thoughts together. “Zylas … is this related to me hearing your thoughts?”
“I hear what you want me to hear. I do not hear what you are afraid to show me.”
A prickle ran over my skin as I stared at the back of his head, small horns poking through his tangled black hair. A tearing sound dragged my attention down. He’d sunk his claws into the carpet.
“That is why my thoughts are silent to you.”
My brow furrowed. “I don’t understand.”
“I tried. I can’t.”
“Can’t what?”
“Let you hear me.”
It took me a moment to figure it out. A sharp, disbelieving inhale caught in my throat. “You … I can’t hear you because you won’t let me?”
The back of his head moved in a nod.
My mouth hung open. At least it wasn’t my fault, but … “Zylas, we need this to work.”
“I know,” he snarled. “I tried.”
“Well, try harder, then!”
“I did!” He whirled around, crouched on the balls of his feet, teeth bared. “I tried, but need does not make all things happen.”
“If you tried and it didn’t work, then why not?”
“Do you decide to hide thoughts from me?”
“No. I didn’t realize I was doing it until you told me.” I pushed my bangs away from my eyes, not understanding why his temper was so cutting. “Do you know why you’re blocking me out?”
His upper lip curled. “Why does your face change color?”
“Zylas!” I yelled furiously. “This is serious!”
“I am serious.”
“I told you, that isn’t important—”
“You hide too much.” He stood, towering above me. Cold red eyes stared down. “When you think of me, your mind is silent. When I ask, you refuse to speak. You say it is not important, but untruth creeps in your meaning. All deep, important thoughts about me are hidden in your mind.”
My mouth opened, but I didn’t know what to say.
“I trust you in many things.” His voice dropped, huskier—and more dangerous. “I do not trust you with my everything. I do not trust you with my mind and thoughts and all things I feel and know and wonder. Not you who hides so much from me.”
“But … but it’s not …”
Not important. Except his preternatural ability to detect lies told him I was not being entirely honest.
“It worked before,” I whispered. “You trusted me once.”
He stared down at me, then turned away. “I will find a different way to defeat NazhivÄ“r.”
No arguments sprung to mind as he disappeared into my bedroom. No simple solutions manifested as I sat alone on the living room floor, waiting for him to return.
He didn’t trust me. He couldn’t open his mind to me.
His persistent questions about my face changing color had seemed so frivolous—just another way to annoy and embarrass me. I’d never considered that it was important to him. That he needed to understand. That he was searching for an insight, however small and insignificant, into what I thought of him.
But I’d locked all those thoughts away, and as a demon conditioned by a lifetime of violence to mistrust everyone, he couldn’t abide my secrets. He would only open up to me if I opened myself up to him first—all my secret, private thoughts bared to his scrutiny.
And that … that was never happening.
Chapter Fifteen
Chewing on the end of my pencil, I studied the translation I’d just finished. My face was warm, my heart pulsing slow and hard against my ribs.
I’d pored over fifty pages to find Myrrine’s third journal entry. Based on the amount of grimoire she’d recopied before this addition, I assumed weeks or even months had passed since her account of successfully summoning a Vh’alyir demon. Her new entry—so long she’d dedicated a full page to it—seemed to confirm that some time had passed.
But that wasn’t the part that had triggered the flush heating my neck.
I am losing myself, sister.
Some days, I think I have never been so whole, so alive. Never have I felt this safe. Never have I felt this protected. Never have I felt such freedom from fear.
My Vh’alyir is ruthless. He is power and cunning and strength, and he commits it all to our safety. But he is so much more.
The questions he asks me, sister! Curious as a child, he wants to know everything. The conversations we have, about our world and his, fuel my wit and grip my imagination, but sympathy wells in my bosom as well. The violence he has known, so great the terrors of my life seem mild to him, makes me ache.
Last night he told me of