Page 21 of The Demon God's Desire
“There’s a natural order to everything,” she continues, smoothing a hand over the grain of the wood on the table. “You can see it in nature. There’s a harmony in how things behave. Sometimes the natural order is perverted to suit those in power. But I want to think that the natural state of everything is peace and harmony.”
She smiles and my heart starts hammering in my chest. What is it about seeing that smile that does things to me?
“Besides,” she adds. “Being with you, well, it makes me feel...peaceful.”
It shouldn’t,a voice whispers in the back of my mind.
I could be the death of you all.
10
BRIDGET
After our conversation, Guilri is quiet for the rest of dinner. I watch out of the corner of my eye and he seems to be thinking through what I’ve said. It makes me feel itchy and unsettled.
I wish I could tell what he was thinking. The past couple of weeks with him have honestly been the strangest, most amazing weeks I’ve ever experienced.
Getting to know the man behind the warrior has been eye opening. Guilri is strong, determined, brave and possesses a lot of confidence. He’s funny and can deliver a comeback just as quickly as I can.
I think maybe...I might be developing feelings for him. I’m not sure. It’s all so confusing and a little scary. I wish that I could take the way I feel about him and transfer it to the way I feel about Allan. It would make things so much easier. But I can’t. No matter what I do, when I look at Allan, with his perfectly wavy hair and startling green eyes, I just can’t stop picturing silky, white hair and inky black eyes instead.
Guilri is so different from anyone I’ve ever met. Everyone here is so peaceful, so contained. Guilri feels like he takes up space wherever he is, like his presence is large itself.
He adds a balance to my life that I don’t know how to describe. It’s like he’s taken me from a quiet, lonely existence into a bigger world.
But even if I’ve developed some kind of little crush on him, I don’t know that I can fully trust him yet either. I haven’t forgotten his threat to bring his men here to kidnap us and take us back to our “owners.”
The month that he promised to stay here is coming to an end quickly now. And the rest of the village is getting even more antsy for him to be gone. I see the way they look at him, uneasily tracking him as he walks through the village with me to the healer hut every day.
We’ve had so many good talks about our views, about how problematic his views on humans are and IthinkI might be getting through to him but I can’t be sure.
Guilri is almost completely healed now too. He could easily finish his healing and start slaughtering us wholesale if he wanted. He could inflict untold damage on us once he’s back at full strength.
“Goodnight,” I tell him, standing outside of my own door, hand on the knob. He bows his head politely to me and heads inside his own room. I turned my workspace into a space for him to sleep because I didn’t want him trying to recover while sleeping on a couch.
My head hits the pillow and I close my eyes, his face in my mind. I feel like there might be something there between us. Maybe I ought to test the waters soon?
I’m fully asleep when I hear a commotion outside. It sounds like yelling. It jerks me from my slumber and I sit up, fully awake and blinking the sleep from my eyes.
Shit! What in the world is going on out there? I throw on a soft, silky robe and head outside to see what is going on.
Guilri is standing just outside the door, facing a group of angry villagers, led by none other than Allan. Of course.
They’re screaming at him and brandishing weapons. I wish I’d grabbed a weapon from under my bed before I ran outside.
Guilri, surprisingly, is completely still and calm. He looks as though he’s holding himself back from launching into a frenzy though, from the way his fists are clenched and the muscle in his jaw is twitching. It’s worrisome and I don’t even think twice before I put myself between him and the other men.
But when I get between them, Guilri shakes his head. “Don’t,” he warns me. I ignore him and step forward again, with just as much luck as before. “I don’t need you to defend me, Bridget,” he says quietly.
Allan sneers at this and I roll my eyes and try to step in between them once again only for Guilri to physically hold me back from doing so.
But the second he lays his hands on me, pulling me towards him, Allan comes undone and attacks Guilri in a frenzy, screaming at us.
“She’smine!” he shouts. “You get your hands off her, you filthy elven bastard! You’re sullying her purity with your bastard touch! Get off of her before I rip your eyes out!”
He continues ranting about how I belong to him and that Guilri is tainting me but I’ve had enough. I’m getting a headache from this nonsense. I knew Allan had a crush on me but I didn’t think it was going to cause him to go crazy!
“Shut up, you worthless human dripir!” Guilri sneers. “Don’t you say that about her!” He grabs Allan by the collar of his robe and shakes him.