SWEET POISON

"COURAGE IS SOMETIMES NOTHING MORE THAN FEAR THAT SPEAKS BEFORE COMMON SENSE CAN SILENCE IT."

STELLA

The serving tray felt heavier with every step, and I couldn't tell anymore if it was the silver plates weighing it down or my mother's warning replaying over and over in my head. Don't give Alpha Damien a reason to notice you. The palace corridors had gone unusually quiet as we approached the private dining hall, and even the guards stationed outside the doors stood straighter than I'd ever seen them.

Mother stopped just before we reached the entrance and turned to face me.

"Head down."

"I know."

"No." She lowered her voice, and I could hear how serious she was underneath it. "I mean it, Stella. Do not look at him."

I nodded. "Yes, Mother."

The doors opened, and warm candlelight spilled out into the hallway along with the scent of roasted meat and fresh bread. Mother stepped in first and I followed close behind her, my eyes fixed on the polished marble floor exactly the way she'd told me. The dining room was silent except for the soft clink of cutlery against expensive china.

"Your meals, my Lords," Mother said, dipping her head respectfully.

We separated there. She moved toward the head of the table while I carried my tray to the opposite end, where Lady Valentina sat beside Alpha Derek. And that was when curiosity got the better of me. My eyes lifted before I could stop them, and they landed on him.

Alpha Damien.

For a moment I forgot to breathe entirely. He sat at the head of the long table like the chair had been carved specifically to hold him, his broad shoulders stretching beneath a fitted black coat that didn't do a thing to hide the strength underneath it. Every movement he made was controlled, measured, deliberate. His sharp blue eyes were unlike anything I'd ever seen — cold enough to freeze a room, and yet beautiful enough that I found myself staring a second longer than I should have.

 His dark hair fell carelessly across his forehead, making the hard angles of his face look even sharper by comparison. Majestic. There really wasn't another word for it. But underneath all that impossible beauty there was something darker, something that pressed against my chest the way standing too close to the edge of a cliff might. 

Sweet poison — that was exactly what he reminded me of. Beautiful enough to tempt you closer, and deadly enough to destroy you the second you gave in.

A sharp nudge against my arm dragged me out of it. Mother was glaring at me, her eyes flicking pointedly downward. ‘Bow’. Heat rushed straight to my cheeks and I lowered my head again immediately, silently asking myself what on earth was wrong with me?

I set Alpha Derek's plate down carefully in front of him, and as I leaned forward to do it, a hand slowly brushed against my thigh. My whole body went rigid. It only lasted a second — the lightest graze, barely anything at all but every nerve in my body screamed at once. I didn't dare look at him. It had to have been an accident. 

The table wasn't exactly spacious, and his hand could easily have slipped. And yet something about the touch lingered in a way an accident shouldn't. It felt deliberate. No, that wasn't possible. He'd never once seen my face clearly. Every night I wore Valentina's perfume, every night the darkness hid me completely. There was no way Alpha Derek could recognize me. ‘You're imagining things, Stella.’ I finished placing the plate and stepped back into place.

The silence didn't hold for long. Mother had just reached Alpha Damien's side when her foot caught the edge of the carpet. The tray tilted in her hands, and before either of us could do anything, the plates crashed onto the marble floor. The sound cracked through the dining hall like thunder and my heart stopped cold. Mother dropped to her knees immediately, already reaching for the broken pieces.

"I-I'm terribly sorry, my Lord. I'll clean it immediately."

The room went deathly still. Nobody moved. I don't think anyone even breathed. Alpha Damien set his cutlery down onto the table without any hurry at all, and the soft clink of it against the china somehow sounded louder than the tray hitting the floor had. When he spoke, his voice was calm. Too calm.

"Is this truly the standard of service the Night Wing Palace has fallen to?"

Mother's hands were shaking as she gathered the broken pieces off the floor. "My deepest apologies, my Lord. It won't happen again."

Damien didn't raise his voice once, and somehow that made everything worse.

"If you cannot even carry a tray without making a spectacle of yourself..." He paused, letting the words sit in the air. "...perhaps age has made you unsuitable for palace service."

My mother's hands went still, just for a second, but I saw it happen. I saw the hurt land, and the humiliation right behind it. Something inside me snapped clean in half.

Before I could stop myself, the words were already out of my mouth.

"Please don't speak to my mother like that, my Lord."

Silence. Complete and absolute. The words had already left my mouth and there was no pulling them back now. Mother's head whipped toward me, her face pale with horror.

"Stella!" Her voice cracked down into a whisper. "What are you doing?"

My stomach dropped straight through the floor. Every servant in that room was staring at me like I'd lost my mind completely, and even Derek had stopped eating to look. The air went too heavy to breathe.

Then, very slowly, Alpha Damien lifted his head. Those piercing blue eyes settled on me again, and this time it wasn't brief at all. It was direct. Intent. The corners of his mouth didn't move. Nothing about his face moved.

"What," he said, his deep voice slicing clean through the silence, "did you just say to me?"