I was as naked as he, my body bearing the marks of our passionate explorations - faint bruises where his fingers had gripped, the lingering scent of his skin on mine. Though we had not crossed every boundary that beckoned, had kept to the worship ofhands and mouths, I hungered for more of the same sweetness.
He drew me back down beside him with eager hands, and I let myself be pulled into his embrace like a drowning man accepting salvation. When my fingers found him, wrapped around the velvet steel of his desire, he arced beneath me like a drawn bow, his breath escaping in soft gasps that were sweeter than any music.
I stroked him with reverent care, watching rapture bloom across his features as he surrendered to sensation. His hands fisted in the silk sheets, his head thrown back to expose the elegant column of throat I longed to mark with kisses. When release finally claimed him, he called my name like a prayer, and I thought I might weep from the beauty of it.
Afterward, we washed and dressed with the careful efficiency of men who had shared such intimacies, movements synchronized by new understanding. Serin donned a fresh seret of sea-green silk while I returned to my familiar leather and steel, the armor feeling strange and heavy after a night of freedom.
"I wish to visit the sacred stream today," he said as we prepared to break our fast. "The one Priest Myris mentioned, where pilgrims go to seek Elyon's blessing."
I nodded, though something in his tonesuggested he preferred to make this pilgrimage alone. "Of course, Your Highness. I should... I believe I may have left part of my kit at the inn. I should retrieve it."
The lie came easily, born of years of practice at reading his moods. He needed space to think, to process what had changed between us without my constant presence as reminder.
"Meet me before the evening rites at Elyon's temple," he said with a smile that made my chest tight with longing. "I would not want to experience such beauty without you there to share it."
I promised to find him before then, bowing with the formal courtesy that sat strangely now between us. When he disappeared toward the gardens, I felt the loss like a physical ache.
The inn welcomed me with familiar smells of bread and ale, a comfort after the overwhelming beauty of the palace. I sought out the serving youth who had attended us on our first night, his amber eyes bright with recognition.
"Any messages by bird?" I asked casually, as if my heart weren't hammering against my ribs.
"Aye, one came yesterday evening." He disappeared into the back rooms, returning with a small roll of parchment sealed with dark wax. I pressed two coins into his palm, generous enough to ensure his discretion.
Finding an empty alley behind the inn, I brokethe seal with trembling fingers. The message was brief, written in the crabbed hand I knew too well:
The old man draws his last breaths as I ink these glyphs. Retrieve the youth and return home. Time is of the essence and far too much has been wasted.
The words hit me like cold iron through the chest. King Dorin was dying, might already be dead by the time this message reached me. Which meant Serin was no longer merely a prince playing at freedom on a distant island. He was a king, with all the terrible responsibilities that crown entailed.
My duty to the prince would soon become my duty to the king. I would have to place that iron circlet on his golden head, watch it transform him from the laughing young man I'd held in my arms to the hard ruler his people needed. With the crown would come a wife chosen for political advantage, children to secure the succession, a life too cruel and demanding for someone born to appreciate beauty rather than destroy it.
Yet the Three Isles depended on my success. They needed their king, needed the strong hand that would guide them through the chaos that inevitably followed a monarch's death. Lords would be circling like sharks even now, testing boundaries, probing for weakness. Without Serin to claim his birthright, civil war would consume everything.
And Serin's life was not entirely his own, no matter how much I wished otherwise. He had beenborn to the crown as surely as I had been born to serve, married to duty that had finally come to claim him.
I stared at the message until the words blurred, crushing the parchment in my fist as if I could destroy the reality it represented. But duty was duty, and love, no matter how fierce, how pure, could not stand against the weight of kingdoms.
Tonight, I would have to tell him. Tonight, I would watch the light die in his beautiful eyes as paradise crumbled around us like ash.
The thought nearly brought me to my knees in that narrow alley, surrounded by the detritus of ordinary lives that would never know such impossible choices. But I was not ordinary, and neither was he. We were bound by chains forged in blood and sworn oaths, and those chains would drag us home whether we willed it or not.
I tucked the message inside my jerkin, close to my heart where it burned like accusation. Then I began the long walk back to the palace, back to the man I loved and would have to betray with truth more cruel than any lie.
Chapter
Ten
SERIN
The temple of Elyon blazed with candlelight as evening descended over the sacred complex, hundreds of flames dancing like earthbound stars against marble walls inlaid with gold. Incense smoke curled toward the painted ceiling where gods and mortals intertwined in eternal celebration, and the air itself seemed to shimmer with divine presence.
I stood among the gathered faithful, watching Priests Callis and Auren lead the evening rites with matched grace. Their voices rose in harmonious prayer, calling upon Elyon to bless all who sought love's sacred mysteries, and I felt something stir in my chest, not mere reverence, but recognition. Here was worship that celebrated union rather than conquest, that found the divine in tender touch rather than spilled blood.
Rhazir had not yet appeared, though the sun had already kissed the horizon farewell. I tried not to let worry cloud my heart, but his absence felt like a missing note in an otherwise perfect symphony.
The day had been spent in contemplation by the sacred stream, where pilgrims came to seek Elyon's blessing on matters of the heart. The water ran clear and sweet over stones worn smooth by countless offerings, and I had knelt on its banks to pray for understanding of what was happening between us. When I'd returned to our chambers afterward, I had found myself drawn to Rhazir's worn shirt, still bearing his scent - leather and steel and something uniquely his that made my pulse quicken. Holding that simple garment had felt like coming home for the first time in my life, even though I stood farther from the Three Isles than I had ever been.
A familiar presence touched the edge of my awareness like warm fingers against my soul. I turned before conscious thought could form, somehow knowing I would find him there despite the crowd of robed figures between us.
