Chapter 24
Absolution Day.
The only time when Kinlear felt he shined inside the Citadel, if only because he was plenty prepared to do as he pleased. It was just a bonus that tonight he wouldn’t have to pay any penance.
He entered the training room to find it transformed. Music flowed from the right, where a group of musicians plucked at stringed instruments, making his steps feel strangely light.
Today...perhaps today...he would be brave enough to push a little further with Ezer. Perhaps he could step a little closer to toeing that delicate line between friends and future.
He’d dressed in simple finery today, a pale velvet suit with gold eagle wings stitched into the front pocket, though he chose his mask with care.
He’d picked out a wolf...for Ezer.
Not because she was scarred by one, but because he saw it as a symbol.
Because this wolf?
She had already defeated him.
He was hers to claim the victory over, and he was ready and willing to bend a knee to her... even before they’d ever laid eyes on one another in person.
His heart was practically beating out of his chest as he searched the room for Ezer now, knowing she would be here tonight. Izill had let that little bit of information slip, after she’d come to deliver Kinlear his mask.
“Be careful, Prince,” the servant had warned him, as she’d left his room. “With her heart and yours.”
He’d just held out his gloved hands, winked, and said, “am I ever anything but?”
Now, he was buzzing with energy.
He hadn’t felt this good in weeks, and the music practically flowed through his veins.
Debauchery. It was one of Kinlear’s favorite things, bless him, particularly when it came with a free pass.
He quickly grabbed a goblet of winterwine as a servant skirted by.
He downed the entire thing in three gulps, then moved past his people, his cane pounding in time to the beat.
Lovers -- forbidden, except for today -- were already embracing in every shadowed corner of the room. His stomach did a little flip as he imagined himself there with Ezer.
Slow, he told himself, though every part of his body objected. You will go slow until she leads the way.
He set down his goblet on another tray, head already buzzing, and was just getting ready to circle back towards the enormous window-wall when the crowd parted.
He swore it was a moment gifted straight from the gods of romance novels, for a beam of fractured evening sun suddenly shone through the windows, pushing past the frosted panes until it landed on her.
His entire body went taut.
Because the Raphonminder?
She. Was. Glorious.
She was dressed in all white, like any good Sacred, but her braid was loose. Her dark hair hung in delicate waves to her back, and her small Absolution mask was red.
Red to match the desire that flared in his chest.
She could have been the most pious Sacred in the room, until she turned, searching for a familiar face. And in that moment, he caught sight of the back of her dress.
Well...hell, Kinlear thought, as his eyes widened.
He’d be damned if he didn’t admit he’d just gasped.
Her dress left very little to the imagination.
It was made of soft white silk, caressing her every perfect curve in a way that had his fingers gripping his cane a bit harder.
..if only to hold himself back from the need to run them across her skin.
As the waning sunlight caught it, she sparkled.
As if her skin had a sprinkle of delicate stars painted upon it.
He could see all the way down to the small of her back, a perfect dip he remembered touching in his dreams. How he longed to run his hands across her now, pull her close, press her against the wall of this training room and claim her with his tongue and his teeth.
Soon, his mind promised him.
But he’d go to that godsdamned cave in the darkness right now if he could. He’d walk all the way across the Expanse if it meant they’d get to that moment sooner.
Kinlear Laroux wasn’t impressed easily.
But today...he couldn’t have removed his eyes from her if dared.
And he most certainly did not dare.
If anything, he was wasting precious time before another suitor swept her up. He followed the crowd until he made it to her, cleared his throat, and said, “I thought I was the only one capable of looking so fine in both black and white. And yet...here you are.”
She spun...and smiled. A true smile, without any shadows in her eyes. “You clean up well enough, Prince Laroux.”
She looked relieved to see him, as if she’d been searching for someone to be close and comfortable with, and he was more than happy to be it, to carry that burden for her, but then...she leaned in...and sniffed him.
“Though...there’s a lingering scent of something strange upon you,” she said.
He almost panicked until he caught the playful lilt to her voice.
“Is that...war bear?”
He grinned, lifting his chin.
“Oh, it’s something far worse,” he said, and winked as he held out his arm to her.
She took it, the press of her hand against his elbow so perfectly sweet.
He led her about the space, his cane clacking almost in time with the music.
And as he walked, he leaned in close, as if he were sharing a secret.
“I heard a rumor there’s a strange and deadly beast hiding in this very castle.
” His lips nearly grazed her ear as he whispered, “A raphon.”
“No,” Ezer gasped, and feigned surprise. “Surely there must be someone to mind it?”
“Oh, there is, My Lady,” Kinlear said. “A fine Raphonminder. The best there ever was—”
“The only,” Ezer corrected him, but he lifted a finger and continued.
“She is strong and brave and a little bit feisty, as Raphonminders should be. But rest assured. She’s brought back down to earth by the brutally handsome assassin she’s rumored to train it with.”
“Brutally handsome?” Ezer asked and lifted a brow beneath her mask. “Are you certain?”
“Certain as death,” Kinlear said. “They say he’s so handsome one can hardly look upon him without drooling into their winterwine.”
At that, she laughed and held onto his arm a bit tighter.
And her body slid a bit closer.
And he could not fathom a world in which this Raphonminder, bold as she was, would not go with him into the dark.
Their future was swift on its way. He was just about to push a little further, ask her to dance with him, when suddenly his eyes latched on to a monster in the crowd.
His twin.
Arawn approached, looking so godsdamned handsome Kinlear could have been sick. From his suit to his fiery mask to his muscles...
He came straight toward them. A solid presence to part the sea of Sacred. Kinlear tensed beside Ezer, his only anchor the fact that her hand was still in the crook of his arm.
Don’t let go, he wanted to tell her.
Because as Arawn approached, he was suddenly transported back to another night. Another Absolution, when it was not Ezer on his arm, but Soraya.
He’d commissioned a dress just for her, gold to match the glittering feathers of her war eagle. It had long, flowing sleeves, but a tight bodice, and war eagle wings runed to glow on the back.
As if she were an angel, something far too magnificent for him. He’d planned to sweep her off her feet into the night, winterwine lulling them both into a dark alcove, kisses upon swollen lips, and then later, back to his room.
But his illness had other plans, as that bastard so often did.
He’d only made it a few dances into the night with her, spinning her in his arms, kissing her neck the way he so loved, when his cough came on strong.
He sat down, but it was dark in the training room, and full of bodies and music and joy. There was so much godsdamned joy, from people his own age that were living, that weren’t burdened by an internal monster that sought his early death...
So, he’d excused himself.
He hadn’t yet told Soraya the truth of his illness, though she knew, of course, how his health burdened him. But she didn’t know the way it would end, that every day he felt nearer to his own death. At this rate, he would die long before she did, even with her using her magic.
He didn’t want her to know. He couldn’t bear it if she did...so he’d come up with a lie that he’d drank too much. That he just needed to go to sleep for a while.
They had matching masks, red filigree that made Soraya look, for all the world, like a treasure.
“We get one day to be free, Kinlear,” she’d said. “One day...and you’re just going to walk out early? Walk out on me?”
He was going to be sick.
But she couldn’t see him like this, because then she’d think him weak and insignificant, and— no. He could taste blood on his tongue. His chest was rumbling, the illness flaring, ready to erupt, and the room began to spin.
He muttered an answer, nearly tripped over his own cane as he’d left the dance floor like it was on fire.
And now?
Now...Kinlear knew he never should have left her behind.
He’d broken a part of her that night.
He’d abandoned her in favor of his illness.
He’d made it halfway up the stairs, sweat beading across his bow, when a little whisper in the back of his mind had hissed, “What if she’s already found someone else?
It’s Absolution, after all. Betrothed or not, she could decide to choose another man to be free with.
..and she’d face no true punishment. She could lie to you about it, too, Little Prince. ..and you would never know.”
He had vomited in a potted plant, the work of a Realmist, no doubt. He hoped, at least, it was his mother’s.
And then, despite himself, Kinlear had turned back around that night, wincing with each step. He knew he would regret it, because what if he passed out right there in the stairwell? But he couldn’t just leave her there, all alone.
He’d burst through the doors, breathless and aching, ready to apologize and explain himself, as best as he could...
But he paused the moment he saw her.