29. Lyr
29
LYR
L yr lies in Damon’s arms on the White Watch. It has always seemed so right to him that they ended up on a ship together. It was aboard a ship that he came to know Damon, came to understand him. It was on a ship that he fell in love with Damon and Damon fell in love with him.
And now he is aboard a ship, in Damon’s arms. Nothing calms his heart like this.
But, the truth is, Lyr’s heart is never truly calm.
Lyr’s mind frustrates him. His sharp, wary, questioning mind that kept him alive in Attar, plagues him now he has escaped. He feels as if he is constantly alert, looking for danger everywhere. He tries to tell himself that he is safe. He is with Damon. But he cannot seem to believe it.
It is hard to feel safe. Even in Damon’s arms.
Lyr escaped Jareleezi and he escaped Attar. Six moons have waxed and waned since then and he has spent every night in Damon’s arms. And yet, and yet…
His nerves still force him to look out for terrors around every corner. Every time they go ashore he is wary, pressing close to Damon. Scanning crowds in markets in case he sees her. In case she somehow finds a way to take him back.
Jareleezi had been so sure that Lyr would set Damon on a path to her. She had been right about so many things. If she is right about that too, so long as Lyr is with Damon, he is destined to return to Jareleezi.
He has not told Damon about this. Damon would be tormented by a problem he could not solve. When Lyr dreams of Jareleezi he wakes screaming, thinking himself tied down in her chamber, skin burning as she chants over him. When he finds he is really in bed, in Damon’s arms, looking into Damon’s green eyes, dark with concern, he tells Damon he doesn’t remember his dreams, but he does.
She is still with him.
Jareleezi’s marks still cover his body. He will never be rid of them. And he finds himself wondering more and more, what does it say on his skin? What is he truly for?
What does his time with Jareleezi mean now he is far, far away from it?
Even like this, naked, pressed to Damon’s naked body, he can feel something is coming.
He shifts. It’s late and he’s sweetly, softly sleepy. Sleepy and in Damon’s arms. He tries to tell himself that there is no place he would rather be, but he is more worried for their future than ever. He presses closer.
Damon kisses the top of Lyr’s head and says, “Lukas wishes to return to Attar.”
Lyr looks up. Attar. It is coming now. He knows it. With Lukas here, what awaits them has become inevitable. “To kill Selim?” Lyr says, his voice neutral.
“I believe he still has some foolish plan to do so.” Damon sounds amused. His voice a deep rumble in the chest Lyr is pressed to.
“And you’re going to go with him, aren’t you?”
“I cannot let him go alone. Last time he attempted such a thing he only survived because I felt duty-bound to make sure of it.”
Lyr looks into Damon’s eyes. The colour of Damon’s eyes is his favourite colour in the world. The colour of the South Mortingale sea. The colour of that sea one particular day, when they’d stopped at a small unnamed island to take on water and while Trysta, Opeth and Razelii were gone Damon had bent Lyr over the ship’s rail and…
Damon’s tongue, his fingers, his cock…
Oh, that Lyr’s life could just be such pleasures.
But those days of the sparkling green sea and the southern sun and Damon’s growls of pleasure mixing with the distant calls of seabirds are coming to an end. That low hum of dread deep inside Lyr grows more and more insistent. He tries to quiet it, but he can’t.
Since Lukas arrived, it has been impossible. Lukas with his own strange stories of demons and destiny wake memories Lyr had hoped long buried. Lyr is sure, his fears are closer than ever.
“I know you wish to go to protect Lukas,” Lyr says cautiously, “But it is death for you to be in Attar.”
Damon smiles. “It is. But Lukas is reckless. He is still obsessed with undoing his past mistakes. But I do not go only to protect him. I must return. For I swore so to Doroth Zain.”
“Doroth Zain? He wanted you to go to Ismagaar.” Lyr does not mention Jareleezi. He tries not to say her name. She remains ever present without him speaking of her.
“More than that,” says Damon heavily. He runs his big hand across Lyr’s back. “I told him I would. I had to. I gave him my word.”
Lyr’s heart sinks. He knows very well what it means if Damon gave his word. He doesn’t imagine Damon has ever broken his word in his entire life. “You swore you would go to Ismagaar?”
Damon nods. He no longer seems amused. He looks solemn. “I had to. Lyr, I love you. You have my whole heart. But there are people I need to protect in Attar. Inez.”
Lyr nods. “Inez,” he echoes back. “Your wife.”
“No,” Damon says, soft and firm. “Inez is not my wife. Not in my heart and not under Azurian law. But there are things I must do to protect her from the Rose Court. She always protected us.”
Lyr nods. Damon is so deeply honourable. Lyr loves that about him. He loves the safety of knowing he can trust everything Damon says to him. But this makes him ache. Damon protects the people he loves. He’s going back, not just for Lukas, but for Inez. His wife. His beautiful wife.
But Lyr says nothing about that. He knows his old jealousy of Damon’s wife belongs to a different, more uncertain time, but there’s still a wound there. An old wound. It aches still if pressed upon.
Softly, Damon says, “I love you as I never loved her, never could have loved her. You must know this, Lyr. I would take you to wife if I could.”
“But you will return to Attar simply because you gave Doroth Zain your word that you would.”
“I did. The Rose Court wishes to marry Inez to Atticul. Doroth Zain swore to prevent it. In return, I promised Doroth Zain I would do as he wished. But there are other reasons we must return to Attar. Lukas has told me much that is strange. He believes Vindar has also tried to kill him. And the sword he has, it looks very similar to the Amber Blade. There is that strange tale of the man who bid him retrieve it from Lunatum. A man who spoke to him of Bellator demons rising in the Amber Forest and five fae brothers. He said one of those brothers would meet this demon in the Amber Forest. Tobi is with the Copperhead Players in Northern Azuria. Not far from the Amber Forest.”
Lyr takes a breath. He has heard what Lukas has said about the man he and Elric met in Lunatum. And it scares him. He knows the runes on his back contain things that echo what Lukas said that man told him and Elric. Old tales. Prophecies. The words in the Books of Alios that Emperor Selim wanted destroyed. Books Jareleezi has. He tries to keep his voice steady. “Five brothers with fae blood. The blood you and Lukas carry from the Hevelikar. Are you the five brothers? Do you know? Does your father have five sons?”
“Perhaps,” says Damon. “I believe my father has five bastard sons. Me, Lukas and Tobi. And then there is Kerik and the last one. Unnamed, but the reason I was indentured for twenty years.”
“Kerik?” Lyr frowns. “But Kerik is dead.”
“Kerik is missing,” says Damon. “He has been gone over five years. I was sure, after all we had discovered, that Vindar had disposed of him as he tried to dispose of me. It would have made sense for Vindar to rid himself of Kerik first. He was always the bastard son of my father’s who had the best claim to the royal line. But, now, I wonder if perhaps he is elsewhere. Perhaps Jareleezi found a way to draw him to her too.”
Lyr flinches at the name. He cannot hide it.
Damon notices. He puts a big hand on Lyr’s cheek, fingertips splayed wide. “I know what that witch did to you,” he says. “Lyr, please, you must know, it haunts me too. I understand you fear what she wants with me. But I swear to you, whatever happens, I will keep you safe.”
“And yourself,” says Lyr earnestly. “Will you keep yourself safe?” Because that is what is hard about loving a man like Damon. Damon who would run into a fire to protect those he loves.
How can a man like that protect the hearts of those who love him?
“Lyr,” Damon says. “I am the One Man Army.”
“Armies can be defeated,” Lyr says heavily.
Damon wraps his arms around Lyr and pulls him tight. Lyr feels the heat of Damon’s body. Damon’s body always feels a little hotter than it should. Like there is a great fire inside him. “Lyr,” Damon says, “Know this, my love, I gave Doroth Zain my word, but if you told me to break that word, I would. If that was what you wanted… Lyr, you could order me not to go and I would obey you. I am as much your slave as you are mine, and if you wished, you could order me as my Master not to go with Lukas to Attar, not to see Doroth Zain, not to keep my word and do as he bid me. For you, I would only obey. I would obey any command you gave me. But, know this too, my sweet slave, my great treasure won with blood, if I do go to Jareleezi to keep my promises to Doroth Zain, then I will do so happily. Lyr, if I go to her, know that it will mean her death, I promise you that. If I am to be drawn to her, then know that I will kill her. For what she did to you.”
Lyr looks at Damon, curiously. He is overwhelmed by what Damon has just said. He did not truly believe Damon was capable of breaking his word, even if Lyr insisted upon it. And although he does not want Damon to go anywhere near Jareleezi, there is part of him that would dearly love Damon to kill her. Perhaps then he would be free of her forever.
But there is more. Something else Lyr has been thinking about Jareleezi since Lukas and Elric arrived and he heard their stories. And what that might mean, it scares him more than the idea of Jareleezi herself. “Sometimes,” Lyr says softly. “I wonder if she was right.”
Damon frowns. “You think the witch that tormented you for years was right?”
Lyr nods, surprised to hear himself admit this. A thought from the darkest part of his mind. “Because of what we have learned from Lukas. It has made me wonder if she was right about the demon king she spoke of returning. And about you being the person who could destroy him. And what she did to me, to get to you, she did it because it was the only way she could do what had to be done. It seems there are people out there drawing both you and Lukas onto a path. Perhaps Jareleezi, and I, were part of it?” These are thoughts that have been taking shape in Lyr’s mind over the last few days. He’s been thinking about Doroth Zain and the Immurite. Thinking about Jareleezi and all she did. Truly he doesn’t know what it will mean to him to discover that he was, in Jareleezi’s eyes, some kind of necessary sacrifice to achieve a greater goal.
Damon sniffs. “If that is true I will still kill her for hurting you.”
The blunt simplicity of this statement startles Lyr. But the way Damon sees things so clearly sometimes stuns him. He stretches his neck to kiss Damon. “Good,” he says. Feeling a calm wash over him and his heart quieting like it hasn’t for days. “But I think to discover more, we ought to find someone who can read what it says on my back. The messages her Gods sent through me are part of this. If we found someone who could read it, then we might know for sure if you and Lukas are on a path to defeat the demon king.”
Damon nods. “If we hadn’t been in so much danger in Attar, I would have taken you to the Hare. He can read Ur-Ambolk. Perhaps if we return to the Rose Palace, I will seek him out for you.”
“We might not need to,” says Lyr. “Elric, your brother’s lover, he looked at me the first night they arrived, when I walked into the galley, the way he looked at my chest… I think he could read the runes there. Perhaps he can read my back too.”
“Elric?” Damon sounds surprised, as well he might.
“I know he does not look like a scholar,” Lyr says.
“He does not,” says Damon. “He looks like the only thought in his head is about my brother’s cock.”
“Darek cocks are very distracting,” Lyr says sweetly. “I ought to know.”
Damon makes a soft growling noise and presses his lips to Lyr's. The kiss he takes is sweet, but Lyr knows when Damon kisses sweetly he does not always have sweet thoughts in his head. When the kiss breaks, Damon says, “Then we will speak with him, if we can pry him from my brother’s bed. But before that, it sounds like you might need to be distracted by a Darek cock.”
Lyr feels Damon’s low, seductive voice rumble through him. He knows something is coming. Something they must prepare for. Something bigger than palace intrigue or imperial conquest. And he is scared of what he might discover about his true part in all of it.
But he has Damon and he knows Damon’s body will be the thing that protects him from whatever will come. And before that, he will take the distractions offered by Damon’s body as Damon rolls him onto his belly, spreads him and begins to run a hot, slick tongue down his spine, with a familiar growl of pleasure.