Page 113 of The Concubine King
“Feel it?”Ethyr asked, baffled.“Feel what?”Kiaro’s eyes flitted from staring unseeing at the railing to Ethyr, and he met the gaze, questioning.The god’s dark eyes searched his with a question of their own, as though looking for something else entirely.
“Is it important?”Ethyr finally, hesitantly, asked.
“Yes.”
He blinked, prying his gaze from Kiaro’s to inspect it more closely.“There’s a piece missing.”It was hard to tell amongst the tangle of roots, but one was definitely broken off at the end in a way none of the others were.
“Yes,” Kiaro said quietly.His eyes were blacker than the night.His jaw clenched.“There’s… something you should know.”
“What should I know?”Ethyr prompted when Kiaro became reticent again.He had gone very still, but it didn’t diminish the strange turbulence around him, the tension stringing his shoulders.He closed his eyes, black lashes accentuating the curve of his pale cheek.
When his eyes opened, the mass vanished.Kiaro turned to him.In the ambient firelight from the room, his eyes were gray again.Ethyr looked between them, waiting.
The arms wrapping around him took him by surprise, not giving him time to even consider what was happening.He was drawn flush to Kiaro, squeezed to near suffocation, the god’s face nuzzled deep into the crook of Ethyr’s shoulder.He couldn’t move; he could hardly breathe with his torso curved and pinned against the god.
He couldn’t think.
His mind was saturated with the feel of Kiaro, the solidity of his body, the pressure of his arms, the juts of his face digging into his neck.His own cheek lay pressed to Kiaro’s shoulder, staring at the milky white of his throat so close to his nose it was just a blur of color.It felt natural, as though he could grow into that space, into the shape of Kiaro, and live there.
He closed his eyes and lifted what he could of his arms.As soon as they touched Kiaro he released Ethyr like he’d been burnt, taking a few unbalanced steps back.Ethyr grabbed onto his wrist before he could get further; or worse, vanish altogether.
“Don’t,” he pleaded.Kiaro looked down at Ethyr’s hand and back to his face like a man caught in a crime.“Don’t let go.”His heart, his body, ached for the contact again.By the conflict on his face, so did Kiaro’s.
“Please,” Kiaro said, voice not even a whisper.“Please.I have no recourse against you.”
“I wish that were true.”If it was, maybe he could have felt Kiaro’s arms around him much sooner.
“You will hate me for this,” Kiaro whispered.
“I won’t.”Ethyr met his gaze, entreating.
He came forward all at once, the force behind his strides stumbling Ethyr back, and Kiaro’s mouth on his pushed him into the frame of the archway.Its edges dug into the furrows of his shoulder blades as he tried to match lips with lips and tongue with tongue.Hands gripped Ethyr’s head, fingers dug into his hair, the mass of Kiaro relentless and covering.It was not kissing, it was devouring; like Kiaro would swallow his breath, his life, and his soul if he could.He kissed him like a starving man at a feast.
An arm under his butt lifted him and Ethyr obligingly wrapped his legs around Kiaro’s hips, trying and failing to keep up with his kisses, uninterrupted as he carried Ethyr from the balcony to his bed.
He laid them both down, Ethyr’s back sinking into the cushion of blankets, Kiaro holding himself above him.
His eyes swept Ethyr’s face, eyebrows pulled together as though pained.Starving desperation became fragile sorrow with startling speed.A thumb brushed over Ethyr’s chin, across his lower lip, then glided up the side of his face with the gossamer touch of a feather, Kiaro’s gaze following.Fingers tucked into his hair, wiped some locks from his temple in gentle, short strokes, before knuckles grazed back down the side of his face.Kiaro’s eyes followed where he touched, not in admiration, not like the other gods looked at Ethyr, but as one might examine something precious to them that was lost.
Ethyr wouldn’t have believed that the trickster god could be so soft.Something in his touch cried out, ‘be tender with me, I am bruised.’
Ethyr reached out slowly, knowing somehow that Kiaro would shy from his touch even after what had just happened.And he did, flinching away from Ethyr’s fingers on his cheek.But Ethyr persisted, stroking over his perfect cheekbone, combing into the black hair pulled back from his face.It shifted Kiaro’s eyes from Ethyr’s face to his hand, watching it trail down the braid over his shoulder.Ethyr tugged on the strip of fabric tying it together, slipping it free.Like a life of its own, his hair unraveled into a loose, gorgeous curtain.Ethyr dipped his fingers into it, marveling at the soft, ethereal black, like dipping his fingers into the night itself.
Kiaro grabbed his wrist and Ethyr froze, meeting his gaze.It had that look again.Startled sorrow.He wanted to know what had happened to make the god wear his emotions so freely all of a sudden.
“Are you okay?”Ethyr whispered.
Kiaro’s lips parted.Pressed back together.His eyes drifted down and he turned his cheek into Ethyr’s palm.His own palm slid from Ethyr’s wrist to mold against the back of his hand, and Kiaro pressed his lips to each of Ethyr’s fingertips, one at a time.He made slow, deliberate progress, from his pinky to his pointer.Ethyr watched, fighting for breath, as the god’s perfectly carved lips layered kisses down into the palm of his hand, lingering there with caresses of breath and the barest touch of lips.
It was only kissing, innocent and gentle, and yet Ethyr couldn’t control the sudden hitch in his breath or the line of fire from his heart to his groin.Kiaro’s mouth drifted, slow, deliberate, to Ethyr’s wrist.Cool breath washed across the fluttering heat of delicate veins and Ethyr felt the words, burning in his heart, at the same time Kiaro murmured them, eyes closed and brow furrowed.
“I ache for you.”
Kiaro continued down his arm, every descending kiss a repetition of the words, pressing into his veins.I ache.I ache.I ache.Ethyr could not move, could not breathe, as Kiaro’s mouth traveled up his shoulder, brushing past the fabric of his tunic, to land on his neck.
The chill of his breath was not a contrast to the sweetness of his lips, or the warm pressure of his tongue applied to Ethyr’s throat.He lifted his chin without thought, closing his eyes, exhaling a shuddering breath and forgetting to inhale another.
There was something about Kiaro’s mouth against his skin, hands on his body, weight above his own, that rid Ethyr of all awareness but them, all thought, all feeling.Kiaro’s movements were not forceful or pushing, but yielding, giving—like Ethyr was the god and Kiaro’s devotion his sacrifice.He fought for breath and for words beyond the sensation.He could find none.
