A shudder rippled over me. I’d just been in that dungeon, not realizing it was a place of unimaginable horror. “And Mortana was able to survive because of her blood oath.”
“Exactly. She’s always been impressively cunning. But she disappeared a few hundred years ago, and no one has seen her since.”
I bit my lip. “Is it going to be a problem that I don’t actually have any magic? I can’t control anyone’s mind.”
He shook his head. “No, you’ll just tell people you had a change of heart over the centuries. You won’t do anything forbidden by King Cambriel. But the sexual magic…you’ll need to make people think that you’ve been feeding off desire.”
I closed my eyes and shook my head. “Sorry, exactly how do I do that?”
“That’s simple, Rowan.” His low, husky voice dripped with a seductive promise. “You and I will use our body language to make people think we’re fucking.” He quirked a smile. “Assuming you can feign attraction to a grotesque alien species.”
I folded my arms in front of my chest. “I’ll do my best to fake it, but if I’m supposed to be getting close to the king, won’t it be a problem if he thinks I’m with you?”
He shook his head. “Not at all. Cambriel always wants what someone else has.”
“I suppose that’s why he killed his own father.”
“He’s from the Beelzebean Line. Envy. He already envies the attention I’ve received for killing so many in the Infernal Trial. And if you seem to want me, he’ll use his position as king to take you. We’ll just have to make it look real.”
A hot electrical tension buzzed in the air. “So you’ll be playing along with this charade, too. Pretending to want me.”
He shrugged. “I’ll do my best to fake it.”
“Is there anyone here who knows Mortana well?”
A sly smile. “Everyone hated Mortana. They called her the king’s whore. Her only ally was Nergal himself. I suspect she left here when he finally grew bored and refused to marry her, and she realized she no longer had a protector.”
“Do you feel any empathy for her at all? Maybe she was just trying to survive while her kind was being slaughtered.”
His brows knitted like I’d just said something insane. “No. I don’t have empathy. And if I did, it certainly wouldn’t be for Mortana.”
“Right.”
The door opened, and I turned to see Morgan striding into the room with bulging bags of clothes. He looked between the two of us nervously and dropped the loot. “Everything you need is in here. I have to run, I’m afraid.” He backed away, staring at me. “Please be careful with her, sir, would you? No offense, darling,” he added, glancing at me, “but I don’t want you twisting his mind all up.”
No one had ever been scared of me before. Was it…was it bad that I liked it? He saw me as fearsome.
I dropped the grip on my bathrobe and glared at him, then flashed a smug smile—the kind Orion had been giving me since I’d met him. “I’ll try to be gentle with him, Morgan, but I make no promises.” My voice sounded icy, cruel.
His face paled, and he pointed at me as if to say, I’m watching you. With that, he backed out the door, then let it slam behind him.
I turned to see Orion staring at me, his eyes a pale, heavenly blue. “That was disturbingly convincing. It was like I was watching the real Mortana come to life before me.”
The thing was, it was easy to act in the ways that were expected of you. When people thought I was crazy during my presentation, I became flustered and desperate—I started to act crazy. When I was treated like an outcast at Osborn High, I couldn’t help acting weird.
And if people thought I was terrifying—maybe I could rise to the occasion.
But instead of explaining all that, I just shrugged and said, “I contain multitudes.”
His gaze pierced me, and he waited for me to give a better explanation.
I sighed, and my mind started turning academic, as it often did when I was unnerved. “In the world of social psychology, there’s something called a self-fulfilling prophecy, or a behavioral confirmation. It means that people’s behavior changes depending on what’s expected of them. A person’s expectations actually elicit certain behaviors.”
“Right…” He ran his finger over his lower lip, studying me. “You’re a bit of a nerd, you know that?”
I nodded. “Oh, believe me, I’m aware.”