The gold did not belong on a prisoner.
It was etched with swirling, intricate patterns that snagged the torchlight with every rhythmic, heavy step he took. The thick cuffs were clamped tight around his biceps and his corded throat, the precious metal shimmering in mocking contrast against his skin. But the elegance of the goldsmith's work couldn't soften the man wearing it. He moved with a predatory, muscular grace, his shoulders so broad they seemed to narrow the stone corridor. His bare torso was a map of a violent past, crisscrossed with silvered scars that vanished into the waist of gray pants that billowed like smoke around his ankles.
His hair, a deep and violent shade of red, was slicked back from a face that promised nothing but lethality. He didn't look like a man being led; he looked like a beast momentarily humoring his leash. Every few paces, he cast a look back at Daniela and Jasper, his eyes holding a sharp, hungry glint—the look of a wolf gauging exactly where the jugular sat beneath the skin.
The navy silk of Daniela's dress whipped around her legs as a stray wind whistled through the open-air battlements of the castle. The servant leading them said nothing as he guided them upward. The spiral staircase seemed endless, the stone leaching the warmth from Daniela's bare soles, until the muffled sounds of discordant music and raucous laughter began to bleed through the masonry.
As they reached the final landing, the prisoner stepped aside. The world exploded into color and noise. Above, the moons hung low in the sky, illuminating the chaos below in a bruised, silver light.
The top floor was a fever dream of excess. Massive velvet divans held lounging royals, a sea of navy and orange silks. The air was thick with heavy perfumes and the iron tang of roasted meats. But as Daniela's eyes scanned the room, she realized the "feast" was not just on the tables.
In a recessed alcove, she saw Quasi. The King's eighteenth son was leaning down, whispering something soft and jagged into the ear of a human man. The man was dressed in tattered rags, tears streaming down his face in silent, rhythmic tracks. His gaze was locked, shattered and helpless, on a woman across the room.
The woman was naked, her pale skin stark against the dark velvet of a lounger. A demon was behind her, his movements rhythmic and ruthless. Her breasts bounced with the force of his thrusts, and she was crying out—not in pain, but in a high, sharp ecstasy that seemed to twist the knife in the watching man's heart. Quasi watched the man's breaking spirit with a look of clinical hunger, his lips curled in a tiny, satisfied smile.
The moment the demon reached completion, his hand shot forward. With a casual flick of a clawed finger, he sliced the young woman's throat. There was no fountain of blood. Instead, as the life left her eyes, her body began to gray. It disintegrated into fine, dark particles of sand—the same obsidian grit that covered the entire demon realm. Within seconds, she was gone, leaving only a shimmering pile of dust on the velvet. Not a single royal spared her death a second glance. The demon simply stood, adjusting his silks, while Quasi looked up and caught Daniela's confused gaze. He didn't look away; he simply smirked, a predator acknowledging a witness.
"Food!" Daniela stated, her voice tight as her eyes wandered the expanse. There were more terrors to take in; a single woman was barely a blip. Though she did wonder: what was that man feeding on? Betrayal? Sadness? She couldn't quite figure it out. She would have to be far more discerning in this realm. The demons here were far more complex than those in the demon realm.
"Get my wife food. Human food," Jasper commanded the red-haired prisoner. The man's eyes flashed with a flicker of confusion before he turned to do as his jailer bid. To the creatures on the velvet divans, it was a feast; to her, it was beautiful poison.
Opal approached Jasper, and the two began speaking animatedly in their native tongue. Daniela couldn't understand a single word; it sounded like two beasts roaring back and forth.
"Do you like the celebration?" a young man appeared at her side. His robes were color-blocked in orange and blue, his shaved head giving him a deceptive air of maturity.
"Quite festive!" Daniela answered as another scream ripped through the air. He was the same demon who had whispered to the crying man.
"I feel so much sorrow for you," the boy said, his eyes watching her with keen interest. "Seeing your brethren in chains... I would feel helpless in your position." Quasi was hunting for a flicker of grief or guilt to capitalize on. A meal as decadent as grief could not easily be found in a place of perpetual suffering; there wasn't enough light for grief to take root.
Daniela met his gaze with a conspiratorial coldness. "You must struggle to hold so much empathy inside of you. I will keep your secret!" Her words tripped with warmth, but her tone was icy.
Quasi blinked, wholly unsatisfied. He wanted to see guilt fester; instead, he found a woman who seemed to have made peace with every monstrous decision she'd ever made.
The prisoner returned, thrusting a plate of roasted meat and root vegetables toward her. Daniela took it politely, her cold green eyes staring up at the royal boy. "We have not been properly introduced. I am Daniela, and you are?"
Jasper's obsidian eyes flicked toward Daniela. He saw Quasi speaking to her and, remembering that his cousin's food of choice was grief, he let them be.
"Quasi. Eighteenth son of the King."
Daniela ignored the weight of his gaze and took a seat on the nearest lounger by Jasper, beginning to eat as another royal approached him. In the moment her attention deviated from Quasi, he disappeared into the throng of the party. Daniela was sure that whatever he was looking for, he did not get.
Left to her own devices, Daniela watched as a demon nearby began to slowly dislocate the fingers of a kneeling servant, the pop of the joints punctuating the air like small firecrackers.
Celestine's hood billowed as she glided over and sat beside Daniela. She moved without the slightest sound, a phantom radiating a calmness that allowed others to lower their guards. "How do you like marriage?" she said, her voice musical and calm amidst the carnage.
"Are you married?" Daniela asked, answering with a question of her own.
"Too young," Celestine replied. "It is a battle I do not believe I'm ready for."
Daniela's wandering eyes refocused at Celestine's words. "Battle?"
Celestine only nodded, her eyes flicking toward Jasper as she spoke again. "You hate him."
Daniela glanced at Jasper. "I do not know what gave you such an impression. I am quite devoted to my king."
"Devotion and hatred are not the same," Celestine whispered, leaning in as if she were sharing a secret with her best friend. "You are not the first wife to hate her husband. It is quite common, even for demons."
In a way, Daniela was happy to hear she was not the only wife who hated her husband. It seemed it was a universal experience. "Then I am sorry for the demon wives who hate their husbands. I am so fortunate," Daniela lied, the words feeling heavy on her tongue. She stood up to return to Jasper's side.
"Anger is a deep burden," Celestine said as a parting gift. "We should speak again when you are ready. My cousin-in-law is quite... different."
Daniela stood, her appetite finally dying completely as she watched a demon lick blood from a golden platter. She wove through the throng of bodies, her skin humming. As she reached Jasper's side, King Umbay fixed her with a heavy, predatory look. "You're still alive? Have humans evolved so much?"
"It's a short trip," Jasper said dismissively, resting a palm on Daniela's back. "The strain will be minimal."
"So we have heard," Umbay rumbled, his eyes locked on Daniela's green ones. He could smell it now—an inner strength, a pulsating defiance that perfumed the air around her. "Should we share a meal, nephew?"
"Another time. We must retire," Jasper said, his palm flat against Daniela's back, guiding her toward the exit.
As they wove through the last of the lounging royals, they passed a man sitting atop a marble plinth, his head thrown back in a silent snarl of pleasure. A human prisoner was on his knees before him, his head bobbing rhythmically. The prisoner's eyes were vacant, glazed over as if his soul had left his body long before the party began.
The transition from the sweltering heat of the banquet to the damp, silent chill of the lower corridors was jarring. Jasper's hand remained a constant, grounding pressure against her spine as they descended the spiral stairs. The sounds of the screams and the laughter faded into a low, muffled thrum. They walked past flickering torches and silent prisoners with heads bowed until they reached their chamber.
The moment they were alone, Daniela nearly shouted. "Explain! Why is everyone shocked I'm alive? Why do you keep calling me your wife? And what did the King mean by sharing a meal?"
Jasper stripped off his clothes, inky black shadows pushing out from his skin to create a barrier that silenced the castle's noise. "One little disagreement, and you hate me? I thought we were tougher than that," he said with pitying dismissal.
"Little? You tortured me! I'm still in pain!" Daniela screamed, her power surging. Her eyes took on an eerie iridescence as her skin began to hum. A green hue glowed beneath her skin, and her power shot outward. Through her wrists, the skin broke and blood spurted from the wounds, coating her arms and slipping down her fingers until it dripped onto the floor. Her eyes remained fixed on Jasper, completely oblivious to the pain.
Jasper sighed, thinning his barrier so her power could vent out. "I stopped once I hurt you."
"You didn't stop because I was in pain. You stopped because you drew my blood!" she yelled, her voice cracking. Tears finally welled in her eyes—tears of frustration and the sudden, overwhelming realization that the worries of her old life couldn't catch her here, leaving her only with the raw agony of the present.
He grabbed her wrist, his shadowy magic acting as a seal, stopping the bleeding and preventing infection, but she kept her eyes closed, refusing to let him see her cry.
"Rest," he commanded.
She opened her watery eyes, a quiet desperation in her gaze. She took a moment to think. When they first arrived, Jasper had asked her if she could feel herself breathing, and since then, every demon had been curious about how she survived. "The air is poison here. You knew it could kill me."
"You have a God's gift," he said simply. "I knew you would be fine."
"And if I wasn't?"
"But you are. I will not waste time on what did not happen."
"You chanced my life?!"
"Daniela!" His voice thundered, vibrating in her very bones. "Your life is tethered to mine. Whatever furthers my survival strengthens yours."
"I am not a coat you can drag around!" she screamed.
"I have treated you exceptionally well," Jasper said, his voice dropping to a dangerous, low crawl. "I am a demon." He said an exasperation. "Blood and sex and violence—that is what I am. You chose me. Your not a damsel."
Scoffing, Daniella couldn't believe his tirade. As if she should have expected his violence towards her. She thought it was implicitly implied that they turned their aggression outwards. "I expected-"
" I expect the bare minimum: open your legs, close your mouth, and do as you are told." The air around them still with his growing frustration.
"I—"
"Have you forgotten we are only here because of you? You are a calamity. Leave your chaos for others! My patience has ceased!"
With lightning speed, his hand shot out, gripping her throat—not to choke, but to command. He pulled her flush against him, his other hand ripping the navy silk from her body in one violent jerk.
"Get in the bed." Each word was said with slow finality.
The lethality in his tone was absolute. Daniela didn't protest. She climbed under the heavy furs, turning her back to him. When Jasper climbed in behind her, he didn't apologize. He simply wrapped a heavy arm around her waist, pulling her back against his chest.
Despite the fire in her heart and the urge to drive her nails into his ribs, her exhausted body betrayed her. The familiar warmth of him, the very thing she hated, was the thing that finally lulled her into a dark, dreamless sleep.