Chapter 14 #3
Cedric chuckled, folding his arms across his chest as he watched Finn take in the sight. “It is.”
Finn continued to study the moon, brow furrowed in quiet concentration. “I knew it had splotches on it. But I never knew they looked like that.”
“Craters,” Cedric said softly. “Those are called craters.”
Finn pulled back to look at him, eyes glinting with something between curiosity and admiration. “How do you know all this?”
Cedric cleared his throat. “Gwenna and I have been studying the sky for years. And that’s not all.” He gestured toward the telescope. “Before you came here, we were tracking some of the nearby planets. Did you know they have moons, too?”
Finn blinked, clearly caught off guard. “I thought everything up there was just…stars.”
Cedric grinned, shaking his head. “There’s so much more than meets the eye.”
He sat down on the low wall that lined the top of the tower, cool stone pressing into his palms. A quiet thrill rippled through him when Finn stepped away from the telescope and sat down nearby.
For a time, they simply sat there, the silence between them comfortable rather than strained. The sky stretched above them, glittering with a thousand tiny lights, as if the universe itself was listening.
Then Finn spoke, his voice quieter now. “Speaking of more than meets the eye…” Cedric tensed. “Can I ask you something else?”
Cedric exhaled slowly, forcing himself to nod. “Go ahead.”
Finn hesitated, as if carefully choosing his words. “Why did you give up being a prince? I mean, I know you said it was to protect Gwenna, but...was there more to it?”
Cedric stilled.
He could lie. He’d done it before. But for some reason, tonight, he wanted to offer a small truth.
A long pause stretched between them before Cedric finally said, “Part of it was for Gwenna, yes.” His voice was even, which said more about his spectacular ability to suppress his emotions than anything else. “But…there was another reason.”
He swallowed. A truth too long buried fought its way to the surface. Cedric half expected Finn to cut in with a barb, but the knight only watched him, really listening. “When everything fell apart, my parents were preparing to announce my betrothal to Princess Cassara Marovelle.”
“She’s Revendarian, right?” Finn asked.
Cedric took a slow, calming breath. “Yes. It was supposed to strengthen our alliance with Revendar, to keep the Avalisians from creeping in at their borders. And more than that, it would have secured access to their Revendarian steel.”
The knight cocked his head. “That would have been a huge benefit for us.”
“Yes,” Cedric agreed, then cleared his throat before continuing.
“But after the attack…everything changed. And when the people wanted someone to blame, they looked to Revendar. My marriage—our peace—burned to the ground with my parents. If I had stayed, they might have forced it anyway, but it wouldn’t have mattered. ”
By the furrow of Finn’s brow, he understood the connection immediately. “Ah. I’ve done my fair share of time at the border. Not right to marry you off to a kingdom half the realm thinks is the enemy, anyway.”
Cedric’s jaw clenched. He wanted to blurt, I think Revendar is innocent, but that would lead to far too many questions.
So instead, he sidestepped to another aspect of the issue.
“Even without that, I wasn’t looking forward to such a marriage.
Even if the treaty had held, it wouldn’t have been right—to her or to me.
I’m not interested in princesses. Or any women, for that matter. ”
He braced himself for Finn’s reaction. He glanced at the knight’s face. And what he saw wasn’t judgment. Wasn’t surprise. Just…understanding.
“I see,” Finn said simply. Then, after a beat, he added, “I’m attracted to both men and women myself.”
Cedric hadn’t expected that. He blinked, searching Finn’s expression for any hint of jest, but there was none—just quiet honesty.
“…Oh.” Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant response, Cedric.
Finn chuckled, shaking his head. “You look like I just told you I’ve got three heads.”
Cedric let out a small breath, something like a chuckle caught at the edges. “No, I…just didn’t expect you to say that.”
Finn leaned back, arms resting on the stone ledge. “Well, I don’t exactly announce it in every tavern I visit. But…I figured you should know.”
Cedric wasn’t sure what to say about that. Did he want to know? Yes. Did it complicate things? Also yes.
The star-dappled sky stretched wide and endless, but Finn was right there. Close enough that Cedric could feel his warmth, even with space between them.
He should look away. He should say something. Something safe, something neutral.
Instead, he looked at Finn.
Really looked at him.
The way the moonlight softened the sharp angles of his face. The quiet steadiness in his eyes, like he wasn’t expecting anything—but he wasn’t running from this either.
“…Thank you,” Cedric murmured. The words felt too small for what he meant, but they were all he had.
Finn’s gaze searched his, as if trying to read between the lines. “For what?”
For telling me. For trusting me. For making me feel—gods, I don’t even know what I’m feeling. But all Cedric said was, “For being here.”
The wind whispered around them, cool against Cedric’s flushed skin. Finn’s lips parted slightly. The quiet between them wasn’t empty—it was heavy and charged.
Finn was so close now. Close enough that Cedric could see the way his breath slowed, the way his pupils dilated, the way his hand—resting so casually on the ledge—clenched, as if resisting the urge to move.
It would be so easy. Too easy. And yet, the thought of closing that distance didn’t feel reckless. It didn’t feel like a mistake.
It felt inevitable.
Before Cedric could overthink it, he swooped in. His hand came up to cup Finn’s jaw, the knight’s stubble rough against his palm. Their lips met in a tentative brush that quickly turned into more when Finn responded.
He leaned in, deepening the kiss, and Cedric felt as if he might catch fire from the inside out. The world narrowed, the cold night air vanishing beneath the searing heat blazing through him.
Finn’s hand came up, fingers tangling in Cedric’s long hair. He memorized the way Finn tasted, the way he breathed against him, the way every worry, every wall, every carefully kept secret momentarily melted away into nothingness.
For the first time in years, Cedric allowed himself to forget. To want. To simply feel.
The warmth of Finn’s lips still burned against Cedric’s own when reality returned, as sudden as a kick to the head.
He jerked back, air punching from his lungs. His back hit the cold stone, hands splayed as if to brace against the world tilting beneath him. His breath came hard, ragged, like he’d been running.
Idiot.
Cedric’s pulse roared in his ears, drowning out the sounds of the night. “I’m sorry,” he choked out, the words like ash on his tongue. What have I done?
Finn’s hand caught his. “Don’t apologize.” Finn’s voice was gravel wrapped in velvet, low enough to make Cedric’s traitorous heart lurch. “I wanted that, too.”
Cedric’s heart soared at those words—and promptly plummeted, torn between impossible hope and crushing dread. The unshaken look in Finn’s eyes carved through him, deep and aching. Cedric wanted to believe it. Gods, he wanted.
He wanted to pull Finn in again, to drown in the warmth of him, to forget for just one more moment that he was a monster. But his mind screamed at him to stop. To protect them both.
“Finn, I...” His voice fractured. The confession tore at him—dragon, curse, monster—but fear sealed his lips, cold as iron shackles. ”There’s so much you don’t know about me.”
“Then tell me.” Finn’s thumb traced the curve of Cedric’s palm. ”Whatever it is, you can trust me.”
Tell him how your bones snap and reshape at dawn. How the very tower we stand on blurs into clouds beneath your wings.
How you scorched your own parents to cinders.
Cedric’s golden-brown hair clung to his damp temples as he shook his head, hard, too hard, like he could shake off the truth itself. A loose strand caught on his lashes. He swiped it away, voice little more than a whisper. “I can’t.”
He wrenched his hand free. The sudden absence of contact like a bruise.
Finn’s face fell. Not anger. Not rejection. Just…hurt. A flinch, quick as a spark before resolve hardened his features. “Whatever you’re hiding...whatever you’re afraid of...it doesn’t change how I feel about you.”
Cedric’s throat closed. How I feel about you.
The words were a lance through Cedric’s chest. He lurched away, boots scraping against grit-strewn flagstones.
You’d drive a sword through my heart if you knew.
His laugh came out brittle, edged with hysteria. “You don’t know what you’re saying.” Cedric turned away, wishing in that moment to sprout his dragon wings so he could fly far away. ”You don’t know me. Not really.”
“Then let me know you—” The knight stepped forward, the plea in his voice almost undoing Cedric completely. “Cedric, please…”
But Cedric was already backing away, shaking his head, his breath coming too fast, too ragged. “I’m sorry, Finn. I truly am. But this…whatever this is between us…it can’t happen.”
It was a mercy, he told himself. A clean cut, before Finn could get any closer. Before he could figure out the truth.
Before Cedric ruined everything.
Finn’s expression twisted, as if he wanted to argue, but Cedric didn’t wait to hear what he had to say. He pivoted, his boots thudding against the stone floor as he fled down the spiral staircase.
By the time he pushed through the tower’s door and into the night, he didn’t know where to go.
The stars spun overhead, sharp and cold against the dark sky.
He was suffocating. His skin itched with the reminder that morning would come all too soon, that the transformation would rip through him once more, shattering the fragile pieces of his humanity.
The stables.
Without thinking, he stumbled inside, pressing himself against the rough wooden wall as a strangled sound escaped his throat—half a sob, half a breath he couldn’t quite catch.
Stupid. Stupid. He had let himself hope.
Let himself believe, just for a moment, that there was a future where Finn could see him—all of him—and not turn away in disgust.
He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, as if he could scrub away the memory of Finn’s warmth, the way his lips had felt right, like something Cedric had been missing his entire life.
What a fool he had been.
Because there was no future.
Not for him. Not for them.
Cedric had been lying to himself, and worse, he had strung Finn along with him, letting him believe this could be something real. But it wasn’t. It couldn’t be.
Maybe it would have been easier if Finn had killed the dragon, just as he was meant to.