***VERA***

Alaric watched me instead of his food. He held his spoon the way someone holds a weapon—loose, easy, like he could drop it and still kill you with his bare hands.

“Eat,” he said, voice gentle in the way venom is gentle before it kills. “You shouldn’t hear the rest of my story on an empty stomach.”

I didn’t touch the plate.

The woman beside him scoffed. Loud. Sharp. Like she wanted me to flinch.

Alaric blinked, almost startled by her noise.

“Oh—right,” he said, ...