Pride, and Ronan’s strong hands at his hips, steadying him, urging him on. Each movement threatens to be his last, his body overloading with sensation. He claws at Ronan’s shoulders, and doesn’t have the breath to apologize for it.
“You’re doing great,” Ronan rasps into his ear, and it should sound condescending, but in the state Karis is in, the praise is like a drug. “You feel so fucking good on me.”
Karis doesn’t know how to reply, so he throws himself into a kiss instead. Closes his eyes, and rides through the cascading pleasure. His soul soars while Ronan’s strong hands pin him down.
No more rope bindings, no more warded windows. Karis could run away at any time— but in truth, he’s more trapped than he’s ever been. When he was kidnapped, bound, and gagged, he always had his magic as a safeguard. He always had hope that the next opportunity would let him escape. But now, his chains are rough kisses and pretty words, sweet bruises and the relentless infiltration of his heart.
He’s well and truly caught.
?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
RONAN
Ronan circles the barn and resets each ward twice, because he doesn’t trust himself to get it right the first time. His mind is still preoccupied with other things, like the way Karis clenched down on his cock every time Ronan said something—the reddening corners of his eyes as everything overwhelmed him—
Distracting is an understatement. Ronan’s half-hard in his trousers just looking at Karis across the barn. The tentative way he wipes down his thighs with a rag, the way he bends all the way over to pull his boots back on.
Ronan takes a deep breath and flips another coin to activate the cloaking array on the final door. He catches it in his palm, crown up.
“Need any help?” Karis calls out. His voice is still low and husky, his lips red and swollen from kissing.
There are a lot of tasks to take care of. They need to light a fire and check in with the sisters. They need to take inventory of all the supplies in the loft. Ronan needs to warn the farmer that they’re here.
But taking care of Karis is important too. Resetting the cloaking wards was urgent; everything else can wait an hour. Ronan pockets his coins. “Let’s go up to the loft.”
Moments later, he presses Karis against the ladder and kisses the pleased hum from the young man’s lips. Every time they kiss has been different. Like rolling a die and not knowing how it will land. Inexperience giving way to practice, sweetness alternating with ferocity. This newest kiss is slow, lazy, satisfied.
“This is helping?” Karis asks when they pause to breathe.
Their foreheads press together, and their breaths mingle. Karis’s waist is firm under Ronan’s hands. “Very helpful. We have to test the ladder.”
They test the loft too, with its piles of soft hay. The sweet, grassy scent surrounds them. Ronan’s cock stirs when Karis climbs over him, but he doesn’t move to remedy that. The desire isn’t urgent, and he wants to linger in it. Their kisses lighten, then melt away, and Karis falls limp on top of him, his head tucked into Ronan’s neck. His hair tickles Ronan’s skin with every slight movement, and he traces little patterns against Ronan’s shirt.
Ronan doesn’t fall asleep, but it still feels like a dream.
***
The next few days are a blur of activity. The farm is only half an hour out from Melody, and the city conveniently lacks walls. No matter how many guards and soldiers keep watch, they can’t close up every covert entryway. They might not even be trying; perhaps the Dravans and bard priests think capturing Ronan will be easier at the Bower than outside it. They’re probably right.
Ronan makes his first trip into the city alone, despite Karis’s frown. In the Melody marketplaces, he makes sure that he’s seen buying rope, and that he isn’t seen stealing cosmetics. That night, he dyes Karis’s eye-catching hair a deep, dark brown. The color makes his face look paler, a little more serious.
“It’ll only last a week,” Ronan says, an attempt at reassurance, but Karis doesn’t seem to mind the change. It’s Ronan who misses the rich auburn waves.
The disguise makes him feel safer bringing Karis into the city, though. He doesn’t dare take Karis to the Bower itself yet, but he leads him through various neighborhoods, familiarizing him with escape routes. Studying a map is no replacement for learning the feel of a city. A street’s sounds, an alley’s shadows. The height and texture of a wall as you vault over it. Karis follows with rapt attention and never once complains.
Only sometimes, his gaze grows distant, dazed for no reason Ronan can discern. He snaps back when Ronan nudges him, and never says what he was distracted by.
They rent rooms and horses all over Melody. “I’ll need the room on the twenty-seventh,” Ronan tells one innkeeper, looking over his shoulder. “Please be discreet.” The twenty-eighth, he tells the next. The twenty-sixth, he tells a third. The stablemasters all get different information too. Ronan wants one horse, two horses, three. Tomorrow or the next day or the next.
“This is all getting very expensive,” Karis remarks as they backtrack away from one stable. If the stablemaster looks out, he’ll see them heading in the opposite direction from the farmhouse. “Bad enough that you literally throw money away every time you want a distraction.”
“I can afford it.” Armor clinks up ahead. Ronan turns casually into a residential garden, his hand on Karis’s shoulder. He lowers his voice. “My teacher was the greatest thief Praia ever had.”
Karis frowns. “Was?”
They take shelter under a flowering, fluttering tree, obscured from street and home by fragrant leaves. The day holds none of autumn’s chill. Ronan clarifies, “She’s retired now.”
