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Marius’s grin melted away, his stare lost to a spot on the table. “Because you are to die.” His voice was as cold as his touch. It lasted only a moment before he shook himself out of the strange trance I had watched him slip into.
Opting to steer away from this conversation, I presented Marius with a question.
“What do you do during the rest of the year when you are not… entertaining your Claim?”
It was a question I truly wanted an answer to. I had longed stared up at this castle from my bedroom window. Studying the dark, lifeless windows and seemingly empty place. It was only during the month of the Claiming when the castle came to life.
“I wait.”
“That sounds awfully dull,” I joked, trying to lighten the suddenly heavy atmosphere that laid upon the room.
“Time is an odd concept in this place. It has taken me years to not dwell on it. For the more I did in the beginning, the more I let myself slip into madness.”
A just punishment.
As I thought it, his inquisitive stare settled on mine and held it. His furrowed brow made me believe for a second that he could infiltrate my thoughts.
“It is my turn again.” He groaned, lifting the rim of the glass to his lips and holding it there.
“For what?” I said, licking the dregs of wine from my lower lip. Appetite was failing me as the beast bored into me. Instead, I opted for a chug of fruitful, red wine to dull my anxiety at the questions to follow.
“It is my turn to ask you a question.” Marius leaned forward on the table, finger tapping his defined jaw. “What did you know of me before you were chosen as my Claim?”
“You want to know?”
He waved a hand, urging me on. “Entertain me… please.”
Little is more.Lamiere’s words echoed in my mind and my chest warmed at the memory of the old maiden.
“I know you were cursed for killing the betrothed of Morgane De’Fray.” My own great-grandmother.
He scoffed, draining his own glass of wine in one fell swoop. “Go on,” he said, teeth stained red.
“That you have lived out your days in an eternal cycle. One that can never be broken.”
Lie. I will break it.
“I know that those who are sent to your castle never return home.”
“Why?”
I kept my face straight, no matter how the wine I had devoured made me want to act. “You kill them.”
“Why?” he asked again, a low hiss sounding from the back of his throat.
“To drink from them, to keep yourself—”
“Without pain!” Marius shouted, standing abruptly and slamming his palms on the table. It shook beneath the force, glass and china hitting into each other in a chorus of high-pitched clinks. “I drink because I must. Every year I have asked these same questions hoping that I may hear something else in response. To share in my own confusion as to what thebitchturned me into. And every year the same, empty, answers are provided. Believe it or not, Claim, I know little more than you.”
I stood, swaying slightly. “My name is Jak.”
The flames of the many candles across the table sang to me, willing for me to reach out for them. But I resisted, only just.
“And I do not care.”
I pushed from the table, not caring about the chair that fell across the floor in a bang.
“Where are you going?” Marius hissed, demand dripping from his tone.
