Chapter 251: Unsettling Smiles, Familiar Faces, and Something That Refuses to Sit Right
Chapter 251: Unsettling Smiles, Familiar Faces, and Something That Refuses to Sit Right
Elyn’s POV
I met them at the entrance of the castle.
Caleth, Faelyra, Draeven, Aurelixa, and Guilidern.
Five of the most powerful demons in the realm standing at the entrance of the palace at an hour that warranted an explanation I hadn’t received yet.
I walked toward them and stopped at a respectful distance.
Something was off.
I couldn’t put my hand on it. I couldn’t name it or point to it specifically. It was just — there. A feeling. The particular unease of looking at something that appeared correct but wasn’t quite sitting right, like a painting hung at a slight angle that no one had mentioned.
Caleth and Faelyra were staring at me.
Wide-eyed.
And I couldn’t explain it, but the expression suggested something about my appearance or my arrival had surprised them, which made no sense because I lived here and they were the ones who had shown up unannounced.
Draeven was staring too.
The Duke of the Golemhold Territory was looking at me with something that could only be described as awe.
Then Caleth recovered.
He cleared his throat — a small, controlled sound — and his expression smoothed back into the composed, oceanic steadiness I recognized. The scales along his neck caught the morning light faintly as he straightened.
I frowned.
I didn’t understand what was going on.
I turned to Zorathys, attempting to speak with him on how strange I found this, but he was not beside me. It seemed my husband-to-be had, in fact, not followed me downstairs to meet with the guests.
Perhaps he was too lazy to move, or he did not see the need to meet with them, especially so early in the morning. Who knows.
I exhaled quietly and looked back at the guests. Marrok was with me at least, standing slightly to my left with his stone wings folded and his eyes forward.
I was about to speak — to ask what had brought all of them here at this hour — when I saw it.
Something behind one of the gargoyles stationed along the wall.
A shadow.
Or — not a shadow exactly. More like something that had tried to be still and hadn’t quite managed it. A flicker of movement at the edge of my vision that stopped the moment I looked in that direction.
I frowned and began walking toward it when Caleth spoke, drawing my attention.
"Your Highness," he called out.
I fixed my attention back on him and noticed he had stepped forward slightly, and now he bowed.
The others followed immediately, Faelyra and Aurelixa with grace, Guilidern with smooth precision, Draeven with a heavy, graceless dip.
"It is a pleasure to see you," Caleth said as he straightened.
I looked at him.
"The ball concluded just days ago," I said.
He nodded.
"Yes, Your Highness."
"So," I continued, my frown still in place, "is something wrong? Why are all of you here this early in the morning?"
The question was reasonable. I genuinely wanted to know. Dukes and duchesses didn’t arrive at a palace at this hour without a reason, and none of them had sent word ahead of time. No letter. No gargoyle messenger. Nothing.
Caleth and Faelyra exchanged a glance.
Draeven was still staring at me, which was becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. The awe on his face hadn’t gone anywhere. It was still there like it was frozen on his face.
Minutes passed and no one said anything. I was beginning to wonder if perhaps I was in a dream or this was a prank of sorts when Aurelixa cleared her throat.
"We wanted to have a conversation with you," she said. "That is why we came, Your Highness."
I looked at her.
"A conversation," I repeated.
"Yes."
"Regarding what?"
Aurelixa opened her mouth, but before she could speak, we all heard a voice... a lazy drawl that already explained who had decided to show up even before he did.
"I’d like to know that as well," he said.
Shadows pooled at the floor beside me, dark and unhurried, and then Zorathys was simply there.
He looked as bored as ever.
He stifled a yawn — not bothering to hide it, just pressing the back of his hand briefly to his mouth — and then let his ruby gaze settle on the assembled dukes and duchesses.
The reaction was immediate.
Guilidern looked like he wanted to leave.
His weight shifted backward by a fraction and his jaw tightened. It seemed like he was calculating the social cost of simply turning and walking back through the teleportation point.
He didn’t leave.
But he pinched Caleth’s arm.
Caleth, who was already frozen, went even stiller at the pinch. His eyes did not move. His scales caught the light. He did not breathe in any way that was visible.
I watched all of this.
I knew they were scared of Zorathys. That was not news. Every demon in the realm was scared of Zorathys in some capacity — it was simply a fact of existence here, like the way the palace gargoyles occasionally fell from where they were sleeping and no one knew why.
But this was different.
This was something more than the standard fear that his presence produced.
The way Caleth had frozen. The way Faelyra’s eyes had gone wide. The way Draeven was still and looked like he regretted his life choices.
Something was going on.
Something I didn’t have enough information to name yet.
Zorathys turned his gaze to Aurelixa.
"Am I," he said, his voice carrying that particular lazy weight it had when he was asking something that wasn’t really a question, "not liable to hear what you wish to discuss with my wife?"
Aurelixa met his gaze.
She swallowed nervously.
And then her eyes moved.
Just for a second, but it was enough.
They flicked toward the gargoyle near the wall.
The same gargoyle I had been looking at before Caleth’s voice had stopped me.
The same spot where I had seen the shadow that hadn’t been quite still enough.