Iscariot

I won't trust myself once I hear your call.

Uzaeris walked through his throne room, the dancers making way as they spun about him, the handsome courtiers and beautiful courtesans bowing to him in their elegant clothes. The crystal prisms of the chandeliers sprinkled light throughout the room, dangling in the gold filigree around the candles. Mirrors along the walls made the room feel even bigger, at least that was what he had been told. To Uzaeris, they gave him nowhere to run, nowhere to hide from his own haunted eyes.

He could still feel it, even now, leagues away. Her magic was calling, beckoning him. A feeling on the very edge of his perception. He strode down the plush red carpet of the halls, flashing his sultry smile and not seeing anyone he passed, only knowing they accepted his greetings with their own fake regards.

Uzaeris dismissed his guards, entering his private suite. Luxurious fabrics, soft lighting, plush furnishings, and decadent delicacies lined the walls. The Kingdom of Lilith was a land of art, wealth, and delights. Wine flowed freely, food was plentiful, and the peerage unmatched in hospitality. Three girls of his choosing awaited him for his bed, skilled in every pleasure he desired and ripe with energy. He had only to ring the bell and they would come and come and come.

It all disgusted him. It was Lilith's Kingdom, but her bloodline was dead. He wasn't a full-blooded incubus, not with his brute father, but his mother had been And she had taught him in the ways of Lilith. His education had been most thorough. Still, he felt every bit the interloper. There was no Queen; no one to serve. It was so ingrained in him and yet repulsed him so.

Uzaeris reached for a crystal glass but poured himself water rather than wine. He no longer trusted himself to drink. He would lose himself in flesh, first, before letting alcohol claim his mind. It reminded him too much of the days after their return from the human world.

They should have known they'd be separated from Raestrao. His father would never risk the Heir running again. His mother separated him from Aomaris, too. He needed further education, according to her, and he was left to her. With only the memories of his brothers and his dream of Mika for solace, he soon lost himself to drink. He fought for a little while until he realized she arranged to have him broken. It was a sobering realization.

Instead, he went on his own terms. If he was going to be a whore, he decided he'd be the most desired in the kingdom. He threw himself into the world of flesh, let the sex consume him as he consumed it, a civilized beast. But he wouldn't go on his knees, not ever again.

And he stayed. Buried in his thoughts, reliving the memories a thousand times; he dreamed a lifetime with one who had forgotten him, who would never be his. No matter whose body moved beneath him, Uzaeris wasn't with them. He was with Mika. Where she smiled and laughed, and hugged him tenderly. Where green, innocent eyes shined for him and blushes still meant something. He gave his heart away to her a thousand times. And the lovers in his bed never knew.

Mika was the only one he wanted. If he had the chance, he knew he would take her: in the gazebo with the scent of the flowers around them; on the table in the middle of the foyer of her home to hear the echoes of her pleasure resounding in the room; in the broad, soft bed his brother had taken her in the night before.

It had taken hours to break his brother's command. He'd been beside himself, wondering what the Demon Lord was doing. He wouldn't put it past Raestrao to just take her, pulling her into the Abyssal Plains for himself. Her energy would give him power beyond any he'd had before, for the first time he'd broken Uzaeris's shields. Instead, he returned to find James taking her energy and his pleasure of her, right there in her and Andrew's bed; even as she mourned her fiance's death. It was deplorable. And even worse, exactly what he would have done.

And what he wanted to do tonight.

Uzaeris snatched up an ornate music box from the table beside him and threw it against the far wall, hitting another of the castle's large mirrors and shattering it, revealing the dark and dirty surface beneath it. Turning away, he dropped down into one of the plush chairs of his bedroom. An ornate golden bud vase held a single flower on the table before him. It was a daisy he had managed to steal from Mika's bedroom when Raestrao wasn't looking. It was pristine and would remain so for a long time, aging at the rate of its homeworld, maintained by his magic. It gave him the link he needed to connect him to her world, to let him scry for her.