Jewel Monster (House Beasts #2)

Risk and Demand

Dimor couldn't stand it. He hated the way they lived, the way they lied by saying nothing to one another. And he could not stand the mere idea that he was about to lose Eric, that each day that went by was a day that brought them closer to their separation.

Why... why couldn't things just be between them? Why was there always some sort of complication? His stolen heart. His mother. Other's gazes and what they might say. The rules of polite fairy society. So many things, so many pointless barriers that Dimor could never possibly tear down. He hated that. He wanted it to stop and for them to just exist. Together.

With Eric, he felt alive. Whole. They loved one another and that was that. It was the rest of the world that did not make it simple for them to do as they please. It was the other's fault.

Dimor refused to not do anything that was in his power to try and get those things out of the way. If he had to fight, then so be it, he would fight. He would fight and make sure that he had done everything he could, until he couldn't anymore, until the barriers of literal dimensions fell between them.

And for that, he was going to be more courageous than he had ever been: he was going to have to speak to his mother and tell her that he had tricked her.

Because it was the only way, really. He knew it. She would not let him take in a human unless she knew, she was a master of scheming too. Dimor had considered tricking her, but he was coming to the conclusion that if she was the one that had taught him everything he knew, that maybe it was not a good idea to use her own tricks against her. She would guess.

And so negotiation it was. And negotiation required a certain degree of honesty, at least on the terms negotiated. That was the basics.

After all, he thought, she was his mother. She loved him. Maybe the argument that it would make Dimor happy would be enough for her... She knew about doomed love herself. She was married to a dragon and had spent decades trying to make sure that her family would get viable heirs just so that she could marry the man of her dreams. It would be pure hypocrisy, Dimor reasoned, to deny him his request when she had granted it to herself.

Or so he hoped.

But first, he prepared himself. Or maybe he was only stalling because he was nervous. But he took a bath, assisted by Mustard. He did not speak much as he went through the motions, and the hot water did little to relax him. But it was something, and Dimor always felt a little more confident when he was clean.

He found his mother in the garden, having tea with her firstborn Finwer. The moment Dimor appeared in the latter's sight, he stopped talking and tilted his head ever-so-slights; Pandora turned around to see what Finwer was looking at.

"Dimor," she said, "you've decided to come here after all! We were talking about the human world, you've come at the right time..."

"Actually," Dimor said, "I would like to talk with you about something important."

"Should I leave?" asked Finwer.

"No," Dimor said, "you can stay. If you wish."

Dimor saw a strange expression on Finwer's face as he went for some more tea. Mustard pulled a chair for Dimor, and it was gone before Dimor could identify what it was, but he guessed that maybe Finwer already knew what Dimor wanted to tell his mother.

"What is it?" Pandora asked Dimor. "Is everything all right?"

"Mother, do you remember Masks?"

"Your companion at the ball? I cannot say that I had the honour of speaking with him but yes, yes, I remember him. What about him?"

"His real name is Eric. He is the human that last held my heart and freed me, the one I am currently working with."