The Price of Freedom (Heirs of the Empire #2)

32. Damon

Luxol, Luxoria’s great city, on Alios Day is hot and damp. The air is heavy. Damon likes it here. He likes the feel of the hot sun on his bare shoulders and the back of his neck. And the climate is just one small reason.

It was Opeth’s idea to make a stop here. They need to take on water and buy provisions. Elric, Lukas’s noisy excitable lover is delighted. As soon as they go ashore his green eyes are wide as saucers. He takes Lukas and drags him off towards a stall selling calcis birds in cages, their dog dancing at their feet.

The market in Luxol sells bright lush fruits. Opeth seems to know them and urges Lyr and Razelii to try the pale flesh of a strange-looking prickly yellow gourd. It tastes so sour and sweet at once it shocks Damon’s senses. The air smells of spices and charring meat.

The people wear bright silks. There are many people in only hip cloths as brief as Lyr’s. Amongst the crowds, men walk arm in arm with other men, women with other women. Damon enjoys wandering in the hot sun with Lyr on his arm, listening to the cries of traders in every language he knows and many more he doesn’t.

Perhaps one day, Damon thinks, when all he needs to do is done, he will return here. He will live a sweet life in this baking heat with good food, in a place where the truth of his heart is not something he must hide.

But they are not here for Luxoria’s climate or its strange food or its famed tolerance of sins of the body. They are here because of something Opeth suggested to Damon.

Damon knows Lyr’s heart is still twisted about their return to Attar. And no one understands the heart as well as Opeth. When Damon asked her how he could make Lyr feel safe and calm. She suggested something Damon had not thought possible.

Something possible only in Luxoria. Where, it seems, almost anything is.

It’s almost sunset when Opeth takes them to the water gardens of Luxol. They are all well fed and merry on a strange strong wine, red as blood and sweet as honey, that Opeth explained was the speciality of Luxoria. The name of the wine is hard to pronounce. Duletiach, Damon thinks it is called. Something like that. The word sounds better when Lyr says it.

Elric, Damon thinks, has had a little too much of it. His mouth is stained dark and as they made their way to the water garden he was unsteady on his feet as he leant on Lukas. Lukas chides him for stumbling and stops to drink kisses every time he does so. Elric moans shamelessly to be kissed, like a virgin maid who has never had his lips given such attention before. Damon wonders if Elric stumbles so often on purpose.

In the water gardens, Opeth bids Damon stand in the cool shade of a small archway of black stone, heavy with bright purple flowers. The blooms are still open wide for the last of the Alios Day sun. The stamens inside are bright orange and dusted with yellow pollen.

Lukas and Trysta are standing next to Damon, waiting with him. Lukas says, “I never thought I’d see this.”

Damon looks at him. “I’ve done it before.”

Lukas shakes his head. “No,” he says, “you haven’t.” He runs his left hand over the curve of his hook.

Trysta nods and says, “Not with your true heart.”

Before Damon and Lukas is a wide shallow pool of water, glittering, turning orange in the light of the setting sun. Alios Night, the shortest night of the year, has almost begun. Beyond the pool is a small pavilion made of woven grasses. Eventually, from the curtained door of that pavilion, Opeth appears, leading Lyr, with Elric and Razelii and the small black dog processing behind.

Lyr is wearing a lace chiton over his hip cloth. The threads are white silk, so fine they seem to glitter with every colour in the world. He looks so beautiful Damon thinks his heart might seize. Lyr. Lyr smiling shyly at Damon.

Zai, was there ever anything so beautiful in this world as his warprize, his slave?

His unwanted gift, a treasure for a lifetime.

Lyr’s cheeks blush pink as Opeth leads him past the pool to Damon.

When they reach the stone arch, Opeth says, “Master Damon Darekul, I present to you, Lyr of Klish. And I ask you now, is he the centre of your heart?”

Damon takes hold of Lyr, wrapping each of his hands around Lyr’s forearms. His throat is so thick. His eyes are prickling. “He is.”

“Damon,” Lyr says in a whisper, “I can’t believe this. Are we really doing this?”

Damon nods, “If you will it, I would make you mine.”

Lyr nods, shakily, “Damon, yes,” he says, “more than anything.”

Opeth says, “Lyr of Klish, this man is Master Damon Darekul, is he the centre of your heart?”

“Yes,” Lyr says, then adds in Magaar. “He is my everything.” Lyr’s voice always sounds even sweeter when he speaks Magaar.

Opeth conducts the brief ceremony. She explained to Damon when she offered to do this, that the ceremony she knows is Voluptuan. These are the Voluptuan wedding words, but she speaks them in Artemian.

People in the water gardens stop to watch. This place in Luxol is one of the only places in the world where sly weddings are solemnised. Even here, they are rare enough that people gather to watch.

Damon’s last wedding had been in the Rose Palace. Ordained by Doroth Zain. Inez had been a mystery to him then, veiled in white and pale yellow. A woman he barely knew and did not want, but was bound to forever in the eyes of Zai. Until the Rose Court declared the marriage was never true.

This, this is so different.

Damon remembers the words he said before the Justice in the Hall of Twelve.

“I am sly. The Juran whore is my lover. He is to me as a wife. If I were able to set the Lady Inez aside and take him before Zai, I would. I am bound to him as close as any person of my blood kin. I take my pleasure from his body and I love him above all others.”

Those words, Damon thinks, are the truest he has ever spoken.

Opeth calls on the ancient twin Gods to bless them. Alios and Gaari. She calls for true witness from all of the Sidu. Damon gazes into Lyr’s blue eyes, deep endless blue. Beautiful blue. He owns Lyr. They own each other.

When Opeth asks Damon what he wishes to declare, he goes to his knees before Lyr and says, “Lyr, my love, I am as much your slave as you ever were mine. I will always protect you above all others. I give all that I am to you.” He has not said much, but he finishes almost choking on his tears.

Lyr looks down at Damon with glassy eyes. Softly he says, “Damon, I love you. I knew your name before I met you. I was sent to you by great powers. I was always meant to be yours. But even if I had met you in the market square, like any other man, I would love you as deeply. You are the truest and most honourable man I have ever met.”

Damon stands. He strokes his thumb over Lyr’s cheek and kisses him. He knows there are people all around him, Lukas and Trysta at his side, Elric and Razelii behind Lyr. And more watching, crowded around by the pool. But he feels like he is alone with Lyr, alone with Lyr in all the world.

When they leave, walking past the pool, people stop Damon to congratulate him.

One man takes his forearm, holds it in a tight grip. He is heavy built and with a face that has easily seen more than fifty summers. He says, “Blessings for your union, Damon Darekul.”

Damon thanks him.

But as he goes to move along, the man says, “Please, introduce me to your friends.”

Damon stops and looks at the man. Behind him, Elric says softly, “Oh, Zai. No. It cannot be.”

Lukas says, “Lordling?”

Damon says, “I would introduce you happily, but I do not know your name.” But as he says that, something prickles at the back of his mind. He does. He knows this man.

Lyr laughs and says, “Oh.” he leans in close, “Damon…”

Damon looks at Lyr and then over his shoulder and exchanges a puzzled glance with Lukas. Lyr and Elric know who this man is and seem quite amused that Damon and Lukas do not.

Elric’s voice is bell-bright. “That’s your uncle, bastard,” he says to Lukas. “Do you not see how he looks like you and Damon both? Look at his eyes.”

It’s Opeth who extends a hand to the man, saying, “Delighted to meet you, Your Imperial Majesty, Emperor Markus.”