For this pleasure you’re invited
to make one small request
“I want nothing except what I’m owed!” Cyrus shouted, turning sharply as he spoke. He’d fully lost his temper now, glowering even as he addressed an empty room. “If you think I’d ask you for anything, you’re a great deal stupider than you seem.”
Oh, the jester is delighted!
To see you so distressed!
In exchange you are entitled
to this splendid bequest –
“No –” Cyrus tried to cut him off, fear branching up his spine. “I want nothing from you – I asked for nothing –”
The curtain of flesh evaporated without warning, and Cyrus went slack with disbelief. His anger changed, tenuous emotions braiding together in his chest. He saw the familiar orange light in the distance, its flickering glow acting as a beacon as he drew steadily forward,his heart pounding madly against his ribs.
He heard a muted rattle of chains, a ragged drag of breath. Cyrus pushed toward the sounds, following a long wall lit by an endless procession of blazing torches. A muggy heat clung to his skin and lingered, drawing beads of sweat down his throat as he turned a corner, and the scene came suddenly into view.
Chains as thick as fists were fastened to a cratered wall, shackles clasped around the hinges of an older man who hung unnaturally in the air, his emaciated body starved and tortured beyond recognition.
“Who’s there?” came a hoarse, trembling voice. “Who’s come?”
Seldom did Iblees allow Cyrus such a moment, and the sound of this haggard speech provoked a sting inside the young man’s nose, his eyes heating foolishly. No matter how many times he’d come, this scene had never grown easier to endure.
Another desperate rattle of chains. Another terrified rasp of voice. “Who’s there? I demand you declare yourself!”
Were he capable of humor, Cyrus might’ve smiled at the high-handed command, for it gave him reason to hope. The king had not yet lost his sense of superiority. He was not yet broken beyond recognition.
Cyrus approached his father then with a composure he could not explain. The young man did not feel as calm as he appeared, yet he knew no other way to face these horrors.
“Father,” he said softly. “It’s me.”
“NO!” The true king of Tulan fought uselessly against his chains, his face contorting in terror, his eyes squeezing shut. “Leave here at once! I begged you – I asked you never to come back –”
“He took your other eye, didn’t he?” Cyrus said thickly, pain lancing through his chest. “Tonight.”
His father stiffened, then sagged, grief painted across his face. He did not open his eyes. He did not answer the question. “Never think of me again,” the man said raggedly, the last dregs of energy leaving his body. “Imagine me dead and gone, child. This debt is not yours to bear.”
“How can you say that,” came Cyrus’s quiet reply, “when it was you who asked me to bear it?”
A tense silence settled in the filthy chamber.
Cyrus cursed himself. He hadn’t meant to say the accusing thought aloud – hadn’t meant to waste this precious moment delivering emotional blows his tortured parent could not withstand. The young man had not paused to consider his words because his mind was splintering. The devil had not exaggerated: Cyrus had not slept since first laying eyes on Alizeh.
He hadn’t dared.
He’d never forget the first time he saw her on that calamitous night, the way she’d stepped out from behind the dressing screen. She’d appeared in the golden lamplight of Miss Huda’s bedroom like some impossible vision. Only when she’d lifted her eyes to his face and the sight of her had nearly killed him did Cyrus realize just how artfully he’d been outmaneuvered. He’d absorbed the blow with immaculate outward calm,letting the bomb explode inside him, liquefying his core. This inner destruction birthed a staggering, terrifying anger he’d been almost unable to conceal. He felt he’d gone mad, swinging wildly between desire and fury and disgust and fear, hardly able to manage himself or his reactions to her. He knew at once he’d been tricked; he knew at once she was an instrument of the devil, sent to ruin him. And yet, he weakened each time she looked in his direction. His need grew only more explosive as she solidified into someone real; always he desired another glance, another accidental graze of her skin –
He was terrified to ever dream of her again.
Cyrus had been using magic to keep himself awake for two days now. The drugged drowse of the devil had weakened his mind even as it revived his shattered body, and he’d awoken from that dangerous slumber only to betray himself shamefully. Exhaustion was even now pushing through the bonds of magic that held him upright, and the young king was not himself. Still, this was not the first time his father, Reza, had made such a ludicrous statement, and Cyrus should’ve bit his tongue. A wave of self-loathing washed over him as quiet sobs soon wracked his father’s limp body. Tears fell from the man’s closed eyes, streaking down his sunken cheeks.
Yes, Cyrus hated himself.
“Forgive me,” came the older man’s broken response. “I was a fool – I didn’t know – Our weak, sheltered imaginations cannot fathom such corruptions of darkness – I never thought it would be like this – I never –”
Cyrus set his jaw. “I will see that this matter is resolved,and when it is done, you will return to Mother. The Diviners will fashion you a new set of eyes –”
