Chapter Twenty-Two
VIOLET
The world shifts all around me as the door at my back opens and I fall. Blinding light flares, consuming the dark. The victorious howls quickly transform into piercing screeches of agony. Then there is only silence.
In one seamless move, two strong hands catch me before I hit the ground and drag me inside, letting the door snap shut.
Joon’s endless blue eyes hover above, searching my face. Imugi hovers behind his shoulder, dipping in and out of view.
Familiar tendrils of magic weave through me, easing the vice-like grip around my heart.
Pressure builds behind my eyes with prickling heat. “I hate this. I—I thought I was going to die—I couldn’t do anything to stop it.” Years of pent-up emotions I buried surge forward all at once, spilling over in rivulets of hot tears. “I’m so tired of being afraid and weak.”
After days of rest, I thought I was fine, but that day in the alley, a crack formed in the dam I created to hide it all, until the pressure became too much.
Joon holds me to him as fear and anger pour out. Most of what I manage to say is barely intelligible, but it hardly matters. He listens silently and waits until I take shuddering breaths, completely spent.
“Your body may have a weakness, but that doesn’t make you weak.
” Joon strokes my hair. “This… condition is only a small part of you. There is so much more to you than this. It does not define you. Look at me, Violet.” He pulls back and pins me with his gaze.
“It takes more strength and courage to keep going and fight for your life every single day than most could ever hope to possess, and when you thought it was over, you faced it with bravery.”
I sniffle pathetically and offer him a thin, half-hearted smile.
These feelings have been building for years. They are not about to change after a few kind words from a prince. It will take time to be rid of them—time I don’t have.
It’s not that I don’t believe him. For so long, I have lived trying to get the world to see me and not my broken heart. Pretending I could live a life as normal, as long as anyone else’s.
Though perhaps he, more than anyone, is capable of understanding how I feel.
“Come,” he says. “Let us get you back to your apartments.” Supporting my forearm with his, Joon wraps an arm around my waist and helps me stand.
Happy to lean on him for support, I shuffle along, but before we can even take five steps, the rustling bush leaves sends fear spiking through my veins—there is no breeze within the enclosed garden. Nothing to logically cause that to happen.
I plant my feet and refuse to take another step.
Several leaves near the ground flutter, and from within the cluster of branches, two red eyes blink through small gaps in the foliage.
“Demon,” I squeak, stumbling back, pointing a shaking finger at the beast that somehow managed to get past the wards and inside the palace.
“How did they get inside?” Hysteria builds at the base of my throat.
Joon grips me, holding me steady. “I invited them in,” he says in a calm voice, as if giving a demon permanent access to the palace was a reasonable thing to do.
“Three demons tried to kill me a minute ago, and you invited one in?”
“They… helped me find you.”
My head snaps up and I look him in the eye, so he knows I’m aware that he’s lost his demons damned mind.
“They were scratching at my window as if trying to escape the Otherworld. Each time Imugi chased them away, they kept coming back more insistent. Then I realized I had seen this one before.”
I frown. “What are you talking about?”
Imugi gives a derisive snort, then floats toward the door to the outside garden, muttering something about the perimeter.
Joon shakes his head, disbelieving, and… smiles? “When I asked you about possible encounters with demons, it was because this same one led me to you when you were with my uncle.”
My jaw goes slack. Was I wrong to put so much trust in his ability to keep me alive?
Joon studies the demon thoughtfully, then motions for them to come closer.
I half jump when they obey like a trained dog. The demon stops halfway and plops down in a sit.
“They won’t hurt you, Violet. In fact, I think they’ve been protecting you. I do not understand how or why, but I think they are attuned to you,” he murmurs.
Aghast, I step sideways out of his hold. “Are you insane?”
The prince continues to ignore my incredulity. “Look closely.” Joon jerks his chin, gesturing toward the demon. “Are you sure you haven’t seen this one before?”
He is so confident in his fascination that his calm rubs off on me until I doubt myself.
I close my mouth and tear my gaze from his to play along and do as he asks.
The demon shifts up on their haunches, lifting both hands and wriggling their taloned fingers as if attempting to communicate.
Maybe I’m the crazy one?
The demon falls onto their back, plucking a leaf from the bush and sticking it to the side of their head.
Then it hits me—this is the demon outside my room from earlier. I take a tentative step forward, squinting at them.
They pop up, point at my legs, gesturing again. The demon points to me, then to the ground at my feet as they back up. They repeat it twice more, pausing after each time to see if I understand what they are trying to communicate.
Joon shrugs. “I am not sure what they mean here.”
The demon huffs in annoyance.
A demon expressing emotions?
Though I suppose that’s not too far-fetched. Imugi is a demon, and I’ve never questioned their ability to feel emotions.
The demon clambers up the bush and then tumbles to the ground with their rear in the air, holding the pose a moment before righting themselves.
There’s something familiar…
Details of an incident I’d brushed aside push to the forefront of my memories. I crouch to the demon’s eye level. “Have we met before?”
They nod their head enthusiastically.
“The morning in the forest…” I flick a glance toward Joon, then back to the creature in front of me. “That was you?”
Another vigorous nod.
“You came all this way… because of me?”
The demon lifts their chin a little higher.
“The day I was in the forest,” I explain. “They… fell out of a tree and ended up in a pile of snow. They were stuck, so I pulled them out.” As I speak, the demon approaches tentatively, then slowly reaches out to rest a hand on my knee.
“You helped a demon?” Joon asks slowly.
I shrug. “I don’t make a habit of it, but I couldn’t just leave them there like that.”
They are so small… I suppose a baby demon is still a baby.
“Demons deal in bargains and trades. But it seems you have made a friend by doing them a kindness and asking for nothing in return.”
The demon stretches their neck out as if asking me to pet them, so I do. Their charred-like skin stretches over elongated limbs with joints that bend at painful angles, but they are smooth to the touch.
This demon is identical to the three who attacked me. Yet, their small size, puppy-like demeanor, and intelligence make it easy to see them as a wholly different creature. One that I need not fear.
“Come, it’s late and you should get your rest.”
“What about them?” I ask.
“They can go back outside, where they belong.”
The demon sits back on their haunches and looks at Joon with a sad expression reminiscent of a puppy, then chatters their teeth.
I bite down on my bottom lip to keep from laughing. “You would toss a poor, defenseless baby demon out on such a cold night?”
“Demons do not have babies,” Imugi snaps.
I blink up at them. “Oh.”
Well, there goes that theory.
“It’s a wonder humans manage to survive as long as they do when they know nothing about demons,” the demon grumbles to themselves.
“You might as well keep them near you,” Joon relents with a sigh. “Otherworld knows they will continue to follow you. Just make sure no one else sees them.”
“Other than Mingi and Iseul?”
“Of course.”
As we walk through the halls, I can’t keep myself from glancing back over my shoulder at the demon prancing happily along as they trail us.
They really are like a puppy.
When a patrolling guard turns the corner, the demon zips forward, hiding under the folds of my skirt. I choke on a sound somewhere between a gasp and a whimper.
Joon presses his lips in a tight line, trying—and failing—to contain a snort of laughter.
I shoot him a glare. I doubt he’d enjoy a demon hiding inside his clothes.
Even after we are alone again, the demon refuses to leave their hiding place until we reach my apartments.
As soon as the door opens, they dart out and race over to the bed, leaping up, then curling into a shadowy ball in the center.
Joon follows me further in. I’m relieved. Perhaps more than I should be.
All the energy that kept me going until now drains away in the span of a breath. I drop down onto the foot of my bed.
“What were you doing outside alone?”
I frown. “Your note said to meet at the Garden of Stars.”
He shakes his head. “I never left you a note.”
I realize my error the moment he speaks. Whenever he sought me out in the past, he either sent Mingi or came himself. I’d just assumed he was responsible for the note.
“Then…” I trail off.
Joon doesn’t answer for a long time. A muscle in his jaw ticks as he considers. “Show me.”
It takes far more effort to rise than it should. Imugi joins us as we cross to the stand beside the door. The smooth wood surface where I left the note is now bare.
“It’s gone,” I say, backing up to see if it fell on the floor, even knowing it won’t be there. “I don’t understand.”
Imugi blows out two frosty puffs from their nostrils. “There is no trace of anything unusual.” Then muttering, they add, “That wild thing is muddying everything up with their smell.”
A small decorative pillow flies from the other room toward Imugi, who barely dodges it in time.
Joon releases a long sigh through his nose. My gaze snaps to him. There’s no judgment or disbelief in his expression, yet I feel defensive.
“I’m not making this up—there was a note,” I insist.