The ballroom hummed with movement and laughter, thick with the scent of wine and fruit. Bodies pressed close, voices overlapping in a steady murmur of indulgence. I slipped between them with practiced ease, weaving through conversations.

  No leash, no handler, no eyes tracking my every move with the silent promise of control. I was free to drift, free to decide where to linger, whose attention to steal, whose conversation to disrupt.

  I trailed a hand along the back of a plush velvet chair as I passed, smirking when a noblewoman’s conversation stumbled as she caught me watching her.

  Somewhere deeper in the room, a man laughed too loudly at his own joke. The young demon beside him sat perfectly still, the gleam of a polished collar reflecting the candlelight as she pretended not to hear. I had been in her place before, listening but not listening, existing only as part of the atmosphere.

  A slow smile curled at the edge of my lips as I adjusted my path, slipping closer to the knot of guests surrounding a table of drinks. I reached for a glass, letting my fingers brush lightly against the back of another demon’s hand before lifting away with a gentle smile. He barely reacted, trained to stillness, but his owner did. A flicker of narrowed eyes before amusement set in.

  Disrupt, distract, disappear.

  I turned before the moment could linger too long, already scanning the room for the next excuse to move.

  Then the shift came.

  The wrongness at the edge of my senses, something I had been deliberately ignoring.

  Marcelo.

  I hadn’t laid eyes on him yet, but I knew he was there. The ripple of unease in the crowd, the way certain conversations hushed when his voice cut through them. He was somewhere in the room, watching, waiting.

  I kept my smile in place, adjusting without hesitation. If he wanted to find me, I would make it difficult.

  I moved past a group of trainers. They didn’t acknowledge me as I stepped behind one of them, letting his broad frame obscure me for a heartbeat. Another shift, another small adjustment. Slipping behind a waiter balancing a tray of crystal glasses, stepping into the orbit of a laughing couple, a quick touch to a demon’s waist to shift them into someone else’s path.

  Marcelo’s voice cut across the room, smooth and slow, a spider testing its web. My skin prickled. Too close.

  I veered toward the farthest corner of the room, where the deeper shadows made it harder to be seen at a glance. A group of demons stood along the wall, draped in fine silks, their collars gleaming in the candlelight. I slid into their midst with practiced ease, positioning myself behind one of the taller figures. A beautiful rose-skinned woman with horns curling elegantly back from her brow turned toward me, amusement clear in her gaze.

  “Hide and seek, is it?” she murmured.

  I let my lips quirk up in response. “Something like that.”

  She chuckled, tilting her chin toward the room. “He’s circling.”

  I didn’t ask how she knew.

  I had lingered too long in one place. Time to move.

  Then a scent cut through the haze of perfume and wine. Clean, familiar, unmistakable.

  Selwyn.

  I turned my head slightly, lifting my tail just enough to catch him as he passed. The tip brushed his arm, and he skidded to a stop, searching through the crowd of demons before spotting me.

  His lips twitched, eyes flicking down to the champagne glasses in his hands, the pastry held between his teeth. I grinned, tilting my head.

  I rarely let my tail move freely, years of training teaching me to keep is curled close to my body, unobtrusive, forgettable. It had been easy for handlers and opponents alike to use it against me. But with Selwyn, it was different. He never tried to grab it. Never acted as though it was something strange or something to exploit. It felt safe to let it move, even if only to tease.

  I moved closer to him. “You wouldn’t be trying to sneak out now, would you?”

  Selwyn made a vague attempt at an innocent expression, but with a pastry stuffed in his mouth and both hands occupied, all he looked like was a man caught mid-act. I plucked the pastry free before he could protest, inspecting it with exaggerated suspicion.

  “Stockpiling food now? Should I be concerned?”

  Selwyn swallowed, shifting one of the glasses into a better grip. “I like to be prepared. I never know when someone might try to swipe what’s mine.”

  I hummed, glancing at the pastry in my hand. “That’s a lot of effort for a snack. I’m almost jealous.”

  His smirk didn’t falter, but something about his posture shifted, just slightly. “If you were mine, you’d be just as well protected.”

  I tore off a small piece of the pastry, chewing thoughtfully. “Careful, Selwyn. Stay too long, and I might get attached.”

  He exhaled a quiet laugh. “Wouldn’t be the worst thing.”

  I held his gaze for half a beat longer, feeling the weight of words unspoken. Then, before the moment could settle too deep, Selwyn leaned forward and reclaimed the pastry with his mouth, a flash of amusement sparkling in his expression.

  I let him take it, falling back into the comfort of our usual dynamic. “Go on then, wouldn’t want to make her—him?—wait.”

  He said something around the food, and I cupped my hand to my ear, eyes wide with mock innocence. “What’s that? You’re mumbling, Selwyn, I can’t make it out!”

  He only waggled his eyebrows, the picture of smug mischief, before slipping back into the crowd with the kind of effortless grace that made me suspect he practiced that look just to annoy me.

  As he vanished, the weight of reality crept back in. My tail curled back, tucking loosely around my ankle—instinctive, protective.

  I kept moving, carefully tracking Marcelo’s presence at the edges of my awareness. I knew better than to pause, but when I passed one of the ornate tables piled high with fruit, a flash of colour stopped me mid-step.

  Strawberries. Glossy under the candlelight, red as fresh-spilled blood.

  My fingers hesitated above the platter. We had nothing like them on my home plane. Their sweetness had quickly become an indulgence, a rare comfort.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  I took one, savouring the gentle pop of flavour against my tongue, letting myself enjoy a brief moment of calm. Then, carefully, I scooped a small handful of the berries into my palm, to take on my circuit around the room. My other hand found the slender stem of a crystal champagne glass, lifting it smoothly to my lips. I took a slow sip, the cool fizz a perfect match to the lingering taste of ripe fruit.

  I let my gaze sweep the room as I lowered my glass, ready to move again.

  But then my stomach went tight.

  In the curve of the crystal, distorted but unmistakable, Marcelo’s reflection stared back at me.

  My pulse thudded in my throat, but I willed my body to stillness, my expression smooth even as adrenaline flooded through me, every instinct telling me to run.

  I turned deliberately, meeting his gaze.

  Marcelo’s dark eyes glinted with something predatory, his lips twisting into the pretense of a smile that never reached his eyes. He steps forward, just enough to make the space between us feel smaller. To remind me that it was his to take.

  “Joy. You’ve been terribly hard to find this evening. One might think you were avoiding me.”

  I let my gaze flicker over him, noting the tailored lines of his suit, the way the fabric shifted with his movement. The subtle bulge beneath his sleeve where he likely concealed a blade. Marcelo wasn’t a fighter, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t dangerous.

  My fingers drifted to the collar at my throat. Just a glancing touch, lightly over the embedded gems. Jacobi’s mark. A quiet reminder of who truly held control here.

  “I was instructed to make myself available to all of Master’s welcome guests,” I murmured, keeping my voice calm. “And for tonight, I can pretend you are one.”

  Marcelo’s laugh was low, humorless. His hand shot out, too fast for decorum, fingers locking around my wrist. The force of it sent strawberries scattering across the marble floor in small, broken splashes of red.

  The grip was strong. Fingers calloused from the kind of training that didn’t demand real skill but had been drilled into muscle memory regardless.

  Not like Jacobi.

  Marcelo leaned in, voice dropping, something just meant for me.

  “There’s no undoing what I am going to do to you. That’s the part he doesn’t understand yet. But when I am finished, all he’ll see are the scars. You won’t just be bruised, you’ll be changed. Every time he lays a hand on you, he’ll know exactly where I was. Exactly what I did. You won’t just remember me, pet. You’ll wear me, inside and out. And he can layer you in diamonds and leash you in gold, but my stain won’t fade when the bruises do.”

  The words didn’t just land, they settled like rot. I stayed still, expression blank, but something inside had already begun to unravel.

  It wasn’t the threat. I’d heard worse. Lived worse.

  It was who it was for.

  Marcelo wasn’t just coming for me. He was reaching though me, aiming for Jacobi, carving the message into skin he didn’t see as any more than a means to an end.

  My chest tightened, my skin buzzing like it didn’t belong to me. My body felt under attack from itself. This wasn’t a threat I’d trained for. I didn’t know what to call it. I just knew I needed it to stop.

  I needed… to get away.

  If I stayed, he’d see it. The tremor in my fingers. The way my knees were already trying to give out beneath me.

  This fear was different. Unfamiliar.

  For the first time, I didn’t feel like I was just pretending to be Joy.

  I was Joy. A slave. A tool. Just something to be moved, used, broken to make a point.

  And it terrified me.

  I wasn’t supposed to be that.

  It was hollow. Horrifying.

  I couldn’t let him see it. Not Marcelo. Not here.

  I forced myself to move, to say something, anything, before the cracks showed.

  The echo of Marcelo’s voice had stopped. He was waiting. Expecting a response.

  Instead, I tilted my head, deliberately unimpressed, and let the smallest smile ghost across my lips. “I’m sorry, did you say something?”

  Marcelo’s jaw clenched, his fingers grinding into the delicate bones of my wrist. “That defiance in your eyes will be gone by morning. And what I put there instead? That will stay with you for the rest of your pathetic little life.”

  The threat barely registered. But I saw the shift in his shoulders, the tension coiling in his frame. His carefully maintained mask was slipping, and for the first time in this exchange, I felt something solid. Anger I knew. Anger was a weakness I could work with.

  A slow breath. A shift of weight. I let the moment stretch before I moved.

  Deliberate. Precise.

  My free hand found his wrist. Not a struggle, just enough pressure in the right place, sharp and measured. The bone beneath my fingers flexed, and Marcelo inhaled sharply.

  I leaned in just enough to for my voice to slip between us. “Marcelo,” I murmured, pointedly ignoring his title. “Have you never seen a Xadian fight? At your strongest, you’d be bested by one on their deathbed. I train every day. I get punched, kicked, thrown to the ground. Compared to that-”

  I twisted my grip, slow and deliberate.

  His breath hitched.

  “-you’re just a temporary inconvenience.”

  His eyes widened. Just a fraction. It was enough.

  I let go.

  Marcelo stumbled back, more reflex than choice. His face blanked, his mask faltering for a beat before he forced it back into place. But even as I registered the crack in his control, I couldn’t ignore my own. My breath was too shallow. My hands were threatening to tremble at my sides. I didn’t feel steady. Didn’t feel sure. I turned and slipped into the crowd, the hum of conversation swallowing me.

  I moved fast, scanning the crowd for Jacobi, but my thoughts were a mess, frantic and looping. Marcelo’s voice echoed in my head, and now that I was away from him, the panic was rising.

  I wasn’t supposed to be like this.

  I didn’t panic.

  But Joy? Joy had learned fear. How to perform, to smile, to stay still and let the world happen around her.

  Ellah had used my title tonight, Tesh’ilia. Teasing. Familiar. Maybe that should have been a sign. Had I lost too much of myself to being Joy?

  My vision tunneled as I pushed through the crowd, barely registering faces. Marcelo’s words hadn’t just shaken me. They had revealed his intent to sabotage Jacobi’s property. If Marcelo was willing to go this far, what else might be do?

  Then I hit something solid. Someone.

  A hand caught my arm before I could fall.

  “Didn’t see me? That’s a first.”

  “Wyn…” I started, but the rest caught in my throat. I looked up. Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes.

  He froze when our eyes met. Whatever line he’d been ready to toss vanished behind a flicker of tension in his jaw. His focus shifted, no longer casual, but calculating. A quick sweep, like battlefield triage: what would wounded, what could wait, what might collapse.

  “I need to get to Jacobi.” The words burst out too fast, too raw. “He needs to know…Marcelo-”

  The name caught in my throat, the panic latching on harder as I said it.

  Wynford’s gaze swept the room once, quick and clean. “Is he in immediate danger?”

  I hesitated.

  “No, not yet.”

  Wynford nodded. Like he’d already made his own assessment.

  “Then you’ve got three options. Regroup with me. Get your breath, clear your head.”

  I nodded, focusing on Wynford’s words and calm tone.

  “You can report. Go to Jacobi now and tell him exactly what this is. Or reengage. Go back to Marcelo, do what needs to be done.”

  I shifted, leaning back just enough to steady myself. My hands found a column behind me, solid, cold.

  A thorn bit into the base of my thumb. I hissed and flinched back, staring down at the small spot of blood rising on my skin.

  Ivy twisted up the column. Rosevine. Jacobi’s favourite.

  Beauty designed to draw blood if you got too close.

  The pain cut through the haze. The noise of the party filtered back in, glasses, laughter, voices softened by distance.

  I blinked. We weren’t where we started.

  Wynford had moved us to the side of the ballroom, secluded behind one of the marble columns without my noticing.

  I nodded again, slower this time.

  “Regroup.” I said. The word came out steadier than I felt. Not surrender, just strategy. Jacobi wanted me to look breakable without actually breaking. But this wasn’t performance. This wasn’t what he wanted me to be.

  Wynford didn’t say anything. He just offered his arm, calm and practiced, like this was any other evening.

  We moved as one, slipping toward the back of the ballroom. No one stopped us. No one looked twice.

  I didn’t look back.