~LENORA'S POV
I slumped against the pillows, feeling like a fragile leaf trapped in a tempest. Weeks had blurred together since Lucian caught me trying to escape. The memory of his grip still lingered on my neck, a quiet reminder of the power he held over me.
He had carried me here, to the chamber adjoining his own, and stationed two guards outside the door. Their expressions were carved from stone, their eyes glowing with an otherworldly intensity that screamed demon. I shivered at the thought, yet the way they moved gave me an odd, uncomfortable sense of safety.
I remembered the last time Lucian had entered this room. I had stared into the flickering shadows while he spoke in his usual parables, his words circling my thoughts and teasing at something I could not understand.
His face gave nothing away, completely cold and closed off, but I kept watching him anyway, waiting for some kind of reaction, some hint that I wasn't speaking into a wall, but there was nothing to catch onto.
Trying to understand him felt useless. It was like reaching out for smoke and feeling it slip through my fingers every time.
The room he had kept me in only made it worse. Everything felt excessive, and heavy, pressing in on me from all sides. The silk drapes shifted with the air as if they were watching, the crystal vials on the table throwing sharp flashes of light that made me uneasy, and the fire in the hearth burned an unnatural blue, its glow crawling along the walls in a way that made my skin prickle.
Nothing here felt warm or familiar. Nothing here was meant for someone like me.
How had I ended up here? A college girl once lost in lectures and parties, now a captive in a world I did not belong to, with demons watching my every move. The absurdity of it all tightened my chest.
And yet, beneath everything, I couldn't help but to think and worry about my mother, if she was doing well, and had finally gone through with the mastectomy.
Even though she doesn't seem to like me much, she was still my mother after all.
I remembered the last time I saw her, her face had twisted in disgust the moment she saw me enter her wardroom. Her hand immediately flew to her mouth, turning away in disgust.
"Get out." She hissed with so much disdain.
The words still stung till this day.
My presence unsettled her to the point that once, she had thrown a mug at me just because I was few minutes late to her appointment.
Fortunately, the mug had missed me and it was at that point I gave thanks to my guardian Angel who had always saved me from situations like these.
Maybe this was what my mom wanted. Me gone. Erased from her life like the mistake she had always treated me as. If she was happier without me, then I would let her be.
My thoughts returned to the brothers. They hadn't shown their faces in days, yet their touch still lingered, heavy in a way I couldn't shake. I shifted against the bed, disturbed by the unwanted awareness it stirred.
"They're your kidnappers, Lenora," I murmured to myself.
I need to focus.
Escape.
Go back to your life before they tore through it.
My gaze drifted around the room before settling on the two sister maids, Nilah and Xyla. They moved through the room with quiet grace. Their pale skin held a faint glow as they worked, with their tails flicking softly behind them.
I had panicked when Lucian assigned demon maids to me, but he assured they wouldn't bother me. The sister had watched me with open curiosity, as if my humanity itself fascinated them.
"How old are you?" I had asked when I first met them.
They'd exchanged a glance, before smiling.
"A few hundred years, Miss." Nilah said lightly.
They looked no older than twenty, and the idea unsettled me more than I expected.
Age meant nothing here. Power did.
And then, there was him
The silver-haired man who refused to leave my thoughts no matter how hard I tried to brush him away. He clung to the edges of my mind like something half-remembered and unfinished.
The blindfold over his eyes made him worse somehow. Not less threatening, but more like he didn't need to see to know exactly what was happening around him.
When I asked Nilah and Xyla about him, their movement stopped, and their laughter faded as if I had asked about something forbidden.
"He's the demon lord," Nilah said in a whisper. "Alaric."
The air between us was thick with tension, and for the first time I understood what fear looked like on creatures who were not human.
I proceeded to ask about the blindfold, whether it was some kind of fashion trend in the demon world or it was to make him look different as the ruler. They both shared a quick glance and looked at me weirdly like I had spoken gibberish.
"He is blind," Xyla said at once.
Too quickly.
That was all they gave me. No explanation. No backstory. No warning spoken aloud. Even though it was hard to do, I let the question die there, and I knew the topic about this Alaric guy was never to be touched again.
"Miss," Xyla said, breaking my train of thought. "Lord Lucian is here."
She bowed her head and stepped back, putting space between us as if distance itself might shield her.
This bowing stuff that they do all the time made it look like we were in the 1800s. I had told them several times to treat me like they would treat a friend, but they disagreed saying, I was their Lords guest and they would treat me the same way they treat their Lords.
With a small sigh, I smoothed the fabric of the dress over my legs and followed her into the hall with my heart pounding in my chest. Every meeting with Lucian felt like walking onto thin ice. He never said more than he had to, but his words stayed with me long after he was gone.
We turned a corner and I saw him waiting.
He stood with his back straight, dark hair sleeked back with his horns, framing his face like a crown made for war. His blue eyes met mine for a brief moment, making my breath hitch before I looked away.
"Hey," I said, and hated how small my voice sounded.
"Walk with me," he replied, already turning.
We walked down the empty corridors, our footsteps echoing softly against the stone and I couldn't help but to wonder what he wanted with me.
The silence between us stretched until it pressed against my chest. I tried to hold it in until I couldn't anymore, blurting out the first thing that came into my mind.
"Is this about my mum?" I asked.
His steps slowed, slightly, and a contemplative look passed his features before he masked it to his usual stoic expression.
He raised his hand and drew intricate patterns in the air before blue flames bloomed into existence from his fingers. The flame were cold and brilliant, shaping itself into a floating orb which felt alive, casting shifting light across the stone walls.
It was beautiful.
And it terrified me.
I had seen their power before. I knew what they were. Still, my mind rebelled against it, because fire was not meant to sit so calmly in someone's palm without it burning them.
I focused my gaze back to the floating orb, and an image began to take form in it. The more I watched, the more the face morphed into one I was familiar with.
My mother.
She was sat in a restaurant, smiling. The smile on her face was so wide I was scared her face would rip off. My gaze settled toward the unfamiliar man that sat opposite her, feeding her gently. His hand rested against her arm while she laughed, eyes bright with a warmth I had never been given.
I felt something in me shatter at that moment. She had never looked at me like that.
Never smiled at me that way.
Here, she was happy.
While her daughter had been missing for weeks.
I pushed her feelings aside because I can't let the thought of someone who barely remembers my existence weigh me down.
I asked to see Jason instead, but Lucian hesitated briefly, almost imperceptible, but I noticed.
The flames in the orb shifted again, and a smile graced my lips despite myself as the image formed.
And then my smile fell away.
Jason was there.
But he was not alone.
Skye stood beside him, too close. Her hand rested against his arm. They were laughing softly, sharing something private, something warm. The kind of moment that did not leave room for a third presence.
My chest hollowed out.
"I knew it," I whispered, more tired than shocked. "I knew it, but I told myself I was just being paranoid."
The images blurred as everything crashed together. My mother. Jason. Skye. The realization that I had always been unimportant in people's life dawned on me. I had always been easy to forget. Easy to replace. Easy to live without.
Tears slipped free no matter how hard I fought them, and they burned as they fell down my cheeks.
The floating orb vanished, leaving only the cold truth and the unbearable silence behind.
"Come," Lucian said.
He did not soften the word. He did not need to.
I was already moving. My legs carried me forward before my pride could stop them. I pressed my face against his chest as the sobs broke loose, shaking through me like something had finally snapped.
Lucian firm arms wrapped around me. It was a hold that did not ask permission and did not allow collapse beyond a certain point.
He said nothing.
And somehow, that made it worse and better at the same time.
When the tears finally slowed, I pulled back from him slightly with a swollen and exposed face. He lifted his hands and brushed the tears from my cheeks with his thumbs which caught me off guard.
"You look even more hideous when you cry." He said calmly.
The faintest curve touched his mouth and was gone almost as soon as it appeared.
I let out a weak, broken sound that might have been a laugh or a sob.
"What," I managed to say. "What was it you wanted to see me for?"
His expression shifted at once.
The faint humor vanished. His jaw tightened. A muscle ticked near his temple as his gaze sharpened, all warmth gone like it had never existed.
"There will be a royal masked banquet in two nights," Lucian said. "It marks the anniversary of the demon lord's ascension."
He watched my face closely, as if measuring how much I understood and how much I was pretending not to.
"You will not remain in your chamber during the event. Other beings will be present."
Other beings.
The words sat heavy in my chest. Demons had already shattered everything I thought I knew. The idea that there were more paranormal beings felt unreal.
"More?" I asked quietly and he gave me a single, subtle nod.
"You will stay with either Zephyrus or me. One of us will ensure your safety," he said. "As a human, vampires will pose a threat."
My stomach dropped.
"V-Vampires," I stuttered, the word catching in my throat.
I had expected witches. Faeries. Anything that still felt like myth, not that.
Lucian stepped back, his presence shifting as his voice dropped octaves lower. "This is not a suggestion. No mortal moves freely in the demon realm. Every choice you think is yours has already been seen, and weighed.
The truth of it crushed the air from my lungs. I felt suddenly exposed, as if even my thoughts no longer belonged to me. Escape sounded like a fantasy I couldn't bring to life, and survival in this insane world demanded submission.
He turned away, the faint glow of blue fire casting long shadows across the stone walls. He did not look at me, yet the weight of his attention pressed deeper than any gaze.
"Remember this, Dove," he said quietly, "there are paths here that do not lead back, and knowledge taken too early does not enlighten. It ruins."
Then he was gone.
I sank to the floor, trembling with my chest heaving as I hugged my knees to myself, trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to spill again.
The banquet. Vampires. The brothers. And me.
A human girl, dropped into a world that did not care if I survived it.
I had endured the forest. I had lived through the spirits. But this felt different. This felt like standing on the edge of something that would not hesitate to push back.
Fear twisted in my stomach, at the thought of having to see a real Vampires. It wouldn't be a Halloween costume, a movie, in a book, but real, in the flesh.
"Oh God…" I whispered.
In this realm, being invisible was not enough. Being careful would not save me. Only understanding, only obedience... might keep me alive.
I stood up from the floor and cleaned my tear stricken face.
If obedience was the price of survival, then I would learn the rules well enough to break them.