Pandora's Box | 18+ (completed)

Chapter Twenty Seven - DIVINE

𝑑𝑖𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑒.
EXPECTATIONS ARE THE DEAL
OF THE DEVIL

•••

"Which is?"

"To know yourself. Know yourself better than you know the enemy."

Beast snapped his fingers and light tore through my peripheral vision. He spun me around toward a mirror—it hung proudly on the wall, inches away from my face.

In a place it definitely hadn't been before.

"Stop magically disappearing and appearing things from thin air," I deadpanned. "It's not impressive."

He chuckled lowly, bracing a large hand over my hip. His gaze met mine in the reflection, pointed and dark.

"Look at yourself," he whispered, his breath warm over the shell of my ear.

"I am," I replied, still subdued by his reflection.

"Not at me," his hands trailed higher, "at yourself."

I took in a sharp breath. "We're going to have to do something about your ego."

I'd been looking at him. I'd been looking at him shamelessly. And it was the only thing I could say to cover the embarrassed red creeping up my neck.

Beast laughed. It was an open and honest laugh, warm and real in its syllables. His eyes crinkled at the edges for a second and I felt a grin tug at my lips.

"You find me enticing. Every shred of my being calls to you."

"Well," I murmured breathlessly, "I'm seriously going to have to do something about that."

"Tell me if you ever find a way." His jaw clenched, his grip tightening on my waist a fraction. "There's someone I'm struggling to take my eyes off, too."

My breath caught in my throat. "Really?"

"Why do you look so surprised?" He grinned. "It's unexpected, isn't it?"

"What's the lesson here, again? The Sin of Lust has an arrogance problem. Therefore, I should be aware of everyone that—"

"Be aware of yourself," he interrupted.

I frowned. "I am."

His eyes were raw on mine in the reflection, the golden hue of his irises blazing.

"Look at yourself, Pandora."

He tugged on the clip holding my hair, and it fell over my neck, sweeping down my back.

"Why did you do that?" My hands itched to tie my hair back.

"Look at your hair. Look at its length."

It was the most average hair. A single strand escaped the rest of the cluster—it brushed over my temple, curling slightly by my jaw.

"Look at your eyes. Look at their strength."

My eyes were a mundane shade of brown. And yet for some reason, as I looked at them now they seemed brighter—as if some of the gold in Beast's eyes had reflected from the mirror, into mine.

But my eyes were what I liked most about myself. In the summer, under the intense heat of the sun, they turned a lustrous fawn, turning lighter and brighter.

In the winter, they would darken—they'd darken like the shortened days, like the subtle, ominous depth of the night.

"Look at yourself. Look at your depth."

"You almost sound like a poet," I whispered.

He simply looked at me in the mirror. There was something about that gash on his face that seemed to blur past my vision whenever I looked at him.

The ugly scar tore through his skin—it had probably always been there, a whisper of a past wound.

At his silence, I continued quietly, "You should look at yourself once in a while." I turned, the heat of his body searing through mine. "The golden of your eyes. How they glow when you smile or," I mused, "when you're angry. Sometimes they darken and that gold becomes flecked with a shade of the deepest brown."

Even now, the golds of his gaze flickered as he stared at himself in the mirror.

"Your scar. How it almost belongs on your face, as if you've let it become a part of you. As if you welcomed the mark but never the pain."

Suddenly his eyes snapped down to mine and all at once, I was the one up against the mirror, the cold glass cool against my back.

"Don't leave your room tomorrow," he growled, the animalistic sound vibrating in the air.

I struggled to catch my breath. "Why?"

His response was sharp; he'd allowed a whisper of the beast within him to show through. "Because it's the full moon."

I frowned. "So?"

His head dipped closer, his lips resting inches above mine. "You're my guest here, Pandora. I'm not inclined to tell you anything or give you anything. So don't set your expectations up too high."

I latched on to the warning beneath his words immediately. "You still lied to me, Beast. You're still a Sin. Setting expectations for you isn't something I can do."

A dark flash curved through his face, his eyes widening.

And then he was gone.

The disappearing and appearing were only impressive when he did it with objects. When Beast disappeared without a single noise, without a warning, without any reason, I recoiled with shock.

All he left was a ribbon of golden whisps behind in his wake.

Silently, I looped my hair back at the base of my neck, searching the floor for any sign of my clip. I huffed, letting it fall back down.

With a frustrated sigh, I realised I still didn't know my way around the Unholy Court. The corridors all looked the same; winding and dizzying circles.

I ambled hesitantly through the door Beast had led me through in hopes of finding the rest of the Sins and Virtues. My steps echoed loudly in the empty hallway.

A scream sat ready in my throat at the bodies lying across the floor.

Heaps and heaps of bodies.

•••

I know this chapter was super brief but it's all I can do for the length at two updates a week. Hopefully, they'll be longer in the coming weeks when I have less projects on hand <3

Love,
Laila.