The Demon King of the Desert

Chapter 9

Breed.

Even if it wasn't the term humans used, you knew exactly what he wished to do. Your fingers curled about the food you were holding, unable to even process a single word to speak for a good few minutes.

"D-Demiurge," you began, "I'm... you know I'm very new to this."

He could practically taste the fear in the air. If he were hunting you, the sensation would be welcoming and something he would openly feed upon. But this was not the response he was hoping for.

In the moment, you were a mouse cornered in a room with the vicious predator come to claim its prize. The feeling gnawed at his gut, making his body tense in wonder of how he could proceed without forcing you to do it. If his brother wasn't in the way, he would have loved to take all the time in the world to build up to this moment.

But he knew his brother...Even if it had been centuries since they last saw one another, Demiurge knew what Jaldabaoth would do.

The inner demon in him wanted to fight against what love and admiration he had for you. His mouth even opened slightly, lips nearly peeling back to expose his fangs in a fit of frustration, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. Thinking back to all the other people he forced to bed with him before, Demiurge shuttered at the thought. He couldn't do that to you.

The difference between merely satisfying one's self and mating with your partner were two different emotions that even a demon could understand. It was a line he couldn't and wouldn't cross just for the sake of protection, jealousy, or any other feelings or excuse he could dig up from his blackened soul.

A sigh expelled from him in the form of a soft, rumbling growl as his brow furrowed in confusion of what to do. He wanted you to enjoy it as much as he knew he would. However, the first wrong step would be the difference in you being his mate and you being his slave.

His face scrunched up in a fit of annoyance with himself.

Demons were selfish, doing any and everything to get what they so wanted. But, they were not without mercy, love and kindness; especially to those they claimed as their own. Demiurge wanted to swear at himself for trying to even consider forcing you to do anything he so wished.

Your name shivered past his lips. "Forgive me," he apologized. "In a fit of my own greed, I wished to claim you completely as my own. However, I know this very act would have you fearful of me..." His features tensed. "This... is not how I wish my mate to view me as—a villain who would see her caged."

Heart fluttering in a mixture of emotions, you wondered what to even say. He still had the chains in place. Even now, he had yet to remove them, and you would have preferred them gone. He kept you confined within his city, but you understood that was his way to keep you safe. Demiurge had his women and men he kept under close watch to make certain he didn't lose his numbers.

It was very much how animals in the wild worked that traveled in packs.

The past you would have said he was merely saying what he so wished to gain your favor, but there was a heavy honesty to his tone that evaporated all doubt within your breast. You could feel his sorrow emanating from his being.

Your fingers mindlessly plucked at the bread you had been offered for your dinner. "Demiurge, I just never really thought that far ahead about myself." You winced, opening up so much about yourself in that one confession. "Normally, depending where you are in human society, you are either betrothed or sold off to be with someone who can possibly make you or your family's lives better. When it came to me? I just..." Wanting to continue made you lower your head as the words, which wished to surface, burned like hot embers in your throat. "...the Hunter's Moon was the horrific end to my family." Tears blinded your vision as you nearly threatened to break the bread in your grasp. "So whatever life I could have had by their command was gone in one night."