The windows were open. It was the kind of sweet, warm night that came often in the south. Veretian decoration was everywhere, from the intricate grilles covering the windows to the helicoidal braiding that looped the bed silks, but these border forts had some hints of the south, in the shapes of the arches, and the flow of space, open and without screens.
He looked down at the badge in his hand. His time as Laurent’s Captain had been short-lived. An afternoon. An evening. In that time they’d won a battle and taken a fort. It seemed wild and improbable, a hard-edged golden piece of metal in his hand.
Guymar was a good choice, the right interim until Laurent gathered advisors to himself and found a new Captain. That would be the first order of business, to consolidate his power here in Ravenel. As a commander, Laurent was still green, but Laurent would grow into the role. Laurent would find his way, transforming himself from commander-prince to King.
He put the badge down on the table.
He moved away from it to the windows. He looked out. He could see the pinpricks of torchlight on the battlements, where the blue and gold had replaced the banners of Lord Touars.
Touars, who had wavered, but had been convinced into battle by Guion.
In his mind were images that would always be linked with tonight. Stars wheeling high over the battlements. Costumes, and Enguerran’s armour. A helm with its one long red feather. Churned earth and violence and Touars, who had fought, until a single moment of recognition that had changed everything.
Damianos. Prince killer.
Behind him, the doors closed; he turned, and saw Laurent.
His stomach dropped, a moment of confused shock—he’d never expected to see Laurent here. Then everything resolved, the size and the opulence of these chambers made sense: Laurent was not the interloper.
They faced each other. Laurent stood, four steps inside the room, vivid in the severe clothing, tight-laced, with only a single shoulder ornament to signify his rank. Damen felt his pulse beat with his surprise, his awareness of Laurent’s presence.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Your servants brought me to the wrong rooms.’
‘No, they didn’t,’ said Laurent.
There was a slight pause.
‘Aimeric is back in his rooms under guard,’ said Damen. He tried for a normal tone. ‘He’s not going to cause any more trouble.’
‘I don’t want to talk about Aimeric,’ said Laurent. ‘Or my uncle.’
Laurent began to come forward. Damen was aware of him as he was aware of the badge he had removed, like a piece of armour discarded too early.
Laurent said, ‘I know you’re planning to leave tomorrow. You’re going to cross the border, and you’re not going to come back. Say it.’
‘I—’
‘Say it.’
‘I’m going to leave tomorrow,’ said Damen, as steadily as he could. ‘I’m not going to come back.’ He drew in a breath that hurt his chest. ‘Laurent—’
‘No, I don’t care. Tomorrow you leave. But you’re mine now. You’re still my slave tonight.’
Damen felt the words hit, but that was subsumed in the shock of Laurent’s hand on him, a push backwards. His legs hit the bed. The world tilted, bed silks and roseate light. He felt Laurent’s knee alongside his thigh, Laurent’s hand on his chest.
‘I—don’t—’
‘I think you do,’ said Laurent.
His jacket began to divide under Laurent’s fingers: Laurent was unerring, and a distant part of Damen’s mind registered that: a prince with a servant’s proficiency, better than Damen had been, as though taught.
‘What are you doing?’ Damen’s breath was shaky.
‘What am I doing? You are not very observant.’
‘You’re not yourself,’ said Damen. ‘And even if you were, you don’t do anything without a dozen motives.’
Laurent went very still, the soft words half bitter. ‘Don’t I? I must want something.’
‘Laurent,’ he said.
‘You take liberties,’ said Laurent. ‘I never gave you permission to call me by my name.’
‘Your Highness,’ said Damen, and the words twisted, wrong in his mouth. He needed to say, Don’t do this. But he couldn’t think past Laurent, improbably close. He felt each shifting inch that divided their bodies with a fluttering, illicit sensation at Laurent’s proximity. He closed his eyes against it, felt his body’s painful yearning. ‘I don’t think you want me. I think you just want me to feel this.’
‘Then, feel it,’ said Laurent.
And slid his hand inside Damen’s open jacket, past his shirt, to his stomach.
It was not possible, in that moment, to do anything but experience Laurent’s hand against his skin. His breath shuddered out of him, Laurent’s touch hot across his navel and sliding lower. He was half aware of the silk bedding, rumpled and disturbed around him, Laurent’s knees and other hand like pins in the silk, holding him down. His jacket was discarded, his shirt half off him. The laces between his legs parted, obedient to Laurent’s fingers, and then he was all undone.
It was Laurent’s face he looked at. He saw as if for the first time the look in Laurent’s eyes, his slightly altered breathing. He was aware of the taut line of Laurent’s back; of the conscious way he held his body. He recalled the line of Laurent’s back in the tower, bent over the table. He heard the tone in Laurent’s voice.
‘I see you are everywhere in proportion.’
Damen said, ‘You’ve seen me roused before.’
‘And I remember what you like.’
Laurent closed a fist around the head, and slid his thumb over the slit, pushing down into it a little.
Damen’s whole body curved. The grip felt more like ownership than a caress. Laurent leaned in, let his thumb delineate a small, wet circle.
‘You liked this too, with Ancel.’
‘That wasn’t Ancel,’ said Damen, the words coming out, raw and honest. ‘That was all you, and you know it.’
He didn’t want to think about Ancel. His body strained, like a strap pulled too tight. He did what was natural to him, but Laurent said, ‘No,’ and he couldn’t touch.
‘You know, Ancel used his mouth,’ he said, almost nonsensically, desperately trying to distract Laurent, to distract himself, fighting to hold himself in place against the sheets.
‘I don’t think I need to,’ said Laurent.
The rise and fall of Laurent’s hand was like the slide of Laurent’s words, like every frustrating argument that they’d ever had, stymied, tangled up in Laurent’s voice. He could feel the tension in Laurent, sharp like the feel of his own heartbeats. Laurent held his former mood within him, constrained, and converted into something else.
He fought it, as it rose inside him, striking out for resistant purchase in the silks above his head. But Laurent’s free hand curtailed his movement, pushing down on him in hot, insistent command. He was caught unexpectedly in Laurent’s eyes, and it hit, in a tangled burst, Laurent fully clothed above him, a prince in full panoply, his shiny boots alongside Damen’s thighs. Even as Damen felt the first tremor rolling up his body, the moment was transforming, too much communicated between them. He felt suddenly that he should look away, that he should stop or turn back. He couldn’t. Laurent’s eyes were dark, wide, and for a moment looked nowhere but at him.
He felt Laurent pulling back, pulling away, shuttering himself, trying but not quite able to manage a cool snap withdrawal.
Laurent said, ‘Adequate.’
Breathing roughened, still trembling with climax, Damen was pushing up, chasing the look in Laurent’s eyes to catch it before it was gone.
He caught Laurent’s wrist, felt the fine bones, and the pulse, before Laurent could rise from the bed.
Damen said, ‘Kiss me.’
His voice was husky with pleasure tha
t he yearned to share. He felt the warm flush that suffused his own skin. He had pushed himself up, so that his body made a curve, the planes of his abdomen shifting. Laurent’s gaze splayed out instinctively over him, then lifted to his own.
He’d caught Laurent’s wrist before, to hold him back from a blow, a knife strike. He held him now. He could feel the desperate urge for retreat. He could feel something else too, Laurent keeping himself apart, as though, this act being finished, he had no template for what to do.
‘Kiss me,’ he said again.
Dark-eyed, Laurent was holding himself in place as though pushing himself past a barrier, the tension in Laurent’s body still telegraphing flight, and Damen felt the shock with his whole body when Laurent’s gaze dropped to his mouth.
His own eyes fell closed as he realised that Laurent was going to do this, and he held himself very still. Laurent kissed with a slight parting of his lips, as though he was unconscious of what he was asking for, and Damen kissed him back carefully, dizzy with the idea that the kiss would deepen.
He drew back before it did, just far enough to watch Laurent’s eyes come open. His heart was pounding. For a moment, looking felt like kissing, an exchange in which the distinctions of intimacy blurred. He was leaning in slowly, tilting Laurent’s jaw with his fingers, and kissing him softly on the neck.
It was not what Laurent had expected. He felt the slight shock of Laurent’s surprise, and the way Laurent held himself, as though confused as to why Damen wished to do this, but he felt the moment when surprise turned to something else. Damen allowed himself the minor delight of nuzzling. Laurent’s pulse reached a little crescendo under his lips.
This time when he drew back, neither of them broke fully from the other. He lifted his other hand to brush Laurent’s cheek, slid fingers into his hair—shifting gold under his marvelling fingers. Then he took Laurent’s head gently in his hands and delivered the kiss he’d longed to deliver, long, slow and deep. Laurent’s mouth opened under his. He couldn’t stop the slow, spreading flush of heat he felt at the touch of Laurent’s tongue, the feel of his own, sliding into Laurent’s mouth.
They were kissing. He felt it in his body, like a tremor he couldn’t still. He was shaken by the force of all he wanted, and he closed his eyes against it. He drew his hand down Laurent’s body, felt the raised gathers of the jacket. He himself was naked, while Laurent was fully, untouchably clothed.
Laurent had been careful, since that first momentous disrobing in the palace baths, not to strip fully in front of him. But he remembered, from the baths, how Laurent had looked; the arrogant balance of his proportions, the fall of translucent water over white skin.
He hadn’t appreciated it then. He hadn’t known, in the palace, how rare it was for Laurent to appear in anything less than full, impeccable dress, in front of anyone.
He knew now. He thought of the servant he had seen attending Laurent earlier, how much he had disliked it.
He lifted his fingers to the tie that closed Laurent’s collar. He had been trained to do this, he knew every intricate fastening. A sliver of opening widened, his fingers sliding up the fine line of Laurent’s collarbone, revealing it. Laurent’s skin was so pale that the veins in his neck were blue, stria in marble, and with silks and tents, shaded awnings and high-necked collars, its pristine fineness had been preserved even through a month on the march. Against it, his own skin, sun-darkened, seemed brown as a nut.
They were breathing in tandem. Laurent was holding himself very still. When Damen pushed the jacket open, Laurent’s chest rose and fell under the thin white shirt. Damen’s hands smoothed down the lines of the shirt, and then, parting, opened it.
Exposed, Laurent’s nipples were hard and puckered, the first tangible evidence of desire, and Damen felt a wild surge of gratification. His eyes lifted to Laurent’s.
Laurent said, ‘Did you think I was made of stone?’
He couldn’t stop the rush of pleasure he felt at that, said, ‘Nothing you don’t want.’
‘You think I don’t want it?’
Seeing the look in Laurent’s eyes, Damen deliberately pushed him back onto the sheets.
They were gazing at one another. Laurent was sprawled on his back, slightly mussed, one leg drawn up and pushed out slightly to one side, still wearing its immaculate boot. He wanted to slide his hand up Laurent’s ribcage to his chest, press his wrists down into the mattress, take his mouth. He closed his eyes and called on a heroic effort of restraint. Opened them.
Lifting a hand idly to the exact place above his head where Damen might have pressed it, Laurent gazed back at him through veiled lashes. ‘Like being on top, do you?’
‘Yes.’ Never more so than at this moment. To have Laurent beneath him was heady. He couldn’t help drawing his hand down over Laurent’s taut stomach, over the controlled rise and fall of Laurent’s breath. He reached the faint line of hair, touched it with his fingertips. His fingers were now resting on the place where the line disappeared under symmetrical lacing. He looked back up.
And found himself pushed backwards, sudden, unexpected impetus, and he sat back between Laurent’s legs, a little breathless. Laurent had placed his boot flat against the plane of Damen’s chest, and pushed. And he didn’t remove his boot from its position, he held Damen in place with it, the firm pressure of the ball of Laurent’s foot a warning to stay back.
The flare of arousal he felt at that must have shown in his eyes.
Laurent said, ‘Well?’
It was a directive, not a warning: what Laurent was waiting for suddenly made itself plain. Damen put his hand around Laurent’s calf, the other on the heel of his boot, and pulled it off.
As the boot hit the floor on the side of the bed, Laurent drew back his foot and replaced it with the other. It came off as deliberately as the first.
He could see the rise and fall of Laurent’s breath, near his hipbone. Despite the cool tone, he was aware of the extent to which Laurent was holding himself in place, allowing himself to be touched. Tension still glinted in Laurent’s body, like the shine on a blade edge that would slice you open at the wrong touch.
He was suddenly shaky with everything he wanted. He felt dizzy with competing impulses. He wanted to be gentle. He wanted to tighten his grip. They were kissing again, and Damen couldn’t stop touching him, couldn’t stop the slow slide of his hands over Laurent’s skin. There was an interval of touching, and Damen kissed him softer, sweeter. The edged seams and criss-crossings were distinct beneath his fingers. He pushed a finger between lacing and fabric, felt the slow draw of the lace, growing longer as he reached the vertex.
Needing it suddenly, Damen pushed away and down and Laurent half-followed, hazily pushing up on one arm—uncertain, perhaps, of the purpose of this detour—until the moment Damen curled his fingers and pulled the fabric down to mid-thigh, then further.
He tugged the pants down and off, smoothed his hand up Laurent’s thigh, feeling it flex. Reaching the juncture between leg and hip, he thumbed it, feeling the pulse beat wildly under the very fine skin there. Damen let himself experience dizzily just how much he liked the idea of controlled Laurent betraying himself in salt flavoured need into his mouth. He touched it with his hand and encountered a texture like hot silk.
Laurent had hitched up, his jacket and shirt pushed down to his elbows, holding his arms half-restrained behind him.
‘I am not going to reciprocate.’
Damen looked up. ‘What?’
Laurent said, ‘I am not going to do that to you.’
‘And so?’
‘Do you want me to suck your cock?’ said Laurent, precisely. ‘Because I don’t plan to. If you are proceeding on the expectation of reciprocity, then you had best be forewarned that—’
This was too convoluted for bed play. Damen listened, satisfied himself that in all of this talking there was no actual objecti
on, then simply applied his mouth.
For all his seeming experience, Laurent reacted like an innocent to this pleasure. He let out a soft shocked sound, and his body re-formed around the place where Damen was giving his attention. Damen held Laurent in place, hands to hips, and allowed himself to enjoy Laurent’s slight, helpless shifts and pushes, the quality of his surprise, and the hard act of repression that followed, as Laurent tried to even out his breathing.
He wanted it. He wanted every stifled response. He was aware of his own arousal, half-forgotten, pushing against the sheets. He drew up to the head and furled his tongue there, so well pleased with the experience that he lingered, suckling, before sliding back down again.
Laurent was, by far, the most controlled lover Damen had ever taken to bed. The head tossing and cries, the easy, open sounds of past lovers were in Laurent a single tremor, or slight hitch of breath. And yet, Damen found himself primed to each reaction, the tension of his stomach, the faint trembling of his thighs. Damen could feel Laurent’s cycle of reaction and repression beneath him, as impetus gathered, building in the lines of Laurent’s body.
And felt it stymied. As rhythm built, Laurent’s body locked down, his responses repressed. Looking up, he saw that Laurent’s hands were fists in the sheets, his eyes closed, his head turned to one side. Laurent, out on the shattered edge of pleasure, was holding himself back from climax by sheer force of his impossible will.
Damen drew off, pushed himself up to search Laurent’s face. His own body, fully primed, took up barely a quarter of his attention as Laurent’s eyes came open.
After a long moment Laurent said, with painful honesty, ‘I . . . find it difficult to let go of control.’
‘No kidding,’ said Damen.
There was a drawn-out pause. And then: ‘You want to take me, as a man takes a boy.’
‘As a man takes a man,’ said Damen. ‘I want to take pleasure in you, and to please your body with mine.’
He said it with soft honesty. ‘I want to come inside you.’ The words rose, like this feeling within him. ‘I want you to come in my arms.’