“Where’s Bell?” Rakos asks the nearest guard.
“His Highness is in his chambers with a headache,” the guard answers. “He gave orders that he isn’t to be disturbed for the next six hours. Except for you.”
Rakos feels a pang of guilt for enjoying his flight while his lover was incapacitated. He and Bell are due to leave Sandrelle soon, since Bell can only stand it here with Rakos’s magic lessening the scalestone glare. Even then, most of Bell’s headaches aren’t due to scalestone. Rakos can’t fix them.
But he’s happy to sit with Bell through the bad days, as well as the good.
He and Bell are quartered in a pale stone tower entwined with a pair of spiraling trees. The stairs inside look fragile, ethereal, but are firm beneath Rakos’s feet. His supervisory escort drops off in stages as he ascends past Bell’s living quarters and library to the third floor, where another oathguard waits outside Bell’s bedroom door.
Rakos waves, but doesn’t pause before entering, and closing the door behind him. He does pause then, surprised by howbrightthe room is.
Usually, when Bell isn’t feeling well, he prefers peace and darkness. All lights extinguished and all curtains drawn. But today, the windows are all wide open, welcoming the afternoon light and breeze.
Bell is in bed, but he isn’t lying back on the pillow with a mask over his eyes. He’s on his stomach, heels kicked up behind him, with his nose buried in a book.
“What are you reading?” Rakos asks, unlacing his boots.
Bell looks up with wide, innocent eyes. “An adventure novel. About a notorious thief and an innocent young mage who gets taken hostage by him. And then—”
“Smut. You’re reading smut.”
“Very adventurous smut,” Bell says happily.
Rakos drops his coat on a chair. Loosens his belt and sinks onto the green silk bedding beside Bell. “You don’t have a headache, do you?”
Bell tucks a bookmark between the pages and hands the book to Rakos. “I don’t have a headache. What I have is a good six hours in which we won’t be disturbed.”
Rakos sets the book carefully aside on the bedside table, then tackles Bell backward onto the bed. Bell’s hands find his hair immediately, fingernails scratching into his scalp, and long teal strands fall around them like a curtain.
Joy heats through Rakos’s entire body, as exhilarating as flight. Bell is a scheming prince. A loving son and brother. A terrible minstrel. Rakos sees the truth of them both in every facet of Bell.
“I love you,” Rakos says.
Bell’s eyes crinkle, and he hooks a leg around Rakos’s hip. “Really? Prove it.”
“With pleasure,” Rakos purrs, and kisses Bell’s smirk away.
?
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Bellamy
Bellamy soars into the kiss. From his fingertips to his toes, every part of him tingles with want. He loves this. He loves Rakos. Sometimes, Bellamy can’t believe this is real. After reading and dreaming so many adventures, he survived one of his own and brought home a man he refuses to live without.
A man who protects him without patronizing. Who cares without smothering. Who’s just as affectionate and forthright now that Bellamy’s a prince again as when he was a minstrel. Rakos meets Bellamy where he is, and Bellamy loves him for it.
Love won’t change that Bellamy tires too easily. Love won’t keep him from losing days to headaches when he’s stressed, or eats the wrong amount of the wrong thing, moves too much or too little, sleeps too late or too early.
Love doesn’t need to cure anything for Bellamy to need it like air.
Rakos’s hair spills luminous over his shoulder. He’s so vibrant, larger than life, from those spellbinding purple eyes to the flash of white teeth against tawny skin. Even when Bellamy can see magic, Rakos is the brightest thing in the room. A story come to life, except he’s real, and he’s all Bellamy’s.
Very real, as Rakos’s hands wander down Bellamy’s body, undoing buttons and laces as he goes. Bellamy arches up. “Does flying make you horny? You’re always hard after you fly.”
“You make me horny. I don’t get hard when you’re not up there with me. Usually.” Rakos nips at Bellamy’s chin. “What were they doing in that book of yours? Are there ravishing pirates in this one too?”
“I’m going to regret letting you read that one, aren’t I?” Bellamy says. “I can’t believe you’re jealous of fake pirates.”
