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Seth glanced at Rahim, wary of his reaction to Malik’s flirtation. During the two previous dinners, Seth had exchanged only a few words with the prince, but observation had told him what words had not.
As Raider had so quickly recognized, Malik and Rahim were lovers, but the relationship had many other layers. Malik was Rahim’s arcanist and counselor and representative—and Rahim needed him. Where Rahim’s speech was curt and sharp, Malik was silver tongued. While Rahim luxuriated in his royal security, Malik navigated the court and city.
None of that, however, changed the fact that power, ultimately, lay with the prince. And the prince, though reserved, had a temper. Seth had heard him snap at Malik and at servants. He was also touchy about ruling such a remote outpost of the empire.
Seth vividly recalled Rahim’s response to Seth’s compliment when he had feasted at the royal table that first night.
I suppose you did not expect such richness amid the Gold’s wasteland.
Only Malik’s clever tongue had saved Seth from stumbling through a response to that loaded statement. The prince’s hard eyes had softened, and he’d turned his attention to where his dancers had been whirling about in their shimmering chains. As Raider had noted that first night, the chains spoke clearly of ownership.
With the complexities of Rahim and Malik’s relationship, Seth wasn’t sure how the prince’s possessiveness applied to his arcanist. Malik had not hidden his flirtation with Seth, but he’d never flaunted it either.
Until now.
With his wary glance, Seth saw Prince Rahim’s eyes harden. In spite of that, the prince’s cheeks were flushed. Seth’s probably were too.
Malik distracted Seth by reaching past him to take up the nearest hookah. As the arcanist lifted its hose to his lips, a silver shimmer caught Seth’s eye across the table. It was a delicate silver bracelet encircling the wrist of a beautiful, dark-skinned woman. She wore a similar decoration around her neck.
But it wasn’t a decoration, not exactly, and everyone around the table was thus adorned.
These were Rahim’s beautiful dancers, feasting and smoking and beginning to put their lips to more than food and wine. Why would the prince populate this table with his slaves—pampered ones, but still slaves—instead of courtiers?
The smoke from the incense burners and hookahs rendered the scene hazy and almost dreamlike. Seth waved a thread of it away, which seemed to drift from one of the burners straight to him, assaulting him with its sharp, unknown scent. Mixed with the frankincense and myrrh and the muskiness of the hookah smoke, he couldn’t parse it out.
Raider’s fingers gripped Seth’s thigh. He leaned drunkenly into Seth and spoke for the first time all evening. “Seth, I think—” Raider broke off coughing, and Seth coughed too as Malik blew smoke into their faces.
Seth looked angrily at the arcanist, who only gave Seth his usual, unruffled smile, though his cheeks, too, were flushed. Before Seth could say anything, his mind seemed to fog over. Then he totally lost his train of thought as Raider’s fingers slid up his inner thigh to his groin.
Eyes closing, Seth sucked in a breath at the shock of arousal—then coughed again on the sharp, almost bitter smoke. For half a second, that alerted him, but then Raider’s hand was on Seth’s hard cock and nothing else seemed to matter.
Seth turned toward Raider—practically fell into him—and bore him to the ground as he’d imagined doing. Part of Seth’s brain recognized that something was wrong, that there was a fog in his mind, that his arousal was too strong and out of place.
But everything seemed to recede as Raider bowed up under him—just as Seth had known that he would. Seth sought Raider’s cock through his silk pants, groaning to find him so beautifully hard. Seth ground his own cock against Raider’s thigh while his lips explored Raider’s throat, enjoying the vibration of his moan.
“Give me more antidote,” someone said. “The quiva is strong.”
Quiva?
Antidote?
Incense was everywhere, too many scents, and the light dazzled him. Seth couldn’t focus on anything other than the hard cock in his hand.
Seth shook his head. Something was wrong.
“Hit him with the smoke again.”
Smoke wafted into Seth’s nose, dizzying him. He laid his head down and felt the heavy beat of Raider’s heart, felt how limp Raider was despite his hard cock.
Like he’d been after the jackal fight. After the quiva.
Quiva.
Seth took his hand away.
“The Curator’s getting up. He knows something’s wrong.”
“Deal with him.”
