Page 23 of Demon's Beauty

I drift back over to the grimoire, but I can’t make my eyes focus on the tiny lines of text. I can’t really make myself do much of anything, actually, other than stew in my own thoughts.

“How’s the work going?” Vayla asks a few minutes later, coming to stand next to me.

“I got… a bit done. But I’m not sure how much more useful I’m going to be today.”

“Maybe you just need some sleep?” Vayla tactfully suggests. “You look a little, uh, tired.”

She’s right.

After my stint making the dreamsbane and the rest of today’s chaos, sleep sounds like the best thing in any of the thirteen realms.

Maybe everything will look different after a nap.

Maybe I’ll wake up with a clear head, feeling more like myself, and know what to do about… all of this.

Or, maybe I’ll wake up and I’ll still be here in the demon realm, with my Ascension waiting for me back home, and a big, blond, handsome demon mate who looks at me like he’s been waiting lifetimes to find me.

Still, a nap couldn’t hurt.

8

Finn

My head is somewhere three feet to the left of my body as I make my way through the court’s atrium for the second time today. Disconnected. Floating away. Lost in thoughts of black-haired witches and heartbreak.

It’s gotten so far away from me I don’t see my father—still working, still with such purpose—standing off to one side of the large chamber where courtiers come to see and be seen, until I’m just a few meters away from him.

He’s speaking with a demon I recognize vaguely, though it takes me a few seconds to place him. He’s wearing a guard uniform, but it’s not until I see the smattering of metal commendations pinned to his shoulder plate I realize how I know him.

“Ah,” my father says when he sees me approaching, with no warmth in his voice to speak of. “And here’s my son. You’ve met Finn, haven’t you?”

Oh, I’ve met the Lieutenant.

I’ve met him atseveralof my parties. Usually pissed off his arse, living it up with the rest of the degenerates who love to come and cut loose away from some of the stricter formalities of court.

Lieutenant Glenson coughs. “We’ve met in passing, I believe.”

“Summer Solstice, wasn’t it?” I ask, and he goes a little green.

“Er, yes. It might have been.”

Reprobate I might be, but my memory’s always been sharp. And I recall one Lieutenant who disappeared out of the bonfire light and into the Solstice wood with a very lovely demonessanda very handsome courtier on that particular night.

Not that I really care. I hope they all had a marvelous time together.

“Good to see you again,” I say, affecting my best impression of courtly manners. “And you, too, father.”

My father looks at me for a beat too long.

What can he see?

I haven’t passed a mirror since I left Callum and Seren’s rooms. Is the truth of what happened written all over my face? Am I as changed on the outside as I feel on the inside? It wouldn’t surprise me, after the day I’ve already had.

But the moment passes, and he gives his head a small shake as he turns back to Glenson.

“You’re off soon, aren’t you? I heard there was some urgent business you’re being sent on.”

“Yes, sir. We’re running an operation in the Bone Peaks,” Glenson says, all professionalism again. “Vayla, the court healer, requested it. There’s an outbreak of fever in one of the southern coastal cities, and she has a remedy which requires the night-blooming stellarin flowers that—”