Michael lunged up with that predatory swiftness that made him so lethal on a battlefield, yet somehow managed to fall back in hesitation. His beautiful face was guarded, anxiety layingacross high cheekbones and pulling down the corners of his full lips. Luce’s chest constricted with the need to kiss and strangle him simultaneously. He settled for leaning back against the doorframe with his arms folded tightly across his chest.
Michael opened his mouth, then closed it, unsure of how to even begin this conversation.
“Oh no,” Luce snapped. “You’re on my turf, so you have no excuse not to explain what the fuck you’re doing here.”
Michael visibly started but quickly schooled his features into mild annoyance. “I didn’t come here willingly.”
“I know,” Luce sneered. “If you’d wanted to be here you would’ve come years ago.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Life isn’t fair.”
Michael scoffed. “You were never this cynical before.”
“I was a different man before,” Luce retorted, tone sharp and laced with warning. “A lot has changed between then and now.”
“Yes, now you kidnap people after you brutalize them.”
“No, I interrogate spies.” His eyes narrowed. “We both know why you were on that rooftop, and we both know who sent you.”
“Your brother has cause to be concerned. That book contains knowledge of powerful artifacts, and he does not trust you.”
“I’m well aware of that.” Luce shifted off the wall, advancing slowly on the other man with gold sparking dangerously in his dark eyes. “I was the one who was cast out, after all. Denied access to my rightful place and all of the artifacts within it.”
“Of course I know this,” Michael was getting irritated, his pulse jumping in his veins. At least he told himself it was due to annoyance and not fear or—Saints forbid—longingthat stirred in him as Luce stalked closer, radiating power and dominance. “I never said that I disagreed with her actions, for the record.”
This made Luce pause. He blinked slowly, frowning. “Well, that sounds borderline heretical, Michael.”
His name from that mouth after all this time... it sent a tremor through the blond that he hoped didn’t show on the surface. This was rocky ground; they needed to tread carefully here.
“Perhaps sometimes… what is right and what is easy are not... congruent.”
A wry smile tugged at Luce’s lips against his will, one corner quirking up. “You and your damn doubletalk.” He shook his head. “Always saying what people want to hear and never what you really want to say.”
“It got between us in the end, didn’t it?”
Luce abruptly closed off, face slackening into a bland mask of disinterest. “We’re not talking about that.”
“We should,” Michael pressed. “I need to?—”
“This is not about whatyou need,” Luce hissed. “I don’t want to talk about it, and as a guest in my home you will respect my wishes.”
“An unwilling ‘guest’,” Michael threw up air quotes with a sneer, “should not be bound by the laws of courtesy.”
“You’re right,” Luce agreed readily. “And since you’ve already intruded on my hospitality, you would do well to remember what I do to those who makes themselves my enemies.”
“You’re threatening me, after I just told you I agree with you.” Michael scoffed. “This is why you struggled to lead.”
“I do not, nor have I ever, ‘struggled to lead’.” A tangible feeling of cold swept the room as his tone turned icy. “I rescinded control to my brother because he wanted it more, and my subjects here find me quite an amicable King. You have some nerve to speak of threats when you’ve done more harm to me than I ever inflicted upon you.”
Michael tensed. “We hurt each other.”
Luce snorted. “Maybe so, but only one of us still has hiswings.”
He spat the word like it was something foul, and he might as well have struck Michael for the way he recoiled. For a moment Luce looked at the closed off form—the hunched shoulders, the bowed head—and he almost felt guilty. Then he remembered Glory’s concerning message, and simmering anger slipped back around him like a shawl.
“I have been sorry for that since the day it happened.”
