Page 23 of Fated to the Demon Lord

“What stopped you from killing me last night?”

“Are you certain that was my intention?”

“Yes. You wanted me dead. I could tell. But something about me… about my blood made you stop. What was it?”

He leaned forward, his gaze intense. “I’ll tell you the answer to that if you eat some food.”

He gestured to the amply provided table.

Of course. Everything with him is a trade. My stomachache intensified at the sight of the bounty. “No, thank you.”

Annoyance flashed across his face. “What can I do to get you to eat?”

“Why do you care?”

His jaw clenched, and he rose to his feet so swiftly that I froze, startled. “Stand up.”

I did as he said, aware that defiance would grant him the power to compel me in the most painful fashion.

He stalked toward the door. “Come with me.”

I followed him into the hall, stepping over my own blood that soaked into the stone. He marched ahead without glancing back, his spine straight, irritation laced in every movement.

“Feron,” he snapped as he strode past where Feron assisted Erlinen in cleaning up glass. “Leave that alone and follow.”

Feron dropped the broom and lumbered toward us.

We snaked our way through the manor toward the rear of the building. He approached a door and reached for the latch, swearing when his hand passed straight through it. My fingers drifted to the cloth bound on my arm. For a brief instant I wondered if he had refused to tie it off not because he wouldn’t—but because he couldn’t. Perhaps he’d already spent whatever limited time he had interacting with this plane pouring wine over my wound and fumbling with the bandage.

“Open the door,” Vaelor growled.

Feron reached for the latch and opened it.

We entered a large room with ovens and huge counters. Pots and utensils hung off the wall next to carefully stored supplies. The kitchen.

“There,” he snarled, gesturing to the space. “If you are so afraid I’ve poisoned every single dish on my table, then make your own damn food.”

He spun toward Feron. “Watch her. Be certain she adds nothing to our ingredients,” he said gruffly, and a degree of surprise came over me. It wasn’t as if I had the ability to poison Lord Vaelor again. Did he care about his servants that much?

“And most importantly,” he added to Feron. “Don’t eat a thing she makes.”

Feron grunted in acknowledgement.

With that, Lord Vaelor stormed out of the room.

I made my way from the kitchen after a meal of cooked chicken and homemade bread, reasonably certain I hadn’t accidentally slipped any secretly poisoned ingredients into my food.

When I reached the front hall of the manor, my gaze caught on a painting hanging in a pool of muted light. Three demons stood together in the portrait, all young—perhaps only a few years shy of adulthood. Two were male.

The taller of them had deep red hair. He stood rigidly, shoulders held tight, his expression solemn. Yet there was an unexpected warmth in his eyes, a quiet softness that seemed at odds with the stiffness of his posture.

I stopped.

It was Vaelor.

For a long moment, I simply stared, trying to reconcile the figure in the painting with the demon I knew. This wasn't the same Vaelor who currently haunted the halls of this home—the intense, sharp-edged male whose anger seemed woven into every glance. Even in the tent before his death, no hint of warmth had softened his gaze.

Others called him the Waiting Ruin. What sort of horrible acts won such a title?