He turned his head away. Uninterested.
“Caspian, for the love of the gods.” She licked her fingers and stuck them in the blood on her leg, and almost vomited. Feeling dizzy and faint and not at allwell with what she was doing, she painted his blue-black lips red. She repeated the action, and his whole body quaked.
“Asmodeus,” she called.
Asmodeus came to stand where she could see him. He looked at her wound and the blood now on her dress and the sheets. His gaze turned hungry. “I—I can’t stay.”
“Yes, you can. I am trusting you,” she said firmly. “Make sure he doesn’t take too much. I need you here.”
Asmodeus folded his arms across his chest and nodded, swallowing audibly.
“Make sure he’s okay,” she said nervously, watching hunger come over Caspian’s features, his silvery eyes blank and unseeing. She was startled to realize that he didn’t recognize her.He can’t see me. He doesn’t know that I’m his Elizabeth.
Caspian suckled at her wound with sick, wet sounds. Elizabeth cried out in pain. She questioned her sanity. He pulled harder at her wound, and life flickered around her, threatening to make her pass out. The world blurred at the edges, and she needed to stop.
“Asmodeus, please make him stop.”
He said nothing.
“Asmodeus!” she called. He remained expressionless as Caspian drained her life force. When Caspian probed the wound with his tongue, she cried out again. “Please.” There was nothing in the demon she had come to know in his face. “I saved you. Don’t hurt me.”
She recoiled and tried to move away, but he held her firm.
“I came back for you,” she repeated, tears in her eyes, but he didn’t listen to a word she was saying. A tear slipped down her cheek. “I made sure you were okay. Don’t you remember me? I’m your Elizabeth.”
Caspian’s jaw twitched, and he lifted his face. He snarled animalistically, his canines pointed. Her blood coated the lower half of his face.
Caspian gripped her thigh, his nails lengthening into black talons, digging into her skin.
“Stop it. You’re hurting me.”
Caspian ignored her and bent to her flesh; she felt teeth as his tongue probed the wound like a curious animal.
“Help me!”
Asmodeus stood stock still.
“Asmodeus!”
Suddenly, he blinked, as if rousing himself from a trance, and swallowed twice before gathering whatever shred of courage he possessed. Asmodeus yanked and shoved Caspian into the bedframe.
She swallowed. “I didn’t think you were going to help me.”
“I debated it,” he said truthfully.
Whoever said honesty was a virtue was a liar.
Caspian purred in the corner, his body on the floor, head resting on the mattress.
“Clean and bandage that,” Asmodeus said, looking at her leg. “Barricade the doors from inside, and do not let anyone in until morning. I will knock when I am … calm.”
She nodded.
Caspian sprawled on the bed, nuzzling his head into the sheets like a cat. Asmodeus grabbed him and dragged him upright, supporting him at the shoulder.
“Can’t you heal my leg?”
He rolled his eyes. “Of course, I can, I just forgot about mortals’ slow healing. I can’t restore your blood loss, though.” He peered at her and stilled, eyes glazing over. His aura felt ... hungry.
