Page 92 of The Concubine King
“Ethyr,” Mikel stopped him, lifting his hands.“It’s fine.”
“You came all this way for me!”he replied, so flustered it came out as anger.“The least I can do is help you return!I don’t care what you say, I’ll do it anyways, so you might as well accept.”
Mikel’s smile softened and his eyes didn’t leave Ethyr’s.“I forgot how stubborn you are.”
Ethyr scoffed.“As though you’re any better.”
Mikel grinned.It faded a moment later.“Ethyr…” He trailed off with a sigh, looking away and fidgeting with the bottom of the robe.It was unlike him to fidget.
“Yes?”Ethyr prompted when he didn’t continue for a long moment.
“I heard… in the city… people were talking…” He bit his lip, thinking for another moment before deciding to just get it out.“There was a lot of talk about how the king killed a priest.”
Icy dread stiffened Ethyr’s spine.“Did you believe them?”he asked slowly.
“Of course not.I know you could never do something like that.But how does a rumor like that get started?”
Ethyr looked away.Could he deny it?There was never any telling who was around to hear.
“Ethyr?”
It was Mikel—he had to tell him, didn’t he?He opened his mouth.Closed it.The whirl of emotions was back, stopping up his throat.He took Mikel’s hand again, gentler, and brought it to his face.The man’s fingers opened reflexively, sliding into the hair at the back of Ethyr’s neck and brushing his thumb over his cheek.The touch of calloused fingers was warm, familiar.
“You didn’t,” Mikel said softly, then, pained, “Did you?”
His voice, though tense, was steady—his presence offered the solidity of fortified walls in a raging storm.Ethyr had forgotten what it was like to have the shelter of someone he trusted.Loved.
He stood on his knees and straddled Mikel’s lap, draping his arms over his shoulders.Mikel looked up at him with furrowed brow.
Ethyr kissed his lips, light and yielding.
“I missed you,” he murmured.
Mikel’s brow didn’t unfurrow.He gripped Ethyr’s arms, holding him back.“Ethyr, I want an answer.”
Ethyr sighed as intrusive thoughts and feelings threatened to surface.He pushed them back down and sat on Mikel’s lap, pressing close.“I can show you real pleasure,” he whispered, gripping the back of his hair.Mikel’s face smoothed into what Ethyr took as desire and he kissed him again, harder, sliding his hips to be flush against Mikel’s.
Mikel tore his face away.“Are you mad?We’re in an open room!”
“So?”Ethyr asked sweetly, twirling his fingers in Mikel’s hair.“I told the servants not to disturb us.”
Mikel looked at him like he’d sprouted a second head.
Ethyr pouted.“It’s no different from making out behind the drying shed during feasts.”
He grabbed Ethyr’s wrist and pulled his hand from his hair.“It’s completely different!”
Ethyr blinked at him, startled.“Don’t you want me?”
Mikel’s face twisted.“Not like this.Not when you’re acting like this.”
“Like what?”Ethyr asked.Mikel pushed him off his lap and his butt hit the floor before he had a mind to catch himself.He stared at the man, not sure if he was shocked, hurt, or offended.“What are you doing?Isn’t this what you came here for?”
Mikel stood abruptly.“I came here to see my friend,” he said sharply, self-consciously adjusting his robe.“I’m going to find my clothes,” he said, and marched out.Ethyr stared at the empty doorway, a nauseating pit twisting in his stomach.
Ethyr paced the dining room until he realized the food would be sitting out too long for the servants to salvage.So he went to find Mikel, asking three servants before one knew where he was, and showed Ethyr to one of the bedrooms that were usually closed off and tucked away into a rarely visited corner of the palace.Apparently it was where Mikel had been placed as a guest.
It was smaller than Ethyr’s room, but still furnished lavishly, with a cushy bed and colorful tapestries on the walls.Mikel didn’t have a jutting balcony, but there was a window opening in the wall, where he was leaning and watching the waterfall.He straightened and turned when the door opened, and Ethyr stopped in his tracks.Mikel didn’t wear his own clothes, but a blue silk tunic, embroidered with silver thread, over red cotton pants.Gone was the humble village boy in his ruddy wool tunic.The fabric, the colors, the embroidery, were all grander things than anything Ethyr had seen on Mikel before.He looked noble—far more noble and kingly than Ethyr ever did, even in all his fanciest trappings and cosmetics.
