Mithri stops walking.
Bryn can't blame her. Seeing Ithyris for the first time is an experience. The prince is tall and broad and the violet scales at his throat catch the amber light and his amethyst eyes are striking from across the room and the sheer physical presence of him, the density and the warmth and the contained power, fills the hall in a way that makes every other person in it feel as though they've been drawn slightly smaller. He is, objectively and by any standard of measurement available, the most beautiful man either of them has ever seen.
"Oh," Mithri says quietly.
"Don't," Bryn mutters.
"I'm just saying. Oh."
Ithyris approaches. His gaze moves to Mithri first, a brief assessment, polite and warm, and he bows with a formality that surprises Bryn because the prince's usual mode of interaction with the world is considerably less ceremonial, usually involving bare feet.
"Princess Mithri. Welcome to the Sovereignty. I hope your journey was not too arduous."
"It was terrible, actually," Mithri says, because she is Bryn's twin and incapable of dishonesty when directness is available and there's no reason to choose diplomacy over accuracy. "The roads are dreadful and I was saddle-sore for three days and the last inn smelled of goats."
Ithyris blinks. Then, to his credit, he smiles, and it's a genuine smile, not the polished diplomatic version. "I'll have the steward arrange more comfortable quarters for you. And I'll see about the roads."
"Thank you." Mithri studies him with the same clinical attention she applies to her embroidery, the careful, assessing gaze of someone who is evaluating quality and craftsmanship and will not be satisfied with anything less than excellent. "So you're the one who's been biting my brother."
Bryn closes his eyes. He considers the feasibility of the volcanic floor opening and swallowing him whole. He calculates the odds and finds them disappointingly low.
Ithyris, to his infinite credit, does not falter. "I am," he says. No apology. No embarrassment. Just a simple, steady acknowledgment delivered with the same calm certainty he brings to everything, and then his gaze slides from Mithri to Bryn.
And there it is.
The difference. The thing Bryn has been afraid of since the moment he heard Mithri was in the entrance hall, the thing he has been bracing himself for with the same grim determination he brings to every potential catastrophe. He was afraid that Ithyris would see Mithri and see what the treaty intended. See the princess. See the golden hair at full length and the curves and the grace and the version of Bryn that was supposed to be here, the version that fits, the version that makes sense, and realize what he got instead.
But the prince looked at Mithri with warmth and courtesy and the appropriate respect owed to a princess of a neighboring kingdom. He looks at Bryn with a heat and focus that hasn't dimmed one degree, that dark, consuming attention that makes Bryn's skin tighten and his breath come short and his body lean toward the prince before his brain can intervene. Ithyris doesn't look at Mithri the way he looks at Bryn. He doesn't look at anyone the way he looks at Bryn. And Bryn knows this because he's been watching, cataloging, preparing himself for the moment the prince sees his twin standing beside him and realizes what he's been missing. What he got instead of what was promised. What showed up in a dress when a princess was expected.
But Ithyris looks at Mithri and sees a princess. He looks at Bryn and sees everything.
Something in Bryn's chest releases. A knot he didn't know he was carrying, wound tight since the moment Lira told him to come to the main hall, loosens and comes undone and the relief is so profound it makes his knees unsteady. The prince doesn't want his sister. The prince wants him. Not because Mithri wasn't available, not because Bryn was a convenient substitute, not because the bond is indiscriminate and landed on whoever walked through the door first. The prince wants him, specifically, with Mithri standing right there, and the difference in how he looks at them is so vast it's visible from across the room.
Mithri notices. She is his twin and she notices everything and she sees exactly where Ithyris's gaze goes when it leaves her and she sees the way it changes when it finds Bryn, the way it warms and focuses and deepens, and Bryn watches her clock it, file it, and tuck it away with the quiet efficiency of a woman who has just gathered all the intelligence she needs.
Ithyris asks about her journey. He makes sure her rooms are adequate. He arranges for a meal to be sent and inquires about any supplies she needs. He is gracious and attentive and exactly as courteous as a prince should be to his intended's sister, and Bryn is grateful for the prince's manners and for the fact that Ithyris is treating Mithri with the kind of thoughtful hospitality that Bryn's own kingdom was never able to provide her.
And through all of it, the prince's hand finds the small of Bryn's back and rests there, warm and sure, a point of contact that says I'm here and you're mine and nothing about your sister's presence changes that, and he doesn't move it. Not once.
***
That evening, Mithri comes to his chambers.
She sits cross-legged on his bed, which he has changed since the last catastrophe, fresh sheets that don't smell of sex and cedar, and he sits in the chair across from her and they look at each other the way they have looked at each other their whole lives: with the particular, uncomplicated certainty of two people who grew up sharing everything, including the fundamental understanding that the world is difficult and the only safe place in it is each other.
"He's in love with you," she says.
"He thinks I'm his mate. It's a biological..."
"Bryn. I watched his face when he looked at you. That isn't biology. I don't care what the Drekian elder council says about mate bonds and involuntary responses and biological compulsions. That man is in love with you. The biological component might have pointed him in your direction, but the way he looks at you is not a compulsion. That's a choice. He is choosing to look at you that way and he is choosing to keep looking and he could not have been more obvious about it if he'd hired a herald."
Bryn looks at his hands. They're twisted in the fabric of his shirt. The prince's shirt. He's still wearing Ithyris's shirts because they're the most comfortable thing he owns in this palace and they smell of cedar and he has stopped pretending that isn't the reason.
"What do you want, Bryn?"
The question hits him in the center of his chest. No one asks him what he wants. People ask him what he can do, what he'll sacrifice, what he'll manage, what he'll hold together for them while they break it apart from the other side. No one asks what he wants because no one has ever considered the possibility that his wants might matter, including Bryn himself.
"I want you to be safe," he says.
