“And you are needlessly shocked. You’ve known from the first that I am yoked to a ruthless master, that in fact I sought you out under his orders, that I disrupted my life and disordered my home and tore myself open at his behest, all for you.” He swallowed. “All for you. Do you really not see what you’ve done to me? In a matter of days you’ve stripped me down and upended my world. My hours are in disarray, my future is in chaos, and my head—my head—”
He turned away and grimaced, his fists clenching, andAlizeh thought her heart might stop.
“And instead of being angry,” he went on, “instead of driving you away—instead of wishing we’d never met—I keep staring at that fucking cut on your neck, Alizeh, and I want to die.”
“Cyrus—”
“It’s my own fault,” he said, and dragged both hands down his face. “I have only myself to blame. I knew better; I knew you were dangerous. You’ve had the upper hand from the moment I laid eyes on you. I saw you and saw right away that I was in hell, and I hated you for it, because I realized even then that you would be the end of me.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked, alarmed. “You speak as if I harmed you—”
He laughed then, laughed like he might be coming unhinged. “Of course you don’t know. Why would you? How could you possibly know the truth? That you’ve been haunting me for so long—tormenting me every night—”
“Cyrus, stop it,” she said. “You’re not being fair— I never evenknewyou—”
“You don’t understand,” he said, tortured. “I’ve been dreaming about you formonths.”
The nosta flashed hot against her skin, and Alizeh went still. “What?”
“I didn’t know who you were,” he said, shaking his head. “I didn’t know your name. I thought you were only an achievement of my imagination. Some kind of conjured fantasy.”
Alizeh felt stricken. Disoriented. Her pounding heart was a disaster. “What— What did you dream about me?”
He only looked away, said nothing.
“Are you not allowed to tell me?”
Cyrus laughed a bleak laugh. “Oh, no,thisstory I’m free to share. I just don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“Alizeh,” he whispered, still refusing to meet her gaze. “Spare me a bit of mercy. Don’t make me say these things out loud.”
“Please,” she said urgently. “I don’t mean to make you suffer. But I need to understand— If the devil has been planting my likeness in your mind, I must know how he’s using me. What did I do to you? Did I hurt you in your imaginings?”
It was a moment before Cyrus said, now staring at the wall, “Far from it. I always thought you were some kind of an angel.”
She drew a sharp breath.
That word, again. He’d called herangelin his delirium, and now she thought she was beginning to understand.
“It was a long time before I suspected Iblees had anything to do with my dreams,” Cyrus was saying. “I see now, of course, that I should’ve doubted sooner, but you always struck me as far too lovely to be associated with him. So generous, so sweet. So beautiful I could hardly look at you, even in my dreams. I thought my mind had magicked you to life as an antidote to my nightmares. I never dared to believe you might exist in real life.”
The nosta continued to substantiate his words, and Alizeh grew only more unsteady as she listened; she worried she wouldn’t survive this speech.
“When I saw you for the first time before the ball,” he went on, “I finally understood. You have no idea how you unbalanced me then. How could you know how it terrified me to look at you when I realized the devil had done this to me on purpose? That he’d taken a reverie I’d come to cherish and twisted it, tainted it with his darkness?”
“I don’t understand,” she said desperately. “Why does Iblees torture you so much? Why would he do such a thing?”
Cyrus finally looked up, meeting her eyes with a force of emotion so intense Alizeh felt the nosta burn against her skin, verifying something he hadn’t even spoken aloud.
It shocked her.
“I made the devil the only oath he would accept,” Cyrus said softly. “The terms of which are damning, indeed. If I renege on our agreement at any point, in any way, my life will be his to control forevermore. Often I think he made me this bargain because he felt certain I would break under the weight of it. Iblees would much prefer the convenience of an utterly loyal subject—for either way, he’d get what he wanted from me. I think it’s why he so often torments me, pushing me too far. He’d planted you in my mind with the express purpose of destroying me emotionally, undercutting me, stripping me of my defenses so that I’d be unprepared when we met.” He laughed, and the sound was bitter. “No doubt he hoped that, upon discovering your identity, I’d release you at once, and in the process, lose everything.”
Alizeh’s eyes burned with tears as he spoke. There was no other way to describe it: her heart was breaking.
“I didn’t trust you,” Cyrus said quietly. “How could I trustyou? You were a vision conjured by the devil, designed to ruin me. I hated you for being real, for coming to life only to personify torture, to be another trial to endure. In fact Iwantedto hate you. I wanted to discover your faults, your flaws. I thought you’d never match up to the figment of my dreams, and I was wrong. You are far more enchanting in real life. Far more exquisite.” His voice shook just a little when he said, softly, “It is excruciating to be in your presence.”
