Page 39 of Demon Food

The king murmured a few inaudible words under his breath, scrubbing his hands over his face. It almost looked like he might yell, then he huffed out a dark chuckle. “Do you have any idea what I’ve gone through? What I’ve done for you?”

Alek picked a piece of lint from his shirt. “No, but I’m positively certain you’re about to tell me.”

“I went into the villages for you. The villages, Alek.”

“So…congratulations? My condolences?” Alek shrugged. “I don’t know what that means.”

“The villages are disgusting. And I went to four of them where I sifted through dump after dump, tasting the most mediocre filth imaginable. And against all odds, what happens? I find you a diamond.” He thrust a hand toward me. “I find you a human that will dissolve on your tongue like candy. Any vultus in this palace would fight you for it.”

I glowered at the king, then at every soldier who eyed me. A part of me wanted to tell each of them the specific ways in which they revolted me, but I forced myself quiet. Meanwhile, Alek was studying his nails, like he was unbothered to even listen.

“His essence is infinite, son. There is a well inside him that is never ending. And not only that, but he just fucking tastes good. A diamond is shackled before you in a sterling chain, and you’re not ‘attracted’? What does that even mean?”

Alek lazily lifted one shoulder. “I felt nothing when I first saw him, and I felt nothing during your little puppeteering just now. The body wants what the body wants.”

“The body wants what the body…” The king trailed off, his eyes huge as he shook his head. “Gods, with such privilege you’ve grown. My first was a fifty-seven-year-old field worker, dying of syphilis.”

“I am well aware, Father. We are all so well aware of your excruciatingly noble sacrifices for the greater good of the kingdom. How can we ever repay you?”

The king glared. “Have you considered that what your body wants is impossible to find? You’ve not been out there. It doesn’t get more ‘attractive’ than this. Most of them are not fit to breathe our air, let alone suck our cocks.”

It took every inch of my body working together to keep myself from finding something to stab him with. This was how they thought about us. Of course, it was. Not fit. Just the scum they used for food.

Alek raked his cold gaze over me. He switched languages as he asked, “This is your idea of a diamond? You can’t polish a lump of coal and expect it to shine.”

Vultaen. He was speaking Vultaen. In all my years, I’d not ever heard it spoken so handsomely, with elegance, the words stringing past his lips like a delicate hymn. He probably assumed I couldn’t understand, as learning it was against the law for a human, but I could understand every word.

“Just like you can’t go slumming in the fleabag district,” Alek continued in his noble dialect, his words as cruel as they were lovely, “and expect to find a diamond.”

The king blinked for a moment, then responded in the same noble dialect, “I don’t understand you. I’ve brought you human after human, and they’re either too tall or too boring or too ‘expressly average’—remember that? Now, I bring you the epitome of unique and you’re still not pleased. What do you want?”

“Oh, I don’t know, Father. For one, not to be able to count every one of his ribs.”

The king flicked a sidelong glance down my body.

“When was the last time he ate?” Alek asked. “Think it was this decade?”

The king frowned as I sat up a little taller. Something about it had hope beginning to bloom in my chest. He really wasn’t attracted to me? It made sense. He hadn’t twitched.

“Like I said,” the king argued, “he’s from the villages. That’s just how they look.”

“Like starving vermin?” Alek’s nose scrunched. “Is there supposed to be something sexy about that?”

The king’s jaw ticked. “It’s nothing that can’t be fixed. We can feed him full meals every day for a week.”

“You can’t fix his eerie eyes, Father. They will forever haunt my dreams, and not in a good way.”

“Oh, for crying out loud. Then don’t look him in his eyes, Alek. Fuck him from behind.”

“So crass,” Alek chuckled. “You do recall, this is my first. It’ll be recorded in history. Celebrated amongst the masses. It must be memorable.”

“Well, we’re quite past that, aren’t we? On account that you’re dying.”

I flashed my gaze to Alek, half-expecting him to deny such an accusation. But he didn’t. And suddenly, I saw it. The hollows of his cheeks were too deep and there was something not quite right about the smear of purple beneath his eyes.

Shit. He was dying because he wanted his first to be memorable. From the sounds of it, perfect. The perfect human. He was willing to sacrifice his life for it.

“You need a human,” the king urged, thrusting a hand toward me. “I’ve brought you a human. Get it over with.”