Page 87 of The Demon Prince

“Gluttony,” Envy hissed. “You have to let me take her.”

What?

No!

She didn’t want to go with this brother who had seen her only as a broken little doll. Envy would do gods know what to her, and the last thing she wanted in the end was to be parted from Gluttony.

She wanted to be with him. He would take care of her, and she trusted him to do so. Not his brother.

And yet, she felt his arms quiver. He shook against her and then pressed his warm face against her icy neck. He breathed her in, pressing a slight kiss to the side of her throat. Right over the wound that never quite healed.

“Be safe,” he whispered against her skin. “Be brave. Envy will not hurt you because he has no wish to harm me. You understand?”

No! She didn’t understand. Why was he handing her off like a sack of grain or a wounded animal that only his brother could fix? She just needed rest, food, she needed...

Katherine couldn’t fight as they handed her between the two brothers. Her head lolled against Envy’s chest, so much broader and harder than Gluttony’s. The faintest plush feeling of chest hair underneath her cheek felt so wrong when she knew what Gluttony felt like.

Then she heard the rumble of Envy’s voice in his chest. “You’re doing the right thing, brother.”

There was no response from Gluttony. And she already knew he was taking it out on himself. He’d all but told her that she was precious to him, and he’d already harmed her.

Broken her.

Proven that she was just as weak as the rest of the village thought.

It had just taken him a little longer than most to find that weakness and to flaunt it against her.

She fought to keep her eyes open as Envy strode to the back of the kitchen. She felt his hands shift underneath her, making some kind of motion with his fingers, and then all she could see was a bright flash of green.

“Wait,” she whispered, and in one last expulsion of energy, she rolled her head on his shoulder to look over it. Just enough for her to see past the bulk of the demon carrying her.

Gluttony still knelt by the fire, on his knees. He stared down at his clawed hands, his silhouette the picture of a man who had given up entirely. But he must have felt her eyes on him because he looked up and there was still hope there. Just the tiniest amount.

He had better hearing than most. So she whispered, her dry throat clicking as she said, “I will come back.”

Envy strode through his magical portal and then everything blinked out of existence. For a few moments, she wondered if she’d died. Then, faint light filtered back in and she could see that they’d stepped into a gray room.

Gray everything, actually. The stone above her head had been meticulously polished and then carved with visions of snakes slithering over her head. They were so detailed she could see each individual scale and the pupils of the creatures that almost seemed to move and watch her as she was carried beneath them.

Envy wasted no time. He carried her to a corner, where he put her down on something plush and soft. It was warm and comfortable, and she was so tired.

The demon she did not know banged around in the corner for a bit before he approached and held something to her lips. “Drink.”

Katherine did not know him or the substance he wished to pour down her throat. She stubbornly sealed her lips shut and did her best to glare at him, hopefully looking at least a bit intimidating.

She failed.

Envy rolled his eyes and kept the vial against her lips. “If I wanted to kill you, little human, I could have done it in a thousand ways already. I will not poison you.”

He had a point.

Katherine opened her lips and the cold liquid seared as she swallowed. But it was an almost instant affect. She could feel her entire body fill with strength for a moment, before it leaked out her ears like it had never been there at all.

“It’ll help rebuild all that blood you have lost,” Envy muttered as he turned from her. “There are more I will make, and you will take them every day. If you’re so insistent on risking your life with Gluttony, then the both of you need to learn how to be a little more careful. Foolish idiots. You should not and will not continue to do it like this.”

She swallowed, her mouth feeling a little more wet. “Water?”

“Yes, yes.” He lifted a hand above his head, scraping over the vials above him before coming up with another greenish colored liquid. He held that out to her as well. “Drink this, and I’ll get you water.”

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