🏆 THE AMBYS 2024 - PARANORMAL FAVORITE 🏆
The Mayaware's reign must end.
In a world of demonic beings with a hunger for human flesh and thirst for blood, Hesi Renen knows it well. When her siblings are taken to the harvesting farms, she must do eve...
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Hesi craned her neck at the niches bursting with books. In essence, they were sheets of parchment bound, and they hold stories within their pages. Mezo referred to the ones in his collection as fiction. "Not real history, but entertaining tales," the demon prince said about the tomes.
The talk stemmed from when she entered his quarters and found him slumped forward, slitted eyes glued to the pages. His forked tongue would flit between his lips in a quiet hiss at random intervals. He only looked up when she cleared her throat.
"What are you doing?" she asked, dropping into the empty cushion without his invitation. Similar to how she barged into Kharta's life, she now did in Mezophis'.
The prince shut the book with a heavy thud. "Reading," he answered.
She snorted. "What are you learning today?" She tapped a finger on the low table. It was the only thing separating them, but somehow, she didn't feel the need to run or cower from him. "It can't be fun."
A bewildered look passed across the demon prince's features. "Do not tell me that is how you see reading." He set the book aside, removing the finger he hooked between the pages. There went his marker. "Reading is...fun."
He learned the word after mulling about the feeling of happiness recently. She crossed her arms over her gossamer dress. The corners of her lips turned down. "Can't be," she argued. "You only read to learn, right? Those medical and information tomes bored me out of my mind. I dislike reading. Don't have the focus for it either."
It was true. When she entered Berheqt, she couldn't recognize a letter even if it clawed her eyes out. Thanks to Kharta and Tagara, she learned to read a few printed sentences at a time. But imagine reading pages after pages. Wouldn't that damage one's eyes, especially in this meager light?
"You can try one," Mezo said after a beat. "I know a great story you will like."
She scrunched her nose. "Story? Like the myths?"
The demon prince stuck a lip out. His fang glinted silver in the lamplight. "Close, but not quite," he replied. "These are fiction—tales of adventure and wonder. These stories did not happen as our history did, but our people wrote them."
"By 'our' you mean the Mayaware?" she clarified.
He chuckled. "There might be works from human authors in my collection."
She blinked. "You have a collection?"
"Why else do you think I have a spacious room?" He pushed off the table on his way up. She watched him stalk into the dark, glimpsing the shelves' niches. Was that why there stood leagues of them inside? "Let me look for it."
She stalked after him, approaching the nearest shelf. It stood two heads taller. Every niche boasted spines resembling the one on the table. And every shelf burst to the brim like this? Wow.
