Painted Lies and Demon Eyes (SVTFOE Fan Fic)

Epiphany

My wings were getting cramped and stiff. I shifted in my chair.

The low rumble of the heavy door was enough to startle me out of my own thoughts. Steady, sluggish footsteps followed. I didn't even need to look to know who it was. 

He ceased in front of me, plummeting down in the seat across the table, releasing a long, exaggerated sigh. 

I thought I made it evidently clear that I wanted nothing to do with him. 

I couldn't care enough to try to understand his intentions. Any attempt to arouse a conversation now was only going to lead to detrimental chaos - and I was sure that he didn't want another altercation in the same night. I was sure his energy had to be just as worn as my own. 

Star had gone back to the Above. That much, I could gather from his return into the dining hall and her absence. I hadn't even bothered to ask because, not only was the silent treatment I was already giving him working, but I couldn't let him know that I cared at all about the situation anyway. 

Besides, I didn't owe him anything, not even my own company.

His motives were baffling, never ceasing to confuse me. One moment, he's throwing me into a brick wall and yelling at me - the next, he's sitting down next to me as if to make casual banter. 

He's lucky I'd even allowed him to sit down. Fortunately for him, I was too exhausted to fight. 

I'd been sitting at the table for so long, fixated on finding the subtle humor in the stone gargoyles on the mantle of the fireplace - even the reason of why exactly the castle's dining room needed a fireplace struck me in some kind of funny way, considering the Underworld was already a sweltering thousand degrees on its own. 

Just another question to the many questions to add to the list.

Not a Prince. Not a brother. Not a demon. 

How could it be so far from the truth yet, at the same time, make so much sense? 

The Lucitor family portrait hung daringly on the wall, just above the gargoyles. 

Prince Thomas Lucitor and his father, King of the Underworld. 

Only son, only successor. 

No other demon prince. 

Left out of the family portrait. 

Nonexistent, gone, forgotten. 

But maybe it wasn't just because I was simply forgotten - I wasn't a part of this family.

Just another thought to distract me from my own stupid existential crisis. If I found another thing to obsess over, I was going to go insane. 

I always hated that damn portrait.

I was still a demon, I had to be. Despite whatever Tom might've told me - I was a demon. 

Maybe not Tom's brother nor a descendant of royalty, but a demon at most. 

But then… who was my real family? 

Did Tom know? 

Did Star know? 

Could she be the answer? 

I guessed I needed another distraction from my rambling thoughts and that, I could thank Tom for being. As long as he didn't try to disrupt the peaceful bliss and silence, then I'd be truly grateful. Maybe, I wondered, he had only come here for the same as me - a moment of calm to reflect and collect his thoughts.