A Suitable Consort

(for the King and his Husband) 

R. Cooper

Copyright 2021 R. Cooper

All Rights Reserved

ISBN 9781005393137

Cover art by Lyn Forester

Content tags: polyamorous and polygamous culture, on-page sex, threesome, on page-drinking, references to past violence including executions, off-page death, assassination attempts, discussion of past trauma and PTSD, class snobbery

Table of Contents

Beginning

Middle

Epilogue

The End

“If His Highness is so preoccupied by the concerns of the court, perhaps he should consider finding a new consort suited to handle such matters.” 

The statement resonated through an abruptly silent council chamber, and hung, shivering, in the air like an icicle primed to fall. Mattin thought the temperature of the chamber itself dropped as the silence continued for one more moment, then one more, then another. He imagined he would have seen his breath—had he dared to breathe—despite the multiple braziers lining the walls to keep those at the wide, round table warm in the winter chill. 

The windows had been thrown open before the council had met, for light, and perhaps to keep the air fresher than it might have been in a room filled with nobles who smelled of perfumed hair oils and a few guards in their leathers. The draft that reached Mattin in a back corner was still crisp, though nothing to the icy quiet from the one now watched so carefully by the entire council. 

Mattin did not look to find who had spoken; he knew the voice, although he would have never expected the man to make such a bold, insulting statement. Not to the king’s face, anyway. It was a wonder he had not also called the king Traitor, as some still did. 

Per Tyrabalith, of a family so old as to have been one of the original Earls, centuries upon centuries ago, and also of a family unhappy with the way the dust had settled in recent years. Of course, he and his relatives had taken almost no action after the old queen’s murder, or during the subsequent decades of scheming and confusion and constantly changing rulers.  

Not that Mattin could blame anyone for that, seeing as Mattin had never held a sword in his life, but there had probably been chances those of the Tyrabalith could have taken before or during those years of chaos if the throne was of such interest to them. They felt it owed them, more like, as some did. As if that sort of attitude hadn’t been the cause of so many years of tension and spilled blood, or the reason Jola of the Canamorra had once been a prisoner in this very palace, an event many still regarded as a disgrace.

Coveting a thing was a great deal easier than grabbing it and holding onto it, as the past years should have taught anyone with sense. But then, Mattin did not think Per Tyrabalith even helped to run his family’s estates, choosing instead to stay in the capital and act insulting and self-important during council meetings. Per Tyrabalith would know little of the stresses of rule on such a scale.  

Mattin made a note to himself to investigate this further whenever he had a moment, before he at last risked a look across the room and the magnificent, gleaming table of stone to the king himself, who had one hand closed in a fist though he had been playfully, silently drumming his fingertips against the tabletop moments before.  

Someone, likely the palace guard not far from Mattin, swore softly under her breath. 

Mattin lifted his gaze from the sign of the king’s anger to sweep it over the robe of blue so dark it was nearly black, and the collar of fur meant to shield the king from the bitter cold of the capital around the time of the winter solstice, and the hint of mail the king often wore. The king’s beard was dark, short, and neatly trimmed, yet did nothing to conceal the old, faded scar that slashed across and up his cheek, nearly reaching his eye. 

The injury had occurred decades ago, but it seemed to remind many of the other wounds concealed beneath the king’s furs and armor, the wounds that had nearly killed him, yet put him on the throne. Sometimes, Mattin wondered if the king knew that, and used it. Then he realized that of course he did. Arden Canamorra might not have asked to be king, but he was no fool. 

Mattin followed the thin line of scar tissue until it stopped. The king’s eyes were dark also, as dark as his thick, frowning brows and the rest of his hair, except for the strands of silver. Mattin spent another moment staring, then glanced away, although he was far across the room and unlikely to be noticed. 

King Arden turned his head, displaying the cuff of gold along the shell of one ear as well as the unusually short length of his curls—short, how those in the Outguard wore their hair, as if he was one still in his heart. He did not wear a crown, not in the council chamber and rarely anywhere else. Neither did he have to wear a traditional fighting weapon, but Mattin suspected the king’s other hand was on or near his belt, where he often kept the practical knife of an outguard, and sometimes a sword as well. 

Then the king smiled, white teeth flashing for a moment as if something had amused him terribly. 

The guard next to Mattin made a disappointed sound. Someone at the table sighed in relief. 

Mattin did not make either sound, though he understood both. Arden of the Canamorra was inclined to overthink decisions on things like import tariffs and palace repairs, but had no patience for the sort of posturing that had led to years of bloodshed. In the beginning of his reign, recovering from his injuries, he had nonetheless roared at council members and loomed over them with his great height and his body thick with muscle and added armor, and called himself the Traitor King before they could dare, and the council members had learned to moderate their tones when it came to demands and, importantly, to never, ever, speak ill of the king’s husband. 

Per Tyrabalith did not seem to like King Arden’s smile, and grew louder. “With no insult intended, you should choose from among those who still hesitate to be your allies.” 

Mattin felt his eyebrows rise nearly to his hairline but at least suppressed his gasp. 

The guard near him did not make the same effort for her quiet snarl. “He means a beat-of-four.” 

Mattin glanced around the table, to the council members whose faces he could see from his position in the back of the room, then to Cael, the palace’s official Head of House and the king’s first advisor, before returning to King Arden. The king’s smile had frozen in place. 

Per Tyrabalith rose from his seat, although the lady next to him attempted to discreetly pull him back down. The Tyrabalith of the Tyrabalith, who was young for such a position, wore his long hair loose, with a few braids to keep the cedar-colored strands from his face. Some of them tumbled forward as he put a hand on the table to make his point. He did not smile, although his tone was almost too ingratiating. 

“A hero is good for a story or a song, and perhaps in bed, but after five years, the situation has not improved. It is time to consider new options—you must choose a new consort… Your Highness.” 

Mattin’s gaze flew to the space just behind the king’s chair, and the large, larger even than the king himself, figure in metal and leather armor who stood there, a sheathed bastard sword visible under the folds of his thick cloak. 

Mattin supposed he ought to be worried about Per Tyrabalith’s deliberate hesitation over properly addressing the king, but Mattin doubted very much that Arden was concerned with that at the moment. The king was still looking at his husband, as he had when he had first smiled, although his expression this time was more serious. 

“You speak of the Captain of the Palace Guard,” someone reminded Per Tyrabalith, rather sharply. Mattin was grateful for it, even if it said much that none of the other nobles present had disagreed with Per Tyrabalith’s suggestion. They might even already be scheming to find a suitable consort—from their own houses, naturally. 

Mattin curled a hand around his wrist and his enamel bracelet in the design of a rowan tree, and wished for many things, but mainly for Per Tyrabalith to shut up. The rowan was sacred to the fae. The fae, absent though they often were from the doings of humans in their realm, seemed fond of the Traitor King, perhaps for something Arden had done while in service in the Outguard. They might listen to Mattin’s tiny prayer now. 

Possessing a fierce temper or not, Arden could be inscrutable when he chose to be. Instead of leaping from his seat and ordering Per Tyrabalith silent or banished from the chamber, the king regarded his husband steadily, and seemed prepared to ignore the rising tension in the room as The Tyrabalith went unanswered. 

There was little about Arden or his husband that might be described as soft, but Mattin did not think he imagined the fondness in the king’s eyes as he looked over his chosen spouse and accidental royal consort. 

Far from inscrutable, the Captain of the Guard had fixed Per Tyrabalith with the interested stare of an eagle, or perhaps a wolf, like his name would suggest. Mil, surname Wulfa, a palace guard from a family of palace guards, who had run away with the disgraced and far too young Head of the Canamorra when they were barely more than children, to serve as outguards together. 

It was while in the Outguard, patrolling far reaches of the country and ensuring the will of the current ruler as those in the Outguard were sworn to do, that they had married—hand-fasted, in the manner of the countryside, but nonetheless binding. 

Mattin often wondered if Arden and Mil had been bearded then, if they had fallen in love before they had left together, or afterward, and if they would have made the same choice to marry if they had known they would be drawn back to the capital and the palace years later. He hoped they would have. 

Mil, with a beard of dark red-brown, and hair the same but for a streak of white at one temple, wore no jewelry at his ears, and had permitted his hair to grow slightly longer than the average guard either in the palace or outside of it. He often kept it up in a small tail at the back of his head, but today it was down, making him look neither outguard nor noble. He was protected from neck to foot in the plain, dull-colored clothes and armor of the Outguard, save his vambraces, which were finely made, and, if Mattin was not mistaken, a gift from his husband. Though simply dressed, Arden was a lord and a king. Mil could have stepped back into the Outguard at that moment and no one would have known he was the reason the capital had not drowned in its own blood. 

Arden tipped his head to one side and Mil’s attention came back to him. The king’s smile returned. It was reserved and yet still a smile like dawn breaking.

“I don’t believe another hand-fasting was mentioned in today’s agenda when we discussed it this morning,” Arden remarked, voice low and faintly husky, as well as entirely calm. “Do you remember that, my love?” he asked Mil, almost teasing. 

Whatever Mattin had expected Arden to finally say, it had not been that. 

Mattin released a puff of air in surprise, then hid a smile at the sudden burst of fidgety energy from many of those at the table. 

Mil hummed thoughtfully, then shook his head. “Sass would’ve mentioned it,” he answered in his usual, somewhat gruff tone. 

Someone coughed a laugh, then stifled it. 

Mattin hunched his shoulders nearly up to his ears and did his best to disappear. It should not have been difficult. Mattin was hardly tall, and while his tunic and vest were finely crafted, in the bright colors and patterns of the latest fashions, he did not stand out in a room full of some of the wealthiest figures in the capital, if not the entire country.  

He shot a look to the guard nearest to him, who was now regarding him with some amusement, and nervously tugged at his long braid, dotted with shining, jeweled clasps in the shape of berries, before forcing himself to release it. He huffed. 

The guard, perplexingly, grinned at him. 

“It is a valid suggestion,” Per Tyrabalith insisted, pulling all the tension back into the chamber just as the air had seemed to lighten. 

The king and his husband exchanged a look before turning to face Per Tyrabalith as one. To his credit, The Tyrabalith remained on his feet, though he faltered and seemed to lose whatever he had been going to say. 

“The idea is not without merit,” another noble offered, not quite timidly, but carefully. Rory Stelollen, not a beat-of-four, but from a respected line nonetheless. 

Mattin forgot all about his hair or his warm face and narrowed his eyes to reconsider the assembled council. 

“Oh,” he said aloud, though barely audible. Most of those at the table supported this idea, even if most of them would never have phrased it so rudely, offering such disrespect to a good ruler and his chosen. 

Mil was not the typical royal consort, this was true. But the last few royal consorts had also been scheming or murderous or cowardly. Compared to them, Mil, who served faithfully and well, was admirable. He was Guard Captain, responsible for both the safety of the palace and the rest of the country through the Outguard. He was also a hero. 

But Per Tyrabalith had mentioned that, and the others were still silent, agreeing with The Tyrabalith, but gauging the king’s reaction before they spoke. 

Mattin swallowed. No amount of coaching was going to get Mil Wulfa to sit down to long dinners and talk nonsense for hours. But even if it did, the fact remained that the old families did not want him there and it was creating tension. Had been creating tension, long enough for it to fester. Arden had his shortcomings—his temper, his lack of training for this role despite his name and his birth, his occasional obvious contempt for those like Per Tyrabalith who felt entitled to what they had not earned—and Mil was not the sort to soothe hurt noble feelings. 

Mattin had done the math. Mil had probably grown up in this palace alongside many of those at this table. He knew them as well as he cared to. Which might not have been a problem in a time of more security, when a stable ruler would have been on the throne for more than just a handful of years.  

Cael delicately cleared her throat. She sat straight, her snow-white hair in several intertwined braids that formed one thick plait which she wore over one shoulder. She had served the old queen and had appeared in the palace shortly before Arden’s coronation, as if she had known she’d be needed, or perhaps had wanted to help the man she’d known since he had barely come to her knee.

“There is much else to discuss on this day,” Cael said, with a formality that had been in favor in the court of the old queen and abandoned in the subsequent years of chaos. “We have issues of more immediate importance than the king taking another spouse.” Mattin rather hoped the others felt chastised, but imagined they did not. Cael carried on, regardless. “This winter will remain, hopefully, less harsh than the last few. But there are concerns for what is to come.” 

With that, unless Per Tyrabalith or someone else decided to act with even more offensiveness, that topic was closed. At least, for the present. Perhaps only even for the day. 

Mattin ducked his head and reached into the satchel nearly always hanging from his shoulder or across his chest to rest at his hip, and pulled out a stitched-together book of blank pieces of paper that he used to keep notes on what might be needed for when he returned to the library. He focused on that, shaping words in his messy, shorthand version of a Master Keeper’s cursive, and not the stilted discussions of crops and soil and weather that went on around him, or the occasional quiet remark from King Arden, or the silence from Mil Wulfa. 

Whenever Mattin glanced up, to them, of course to them, as everyone did, the royal couple appeared untouched, unbothered. He did not think they were. They could not be. King Arden might eventually accept an alliance of some kind, but he had wedded his beloved and he had made that known. Outside of this room, outside of the palace, he was adored for it, Traitor King or no. That popularity was so great, it was at least half of the reason that so few nobles had ever dared stand directly against Arden; there had yet to be a ruler who kept the throne for long without the support of the traders or workers in the capital and elsewhere. The foolishness of nobles was often tolerated or endured… but not always, and the tales of Earls dragged from their beds, or abandoned by their armies on the fields of battle, were favorites in every tavern.

Even if the king and his husband ignored the continued disrespect offered to Mil—if they could ignore it, which Mattin could not—it was ridiculous for anyone to see them together or know the songs sung of them, and think that anyone else, no matter how noble or fine, could be joined to them and not feel lesser for it; an unwanted outcast in their own marriage bed. 

Mattin exhaled harshly and stilled his hand. 

He would not… well, he would not wish that on anyone. Or at least, not on most. 

King Arden asked a question on a topic that Mattin had not been following. The king had been learning quite a bit about the history of the country and the old families. He said it was useful to have counterarguments and examples ready when someone criticized something he did as unprecedented, when, in fact, it wasn’t. 

Mattin bowed his head to tuck his book and pencil away, then curled his hand around the tail end of his braid as it fell forward. He stared at jeweled clasps to brighten up hair of plain, flat black, and to attempt to hold down the fly-aways. He scowled. 

King Arden would do what was necessary to keep the peace. Mattin was suddenly sure of that. 

Mattin raised his head and avoided looking at the rest of the table and anyone standing near it to catch Cael’s eye. He lifted an eyebrow, and she gave him a studying look that made him grasp his braid tighter before letting go. But she finally gave the smallest nod, and Mattin took that for the order it was and lowered his head again before slipping from the room. 

The discussion paused as he left, or it felt as if it did, the softest skip in the king’s low voice, although there was nothing unusual in Mattin scurrying out in the middle of a meeting, on a fast path to the Great Library. 

The only thing that made this time different from any others was the knot of concern in Mattin’s chest, and the unpleasant flush to his cheeks that not even a blast of freezing winter air could dispel. He rubbed his arms as he hurried, having forgotten his cloak once again, and thought of the stories, of the songs, of that day in the palace and all the horrors Mattin had hidden from, but also those moments he wished he had witnessed. 

Arden—not the king then, not officially, had thought he was dying—had been dying—when he’d fought his way to Mil and collapsed at his feet, and whatever Arden had said then, in all the many different versions of the story, had made his love achingly clear. 

The cold made Mattin’s eyes sting. 

He would reach the library, and he would have his tea, and he would do his best to help them, either to avoid this mess or to mitigate it. It was his job to do it, and his honor, and he would work through the night if he had to. 

He didn’t think he would have slept anyway.  

Mattin jerked upright at the noise of metal scraping against stone and was halfway ducked beneath his desk before he realized that the noise was not approaching warriors or guards, but one of the library’s assistants, there to light the fire. A fire Mattin had let die out in the night, as he seemed to have fallen asleep at his desk again.

He blinked, and shivered, and forcibly relaxed his grip on the edge of the desk as he straightened back up, although Elbi was already giving him concerned looks. Elbi had only worked in the library for two years or so. She didn’t understand.

Mattin mumbled an apology for startling her, and got an exasperated shake of her head for it—exasperation, from an assistant who was not that much younger than him. Although, at five-and-twenty, Mattin was an exceptionally young Master Keeper, out of necessity more than anything else. The years of turmoil had been hard for more than nobles and the other beat-of-fours. Anyone who made a home within the palace walls had suffered. Not all of them had lived.  

He pulled his cup of tea to him and drank it all, grimacing at the cold, bitter taste but hoping it would shock him awake. Elbi added to the pile of logs next to the fireplace—the one fine quality to Mattin’s tiny office, before hurrying out the door to fulfill her morning duties. 

Mattin squinted after her before giving another jolt and surging to his feet. The assistants usually made their rounds in the early morning, before the Keepers were in. The light creeping in around the window shutters was gray and faint, but there. Mattin was already late. 

He patted his braid, vainly hoping that would neaten it, while staring blankly at the half-formed lists scattered across the desk. He took a deep breath, decided to leave the lists for now, and wiped the sleep from his eyes as he moved toward the door, pausing only for his satchel before darting out. 

The library was not much warmer than his office. Mattin came as close to running as he dared, not wanting to alarm anyone who had the same memories of the past few years as he did. He cringed backward when he stepped out into the corridor, which was open on one side to face a courtyard covered in white. It had snowed in the night, and it looked like it might begin again at any moment. 

But Mattin ducked his head and pressed onward through the courtyard and into another corridor, this one just as open to the elements, something that suited him in the summers. However, since these corridors were more in everyday use than the paths around the library, these were lined with more braziers, already bright with fires. 

He passed those as well, nodding whenever a guard or a member of the staff called a greeting. Even in his boots, his toes were freezing. He crossed his arms over his chest and went through one of the gardens, skirting some of the older buildings that housed visiting noble families, who lived here and visited in name only. 

There were several royal residences on the massive palace grounds, each built during different reigns. Arden had chosen an ornate, but small, building decorated with pale tiles and complex ironwork. It was an unexpected but wise choice; this way he could not offend anyone by occupying the space of a recently deposed ruler. The old queen’s residence, the one that might best be called the official royal house, remained empty out of respect. 

Arden was cannier than most gave him credit for, although they should have remembered that he had grown up here, and came from the family that many thought should have ruled in the old queen’s place. Arden and his siblings would have been educated as possible future rulers for at least part of their childhoods. 

Then, of course, his parents and some of the others of the Canamorra had decided to take what they felt was theirs, and had tried to murder the old queen. Some said they had; though she had survived the attempt, she had not lived much longer than that. A few months only. Just long enough to witness the executions of the traitors and to make the decision to care for the children and keep them in the palace. 

Some of the ballads rather poetically said she had died of a broken heart after learning the once-great house had betrayed her. 

Of the children, the ballads did not say much, not even to note the cloud of suspicion and anger that had been directed at them in their time here. Nearly half of the rulers of the country had sat on the throne through deliberate acts that might have been called traitorous had they not been successful. Mattin knew that for a fact as a Keeper of the Records at the Great Library. But the younger generations of the Canamorra, orphaned and punished for their parents’ deeds, left to their own devices, had chosen to keep with tradition, and had named the strongest and boldest of them The Canamorra.

The title was stained, but might have been Jola’s; Mattin suspected it wasn’t because Arden had thought to protect her. Just as Mattin had no doubt that being The Canamorra had been part of the reason Arden had eventually fled with his best friend to serve as a wandering outguard. Arden had made himself a target, the head of a tarnished house, forever suspect, and then all but announced he had no interest in the throne and proved it with years of absence.

Nonetheless, the cloud of suspicion had followed him even into wilderness.

It was some of the reason for his nickname now.

But only some. 

The number of guards doubled as Mattin reached the new royal residence and he paused as always at the doorway, to stamp the snow from his shoes and to make sure his presence was expected, but he supposed he was easily recognizable, even sleep-rumpled, because the guards opened the door for him without comment. 

He shuddered at the warmth the moment he was inside, flexing his cold hands and then rubbing his chilled nose as he walked through the room where visitors to the king’s chambers were told to wait. The next room, called a study although Mattin had doubts Arden did any studying there, was as empty as the first. 

Mattin cleared his throat since he had not been announced, and gave his hair one last hopeful pat before pushing aside the heavy curtains that blocked the king and his husband’s private chambers from the view of anyone privileged enough to make it this far. 

The space beyond the curtains was even warmer, and he shivered helplessly as they fell closed behind him. 

The king and his husband looked up from their breakfast, seated, as they almost always seemed to be when Mattin showed up, at a small table inlaid with black stone, in front of a roaring fire, on seats lined with soft, thick cushions. Mattin had been asked to brief them in the mornings with information either they or Cael had requested, and so he did, despite not wishing to rise early if he could help it. The king and his husband liked to get up with the dawn, or perhaps that was habit from their days of patrol. They had likely been up for an hour or more already. Mattin was late. 

They should have broken their fast long before, if that were true. But Mattin forgot the suspicious thought the moment he was frowned at by the king himself. 

“Are those the same clothes as yesterday? From our Master Arlylian?” Arden put down his heavy mug of tea. “Are you well?” 

Mil finished chewing his bite of toasted bread, then swallowed. “And his linens wrinkled? He must be sick. I’ll get the healer.” 

Mil had actually put a hand to the table to push himself to his feet before Mattin woke up enough to huff an embarrassed protest. 

“I’m fine. It’s fine. Please sit back down.”

“Only other time I’ve seen you this mussed was when you got caught in the rain,” Mil grumbled, but sat back down, and then gave Mattin a study that only made Mattin more conscious of his doubtlessly bedraggled appearance. He did not like to look a mess, especially not in front of these two, who fit even their simple clothing with enviable grace. 

“Hmm.” Arden’s noise of agreement drew Mattin’s attention away from Mil’s warm glare. 

In the privacy of his apartments, Arden wore no armor, only comfortable clothing of linen or wool that was doubtlessly as soft as a cloud. Today, he was in deep blue, as if dark, serious colors were something he put on with his mail or his vambraces. Up close, there were a few lines at the corner of his eyes, and a few more sparks of silver in his hair. He was young for that much gray, but injuries and stress were said to do that in some.

“You’re shivering,” Arden observed in his low voice, which sent yet another shiver down Mattin’s spine. 

Mattin took a breath before turning back to Mil, as if Mil would be more reasonable, as if Mil had ever been more reasonable. Mil was in a long-sleeved tunic of white that was untied at the throat. He was flushed from proximity to the fire and there was a hint of a reddish-purple mark near the hollow of his collarbone, the kind of mark left by kisses or teeth or both. 

Mattin could not seem to remember the words that had just been on his tongue. “It snowed in the night,” he answered at last, then winced for such a meaningless statement. 

“It will again today,” Mil said, with confidence. Mattin had heard of those with old, healed wounds who could predict weather changes by the way the wounds twinged or ached. But Mil might have just been saying what would likely happen anyway. He waved at Mattin a moment later. “At least sit down. You’re worrying him.”

Mattin swung back toward the king, startled. Arden regarded him steadily, expectantly, and something, words of some sort, tripped out of Mattin’s mouth. “This is your breakfast time. I wouldn’t want to impose.” But the cushioned seats were so comfortable, and he fell onto one when it was kicked out toward him in invitation. The fire was blazing. He briefly shut his eyes to bask in it. 

“’Impose,’ he says,” Mil grumbled, returning to his bread while also moving a small jar and an equally small pot to Mattin’s side of the table. 

Arden reached for their sturdy and somewhat battered teapot and poured some tea into a tiny cup half the size of one of their mugs. Delicate cups of that size had appeared in their breakfast settings for a while now. Mattin was convinced the kitchen staff was teasing him, but said not a word to the king as Arden stirred in a spoonful of honey before handing the small cup to him. 

Instead, he stared at the tea in tired consternation, because it smelled like his favorite blend and it was too hot to drink without slurping, which he would never do in front of the royal couple. He settled for holding it tightly before his face. His eyes fell closed again. 

“Looks ready to fall asleep, he does,” Mil remarked, a not-quiet quiet aside.

“This is my favorite blend.” Mattin opened his eyes. “And you added honey.” 

“Why wouldn’t I?” Arden asked easily, handing his husband a section of an orange he must have peeled before Mattin had arrived. “You like the stuff.” 

Mattin blew on his tea in vaguely annoyed frustration, realized his peevishness was visible, then wondered why he should be peevish to have his tastes remembered at this table. He blew on his tea again before risking a sip. It was perfect and he sighed for it. 

His shoulders slumped as he took another drink. 

Plates were nudged in his direction. 

“Eat.” Mil’s narrow-eyed look would have been intimidating if Mattin had been more awake. “Before you fall over. Fuck me, not even that useless, damn fool cloak on.” 

Mattin carefully sipped his tea and reflected that yes, he had forgotten his cloak… again. No wonder the morning had been so cold. “In my defense, I am very tired.” It did not seem a good defense when the king clucked his tongue. “That cloak is quite pretty,” Mattin tried to defend himself again, lifting his chin. “That style is all the rage.” 

“It is indeed lovely,” Mil replied, voice rough but polite. “Is it made of paper?” 

Mattin opened his mouth to argue that some needed more decoration than others to appear their best, a hand already curled to gesture to the exposed column of Mil’s throat against the simple white linen of Mil’s shirt. He stopped himself just in time. “I have warmer cloaks,” he argued weakly instead. 

Mil scoffed. “I’ve yet to see them,” he muttered, again not quietly. 

“Every morning,” Arden remarked, almost to himself, only to gaze innocently back at Mattin when Mattin turned to him in question. Arden popped a piece of orange in his mouth and grinned as he licked at the juice on his lips. Mattin turned his attention swiftly to his tea. “You finish your first cup, and you finish your breakfast,” Arden added, speaking to Mil, who took a vengeful bite of his toast. “Then tell us why you’re so tired, Arlylian of the Records.” 

Arden’s habit of using all of Mattin’s possible titles at different times was as distracting as Mil’s habit of using none of them.

Mattin nearly forgot his purpose in coming here this morning. He gulped the hot tea to help explain his warming cheeks and then cleared his throat. The honey and conversation had lulled him. Perhaps he had wanted to forget. 

He put down his cup slowly and observed both of them, one at a time and then together. Mil moved on to some porridge, unsweetened. Mattin belatedly noticed the empty bowl in front of Arden. They had lingered at their table this morning, likely waiting for this briefing, and Mattin had no good news for them. They must have worried over this all night. Or, well, not all night since Mil had….

Mattin ended that thought there and inhaled sharply. “Well, you see—oh. Thank you.” He took the slice of orange from Arden’s outstretched hand and ate it as neatly as he could. Mil, for whatever reason, sighed. Arden was generous to share the fruit, which at this time of year, came from the palace hothouse. “That is…” Mattin regarded them intently, searching for some sign that they’d had as restless a night as he had. He accepted another section of sweet orange and ate it in two precise bites. 

He caught Arden and Mil exchanging a look as he licked a bit of juice from his thumb. 

Knowing he’d get no explanation for whatever their shared glance was about, Mattin nonetheless asked, “What?”

As though Mattin had not spoken, Arden handed him a piece of toasted bread that Mil hadn’t gotten to. “Take your time, if you wish. Something is obviously bothering you. Would you like your second cup now?” 

It was soon for it, but Mattin was tired, and sleepily distracted from his questions by the warm bread now in his hands. He studied them both for another moment, then took a bite before nodding. 

Mil reached for Mattin’s cup, hesitating before grasping the tiny creation of bright porcelain and holding it still as he poured the tea. He was quicker to pour what tea remained into their two mugs, and sprinkled lein spice over the top of his. Neither of them put anything else in their tea. 

Mattin poured a small amount of milk into his tea, pleased to no longer be questioned on why he liked his first cup one way and his second another. He returned to his bread while Arden took hold of a pear and began to carve slices to offer his husband. Fruit seemed to be the one area where they treated themselves. Mattin should not have found it charming, especially when Mil might have worn necklaces or Arden might have adorned his fingers with more, or finer, rings. He imagined them as outguards, younger, sitting around a campfire and sharing meals just like this. 

“Are those new sparkles?” Mil asked, pulling Mattin from his dreaming. “In your hair,” he clarified when Mattin blinked, bemused. “Thought so, yesterday.” 

“Oh.” Mattin patted his hair clasps, and did indeed find strands that had come loose as he slept. He sighed and left them there. “Yes! A lovely set of berries! They’re from this jeweler who just set up shop in the capital now that more and more of the old families are returning for longer and longer stays. They weren’t that expensive, considering.” More than a Keeper’s pay, or more than a Keeper his age should have received, but Mattin had funds from his family as well, and the clasps were only colored glass. “Though once he gets popular, I am sure his prices will go up.” He dropped his hand when he realized he was prattling about jewelry, which Mil could not possibly find interesting. His gaze caught on Mil’s big hands, unadorned and callused, wrapped around his large mug. Mattin cleared his throat. “I believe it’s a family business. The sister works with iron and steel and makes very pretty things, if you wanted something more along those lines.”  

“Mil was just remarking that he could use some more pretty things in his life,” Arden commented, visibly amused, and then grinning outright when Mil snorted.

“Oh, aye,” Mil agreed nonetheless. “I’ve become fond of having a bit of sparkle about.” 

“Really?” Mattin asked without thinking. Surely, if Mil wanted something in precious metals or stones, the king would gladly provide it for him. 

“But I worry, you see.” Mil gave an odd sort of smile. “Never been around such things, not to touch them, and I think they’d likely break in my hands, or not suit me, after all.” 

“I have never seen you be careless, or reckless.” Mattin thought of silver clasps, the kind without jewels or stones or even enamel, but intricately designed all the same. “There are clasps, I would give—” He closed his mouth and stared in dismay at the crumbs on the table before him. He woke up just a fraction more than before. “You tricked me into tea and breakfast again.”  

“Hardly a trick,” Mil assured him smugly. “You’re just one of those that need morning sustenance before they can think. You’re thinking now, I see.” 

Mattin made a face. 

Arden intervened by squaring his shoulders. “All right,” he said decisively, drawing both their gazes to him. “Keeper Arlylian has woken up and has work for me.” He didn’t guess. That was generally always Mattin’s reason for meeting them in the morning. Neither the king nor his husband were much for reading for pleasure or for knowledge, although Arden would when he felt he had to. But he preferred things explained to him and to then ask questions. When King Arden had first started sending requests to the Great Library, Mattin had researched for him and written summaries. At some point, that had become this. Arden considered him. “You have thoughts about increasing the size of the granaries? You know, I never thought so much of a ruler’s time would be spent discussing grains. But here we are.” 

“What?” Mattin had filed his research about grain elsewhere this morning and had to concentrate to summon it to the forefront of his mind. “Yes. No. Not now. But yes—more hothouses too, with people trained to run them, so that more fresh fruit might be available and not only what has been dried or preserved. There is a large one in Agard, which the Dettavicci have maintained for centuries that I thought might be worth study. They need it there, with their heavy snows and long mountain winters. And since Bet Dettavicci is supposed to arrive in the spring—or so I hear—I thought you might write to them before then, to establish friendliness. But no,” Mattin summed up, shaking his head, “not right now.” 

He studied both of them in turn, confused that Arden would ask about grain at this moment. 

They were silent for long enough to make Mattin smooth his fingers restlessly down the sides of his cup. Then Arden said, “This is about the other occurrence, then, and what else was said yesterday.” 

“Are you surprised?” Mil pressed. “Look at him. He likely hasn’t slept a wink.” He and his husband shared another glance before turning toward Mattin with sudden energy. “Do you have something to discuss with us?” 

Arden drummed his fingers impatiently along the table top. 

Mattin made himself appear as calm as he could. “Tyrabalith’s suggestion,” he began cautiously. “He said it and the others did not disagree. The idea will be floated again, the next time with more deliberation behind it.” He eyed them both and found two blank faces. They had decided not to give anything away today. That was not helpful. Mattin let his tone get crisp. “How would you like to deal with it? I assume Cael already discussed it with you.” 

Arden nodded.

Mattin looked away from their impassive expressions, down to his tea. “Ties and relationships with the noble houses might be strengthened without a new spouse,” he offered hopefully, gaze steady on his cup. His hands twitched, nearly trembling. “After all, there are some noble houses that might not view it as much of an honor, seeing as you already have a husband you adore. This new spouse would clearly be…” Mattin struggled to find something nicer to say than unwanted, “secondary, in your affections.” He took a sip of the tea, though it was cooler than he liked. “Also some might find offense in the fact that your first husband is, and I apologize, lower-status.” He darted a glance up, his heart beating quickly at having their silent attention. “Nonetheless, a political marriage to a ruler of your fame would appeal to some, and it would serve as a decent reminder to some louder politicians that you are of the highest rank.” He let the charge of traitor go unspoken. Mattin cleared his throat, ticking off points that had kept him awake for most of the night. “If you chose well, it would actually leave you with less to do—personally, that is. Your new spouse might handle some court events in your stead. You would need someone familiar with court to do that, of course, and the old families almost all are, in some way.” 

He wished they would interrupt him. Maddeningly, they did not.  

Mattin began again, after another sip of unsatisfying tea. “The downsides of this plan are, among other things, that you will have to choose carefully and well. You will risk offending some, but likely only those trying to rise in rank. And, if I may, you would be doing what Per Tyrabalith suggested, which I find distasteful.” 

This, at least, earned him a little chuffed laugh from Arden. 

Mattin glanced upward once again, briefly looking to Mil. “And there is, again, the matter of your first spouse. I… am unsure if you would like him to also pledge themselves to anyone new, or to leave the matter as a political alliance to you only. Whichever way, the spectacle changes but will still matter.” There would need to be a spectacle. That was the point, really. “It is not only the nobles you would need to please, so the scene you present to those within, and without, the palace wall will be important. There is some precedent to consult, but I will not bore you with that until it is necessary. So, then, the question is—do you wish to take this suggestion seriously and look for another spouse?” He wrapped his hands tighter around his cup to still them before he raised his head. “You do not have to.” 

“Of course, he doesn’t,” Mil spoke at last. “He’s the king.” 

But that was not what they should have said, what Mattin had hoped for through a long night. 

“Oh.” It escaped him without any conscious thought, his stomach twisting around his breakfast. “But you are going to?” Mattin’s voice was soft and small. “You’re going to marry someone else?”

“You sound upset,” Arden said, shifting in his seat. “Are you upset? We don’t want that. We can—”

“You’re going to marry someone else,” Mattin said again, no longer asking. 

Arden leaned forward as if he might reach across the table. “Despite who suggested it, it’s not unreasonable.” He spoke slowly, without looking away. “I won’t say it hadn’t occurred to us before, because indeed it had.” 

Mattin hiccoughed, then flicked his gaze toward the fire, the table top, the shivering surface of what was left of his tea. 

“If you would prefer to be practical and discuss it only in those terms,” the king continued almost warily, “we have had several harsh winters in a row, after years of instability and forces marching over wheat fields. We would rather people had a spring and summer spent focused on planting and harvesting and rest than more fighting. I thought—we thought that might appeal to you as well.” 

“Oh.” Mattin was distantly embarrassed at how repetitive he was being. And childish, focusing on their love while they were concerned with keeping people fed. “Right,” he agreed faintly. “Then, there are things to consider.” He gulped his tea as he did just that, then he looked up, to somewhere in the space between the two of them. “If you are looking for an ally… for an alliance more than… a love match, there is much I will need to look into. Though I had already begun some of it.” 

“Did you get any sleep last night?” Mil’s gruff question stopped him, but only for a blink. 

“Hmm?” Mattin turned to dig through his satchel, currently full of papers on every subject but this one. “Not really.” He found his book of notes and a pencil and fiddled with them, arranging them fussily in front of him. “Per Tyrabalith meant it either meant to unsettle you, or provoke you into a fight… or I suppose he might have someone in mind already.” 

“Or all three.” Mil grunted.  

“Or all three.” Mattin made a meaningless notation, then paused. “No one with sense would assume that you would be cock-led around by a new spouse, no matter how handsome.” Mil echoed him, just the one word, cock-led, with a faintly shocked air. Mattin’s cheeks grew hot, but he ignored that. “Per Tyrabalith does have sense, so I do not believe that to be his intent, though he might try. He might want you to reject his choice, to provoke a fight that way. His manner was… not diplomatic.” 

“Cock-led,” Mil said again, clucking his tongue now. “What the palace youths get up to these days.” 

Mattin doubted that phrase was new. Mil also likely knew worse, much worse. That was an attempt to distract Mattin. Mattin did not need distracting. 

He made another meaningless note while his thoughts raced. “So, then, to ensure that he can find no reason to claim insult, the field must be open to anyone.” 

The table seemed very still. 

Mattin carefully took a breath. 

“Although, not everyone would work for what would be needed. What they want, the members of the council, is someone from an older family.” He hesitated. “A beat-of-four.”

Long ago, when there had been numerous Earls with their own lands to rule, with no one person to lead them, there had been similar marriages of alliance among the proud—and usually warlike—families. Not wanting anyone to forget the powerful names in their lineage, many of the new spouses began to combine pieces of their family name with that of their new house and then passing those on to their children. In effect, making many new houses from the old. It had become quite extreme in a few cases, with surnames that twisted the tongue to say, before the Earls had finally bent their knees in submission to one ruler, who had put a stop to the practice. But the names remained, with most of the oldest—except for some of those of the original Earls, of whom not many were left—having four beats to their names. It was those with simple surnames who had first called them beat-of-fours. It had been meant as an insult. It still was to everyone but the beat-of-fours, who embraced it. 

“A beat-of-four from a good house, with no history of anything remotely treasonous… or even scandalous, perhaps.” Mattin thought of several names immediately. “Though, I imagine you two would want someone a little daring.” He did not think he sounded wistful. He took pains not to sound wistful. 

Mil’s voice was, for once, quite soft. “I am dying to know what else you imagine, Sass.” 

“My name is not Sass,” Mattin corrected mildly, never really bothered by the nickname, wrong though it was. He put a hand to his throat, where it felt as if something was lodged. “And if you should… if you wanted someone you could grow fond of… we would need to consider other things as well. Not just the surname.” 

“Would we, Mattin of the Arlylian?” Arden asked, pronouncing Mattin’s name with a particular slowness. 

Mattin was startled into meeting his gaze, both of their gazes, after a moment. Each of them regarded him with innocent interest. 

He narrowed his eyes in suspicion that he was being teased yet again. “I was thinking of your happiness.” 

“I suppose it’s easy to plan from a desk,” Mil mused. “Harder to execute. Much like a battle. You miss things in all the excitement.” 

Mattin had never been anywhere near anything remotely like a battle, so he huffed. “What did Cael say?”

Naturally, they exchanged another look before facing him again. “Much the same,” Arden answered at last, guarded. “With a few more specific and pointed notes.” 

“Oh yes, the notes,” Mil added, as if he had forgotten them. 

“More specific?” Mattin echoed a bit forlornly. He had wanted to at least be helpful if he could be nothing else. “I suppose she knows more of what would suit.” He frowned down at his book.

He did not hear a thing, but Mil must have gotten up, because a weight fell onto Mattin’s shoulders and fur tickled his ears, and when he straightened, startled, Arden was still seated but Mil was not. 

Mattin turned to look for him and saw the dark fur at the collar of one of their cloaks. He could barely see over it. He had to tip his head back to meet Mil’s satisfied stare. 

“Where is your useless but pretty cloak, by the way?” Mil asked, before Mattin could manage a question, like whose cloak was he wearing and why was he wearing it? 

“I forgot it?” Mattin replied quietly. “Somewhere. Probably my desk or… the floor by my desk. Maybe?” He couldn’t actually remember seeing it today—yesterday. 

“You really should rest.” Arden stacked their abandoned bowls like a customer in an inn trying to make nice with the innkeeper. 

“But there is much to do.” Mattin did not want to rest. It would lead to thinking, which was dangerous. “I will consult with Cael, if it pleases you, and perhaps compile a list of possible candidates.” 

“Already?” They both spoke as one, their surprise evident. Arden leaned forward. “Impatient to marry us off?”

Mattin ducked his head to put his unneeded book back in his satchel. The fur in his nose smelled like smoke and leather and all sorts of things that Mattin had no idea how to identify. It smelled of Mil, he supposed. Of an active life and strength and… well, something to do with weaponry, no doubt. He took a deep breath, then sat up. 

“If we have to go through many candidates, some only for the sake of avoiding causing offense, then it will take time. Also, you said you wanted a restful spring and summer. We should at least begin soon, in that case. Perhaps you could reach an understanding by the time the snow melts. That should be enough.” He tightened the satchel strap and trailed his fingers through the fur collar. “It would also give you time enough to plan festivities for the early fall. People like festivities. As they like love stories.” He widened his eyes. “Not that you don’t already have a love story. They sing them in the taverns, you know. Not that you frequent taverns anymore.”

“Not that you know of,” Arden murmured. 

Mattin was distracted into studying him, then Mil. He got two deadpan expressions in return. 

“That isn’t funny,” he declared primly at last, and hoped they weren’t serious. “But if you had, you’d have heard some of the songs about you. You really are popular with most.” 

“Peace is popular with most.” Arden gently shook his head. “And I will do my best to maintain it.” His every word was grave and so sincere Mattin momentarily lost his breath. Then Arden glanced to his husband, who rolled his eyes, so he added, “Though I grant that there are some who do not make me feel peaceful.” 

“I’m already asking about him.” Mil grinned sharply. He meant he would consult with the eyes-and-ears he had established in the palace and capital, possibly elsewhere. Most rulers and their consorts had them; unofficial Keepers, in a sense, and trackers of gossip, usually. But these two had outguards who knew them personally at their disposal as well. “Added something to the soup without consulting the cook, he did. Like to know why.”

This time when they shared a look, Mattin could read it clear as anything. It made his already upset stomach start to really churn. 

“You think he has someone in mind for you?”

“Something in mind, more like.” Mil crossed the room to a low, long sofa, meant as a place for rest but now being used as a miniature armory. Mattin suspected the two of them had moved in here after that hurried coronation and never bothered or had the time to arrange for storage for their armor or weapons. “But don’t trouble yourself about that, Sass. Sniffing out trouble is not your job. Staying far out of trouble is.” 

“I’m not totally helpless,” Mattin objected. “Just because I’ve never slept outside or killed anyone—or even picked up a weapon in earnest. Or… or cooked my own food. Or left the capital for anywhere but my family’s lands….” He shut himself up, far too late for either of them to ever take him seriously.  

But though Arden let out another puffing laugh under his breath, neither of them commented, except for Arden’s quiet, perplexing addition of, “And what a reminder of what work I have yet to do.” 

Mattin didn’t understand, but the king was rising, so he rose too, and caught the cloak on his shoulders before it could fall. “Mil. Your—” 

“Keep it until you find yours.” Mil waved that off. “I’ve got plenty.” 

“You’ll be cold,” Mattin insisted, holding the cloak closed at his throat instead of using the clasp. 

“I’d rather you be warm,” Mil countered, somewhere between grouchy and cheerful, and froze when Arden kissed him on the cheek. 

“If you step any closer, Keeper Arlylian, Mil will likely strap you into some armor as well.” Arden’s tone was delighted. Mil looked slightly murderous but did not contest the point. 

Mattin should not step closer. Mattin should take his leave. He should not ask why he would ever need armor, or imagine the two of them removing his clothing only to dress him up again in woven linen, or steel, or leather. 

He would look quite foolish, especially next to them. They were big, of course, and tall, but he watched them grow even more so as they added layers of protection over their more comfortable underclothes. Arden wore vambraces as well as mail, which meant he would be out and around today, and not in court or at a council meeting. He put a knife in his belt, and another in his boot, and winked at Mattin’s staring. 

“Not fashionable enough for you and your young set?” Arden paused despite the joke, as if he genuinely wanted to know. 

“You’re only fifteen or so years older than me,” Mattin mumbled, less than pleased when Mil handed Arden a sheathed short sword as well. The grip and hilt were plain. Mattin had seen some nobles his age wear hilts with fancy metalwork, a few with jewels. He exhaled. “You set your own styles,” he added, with a bit of achy despair when Mil was the one who curled the golden cuff to the shell of Arden’s ear. 

Mil grinned at that, or maybe at what Mattin had said, and twisted his hair into a short tail and tied it in place while Arden turned around to see to him. With no knowledge of armor, except for once impatiently helping a friend remove theirs in the midst of some heated foolery, Mattin imagined it did not take two to fasten the straps of a breastplate, or to kneel to do the same with greaves. These two must prefer this ritual. 

Mattin watched the king serve his consort, finishing with vambraces and sword, before realizing that he had not been speaking. He had not been doing anything but watching them attend to each other.

He looked down, quickly, to his fawn-brown boots and his wrinkled red linen pants, and the hand not at his throat, which was as soft as his boots and covered in faded ink spots. His tunic shirt was short, although long-sleeved, and his vest was brocaded, with a pattern of pale cream and gold flowers. Not extravagant, but it seemed so in this room, with them. 

He swallowed. “You really don’t mind another hand tied to yours, in alliance? Perhaps both of yours, in love, if you are fortunate and blessed? Truly?”

He raised his head at their silence.  What he would give to know the paragraphs exchanged in their shared glances. 

“It was not originally my plan to seek out someone else.” Arden finally spoke, with as much gravity and care as he might have from the throne, one hand still on his husband’s arm. “But neither was being king,” he added, far less serious. Mattin wondered how the council could pretend they found fault in Arden when they were the ones who had begged him to keep the peace by taking the crown that was, by that point, already in his possession anyway, since he had killed the one last wearing it. Mattin, and most others, assumed it was the fate of his siblings that had compelled Arden to say yes. Maybe the Canamorra possessiveness and pride as well, but concern for others, too. And here Arden proved it in only a few words as he got dressed in armor like a ruler should not have to. 

“Stop looking at me with worship in your eyes, Keeper Arlylian,” Arden chided quietly, his gaze shining. “I am not worthy of it.” 

Mil scoffed the same time Mattin did, and made a face for Mattin’s benefit when Arden frowned. Mattin rolled his eyes for Mil in return, who snorted. There was no point in discussing the effect Arden had on others, Traitor King or no. Arden never fully understood. He would think it the sword, or the crown, and never the person in-between. 

Mattin felt his face grow hot and blamed the cloak, though he only grasped it more tightly and pretended it did not touch the ground behind him. 

“You are worthy. Both of you.” He nearly whispered it, thinking of Mil reaching the palace wall to open the gates and let the Outguard in, and of Arden leaving dead king and crown where they lay to go save his sister and her family, and then to search desperately for his husband. “So I will help. I will look for candidates for you. Suitable ones. For an alliance first, but… I will try to find those you might become fond of, one day. Perhaps friends. You deserve at least that.” 

“Ah.” Mil sighed. “Ah, Sass.” 

Arden exhaled as well. “If you—I think I would like to see the names of those who might win your approval.”

Mattin looked up, blinking. “I thought you’d be more worried about your husband’s.”

Mil turned to him, then smiled a wicked smile. 

Mattin jabbed the air with a finger. “What does that mean?”

“It means Mil has already made his thoughts clear to me.” Arden crossed his arms.

“It means run along, soft hands,” Mil said, still smiling, “for there is work to be done. But stop to find your damn cloak! Even that thin thing would be better than nothing.”  

“That is Mil-speak for be careful,” Arden interjected firmly. “We have yet to determine if it was salt put in the soup, or poison.” 

Mattin clung to his cloak, fingers sliding through the fur. “I’m sorry. That he did it. And that now you must do this. I will do my very best, I promise. I want you to be happy, above all else.” 

Arden released another long, slow sigh. 

They burned Mattin’s eyes, the two of them standing so near each other. Mattin turned his head and then moved his feet. He took himself from the room, past heavy curtains, to the cool study and cooler anteroom, and heard them, just as the curtain swung back into place. 

“You’re a fool.” 

“Yes. But we are fools together, my love.” 

They burned Mattin’s ears, too. 

Mattin went to the room he had on the grounds, well within the palace wall, but only to wash up and put on clean clothing. His new cloak was nowhere to be found, so he went back out into the falling snow, his face hot, both of his hands holding Mil’s cloak at his throat. 

He went to the library first, grabbing records himself and getting more than a few assistants fluttering nervously around him, trying to help. They eventually fell back or reluctantly went off on the errands he sent them on, until one of the older ones—older than Mattin, probably—took over and let Mattin return to his office. 

He drank the tea they brought him, and ate something dry and sweet that might have been a stale bun from a selection of them they set before him. He left the cloak on, for the fire was low and his assistants did not always remember to stoke it and Mattin never did, and the fur was soft against his face when he turned or sighed and paused to rub his eyes. 

His ongoing project was on hold for this and many other things; he had not had time to leave the palace in months, or perhaps had not wished to. But he could do this and see it through, and then return to that and his visits to the inns and taverns in the capital. It would be easier then, with the king and his husband married again, or promised to be. Mattin would have more time, anyway, if the person they chose was good enough to not need as much research as Arden did. 

Mattin did not think about fewer mornings spent at a little table before a fire, or no longer getting tea from a serviceable, ordinary pot. He sharpened quills and set out jars of different ink colors in a row and opened up books on the histories of different families—both the ones the families themselves had made and the ones the Keepers of the Great Library had collected. Then, he began to make notes. From that, he began to form lists. 

He woke up just after dark, his bladder full, the fire all but dead, with a piece of paper stuck to his face. That there was likely ink on his cheek as well did not bother him as much as the cold and dark, and the precise swirls of his handwriting that decorated the parchment. He did not need light to know what he had written. 

Good names, for their purpose. Although, of course, Mattin would do more research in the next few days before presenting a list to Cael. Fast work, but not incorrect. He had other lists on the desk before him, after all. Traits sought for political reasons. Traits likely sought for personal ones. He had done his job well, as he liked to. 

He was just tired enough to find thinking difficult, which was a blessing. So he tucked the list into his satchel, and reached for his key to the library’s entrance, which was locked at night, and held the cloak tight as he went to the door, only to stop and reach for one of the buns he had not eaten. 

That, he left at an altar in one of the moonlit gardens, in a dish surrounded by carved flowers. Not as a trade, although the fae loved to barter. It was instead a gift for any fae who happened to be near. Mattin thanked them as well, his breath a shivering cloud that made one of the guards wandering the grounds turn to consider him. But Mattin was no threat to anyone, as everyone well knew, and he was left alone as he made his way to his room. 

As it was unremarkable to leave any requested research with Cael if Mattin was too busy to meet with the king, or, more often, if the king was too busy to meet with him, Mattin left information on granaries as well some background on the Dettavicci in Cael’s office, right next to Mil’s cloak with a note of explanation pinned to it asking Cael to please return it for him. Mattin then poked around the palace for several days, avoiding the current royal residence as well as the training grounds and barracks for the palace guards and any visiting outguards. 

He paid visits to friends, or friends of friends, and listened to rumors, and observed, and wondered about Mil’s eyes-and-ears and if Mattin should have his own, although this was the only such assignment he would ever get, so he was not likely to need them. He wore some of his finer vests and even his lovely, useless cloak once he found it, drank vast quantities of tea and a little wine, let those surprised to see him away from his work pull him into an informal late night dance, and was unexpectedly kissed by someone who fled a moment later, apologizing profusely. 

He did not know what that meant, and felt too weary to consider it beyond blaming the wine, and so he collapsed into his bed two nights in a row, only to wake to an aching skull and his hair clasps digging into his scalp. 

Council meetings did not absolutely require his attendance, but Mattin would draw attention for avoiding them all, so he slipped in after one had begun, his head still aching though he had only the single glass the night before. He had his book out and ready, and his hair softly plaited back and coiled at his nape to avoid wearing anything that might pull or pinch his scalp. 

Cael gave him a stern look from across the table, then lifted one eyebrow in question, as if Mattin without decoration in his hair was concerning. But she was focused on the discussion going back and forth and soon enough left Mattin to frown at his pages whenever he heard Per Tyrabalith’s voice. 

If The Tyrabalith had wanted to provoke Arden’s temper, then his gambit had failed. Although Mattin thought that a foolish venture, the members of the older families were often foolish, so he could not rule it out. Whatever Per Tyrabalith’s reasons for speaking as he had, a spouse was now to be found—or at least, to be searched for, in the most correct way possible. That was Mattin’s job. To help find one, and to determine how to proceed from there to satisfy the older families with public courting and equally public wedding festivities. 

He hid his yawns behind his hand and noted points in the current debate but mentally focused back on what had consumed him for the past several days. He had already crossed off some of the names after investigating the gossip, and sidelined a few others. They might be considered, but not in the first batch. He had spent the nights where wine did not help him sleep trying to determine what Mil Wulfa and Arden Canamorra would find desirable, both physically and otherwise. 

He pretended these were new thoughts, and they almost seemed so when aimed outward. 

He had selected only those who named themselves men, which he had mentioned, tentatively, to Cael. The matter of heirs was unimportant, since, if Arden wanted to choose from just within his own family, he had nieces and nephews aplenty in addition to his siblings, not that Jola or Ral seemed to want the crown. Whether or not Arden or Mil were interested in more than men, Cael did not say. She had merely sent Mattin from her office with an order for him to rest and a reminder that the need was not urgent. 

It was, though. Mattin had a vague idea that if he did this, completed the list and studied royal marriages of the past while Arden and Mil did their wooing, it would be better. How, he could not say, and did not waste time examining. He would be better if this was done, and he could return to granaries and ancient property disputes, and, perhaps, never leave the library again.  

The thought carried him out of the council meeting the moment the king stood up and everyone made to do the same. It took him to another gathering of beat-of-fours and other nobles near him in age, who whiled away the dark, frozen nights of winter with parties and games and bedhopping. A mouth on his cock was not unwelcome, but he did not linger, or imagine that anyone cared if he did or not, and he returned to his office instead of his room, and curled up in his chair before his dying fire.  

When there was no longer a reason to avoid the discussion—when Mattin truly could not think of any—he rewrote the list to neaten it, and left it, folded, on Cael’s desk. Then he went to his room to soak in the bath and stare idly at his nails and wonder what he would say when Cael summoned him to have the proper discussion that the list deserved. 

Her schedule was likely busy, which was why he received no summons in the morning. Uncertain, Mattin went on other errands: visiting friends who had been out with him to ensure they’d arrived home, or at least, in a comfortable bed, then to the kitchen to grab something to eat so his assistants would not have to feed him again. He had even remembered to wear a cloak and an extra shirt to make up for the cloak’s deficiencies, and felt almost like a proper Master Keeper who would have no problems spending several weeks researching the spouses of past rulers and all the many traditions they might choose from for both wooing and wedding. 

He was unprepared to walk into his office and find the king there. 

Mattin was momentarily dizzy and held onto the door frame to keep from falling. Something that would have been embarrassingly like the first time they had spoken, and a still-healing, newly crowned king had come into the Great Library both in search of information and to thank the assistants and Keepers who had stayed. 

During those first few months on the throne, Arden had decided to demonstrate his appreciation for those who had stayed. It had been a simple but rather brilliant tactic to make those in the palace grounds, particularly the workers and staff, fond of him. No one had informed Mattin of that yet, or he might have expected their heroic king to show up in search of information on the original powers of the very first rulers. 

He might not have expected it while standing on a wobbly stool while angrily reshelving maps deep in the depths of the library that one of his predecessors had left in their office for, it seemed, several decades, but he might have reacted differently to a pained but beautiful voice telling him that he should stop and get a stronger stool, or perhaps a ladder. 

Mattin, covered in dust, exhausted from nights too filled with leftover fears to sleep, irritated beyond measure at the mess he was cleaning up, had snapped, “Who made you king?” Only to hear, to his horror, that same voice answer wryly after a pause, “I did.” 

Then Mattin had turned, too fast on his unstable stool, and pitched forward, landing awkwardly and not without pain on his feet. But only just. 

Before him, in the wide aisle between the vast rows honeycombed with cubbies for maps and scrolls, had stood the new king, Arden of the Canamorra, his husband, the former outguard Mil Wulfa, several members of the Palace Guard, and Cael of the Rossick herself. The king had been leaning on a cane, his grip white-knuckled on the handle. His husband had been staring at Mattin with his eyebrows raised and had said only, “This wee thing is a Master Keeper? I’ve never seen one so sparkly.” And, before Mattin could stutter an apology for his truly bad manners, Arden had smiled. 

Arden had not had so much gray in his hair then. The past five years had taken their toll. Or maybe nearly dying had caused them and they had just taken time to grow in. Arden had still looked every inch a hero, and very much like the ruler in an old story, handsome and scarred and grave—at least until that smile. 

If the personal introduction to everyone working in the palace had not endeared people to him, that smile surely would have. 

Mattin had felt young and silly, like a boy with a crush, like an assistant who had no place calling himself a Keeper or a child who had cowered in the dark while those two men had saved their family and then ended the fighting. 

Until that moment, Mattin had been there solely for the sake of the Great Library. But he had dutifully noted the information the king was seeking, found it and presented it to Cael within hours, and from then on, all requests from Arden or Mil had been directed to him. Mattin had found himself in an office, albeit a small one, and in a position of some importance and—as his family had reminded him in letters afterward, of some personal risk. 

Yet he did not think his stomach had ever swooped with alarm and worry quite like it did to discover Arden standing before his fireplace, absolutely dwarfing Mattin’s already tiny office. 

Arden was dressed for the weather, in a long cloak that he had flipped over one shoulder to give him more freedom of movement. The collar was thickly furred. His sleeves appeared black but shined with traces of blue in the firelight. He had vambraces on and wore a sword, although he was alone, without even a guard with him. 

Too late, Mattin recalled seeing several guards milling about the library entrance, which might have given him some warning. 

Mattin slowly shut the door behind him and then stepped carefully to his desk under the king’s watchful eye. The fire was roaring. That had to be Arden’s work. 

“You found your cloak.” Arden broke the silence first, though Mattin should have been the one to greet him and ask what he needed. 

The trouble was, the answer would almost certainly have to do with the list Mattin had made, and Mattin was not yet prepared for that conversation. He would almost suspect Arden of ambushing him for that reason, but Arden was not cruel. 

“We were worried, Mil and I. You returned his cloak, but we hadn’t seen you. Then you showed up to the council meeting looking almost ill and we thought the cold weather had brought on sickness.” 

Mattin, who had looked terrible that day and knew it, still huffed. He was not a child needing to be fussed over. To prove it to himself, he inhaled and said, “I assume you are here about the list. Did Mil not like it? Did… did you not?” 

He only stumbled a little and was fairly pleased with himself. 

Arden’s expression flickered from concern to something more unreadable and kingly. “It is a well-considered list.” He regarded Mattin for another moment before pulling the folded piece of paper from where he had tucked it into his shirt. Mattin’s knees weakened, and he hurried to his chair to sit despite the rudeness of doing so in front of the king. Arden was hardly one to take offense, in any case. He unfolded the paper and considered what it said in weighty silence before tucking it away once more. “We were… curious as to the qualifications, though some I can guess.”

Mattin was stuck in his chair, his satchel and cloak limiting his movement. His throat was tight and dry. “Men,” he croaked, and decided to deal with his mortification over that later. He pushed on, voice smoothing out as he went. “Unattached men—the position would require too much attention and energy to maintain a family elsewhere, likely, though of course we did not rule out those with existing known lovers since your marriage to them would be a formality—probably a formality, at least at first. Some voiced loyalty helped. And they are all from old families, with no or little scandal attached.”

“Tasi Diirlylian is a cousin of yours, is he not?” Arden asked, clearly knowing the answer. Mattin wondered with faint possessiveness who else had been educating the king on the ancient houses, but he nodded. Arden still kept his expression blank, though his tone was polite. “But that house is not nearly as distinguished as yours.” 

“Well, yes.” Mattin frowned as he had frowned when putting Tasi’s name on the list. “A distant cousin. But most of my closer cousins are promised or in the midst of courtships, or too young, and it is the same with my siblings, although the children of an undistinguished youngest do not have much to offer but their name.”

Arden raised his eyebrows. “I thought the name was half the point of this, Keeper Arlylian.” 

Mattin conceded that with a nod and a dusty little cough. “Tasi has an interest in horses and hawking or something similar. He’s the athletic type, and a few years older than me, if you want an idea of age. The Lylian branch is not known for taking chances.” Arden lifted his eyebrows. Mattin coughed again. “With a few exceptions,” he admitted, although being a Master Keeper for a troubled and dangerous king was hardly daring. “They also have a history of loyalty.” 

“Loyalty to a crown.” Arden dismissed this. “Crowns go on heads, and plenty of rulers lose those, one way or another.” He should have been blazing hot in all his layers in front of that fire. But, of course, he stayed there, letting the firelight glint off the silver in his hair and draw attention to the fine shape of him. He barely seemed to notice the heat. “You said you wanted ones I would grow fond of.” 

“Could, I believe I said.” Mattin croaked once more. He reached for the cup of tea that had been sitting on his desk all night and took a harsh, bitter sip. “That was also a consideration. Age. Preferences. Activities.” He rolled his wrist. 

For the first time, Arden looked away. “Active youths.” He turned to stare at the fire, then back to Mattin with the slightest pinch between his brows. 

“Problem?” Mattin wondered, confused. 

“I do not want… We have spent over half our lives with….” Arden stopped before measuring out his words. “Lessons with a sword or a bow are well enough, but….”

“But you are already a warrior, and your husband, too.” Mattin thought he understood. “Oh, I see. I thought you might want that, to have something in common with them. I was mistaken?” 

There was another chair, small and simple and currently filled with books. Arden glanced to it but did not pull it closer. He stayed on his feet and clasped his hands behind his back. “We trust your taste and judgment,” he declared at last, and yet Mattin did not think this was what he had planned to say. “I am sure we would find ways to converse with men such as these. And it is only a formality, these initial meetings, so it hardly matters if they want to talk of fighting, or to challenge two supposed heroes.”

“You are heroes to many, including your sister,” Mattin argued, then sighed down at his desk when he could not bear the warmth in Arden’s eyes. “Two of them are also scholars, of a sort,” he admitted quietly. “Hobbyists, but respected. Astronomy, and histories.” He paused. “But one of those is also related to the Tyrabalith. I included him for that reason.” 

Arden cocked his head in distracted interest. “Good scholars?”

“I…” He had Mattin stumbling again. “What makes you think I’ve read their work?”

He received one handsomely raised eyebrow for it. “Mattin Arlylian, you are nothing if not thorough once you’ve committed yourself.” 

If Mattin’s heart beat faster, he was the only one to know. “Well,” he said after too long of a pause, “the security of the country matters. And I would like His Highness and his husband to be happy.” 

Arden raised his head, regal and thoughtful, before lowering it to give Mattin a study that made Mattin skate his hands over his desk searching for something to hold to. Arden reached up to thumb the cuff at his ear. “Then you might reconsider your list, well thought out though it may be.” 

Mattin’s spine straightened in offense without his say-so, and he had to forcibly lower his chin. “I might?” he demanded, outraged and yet not as insulted as he ought to have been. “Who did I leave off?” Arden widened his eyes and looked caught, like a child trying to sneak some marzipan-covered almonds. Mattin’s anger slipped away. “Oh,” Mattin realized aloud, “do you already have your eye on someone?” He reached for the cup without looking and swallowed acid to keep down the lump in his throat. “Is that why the two of you were not as thrown by this request as I would have thought?” 

He splashed tea onto a stack of papers when he set the cup down, so he focused on blotting it with some of the preliminary lists he’d abandoned. “Someone should have told me.” He did not think there was anything in his voice, although Arden said, “Mattin,” very softly, as if there was. “You have intentions?” Mattin looked up. Well, he looked toward the fire. “Tell me, and I will help you construct a plan to woo them.” 

After several moments, Arden moved, reaching for the chair and dragging it to the desk before gently restacking the books on the floor. Then he sat and stared heavily at Mattin as if he was more exhausted than he seemed, as he likely was. 

“Your devotion to your duty is admirable,” Arden said first, perhaps unhappily, before he ran one hand over his head and tried again, this time curious. “Do you… have much experience in wooing, then? You have never spoken of any interest, or lack of interest, in such matters.” 

Mattin scowled for no reason. “I had a youth.”

“You are a youth,” Arden returned immediately, “if one also possessing the spirit of an old fusspot.” 

Mattin kept his objection to a wrinkled nose and restrained himself from smoothing down his sleeves. “I’ve had a flirtation or two, yes,” he said on the subject of wooing, sounding quite old. “They came to nothing, and they were years ago.” 

“Ah.” With that, Arden went silent once more. Mattin had nearly decided to offer more information when Arden finally went on. “Mil and I grew up together, left the capital together, served together. I have always known joy around him, and he married me when I was just an outguard with no prospects or ambitions for anything else.” Mattin somehow doubted that Arden had ever been just a simple outguard, no matter what he told himself. He was a Canamorra. The Canamorra, even as a boy. He had a presence that Mattin had felt when Arden had only been king for a handful of weeks. But he had been disgraced with no prospects, that much was true, and Mil had married him anyway. Arden exhaled.  “I have never….” 

Mattin made the smallest sound in his throat, a stifled cry. He did not mean to meet Arden’s gaze and yet he did, his skin prickling with warmth. “You have never wooed in this way,” he said, so Arden would not have to. “And this is no time to be making mistakes. I see.” Beyond that, Mattin had no thoughts fit to speak. He floundered for several moments, feeling a disgrace himself, then remembered he sat at the desk of a Master and should act like one. “Well, it is always a show. Courtship, I mean. Usually a show for one, or perhaps for the families as well. This will be a show for all. With roles to play, if that helps. It does not have to be… that is… courtship would come later. First, you have only to meet them. That is all you have agreed to with this. Meet them and converse a little. Maybe have tea?” He floundered again. 

“Tea?” Arden repeated in a strange tone. Possibly he was thinking of Mil and how Mil handled Mattin’s fragile cup with the obvious fear that he would crush it. Of course, a suitable spouse shouldn’t mind that, or the use of large, plain mugs instead. 

“A meal?” Mattin reconsidered, then shook his head. “No.” Tea and an array of small pastries were better. Things to busy one’s hands with, sweets to lift the spirits. “Just a friendly cup of tea and some talk. Everyone will know what is going on, naturally, but they are unlikely to say so directly, as is the way of social functions with the old families. It will be potentially embarrassing for them as well, you know. All of you measuring each other with the entire court watching.” That was perhaps less soothing than Mattin had intended it to be. “They will want to impress you… or should, if they say yes to the invitation. Please don’t be worried. You have done braver things in your life…. some of them when I was barely more than a child,” he added that part in an attempt to lift the mood, although his tone was more dismayed than anything.

The king, always the king, even as he was Arden, too, put one hand on the edge of the desk and Mattin’s gaze fell to it. Arden’s voice made him shiver. 

“Offering my heart, and the heart of my husband, is not something I do lightly.” 

“Your heart?” Mattin forced his eyes up. “You said it would be a formality only.”

There was something in Arden’s manner, his stillness when he should have been drumming his fingers, that made Mattin’s pulse as wild as a trapped rabbit’s. Arden’s eyes were dark yet like the fire. “Did you not say I should be happy?” 

“Yes.” It emerged from Mattin weakly. “Both of your hearts?” 

He thought Arden smiled, but could not look away from his eyes to make sure. 

“If I were to give my love to someone else, do you not think it would be someone he could also love?” At last, Arden tapped his fingertips over the scattered papers. “Should I ask someone to bring you fresh tea, Keeper Arlylian?”

He was pleased with himself, for no reason Mattin could determine. 

Mattin closed his mouth, which had regretfully been open, then shook his head, only to nod a moment later. 

Still visibly pleased, Arden got up and went to the door to politely ask someone to bring Master Keeper Arlylian a pot of tea. 

Mattin recovered his voice as Arden sat back down. “It’s what I’d expect from two such as you, if I allowed myself to think on it.”

That gave Arden pause. “Two such as us?”

Mattin waved a hand to avoid having to explain that, then cleared his throat. “I merely wanted someone for you to be happy with. I did not and would not imagine anyone you might love on the same level as Mil.” Arden’s faint air of smugness disappeared. Mattin thought it wise to shift the discussion. “Your intended, if you choose one… or win the one you have already chosen… would have to know that. I wouldn’t want anyone getting their heart bruised.” He tried a smile. “If Mil was here, he’d call me soft for that.” 

“Aye,” Arden agreed, just like his husband. “But perhaps not in the way you seem to think.” 

He sounded fond. Mattin twisted his lips, but had to ask, melancholy and tormenting himself. “You’ve really never… played the game? With intent? Either of you? Not with anyone else?” 

“Not for more than a night or two’s dalliance, which I do not think is the game you are thinking of.” Arden dropped into formal speech, which was strange when Mattin had no doubt that he had spoken much rougher during his years in the wilderness and the countryside. Perhaps that was why it took Mattin a moment to follow his meaning. 

“You mean a fuck,” he blurted, then winced at saying it so bluntly. The moment following that, the rest of what Arden had told him sank in and Mattin nearly lost himself the images that sprang to mind. He wanted to whimper. “You mean together?” How many nameless, faceless strangers Arden and Mil had met while outguards who had been charmed and won over by both of them? Mattin didn’t want to think of what his voice sounded like. “Often?”

Arden watched him for another moment before destroying Mattin’s ability to think of anything else. “Often, when we were quite young—younger than you now. Less often since then. Not at all in the past six or seven years.” He elaborated needlessly, without being prompted, to haunt Mattin’s nights. “Sometimes together and sometimes on our own, with encouragement, if we found someone not to the other’s taste.” 

Mattin was a little lightheaded, and also not sure he could rise from his chair. He swallowed dryly. He was not going to ask. Not one more question. “Encouragement?” 

Arden took a deep breath and let it out before continuing. “We were young, and had only known each other. It seemed foolish not to sample what the world had to offer. And we shared the details and kept no secrets.”

“Well.” Mattin stared blankly as the door opened and an assistant brought in a tray and set it on the desk before leaving. “Well,” he said again, while thinking of some blessed soul between Arden and Mil like a roast on a spit. “That is…” Mil’s hand at the back of someone’s head while Arden watched, his gaze just like it was now. 

Arden handed Mattin a cup that was hot to the touch and Mattin accepted it, blinking. His cheeks stung. He swallowed a scalding sip and found the tea had milk in it. Arden must have poured it while Mattin had been imagining Arden fucking deep into someone while enjoying Mil’s kisses. 

“Have I embarrassed you, Keeper Arlylian?” The formality of his title on Arden’s tongue, at that moment, made Mattin even hotter. He blinked again. Arden’s eyes were bright. “You’re rather red in the face. You said you’d had your flirtations.” 

Mattin had been talking about courtship. He gulped more tea. “I’m the youngest of a youngest. I work closed up in here, and there was unrest for so long, I never…. If you meant fucking, you should have said, I—I was speaking of wooing, Arden Canamorra!” He took another drink that was not calming. “I’ve only had two flirtations that were remotely close to approaching serious. Everything else was just friendly….” He coughed, then put the cup down. 

“Not at all the same thing as picking up someone in a tavern, is that it?” Arden asked gently.

Mattin firmly shook his head. “Courtship,” he began, moving things along to spare himself more humiliation, “will have much more… ado. More rules. More care. And I am not… I am the youngest of a youngest,” he said again. “Of no one special. Far from The Arlylian. There is nothing particularly interesting about me, so I cannot tell you how it would be to be courted—but you grew up here. You had to have witnessed at least some proper flirtations.” 

Arden gave a shrug. “It was not my interest then. And whatever childish things I did to please Mil, I no longer remember well, and what I do recall would not be fit for court.” He grinned suddenly, rakishly, and Mattin grabbed desperately for his tea. “Will you tell me, then, how it goes? Instruct me in the art of courtly wooing?”

Mattin froze with the cup in his hands and lowered his gaze quickly to the floral pattern painted beneath the glaze. Nasturtium, he thought they were. A pretty flower, loved by the fae. 

Arden could not ask him to do this. Mattin was a Record Keeper, a librarian, a minor noble, if of an old family. Arden could not ask it of him. 

That was an odd thought, a misplaced one. Arden was his king, as other rulers had not been. Arden was his, and he had trusted Mattin with this. Mattin could not say no. 

“There would be better teachers,” Mattin said at last, on a sigh. “I am, as you said, a youth. And when I told you ‘one or two,’ I meant that. And never a… never a courtship. I am not someone who would be courted with much circumstance.” He relaxed his tight grip on the cup, then lifted it lightly. “If it was flirtation you were after, then I cannot imagine the rules are much different than an encounter with a stranger. Only perhaps less direct.” He threw back the tea and grimaced as it went down. 

“And if it is not flirtation?” Arden pressed softly. “If it is meant in earnest, as this must be? A courtship in truth.” 

Mattin was surrounded by tradition and knowledge. He could summon it now. 

He looked up. “There are rules for that, guidelines and accepted practices. Like steps in a dance, or how each kind of ballad has its own devices.” He paused to breathe. This was his job. “You will get to know them slowly. The first meeting can stay one meeting, if you don’t want more. A short conversation, if you like. And if you do—want more, that is—you could invite them to another meeting—they won’t offer. Not the first time. Maybe not even the second. Not with someone of your… you’re the king, Arden.” 

He said it as if Arden had forgotten, and Arden inclined his head, as if perhaps he had. He was still listening, so Mattin went on, not certain of what he was saying, except that it sounded right. 

“But if they want to, they will refuse your offers, king or not. They will all understand the purpose of these meetings now that the council has been talking. If they are not interested, they will politely decline. If they are, you have only to determine why they are interested, and if it is for the same reasons you are.” Arden’s attentive stare was making Mattin dizzy again. “Once you have established your interest, and their interest, you would also need to spend time together in public, and eventually in private, to discover if you would want them in your home, at your table. In your bed.” Mattin had to move his gaze to the fire to say it, but say it he did. “But, in your case, the public part will be more of a show, since there will be attention on you. You might have them sit near you or Mil at feasts or other events. Take them riding or walking with you, if they like that sort of thing. Get to know their attitudes toward the work they would be doing as your other consort, I suppose. If you are not dotingly in love by then….” Mattin lost his thought and trailed to momentary silence. “Although even if you were, you would still need to attend to your duty so… so….” He could not think of the rest of what he had been going to say.

“And if I am dotingly in love by then?” Arden was merciless, but carefully so. 

“How does anyone show affection?” Mattin wanted to snap out the question like a snarling cat and suspected some of his helpless displeasure was obvious, although Arden would never say. “Gift them things, things they like, or would want, but because it is you, these gifts cannot be private. Or, not all of them can be. Spend more time with your… your chosen. Let them know you think of them when they are not near, the way one shows favor to anyone, friend or lover.” He did not know where his hands were, then realized they were pressed flat to his desk. He slipped them out of sight. “But you will only be meeting people, at first. Only that, if you want. Then you may do what you did with Mil, if at a grander scale. No! I mean—” He raised his head, alarmed, and found Arden with a subtle curve to his lips “—don’t nearly die trying to reach his side! Please do not do that.” 

Arden’s small smile became wider and full of mischief. “Don’t worry, Mattin Arlylian, I had won Mil before then, anyway.” His smile abruptly disappeared and he sat up. “Were you here that day? Did you witness that?” 

“Oh, no,” Mattin assured him immediately, cold when a moment before he had been hot. “I was hiding. Many of us were, down in the cellars below the library. Only the Keepers and assistants and the odd scholar know those are even there.” 

They had heard much of the fighting, however. And when they had finally left the safety of the library, they had seen the aftermath. 

Arden relaxed, if only slightly. “Good.” 

“Good?”

Arden nodded. “Hiding was sensible. And I don’t like to think of you in danger, or watching as I died.” 

Mattin wheezed at that word. “But you didn’t.” He thanked the fae again, as he would always. “Anyway, you wouldn’t have known me from anyone else.” Despite how members of the Outguard personally delivered the information they collected on their patrols to the Great Library, and how often they would flirt with assistants—and often tup them in the many secret aisles and passages—Mattin could not recall ever seeing Arden or Mil there. 

“But you were safe in the library.” Arden seemed to find satisfaction in the thought. 

“Oh, the library is not always safe,” Mattin said without thought, “just remember Master Keeper Lanth.” Only, Arden would not have been near the capital when that had happened, and had possibly never heard about it while out on his patrols. “During one of the more turbulent years—” for all that the beat-of-fours tossed around the word traitor at Arden, many of them had few qualms about taking what they felt was theirs through traitorous acts and then seeking to ignore this fact afterward “—Master Keeper Lanth was asked by the Queen Tye to remove any records that would have weakened her claim to the throne.” All Tye had to do was keep her seat, Mattin reflected shakily. None could have argued with that. “Lanth refused and was killed for it. I suppose that news did not travel to the countryside.”

“No.” Arden was a grave and somber figure once more. “We knew things were not stable here, but my family had left the palace, and I’d sworn to myself to stay out of it, releasing all claims or interest in anything to do with the throne. It kept me alive, I think. All of us. For a while. Lanth?” He shook his head sadly. “I think I remember her. She would have been doddering about by then.” 

“Stubborn, though.” Mattin’s family had snatched him back from the capital for a while after that, no matter his love for the library. He made his voice soft, because Arden was pained, as though he was somehow to blame when at best only his parents had their share of that. “Many left then.” 

Arden looked up again. “You didn’t.”

“I came back.” Mattin did not know what to do with Arden’s admiration and the feeling it stirred in his stomach. “I came back, and eventually… well, we still needed Keepers, didn’t we? And I was very young. No one noticed me. Any of us, really. Which is good, when you have no defense but research.” 

Arden ignored this fragile humor. “I still do not like to think of you here for that.”

“Neither do I,” Mattin admitted, knowing he would have been useless had he seen Arden bleeding out at the foot of the palace wall. He glanced away, imagining the scene regardless of his wishes, and noticed the stack of papers and books always pushed to the side on his desk. “There are not many songs about the two of you when you were mere guards, none that mention your wooing then,” he offered, wanting a new topic, even this painful one. 

Arden allowed it. “Have you heard them all?”

Mattin’s ears were going to burn to a crisp at this rate. “I am keeping a record of all the songs about you. Even the negative ones.” 

That got him a glimpse of real surprise. “Did Cael ask you to do that?” 

Mattin skirted the truth without lying. “I thought someone might wish to read them, one day.” He reminded himself of why the king was here. “Perhaps your intended.” 

All emotion disappeared from Arden’s face. It meant something that he would do that. Mattin knew that much, just not what it meant. “You will be there, at these arranged meetings?” 

“You want me to be there?” To watch? Mattin demanded silently, only to realize he was already nodding. “Can’t have an incident, can we?” he asked inanely. “I suppose I must be there—in the background. If it will help.” Arden’s relieved smile would have made him giddy another time. As it was, he was flushed. “You still do not have to accept one.” 

But whatever had made Arden momentarily withdraw was gone. He was regarding Mattin warmly once more. “It will do no harm to press on, I think. Or I hope it will not. Let the others see that I tried. Let The Tyrabalith see it. If he expected me to leap up in anger, he will learn that I try not to waste my anger on unimportant matters these days.” He got to his feet, so Mattin did as well, tipping his head back to keep eye contact. “It is not my duty to marry again, but it is my duty to try to make peace, and that I will. But I do not think he made the suggestion with peace in mind.” 

“It certainly wasn’t private, as it might have been,” Mattin remarked with a huff. 

“Yes.” Arden nodded. “Mil wonders if he didn’t expect a fight right then, from him or from me. We are not subtle about our feelings.” 

“No, not for each other.” Mattin smiled despite the pull in his chest. “But I have often found you hard to read.”

Arden tilted his head down to level Mattin with a puzzled look. “I’ve spent most of my life in armor, but you’ve seen me without.” 

Mattin turned away enough to let him fuss with the papers on his desk without knocking over the teapot. “So Mil thinks The Tyrabalith may try to goad you into further conflict? Then we must be careful that all of your meetings are the same, and above reproach. Yes. I will definitely be there to help. I would be honored.” 

The sigh from Arden surprised him, but not nearly as much as the feel of his hand being gently picked up and held between both of Arden’s. Arden was hot and his palms were slightly rough. He did not wear gloves, but did not seem to need to. Mattin could feel Arden’s rings, almost as warm as Arden himself. 

He was not sure Arden had ever touched him before. He looked up instead of down, to Arden’s eyes. Arden held him still with just that. 

“I won’t take up more of your time,” Arden said, formal once again, courtly, something that should have made Mattin pause for longer than it did. “But I thank you.” 

Many foolish things rose up in Mattin’s throat and he barely kept them behind his teeth. “It’s my job.” 

“Your hands are still quite cold,” Arden observed as if Mattin had said nothing. “I do not think I have ever seen you with gloves. Not inside. Not outside. Not even in this weather.” 

“I forget them,” Mattin admitted, though it was no secret. 

“So I imagined.” Arden’s gaze was almost unbearably tender. “Your fire was not properly lit, either, despite the logs here for you.” 

Mattin blinked, although his hand was still being held, and his gaze was still caught in Arden’s. “It’s often late when it goes out. I’m not going to call someone in here at that hour to start a new one. Mil would say I am soft for that.” And for not being able to start one of his own, which Mattin had all but confessed to. 

“Hmm,” Arden agreed in a rumble Mattin felt in the air and in his hand before Arden finally released it.  “And your list was quite thoroughly thought out, I am sure,” he added, with an expression that seemed odd, although Mattin was likely dreaming all of this. “I will see you in the morning? Or will you sleep at last?” He paused. “Have you been sleeping? Is that where you have been?”

The comment was enough to prod Mattin from his staring. He jerked his head back. “Did you come here to scold me?” 

For the second time in what could not have been more than half an hour, Arden gave him a pleased, rakish flash of a grin that made Mattin want to smile back, or do something wild. Whatever wild would mean for him, he had no idea. Probably something that would make him fall on his face. 

“I came to get your thoughts of courting,” Arden revealed, still grinning, “and those I have received. Anything else was for the pleasure of talking with you only.”

“I…” Mattin could not tell if this was teasing because of his obvious foolishness or a reminder of their early conversation about flirtations, but he finally got his mouth shut after a few moments of gaping and then he wrinkled his nose. “Indeed,” he declared, like the fusspot he had been named, and shooed the king out with one wave of his hand. “Out, you.” 

“Oh, no,” Mattin went not even a heartbeat later, his eyes wide. “That is, I didn’t mean to order you about. I—”

“I know what you meant, Master Arlylian,” Arden assured him gravely, despite his smile, and bowed his head graciously as he took his leave and went out the door. 

Mattin put his hands to his face the moment the door was closed.

One was still warm. 

Mattin generally assumed Jola of the Canamorra associated the palace grounds with her unhappy childhood or her captivity here at the end of the reign of their last ruler. While her other sibling was content on what remained of their family lands from the capital, and Arden had fled to the Outguard, Jola had stayed in the capital, but in a house outside the palace wall, and had kept her visits here brief. 

That was, until gossip or paranoia had convinced King Piya that Jola was plotting against him. Piya had stepped to the throne while others had hesitated, but had made no other bold moves in his time sitting on it. His rule had been one of confusion and whispered plotting that even those in the depths of the Great Library had begun to overhear. Perhaps finally realizing this, Piya had at last decided to act to eliminate those with the strongest claims to the crown. That his eye had turned to the nearest Canamorra should have been expected, but somehow, it had not been. 

Mattin would never forget the stillness throughout the capital as the news had traveled that Jola of the Canamorra, pregnant, holding the hand of her young daughter, had been brought to the palace in the dark of night and confined to a small room to await the King’s judgment. Jola’s popularity, Piya’s typical hesitation, and the sudden ripple of awareness through the old families that Piya would come for them next, had granted Jola a stay of execution. Piya had focused on trying to subdue angry council members and made himself more enemies in the process. Others had begun to join Jola in her captivity by the time word must have reached Arden. 

Perhaps it was for Arden that Jola had now surprised everyone by temporarily returning to a home inside the palace wall. That very morning, she and her children had set up a small royal residence in a section of a building that had once housed the orphaned Canamorra children, and by afternoon, she had surprised Mattin again by sending him an invitation to a gathering in her new home that night. 

It was natural that she would take an interest in her brother’s attempts at finding a new spouse, especially as it was politically important. This party must be about that as well as being one of the more formal ways that old families greeted each other. What had stunned Mattin was that he was invited. 

Nonetheless, Mattin had left the library the moment he had read the note, and headed to his room to bathe and restyle his hair and consider what to wear. He saw many of these people every day, but not in a social setting. A Keeper and a minor Arlylian did not often move in the same circles as the Canamorra. 

The gathering was not overly formal, although even Arden and Mil had put on clothing more decorative than practical—with concealed armor, Mattin was sure. Mil was in a tunic of dark green, with another, long-sleeved tunic of white beneath that, and someone, Arden likely, had knotted some of his hair at the back of his head. Mattin thought wistfully of the beautiful green-enameled hairpin in the shape of a leaf that he had almost purchased with Mil in mind. 

Arden was in midnight blue with hints of gold at the trim, with a thin golden circlet at his brow that had to be Jola’s doing. It was no proper crown, but it was clearly intended to remind people of one, making Arden even more of a king than usual. Mattin was not the only person drawn to the sight of him, but at least Mattin had a cup of wine to drop his attention to whenever it seemed like Arden might look back. 

Avoiding his king was not wise, perhaps, but until Mattin spoke to Mil or Arden, he could pretend it was a simple party he had been invited to and not a first step in a campaign to bring a third to Arden and Mil’s bed. 

Mattin had been waved in by several guards, and since then, he had smiled at a Cael with silver stars in her hair, and chatted with a few of those he had seen a few nights ago, and seen no sign of Jola Canamorra herself. He had eventually settled onto a short, cushioned bench by a window to observe the many who approached Arden and his husband from safely behind his cup of wine. 

Some of the council members were here. Two or three had nodded in Mattin’s direction, showing surprise to see him. A few others had also nodded, showing no surprise, or pleasure, or displeasure. But though they stared, Mattin had kept his expression polite, and sipped his wine, and reflected that in the time it had taken him to plait two braids into a spiral and pin them up to leave his neck bare, he ought to have eaten. 

He also should have reconsidered his attire. He was still not sure what had made him order a robe or pants in a deep blue-purple, when blue was not his usual choice in color, and then wear the robe tonight. But he’d put silver cuffs along both ears, and a silver necklace wrapped close around his throat. He could not compete with wealthier or more powerful nobles and had not wanted to try. But he had not wanted to look foolish, either. He had even scrubbed the ink off his fingers. 

He might have as well have been one of the guards discreetly positioned around the room that everyone was ignoring. Mattin half-wondered if there had been more guards around recently, or if he was making himself nervous and imagining that. They acknowledged him whenever he passed; perhaps that was why he noticed them more now. 

Across the room, two nobles about Mattin’s age or slightly older were now standing before Arden. Arden had angled his head to indicate interest in their conversation, but either they were boring Mil or were not including him, because Mil was blank-faced. Mattin wondered if those two boring nobles knew yet why Jola had invited them. Probably not. The assembled guests were not all political or romantic candidates, just the families of candidates or possibly friends of Jola’s. But this was a preliminary round of some kind. Mattin had no doubt of that. 

Anyone with sense would talk to Mil, even if only seeking Arden’s goodwill and not his hand. But Mattin did not expect much sense from those two—they had not been on his list. 

“You appear to have finished your wine.” A voice quietly broke into Mattin’s thoughts and then the space next to him was claimed by Per Tyrabalith. 

He might have asked. But he did pluck Mattin’s empty cup from his hands and offer Mattin a full one, so Mattin decided not to comment. He did not take a sip, however. 

“Tyrabalith,” Mattin said formally. 

“Arlylian,” The Tyrabalith responded, as if amused. That he knew Mattin’s name was mildly surprising. Most Keepers were not nobles, but Master Keepers—usually of more advanced years—who sat in council meetings might be of interest to the council members. Despite that, Per Tyrabalith had never addressed Mattin in the time Mattin had attended the meetings. “Those are odd choices for him,” The Tyrabalith went on, leaning toward Mattin as if they were sharing a secret. He gestured loosely in the king’s direction. Mattin kept himself from glancing that way, but only just. “Your searches in the library have been of some interest,” he explained at Mattin’s rather stunned staring. “But old families know best, so I am certain you will separate out the chaff soon enough.” 

Mil and Arden had eyes-and-ears in the palace, and probably in the capital and the rest of the country. Of course, other nobles would as well. Mattin had known that on some level, but never really considered it would apply to him. He doubted an assistant would maliciously share news of Mattin’s record requests, but careless talk was useful to many. 

He made a note to himself to do the rest of his searches personally and to consider his choice of assistants more carefully. 

Per Tyrabalith did not seem bothered by Mattin’s silence. “Still,” he said casually, now looking out to consider the rest of the party, “I was surprised to see you here. Despite your family, you are not usually to be found at these sorts of events. What a privilege for their matchmaker—if I am right in my guess?” He did not stop to see if he was. “Unless that is dear Jola, and you are merely here to offer reminders on rules and etiquette. You understand the necessity of this. I regret that it took such strong words for Arden to understand it.” 

A frown passed across Mattin’s face. He could feel it, like the sort of flicker of distaste or confusion that he had felt when a particularly out-of-touch Keeper would sing the praises of a ruler who had been cruel or inept. 

Per Tyrabalith turned to face Mattin again, tucking a chunk of his hair behind his ear to share a smile. The Tyrabalith was younger than Arden. Mattin had never really noticed that before. He didn’t suppose it mattered, except it should have given Per Tyrabalith and Arden something in common; being pushed to the head of their families at a young age by political scheming that had not been their doing. The past decades of in-fighting had taken their toll on the older generations. The survivors were cautious and guarded, or had abandoned the mess to their children, no doubt filling their heads with nonsense as they went. 

“This is no time for tender feeling, though it is, of course, admirable.” The Tyrabalith’s smile did not falter. “The workers, the people in the capital, they do not see the situation as it is, but we do, do we not, Arlylian?” 

“Keeper.” Mattin wet his lower lip and ignored the faint quiver in his stomach. “Master Keeper, if you prefer, but Keeper will do. Arlylian is what my ancestors did, but Keeper is what I have done for myself.” 

Per Tyrabalith paused, then raised both eyebrows in a graceful expression of surprise. “Yes, so you have,” he answered at last. “With remarkable swiftness. But you have much to do, do you not? Your position might remain with less work. That is something to consider.” He gestured with the empty cup to Mattin’s full one. “But in the meantime, you might enjoy your evening, and try to momentarily forget all that is expected of you, Master Keeper Arlylian. Most of us never get the pleasure.” 

He rose to his feet while Mattin was picking apart his words. Mattin watched him walk away, no less annoyed than he had been a moment before, only for that to shift into confusion when apparently the absence of Per Tyrabalith was a signal for several of the younger nobles to surround Mattin in order to share their opinion of the gathering, Arden’s beard, Mattin’s robe, and the food. 

Mattin had half a moment to wonder if the others had been wary of talking to him until now, and then another to wonder why, before the crowd just as abruptly dispersed with various murmured excuses and one rather bold wink. 

The reason they had all politely removed themselves from Mattin’s orbit became apparent when a new figure appeared next to his bench. Unlike the presumptuous Per Tyrabalith, and though she would have had the right to, Jola Canamorra did not sit down. 

Mattin got up, or started to, but was waved down almost impatiently. 

“I supposed that having a slightly younger set around might ease things, but I think I supposed wrong.” Jola was two or three years below her brother in age, and darker of complexion. Her smile lifted her plump cheeks and was nearly as bright as the clasps at her temples. The golden bees were not enameled glass as Mattin’s clasps often were, and were charmingly arranged to seem to be eyeing the real flowers tucked into the many braids she had pinned up behind her ears. Her long robe reached nearly to the floor, and was the same warm yellow as her pants, which she wore in the loose style. 

“Ease things?” Mattin echoed blankly, looking up from admiring the heels of her boots.

“He never had to survive at court as an adult, never had to learn to negotiate the different groups and silly allegiances that form at young ages. I thought it might do him some good to be around that.” Jola did not drop her smile although she lowered her voice. “And I thought it would benefit you as well, to have some of your friends here. I admit, I did not expect them to fall over you quite so obviously.” She glanced over her shoulder, then looked back to Mattin and lifted her eyebrows in question. “But your outfit is quite striking, especially with that necklace. Well done.” 

“Oh.” Mattin did not know what to make of that. “Thank you for thinking of me, but that wasn’t necessary.” Perhaps the wine or his empty stomach made him then add, “I begin to think that others feel I have more power than I do. They were not fawning over me in particular.” 

“It takes sense to recognize what is done to gain things and what is genuinely meant.” Jola’s expression became a touch more serious. “I commend you for it, but I wonder if you are correct, Master Keeper.” 

She knew who he was as well. 

Mattin shot a look over to Arden and jumped when their eyes met. Mil put his chin on Arden’s shoulder to whisper something in his ear. 

Mattin quickly turned back to Jola. “The king has spoken of me?”

Jola’s eyebrows flew upward once more before she also glanced at her brother. “Master Keeper Arlylian,” she said slowly after turning her back on Arden, “I have been here for the past decades of unrest. I remember Tye and how she tried to use the Library. And I know not everyone was pleased when so many others asked a Canamorra to take the throne, especially not in the very beginning of my brother’s reign, when people were, perhaps rightfully, afraid to trust or to hope for peace. You were young to make such a brave choice.” Mattin felt he could not look away without disappointing her, so he did not, holding his cup tighter. He had no words, but Jola did not seem to expect any, although something made her eyes bright. “You didn’t even know them then, and from what they tell me, it is only in the past two years that you have grown so close to them. If you don’t realize how special that is, which I think you do not, I will tell you that a childhood here under the scrutiny of countless eyes does not lend itself to trust. But they trust you. They trust you enough to let you manage their hearts. My fool of a brother inspires this sort of thing, but he doesn’t always fully realize the risk for others. So I wanted you to know that I realize it, and I thank you.”

“Oh.” Mattin finally dropped his gaze. “It is not….” He was not selfless. He enjoyed being a Keeper and he enjoyed that he had somehow wound up sharing breakfast with the king and his husband more often than not, and he enjoyed… thinking that in some way he was helping to keep them both safe. “It’s what we are supposed to do.” He finally settled on the truth, but as spoken by a diplomatic Master Keeper. He looked up from his pink wine. “The records exist to be used, to help those in the future.” 

“And to help make royal matches?” Jola asked then, regarding Mattin with the same impassive face that her brother had perfected. 

“I don’t know what he told you,” Mattin muttered, startling himself with the irritation in his voice. “I will do the best I can for them.”

“Yes, they mentioned that. I had my doubts, but now I’ve met you and those are rapidly disappearing.” Jola still did not take the seat next to him, but neither did she leave. “Your list was rather astonishing, and I did not quite know what to make of it during my initial reading. But when I read it with a mind for the gaps, it was almost a code. Not that I know anything of codes.”

Mattin considered her confined to a room for months and yet still finding allies and support, and then wondered if Piya’s suspicions had been at least partly correct. Jola might not have wanted to make herself ruler, but some took to being eyes-and-ears more seriously than others. She might have simply thought it wise to stay informed in such troubled times, although it had not saved her from arrest. 

Then he disregarded the thought because that was Canamorra business and only partly related to his task. 

“Do you have thoughts about the list?” Mattin took a deep breath. “The king seems displeased but will not tell me why.”

“He has heard my thoughts.” Jola’s reply told him nothing, as it was likely intended to. 

“But he sent you here?” Mattin asked, then hesitated at her sharp look. “I mean, he asked you to come here, didn’t he? To help him with this?” 

“Pff. I came here because he knows some things of people, but in other areas, he is next to useless. This matter is important.” 

“The country…”

“Certainly.” Jola cut him off. “But also him, and dear Mil. They are important too. You understand this?” 

Mattin raised a hand to the sky, palm up, to indicate his exasperation and confusion and perhaps make a plea for help. “Mil is there. I mean—Captain Wulfa is there with him, if he needs…. Mil is slightly better at other aspects of… people.”

“Mil is better at demonstrating his devotion, even if he does not speak it.” Jola sighed, then tossed a look back to where Arden and Mil were now trapped in conversation with several of the elder Racetia, who were nice but tended to talk without pausing for breath. “He expressed some concern over how quickly you’ve finished your wine, and here I find you with another cup.” She quirked her lips and waved off Mattin’s dismay. “I say enjoy it, Master Keeper. Chances to relax and have fun are few and far between for some of us. If you wish to have more, and to beckon your troop of potential suitors back here once I have gone, I say do it. Perhaps Mil Wulfa and Arden of the Canamorra will learn something.” 

Mattin looked over, half-expecting to get caught again, and idly took a drink of his wine. “I suppose I should eat something,” he said to Jola, but to appease Mil, who kept glancing at him. 

“Do,” Jola said pleasantly, and drew Mattin’s attention back by briefly placing a hand on his shoulder. “Take what innocent pleasures you may, but make your decisions with your head and heart clear. I am sure I will speak to you again soon, Master Keeper Arlylian.” 

Mattin did get to his feet this time, respectfully waiting for her to get some distance away before he toppled back onto the cushion and drained his cup. 

A soft-voiced servant interrupted his bemused fretting to offer him a tray of food and another cup of wine. He accepted both, with his thanks, and consumed them while all of Jola’s most handsome or athletic guests paid their respects to Arden, and sometimes, to his husband as well. He watched as Arden listened and leaned down to answer, and as Mil murmured into his ear in their brief moments alone. Then someone handed Mattin a new cup and sat next to him to gossip about it all, and he drank that while nodding politely and setting aside a few scraps of information casually passed his way. 

He nearly forgot them all by the time that cup was emptied, and had the brief worry that he was behaving inappropriately, for he was so hot and the cushion was so comfortable. But then a different very friendly someone brought him a plate of tiny cakes and another cup, full to the brim, and smiled at him, and after a while, Mattin forgot his worries entirely. 

“I haven’t not been worried in years,” he explained to Jola Canamorra in amazement, hoping he made sense. He could not recall her sitting next to him. But she might have been bored. The party seemed to have grown smaller and quieter since Mattin had last looked around. 

Jola patted Mattin’s head where it rested on her shoulder and perhaps smiled meanly across the room as she had done once or twice as Mattin had talked with her. “I understand perfectly. Not all of us get to run away to join the Outguard.” 

Mattin nodded, then frowned. “They’re heroes, you know. Heroes. And they love each other so much. So much that no one else could compare.” 

“Hmm.” Jola had a laugh like the tinkle of a bell. “I think it’s time we get you home, Master Keeper. Home and cared for.” 

“Oh, I’m fine,” Mattin assured her. “I’ve crossed the palace many a time so tired I could barely walk. This is nothing.” With that, he thanked her warmly for her hospitality and stumbled sleepily to his feet. 

And then perhaps to the floor, or almost, before strong arms caught him.

Mattin held onto the strong arms distractedly, a hand on each forearm on either side of him. He was too hot and too cold in turns, sandwiched between two warm bodies but his front and back exposed to the freezing night air. 

The corridor was not enclosed. Mattin considered, not for the first time, if the buildings with the open-air corridors and walkways had been built by people who did not know what winter was. Perhaps builders from one of the warmer coastal provinces. 

A blast of wind made him stop to shiver. The people around him stopped with him. 

“Are you well?” asked a voice like a lit brazier.

“I’d fetch you water if I thought you’d keep it down,” offered another voice, rough enough to make Mattin shiver again. 

“It’s cold,” he complained tiredly, raising his head. 

Someone huffed, the sound almost a laugh. “It is winter, dear heart,” said the beautiful voice in a tone which implied it had been said before. “And you could not recall where you had left your cloak, if any.”

“Suspect he thought the robe was enough,” someone muttered. 

Mattin turned to Mil, but had to tip his head back to see his face. They were very close. He was not sure he and Mil had ever been so close before. “My hands are warm, though.” Mattin dropped his head to solve this riddle, and realized he was arm-in-arm with his king and his king’s husband, and his hands were tucked into their sleeves. He smiled and resumed walking when he was gently tugged onward. 

“Are you seeing me to my room?” He curled his fingers into fine cloth warmed by their body heat. “Walking at night can be lonesome, at times, although it is less frightening these days. Have you seen more guards around? Mill, have you put more about? But it’s so cold. The poor things.” 

Several yards in front of them were two guards, keeping a steady pace. One of them coughed. Mil growled something. 

Mattin arched an eyebrow. “I assure you both I can make it home without incident.” He struggled to make the words clear and briefly scowled for it. “I always have before.”

Mil, apparently, still felt like growling. “Sass, if I didn’t think you’d never forgive me for it, I’d carry you. You can barely stay up as it is.” 

“Not enough sleep. Not enough food.” Arden sighed. 

“Oh. Oh no.” Mattin stopped again. Everyone else stopped with him. “Did I make a fool of myself?” He tipped his head up dizzily to look from Mil to Arden. 

Arden answered. “No. You sat with Jola and had a long talk.” He paused, disgruntled. “She would not say what you talked about. But… I am sorry if you have not been able to have fun because of your work for us. I should have thought. You are young for a Keeper, and we kept asking more of you. And now we would ask even more—my sister is genius at making me realize my failings.” 

Mattin blinked several times. “She asked what Per Tyrabalith said to me. And… and… we spoke of you, of you two. No failings.” 

“She should not have kept you from your friends. The others your age,” Arden insisted. 

“How dare you,” Mattin breathed, and yanked his hand from Arden’s arm to latch more firmly onto Mil’s. “What is he even talking about?” he complained to Mil. “I chose to be an assistant, and a Keeper, and I think I’ve been a good Master Keeper, even if I am young for it and perhaps I fell over in front of Jola Canamorra. Ah. She complimented my necklace.” 

“It is a charming necklace,” Arden agreed. Mil’s eyes were hard to read in only the light from some distant braziers, but Mattin thought he shared Arden’s opinion. The links of silver were cold on Mattin’s skin now, but looking at Mil made him hot. 

“Perhaps we ought to keep walking, Sass,” Mil finally suggested, tugging Mattin along again. Mattin went, reaching out for Arden’s arm when the corridor swayed. 

“And yet,” Arden began again after a few steps, cautious, “I do not think this is usual for you. Not when a pot of tea and a book pleases you more.” 

“And definitely not in front of any other beat-of-fours,” Mil contributed. 

“Don’t be mean,” Mattin chided Mil. 

“I wasn’t, Sass,” Mil told him warmly. “I only meant that you like to look your best around them.” 

“Youngest of a youngest,” Mattin explained quietly. “Plain. And an assistant.” 

“You’re a Master Keeper now, Mattin Arlylian.” For a moment, Arden’s other hand settled on top of Mattin’s on his arm.

“There was no one else,” Mattin confessed. Then he made a face. “You understand that. I know you do. Being chosen because there is no one else.” 

“It might be why you’re chosen, but it’s not why you succeed,” Mil said in his low rumble. “That’s a matter of mettle.” 

Mattin shook his head. “You were handed a country seething with resentments and past wounds. I must seem childish, worrying over wine and… and… hair clasps.” 

“Seems to me you worry over everything. But the clasps are lovely, Sass. Don’t doubt that.” 

“Really?” Mattin leaned against Arden to better study Mil. 

“Many mentioned them to us,” Arden assured him after Mil’s strangely tentative smile had rendered Mattin silent. “They were sure to,” he added, so softly Mattin almost missed it. Then Arden raised his voice again. “You have wonderful taste.” 

“Well.” Mattin’s face was too cold for blushes, surely. “Blue is not my usual color, but you are fond of it, and I wanted to be supportive. Wasn’t I?” he asked Mil. “I was there. I even tried to be a good eyes-and-ears, although—I didn’t mean to have too much.”

“Oh, that we are sure of.” Mil looked over Mattin’s head to Arden, and then Mattin was abruptly lifted off his feet and held between the two of them as they walked up some stairs. They placed him gently on the ground again the moment they reached the second floor corridor. “First, The Tyrabalith gave you more, and then Jola encouraged it. But at least you looked to be having fun.”

“I have fun.” Mattin wrinkled his nose. “I have fun all the time. I might not sneak out to taverns…” he swung a fiercely suspicious look to both of them, letting them carry him when he could not do that and walk at the same time. The shoulders of the two guards in front of them appeared to be shaking. They were older guards. That was who Mil and Arden had kept on, after the dust had settled. The guards who had left after Jola had been taken, or who had helped Mil open the gate to bring in the Outguard. And, of course, some older outguards themselves now served as the king’s personal protection. Mil would trust no one else. “Oh. Yes.” Mattin nodded as he realized something. “You don’t get to have fun anymore, either.” 

“We do,” Mil confided, a sudden whisper against Mattin’s ear, “just in private.” 

Mattin’s words shook as a thrill went down his back. “Were they pretty?” he wondered breathlessly. “The others you….” He shut that away without saying it, dragging his teeth over his bottom lip instead. “Your sister told me to have more fun. But I do. There is nothing wrong with liking a pot of tea!” he declared hotly, and huffed at the sound of laughter from one of the guards behind them. 

“Soul of an old fusspot,” Mil said fondly. 

“But you don’t,” Mattin argued, although he was not quite sure what they were arguing about. “She said… ah, that you joined the Outguard to get away. That must have been such a relief.” The night air was suddenly much quieter. “You both got to have fun, at least at first. That makes me happy.” 

“Does it?” Arden’s attention seemed even more intense than usual. 

Mattin exhaled in a melancholy fashion. “Now you can’t even seduce strangers in taverns.” His sadness on their behalf melded with a bit of displeasure. “Or do you?” 

“Not really an interest of ours anymore. Wasn’t even before we came back.” Arden gave Mattin’s hand another lingering pat. “And we’re far too busy besides. Don’t let that be another worry for you.” 

“Your new…. Your chosen.” Mattin clutched their sleeves even tighter. “They might not like that. You will have to discuss it.” 

“I suppose we will,” Arden agreed readily, without any rancor. “But, to my way of thinking, the real question is, why don’t you? Why doesn’t the young and pretty Mattin Arlylian make his way to more taverns to charm strangers into his bed? Does he not desire to? Or is there some other reason?” 

Mattin was guided farther along when his steps faltered. He turned to Mil first, sputtering at Arden’s cheek and effrontery. “Fusspot.” He pointed to himself, resisting the need to return Mil’s charmed smile. “It takes a lot of jewelry to make me sparkle. I don’t seduce anyone. We just sort of… agree that we might as well.” 

Mil’s smile disappeared. “What?” 

“I know what you’re thinking, my love, but even when I was a palace youth, I did not understand them.” Arden made a rude noise. “I understand them even less now. Mattin, you are….” 

“A bit of a magpie.” Mattin slid his arms free of theirs to pat his braids, which were still in order. The guards had stopped moving. Mattin did not seem to be walking anymore, either, and was not certain when that had happened. He touched a fingertip to one of the crescent moons helping to keep his hair neat. “Did you know they’re a pain to get out when I am tired? Sometimes I forget, and wake with a sore head.” 

“Ah. Then if I might be of use?” Arden’s tone indicated this was an offer, so Mattin turned to stare curiously up at him. Arden’s lips curved as he lifted a hand to lightly, carefully, press on one of the silver moons in Mattin’s hair. His eyes seemed especially dark, but there was only one brazier lit in the corridor that led to Mattin’s room. Perhaps that was why. 

“If you don’t mind,” Mattin heard himself saying. His breath caught when Arden reached up with both hands. The first tickle made him shiver. 

“Tricky fastenings,” Arden observed, to either Mattin or Mil. A flash of silver in Arden’s palm and then he was on to another. Mattin uttered not a word, chest abruptly, unbearably tight.

“There are more along the back,” he finally managed, shivering uncontrollably when Arden stepped closer. Mattin turned quickly, his body acting on its own to make him face Mil with his eyes wide and searching. He was breathing fast, his breath small puffs of steam, there and gone. He had a passing thought that he should look at the guards instead, but Mil was far more interesting, broad and still, gaze heavy on Mattin as a king tended to his hair. 

“Mil,” Mattin pleaded, although that was all. 

“Don’t think I’ve ever seen you with your hair loose,” Mil returned in a rasp. 

“It gets in the way.” Mattin shivered and shivered. The air was frozen and yet he was burning, trembling when Arden’s fingertips grazed behind his ear. Everything was so quiet except his pounding heart and Mil’s shallow breathing. “Can you braid hair?” he asked, a desperate sort of question.

Mil inclined his head. “I can learn.”

Mattin smiled without thought, then exhaled for the warm hint of Arden’s touch at his nape. “You are teasing me?” He didn’t want to wait for an answer. “If your chosen wears braids, then you should.” If they were a beat-of-four, they likely would. Mattin pushed that thought away and shuddered for the heat at his back. “It will help for afterward.” 

“Afterward?” Firelight was flickering and never to be trusted. Mil was not watching Mattin’s face or studying his mouth.

Mattin wet his lips. “When you are getting dressed again,” he informed Mil in a husky whisper.

Mil nodded seriously. “Then I’d best learn, hadn’t I?” 

Mattin raised a hand and had it nearly on Mil’s chest before he had the dizzying realization that Mil was making the offer for another. Because there must truly be someone they would prefer. Mattin dropped his hand but still could not look away. 

Arden’s breath trickled down beneath Mattin’s ear to his collarbone. “The necklace as well?” 

Mattin dragged a hand to his throat. Mil made a sound, pleased or denying, or both. 

“Just loosen it. Please.” Mattin’s eyes fell shut at the glancing feel of Arden’s hands at the back of his neck, the slide of the thin chain, and then he was sucking in a breath and moving away. 

He did not get far on his suddenly weak legs, but he did not have far to go. He stared in confusion at the door to his room until one of the guards opened it. 

“No lock?” Mil’s voice was rougher than usual. “Check it first.” 

Mattin opened his mouth to object, but two of the guards were already inside, lighting the candles in the sconces and then, at Arden’s thoughtful order, a fire in the fireplace. Mattin shuffled in after them, blinking a little at the mess he’d made in his search for the right outfit, the open door to his bathing area, the mussed blankets on his bed, the stacks of books so like his office. 

Tomorrow, he would wonder what Mil and Arden thought of it. Tonight, he was drifting toward the bed already, letting the guards move around him as they filed back outside. 

Arden and Mil stayed in the doorway, not stepping beyond the threshold. 

Mattin’s hand was still at his throat, holding the necklace as it began to slip. He had the feeling he ought to speak, although he had no idea what he should say. 

Mil broke the silence with quiet concern. “Get some sleep for once, Sass. I’ve never seen you so upset as you have been lately, and I’m sorry we caused it.” 

Mattin shook his head to refute that. Everything he had done he had chosen to do. They had trusted him with it. “I’m sorry I was trouble.” 

Arden’s gaze met his. “No trouble at all.”

“Not enough trouble, some might say,” Mil added, with a feathery sort of gentleness that would have surprised Mattin if he had not had so much wine. 

“This was our pleasure, though you will not believe me, I think.” Arden should be more tired than Mattin, not pausing in his doorway to say such things. “Sleep well, Master Arlylian.” 

Mil barked an order to the guards before Arden had fully closed the door. 

Mattin tripped backwards to his bed, then fell onto it to stare blankly at his ceiling. His skin was pebbled with goosebumps although his cheeks were stinging. The fire was bright. He pulled the necklace slowly from his throat, and without moving his head, tugged at his braids to loosen them. Then he closed his eyes. 

Surprising even himself, he slept. 

The first meeting was uneventful. Probably because Mattin had been given no warning and so no chance to fret over it. He had known it would happen soon, if only because of Arden’s wish to have the atmosphere in the palace calmer by the end of summer, but he had not expected Cael to invite him along as she made visits, or to then end up in a sitting room occupied by King Arden, his sister, Captain Wulfa, and several nobles from different families. That one of these nobles was Hess Lilanatha, from Mattin’s list, and that Hess was seated before an exquisite window of dyed glass next to the king himself, had made Mattin falter beside Cael. 

Cael had given Mattin a look of concern, or warning, then ushered him the rest of the way into the room, where Jola Canamorra had immediately invited Mattin to sit beside her and thus blocked Mattin’s view of the window. Mattin had not spoken to Arden or Mil since his evening with too much wine, and in those two days, he had considered many times what he ought to say when he saw them. Rescued, or trapped, by Jola, he had no chance to say anything. He had been given treats of crushed pistachios rolled in honey and sweet, fried dough, and cups of tea of a familiar blend, and then sent from the room with Cael once again before the meeting had concluded. 

Hess had looked to his best advantage in the pale pinks and blues from the window glass. So Mattin had thought. But the meeting was not mentioned during his next breakfast in the rooms of the king and consort, and no matter how the conversation had lulled once or twice while the two men had studied him, Mattin did not bring it up. Whether or not Hess was the one they may, or may not, have wanted, was for them to explore, and they could certainly do that without Mattin’s help—except for the short lesson in frivolous conversational topics that Arden had insisted that he and Mil needed and which he hoped would not inconvenience Mattin too much. As if walking through one of the palace gardens and asking Arden and Mil questions about the weather and the winter-blooming flowers had been a tremendous burden on Mattin’s time. 

They had actually wound up talking more about the fae and Arden and Mil’s encounters with them, which had been fascinating enough to nearly make Mattin forget his cold nose and his chilled hands and Arden’s tiny, fleeting frowns whenever he noticed them. 

After that, Mattin had gone back to grains and harvest information between researching royal wedding rituals of the past several hundred years. He had also taken some time to watch the assistants going to and fro on various errands for different Keepers, and considered the Great Library as a source of information in an entirely new way than he ever had before. 

All of that had been more than enough to keep him distracted until a message had arrived for him in his office, another invitation on richly textured paper, another small gathering in the temporary home of Jola Canamorra. 

For this one, a midday meal with several of Jola’s friends and acquaintances and their friends, Mattin had straightened his clothing and washed the ink from his hands, but had not had time to do more. Which meant he had been at one end of the table in rumpled linen with his hair in two long braids down his back and not a single piece of jewelry while Arden, with Mil nearby, had talked at length with Lan Balylithan down at the other end of the table. Lan had been in velvet the color of pomegranates with delicate gold cuffs at his ears and nose, and a gold necklace that matched the clasps at the ends of the tiny braids starting at his temples. 

Mattin spoke absently with those around him and smiled when he thought it appropriate, and when everyone finally got up to walk the room and chat and sip what was left of their wine, he slipped away to a balcony, closing the door behind him. He was hardly needed in there, whatever Arden would say. 

This many people in attendance for one initial meeting was either intended to disguise the purpose of the meeting or to see how well Lan would handle the pressure. It also seemed more Jola or Cael’s doing than Arden’s. Definitely not Mil’s. 

It was nearly evening, which came so early in the winter, and not snowing, although the air was crisp. Alone, Mattin reached into a pocket to pull out a set of gloves. 

The gloves were a gift. A present left on Mattin’s office desk the morning of Arden and Mil’s first meeting with someone from his list, although Mattin had not known that then. Mattin had arrived, bleary eyed and tired, to the sight of a pair of small gloves in pale brown leather with button closures at the wrists, and next to them, a handful of gleaming hair clasps in the shape of crescent moons. All of it had made his face sting. 

The gloves were similar to what the palace guards wore in winter, although much finer, and obviously not intended to be used while handling weaponry. The buttons were carved blackwood, dramatic against the light color of the gloves themselves. Mattin loved the gloves dearly, and touched them often, running his fingertips over the soft interior when he was alone in his office. But he had not worn them much, forgetting them at his desk a few times, or then finding himself reluctant to put them on once outside. Like his clasps being returned to him, it seemed something that ought to be brought up in the proper way—as soon as Mattin determined what that was. 

But he was chilled—he had remembered a cloak but removed it for the meal—and he was alone, and it was likely he would be alone for some time. So he put them on and fastened the buttons with trembling fingers. Then he placed his hands onto the railing to peer down at the courtyard below.  

“Be careful out here.” Mattin should have startled at the interruption. At the sound of Mil’s gruff warning, however, he merely turned. Mil soundlessly closed the door to the balcony behind him. “You’re a nice, fine target.” 

Since that made no sense, Mattin stared blankly at Mil as Mil came forward to join him. “A target?” he finally echoed. “For what?” 

Mil came closer. His sleeve brushed Mattin’s arm as he stopped to peer over the ledge. He nodded to someone. Mattin twisted to follow his gaze and saw a palace guard returning the gesture. 

He had been sure to not have any wine today. His thoughts still seemed a few paces behind. 

“Are you worried?” Mattin couldn’t believe it. “About me? Whatever for?” 

Mil pulled away from the ledge and put a hand to Mattin’s elbow just long enough to urge Mattin to take the step back with him. Then he slid Mattin a look that felt pointed. “The Tyrabalith’s cousin is next on your list,” he said, significantly. As if this explained anything except that he and Arden were methodically ticking off names. 

“Yes, well.” Mattin shivered a little but raised his eyebrows loftily when it made Mil scowl, and Mil did not comment on how cold Mattin must be. Mattin glanced to the balcony door, made of colored glass but covered by a curtain for warmth at this time of year, which meant he could not see inside. “You two hardly tore him to pieces for his suggestion. If Per Tyrabalith wants to provoke something that would be… foolish, really. He’s not going to try convincing me to add names the list, and even if I did, it wouldn’t change anything. Anyway… I still don’t think defending his love makes the king look terrible. Not even to the other beat-of-fours.” 

Mil scoffed. “The Traitor King does not need much to sour his reputation, you know that. It’s only been a few years.”

“Anyone who meets him—” 

“But not everyone has, or will.” Mil’s interruption was gentle. “There is a point to be made about stronger alliances. I’m but a guard and I do not belong in finery.”

Mattin looked up at him. Mil’s hair was back today. His ears were bare as ever, even of simple pewter jewelry. He must not care for it. But he wore brown today, deep brown, and it made him seem warm despite the weather. 

Mattin dropped his eyes, aware that he’d been staring.  “You’re a hero,” he argued heatedly. “People regard you as such.” 

Mil gave a snort. “Nobles aren’t people—no offense.” 

Mattin jerked his chin up in surprise, then frowned. Mil lifted a hand. 

“I said no offense, Sass.”

“Saying it doesn’t take away the offense, you know.” Mattin huffed, then shook his head at himself. “But you have been treated poorly, for no reason other than dismay that you are not a noble. Or perhaps because you knew so many of them when they were younger, and they are ashamed for how they acted, or did not act, to Arden or to you. So I cannot fault you for your bitterness.” 

Mil seemed taken aback. He waited a moment, then bent his head as if to study Mattin more closely. “You think it’s their shame over that, and not just the fact that I am not one of them but, in a manner of speaking, have more power than they do?”

When Mil chose to speak on political matters, he was clear and direct.

Mattin nodded respectfully and spoke gently. “I think it’s both. And also that you don’t know their ways, and have made it clear you don’t want to and will not be bothered—except for when you do bother. Because you can and you have when you feel you should. Like with Jola’s parties. So you remind them that they are not necessarily important, and that their ways are not, either. And they act resentfully at times.” 

“At times.” Mil seemed amused by that. His stare was hard to hold. In these moments, he was thoughtful and sincere and everything other nobles believed he could not be. “Their ways are also your ways, Sass.” 

“Yes,” Mattin agreed immediately, only to stop and look down. “I understand, a little, of having to claim your own space in the palace. But you are right. I am still one of them.” He thought of what Jola had said and smiled. “Not all of us get to run away to the Outguard.” 

He had expected Mil to find that funny. Not for his expression to sharpen and grow fierce. “Not all of us should.” Mil growled it. He also seemed to know who had originated the phrase. “Oh, Jola would have been fine. She’d lead armies, that one, if she were inclined. You should stay in your bright clothes and your little office.” 

“I…” Once again, Mattin was practically a helpless infant. But he could hardly argue against it. Not with Mil so concerned he had imagined Mattin as a target. “You’re changing the subject.” 

The ferocious look remained for a few moments more. Then Mil gave in. “And what good is it to mention their dislike of me, or my dislike of them? Not all of them are terrible, it’s true enough. But the past twenty years have proven that not many of them can be trusted. That’s a fact. And it’s my job to watch out for them, too, and they know that. It just helps that I am not one of them. Helps them keep me separate. And so, though I did not think of it in those terms at first, I can now see the advantage of having someone at Arden’s side who knows them and can talk with them. I think it will be good… if we can ever get the matter settled.” 

Mattin forgot to blink for a while, then did so, before frowning so intently at Mil that Mil should have commented instead of allowing it.  

“Mil,” he began at last, with a vague feeling that he had said it before in much the same way, “you do not have to answer, but I must ask.” Which was easier said than done. Mattin breathed in deeply, then let it out. “Are you worried he will love someone else more than you? Because you shouldn’t be. I don’t think that’s possible.”

Surprise, unhappiness, and confusion flickered across Mil’s face before he fixed his expression to something inscrutable. He squared his shoulders. “He and I have discussed my worries, but I reckon I should have had it out with you, too.” 

That was… not whatever Mattin had expected. “Why?”

Not a hint of any feeling crossed Mil’s face this time, although his attention and interest were heavy. “Helping all of this along, aren’t you, the king’s wooing of one noble creature or another? No matter what you might think of it.” 

Mattin wrapped his arms around his chest, then thought better of it and let them fall to his sides. A moment after that, he was pointing at Mil accusingly. “You’re implying I don’t think well of it.” 

“Are you saying you don’t?” Mil narrowed his eyes. “Because then you’d be lying to me, I think.” 

Mattin had no desire to lie to him but also a very real urge to run from this balcony. “I… recognize the expediency, but I don’t wish you any undue unhappiness, either of you. You’ve had enough of that.”

Mil raised his eyebrows and was slow to lower them. “If you mean our years away… we didn’t mind the life. Not really. It was cold and wet a lot, for certain, and most nobles didn’t want us there on their lands, as agents from the capital, even if we weren’t there for them. There was often fear and sometimes danger and almost always bad food, or not enough of it. I won’t speak of the lack of hot baths or proper toilets so as not to offend you, but… we liked it, for all that. It offered a great deal of freedom from the rules and troubles of this place.” For the first time Mattin could recall, Mil seemed uncomfortable, or nervous, reaching up for a single moment to tug at his hair, and then he shrugged and the moment was gone. “It was a struggle for us, him more than me, at first. But then it let him be something else. For a while. And me too.” Mil made a thoughtful noise. “Never said that out loud before, but you should hear it. We did run away. That’s true. But it made us more ourselves, more myself, because I got to see what I was like as something else than what I was meant to be.” 

“Do you not like being Captain of the Guard?” Mattin questioned with a small amount of shock. Mil was everything a guard should be, everything the Captain of the Guard was meant to be. Which was a foolish thought from someone who knew well what palace guards had often participated in, but Mattin had never felt safer here than during the past five years. 

Mil flashed a grin. “Oh, I’m good at it. And I’ll do my best to do it right. But… it was always going to be my life before I left—if the infighting didn’t do me in first. It was my destiny, maybe, though you’d have to ask the fae about that. Same as this was his. We ran away and came right back to where we started, but stronger for it. Maybe that was our destiny, too, leaving just to return, to find everything here.” 

“Everything,” Mattin repeated quietly, darting a look upward when holding Mil’s gaze made him feel cagey, as though he needed to move but didn’t know where. “You still gave up that freedom to return here—well, to stay here. Arden is… I suppose he would always have chosen the crown, and you would always choose to protect. Nevertheless, you should not have had this forced upon you.”  

Mil still did not show even a hint of anger at his predicament. He was watching Mattin as though he wasn’t quite sure what he was seeing. “He doesn’t have to say yes, or make any offers except for more blasted tea. Different from your tea, of course, Sass,” he added quickly. “You actually enjoy your tea and your tiny cups. All this is for show, and I’d rather have an ale if we’re going to sit around sipping drinks and not talking about what everyone can see in the room.” 

He sounded like someone would if they were angry. And yet, his fury, if any, did not seem focused on the issue of his heart. 

“Are you upset?” Mattin pressed anxiously. “You can say so if you like. I won’t tell anyone else.” 

It earned Mattin a smile, which was so confusing Mattin was sure he would fret over it later. 

Mil slowly shook his head. “You’re a sweet thing to worry about me. But it’s not this upsetting me.” 

“Oh?” Mattin peered up at him, wondering just when Mil had stepped closer, making the balcony smaller by cutting off Mattin’s view of anything below his broad shoulders. He blinked, then swallowed. “The idea truly doesn’t bother you, then you must—” Arden had not denied the idea that the pair of them had already had their eye on someone. Perhaps they had not been considering marriage before, but they clearly had now. Mattin opened his mouth, then shut it with a snap. 

He could not ask. 

Mil continued to watch him like Mattin was a curious riddle, or one of those touched by a fae’s curse, unpredictable and potentially dangerous. “We’re not opposed to the idea,” Mil said, slow and cautious, “only the way of it, at The Tyrabalith’s suggestion… and some of the choices. We told you that before.”

“Yes, but…” Mattin silenced himself before he could argue against what he knew was true. Mil and Arden had told him this that very first morning. At the time, he hadn’t let himself consider it. “It finalized a notion you had already discussed between you?” That was the question Mattin had not been ready to ask that morning. He did not think he was ready to ask it now, yet it had fallen from his careless mouth. “It will not be like your” –he dropped his voice to a whisper— “nights with strangers.” 

Mil arched an eyebrow, then gave Mattin a grin that made Mattin flush with heat. “He mentioned he’d told you of that.” He studied Mattin as if he also knew how Mattin had reacted to that information. Mattin parted his lips to defend himself or deny it or simply to find more air on the suddenly warmer balcony, but then Mil shook his head.  “No, this wouldn’t be like that. We figured that long ago, to our dismay, because seduction would be far easier. This is the sort of thing that takes thought and planning done by someone who knows which tunic to wear with a nice cloak, and the names of each tiny biscuit on the tray, and how many of the last dozen rulers had more than one spouse.” 

“Two,” Mattin answered immediately. “But both before they were crowned.” He suspected he was frowning but did nothing to correct it. He ought to be flattered, not cross. They honored him with their trust. But he wished, briefly, for a single moment, that he was not so fussy, so he would not be the one to help them with this. Then he swallowed the lump in his throat and looked away, to the glass door and the curtain that shielded him from Lan’s prettiness. “I did not think you were pleased with my list,” he said finally. “It is all nobles on it, after all. And he is one of them, as much as I am. Arguably more than I am. But you want him to marry one of them, to… love one of them.”

“What I want first and foremost is to shut up that loudmouth Tyrabalith with something heavy, or separate him from his tongue with something sharp.” 

Mattin looked at Mil after a small jump of surprise. 

Mil’s glare instantly softened. He glanced to the glass door too. “But Arden,” he said the name quietly, reverently, “has lived with weight on his shoulders from the day I’ve known him. If there were someone suited to helping him in ways I cannot, and that someone also made him smile, I’d thank them for it.” He swung his gaze back to Mattin. 

Mattin had not considered that when he’d made the list. He should have. He shifted from foot to foot, then reached up to rub the tip of his cold nose, which at least briefly hid him from Mil’s stare. “He said, if he were to love such a person, you would likely love them, too.” 

“I’m not saying no,” Mil agreed, returning to his roundabout ways, though only for a moment. “But. You didn’t make that list of candidates with me in mind.”  

Mattin flattened his mouth. “Not entirely. But I thought….” 

Mil seemed to know what he had been going to say. “That the sportsmen, the children who learn the skills but don’t have to live by them, would interest me?” Mattin felt scolded, though Mil was smiling faintly. “You know a great many things I don’t, so I sometimes forget you’ve only lived here, and most of that spent in your library or your office. Don’t misunderstand me—you were not completely wrong to think so. Arden can use his sword, and has thighs I’ve dreamed of when we were apart, but do you think he has anything in common with that sort? Even when he lived among them, he was always the traitors’ son. It made him different from the others his age. More inclined to think before he acted, unless he wanted to be fighting always. Maybe I like a thinker, too.” 

Some part of Mattin trembled, a low shaking deep inside his chest that was visible when he pushed out a breath and the steam seemed to shiver in the air between them. 

“There are several scholars on the list.” He told Mil as he had told Arden. “We just haven’t gotten to them yet. You like poetry?” The question shot from him, loud. He cringed. “That is, one of my original choices that I took off the list likes to compose poems.”

Mil regarded him curiously. “Did you think I wouldn’t enjoy poems?”

Mattin shut his mouth. He darted a look up. “Arden does not care one whit for poetry but I have heard him recite it for you. I didn’t think you would enjoy his poems.” He grumbled the rest. “I certainly didn’t.” 

Mil snorted, then laughed, a short, happy sound. “You always give your true opinion when it matters, politeness be damned. And Arden’s right. You’re thorough even when you don’t want to be.”

The remark hit Mattin unexpectedly hard. “I do my best,” he said stiffly. 

All signs of Mil’s mirth disappeared. 

“I know you do, Sass.” Mil was too kind. “It’s why he trusted you enough to tell you what he did. You can’t often admit weakness, growing up like he did. Not in these walls. But I suggested he speak to you because I knew you’d be good to him.”

“Oh.” The tiny spike of bitterness that had pained Mattin since Mil had implied Mattin had been too obvious melted away. “Oh.” He looked around wildly, then only at Mil. “You are good to him too, Mil Wulfa. He could not do better.”

Mil tipped his head to one side without taking his eyes off Mattin. 

“What?” Mattin gestured at him, nearly bumping his hand against Mil’s chest. “You have something else to say, I can tell.” 

The corners of Mil’s eyes crinkled as if he was pleased, but when he answered, he was serious. “None of these meetings are going to come to anything. But I am sorry for the trouble, Sass, I truly am.”

Mattin reared back and furrowed his brow unhappily. “He has loved you as he would no other. I didn’t expect that to change. But if he is serious about this—or if it turns out that, well, there was a fancy but that fancy has gone nowhere—we only need to find someone you like. For a friendly arrangement if nothing else. An alliance.” 

Mil did not move, although his gaze seemed to sharpen. 

“Have to be a strong someone to accept a mere alliance from someone like him, with space for another in our great, big bed.” He did not let Mattin look away. “I think most would want more. I think he’d want someone who wanted more. I know I do. Good sense and knowledge are but a fraction of what we desire. You tell me, Sass, are we asking too much? Is that the problem?”

Mattin drew in an unsteady breath. “In… in any event, right now we are going through the motions. If you don’t want… if nothing else, it should appease The Tyrabalith.” 

“That one can’t be appeased.” Mil dismissed that with a toss of his head. Mattin could finally close his eyes to catch his breath. Mil carried on quietly. “Arden has plenty of heirs to choose from, when it comes to that. And people are tired of fighting. The only thing to nudge Arden from the throne now would be opinion turned against him, and the easiest way to do that is to make him behave badly—very badly, I’d imagine, considering what people have tolerated from rulers in the recent past. You’d need a scandal equal to locking up an innocent Jola to make most dislike him. He has a temper, aye. Though these days, you need to know him to know how to raise it. One particular noble who does know him enough, it seems, is stirring up trouble, or trying to, which is why I’d prefer you avoid balconies and pay more attention to things outside your ledgers and scrolls. I’d give you a knife if I thought you could use it.” 

Mattin opened his eyes to stare at Mil in bemused shock. 

Mil clucked his tongue. “If it wouldn’t spark another incident, I’d give you the cloak off my back. The lining is thick and will deflect most things.” 

“Why would I need that?” Mattin demanded, heartbeat growing louder in his ears. 

“Keepers are supposed to analyze information, aren’t they?” Mil considered Mattin shrewdly. “The Tyrabalith is looking to provoke the Traitor King, whatever his reasons for it. Arden has a temper, and if that cannot be raised, then he also has a protective streak that he proved when his sister was threatened.” 

“You can’t be saying that I matter enough for any sort of—”

“Arden is not shy about his favorites.”

Bluntly put, it made Mattin duck his head. “I am fond of the king as well,” he murmured, shivering internally at the thinnest of curtains between his words and his thoughts. “But surely, no one will think twice about me. I have only ever done my job.”

“When no one else would do it,” Mil reminded him fiercely. “And you did it well. And with kindness, which we could both use more of, though he’d be the first to say that of me and not for himself.” 

Mattin raised his head enough to briefly meet Mil’s eyes. “No one here treats you with the respect you deserve. With some respect, yes, but not what you deserve. You should have that, and so much kindness. So much.” 

If there had been a curtain protecting Mattin before, it was glass now. Mil slowly raised his eyebrows, then just as slowly lowered them. 

“It’s because of how you are, with your enamels and your velvets, that I forget,” Mil said quietly. He might not have meant to be heard at all, but focused on Mattin before Mattin could ask or shift the subject to something else. “You’re about what is proper, aren’t you, Sass? Perhaps we both forget. I thought it was all there was to you, when I first laid eyes on you. I thought you wouldn’t stick. But you sassed him to his face.” Mattin lifted a hand to object. He had not known he was sassing the king when he had said what he said. Mil swept on. “You stuck. Yet you seem to believe that is no remarkable thing. That you’re… ordinary.” 

Mattin’s back hit the balcony railing, which was cold even through his clothes. He tipped his head up, his view entirely Mil and the arms on either side of him, and shivered uncontrollably. 

Mil frowned distractedly down at him. “We looked over that list and thought, if you had made such an omission, it must be on purpose. But now I’m less sure of that.” 

Mattin did not know where to place his hands, only where he wanted to place them. “I thought of both of you with that list.” 

“Did you?” Mil pressed. “And did you imagine any of them sitting at our table with us for breakfast?” There, Mil paused, possibly at Mattin’s scowl of displeasure at the thought, or possibly just realizing how close they were. He looked between them before catching Mattin’s gaze and holding it. His words were a low, dark rumble. “In our bed?” Mattin narrowed his eyes despite his burning face. Mil’s voice grew even rougher. “Oh, you thought of that, all right.” 

For several beats of his pounding heart, Mattin could not think of anything else. Then he shoved Mil’s chest, and though it should not have budged such a mountain of a man, Mil stepped back. 

Mattin snapped at him, regardless. “Are you teasing me?” he demanded. “I can end this now. He can end this now. You can… you have only to ask him and he would. I researched alternative strategies so you would not have to do this!” 

Mil gently caught the hands Mattin did not even realize he had been waving around. “Pretty gloves,” he observed. “You like them? He’s been worried you didn’t, since he hasn’t seen you in them.” 

“I….” Some of Mattin’s embarrassed anger disappeared as he stared at his hands held carefully in both of Mil’s. The gloves Arden had given him were no doubt buttery soft against Mil’s palms, as the fur was warm against Mattin’s fingers. He shook his head, trying to focus. “What was so wrong with the first two?” he asked at last, and wished he did not sound so plaintive. “They’re suitable.”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt they are.” Mil nodded as if trying to show Mattin he meant it. “After all, you picked them. And, in other circumstances, they might have done well. He’ll speak to them, as he does, and they’ll stare back at him in wonder as nearly everyone does with him, even while knowing they’ve no chance. There’s a reason so many in the guard chose to follow him here, when he sought only to rescue his family but the act was still treasonous. Even without knowing your rules of proper wooing, he would have people willing. From such a list, he might have done well.” 

What was Mattin to say to that?

“Yes,” Mattin uttered at last, strangled. “Arden is like that. But what of you?” 

“What of you?” Mil returned. “No one suitable for Sass? Is it that you’re not interested in partners? We’re never even heard a peep from you on the subject until all this—don’t get ruffled.” 

“Ruffled?” Mattin echoed, and all at once, he was angry again. He yanked his hands from Mil’s so he could give Mil another push and even though Mil gave him plenty of room, Mattin scooted around him without dignity. He reached the door then came back to wave a finger in Mil’s face. “People happily in love don’t get to just—” 

He closed his mouth firmly. Then, with one more glare at Mil’s startled expression, he turned and marched from the balcony. 

Startled or not, of course Mil followed him. “Keep near your guards from now on!” Mil called out to Mattin’s back, loud enough to make several of those in the room look over. 

Mattin snapped to a halt to remind Mil that he did not have guards. 

Except he did. He must. They had been trailing after him for days, lingering outside the library at all hours. He had simply assumed there were more guards around for some unknown-to-him reason. Not that they were specifically for him.

He swooped back to whisper furiously at Mil, ignoring the concern that would have compelled Mil and Arden to order more protection for him. Something else had just occurred to him as well. “What do you mean, ‘knowing they’ve no chance?’ He hasn’t been offending anyone. I made sure of that. We even practiced!” Mattin nearly hissed it. “Did you two decide against it and have been going through the motions so as not to offer any insults? You could have told me, you… you pair of dirt clods!” 

“Well, fuck me,” Mil exhaled, staring at Sass in near wonder. Mattin considered poking a finger in his face again but recalled their audience in time to stop himself. He turned quickly instead, staring with dismay at Cael, Lan, Jola, Arden, and several others, who were, naturally, watching the scene. 

Mattin inhaled sharply, and then, with little else to do since he could not explain himself, he turned on his heel and fled the room. 

Just as he stepped beyond the doorway, he heard someone exclaim softly, “Oh dear. That could have gone better.”

He thought it might have been Lan.

Mattin was not at all appeased by the new cloak, in his size if not his usual style, that was left on his desk two days later. The cloak had clearly been commissioned much earlier, for it was not an item hastily bought or borrowed, but one designed with Mattin in mind. It was the sort of heavy winter garment the palace guards might wear, but the fur at the collar and in the lining was warm red-brown and soft to the touch, and the stitching was precise and perfect. It was, in fact, quite lovely for all that it was designed to be sturdy. Some part of him whispered that it was made to protect him from more than the weather, but Mattin let that stay a whisper. There was too much else on his mind.  

He wore the cloak whenever he left his room to attend to his duties, but only because snowstorms had settled over the capital, and also because whenever he forgot it, one of the guards who trailed after him would either hand it to him or remind him to grab it—and his gloves as well. This occurred not once or twice, but regularly, as if Mattin’s guards—as they undeniably were—had been commanded to remind him. 

Irked, Mattin nonetheless did not chastise them for it, since they were obeying their orders. Perhaps he also did not because there was comfort to be found in soft fur against his hands and brushing his neck. But he offered no comments, either, and left his reports and summaries on Cael’s desk. 

He crossed the arched, elevated walkways over the guardhouse and the guard’s training area with a quick step, and rarely strayed from his path from the library to his room to Cael’s office. He received no more invitations and took his breakfasts alone. He thought this wise, and lamented it in his office with his cold tea, staring at reports he had trouble reading. 

He did not know what the knot of feelings in his belly was, or how to unravel them to name them, or if it mattered if he did. They were obvious, he suspected, and others would name them for him if they had not already. 

Mattin did not like his feelings being so close to being spoken of, when he had so carefully never done so himself. He had hoped they were invisible to others. He no longer had that hope. And yet, Mil was not cruel. Arden was not cruel. Cold, when needed, as was fitting for their roles, but never cruel, and never to him. He didn’t understand why they wouldn’t tell him that while they did not object to the idea of another marriage, they had no plans to seriously consider his choices. Why they would say what they had. Why they would tease him but take such gentle care of him when all he had done was have a little wine.  

He fretted, and the assistants brought him tea, and then food he did not ask for but dutifully ate. He asked them, nicely, to help him keep his fire lit during the day and shivered in his cloak at night, after first shooing his guards into at least the library itself, where they would be marginally warmer. He did his job, answering the questions Cael put to him, and slipping into council meetings late enough that his arrival should go unnoticed and slipping back out before anyone could turn to him. 

It was only a matter of time before Cael intervened. Mattin nearly expected it when she called him into her office to review the last council meeting. Per Tyrabalith had been oddly quiet for the duration, but though Cael had questioned Mattin about his thoughts on that, she had seemed more interested in the current state of the palace grounds and possible improvements once the government’s stability was more assured. 

Her office was ancient, in a small building semi-attached to the old queen’s quarters, and though it had fireplaces in each room, the space remained chilly. Cael sat on a large, cushioned chair behind her vast desk, swaddled in velvet and furs, and drank warm, sweetened milk topped with the mild, spicy liquor from the deep woodlands where her people were from. 

She raised pertinent questions about locations of previous houses and the age of some of the infrastructure, including bridges and plumbing and the leats through the gardens, both ornamental and practical. Mattin took notes in his ledger, and drank tea, and then eventually started to take his leave to go attend to this new assignment. 

“It is good to speak with you,” Cael offered as Mattin rose to his feet. Mattin paused, because he knew that tone; she was not making the remark idly. “I do not think you realize how helpful your presence can be, Master Arlylian. You listen, and you offer thoughtful choices, and you can be relied upon. That is admirable in easy times, and invaluable in the hard.”

“I… thank you.” Mattin ducked his head and held his tongue as he waited for the rest. 

Cael’s even voice fell on the back of Mattin’s neck like a sword stroke. “Your presence has been missed.”

Mattin closed his eyes and exhaled before he raised his head again. Nothing he said here would leave this office unless Cael deemed it a matter of critical importance, which was a confidence possibly even more sacred than the secrets shared between lovers. 

“Since I have been informed that nothing will come of the meetings between the king and any potential suitors, I thought my presence at those meetings would be unnecessary.” 

He said it more stiffly than he should have. 

Cael did not blink. “That is for you to decide. No one here would command you to. However…” 

“My presence has been missed,” Mattin finished for her, sighing. He was warm and cold, heart pounding and hands trembling. There was a name for that. He did not use it. “Have they told you it is a pretense? That they will not choose a new spouse from this list or possibly any other?” He frowned, briefly distracted. “Surely, this will cause more offense.” 

Cael had a sip of her sweet, spicy milk. Her smile was not quite hidden by the cup. “People at court are used to spectacles, and most recognize them when they see them. This one is already building relationships as the king and his husband personally meet with many from the oldest families. Most have been honored with the chance to speak with such famed figures in intimate settings. As for the rest, nothing has progressed to the point where offense, or a broken heart, would even be a possibility. Although, of course, some not invited to these meetings might feel excluded. But that can be resolved in time.” 

Some of Mattin’s frown unfurled. “Everyone is playing along? Doesn’t anyone want to marry them?”

Cael’s expression briefly froze on her incredulity and amusement before she smoothed it back to calm. “There are many who would say yes to him now, if he asked. I won’t deny it.” She looked up, patient but expectant. “But you chose people with sense, and people with sense are not expecting him to ask. That cloak is new, isn’t it? I noticed it the other day. Those gloves as well? I don’t think I’ve seen them before. A bit practical for you.” Mattin visibly bristled despite himself. Cael held up her hand in silent apology. “A little practicality is better than something ornamental, no matter how beautiful. Something to feel, heavy on your shoulders, warm around your hands, instead of something to merely look at or be admired in—although, of course, that is nice too.”  

Mattin had to swallow several times in order to speak. “They were gifts.”

Cael’s smile said she knew that. “You do have a habit of forgetting such things.” 

The walls of Cael’s office held secrets and confessions that would give Mattin more sleepless nights if he contemplated them. “Such things?” 

Cael sat back, her cup in her hands. “You do not avoid the world, exactly, Master Arlylian, but you often forget aspects of it. Or, rather, fail to note them because they are not facts on a sheet, or lines in a ledger. You analyze information very well, except for those areas you do not see, or don’t think to look for… or do not want to look for.” 

Mattin did not shuffle his feet, though he might have. He hesitated, then lifted his chin. “What am I missing?”

The sound that left Cael was too pained to be a mere sigh. “The murder of our old queen—yes, yes, she did not die, not then, but I will still call it her murder—set off nearly twenty years of chaos. Twenty years of scheming and foolishness and danger that none of us could have anticipated. Or maybe some Master Keeper did but was ignored; I couldn’t say. There had been troubles before. Our history stretches back for a very long time. Of course, there were troubles. But nothing like this. And all because of a nephew’s hurt feelings, impatience, and pride. None of us escaped it without scars, even those of us who fled the capital, or who subsequently grew up in a country where this was normal. It has shaped us, all of us. This is what makes it so difficult for so many to trust him. Oh, his name matters as well, naturally. He is The Canamorra, just and terrible.” 

“To a certain sort of person,” Cael continued when Mattin was about to object, “Arden is order and he is a threat to order.” She waved one hand dismissively. “But that is not my point. My point is that just as Arden cannot trust us, we struggle to trust him. Even those of us who want to. I knew that boy. He grew up here, eating biscuits I snuck him and hiding in the stables when his parents were short with him. I watched him take punishments meant for his adventurous sister and filch books from the library for Ral—and take punishments for that, too. I watched him stop smiling after it all, their deaths, her death, his family’s disgrace. I watched his husband with him, although he was also just a boy, then, and they were more awkward colts than stallions. Mil Wulfa.” Cael paused to heave another breath. “He would have come to run this place if he had stayed, if he’d had the stomach to serve pretenders, which he does not, may the fae bless him. I know them better than most, and I love them… but I am afraid to believe in them, because twenty years of fear cannot be forgotten at will.” 

“That isn’t… I don’t blame him, or either of them, for what happened.” Mattin shook his head. “Of course not.” 

“I didn’t say you did. I said what happened left its marks on us. It taught some of us to be guarded, and some of us to hide, and some of us to act decisively when it comes to battle but hesitate over softer matters.” Cael held his gaze. “One does not learn how to woo a beat-of-four in the Outguard.”

“Woo a—” Mattin clutched the strap of his satchel. They had considered it. They had discussed it. They had asked him. He wet his lips. “He told me… he said… that I had seen him without his armor. Mil said that they trusted me.”

“Those truly are beautiful gifts.” Cael considered Mattin from above her cup. “I hope you thanked whoever gave them to you. They must worry about you a great deal and are willing for everyone in the palace to know it, although some might view that as a weakness.” 

“I would serve them as I would serve no other royal couple.” Mattin stared down at his boots marked from his journey through the snow. The knot inside him grew tighter. “They trust me.” The thought warmed him to his fingertips, but the knot was still there. “And I am a beat-of-four.”

He was a good choice. Inoffensive to most, with a distinguished lineage, and the royal couple liked him. He was everything on his list, and they knew him. So they were courting him, using the very advice he had given them. 

He had indeed not seen that. 

“I’m afraid I must go,” he murmured, although he had already been on his way out when Cael had stopped him. 

“Master Arlylian?” Cael put down her cup. “I did not say this to upset you.”

“I know, and I thank you.” Mattin could not meet her eyes. “This was surprisingly sensible of them. You must have been very patient as they worked it out. But I wish…” He wished many things, but the fae did not feel like answering him today, it seemed. 

“You haven’t listened. You’re as bad as they are.” Cael made a politely disgusted noise and moved as if to get up. 

Mattin nodded quickly in farewell so she would not bother. “I will thank them,” he promised, bowing his head once more to avoid Cael’s vexed glare, then leaving her office. 

He stood outside in the snow for some time after, a concerned guard on either side of him as he stared unseeing at a garden covered in white. 

Mattin found them the next morning, earlier than he normally would have bothered on a day he was not expected anywhere, in a courtyard among nobles and palace guards alike, who were all watching—and betting—on some of the guards as they sparred for their training. It was a common way to pass the time for the more athletic crowd, who had less to do in the winter months. The guards sometimes took some of the winnings, or so Mattin had heard, but he did not usually attend such events. 

Mil was there officially, Arden likely just to spend time with his husband. But the guards would be pleased by the king and former guard’s presence, almost certainly. 

Mattin had not slept, yet had lingered in his room, twisting his hair into a knot instead of a braid, which he held in place with jeweled pins and not clasps. His new cloak was buttoned tight at his neck, his new gloves closed at his wrists.  

His change in routine had confused his escort, but they seemed happy enough now to be among the others. 

Mattin stopped on the sidelines, prepared to wait until the sparring was over to ask for a moment of Arden’s time, but someone whispered in Arden’s ear, and then Arden looked to Mattin, and Mattin found himself stepping through the crowd to go to him. Several more guards appeared to clear his path and Mattin clucked his tongue but did not comment. 

The king sat on one chair in a row of them that had been brought outside and placed beneath a small, open tent, although the snow had stopped for the moment. Mil was next to him, but stood up to watch Mattin approach. 

“Sass.” Mil greeted him, gesturing for Mattin to sit if he so pleased. Since Mattin’s legs threatened to give out, he sat, perching carefully on the edge of the offered chair. That this put him next to Arden, and then Mil when Mil sat on his other side, was unfortunate, although perhaps a blessing, since it meant Mattin did not have to look at either of them. He stared straight ahead, wincing at the fighting, then directed his gaze downward.

He’d thought to begin by apologizing for his absence, although that could only be explained by baring more than he wished to. Then he’d imagined discussing anything and everything but their honorable and most flattering intentions. But now he was seated between them, at the king’s side, and it had been done so neatly that he sighed. 

“Are we forgiven, then?” Arden asked, voice pitched low. Mattin shivered helplessly. Arden turned from him to someone nearby. “Can we please get a cup of something hot for Master Keeper Arlylian? Tea if you have it, but anything will do.” 

Mattin briefly shut his eyes. “Forgiven? You have not done anything disgraceful or deceitful, not really.” 

“’Not really,’ he says.” Mil tapped a large fist against his knee. “Something has upset you.”

“It is I who should ask your forgiveness,” Mattin rolled on, though it made Mil scoff quietly. “I have not been around to fulfill my duties, but I have been working. I have revised the list.” 

“Ah.” If it had not come from Arden Canamorra, the sound would have been awkward and uncertain. “He has revised the list,” Arden added, apparently to Mil. 

“I heard,” Mil replied impatiently. 

Mattin’s pinned hair left his ears exposed, and he rubbed them absently, distracted by the sting. “I have found more suitable options for you. If it was the age difference that bothered you, we can go older. I am not sure how I chose so many only at the start of their twenties. I might have had some concern about those your age and their activities during the past decades. But I have considered these candidates more carefully.”

“Cael didn’t mention you were working on a new list,” Arden said when it did not seem that Mil would speak. Mattin did not spare a moment to wonder what Cael had told him, but he did glance up in time to catch the look the other two exchanged over his head. 

“We don’t want you making yourself sick over this.” Mil accepted a large mug from a guard with a brusque expression of gratitude and then handed the mug carefully to Mattin, who had no choice but to take it. The mug was clay and so hot it instantly warmed his fingers. Mattin held it close to catch the steam and help the frozen tip of his nose. The steam smelled of broth he had no intention of drinking, but he was grateful for it, for the comfort of having it to hold, and then saddened by the thoughtfulness of it. 

“Are you still angry with us?” Arden was studying him; Mattin could tell although he did not look up. “We didn’t think this was considered pushing by your rules, but if you felt pushed, we will stop.” 

Mattin burned at the memory of being teased for his arousal at the thought of them, and for what it implied—that they had known all along of everything Mattin hadn’t wanted known. He burned more for liking that they knew. Mil had pressed him to that balcony because neither of them would mind Mattin in their bed. That was what it meant that Mil had done it, and that Arden had told Mattin of what he and Mil had done in the past. The knowledge coiled and tied itself tight in Mattin’s stomach like every other confusing feeling they inspired in him. But pushed? No, he did not feel pushed. Not nearly enough. 

He remembered Arden’s hands in his hair and exhaled shakily. “What is there to feel pushed about?” he asked as blankly as he could. He had learned from them, after all. 

Mil swore under his breath.

Mattin clung to what he remembered of his plan. “You didn’t like my previous choices, so I’ve amended them.” 

“We liked them fine,” Mil was quick to assure him. “You didn’t fail us, Sass.”

“But I disappointed you.” Mattin was getting quite skilled at skirting the truth. “I should have considered that it would take you time to feel comfortable, so you wouldn’t have to choose convenience. I should have thought more in terms of… of potential. Not just of names and backgrounds. I considered meetings and similarities, but not maturity, or understanding, or past lovers and what that might mean.” He smiled without meaning it. “I’m afraid I don’t have experience with your sort of love.” 

Their silence was too much for him, so he hurried on. “I’ve also put a few on there who, well, are more… thoughtful. Actually, one of them has been running the estates for his family. So, while he is unlikely to want to leave for the capital, he would have the experience. He’s also a few years older than the previous candidates. Even if you were only to speak with him, it would likely improve your relations with that house.” 

There was a bit more silence, although Mattin was vaguely aware of the murmur of the crowd.

“Very thoughtful of you.” Arden’s use of the word seemed pointed. Mattin slid a look to the side. Arden regarded him almost warily. “We greatly admire your thoughtfulness, as well as your insight.” He was distressingly formal, which Mattin should have wanted. The tangle of feelings was illogical and Mattin didn’t like it. He also wanted to hold it close to him. Arden took such care with him, even in this. “You confuse us at times,” Arden admitted, “but we have come to admire you very much. You do know that, don’t you?”

It made Mattin stumble and forget what he had planned to say. “I… I admire you both as well. You’re heroes, of course, I do.” He jerked his head up. “Please don’t be insulted by that! I have never intended any disrespect. Not for you. I—” 

“Disrespect?” Mil stood up to loom over them both with restless energy. “Did you think I’d mind being your hero? As though that wasn’t one of the few things in my favor?”

“Mil,” Arden put out a hand, but Mil brushed it off and stormed past them to join the guards closer to the sparring. He immediately began to gesture, calling a halt to the whole thing as he threw aside his cloak to reveal his figure strapped in armor. Then he took a pole from one of those who had been sparring and went in swinging after the other one. Arden hissed a little, but at least Mil’s opponent managed some sort of block. Not much more than that, however. 

“You’re supposed to be sharper than that,” Mil told the guard only moments later, helping them up after knocking them flat on their ass. “It’s your life at stake, as well as the person you’re supposed to be protecting, so you’d better be.”

That earned him a smile of all things, grateful and pleased, as though this was a compliment. Maybe it was. They had managed some defense against Mil. That had to count for something. 

“Are you frightened?” Arden asked. 

Mattin glanced at him, but Arden was watching Mil. Mattin shook his head. “No. Never.” 

Arden turned to Mattin long enough to smile. “That will please him. He has a great deal of patience, but right now he doesn’t know what to do, and that frustrates him.” 

“And people worry over your temper.” 

Mil demonstrated something with the pole, flipping it slowly from hand to hand before tossing it back to the one he’d taken it from. 

“As they should.” Arden’s voice hardened. “I don’t like threats, and I protect my family. They should know that by now.” He inhaled, then released a long breath. “Does that frighten you?” 

“Yes.” Mattin’s hands would have trembled if he hadn’t locked them tight around the mug. “Not you. But the threat. It’s why this is so important. And why I don’t blame you for looking for the simplest answer.”

“Simplest answer?” Arden glanced at him, then looked again more intently. “What about this is simple to you?” 

Mattin looked at him, in dark gray today, striking against the silver in his hair, the faint lines at the corners of his eyes, then shook his head. “No, not simple. You are right.” 

“And now I am right?” Arden frowned, though it felt a bit playful. “Are you well, Master Arlylian? It’s not like you to let me win so easily.” 

“Perhaps that is Mil’s job?” Mattin suggested, not certain what had come over him, except that he no longer wanted to do anything but sit next to Arden while they both watched Mil heft a pole with a blade on the end in one massive hand. 

“Mil only lets me win when the mood strikes him, and then only for one particular purpose,” Arden said, his voice low and heated enough to make Mattin’s mouth go dry. 

Mattin watched Mil swing the pole-axe into a pile of snow-covered straw, and imagined how such a movement might look without armor and clothing hindering the view. Arden, sitting next to him, was likely thinking of the same thing, but with detail that could be filled in by experience.

Mattin forced his gaze away, hopefully before Arden realized they had been ogling Mil together, but that was precisely his problem. Arden probably had realized. Probably before Mattin had. 

Mattin cleared his throat, then spoke quietly although the guards kept their distance today. “I did not thank you for my gloves. Thank you.” 

“I am happy to see you wear them,” Arden returned, just as quietly. “They seemed a small thing, but you needed them.” 

“They are warm, as well as beautiful.” If Mattin’s cheeks darkened, it was from Arden’s gentle sigh of pleasure, not the steam still rising from the mug in his hands. “The cloak as well. I should not have snapped at him—well, perhaps he deserved it.”

That seemed to sober Arden. “It truly upset you.” 

He could have meant several things. Mattin chose the safest. “Knowing that you two did not intend to go on wooing any of the people we have arranged for you to meet?” he asked, his tone a touch frosty. “I asked you. I said you did not have to. You agreed. I… I researched. I helped you practice. And you….” He sniffed and rubbed his nose. “Why would I be upset?” 

“Ah, Sass,” Mil exhaled the name as he sat back down at Mattin’s other side. His cloak was off one shoulder as he refastened the clasp at his throat. He was breathing slightly harder than before.

Mattin quickly looked out at the crowd, growing still to notice that several of them were staring back. It was natural that they should. But Mattin had kept that thought at bay with all of the others. Until now. 

Arden drew Mattin’s attention with softly spoken words. “We are not against the idea of another marriage. We told you that. And now we have learned so much about what is expected in these matters. It would need to be proper, we have long thought that, even when we were not certain what that would mean. Proper is all that would do.”

Mattin sniffed again, blaming the cold. “Are you going to continue?” 

Neither of them spoke. 

Mattin raised his head. “Are you?” He glanced from one to the other. 

“Did the age difference bother you?” Arden asked, startling Mattin. “There is new white in my hair each day, it seems. We both have aches from old injuries when it rains, knees that crackle.” 

With a frown, Mattin tried to gesture his confusion, then remembered the mug and set it down on the ground beneath his chair. The pause gave him time to reconsider his initial response. “Everyone involved is of age, and some well-experienced, from what I hear.” 

“Didn’t mention that part before,” Mil remarked. “Maybe we should have them for another tea.”

“You’re not funny, my love.” 

“Sorry, Sass,” Mil apologized without hesitation, although Mattin was not the one who had chided him. 

Mattin turned to him, shaking inside when their eyes met. “Thank you for the cloak, if not for the guards who help me remember where I’ve left it.” 

Mil’s gaze was warm. “You’ll get no apologies for those.” 

“They stand outside the library for hours, freezing.” Mattin huffed. “They won’t come in unless I harangue them.” 

Mil was unbothered by this. “It’s not their job to. It’s their job to watch for threats. Don’t fret over them.” 

“I’m not fretting,” Mattin insisted, plucking at the strap to his satchel. He could have left the discussion there, said his farewells, and hoped his message had been received. But words continued to spill from him. “From the start, I did not think this was a wise idea, for your sakes as much as… as much whoever you would choose. I suggested not doing it, and doing it as an alliance only, and you—you two said it would end up more than that. That is what you both said. So I tried to find a way to help you. I will do almost anything to help you.” He did not care for the tremor in his voice. “I worked very hard.” 

“We know,” Mil assured him. “You are a determined little thing—not little. A determined thing.”

“Your choices were all sound,” Arden added. “Your reasoning was practically flawless.” 

“The Tyrabalith….” Mattin glanced around again, searching through the crowd although The Tyrabalith himself was not present. “I wanted to….” He trailed to silence, aware of how foolish he would sound if he said he had wished to protect them. He drew in a breath. “So. If you do not want the revised list, then we will go back to my original plans to strengthen relationships with the other nobles, and to improve your reputation without another marriage… and we do not ever need to speak of this again.” 

“You are fretting.” Arden’s hand hovered over Mattin’s knee, then withdrew. 

Fretting could be a useful distraction. “I think the key, a key, might be the songs already sung about you. The good ones, I mean. Maybe you could offer a prize for a new ballad, or for the one you choose as your favorite, or hold a public contest for bards, who are sure to sing songs to flatter you. It would be generous and encourage merriment, as well as remind people of your great love for each other, which is part of why so many adore you.” 

He wondered if he had stunned them to silence. He still did not think they were truly aware of just how favorably the public regarded their hand-fasting. He coughed, then continued. 

“I wrote out a few of the songs, in case you hadn’t heard them.” Possible secret tavern visits notwithstanding. “I, hmm, collect them, you see.” With every other secret so close to the surface, that one hardly seemed to matter anymore. “I will have them nicely bound one day, in better scribbles than mine. But it means I had some of them handy.” Mattin busied himself by digging through his satchel to find the papers he had copied last night in beautiful gold ink. He held them out with noticeably shaking hands, and it was Arden who took them and kindly did not comment. Mattin dared to study him while Arden’s attention was on the papers. “Your love is… beautiful. Enviable. I cannot imagine wanting anything less. So… so there is no point in trying.”

“Mattin Arlylian.” 

His full name, from Mil, brought Mattin’s head up and tricked him into meeting Mil’s stare. Mil’s large hand settled on Mattin’s shoulder, over the cloak, his fingers sinking into the fur. He could have brushed the chilled skin of Mattin’s throat if he had wanted to. 

Mattin lifted his chin and gazed back at him, helpless. 

The tangle wanted him to run, and it wanted Mil to touch him, and it wanted to stay to hear what Arden would say. Arden and Mil were kind. They would understand. Mattin knew that. Yet he would stay, trembling, between them if they were not kind, if they pushed again for what they wanted. He was as soft as they thought he was. 

“Well,” he said, voice high and thin. “I’ve more to read up on, and you are busy.” He could not look away from Mil. “You will let me know what you decide?”

“You gifted us our love for each other?” Arden whispered at last as if overcome. His hand was heavy on Mattin’s knee and then gently curled around Mattin’s, which had fallen to meet it. Arden was always so hot, even though his hands were bare. 

“What else could I give you that would ever compare?” Mattin wondered, a shameful quiver in his voice now. He looked without seeing at the crowd, aware that he must be flushed and likely breathing harder. He stood up with no warning, swaying a little as Mil’s hand fell away from him and Arden pulled his hand back. “I’ll see you in the morning.” 

“Sass.” Mil’s voice was husky. 

“My name’s not Sass,” Mattin told him, an old fusspot, and closed his satchel as he hurried away. 

His guards trailed behind him once again, but he barely noticed except to walk faster so they would not see his face. 

Someone ought to have knocked on the door to Mattin’s office to offer him tea at some point in the day. Mattin suspected the assistants had been whispering about him and were leaving him to stare moodily at his inkwells and stacks of unfinished work out of a fear of upsetting him further. 

He had no doubt that he was already the subject of many conversations. A great deal had begun to make more sense once Mattin had realized that most in the palace had guessed where their king and his husband’s attentions lay. Not that it had taken much guessing. Not once Mattin had started wearing their gifts about. But many had seemed to know before then. Arden was not shy with his favorites, as Mattin had been told. He and Mil had befriended Mattin, and favored him, and when Per Tyrabalith had made his bold suggestion, apparently only Mattin hadn’t thought to consider himself a potential suitor. 

Foolish of him. Though wise as well, since he did not think he could have said yes. 

He was spared that uncertainty now; Arden and Mil would never ask. Mattin had disappointed them, but they would respect his wishes. 

Knowing that had done nothing for the knot still tangled in his chest, which was an extraordinarily, annoyingly stubborn thing which insisted he think about it. It would be there tomorrow, when Mattin met them in their rooms as they had breakfast and they would tell him whether they would continue on with their hunt—pretend or not—or decide to forget it altogether. 

The thought of it made him ache and grow restless. Mattin paced a few times before his fireplace, and prodded the tiny fire to keep it burning for a while longer, and tore the pins from his hair to let it hang loose while he rubbed his temples. Eventually, no less restless but now irritated as well, he braided his hair back again, using the collection of mismatched clasps that the assistants often found in the library and left in the drawer of his desk. 

He pulled out a new sheet of paper to make notes on what a contest for the bards might offer as a prize aside from recognition, but wrote nothing. The sky grew darker outside his small window. The faint noises from the library grew quieter. His stomach rumbled once or twice.

He considered that Mil and Arden might decide to press on with the meetings, with their eye actually on the others this time. And though this should have changed nothing, it made Mattin fall into his chair and hang his head. 

No two people should inspire so many feelings at once. But, of course, they did. The hero and his husband, another hero. 

Mattin wished they had not decided to court him. He wished they would not court anybody, though it was selfish when the calm and safety of the palace, the capital, and the country, was potentially at stake. Mattin should help them, whatever they decided, and keep his hopes to himself and whichever fae might be around to spot the truth. 

But it was hope in his heart, a bright, terrible sensation when he considered that Arden and Mil might eventually forget any others and Mattin would not lose his time with him. It was hope because their moments at breakfast, or any moments with them, could give Mattin peace throughout his day, or make him happy in a way that only the library ever had before. He could not be their political match, but he could watch them pour each other tea, and bicker, and help each other into their armor, and listen to their whispered endearments. Thinking of that did not displace the tangle but instead eased it. 

He considered that feeling as the room grew colder and then darker, while he covered the papers in front of him with scribbled notes in orange or purple ink. Mattin crossed out lines and chose a new color, red, his favorite, to circle the points that kept reappearing, the word that he could not avoid no matter how many times he shuffled the papers. 

After so long his eyes burned and his shoulders ached, he put down his quill and stared at the conclusion he had reached. 

Arden and Mil could not have been expected to know this when Mattin would not dare allow himself to even think it. But he had felt it. It had been there, a growing pile of scrolls in an out-of-sight cubbyhole, hidden, perhaps for years. 

It was on his paper now, in bright and bold red. 

He loved them.

He was in love with them. 

What a fool of a Keeper he was, what a silly Arlylian. The thing that had driven Mattin all this time was love, unfair and beautiful.

When the ink had dried, Mattin put the piece of paper that said what he would not beneath his collection of songs about the Traitor King’s great love, and then he got up to leave his office and return to his room at last. 

Mattin staggered out into the silent, dim library. It appeared empty, which meant it was very late, although there might possibly be a Keeper in a distant row of books, or asleep at a table somewhere on the upper floors. 

He pulled up the hood of his cloak and unlocked one of the entrance doors. Then he turned quickly the moment he was outside in the freezing dark so he could lock the door behind him. He shuddered at the sudden drop in temperature and hissed an apology to his guards as he slipped the key back into his satchel and hurried forward. 

Only one brazier was lit in the entire corridor, not that Mattin was going to stop to warm himself. He was aware of the cold only because his body was wracked with shivers, but he could not seem to feel it. 

The realization made him pause for a moment before turning to his guards. “I remembered my cloak without you this time,” he observed, teeth chattering.

Then he stopped. 

His guards were not there. There was little light, but enough to show their absence. No one behind him. No one at the library doors. But in the snow, nearly covered by the fall of snowflakes, were splatters and pools of gleaming black. A sight Mattin had not seen in years, and never in snow, but which he still recognized with a sickening turn of his stomach. 

He took a single step as he felt movement at his back. Something pushed him forward, then caught, tugging him backward. 

He cried out as he tore at the closure of his cloak until it was open, and swung his arms wildly, pushing off the cloak and twisting away, scattering clasps and sending hair pins flying.

He fled into the snow, into a palace where few of the fires seemed to be lit and no one had answered his cries. He ran to one of the gardens and hid until noise in the distance, the noise of fighting, spurred him to run again.

In the relative safety and darkness of the library’s cellars, Mattin didn’t hear anything else for a long time. He kept his hand over his mouth to muffle his breathing, and waited around one of the corners, peering out toward the door. 

When he had crept back to the library, distant clashes and shouts ringing in his ears, he had thought any Keepers left in the library overnight would be down here already. But he was alone. He hoped the other Keepers and all the assistants were back in their rooms with the doors barred or blocked. He hoped Arden and Mil were well. 

The hour had been late. They might have been in bed, asleep. They might not have had any warning. 

Mattin’s breath caught noisily in his throat and he pressed his hand harder to his mouth and breathed shallowly through his nose. 

After a while, his legs weakened and he sat with his arms around his knees, out of sight of the cellar door, and shuddered whenever a noise would echo down to him. Shouts. Faint and loud and faint again. If there was fighting, the thick stone kept him from hearing the sounds of screams or crushed bone. 

It had only been a handful of years. Not long enough for wounds to heal, or even for memories to fade. There would be stains in the stone from the blood. That much, Mattin knew, as well as the costs to clean or replace all of them. He had filed that information himself the last time. 

He shivered without end. The cellar was cold. He had no cloak. He had no gloves, either; he could not remember where they were. He must have forgotten those at his desk. 

He could not tell the hour and or see more than shadows. The cellar door closed tight, and only a small fraction of light would shine through in the morning, and that only whatever sunshine passed through the library’s high windows. Tomorrow, it would likely snow again. Mil would wonder about Mattin’s cloak. Arden would insist Mattin at least drink some hot tea. 

Or they were dead, dying, and Mattin could not move from his hiding place. 

He had thought to protect them with paper. With songs. 

The first sob had him scurrying back, farther from the door, until he realized the sound had come from him. He could not clench his jaw because his teeth were chattering. His arms shook too, and his legs, and his hands, pressed frantically over his mouth. 

His guards were dead. They must be. Maybe all of them were. 

He couldn’t move.

Outside, they were still shouting

Mattin could not have slept, but his thoughts must have drifted. He didn’t hear anything leading to the scrape of the cellar door opening, and tensed as the door was thrown wide. An influx of orange light made him wince, but it was the sound of footsteps on the stone staircase, too many to be from one person, that froze him to the spot. 

“Do not leap ahead! What did I tell you?” someone bellowed, furious and frightened. 

A moment later, there came an answer not far from Mattin, in no less of a bellow, “I’m fine, my love!” 

“Fine,” Mil spat. “Like I’ve nothing to fear this night.” 

Mattin dared to peer around the corner, only to flinch back from the torchlight. 

“The fae have blessed us again.” Arden’s beautiful voice was strange to hear in a secret cellar. Stranger to hear it so shaken. Mattin shifted to rise and found he could not; his legs were numb. The warm glow grew closer, two guards with torches following their king as he turned the corner to kneel in front of Mattin. Mattin closed his eyes to it. “He’s here!” Arden announced to sudden silence far above them. “Are you well?” he asked, quieter, to Mattin alone. 

Mattin nodded, although he did not feel well. He tried to wet his cracked lips before slowly reopening his eyes. He was not being fanciful. Arden was indeed in front of him, alive. “I do not think I can stand yet,” Mattin told him, embarrassed over this, then embarrassed that such a thing would bother him. “You’re alive.” He was foolish, a fool. “Mil?” 

“Mil lives. Please don’t worry, dear heart.” Arden curved his hand to Mattin’s cheek, then muttered something far less complimentary about the fae than Mattin ever would have before leaning down to wrap his arms around Mattin’s body. “Hold still.” He breathed it into Mattin’s hair, and Mattin curled toward his warmth without thought as he was lifted from the ground. “He’s well, but cold,” Arden called out, carrying Mattin up the stairs into the library before putting him gently back down onto his feet. 

Arden did not let go, but he did relax his hold enough for another set of arms to close around Mattin and pull him against an armored chest. It was uncomfortable, possibly, but Mattin did not notice. Mil’s furs tickled his cheek. Mil stroked a hand over the back of Mattin’s neck, then swore. “He’s like ice.” 

Mattin knew he ought to speak, or protest. They were not alone. Guards and likely assistants or other Keepers shifted around them. The windows were still dark, so the sun had not yet risen or they were in a terrible storm. Mil pulled one of Mattin’s hands up and held it to his mouth. His breath burned a little, as if Mattin was colder than he realized, but Mattin only shuddered and buried his face deeper into Mil’s furs.  

Someone took his other hand in both of theirs. From the heat, it must have been Arden. 

Mattin hissed and raised his head at last. Five or six palace guards were gathered around them, holding torches or weapons at the ready. Two frightened assistants still bundled in their nightclothes managed to smile at him, so he nodded in return before looking up at Mil. 

Mil had a dark splash across his cheek and on the fur of his cloak. 

“Is that blood?” 

Mil scoffed, his lips brushing Mattin’s knuckles. “You’re not to fret, Sass. Not yet.” 

“I’ll fret when I please.” Getting the words out hurt. Mattin swallowed dryly. “Is it?” 

“Er.” Mil glanced to his husband before looking back at Mattin. “Not mine? If that helps you.” 

Air rushed from Mattin’s lungs. His heart began to pound. He dropped his head back to Mil’s cloak. “Is Arden bleeding?” 

“No,” Arden said and then released Mattin’s hand. A moment later, someone settled a weight over his shoulders, a cloak or blanket. Mattin should object, but he couldn’t seem to move. Arden was quiet. “We thought…. We found this and we thought…. But you’re all right.” 

“What happened?” Mattin didn’t want to think about that. Or any of it. But he needed to know.  

“It’s not exactly over,” Mil began, stopping when Mattin flinched, then carrying on cautiously. “The short version is, someone got tired of trying to get into a fight and decided to start it himself. Well, actually, I suspect he thought to instigate conflict by ki—with you, Sass, but you got away. And since he had already committed himself with that act, he had no other choice but to keep going. Are you hurt? You’d tell us?” 

Having no idea about anything, much less his own state, Mattin shook his head. 

“We’re hunting down the rest of those who were with him now,” Arden informed him, steel, cold and sharp. He resumed warming Mattin’s hand. 

“Oh.” Mattin suspected he was not thinking this news through, but he nodded before lifting his head once more. “My guards?” 

He did not care for the pause before Mil answered. 

“They might be all right. Don’t worry about that now. We can’t stay here.” 

“Are you sure you’re both well?” Mattin demanded suspiciously as he was turned around and then walked through the library with Mil’s arm at his back. “Are you sure?” Although he could not have stopped to insist on a single thing. He was only on his feet because Mil was supporting him.  

Arden rested a hand on his head, sliding it down to Mattin’s cheek before stepping away. “We’re sure.” 

Guards moved to walk in front of them. More than five or six, once they left the library. 

“Close your eyes for a moment, Sass,” Mil directed. 

Mattin closed them. He had no desire to see the blood in the snow again. “Provoke a fight with me?” he asked. “Oh. By killing me.” 

The sensation began to return to his legs, sudden and stabbing. He fell harder against Mil. 

Arden’s roar shook through the corridor and into the yards and gardens beyond. It might have carried through the entire palace. It might have been meant to. 

“Where is Gen’s company of guards? The gate is shut and it will not be opened until The Tyrabalith is found! I will personally rouse every beat-of-four who is pretending to sleep through this from their beds, and I will make them watch as guards tear through their quarters! Until he is found, there will be no rest!” 

Mil answered only Mattin, pausing once the words were said to give orders to the many people that seemed to be with them now. “Aye. By killing you.” He hesitated at the foot of some stairs, and then bent to lift Mattin into his arms. “No apologies,” he said gruffly, as though Mattin would have demanded them. 

They walked for long enough that Mil was likely tired, and Mattin’s legs no longer pained him as much, and then Arden was giving more commands, in a much different tone than before. 

“Bring us some tea. Please,” Arden asked someone, the please perfunctory and distracted. 

Mattin tore his gaze away from Mil’s red-brown beard to note they were passing the king’s desk, and then Arden and Mil’s makeshift dining room. He pushed on Mil’s chest and Mil grunted, but within a few moments, Mattin was being set on his feet. Which mostly involved him slithering down Mil’s body, then wobbling, but he did manage to stay upright and even keep his cloak from falling off his shoulders.

He straightened as much as he could to consider Mil and Arden, who both stilled. The guards seemed to have melted from the room. 

“You found me.” Mattin did not quite feel himself. Anything might come out of his mouth and most of it would likely not make sense. 

Arden swept a look over him and seemed pleased to see him standing. “You mentioned where you hid the last time.”

“Cowered,” Mattin corrected, voice cracking. “On the floor.” 

“Were safe.” Mil nearly barked it, then took a breath. “Which is how we want you. We’re just grateful—you don’t know how grateful—that you got away.” He scowled as he pulled one of Mattin’s abandoned clasps from the lining of his cloak, where he must have clipped it. He held it out, but when Mattin didn’t take it, Mil set it down on a nearby table.

Mattin crossed his arms and tried to ignore how fuzzy the world seemed, how warm the room was. “He tried to kill me.” Saying it did not sharpen his senses. Perhaps that would come later. “Why? Stop sharing looks!” he demanded a heartbeat later when Arden and Mil glanced at each other. Mattin nearly stamped his foot, and might have, if it wouldn’t have sent him toppling. 

“You need to rest—real rest, Sass.” Mil, of course it was Mil, tried to reason with him. “Stay here. Clean up. Have some tea. Sleep and get properly warmed up again. We’ll return soon enough, and—” 

“You’re leaving?” Mattin’s cry created a rustle in the distance, as if he’d disturbed the waiting guards. “But it’s dangerous!” 

Arden came forward to take Mattin’s hands. Mattin stared down at the sight, then back up at Arden’s grave face. “No one is safer than we are now,” Arden promised him, “except for Jola, her children, and you. As long as you stay here. Please, Mattin, for us.” 

That voice was Mattin’s undoing. It always was. It had been from the first moment. 

Mattin looked back and forth between the two of them. “Please be safe.” It was all he could think to say. 

“They’re on the run and desperate, but we outnumber them.” Mil possibly meant this to be comforting. Or maybe he just wanted to be honest. Mattin narrowed his eyes. Mil gave him a gentle smile. “Don’t worry now. Just rest.” 

Mattin firmed his lips. He was supposed to be a Master Keeper, a descendant of the original Earls. Not a child. He said nothing as Arden slowly pulled away from him and his hands fell back to his sides, but when Mil went to push aside the curtains and leave the room, Mattin twitched forward to reach for them. “I couldn’t bear it,” he blurted, panicked and shaking. “I’m sorry, but I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you.” 

It froze them both in place. Mil slowly tilted his head to the side in question. “You’re sorry?” 

Arden swept forward to stand in front of Mattin’s once more, then put his hand against Mattin’s cheek to gently tip Mattin’s face up. Arden’s eyes were deep and dark and terrible. 

Mattin let his fall closed. 

“I love you,” he admitted in a shamed whisper. 

No sound came from either of them for several fluttering, panicked beats of Mattin’s heart in his ears. Then Arden sighed.

“You are confusing, dear heart.” It might have been fond. It might have ached. “Stay here. We will return for you.” 

Mattin opened his eyes wide as Arden moved out of reach, and clutched at the ends of his cloak when Arden gave him a blinding smile before disappearing through the curtains. Arden shouted as he walked away, demanding to know what had been done and where was the tea. 

Mattin turned to Mil, then stumbled forward to grab him tight. “Do not die,” he ordered, muffled by fur and leather. 

Mil’s hands settled over Mattin’s waist, then fell away. “It’s not what a hero would do. At least, not yet.” 

He was honest when Mattin least wanted honesty. “Mil,” he snapped.

“Oh.” There was a wealth of feeling in how Mil said it. “You love me too, then?” 

“I’m sorry,” Mattin murmured even as he nodded. 

“What a strange, perfect thing you are,” Mil remarked, in much the same tone that Arden had used. Then his hand was under Mattin’s chin, urging Mattin’s head up for a short, soft kiss at his lips, and then another at his cheek. 

While Mattin blinked at him, Mil lightly and gently steered him backwards onto a comfortably giving cushion. Mil was gone within moments of that. 

Mattin realized sometime later that he had not been seated on a cushion at all. He was on a bed. 

Their bed. 

In the stillness of the king’s empty bedroom, Mattin couldn’t hear much of anything. The guards that had been positioned in one of the other rooms might cough, or offer a comment to one of the others, but outside the walls of the royal residence, the palace was quiet. 

Mattin eventually went to a window to crack a shutter to peer out, startled to see looming, ferociously black clouds and only the faintest hints of dawn, or pre-dawn, light. He jumped when a tray of tea was brought in, then he and the guard who had brought it took turns apologizing to each other. The tray had food on it as well, fruit with some pastries still warm from the ovens. The kitchen staff had been roused and felt secure enough to go about their duties. Mattin did not feeling much ease despite the knowledge.

He drank some tea and paced the room, not noticing a single detail. He stopped to study the room for a while after that, belatedly realizing that the fire in the fireplace was growing low because it must have been the one Arden and Mil had started before they’d gone to bed, all those hours ago. The bedroom itself was warm despite that, the walls covered in tapestries as suited the winter weather. Unlike in Mattin’s room, everything was in its place. Wherever Arden and Mil stored their clothing, it was not in their bedroom. 

Mattin skirted around the so very large bed, to find another doorway behind a tapestry. That was where he discovered Arden and Mil’s clothing, as well as more weaponry and armor, all of it next to a jewelry chest built to hold several of the crowns past rulers had chosen. Arden had never had a crown of his own made. Mattin made a note to ask about it, as if this were just any other day and in the morning, he would have answers for Arden’s questions about governing. Then he noticed his hands were shaking. 

He left that room and went into another, a private toilet, and then another, constructed to hold a heated bathing tub and a shallow sink with a connection for water for both. He did not bathe, but he washed dirt from the cellars from his hands and face, and tried to wipe it from his clothing before giving up. 

He ate after that, knowing they would ask when they returned, if they returned. He left the fruit untouched and tore apart one pastry to eat a bite at a time before having some cold tea and sitting on the edge of the bed once again. The bed had a few blankets and a fur tossed over the top, but Mattin could not imagine Arden growing cold enough to need them.

Beyond that, Mattin didn’t look at the bed while he considered what might be happening in the rest of the palace. If the kitchens were running as usual, then surely it was not as horrible as it might have been. The guard who came to take his tray—and cluck over the uneaten food, making Mattin sniff in vague annoyance; he was anxious, not sick—did not seem overly concerned. Not that Mattin understood the guards and their ways. 

He wrung his hands and pulled at his braid and listened but heard nothing. 

The room was well-insulated. The safest place for him, they had claimed, except for Jola’s quarters. And yet they had not brought him there. 

That did not mean anything. Or perhaps didn’t. Arden and Mil had likely just removed him to the nearest safe location. They hadn’t known Mattin would say what he had. Mattin hadn’t known he would say what he had. 

Which was mortifying, would be mortifying, tomorrow. Today. Whenever it was. Whatever day Mattin could rest and think clearly. 

He paced again, or tried to, but it seemed that a night of terror and no rest took his strength from him. He collapsed onto the bed on unsteady legs and waited. Soon, he shifted to sit on the edge of the bed, in front of what was left of the fire. Then, he pulled the fur over his lap. 

When he opened his eyes again, his head was on a pillow, the fur was tucked beneath his chin, and Arden and Mil were holding a quiet conversation somewhere close. 

Mattin listened to them without a care for what was said. It was the sound of their voices that lifted his heart and let him close his eyes again for a few moments more. When he finally looked up from the pillow, it was to find them. 

They stood in front of the fire, which was blazing bright. Mil was gently tying and untying the laces of Arden’s simple shirt. They were both out of their armor, wearing trousers and the loose, thin shirts that went beneath their tunics. The laces seemed more decorative than practical. Mil was fidgeting, Mattin realized. Fretting. 

Arden was the one The Tyrabalith had ultimately wanted to kill. Mattin and Mil, the guards, might have been in his path, but it was a path that led to Arden. The Tyrabalith would not be the only one with royal murder on his mind; he had merely been the one today. 

Arden looked tired, but his lips were curved when he finally stopped Mil. He brought Mil’s fretting hands up to his mouth and kissed them, then leaned in and paused, waiting. 

Mil grumbled something that might have been rough, but he kissed Arden gently and was slow to pull away. 

The firelight flickered over them, warm and loving. 

Mattin exhaled shakily and they both turned toward him. 

He sat up immediately, then blinked at the rush of sparkles before his eyes before the world steadied itself. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sleep. I’ll—”

“Stay!” Arden stilled, then smoothed the harshness from his tone with obvious effort. “If you please. Stay.” 

Mil joined in, gruff as ever. “There have been few good things about this day. Coming back after all that to see you here was one of them.” 

Mattin did not squeak, but was a close thing. He had been on the bed before, not in it. One of them had set him here, and the other likely made him comfortable. Now Mil was petting him with words. 

“You’ve flustered him, my love,” Arden remarked, as seriously as he might have at court.

“He could use some flustering,” Mil returned. He did not seem to be teasing either. 

Mattin frowned at their odd stillness, his gaze dropping to Mil’s hand, which had fallen back to Arden’s chest. Mil’s fingers were tangled in the laces of Arden’s shirt, as if he could not let go. 

Mattin tugged the fur down to his waist, hardly noticing that he was fully dressed except for his cloak and his boots. “Tell me what happened? Are you both all right? No injuries? Show me.” He was too tired to note his own audacity until Arden flashed a surprised smile and then moved as if to take off his shirt. “Oh!” Mattin exclaimed, grateful the firelight would hide any color in his face. He studied them both regardless, first Arden, who sighed and left his shirt on, and then Mil, who had at least cleaned away the blood that had marked him before. “Are you well?” Mattin asked, quieter this time. 

“Aye.” Mil was staring at him in a way Mattin could not handle while sitting in their bed. 

“Merely exhausted.” Arden’s answer was more honest, and horrifying as Mattin recalled himself. 

He turned quickly back toward Arden. “Then I should leave you to your bed and your rest.”

“Or just move over a bit,” Mil suggested, sitting heavily on the edge of the bed and sighing as he removed his boots. “Fuck me, I can’t believe I used to march for days without a problem.”

“I think the emotions of the night are more wearying than they can seem,” Arden remarked, watching his husband remove his thick winter socks with an almost tender expression on his face. 

“Emotions?” Mattin realized he still had not gotten his answer. “What happened? Tell me this time.” 

Mil heaved a breath, then surprised Mattin by flopping backwards to lie with his legs over the side of the bed. The bed was so large that he was nowhere near touching Mattin. 

Mil rubbed his eyes with his palms as he answered. “His friends and allies were not so many, but some were clever at hiding, and it took a while to roust them out. We’re still after a few of them, in fact. Cael is up and talking to people. In a couple of hours, after a bit of sleep, we’ll go back out to try to determine who is guilty and of what. We’ve alarmed more noble families than we’ve calmed, at the moment, but since most invited themselves to stay within the palace wall because of tradition, or pride, or nosiness, they can deal with the occasional attempted uprising in the middle of the night.” 

“And The Tyrabalith?” Mattin pressed, pulling the fur back up to his chest. “His family?”

“I’m hardly one to condemn a whole house for the acts of a single member,” Arden replied, stretching his neck until it popped, then sighing. “Not without cause, anyway. Which is not something that can be discovered in one night, or even one day. Nor am I a king who has the right to condemn another for treason.” He stopped to meet Mattin’s eyes. “For attempting to harm you, however, I can.” 

“Fortunately,” Mil cut in when Mattin had trouble catching his breath, “that will not be a problem since Per Tyrabalith was stuck by one of the guards he attacked, and bled out in his hiding place.” 

“Oh,” Mattin said.

The fire crackled. 

“Oh,” Arden agreed gravely. “You should know that many were distressed to learn that you had been the target.”

Mattin’s eyes widened. “You told them?”

“No one touches my family.” Arden spoke quietly, in a room with only two other people in it, but his words were rolling thunder. “No one will harm what is mine without consequences. I have made this clear, and still, The Tyrabalith acted as he did.” Arden stopped to watch Mattin. When he continued, the storm was far away. “You are well-liked, a respected Keeper, admired by others your age, in your circles. Further, you are innocent of any scheming, as anyone who meets you quickly realizes. Very few were pleased that The Tyrabalith would try this. Many asked after you, including Jola. I assured her you were safe. Did you eat?” 

The storm had dissipated altogether. 

“Did I eat?” Mattin repeated back to him, uncertain how this was a concern after everything else Arden had just said. He threw out a hand to point at Arden accusingly. “You called me dear heart!” He may have shouted it. His finger went toward Mil, who sat up. “You kissed me!” He may have shouted that, too. 

Mil squinted at him. Arden flashed a wry little smile, very like the one when they’d first met. 

“He often calls you that,” Mil answered at last, “just not where you can hear.” 

“I’ve sense enough to know better.” Arden was far too pleased with himself. When Mattin recovered his voice, he ought to say something about that. 

“Pfft. Mil flapped a hand. “He likes it when I call him Sass. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t speak to me when I do it. I suspect he just feels he is supposed to object.”

“To the intimacy?” Arden guessed, then made a small noise of revelation. “Ah. What is proper. Rules that would have suited Queen Lyni, bless her memory.”

Mattin stared between them with a tired frown until Mil stopped and leaned toward him. “Ah, Sass.” He put his hand on the bed to hold himself up. “If I could keep you as gentle in your ways as you are, forever, I would. They’re admirable things, your colors and kindnesses, and your courtly manners even with someone like me… most of the time. You do have your temper.” 

Mattin did not know how to respond to that. “I didn’t even get a list right,” he mourned softly. 

Mil turned to Arden in alarm. “What did I do wrong? He’s upset!”

“Someone tried to kill me!” Mattin flailed his hands a bit, then grabbed the fur over his lap and held tight. “And you kissed me, and he called me… what he called me… and that is why they tried to kill me.” He was suddenly too warm and restless. His voice was husky. “And I worried! All night, or however long I’ve been here. I worried for you, and you did not even send word, and now you are here and I am tired. I am so very tired even though I didn’t do anything but sit on the ground and listen. I’m—” He dragged in a long breath. “Tired,” he finished, after a shuddery exhale. 

“We sent food and tea,” Arden objected, as Mil opened his mouth as if to say the same. But then Arden nodded slowly. “However, we did not send word. For that, I am sorry. We are sorry. I suppose… I suppose we weren’t sure how concerned you would be. And perhaps I also thought that the news might upset you more. I should not have.” 

Mattin stared at the two of them, not sure he had heard correctly. “How concerned I would be? I told you—I said—I embarrassed us all with what I said.” 

“You had just been through a…” Mil met Mattin’s incredulous stare, then trailed off before clearing his throat to try again. “We are doubly sorry.” 

“You kissed me before you left.” Mattin said it quietly this time and regarded Mil with wide eyes. 

The corners of Mil’s mouth drew down. “I am sorry for that, too.” 

Mattin’s frown deepened. “You are?” 

Mil looked as if he had several things he wanted to say, but in the end, scratched the back of his head and glanced away. “You’re about what’s proper. I should have asked.” 

“I would have said yes,” Mattin snapped, without knowing that at all. It instantly brought Mil’s gaze back to him, which Mattin regretted when his face began to grow hotter. “Surely you knew that,” Mattin insisted anyway. “You’ve teased me enough for it.” 

“That part was…” Arden was too kind to say glaringly obvious. “It gave us hope.”

“Who was teasing?” Mil wondered, scowling.

“The rest was not nearly as promising for us as your blushes were,” Arden continued smoothly. “You can be difficult to read as well, Master Keeper.” Mattin shifted his attention to him in question and Arden’s smile lit the room. “I did hear correctly? You love us, Mattin Arlylian?”

Mattin worked his mouth but no sounds came out. He shut his eyes and let the silence answer for him. 

Arden’s sigh was deep and satisfied. “But you asked us, in your way, to stop.” When Mattin opened his eyes, Arden was no longer smiling. “And we would have. We thought we were too old, after all. Or it was too dangerous for you, which we understood.”

“Or that we were still too rough for someone like you,” Mil muttered. 

Mattin was shaking his head before Mil was even finished. It was not any of those reasons, although Mattin should have thought of the danger. “I could not marry you and sleep in another room, or sleep here while knowing that if my surname were different, you would have chosen someone else. I could not be an alliance when I wanted—” he paused before saying what he had never allowed himself to say or even think “—when I wanted to be a husband.” He wet his lips, then dropped his head to consider the fur over his knees. “But we can forget that, never speak of it, if you like.” 

“You are a constant puzzle.” Arden did not sound as upset by this as Mattin would have. If anything, Arden seemed cautious. “There are other beat-of-fours who would do for an alliance.” 

The furs got a scowl. Then Arden got it too, for a moment. “You already know me. I’m convenient.” 

The quiet that held the room had a stunned quality. Mattin imagined the two of them having an entire conversation with just their faces. Then Arden made a noise in his throat. “With any others, a courtship would have been, as you said, a dance. A dance with known steps, simple to follow. With you…” 

“There’s nothing convenient about you,” Mil interrupted. “Except that we generally know where to find you.” 

Mattin shuffled and reshuffled these remarks before finally, warily, lifting his head. “Is that a compliment?” 

Mil gave him a cheeky grin. “You fuss.” 

“And you don’t like mornings,” Arden added, “though we do.” 

“You’re scared of weaponry and fighting—understandably so.” Mil growled a little. “Which I’m glad of, even if it might also make you scared of me.” 

“You’re younger, enough to make us worry.” Arden was just ticking off points now despite Mattin’s soft gasp. 

“You ought to be dripping in suitors, but you’re not.” Mil seemed ready to growl again. “That worried us too. Maybe you didn’t want any. Maybe we were bothering you.” 

Mattin shook his head again. 

Arden’s regard was nearly enough to set him on fire. “You stare at us as though we are incredible.”

“Or like you want us to eat you up,” Mil pronounced it with relish, making Mattin burn even hotter. 

But then Arden sighed. “Yet you didn’t put your name on that list.” He let Mattin sit with that for several beats before adding gently, “At least now we know the reason for that.” 

“Sent us running to Cael, that did,” Mil complained. “Made me feel about fifteen.”

Mattin ignored that for the sake of his pounding heart, and traced back through all their declarations to return to the point. “So I am not convenient?” 

“I wanted to get you more clasps,” Mil volunteered. “But neither of us had any idea how to choose or order such things, and Jola laughed at us, and then it seemed like it would be too much, by your rules. Too public. Too forward, maybe, to hand you jewels.” 

“The cloak and gloves were public enough,” Mattin heard himself saying, in a queer, faint voice. 

“But you wore them.” They were both briefly smug and well-pleased with themselves.

Mattin was too tired to feel ruffled. He suspected that if a hair clasp from them had shown up at his door, he would have worn it and walked on clouds. 

He tried to recover the ground he seemed to have lost, while not knowing why he was holding the ground at all. “But you said the idea had occurred to you before—oh.” 

They had been thinking of him long before he had foolishly come to his senses last night.  

“I told you we should have just seduced him first,” Mil said to Arden. “We could’ve worked the rest out afterward.” 

“I think your cock was making that decision, my love,” Arden answered, dry. “But… it may have worked better than trying to be discreet.” 

Mattin huffed. That either of them thought they had been discreet when the entire population of the palace had known after only a few days—and some before, like Cael—was ridiculous. The palace guards must have suspected, at least some of them. How many of them had winked or smirked or grinned at Mattin as they’d let him into the royal chambers? 

“You are careful with others, but I was permitted into your rooms whenever I wished!” Mattin realized aloud. “To share your breakfasts with you!” 

“Would you like some tea now?” Arden inquired earnestly, and something lighter than laughter bubbled up in Mattin’s chest; a silly, joyous feeling that made him bounce as he turned to Mil. 

“You were worried about me not loving you?” he demanded of Mil’s startled, then wary, face. “I’ve wanted to buy you a clasp, too,” he confessed. “Nothing like mine. But you should wear something to the council meetings to show that you are valued. You let him get you armor, and it’s beautiful. But you should have something with you that isn’t only that.” 

Mil seemed to struggle to catch his breath. “Don’t think I’m meant to sparkle,” he answered at last. 

“You are to me,” Mattin told him fiercely, and Mil made a sound, low and rasping. Mattin had never imagined such a sound coming from him and wasn’t sure if Mil was embarrassed or angry or pleased. 

But Arden was smiling. Mattin turned to him. 

“And you! With your one cuff of gold, lovely though it is, and your collection of borrowed crowns you do not wear!” 

Arden blinked, then dropped his smile. “Many recent rulers have been power-hungry, or greedy for treasures. I didn’t want to seem extravagant.” 

“You could wear anything as long as it was yours!” Mattin declared with quiet passion. “You could wear pewter and look like a king. How dare you. The country would kneel for you in a crown of iron or paper, but you’d have to choose one first. You are The Canamorra and the king, and your people love spectacle, have I not made this clear? What kind of handsome, heroic king is happy to wear shine from his beloved but not a simple crown to please his people? How dare you?” 

Arden lifted his chin, though he seemed more baffled than challenging. “How… dare I?” 

Mil threw back his head and laughed, making Mattin jump. “Oh, Sass,” Mil began when he was able to speak, wiping his eyes, “is it any wonder we’ve wanted you for so long?” 

“He means loved,” Arden corrected, although, from his expression, he was still puzzling over Mattin’s small tirade.

No wonder Mil was laughing, if he also felt this. 

“Loved?” Mattin tossed his head, denying the giddiness to frown in consternation. “I only admitted that I loved you today—last night.” 

Arden shrugged. “Some of us are fools who brave gates and walls and swords. Some of us are wise and hide. There’s nothing to be done about it, though, is there? I’m pleased with the result.” 

Mattin tossed his head again. “But I hurt you yesterday.” 

Arden looked at Mil. Mattin found he did not mind this silent discussion, because Mil explained it. “You confused us, often. First, with that list. Rushed to read it, he did.” 

“Just me, was it?” Arden wondered, with a sly look at Mil. 

“Well...” Mil hesitated while admitting nothing, “we thought you’d put yourself on it, if you had considered us—it. We hoped you would.”

“Oh,” Mattin said. 

“You didn’t. But then you responded so well when Arden tried a more direct approach—”

Mattin opened his mouth to stop Mil right there. None of that had been direct. Except, Mil had said more direct, and by that he must have meant something more direct than whatever they had done before. 

Which included Mattin being fed fruit from the king’s own hand. 

Mattin hid his face behind his hands. “Oh. Oh no.”

“And then,” Mil was pointed, “you offered to show him how to woo. I don’t think you know what you do to us.” 

“I offered,” Mattin began stiffly from behind his hands, “to tell you how to woo someone else.” 

“A beat-of-four,” Arden agreed, only to betray him. “And you did it so very reluctantly.” 

Mattin huffed. 

“Now, Sass, you had your own victories.” Mil patted Mattin’s knee, which only made Mattin huff again. “Jola’s party, for example.”

“Where I made a fool of myself?” Mattin removed one hand from his face to hiss at Mil. 

“Where you dressed like you did,” Arden said, heated and heavy, and Mattin dropped his hands in surprise. “And were surrounded by friends and admirers, and Jola had forbidden us to approach you, so all we could do was watch you draw others.” 

Mattin swallowed. “Do you…” he did not want to ask, but, “do you two not realize I am plain?”

Arden raised his eyebrows, then lowered them into a displeased frown. “My sister ordered us to stay away from you and to let you have your fun with those your own age if you wanted. All while you looked like that. She wanted to remind us that we were not the only ones to want you. That Canamorra, that Wulfa, that king, was a danger, and the others nearer your age and circle are the safer choice. You seemed at ease, as though you were having fun. You were beautiful. And you would not look at us.” 

“We at least got to rescue you,” Mil decided with no small amount of satisfaction in his voice, “and take you home.” 

At the wine-hazy memory, Mattin reached up to his throat, then curled his fingers over his hair. 

“Were you uncomfortable sleeping with those clasps in?” Arden’s gaze was hot. “May I be of service once again?”

Mattin’s gaze flew to Mil even as he turned his head to offer his braids to Arden’s hands. “I am not drunk.” He didn’t know why he said it and tried to clarify his own thinking. “You are a king, Arden.”

“A handsome, heroic one, I hear.” Arden’s weight shifted the bed and the bedding, so Mattin moved with it, curling onto his knees without taking his eyes from Mil. Mil, for his part, did not seem inclined to look away either.

“How dare he?” Mil agreed with Mattin’s unspoken comment. “He doesn’t understand how it is for the rest of us.” 

“No, he does not.” Mattin sniffed haughtily, or would have, if Arden’s fingertips had not brushed his ear and made him shiver. Mil drew in a breath. There was little else for Mattin to do but shiver again and again at each careful tickle and become very warm in the face. He had been going to say something else, but could not recall what it was. 

Arden was thorough. When his glittering handful had been set aside, he tugged lightly on the end of one of the braids. “Should I attend to your hair too, Master Arlylian?” 

Mattin could only imagine the state of his braids after the cellars and then falling asleep here. He thought that no one had ever asked to attend to his hair, except to help him fix it when asked. Then he thought that he did not know what he might do once Arden’s hands were on him. But he’d already told them he loved them. What more embarrassing thing could he do?

“If you like,” he answered, far too late. 

Mil’s eyes seemed to glint in the firelight. “It’ll calm him down,” he said as if revealing a secret. 

“Oh?” Mattin responded, as if he could think at all as his braids were unbound and Arden arranged the loose hair to fall over his shoulders. “And you?” Mattin wondered thickly, because Mil had not looked away. 

“I’m many things, but I wouldn’t say calm.” Mil reached out to take a small handful of Mattin’s hair and let it slide through his fingers. “You’re both quite good to me.” 

Arden chuffed a laugh at that before sweeping the curtain of hair back and rebraiding it. He was not quick, as if he was out of practice, but the braid felt slightly more complex than Mattin had expected from him. 

“This is…” Mattin began tentatively, watching Mil, but then found he could not ask. “I would like to be good to you,” he said instead, then clapped a hand over his mouth. “Sorry.” 

Arden laughed again, a small but warm sound as he tied off the end of Mattin’s braid. “Why would you be sorry? You are in our bed.” He leaned closer to speak against the shell of Mattin’s ear. “Where we put you.” 

“It is a very large bed, as Mil promised it was,” Mattin answered through his revealing little tremble. Then, with a jolt, he straightened his spine and threw one hand back to grab and hold onto some part of Arden’s shirt, though he did not turn around. He watched Mil. One had to watch Mil and not Arden for the plain truth in these things. Mil was easier to read. But they had said it. “You love me?” 

Mil’s eyes crinkled. “You do wrap yourself up in layers, don’t you? Good armor has nothing on you.”

Armor reminded Mattin of his cloak and the gash in it, so he shoved that thought away. He held out his other hand to Mil to show him. Mattin had cleaned up but some of the red ink remained. “This is love, Mattin, you fool. That’s what I wrote on the list I made myself. I did not allow myself to think of it. It did not seem…. It could not be real.”

“Well, we thought about it.” Mil took the offered hand and kissed it, and grinned at Mattin’s quiet gasp. “I’d tease him for his infatuation with our Keeper, and—"

Arden coughed. “I’m not the one who kept remarking on his figure.” 

Mil snorted. “No, you just stared until I caught you staring.” He looked back at Mattin after giving his husband a heated but fond look, and then turned Mattin’s hand over to kiss his palm. “So we both admired you,” he carried on easily. “There’s no crime in it.”

“A bit embarrassing, at our ages, with so much else on our minds.” Arden was no longer speaking close to Mattin’s ear, but was still a solid presence at his back. “But there it was. There you were. Our weekly visitor. Then every few days. Then at our table.” That was almost a purr. 

“Only one place better to find you,” Mil remarked, seeming to enjoy Mattin’s stunned silence. “Though, of course, if you’re not wanting that, just sitting down to share our meals with you is pleasure enough.”

Mattin stared at the pair of them, torn between a thrill of pleasure and a flush of embarrassment. “Are you seducing me?” 

“No—yes,” Arden answered thoughtfully. “Into staying in our bed, at least. It’s been a long night and we are not at our best. We can do a proper job of it later, if you’d like.” 

“I really do wonder how the palace youth go about this these days,” Mil remarked, placing another kiss to the inside of Mattin’s wrist and grinning when Mattin exhaled shortly. 

“We all know each other,” Mattin explained, voice shakier than it should have been. He clutched Arden’s shirt tighter while Mil dragged the tips of Mattin’s fingers against his lips and teased Mattin’s thumb with his tongue. “There’s no need for anything…” Mattin couldn’t remember what he had been going to say. “Complicated,” he finished at last, breathless. “Though it must be… must be different when it’s someone else, like the guards and the assistants. They flirt a lot before they—ah.” Arden pressed closer to his back. Mattin slid his hand down to what might have been Arden’s hip. “Some have a regular outguard that visits them, whenever they return. What… what am I saying?” 

“Did you have one?” Arden asked, a murmur into Mattin’s hair. “A regular outguard to tup in the library?” 

“That is not your business,” Mattin informed him, struggling to even say that when Arden’s lips grazed his ear. “But no. Of—ah, of course not. And they would have been tupping me. I much prefer that.” 

Mil nodded seriously as if this was important information. 

Arden wrapped his arms around Mattin and pressed a kiss, soft, to the side of Mattin’s neck. “Anything else you prefer? Wait—why ‘of course not?’”

“How many times must I tell you I am pl—” Mattin’s voice rose when the kiss became wetter, when there were teeth nipping in tender places. “Plain,” Mattin tried again, in disbelief that he was being tasted by the two of them at once. “The spark… the sparkles are to make me feel prettier.” 

“You’re a smart one, Sass, but some things I don’t think you understand.” Mil’s voice rumbled up Mattin’s arm. His gaze was on Arden and it was smug. “Imagine them all, the sorry souls.” 

“Who?” Mattin asked blankly, with Arden toying with the loosely tied fabric at his waist. Mattin pushed his thumb farther into Mil’s waiting mouth, then hiccoughed at his presumption, although Mil simply closed his lips around it before slowly sliding it free. 

“The people flirting with you, only to have it go unnoticed,” Arden explained over Mattin’s much faster and louder breathing. He did not sound amused though he should have been if Mattin had been that oblivious. “I suspect your peers learned to be more to the point with you.” The tied fabric of Mattin’s belt went slack. Mattin’s pants would have fallen if he hadn’t been sitting on his knees. Arden made a small, pleased sound, but did not press the issue until Mattin found one of Arden’s hands and pulled it to his hip. Arden obligingly dipped his fingers beneath the fabric, then splayed his hand wide over Mattin’s bare skin. His other hand followed the first, settling at Mattin’s ribs in a way that hinted at his thoughts. His words did as well. “Tell us more about these outguards tupping you in the library.” 

Mattin had not known Arden to growl like Mil, but the sound was strangely thrilling. He tipped his head to the side to hopefully feel it again along his throat with more of Arden’s kisses. He had often thought it would be very nice to be lifted off his feet and pressed to the stacks and fucked. But he huffed at the question. “How many assistants did you take against the shelves?” 

Then he nearly moaned at the thought. They would be so good at it, the two of them. 

“Oh, we’re after Master Keepers now,” Arden revealed, gruff enough to make Mil proud, and hitched Mattin up onto his lap. Mattin had to spread his legs to straddle one of the thighs Mil dreamed about. He also squeaked in surprise, but he squirmed back against Arden’s chest in the next moment, perhaps for the fire in Mil’s eyes as he watched. Arden likely had to twist himself uncomfortably to hold Mattin thus while mouthing at his neck, but he did not seem inclined to stop. “One Master Keeper, in particular.” Arden held a hand firmly to Mattin’s hip to keep Mattin still and pressed his forehead to the back of Mattin’s head. “And tonight we nearly lost him.”

Mattin stopped breathing, then pulled in a long, unsteady breath far too many moments later. He shut his eyes, but opened them at the sound of Mil’s voice grown soft. 

“Then to find out, had that happened, that he wouldn’t have known what a gem he is.” 

Mattin could not reply in anything above a whisper. “That was mean. I wasn’t ready.” 

He didn’t know that anyone could be. He did not want them to grieve, or to think of how close he must have come. The assassin’s knife had slashed his cloak, and that only because Mattin had turned at just that moment to joke with his guards. 

He put a hand over Arden’s on his hip, then grasped Arden’s fingers nervously as though they were his own. Mil would not let him look away, or maybe it was Mattin who could not. 

The tangle of feeling in his chest included grief alongside the love. Mattin had ignored that with the rest. Armor, Mil had named it, as though he understood. 

“You choose me anyway?” Mattin asked, quiet. “Despite the risk of this?”

“The question is, do you choose us anyway?” Mil put Mattin’s hand against his cheek. Mattin curled a hand into his beard and scratched, curious. Mil bent his head to follow the touches. 

Mattin had sorted too many feelings for one night and one day. He tore his gaze from Mil to stare at the fire and thought of another question, far easier to answer. “Things I prefer,” he began, dropping a word at a time. Mil oiled his beard well; it was quite soft. “I don’t know. I’ve never been asked in such a way. Although, everything has always been very polite.” 

“Proper,” Mil grunted, not unkindly. 

Mattin turned back toward him without thought. Whatever he said, now or later, Mil and Arden would listen and remember. They had chosen him knowing the risk to their hearts. They loved him. He considered this and then continued despite the heat in his face. “That you don’t finish inside me.” He sighed. “Well, in my mouth is fine if you warn me. And not in my hair.” 

“Well, fuck me.” Mil must not have expected that sort of answer. “That all?”

“I’m happy to wash your hair for you,” Arden offered. 

Mattin shifted back to be more solidly pressed to Arden. Then Arden’s suggestion took over his thinking for several moments. He stared at Mil, wide-eyed and possibly feverish. 

“He means it,” Mil explained. “He likes to know we’re all right, you see. Even if he never tupped you, he’d take pleasure in the little acts.”

“Oh.” Mattin gripped Arden’s hand tighter, then let go. “I suppose. If we have time to wash my hair, afterward.” Arden resumed the kisses down the side of Mattin’s neck, over skin already sensitized. “An outguard in the library would not have been able to do that.” 

“They would if you had ever invited them back to your room.” Arden inched his hands lower, testing or teasing. 

Many assistants shared living quarters, but Mattin did not bother to explain that. “I never brought anyone to my room,” he realized it and worried over it in the same breath. He looked at Mil. “I’ve never had anyone watch before. Never had two lovers at once….” 

“Are you doing that now?” Mil asked before Mattin could reach for his braid to anxiously pull at it. 

It stopped Mattin, then made him frown at Mil in question. 

Mil raised his eyebrows, apparently offended. “Did you think we were going to pin you to the bed and take turns without so much as a please and thank you?”

“Would you?” Mattin immediately wondered in return. He wet his lips. “If not now, then at some point?” His heart was racing. “I think I would also prefer to do something wild—but not too much. Please and thank you.” 

Arden’s surprised, snorting laugh against Mattin’s neck was warm. Mil seemed taken aback, but only briefly, and then he was rising to his knees and beckoning Mattin to him, so Mattin went. He fell clumsily forward until Mil drew him up. Then Mil kissed him, a hand at his face, the other splayed over Mattin’s ribs. 

Mattin flailed his hands before setting them on Mil’s shoulders, his legs weakened, his body humming. He couldn’t—didn’t—know how to respond to something so hungry, except to complain softly when Mil eased back and then to tilt forward to ask for more. 

“Stubble,” Mil observed, perhaps to Arden, while stroking Mattin’s cheek. Mattin hated to think of his unkempt appearance, but barely got a chance to fret over it, for then Mil was kissing him again, a fierce, breathless kiss that had Mattin curling and uncurling his fingers like a cat.

The bed shifted behind him before Arden’s large hands swept beneath Mattin’s shirt to lift it and bare Mattin’s skin. Mattin tried to think, he truly did, to at least do more than moan for Mil’s kisses or shiver for the press of Arden’s hands. He didn’t know if he wanted to remove his clothing; Mil was a mountain and Mattin was so soft in comparison. To undress, Mattin would also have to take his hands from Mil, which he did not want to do, although he had hardly dared to touch Mil beyond his shoulders.

In the end, Arden did not push the matter, and that is what made Mattin decide to release Mil long enough to tear his vest and his shirt away before burying his face in Mil’s throat. 

“Ah,” whispered Mil, quite tenderly, while Arden’s fingertips traced the length of Mattin’s spine down to where his pants had dipped low. Arden toyed with Mattin’s braid, tugging it gently to bring Mattin’s head up, and then offering a kiss, first at Mattin’s cheek and then at his mouth when Mattin twisted around to ask for it. 

The kiss was slow and careful, and it was a lie; all of Arden’s strength was kept from him, and his hunger only hinted at. Mattin would not even have known it was there if he had not tasted Mil’s. He pulled away to huff against Arden’s jaw and the coarser hair of Arden’s beard before offering his mouth again. 

This was better. Arden dropped his hands to Mattin’s waist and made a guttural sound in his throat when Mattin’s lips parted. His hold on Mattin was near to bruising. Mattin should have worried. Instead, he arched in Arden’s hands and was dizzy and hot with how pleased he was. He turned to catch his breath and found Mil’s mouth again, and this time, he kissed it, panting embarrassing sounds and climbing onto Mil’s lap while Arden pressed kisses to his nape and his shoulder. Arden’s thumbs pressed into the small of Mattin’s back. The waist of Mattin’s pants dropped farther. Then Mil fitted his hands to Mattin’s thighs and that was all Mattin thought about for some time. 

When Mattin finally could think again, and then only a little, he was flushed and aroused and struggling for breath against Mil’s shoulder. His pants had been most of the way removed, although they were still trapped beneath him. Mil tipped Mattin’s head up to study his face.

Mil was flushed too, his eyes dark in the firelight. Whatever he saw made him grin like the wolf in his name. 

Mattin didn’t even realize that Arden had moved away from him until he was suddenly flat on his back with Mil kneeling above him, pulling Mattin’s pants from his ankles. Mattin made a noise more of surprise than complaint, though he frowned at Mil for still being dressed. Before Mattin could vocally object to this, or pause to worry over his own nudity, Mil tugged his shirt over his head and tossed it to the side.

Mil had several scars and a mole and freckles, and a line of hair from his chest to his navel, and he let Mattin look his fill while he pulled his belt loose, although he left his pants on. 

“I am imagining if I had been a few years younger, and I’d gone into that library and found you.” Mil rested a hand on Mattin’s trembling thigh, then leaned down to run his thumb over a spot on Mattin’s neck that was especially sensitive, leaving Mattin to shudder. “Though I can’t imagine you having much interest in a rough and dirty outguard.” 

Someone, Arden, snorted, but Mattin kept his gaze on Mil as he finally reached out to touch him. “I think you are lovely,” Mattin confessed, parting his legs a little wider in invitation and splaying a hand over Mil’s collarbone and then up, over his shoulder to urge him down. Muscle moved beneath his palm. “Lovely,” he said again, dreaming. 

Mil kissed his throat, right at that spot, making Mattin throw back his head to gasp and tighten his legs around him. They would leave marks, the two of them, with how they kept kissing him there again and again, and putting their hands on him to move him how they pleased. Mattin could not seem to mind. He bit his lip to keep himself from asking them to do it, then could not remember why he would worry, and angled his head to let Mil mark as he pleased.

Arden stood by the bed, watching them. 

Mattin dug his nails into Mil’s skin. 

Arden inhaled sharply, said, “His hair,” in a roughened voice, and Mattin obeyed, moving his hand to slide it into Mil’s hair, then tightening his grip. Mil shuddered against him before kissing down Mattin’s throat to his chest, then to his stomach. 

“Lovely Mil,” Mattin murmured, hot yet shivering, tugging Mil’s hair free of the single band holding it back before carding it again. Mil was breathing hard, holding still above Mattin’s bared hip. 

“He is the most trustworthy person you will ever meet in your life,” Arden praised, as if he knew it would make Mil quiver beneath Mattin’s hand. Mattin touched Mil’s shoulder too, then the back of Mil’s neck, light and careful, although the hand in Mil’s hair was anything but. 

“You’ll share him with me?” Mattin asked, focused on Mil now, and the tremors under his palm. 

“Please.” Mil was hoarse. He did not raise his head. He was a fine, fragile thing. 

“Better than a crown,” Arden told Mattin, stroking Mil without lifting a hand, kissing Mattin without bending from his great height. “But like a crown you must take him.”

Oh, Mattin thought, and tugged on the oddly silky strands of Mil’s hair until Mil was above him again. Then he took Mil’s face in his hands and brought their mouths together. Mil’s palms were rough, sweeping all over Mattin’s body. He was hot and heavy. His legs were like iron. Mattin kissed him until Mil was moaning and his cock was hard, but that did not seem to matter with Mil’s face at his shoulder. Mattin did not recall choosing, but he must have. “You’re mine,” he breathed, a beat-of-four in his bones, and directed his gaze to Arden. 

Arden smiled, sharp as a crow. 

Arden was beloved of the fae, Mattin remembered from nowhere, and wondered how much of Arden’s behavior in this had been truly artless, and then if it mattered. Arden had followed Mattin’s rules, as he must have followed Mil’s to win him. But he could have just taken, and his gaze said he knew it, that he would, later, when it suited him.

Mattin swallowed. “Come here,” he ordered, his voice surprisingly clear.

With another sharp smile, Arden inclined his head before returning. He kneeled next to them, and placed his hand gently at the top of Mil’s spine before pulling back. 

Mil raised his head to study him, his husband and his king, and then sat up. “Sitting there…” he muttered, before frowning. “Are you well?” 

Arden waved this off, softening his smile for Mil’s concern, then offering Mattin an explanation. “Sometimes, I feel twinges.” He gestured at his chest. “It’s likely in my head. The fae did a good job and time did the rest. There is nothing here to be harmed now, but I thought—ah, don’t stare at me like that Mattin.” 

Mattin would stare at him however he wished. “Dear heart?” he asked hopefully, although he did not mind being only Mattin at last. 

Arden nodded, his smile faint but still there. “Yes.” 

“As your dear heart,” Mattin began tentatively, propping himself up on his elbows, “may I see the scars the fae gifted you with?” 

“You may do anything you like,” Arden said with an expelled breath, and pulled his shirt away to reveal a broad chest, paler than the rest of him and dusted with hair. Across his stomach were raised, dark scars, although the original, mortal wound was a scarred-over line, where a knife had slipped past armor. There were other old injuries as well, smaller, insignificant. From that day or some time earlier. 

Mattin lifted his gaze to Arden’s face and the scar at his cheek. He was touching it only moments later, after rising and turning to cross the space between them and pull Arden’s mouth to his. Mattin was clumsy. His kiss was perhaps too wet. He only held Arden tighter, letting Arden’s hands go where they pleased, down his back, between his legs. Arden groaned as though Mattin’s hard kiss and soft thighs pained him, but he did not urge Mattin to stop. 

Mattin finally did that on his own, gentling his kisses before turning around and settling himself in Arden’s lap. Arden remained half-dressed, but Mattin pressed himself to Arden’s growing arousal as he looked at Mil. 

“We will be careful,” Mattin told Mil, knowing Mil would understand the concern for Arden’s well-being, and then reached out for him. 

Mil came forward on his hands and knees to hungrily take Mattin’s cock into his mouth. 

Mattin retangled his hand in Mil’s hair and tipped his head back against Arden’s shoulder. He shifted his hips, expecting to be chided, or held down, but Mil accepted this with an eager, desperate sound that carried from his throat through Mattin’s body. Mattin watched, mesmerized by Mil sucking his cock, and turned his head without looking away. 

“I will… I will…” The warning felt foolish. Mil must want him to finish, taking him this way. One of his hands settled on Mattin’s thigh, nearly shaking. Mattin closed his eyes then opened them again, for the sight was sweet. Mil’s hair was a silken slide. Mattin continued to pet it, pet him, because Arden watched this too, over Mattin’s shoulder, while whispering that Mattin ought to praise him, their Mil, who was worth a country, worth dying for.

Mattin called Mil beautiful, called him lovely and soft and sparkling, his voice hitching, rising, because Arden’s hand curled around his throat to tease skin raw from kisses and beards and teeth. Mil’s eyes fell shut, his brow smoothed. Mattin wanted to ask if Mil was always like this, or only sometimes, and if strangers had been trusted with this. His thoughts were too shattered to let him form the questions. 

“Didn’t you…” He could not finish that question either, his legs spread to fit Mil’s bulk between them. It took him several tries, broken by gasps and his hand clenching in Mil’s hair as he fought not to force Mil’s head down. “Didn’t you want…?” 

Arden nipped the shell of his ear. It sent an arc through Mattin’s body, making him arch up from Arden’s heat, and then Mil’s hands were at his hips, pulling him forward to fill Mil’s throat. Mattin did not have to push him down. Mil took all of his cock and growled for it, and Mattin’s cry carried through the room. 

He finished, flushed and aching, held tight in Arden’s arms, while Mil swallowed and swallowed and then closed his eyes to catch his breath. Mattin protested wordlessly when Mil pulled away, holding him there for another moment with the fingers still caught in Mil’s hair. Then Mattin finally let his hand fall and looked up to watch Mil drift toward his husband with heavy-lidded eyes. 

Arden kissed Mil slowly, uncaring, or desiring, the taste in Mil’s mouth. 

The knot in Mattin’s chest felt like it was on fire. 

“You’re so beautiful,” he told them in a way that would have anguished him with anyone else. His words stuck together. His hair was likely all fly-aways. He could not seem to care. He was not worrying. It would not last, but what a blessing. 

Mil sat back. Arden held his gaze for a beat longer, and then Mil focused on Mattin with the same pleased-yet-hungry stare he had given his husband. His hair was mussed, his lips very red. Still trapped in his pants, his cock was straining.

Mattin imagined it was also red. 

He swallowed. “Are you two going to tup me at last?” 

“Oh, yes,” Arden promised him, too rough to be amused. His hand remained possessively at Mattin’s throat and Mattin could not seem to mind that, either. “But don’t you think our love could use some attention?”

“Oh.” Mattin sighed his agreement while staring at Mil’s cock. He peeled away from Arden to fall in front of Mil on his hands and knees, and looked up, beseeching, until Mil tugged his pants down. Mil’s cock was indeed red, and as lovely as the rest of him. Mattin thought of it against his stomach, in his hand, inside him, or standing like this while he dragged his hair over it. For now, he held the base in one hand and took the rest into his mouth. 

He wished to be as good or skilled as they were, to be what they were used to, but Mil put his hand tentatively on Mattin’s head before moving it to his shoulder, and then familiar hot hands returned to Mattin’s hips to lift them and spread his legs over Arden’s lap as Arden resettled behind him. 

It would not matter if Mattin was skilled, Mattin realized, somehow pleased by this, even while he burned at being arranged so. Arden’s voice washed over him while Mattin shivered under his attentions and stuttered beneath Mil’s careful touch.

Mil said, “Sass,” in a softly shaken voice, as if the sight of Arden’s fingers pushing into Mattin put an ache in Mil too. 

Mattin imagined them exchanging a look over him, but they had thought of this where he had not, and where he faltered, they would take care of him. He paused to wipe his chin and hold his breath as oil slicked down his inner thigh, and then he arched into Mil’s soothing strokes down his back.

“Mil,” Mattin said it once, then again, “Mil.” He did not think he was complaining. Arden was thorough, torturous, always. His fingers were large and Mattin could not breathe, then could only moan. Arden was so hot.

Mattin put his mouth to use as much as he could with how he was being teased, opened, displayed. Mil did not seem to mind much when Mattin pulled off to gasp again. Mil continued to pet him though Mattin’s tongue faltered for every spark of pleasure, and Mattin did his best to keep pleasing him, but he was floating, and finally just shuddered and dropped down to kiss the crease of Mil’s hip. Mil was watching. Arden was teasing him, too.

Mattin held Mil tight. “Arden, please. I would…” He did not know what he meant to say and abandoned words to push back into Arden’s hands, onto Arden’s fingers.

Mil and Arden did not seem to have the same trouble. Somewhere, distantly, Mattin wondered what it meant that they would plead for him when he was the one about to take them both. They did not praise him as he and Arden had praised Mil. Mil whispered, “More,” and Arden crooked his fingers to make Mattin gasp, and Arden said, “Watch,” and Mil grunted as if pained, and with each order and action, they would both stroke Mattin’s skin and say, “Please,” until Mattin returned the word.

“Now,” he demanded, throat raw as if he had been moaning against Mil’s hip. “Please.”

He would not have protested if Arden had kept going. Or did not think he would have. But Arden obeyed him. His king, withdrawing his fingers to apply more oil, and then bending Mattin to him before finally pushing his cock into Mattin’s waiting body.

“A pretty sight.” Mil cupped Mattin’s cheek. Arden was slow and kind and Mattin was grateful and also wished Arden would simply have him. Like he wanted to, Mattin thought, although the thought was half-formed. Arden’s hold on him was firm, but they were being careful because Mattin had insisted. Mattin was a fool and so were they.

He shifted back, as much as he could when he was so blessedly full, and then turned his head to nuzzle Mil’s palm.

“A pretty sight indeed,” Arden spoke hoarsely, moving slowly again. Mattin did not think it was torment now, although it remained a display. Mattin on Arden’s cock was a pleasure for them all. Mattin was warm and pleased as he stretched toward Mil’s cock again. Mil obligingly guided the head between his lips and Mattin sucked without skill, happy to feel Mil’s hand sink into his hair and to hear Mil groan.

Arden moved him, not as careful as he might have been, pushing deeper but no faster, and Mil groaned again.

“He wants us both to take him,” Mil panted, his thumb restless at Mattin’s cheekbone, his temple. “I can’t—”

“You will,” Arden ordered calmly, if breathlessly, “but if you need a moment, come and kiss me.”

Mattin dropped his hot face to the bed and moaned as Mil leaned forward, one hand still tangled in Mattin’s braid. Mattin listened to the sounds of their kisses, their whispers, and shuddered when Arden went still. He worried, just for a moment, a helpless reflex, hoping he had not done something wrong. Then there was a gentle touch to where Mattin was stretched around Arden’s cock, and he twitched as Mil sighed.

“...See you.” Mattin demanded, or tried to, while still swallowing spit and the taste of Mil’s cock. “I want to see you.”

He regretted it when they pulled away, when he was abruptly empty and cold.

Then he was on his back, on soft bedding with pillows being tucked beneath him, and Arden was gazing down at him with a Canamorra’s greed all over his face.

Mattin bent his knees without thought.

“Show me,” he said while words could still fall out of him, and dragged a hand down his stomach as Arden reeled Mil in for a deep kiss. Mil was flushed across his neck and chest and had one hand wrapped around his cock. “Mil,” Mattin sighed, wriggling a little at how pleasant it was to have them both immediately turn to him. “My king first,” he said, lazy and humming, and had the urge to laugh again for what flashed in Arden’s eyes. “My king and then my Mil.”

But his breath was pushed from him when Arden made room for himself between Mattin’s legs and then spilled oil onto his palm so he could slick his cock more under Mattin’s rapt attention. When he was satisfied, he tossed the bottle to Mil before leaning down to pin Mattin easily, one hand over Mattin’s wrist. Mattin let his eyes flutter closed at the strength in the gesture, and then opened them to turn his head and watch Mil while Arden slid back inside of him.

Mattin took him smoothly this time, with a small sound of pleasure that quickly grew louder. The way Mil stared and slowly worked his cock made Mattin’s mouth water, but Mil did not move closer. Mattin could only imagine the someday when he might.

The muscles of Arden’s shoulder flexed beneath Mattin’s free hand. His mouth was open at Mattin’s neck. Mattin held him close, scratching through his short curls, digging his nails into Arden’s shoulder blade. He kept watching Mil, whose gaze darted from Mattin’s face to the press of their bodies, how Arden filled him. Mattin imagined watching Mil like this and made a thrillingly animal noise before tightening his thighs to urge Arden deeper. He liked being watched when it was Mil doing the watching, and would blush for that thought later, as well as all the others about what Mattin might witness in turn. For what he might do and what might be done to him. Mattin was as greedy as Arden. Greedier, for Mattin would have them both. He would take them, like a crown, like a throne.

He did not think he would finish again, but he was alight, groaning shamelessly with every thrust, and when Arden finally pulled out of him to spend thick across his stomach, he whined. He was shameless about that, too, and about carding his fingers through Arden’s hair under Mil’s hungry stare to make Mil shiver.

Mattin won soft words over his collarbone as Arden caught his breath, dear heart and Mattin and once, so quietly Mattin nearly did not hear it over his own panting, ours.

Mil watched them both with glassy eyes, one hand still on his cock. Mattin wondered if he would finish for a second time with Mil in him, or if he would know Mil’s mouth again. Or Arden’s.

He put his fingertips to Arden’s lips at the thought, and smiled at Mil as they were kissed.

“Our love is ready,” Mattin informed Arden huskily, all of him loose and tired, all of him on fire. Arden gave a short laugh and, smiling, kissed Mattin on the mouth.

“The fae have blessed me many times over,” Arden groaned as he pulled back. He did not go far. He picked up the bottle of oil and kissed Mil’s neck as he stroked the warmed oil onto Mil’s cock for him. Mil allowed it, though it must have been agony. All that care. All that service. Perhaps this display was for Mattin.

Mattin shivered. He did not know how Mil would want him, but he dropped one knee to the bed and wet his bottom lip.

Mil was over him within moments, his big hands spread out over Mattin’s hips as he ground against Mattin’s thigh.

“No,” Mattin commanded, sleepy and yet sharp, tugging on Mil’s hair. “I would take you.”

Mil was big. Mattin threw his head back to gasp as Mil obeyed, then turned his head until he found Arden looming over them again, pleased and possessive.

Mattin rather dizzily reconsidered who was taking whom as he dreamed of what they would be like on some other night, without exhaustion or worry or danger. When they would be what Arden had promised.

Then Mil moved in him, and Arden offered two large, hot fingers for Mattin to take in his mouth, and Mattin was nothing but pleasure. 

Mattin did not pay much attention to the movement around him as Arden and Mil finished straightening up or whatever else it was they did before they finally climbed beneath the blankets of their bed. They had already seen to him quite thoroughly; carrying him to the bathing room, trying to fuss with his hair for him, carrying him back to their bed after harrumphing about his sleepy insistence that he could see to himself. They did not sprawl over him or pull him closer as they settled in. Mattin was both vexed over this and grateful. Curled up between them, he was already more warm than he had been since last summer. In time, he might become too warm. He still did not wriggle away or open his eyes. He did not think he could. 

“Looks like a well-fed cat, he does,” Mil observed, after a tired groan and the sound of a few joints popping. “Smug as can be.” 

Mattin shuffled back against him without unsealing his mouth to reply. 

Mil made a startled, then contented sound, before exhaling into the mess that had once been Mattin’s braid. 

“Let him be smug,” Arden remarked quietly. “He has us, and I do not want to burden him.” He was close, but he did not touch, so Mattin snaked a hand from beneath the blankets they had piled over him until he found hot skin—Arden’s wrist. Mattin pulled it to him. Even the youngest of a youngest Arlylian could be possessive. Mattin could claim, too.

Arden let his hand be taken, sweeping his thumb under Mattin’s chin until Mattin drifted deeper toward sleep. “But I would wear the crown of his choosing.” 

Mil snorted sleepily. “Cock-led indeed,” he mumbled, before chuffing a laugh. 

“Sleep,” Mattin unstuck his lips enough to order, and complain, and they both went silent. 

They slept. 

Mattin was not much more awake, hours later, after he finished removing the last of his rather pathetic stubble from his face while the water ran into his bathing tub to be heated. He should have eaten more of the very late breakfast—in truth, more of a midday meal—that Mil and Arden had pushed on him. They were probably used to eating despite nerves or fear or a lack of appetite. Mattin was not, but had accepted the fruit offered him with something approaching shyness. The tea had been more welcome, although they had made him drink two cups with both milk and honey in them, since he would not eat. 

Arden and Mil had washed and dressed efficiently, taking their time with their armor—of which there was more, this day, although Mattin had focused on his tea rather than watch them put it on. Arden was armed again. Mattin did not blame him, although he was not certain if the sword was worn for potential defense, or to remind others that Arden was willing to use it. 

Mattin left his hair piled on top of his head, held messily with simple wooden pins, as he shed his dirty, wrinkled clothes at last to climb into the bath. He stopped the water before the tub was filled or had fully heated; there would be no lingering. Still, the warmed water sent parts of him stinging. He bit his lip and sank down as much as he could, keeping his head up to listen to the sounds from the other room. 

His quarters did not have a closed door between the bedroom and the bathing room, so the conversation between Mil and Arden was clear. What they were doing in there was not.

When Mattin had insisted that he would not spend his day in their clothes, which were far too large for him in addition to being not to his taste, and had also spoken longingly of a bath, they had both decided without any discussion that they would escort him here. With a great deal of guards as well, naturally. 

The palace had been quiet, with few of the staff to be seen going about their work, and guards everywhere, all of them exhausted, furious, grieving. 

There had not been many deaths. That information had been relayed to Mattin in an attempt at comfort. He supposed it might comfort him, someday. Most of the noble houses had likely either not known of the plan or chosen to act with reason if they had—although Mattin thought some warning would have been nice. One of Mattin’s guards yet lived. He had asked to visit her if she wished to see him, when she was well enough. As for everything else, there was, as always, work to be done. Investigations and questions to be asked. Security changes, Mattin had no doubt. There might yet be more deaths to come. But first, there were things to be seen to. 

As for Mattin, his original task remained: to help ensure a more lasting peace and stability by convincing any restless noble houses to stifle their complaints and accept their king. It occurred to him as he reached for soap that no one had asked him to do this. Nonetheless, the task was his. The other two had many skills, and Jola had eyes-and-ears others did not. But Mattin cared for popular tastes, and knew the ways of the beat-of-fours, and had access to their country’s history. He also had the king and his husband in his bedroom at that moment. Not many could, or should, say that. 

Mattin would fret over it some other moment when he was not nearly so sore or weary or wondering what in the name of the fae the two former outguards were doing among his things. 

After hearing reports from several of the palace guards, Arden had claimed that most of the palace residents were appalled that anyone should have threatened a Record Keeper, noble or not. If Mattin was going to leave his room today, which the other two had not suggested but Mattin worried over, then it would help for him to be seen looking well. 

He soaped himself again, stomach churning, only to stop at the sound of a small thud followed by furious whispering. 

He had wondered also why neither of them would step foot in the bathing room with him there despite what they had done to him only hours earlier. It would not have been proper, but neither of them were particularly bothered by that. 

But Mattin was, and that was why they did not. 

He sank a bit further down to conceal his silly smile beneath the water. 

“How is this room so small?” Mil complained. He was a large figure, larger still with clothes and armor and cloak on. He must have knocked something over. 

“It does not help that nearly every spare surface is clothes or books.” Arden clucked his tongue. “Or bottles of… is this perfume or hair oil?” 

“Not even a proper jeweler’s box,” Mil noted. 

“Where would he put it?” Arden then asked, before pausing, evidently to sniff something. “That is a much more personal oil. Fine stuff, too, from the scent of it. He respects quality.” 

Mattin scrubbed his hot cheeks and then stood up, letting the water cascade back into the tub. “It is the room of a Keeper,” he told them both. Had he wanted, he could have claimed a room among some of the other nobles staying within the palace wall. “It has space enough.” 

“…Don’t think other Keepers require quite so much room for their jewelry,” Mil remarked in a loud whisper, before adding, “Although he’s no regular Keeper.”

“He doesn’t understand that yet,” Arden contributed. 

Mattin reached for a towel and nearly fell as he slipped across the floor. He hurriedly dried himself and softened his skin with a randomly chosen lotion before pulling on a robe. He stopped in the doorway, his robe held closed in one hand. 

Mil and Arden were investigating the small table where Mattin had laid out his combs and clasps and oils, along with some of his jewelry. Several of his prettier necklaces spilled out of a bowl where Mattin had carelessly left them.

Mil and Arden both straightened when they noticed him. Arden’s brows rose slightly. Mil parted his lips, then shut them tight. 

Whatever Mattin had meant to accuse them of was quite lost because they stared at him as though they had forgotten that jewelry ever existed. 

“What?” Mattin asked, not certain he would get an answer. 

They looked at each other. Arden sighed, then Mil turned to Mattin. “What is that thing?” 

Mattin followed their gazes downward, then looked back up. “A robe?” He let it be a question.

“It’s sheer.” Mil was not complaining, exactly. “What good is it?”

Outguards did not often have regular access to hot baths, or any baths at all, but they should still recognize a personal robe. “It’s for when you are out of the bath, but have not yet decided what to wear.” 

“That’s when you’re naked.” Mil did not seem as amused as Mattin might have expected.

Mattin made an affronted face, which finally made them both smile. 

“Ah, that would not be proper enough for you, I suppose?” Arden guessed. “But that tease of a robe is,” he said that to Mil. 

Mattin dropped his head to consider his robe again, damp and sticking to him in places, easy to see through even with firelight and one window shutter only partially cracked. A lock of hair tumbled into his face. He absently tucked it back around one of the wooden pins. 

“I told you I would help you wash your hair,” Arden then added, making Mattin discard the discussion of the robe altogether. 

“We’ve no time today,” he declared, so fussily that he embarrassed himself. He paused, then tugged at the bottom of his robe before letting go of the sides to let them fall where they may. The soft hiss from Mil was pleasing and worth how vaguely flustered Mattin felt to be nearly naked before them both while they were fully dressed and armored. 

“Do you smell of jasmine?” Mil demanded in rough-voiced surprise. “Is that your soap I’ve been smelling all this time? I thought it was perfume, but you use flowered soap? Fuck me.”

Mattin thought to threaten to wash Mil with that same soap, then reflected dizzily that Mil would likely not consider that a threat. He shook his head to at least momentarily banish the thought and studied them both suspiciously. They enjoyed teasing him, but they also did it to distract him. “What are you two doing poking around in here?”

“Getting ideas,” Mil admitted freely, dragging his gaze up to Mattin’s face. “Have more gifts to give, don’t we?”

It held Mattin still. “Because you plan to continue to woo me?” he asked finally. 

Arden had a linked collar of green enameled glass in his hand but carefully returned it to the table before he spoke. “Unless you decided to marry us while you were in that bath.” He met Mattin’s stare, unbearably calm as he revealed that while he might guess Mattin’s thoughts, he certainly did not know them. “But we will likely keep on even if you did. The spectacle matters. You wrote that, in a note to Cael for us.” 

“‘The people need it,’ Cael said,” Mil added. “And I think maybe Sass needs it too. Fuck, I think I need it. It’s a pretty thing, and not as useless as I might have once thought.” 

Arden turned to him, startled, and then flashed a regretful smile. “Ah, Mil, my love, I should have wooed you right.” 

Mil crossed his arms and seemed insulted. “Who says you didn’t?”

Arden, apparently. “Whatever silly things I did—” 

“Who says they were silly?” Mil demanded, head up in full offense. 

Arden made his voice soft. “I didn’t know how to care for you then. I made mistakes. I did not do one solitary thing that our Mattin would consider proper.” 

That stopped Mil for a moment—but only a moment. He did, however, uncross his arms. “And I didn’t know I needed it. But we figured it out in the end. I’m yours and I’ve never regretted it.” 

Mattin highly doubted that Arden had forced anything on Mil, and that was truly all that propriety required. Everything else was decoration over that simple fact. Courtships, public or no, were meant to be about earning trust and respect and then devotion. 

“If you hadn’t run with me to that harsh life, you might have had more of a taste of the things you want,” Arden insisted. He glanced down to Mattin’s combs and bottles and jewelry, to the collar of green glass. “Or learned yourself sooner. You cannot deny that.” 

“I can woo him.” Mattin surprised himself with the quiet offer. He reached nervously for his hair, but it was still piled atop his head. Arden and Mil turned sharply toward him as one. Mattin wet his lips. “Properly. As it is done in the palace, or was, since my manners are a bit old-fashioned.” 

Once the words were out, and the weight of them hit him, his legs weakened. He stumbled to his bed to sit down. He had never made an offer close to that of marriage before. “Oh,” he murmured. 

Arden’s smile was wide and bright. “I will help you, if you need it.” 

Mattin did not need help, he decided, although he probably did. He knew rules and customs they didn’t, after all. He just didn’t know love. Not yet. “And you as well,” he went on, to Arden. 

It was fitting. 

Arden nodded in acceptance. His gaze was more smug than surprised.

Mil’s mouth hung open for several moments before he attempted a scowl. “So we’re to continue courting him, then?” he asked of Arden, apparently choosing to not to address the rest of the wooing that was to happen. 

Mattin had been left open and painted with Arden’s seed when he had brazenly spread his legs to encourage Mil to mount him. It was strange to have that memory clear and sharp and new, and yet realize that they were still uncertain of him.

He was uncertain of him, but he, foolishly, expected them to know better. Sharing a bed did not mean marriage, but Mattin had acted with them as he never had with others. Love, he supposed, did that. 

Of course, love had not made him feel like an Earl of old, taking what was his. But they loved him for that, and Mattin could not think of it now without a pang of sharp satisfaction.

Arden looked from Mil to Mattin. “Still the surprise? At the start of this, when I thought it was what you wanted, we discussed all the logical reasons to choose you. And now you know the rest of our reasons. Do not misunderstand, or allow this information to slide past your many shields—”

“I wear no armor,” Mattin interrupted, close to breathless. 

Arden’s gaze dipped over him. He quirked his lips, although he did not otherwise acknowledge Mattin’s protest. “The hesitations we had before we began this had nothing to do with what we feel for you. Eventually, we would have overcome them to approach you.”

“Then The Tyrabalith had to stick his nose in,” Mil grumbled. “Much that it matters now.” 

“But the original question remains.” Arden lost his smile. “We would like to marry you, Mattin Arlylian. To woo you for all to see and to marry you.” 

Mil regained his smile, small though it was. “Very much.” 

It was not fair that even while exhausted and nearly sleepless, they managed to unravel Mattin so thoroughly with a handful of words and that use of his name. Arden wielded history and customs well. Mattin distantly wondered when Arden had realized that Mattin was undone by them, and if it was at the same time that Mil had chosen to disregard them to spark a reaction in him. 

It was something else that no longer mattered. 

Arden still did not smile. “But there is risk. Last night proved that, and has only reduced it for now.”  

Mattin realized he had pressed his lips together firmly and made himself speak. “There was risk before and you still did it, giving me things so everyone would know.” 

“Most everyone already did know, by then.” Mil announced that cautiously, as if he wasn’t sure what Mattin might do. “They only had to think about where our, well, his affections would go, and they all reached the same conclusion. But you chose to wear them.”

Mattin opened his mouth but had no defense. “Yes.” He had worried over it for reasons he had not dwelt on, but he had worn them. 

“That was a risk, even when we mostly only thought of showing you off.” Arden’s use of mostly made Mattin pause as much as the idea of being displayed to others with pride, but he did not get a chance to ask. “There was a possibility it would involve some danger as it would not have in another time. A beat-of-four chosen for an alliance with me, attacked or otherwise harmed, would have created tensions. But you were more than an alliance and others saw it quickly. At the beginning, we assumed you’d thought of this, and it was another reason you did not put yourself on that list.”

Stunned, Mattin shook his head. 

“No matter what gifts you have given us today, we will accept your decision if you do not choose us.” Arden was solemn and serious. “For other reasons, or if it’s too dangerous. But our feelings for you would still be known. You would still be a target. We would have to ask you to take care. Please. Please take care.” 

“We can hire more guards. Figure something out.” Mil worked his jaw. “I’ll watch him myself.” 

Without turning from Mattin, Arden reached out to caress Mil’s cheek. “You have to sleep too, my love.” 

Mattin considered snapping at them for not mentioning that last night, or this morning. But he should have considered it, would have, if he had believed that they loved him, or had admitted his own feelings to himself. They had warned him and given him guards. He had chosen not to listen. That they still had faith in him was remarkable. 

He took a deep breath. “Today,” he said, words spilling from him out of order. “We need to get through today. I am… I will go with you as you attend to… as you see to the security of the palace and the capital. At least for part of the day,” he added quickly. Some things he did not want or need to see. “If people were worried for me, or if they doubt your ability to protect your… your potential chosen, then they should see me.” Spectacle mattered, even now. 

He took another steadying breath. He was a Master Keeper. He had taken the king and his husband to bed, and was still sore and tired enough to prove it. He was an Arlylian. 

Mattin raised his head high despite his trembling limbs. “Also, I have only known you loved me for a few hours. I’d like to have you near.” 

“Fuck me,” Mil said faintly. “He always surprises me.” 

Mattin stood up and crossed the small room toward his table of combs and his cabinets of clothing. “Now, I need to get dressed.” 

Normally, he would have fretted for at least an hour over what to wear on an important day. Arden stopped him by holding up a necklace. He had last held that necklace when he had been helping Mattin remove it. 

“I’m not sure that is appropriate for today,” Mattin said, instead of remarking that he ought to be dressed before he was put in jewelry. 

“You might like something to cover…” Arden raised his hand to brush his fingertips over a tender spot on the side of Mattin’s neck. Mattin met his eyes. “Permit me?” Arden lifted the length of fine silver but first leaned in to press a kiss to what was sure to be a reddening mark. With Mattin staring at him, Arden gently wound the necklace about his throat several times before linking it and letting the end of the chain fall over Mattin’s spine. 

Mattin did not even think to object. He looked to Mil. Mil’s gaze was heavy. 

Arden whispered in Mattin’s ear. “Tired or not, he will try to pick a small fight with you later so that he can lose.” 

“Oh?” Mattin inquired vaguely, then focused on what Arden was hinting at. “Oh. When he lets you win?”

Mil’s heated stare shifted to a glower, although he did not actually object when Arden answered. “Oh, yes. He will need it.” 

Mattin tipped his head to the side and received another kiss, this one over the necklace. His voice rose higher. “Is that how you always fuck him?” 

“Not always.” Arden was a thoughtful suitor, or at least, he could be. “But he does like it that way. When he does it, I think it’s when he wants to be weak. Fortunately for him, he chose a Canamorra.” 

The glower on Mil’s face intensified. “I’d wager other members of your family might fuck me, but would they take care the way you do?” For the first time, Mil Wulfa was embarrassed by his own words, but the embarrassment was fleeting and seemed more about finding the words than what the words were. “It’s nothing to do with strength and everything to do with wanting that care so I can… so I can… I am always a guard, you see, Sass.” 

“So you can not think?” Mattin understood. He had seen Mil fret just as Mattin did. Mil had more to fret about. “So you can not worry?” Mattin put a hand to his necklace, worrying even now. “But I wouldn’t be like Arden. I wouldn’t tup you. Or possibly, I could…” All that strength beneath him was so much to think about. “Oh.” Mil’s gaze went to Mattin’s hand, still resting at his throat, over the silver. Mattin felt a tingling in his cheeks, a warmth spreading down to his chest. “Is it the necklace?”

Mil scoffed but did not lift his gaze. “It’s when you’re Sass.”

“But the necklace helps?” Mattin tugged the links to expose the proof of how both of them had kissed him. He touched the spot, then shivered. “I could wear it while I ride you? Or… I could have Arden bathe you with my soap and wrap that collar around your throat, and then I would ride you? Wearing only this?”

The sound Mil made was better than a growl. Mattin flushed at his daring.

“You won’t even have to order him to stay down,” Arden revealed, delighted. “Though he likes that too.”

“How dare you,” said Mil flatly, just as Mattin had. “We have duties to attend to now and you’re telling him this?” 

“I believe we are allowed a moment or two,” Arden declared gravely, before pausing. “I will take a moment or two. With all else that comes with the throne that you must deal with, I will make you both happy.” 

Mattin turned to look up at him. He would not like to pick a fight to get what he wanted, even if the game was known. He met Arden’s stare and shivered for what was in it. “You will take your moments before I am dressed.” 

Mil made that sound again. Arden pulled Mattin to him, a hand slipping beneath Mattin’s robe to spread over damp, bare skin. Then Arden kissed him, fiercely, meanly, as he had not before. He had hidden this the first time; Mattin had known it then and sighed for it now. The air was cool on his skin and Arden’s hands were hot, and Mattin shivered to be soft and small and wanted, to be someone his king would take like this, when Arden would not even wear a crown.

Arden lifted Mattin into his arms and kissed Mattin’s panting, open mouth as if he liked how Mattin fitted against him, and the tumble of Mattin’s hair, and how easy it was to carry Mattin to his own bed with every intention of having him again in some way with Mil watching.

He also seemed to like that Mattin pulled him back down when he tried to move away. Armor was unpleasant in bed. Mattin protested that and that only, yet whined when Arden stepped back to obey Mattin’s impatient demands that he remove it. Perhaps that was why Mil took his place, kissing Mattin softly across his bare chest and shoulders. 

Mattin’s robe seemed to have disappeared. Wearing only a necklace made Mattin somehow more naked than he would have been otherwise. Fairly wild, he tugged at Mil’s hair so he could whisper into Mil’s ear. “I will put you in shining clasps, too, big, pretty, Mil.” 

Having left Mil breathing hard, Mattin turned to his other chosen with narrowed eyes. “No more meetings?” 

Arden, struggling to remove his breastplate, practically snarled his answer. “Yours is the only name we wanted to see on that list. The only consort that would ever suit.” 

“Oh. Good.” Mattin nodded, feeling very foolish and then much less foolish when the breastplate dropped to the floor. Arden tugged his belt free as he returned to the bed. Mil shifted to give him room, but did not seem to mind. He stayed, pressed close, as Mattin drew Arden back down to him, and laughed when Mattin complained about Mil’s armor as well. But Mattin did not complain for long.

Perhaps he would not leave bed today, after all. Or perhaps they wanted him to stay here, weary and well-fucked, but safe, or for others to see that Mattin lived and thrived and had claimed them for his own despite what some nobles might have wished. Mattin did not know which idea he preferred. It was a decision for another time. Not when one of his chosen was breathing hard against his neck and touching his thighs, or when his other chosen was bringing Mattin’s oils to them and then removing his armor slowly as he watched a Canamorra take what they wanted.

It was thrilling, and it was lightness in Mattin’s chest and a smile when he finally beckoned to Mil.

His bed was not nearly the size of theirs, but it would do for today. 

Epilogue

Mattin considered an exquisite ear cuff of glass and silver meant to look like a spider’s web, complete with a dangling spider made of banded black onyx. The cuff was not his usual style and the price was high, but it was nonetheless beautiful. It seemed… dangerous, or implied the wearer was, and Mattin was anything but a threat. Regardless, while he waited for the shopkeeper to return, he imagined himself wearing it. 

He would not wear such a thing in public. But in private…. In private, in one or two rooms in particular, he wondered what the reaction would be to that little spider hanging near his neck. 

Then he remembered that for all of Mil’s teasing about the subject, Mattin was hardly the type to seduce anyone. That was part of the reason why the nobles around the palace thought Mattin was a good choice; he was studious, and a bit boring, and was quite unlikely to lead their king around by his cock. It was for the best that Mattin was not, and that Arden and Mil seemed content to abide by Mattin’s ideas about what was appropriate in public spaces, and constrained themselves to flustering him by occasionally taking his hand. Mattin could only imagine what might happen if other nobles decided their king was besotted and that Mattin was a threat. 

Unless, of course, they wanted Mattin to control Arden and Mil and what they considered their rough ways. In which case, having the king and consort’s devotion might be a good thing. Although Mattin would be the one under scrutiny, no matter what. 

Arden and Mil had warned him of it, and so had Cael, once Mattin had confessed his concerns to her. That was why Mattin still hesitated over giving any definite answer. 

Well, it was part of the reason why. 

What everyone else in the capital, in the country, thought, Mattin was less sure of. But since, although their courtship was public, it had not been officially announced, the opinion of those outside the palace remained a mystery. He could ask, of course—Mil had eyes-and-ears, as did Jola—but wondering what answer he might receive made Mattin’s stomach twist with nerves. 

He looked up as the shopkeeper returned, Mattin’s purchase wrapped in soft cloth. It was a bracelet in the design of a honeycomb, a present for Jola. It was only made of glass and wire, but Mattin hoped it would please her. Since he had already paid, he offered his thanks and turned toward the door, nearly bumping into his guards, who took up quite a lot of room in such a tiny shop. 

A condition for Mattin to go out in the capital; he was to have guards now. He’d almost had Mil Wulfa himself, but Mil had duties to attend to, and Mattin had slipped out of the library and through the palace gate while Mil was occupied. 

Arden was away from the palace, visiting Canamorra lands as well as his other sibling, Ral, and meeting with some lower-ranking nobles and a few beat-of-fours while he was there. Nominally, to discuss plans for the next winter, but also to reassure them about the stability of the capital. 

Mil should have gone with him, but after a lot of staring from Arden and Mil snarling in reply, Mil had stayed behind to hold the palace, and likely to protect Jola, although Jola was back at her home in the capital and outside the palace wall.

Mil might also have stayed behind to keep an eye on Mattin. In fact, he almost certainly had. Not that the danger had increased—or decreased, for that matter—but Mattin suspected that Arden and Mil were trying to assuage Mattin’s fears. Such fears were normal. Everyone told Mattin that. Well, everyone Mattin had spoken to of his, or who had witnessed them. Mil was here to make Mattin feel protected. 

Which he did. Quite well. 

But Mil had worries of his own, and Mattin was no good for those. Mattin had statistics and stories and jewelry and… ordering Mil to keep still could work for a time, but with Arden away and potentially at risk, Mil could not truly relax. 

Or perhaps Mattin did not have the presence that Arden had. 

He definitely did not. Mattin caught sight of himself in a silvery mirror by the shop’s door, meant to allow customers to view themselves in the jewelry. His hair was dark and neatly divided into two braids, and dotted with clasps of silver wire and iridescent glass shaped like the wings of dragonflies. He wore no other decoration. His eyes were brown and his eyelashes short, the lids smooth and the corners uncreased, although the areas beneath his eyes were dark from a lack of good sleep. They nearly always were. One of the unofficial duties of the king these days seemed to be finding Mattin at his desk late at night and escorting him to a bed so that Mattin would rest. 

But there always seemed to be more to do, which Mattin had protested to said king more than once, and received only a knowing look in reply. 

Mattin’s cheeks were full and faintly freckled. He looked like he did not get enough sun, which he did not. He also did not look like a stunning beauty who might have two powerful figures on their knees. He was merely, as Mil had once said, a wee, sparkly thing. 

He turned away from his reflection to stow his purchase in his satchel before leaving the shop. Then, his task complete, he turned toward the market instead of toward the road to the palace. One of his guards muttered something but otherwise did not comment. It was likely Essa.

Mattin was not ready to return. He was thinking, and it was better to do that here than in his office where Mil would eventually find him and say something tender that would be Mattin’s undoing. 

Mattin could not be Arden, not in any case and especially not what Arden was to Mil. Mil and Arden both cherished Mattin for some other reason, and that should be enough. It was enough, when Mattin had worries that did not multiply or end with him wandering through the capital with two politely irritated palace guards instead of returning to his room, or the library, or Mil and Arden’s rooms.

But Arden was due to return today or tomorrow, and Mil would want the time alone with him, might even need it, so Mattin was staying away. 

He could have done that in his office, of course, but they might feel compelled to include him, and Mattin was giving them the time to themselves. 

He was not moping, no matter what Cael might have implied. He was trying to give them what they needed. His job as a lover, as a potential consort, was to help them. 

He supposed the rest was secondary to that. But knowing it and living it were quite different. So today, he was outside the palace wall, in the mud and chilly air, away from prying and curious nobles and any of their plans for him. 

A clamor in the distance stopped him in the middle of considering a cart selling hot, fresh handpies. Essa and Kit abruptly stepped forward from their discreet distance to tug Mattin farther from the road. The noise was loud enough that many of the people in the market turned to seek out the source as well, or came from inside their shops to look. Mattin stood on his toes to try to see over their heads and swayed as he finally made out what some of the shouting was about. 

“The king!” 

Business in the market came to a standstill as more and more people came out to line the road. They must have seen Arden before. He was not one to hide himself away, even when he should. But he was admired, here more than anywhere else save the guardhouse, which might explain the crowd. 

Mattin could see a few banners now, bright colors waving in the late afternoon sunlight. Arden intended to be seen, then. Jola must have suggested it; Arden riding in like a hero, happy to see his people. Happy to be home as well. 

Mattin stood on his toes again, studying outguards on their horses and palace guards in carriages and wagons, all of them dressed for travel but more cleaned up than they normally might have been. Arden was learning about spectacle. Now, there was a danger. 

Nonetheless, Mattin caught his breath at his first glimpse of Arden in nearly two weeks. Arden still wore no crown, but he had chosen a fine, vibrantly blue cloak and shining vambraces as he walked in between rows of outguards. He put himself at their level. Truly, he was more skilled at this by the day. The nobles were still a problem, but the people liked their king who had brought peace. 

It didn’t hurt that Arden was handsome, especially in the sun, and devoted to his family, and, of course, gorgeously in love with his commoner husband. 

Horns sounded from another direction as Arden grew nearer, and Arden’s sudden smile was blinding. Mattin turned toward the new commotion, although he already knew the source of Arden’s joy. Arden only smiled like that for one person. 

The contingent of palace guards on the large black horses they preferred when they rode, meant someone in Arden’s camp must have sent word he would be arriving this evening and Mil had not wanted to wait. Mil was in his usual simple cloak and armor, unsmiling yet practically glowing, to Mattin’s eyes, at the sight of his husband. Mattin gripped hard at the strap of his satchel as Mil drew to a stop and slid from the back of his horse to cross to Arden. 

Arden said something Mattin could not make out before pulling Mil in for a kiss so hungry it tugged, low and hot, in Mattin’s belly, and the person next to him let out a long, envious sigh. 

A cheer went up, loud enough to startle Arden, although he did not release Mil immediately and Mil did not move away. They stared at their audience with clear surprise. 

They still did not understand the power of their love story. 

Mattin reached for one of his braids, one over each shoulder today, and held it tight as Mil turned his back on the crowd to run his hands over Arden’s chest. Some of those around Mattin snickered, but that was Mil’s way of assuaging his own worries over Arden’s well-being. It wouldn’t do much; Arden doubtlessly had armor beneath his travel cloak. Mil knew that and did it anyway.

“And some beat-of-four thinks they can come between that?” someone wondered, somewhere to Mattin’s right. Mattin turned reflexively to find them, but saw only shoulders and backs, with everyone watching the king and his husband fuss over each other. 

Someone else answered the original question in a voice deep and carrying. “It’s how nobles do things. It’s likely all arranged. I almost feel sorry for the poor soul, if the rumor is true.” 

One of the guards at Mattin’s elbow shifted. Mattin held very still. 

Several people were now glancing back toward the speakers, who must have been the pair in cook’s aprons, as if they had dashed out of a kitchen to watch Arden and Mil reunite. 

“What’s there to feel sorry about? Half the nobles are always scheming, aren’t they? At least half. They pushed this on them, I’m sure. So what if some beat-of-four might have gotten pushed into it too, for the sake of some Earl’s feelings? I’ll keep my concern for the one they’re trying to replace, thank you.” 

“That’s what he said,” another person stepped in to argue. “There will be no replacing that.” 

“Is it true, then?” A young lad minding a small child turned to ask them all. “He’s planning to marry again?” He said it with a nod toward Arden, who had started to slowly move forward again, Mil at his side, their heads together in conversation.

“I only know what I hear,” one of the cooks responded, with a little sniff that any noble might have done if they had gossip but no actual proof. “And the palace is full of talk of courtship and has been for weeks, with some noble I’ve never heard of getting shoved into that bed.”

“...Don’t think they’d have to be shoved,” someone in the crowd muttered.

“Or planning to shove the Captain of the Guard out of it,” that particular cook carried on, undeterred. “The noble’s meant as a wedge, nothing more. You mark my words. If he can, the king will likely try to be rid of him.” 

Mattin dropped his braid to pull up the hood of his cloak. No one would recognize him, but he felt better hiding behind the fur. No one even knew his name yet. Those who did were out in the street, yards away and increasing the distance with every moment. Mattin stepped back as Arden and Mil passed him, mumbling apologies to the person behind him and ignoring how quickly and efficiently that person was replaced by one of his guards. 

Kit and Essa were possibly wondering why Mattin didn’t dart forward to chase after Arden and Mil. Then again, they would have heard the same words Mattin had, and might not be wondering. 

They shifted again, pointedly, and Mattin nearly smiled to think of them glaring at the strangers around him on his behalf, as if this was a threat. 

It was nothing, and also as much of a threat as a noble thinking to use Mattin’s influence on the king, or who feared that same influence. It was something Mattin would have to deal with, likely again and again, if he continued on with his courtship. He should have considered that before, but he did not have much experience in these matters in general, and none specifically in courting an already hand-fasted king trying to maintain peace, so he supposed he ought to forgive himself the oversight, and perhaps make a note of it to keep in the library for some future potential consort to reference. 

Palace guards were passing them now. A few might spot Essa or Kit or Mattin himself. 

Overwhelmed at the thought of having to explain this to Arden, to Mil, when even seeing them together again was enough to make his hands tremble, Mattin started moving without plan or direction. He slipped through the press of bodies around him, although the crowd was already dispersing now that the king was only a figure in the distance, and walked quickly but aimlessly while his mind spun and his ears rang. 

Mattin did not return to the palace, though he should have. The hour was growing late, and while Mattin had no problem stumbling through the palace grounds after dark, even in the cold, he was less certain of the streets and alleys of the capital. He was not even certain where he had ended up, because while he had visited the city’s taverns on many occasions, he could not tell them apart from the inside, and he had walked into this one with his head down and no eye on his location. 

But it was warm and fairly clean, and packed with lots of people enjoying a meal or a drink while the bard at the far end of the room alternated between heartbreaking ballads and playful love songs in a sweet, aching voice. 

Mattin sat with a cup in front of him although he had stopped drinking wine some time before. He had not brought much money with him into the capital, intending only to pick up the bracelet and maybe a pie or two. He would not be so rude as to ask Essa or Kit for some coin. They were probably tired or bored over at the table next to his, where they were pretending they were not palace guards with their eyes on Mattin. 

He didn’t know if the pretense was for the sake of his pride or if it was a matter of precaution, since they numbered two against many if anyone should threaten the beat-of-four trying to shove the king’s beloved from his bed. 

Mattin rested his chin heavier in his hands and kept his attention firmly on the bard, a brightly dressed person of undetermined gender, as was often the case with bards, at least when they performed and sought to follow the old ways. This one had lovely red and purple streaks in their long, unbound hair as if they had some fae blood. 

The bard looked back at Mattin, a sharp sort of kindness in their eyes that made Mattin wonder if they knew who he was, but if they did, they did not say. They merely continued to sing one of the merrier versions of ‘Arden Escapes’ which told of a young Arden Canamorra slipping out of the palace and turning his back on all who lived there. There were now additional verses about Mil, although there had not been when the song had first appeared years ago. ‘Arden Escapes’ was more of a way for people to thumb their noses at the nobles within the palace wall than a song about Arden personally. Arden probably would have been amused by it. 

Mattin had dropped the hood of his cloak a while ago, too hot inside the tavern to bother with it. Anyway, the only one who might have known him was the bard, although Mattin could not have said how they knew except for perhaps Mattin’s choice in music. Mattin was not famous or remarkable, or dressed as nicely as he might have been. He was not a beautiful seducer of kings, and he was not a high-ranking council member with chains of gold hanging from his ears. He did not even have elaborate braids today. He looked like no one special, and the tavern must get minor nobles from time to time, because no one had bothered him. 

The bard’s gaze left him, rising to the entrance as if someone new or more interesting had come in, but their song never faltered, and after another moment, their attention returned to Mattin and they smiled, showing slightly pointed fae teeth. 

Mattin startled, although no one seemed to notice, focused on something else as the low murmur of the many conversations around him died out. 

Two large bodies settled on the bench of Mattin’s lonely table, one on either side of him. 

They were very warm. 

“All his talk about our safety, and he goes running off to a tavern by himself,” Mil observed over the top of Mattin’s  head. 

“All our talk about his safety, and he goes running off to a tavern by himself,” Arden returned. 

Mattin did not think they were teasing, despite their playful tone. 

He shut his eyes. “You are supposed to be reuniting,” he said, quite clearly for someone tired from wine and moping. “In private. With each other.” 

“Was this meant as a gift?” Arden wondered in quiet disbelief. “No one knew where you were.” 

“Kit finally saw someone she recognized and asked them to run to the guardhouse to give me a message.” Mil did not sound pleased. “Not to mention that both of them should have been relieved hours ago.” 

Mattin flinched and opened his eyes to look over to the next table. “I’m so sorry.” Both guards gave him a flat-eyed look, but did not seem openly angry. “Are they no longer on duty? I can buy them a… oh, no, I can’t. I will give them money for a drink once I return to my room.” 

“Are we returning to your room?” Arden asked, not loudly, but the tavern was silent except for the singing, so Mattin was sure several people must have heard. “I do not object, but we don’t all fit on your bed, and I could use a long rest. Or… are we not welcome?” This evening shadowed his question. Or perhaps it was ever again. 

Mattin made the mistake of looking at him. Arden did indeed look tired, and yet, still so very handsome. Mattin sighed. Even he could not tell if the sound was happy or unhappy. 

“I did not know if I was welcome,” he muttered at last, because Arden would have the truth and Mattin had no skill for lying. “Mil needed you.” 

“Well, now,” Mil said, offended. 

Mattin turned to him. “You did and you know it.” 

Mil admitted this with his silence but then shrugged. “Even if I did, it wouldn’t have meant I didn’t need you, too.”

The bard’s voice faded to nothing.

Mattin turned to the corner of the tavern the bard had claimed for their own rather than deal with the way his heart was pounding. “Do you have another? Or have I bothered you enough for one night?” 

“I have others.” The bard might have been the only one in the room aside from Mil and Arden who was focused on Mattin. Everyone else had eyes for the king and his consort. The bard considered Mattin, then held out one hand, palm up. 

Still a little clumsy from the wine, Mattin plucked another clasp from his hair and pushed it forward onto the table. The other clasps to match it should have been there, but likely had been taken to the bard by one of the servers. This one stayed put, since the servers seemed frozen now, with the king and probably countless guards in their midst. 

Mil swore under his breath. 

“Are you paying for songs with your hair clasps, Mattin Arlylian?” Arden’s rough question carried clearly through the tavern. Even though made of glass, one clasp would have been more than enough for a bard’s fees. “What songs are possibly worth that honor—”

“Fuck,” Mil swore again before Arden could finish, guessing the answer quicker than Arden had. 

“The king has never heard ‘Blood at the Gate’ if you please.” Mattin addressed the bard with a waver in his voice. Everyone would know his name now. Mattin Arlylian: the foolish beat-of-four forced to marry the king—or forcing the king to marry him, depending on who was asked. A small and soft, freckled nobody, with only a surname of any note, and that was certainly not enough to bend Arden Canamorra to his will. Anyone could recognize that within moments of meeting, or even just seeing, Arden. Perhaps they would pity Mattin. Mattin didn’t think he would mind much; it was far better than being scorned. 

The bard gave Mattin another long look, then inclined their head and began, gasping, as Arden must have when the blade had pierced his armor and he had known he’d received a mortal wound. Arden stiffened but said nothing through the verses about his fear, and the pat-pat-pat of his blood falling onto a stone floor, and how each step that took him to Mil had been killing him. 

Mattin’s throat tightened, so he turned to bury his face in Mil’s shoulder. Mil’s cloak, at least, was soft. So was Mil’s hand when Mil raised it to cradle the back of Mattin’s head. 

“I don’t care what they say,” Mattin lied quietly to Mil as the ballad grew quicker, the song matching Arden’s frantic pace, the faster flow of blood leaving him.“But I want you to be happy.” 

“What do they say?” Mil took some time to ask it, perhaps lost in the lyrics describing when Arden had found him at last at the palace gate, perhaps looking to his husband. “Or may I guess?” 

Mattin shook his head and didn’t answer. He didn’t want to say it, and if Mil did not already have an idea, he had only to ask his eyes-and-ears. Everyone in the capital would know it was Mattin now. Maybe Mattin wouldn’t come into the capital alone anymore. Maybe he would become one of those nobles who never left their carriage. 

“I don’t have a carriage,” he realized mournfully. 

“If I got you a carriage, would you finally agree to marry us?” Arden asked, the question loud enough to be heard over the end of the song. Deliberately so, knowing Arden. 

The bard shut up. 

Mattin frowned into the fur of Mil’s cloak before slowly pulling away. Mil lowered his hand. Mattin looked at him, then turned to Arden. “Are you trying to bribe me to marry you?”

“I left for less than a fortnight, and I return to find you hiding from Mil and trading your pretty clasps for songs—also lovely,” he added, briefly speaking to the bard before turning to Mattin once again. “Forgive me if I seem desperate, dear heart, but you are unhappy.” 

Essa sighed. 

“I wasn’t hiding from Mil,” Mattin argued, although he had done just that. “Not hiding. I was… I couldn’t come between you, but I also would not come between you. I was... giving you what you needed.” 

“Ask next time,” Mil said grumpily. “So I can tell you exactly what I need—and what he needs as well.” 

“Oh.” Mattin turned back to Arden. “You worried while you were gone?” 

Arden looked both regal and displeased—a heroic storm cloud. “Messages from Mil, but none from you, Mattin of the Records. Not in any color ink.” 

Mattin put a hand to the side of Arden’s face, his thumb brushing the white line of his scar. “I’m sorry.” He hadn’t thought the gossip of the assistants or the collar necklace with dark green beads he had found that made him think of Mil would interest Arden with all of Arden’s other concerns weighing on him, but he had made notes of palace business to discuss with him upon his return. “I will write to you next time, in every color ink.” 

“You have but one clasp left in your hair,” Arden commented, warm and pleased again after Mattin’s simple promise. His smile was sunshine on gold. 

“I am willing to trade,” offered the bard, politely intruding. “Surely the king could spare some coin for a few hair clasps. Coin is, after all, easier to spend, and my price is much lower than the cost of a carriage.”

Arden turned to consider them. “I could, honored bard. I would keep Mattin in his sparkles, if for no other reason than they please my husband.”

“Sass shines without them,” Mil joined in, also speaking for the tavern to hear. “But I do take pleasure in the sight… almost as much pleasure as your king takes in removing them and undoing those lovely braids.” 

Mattin stifled the sound he might have made and turned to Mil in disbelief. Mil gazed back at him, unfazed, as though Mattin had missed a point in a discussion that had not been had. 

At least, not with Mattin present. 

Mattin tightened his mouth and Mil leaned closer to speak in a carrying whisper. “Didn’t mean to embarrass you, Sass, but some things need to be said and done before witnesses. You told us that once, if you recall. And it seems that people need to know what you are. It seems that you do.” He gestured toward the bard. “How many of those songs have you asked to hear while leaving us to fret over you?” 

Mattin grabbed Mil’s hand without answering, holding it tightly. After a moment, he pressed it to his cheek. 

Everyone was looking at Mattin now, sitting where he was between the king and the king’s husband. They had all heard him called Sass and dear heart and his whole name, beat-of-four though he was. They had all seen him touch them both in a way that spoke of intimacy, and heard that he had asked for nothing but songs of their love all night. 

He turned his hot, flushed face to the bard. 

The bard showed more pointy teeth in a smile, but then looked to Arden. “Well? I will return them all—all but one. I find it a worthy token of a lover’s devotion, and that should be celebrated, and never exchanged for coin.” 

“Done,” Arden answered firmly, as though a deal had been struck. 

Mattin frowned, suddenly certain one had, but the bard began to sing again, a song Mattin did not know. They grinned despite how tired they must be after performing for so long. 

“And now we return home?” Mil asked hopefully. “I had plans that did not involve trying not to cry in a tavern.” 

Mattin released Mil’s hand so he could fall against Mil’s arm and expel a weary breath. “And now we return home,” he declared at last. Everyone in this tavern had witnessed enough, and Mattin’s hands were shaking. 

“To our room?” Arden wondered, and oh, what would those in the capital say now that they had heard their king sound so uncertain about the affections of the noble he was being forced to marry. “Or shall we leave you at your—” 

“Hush.” Mattin shushed him, tired and anxious but also pleased. “Mil has plans.” 

“That I do,” Mil replied after a beat. “I don’t suppose you’d allow me to carry you.”

“That’s hardly proper,” Mattin informed him, but let Mil pull him gently to his feet and then further allowed Mil’s arm beneath his for support, strong and steady. “They are going to speak of us tomorrow,” he confessed in a concerned whisper, glancing up to the two of them and then beyond to the rest of the room, the guards and the tavern customers and the bard. 

Arden leaned down to share a secret against Mattin’s ear and make him shiver. “They are going to sing of us tomorrow.” 

Mattin jolted and shot a look down to the table, where a pile of hair clasps now waited, although the bard had not moved. The pile was all of Mattin’s traded clasps but one. 

Arden placed a small bag on the table, though he had not taken any time to count the amount of coins in it, and scooped up every glass dragonfly before tucking them into the top of Mattin’s satchel. 

Mattin opened his mouth for a question, but then Arden took his free hand, and Mattin left the matter for now to let Arden and Mil lead him back to the palace. 

“I’m sorry,” Mattin said again, to them, and to any listening guards, as they walked out into the chilly night air.

“It’s a shame,” Mil said as if agreeing, only to startle Mattin by adding, “It might have been more fun to go into a tavern and pretend you were a stranger we were bringing back to our bed.” 

One of the guards snorted. 

Mattin turned to see who, only to get distracted by his last glimpse inside the tavern, with everyone still watching them as they left. 

“But this is better,” Mil continued, “don’t you think?”

“Oh, yes.” Arden tucked Mattin’s hand into his elbow and slowed to keep pace with them, seemingly content to walk the capital’s streets despite the lateness of the hour and his own exhaustion from traveling. “As fun as you would be as a night’s bed warmer, Mattin, I take more pleasure in knowing you will be there for many nights to come—and that others will know it now as well.” 

“Not fair,” Mattin grumbled, nearly inaudible, although Arden had not done anything but share what those within the palace wall already knew… and at the same time made everyone aware that this was his choice as king and husband. Mattin was his choice. “They will think you besotted,” Mattin complained, but breathlessly. “They will think that I… Mill is laughing.” 

Mil was laughing, quiet snickers that he did not quite muffle against Mattin’s hair. 

“Oh, Sass,” he sighed as his laughter ended. “Do you still not see it?”

Mattin stopped, bringing everything to a halt with him. “No,” he said at last, thoughtfully, glancing up to the two of them. “No, I see it now.” He did not understand it. But he saw it. “They will never watch me as they watch you. And the danger will be mine, whether or not I am the villain of the story. But you have followed me here, and placed yourselves in my arms for all to see. I have seduced you. You are besotted.” 

He thought of glass and onyx, far more interesting than any carriage, not that he would ever make anyone buy such a thing, or bribe him to do what he had wanted to do all along. 

“It is all mine,” he said softly, and began to walk again. “So I suppose my answer must be yes.” 

Arden’s grip on him tightened almost painfully. Mil took a noisy breath. 

The cheer that rose up from the guards around them was probably loud enough to wake anyone in the capital who had already gone to bed. They would open their windows soon and peer outside to find the source of the din. 

Mattin pulled hard on both of the arms twined with his to bring the king and his husband down to his level. He placed a kiss on their stunned mouths and flushed in embarrassment before continuing on.

It seemed a long journey home, and he desired to be in bed. 

The End

More fantasy romance by R. Cooper:

How to (Not) Train a Firecat

The Devotion of Delflenor

My Man Godric

A Heaven to Reach For

Series by R. Cooper:

Being(s) in Love

Familiar Spirits

About R. Cooper

R. Cooper is a somewhat absentminded, often distracted, writer of queer romance, probably most known for the Being(s) in Love series and the occasional story about witches or firefighters in love. Also known as, "Ah, yes, the one who writes the dragons." She lives among the coastal redwoods of Northern California in a tiny house with two greedy black cats and one possible ghost.

riscooper.com