Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
‘Dance with me,’ the man said.
How thankful the Fox was, then,
for their spirit-silk body –
their gift to slip from form to form –
for human hands and human legs had never
until that night
made sense before.
The Fox’s Tears,
translated by Idwal gan Hywel
SEVENTEEN
Meilyr’s body responded. There was urgency in Osian’s voice, in his very being. Something almost possessive that sent too-pleasant heat roiling through him.
Osian stepped in more to Meilyr’s side and moved the grip on his waist and hands to mimic the starting position of one of the dances Harlan had hammered into Meilyr’s muscles – thankfully not far from several festival dances, though slower and more formal.
At the next appropriate bar of the song, they began.
The prince with his arm bracing Meilyr’s back, chin close to his hair.
What had just happened? How were his feet supposed to move? He nearly fumbled the first switch in footwork leading into a spin, but Osian led him through it, and their eyes met as the new steps brought them face-to-face.
Osian’s earnestness blistered through their woven bond. Through their shared blood, their clasped hands, and their contact. The prince was agitated.
Meilyr wanted to ask what had happened, but at the next change of the song – before he could – the prince pulled him against his chest, in a step that did not belong in this sequence. Their temples brushed, and Osian spoke into his ear: hot and close.
‘Forgive me. Lord Gelens is an Ectheid.’
Fear blanched Meilyr, sharp and icy. Over the prince’s shoulder, he saw the king’s adviser watching him with a cool, pleased smile. He looked away. Trembled as Osian held him in the slow turn of the dance. ‘An Ectheid…?’
Ectheid. Seers whose power and schooling were tied to Raak, south-east of Khaim, beyond the Sea of Spires.
It was said an Ectheid could read the truth from the eyes of anyone they touched, so long as that touch was given freely: a cousin-magic to weaving, but far more exacting.
Meilyr could garner emotion, but Ectheid read thought.
Magic legitimised by Khaim’s rule, because it could be useful to them.
Lord Gelens was an Ectheid. And Meilyr had willingly touched their hand.
Bile climbed his throat. He clung to Osian. Had Lord Gelens learned of his magic? Had they learned of Celyn? Oh, gods—
‘Breathe.’ Osian’s voice was a breath of air in the drowning tide. He held Meilyr against him, steadfast and solid. ‘It is only surface thoughts in the moments after contact. Focus on me. Only on me.’
Meilyr closed his eyes tight and pushed into their bond. Into the steadiness of the prince: his body, his breathing. He was anxious too, despite his words, though he was forcing it away.
His desire to protect Meilyr was like the sun against his skin, so genuine it hitched his breath.
Their eyes met again as the prince drew them into the last position of the dance. The end of the song burst into applause and sound – oh, people had watched them. People still watched, including Lord Gelens.
A high, whining sound threaded through Meilyr’s skull.
Would they have to return to the crowd? What if the king’s adviser tried to speak to him? What if someone else wanted to dance with him?
Osian stepped back, bowed and kissed his hand.
The floor tilted. Heat crawled inside Meilyr’s too-tight collar, and the voices in the hall – all the voices – muffled.
His vision cracked. Just like after the hunt. Next, he would—
Osian slid his arm around his waist and led him past the dancers, beyond the gathered guests, towards the open doors at the side of the hall.
‘Majesty,’ Meilyr tried, little more than a catch of his lungs.
‘Hold on. Just a moment longer.’
The cool air struck his fevered flesh. There were people on the balconies, but the prince slipped through them, Meilyr propped up in his arms, away from the noise and the light, down several sets of steps.
Across soft grass that gave a little under their boots, further, and up a different set of narrow stone steps, into the isolated folly overlooking the fragrant rear gardens and the sea.
Where he deposited Meilyr gently onto a stone bench and knelt, hands firm in his. ‘Breathe, Meilyr. Breathe.’
Meilyr’s head tipped forward, and he breathed. Sharp, shuddering breaths. Had it not been for the immovable Osian before him and the cool, steady stone, he would have lost consciousness.
Damn the awful sensation where his nerves ripped his body to pieces. Damn it.
Slowly, the screech in his skull dropped. Sound came back, night-birds and wind. The wave of fire washed through him, leaving him empty and shivering with cold sweat. Boneless, picked clean on the shore.
Osian’s hands were wonderfully warm, clamped in his.
With a slow strike of shock, Meilyr remembered himself. Saw and felt how the aromatic wisteria, draped around the open arches of the folly, had begun to open and curl inwards behind Osian, towards them both.
‘Do not move,’ the prince said firmly, with care.
He had not noticed, thank the gods. ‘Majesty,’ Meilyr began.
‘If you ask for forgiveness for something out of your control…’ The prince did not need to finish. ‘Take the time you need.’
Meilyr let the protest slip away. It was not hard. He trembled, wretchedly, no matter how he tried to bite it back. Damn this weakness, here of all places.
The prince squeezed his hands, then gently pried his own free as he rose. To Meilyr’s horror, he unfastened his own belt and the exquisite silk tunic that fell to his knees, shrugged it off and laid it over Meilyr’s lap.
It, too, was wonderfully warm.
‘Majesty—’
‘Take your time.’
Meilyr wanted to liquefy through the bench into the earth. ‘I cannot—’
‘You can.’ That gentle not-command, agonizingly earnest.
Everything in Meilyr wanted to object, except his flesh, which sighed with traitorous relief at that damned pool of indigo silk in his lap. He gave up and pulled the tunic higher over his arms and chest, waiting for the sword to fall.
But the prince only stood, in his finely embroidered ivory-and-gold under-tunic, meeting his gaze.
The wisteria had settled, heavy heads bobbing lightly amidst the colourful frescoes that marked the internal walls of the folly: nature scenes, wild animals, sympathetic people. ‘Do you require a physician?’
‘No,’ Meilyr answered immediately. ‘No. Forgive me, Majesty.’
Osian tilted his head.
Meilyr closed his mouth. Opened it again. ‘That merely… took me by surprise. What you said.’ An Ectheid.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’
Meilyr focused on the gold embroidery covering him, his daft shivering calming.
‘It was merely the wine, I think.’ A lie.
The wine had not helped, but sometimes when his nerves pushed towards breaking point, his body simply capsized.
A traitorous infliction he had suffered since adolescence, similar to what had happened on the hunt.
‘Yes, I want to talk about them. Forgive—’
He caught himself.
There was no reprimand in Osian’s eyes, only understanding.
The prince glanced towards the terraces, voice lowered.
‘My father will have sent Lord Gelens to investigate Lord Leighton’s death.
I should have foreseen this; he detests sorcery above all things.
There is no other reason he would agree to such a minimal public response. ’
The wind picked up. The wisteria shrank.
‘Hopefully they can find the killer?’ Meilyr asked, chilled fingers deep in fine silk.
‘Yes. I am thankful your brother has returned home.’
So was Meilyr.
The prince’s concern persisted, surprisingly reassuring.
Yet it had not fully chased away the other things Osian had felt in the Throne Room, and Meilyr found himself staring at the way he looked out through the flowers, his hands bunched, fingers tightly twisting the red-jewelled ring on his thumb.
‘Why did you and your brother choose to leave Gorsedd Arian? Why come to Eascild?’
The question almost pitched Meilyr sideways. ‘What?’
The prince flexed his hand. ‘No matter, I did not mean to pry. I only…’
Meilyr took another steadying breath and found the truth pressing softly at the roof of his mouth, ready to bud. ‘Idwal, Celyn’s father. It was his dying wish that I take over his sister, Lowri’s, apothecary. I had spent months of most years of my life here before that, apprenticed to her.’
Once, the idea of living in Eascild had been near petrifying. But he could not have denied his foster-father’s final hope.
Something came into Osian’s gaze, and even the bond could not help Meilyr decipher it. ‘I see,’ the prince said quietly. Hesitation built in the wake of whatever it was he felt. ‘There is one other thing. Gelens may also have been sent to confirm our marriage.’
Meilyr had guessed that, but it chilled him again to hear it confirmed. ‘So, we need to convince them. How do we convince an Ectheid?’
‘They will consider what they witness almost as much as what they are able to touch. If we continue to convince the court, it may be enough.’
Would it be?
‘Surface thoughts,’ Meilyr mused. ‘That was why you pulled me away.’
A flash of guilt. ‘I had to tell you. Gelens’ abilities are not common knowledge, and they use that to their advantage.’
What an advantage it was. Meilyr did not ever want to touch the king’s adviser again, but court provided so many ridiculous situations where it would be considered odd or rude not to. An Ectheid made for an irreplaceable tool to the Crown.
There was only one thing for it. He pushed himself unsteadily off the bench and handed back the tunic. ‘Then, we convince them. All of them.’
But he swayed, and the prince steadied him under his arms. ‘They can be convinced in a moment, please.’