muscles might feel like if my hand slipped under his shirt, how he might react to my touch, what I might do at the sight of so much exposed demon flesh.

I slam an iron door on those thoughts.

I have no business thinking about a demon in such ways.

That he’s an infinitely handsome, powerful king with the ability to change my family’s—and possibly my village’s—circumstances only complicates things.

Because he’s still a demon.

And I do not have intimate thoughts about demons.

"As I was saying, when we arrived on this plane with only a vestige of our abilities, we had to reshape the land to suit our needs," he says lightly, as though he hadn’t just invaded my space and made me touch him. "We call it shadow-sculpting—shaping the essence of a plane, down to its very shadows, to meet our physiological needs. As a lifelong resident of Tiriana, you’d have no reason to know the world wasn’t simply a thawed version of yours, but I assure you, Amara, that is far from the truth. "

A tendril of worry unfurls in my stomach, twisting tighter with every word he speaks. When the king reaches for the door ahead of us, he pauses.

"I’d prepare myself, if I were you."

I shake my head, the lace hood trailing. I don’t bother asking what I’m meant to prepare for. Instead, I pull my hand from his side and step past him, entering the room on my own.

The breath I didn’t want to waste earlier?

Gone at the sight of the foreign terrain outside my bedchamber window. My hand drifts to my chest.

This was not the soft, lush greenery Mother told stories about. No rolling hills or sparkling beaches. No sandy shores or crystalline blue waters.

"Shattered stars," I whisper.

The king steps close behind me, his hands settling on my shoulders—steadying me or keeping me in place to confront the alien landscape before me. Who’s to say which?