Page 47

It’s Sitri that stirs me awake as he shuffles quietly around the room. I watch him fumble through the wardrobe through slitted eyes. His marks glimmer as he pulls his pants on in two languid motions. He tugs a white button-down shirt from the hanger and slips his arms in. Something as simple as watching him dress is strangely cathartic. He turns back, gaze landing on me while he’s still working at the buttons.

I should be embarrassed at being caught in my perusal, but my contentment doesn’t wane. I suppose that means I’m getting used to this, living together in these chambers. Still, I tug the blanket up over the bottom half of my face. Haven’t quite broken that habit yet.

Feeling oddly barer than normal with the blankets brushing against my skin, it finally dawns on me--I’m still practically naked. “Oh!” I gasp, clutching at the blanket to make sure I’m covered beneath it.

“It’s okay. I’ll be out of here in a second.”

“Sorry-- I didn’t mean to fall asleep…” I say, face flushing as memories of last night wash over me.

“It’s okay, really,” he reassures me as he fastens his cloak. He grabs his boots and sits down on the end of the bed to tug them on.

“Why don’t you ever use the mirror?”

He makes a face in the direction of the bathroom. “It annoys me.”

“Why?”

“Don’t like the things it shows me.”

“It’s a mirror. Doesn’t it show you… you ?” He supplies a pointed look. “I refuse to believe you’re anything but utterly in love with your own face.”

He lets out a laugh that doesn’t quite ring sincere. “True as that may be, the mirror has a tendency to show me more me than I want to see. You’ll get a glimpse of something, and you’ll understand,” he tacks on in response to my vexed expression before dropping his voice to a whisper as he glares in the direction of the bathroom again. “Probably soon since it can hear us discussing this.”

“It listens?”

He nods. “I should be back around noon, and I’ll take you down to the kitchens to visit Vera.”

Genuine glee fills me, and I grin. “What are you going to be doing here in the castle?”

He ignores me as he finishes lacing up his boots and whisks himself out of the room, not even bothering to bid me farewell. My punishment for trying to nose into his business, I guess.

I slump back into the bed with a sigh, drifting back into sleep for a short time that doesn’t manage to last for long enough. Still several hours before Sitri will return.

It’s a good thing I’ll be visiting Vera today because I’m starting to think I’ve been trapped in these chambers for too long. The walls are starting to look different. Shadows quiver always in the corner of my eyes. When I turn to find whatever caused the movement, there’s never a thing. God, I truly am going to go mad.

The dāemon riles with my irritation, and I retreat to the bathroom to take a steaming hot bath to relieve myself of its growing torment. I stare in the mirror for a long time before climbing into the tub.

Come on, show me something. It only shows me my own scrawny naked form. I turn around and study the symbols across my back. Three of them are the spitting image of Sitri’s, but the other one right in the middle is new. A circle with two crescent moons at its side. I decide I quite like the way they look. They make me feel something…I’m not attuned to feeling. Desirable . Even with the ugly scars marring my lower back.

After the bath, as I’m drying off, waiting for the mirror to dress me a different scene unfolds in the tub behind me. My naked body, not standing in front of me but instead legs splayed out over the side of the tub. Someone kneeling before me, in between my spread thighs. There’s no denying who with the familiar markings covering the muscles working in his back. His fingers are grasped so tightly around me they indent my skin. His head bobs, and the me in the mirror kicks her head back.

I gasp, taking several paces back. Behind me is merely an empty tub. Completely normal. By the time I turn back the scene in the mirror is gone.

I practically sprint out of the bathroom, not waiting around for the mirror to dress me. No, I’ll dress myself from now on. Of all things it could’ve showed me…it showed me… that ?

What was that? Is it reflecting my own desires back to me? Showing me what I want to see? The scene taunts me, replaying over and over again in my mind until I find myself back in his bed, door locked, body safely hidden under the blankets, ears perked as I dig that book out from under the mattress. Because I need to get this out of my system, and I’m definitely not going to think of what the mirror showed me or the events of last night as I…no, I need different material.

I’m flipping through the colorfully illustrated pages, trying not to think about Sitri doing the exact same thing when a small ripped piece of paper falls out onto my lap. In terse, neat print, it reads Enjoying yourself?

I stare at those two words for the longest moment, the implication of them. We only discussed this book last night, and sometime between now and then, he’s managed to sneak this piece of paper into this book. Some time when I was sleeping gloriously half-naked in his bed.

I go to carefully stash the paper back into the book when it suddenly bursts into flames. Within seconds, it’s only a few crumbles of ash.

I jump out of the bed and let out a hiss. It’s a trap! Now he’ll know I went digging this book out from under his mattress. Not only had I dug it out, but so soon after we discussed it.

Panic floods my veins. Maybe I can replicate his stupid note, and he’ll never know. I rummage through his desk and pull out the sketchbook, flipping to the empty pages in the back. There it is. The page of paper with a torn edge he’s used to scrawl the note on. Across it is another drawing of me. This time, I’m grinning as though in mid-laugh. You can keep this one scrawled across the bottom.

I slam the book shut and stuff it back in the drawer. Not only had he scrawled a note--he sketched an entire picture while I slept half naked in his bed.

I doubt any attempt I make to replicate the note will be a success. In a moment I don’t consider exactly rational, I carry the pornographic book out to the living room and toss it into the fireplace. Serves him right. However it remains completely unscathed amidst the glimmering flames.

“God dammit!” Flames lick at my fingers as I scoop it out but the book isn’t even warm to the touch. I try the tub next, setting the whole thing under the spout. The water merely trickles over the side as if covered by a protective shield. God. Did he know I would try to destroy this? And, took measures to prevent it?

I stuff the book back under his mattress and spend the rest of the morning on the balcony, angrily staring off into the kingdom below, contemplating how in the hell I’m going to recover my dignity from the last twenty-four hours.

That’s where Sitri finds me hours later, hair still unfixed because I’d been unwilling to brave the mirror again.

“There you are,” he says with an audible sigh of relief. I only grunt in response. “Well, come on, then.”

I can’t even look at him as we walk to the kitchens, though I can feel him scrutinizing me out of the corner of his eye. When I do finally brave a glimpse, I catch a glint of amusement.

Vera, sensing my foul mood, quickly offers me a glass of wine to soften me up. She pesters me until I finally grunt out an answer. “I don’t know why he…”

“He what?”

“You know…torments me. You’ve seen how he is…he’s always trying to provoke me or embarrass me.”

“You are so oblivious. He’s not tormenting you he’s flirting with you.”

I shake my head. “No. I’m a punishment to him,” I mumble out stubbornly. Deep down I know that she’s right. I just can’t admit it to myself. Too afraid of the consequences of speaking it into truth.

She rolls her eyes. “He said that?”

“Yes.”

“And, how long has it been since he’s said that? I’m sure you weren’t exactly thrilled to be married to him, either. You ever think he’s changed his mind a bit since you first got here? He’s practically shouting it, Pandora.”

My face colors. “I don’t know. It’s not like he’s tried to…you know, do anything and he’s had plenty of opportunity.”

She snorts. “Pandora, he probably feels like he can’t. I mean, you were forced to marry him and now he has to keep you locked away in his chambers just to keep you alive. You’re probably going to have to be the one to make the first move here.”

“Well, what exactly am I supposed to do with that?”

“Well…you do like him, don’t you?”

I shrink in my stool. “I don’t know. I mean, how am I supposed to know…it’s not like I’ve ever known any other men…” Her appraisal is skeptical. “Maybe!” I spit out.

She squeals, and I smack at her hands. “Stop it,” I hiss. “That’s part of the problem.”

“What problem?”

“What if it goes wrong…or what if he…I don’t know!” I say, tossing up my hands with indignation.

She rolls her eyes again. “You’re literally already married.”

“I know! That’s what’s so bad about it because we’re going to be married no matter what, and what if he…what if he is like this with everyone? Or if it goes wrong…”

Her grin fades as understanding creeps into her eyes. “Fear shouldn’t stop you from living, Pandora.”

Living . That’s what I want, isn’t it? My shoulders sag. “What should I do?”

“Well, you could stop pretending you hate him?”

I bury my face in my hands with a groan. “I don’t know how.”

When I lift my head, she has a mischievous gleam in her eye. “Flirt with him.”

“I definitely don’t know how to do that!” I complain.

She forms a symbol with her hand and a vine of grapes floats over from across the kitchen. “Next time he tries to feed you…you could…” She plucks a grape from the vine between her forefinger and thumb, plops it into her mouth, and sucks on her fingers from knuckle to tip.

My jaw drops. “If you think I’m doing that, you’re insane!” I hiss.

She melts into a pile of quivering laughter, and I reluctantly follow.

“No,” she says once she’s caught her breath. “Seriously, just, you know, smile at him? Laugh at his jokes? Get close to him.”

“Close to him…” I repeat warily.

“Yeah, close. Touch him and stuff.”

I grimace, and she laughs again. “You don’t have to, like grab his dick—“

“Vera,” I groan. I look toward the door, paranoid Sitri’s going to come barging in at any moment.

“—Just, you know, sit close to him, purposely bump into him, things like that.”

I shake my head. “I don’t think I know how to do that.”

“It’s not like it’s hard!”

“It is for me .”

She releases a bedraggled sigh but it’s true I’ve been so closeted my entire life I have no idea how to live.