“I don’t do it for thanks.”
“Oh?” Aerion snapped, irritated. “Then what? Glory? Duty? Some code of cold northern honour?”
Clyde raised his eyes. “I swore an oath.”
“To whom? My father?”
“To you.”
Aerion blinked. “You barely know me.”
“I don’t need to.”
The silence thickened, pressing between them.
Aerion looked away, flustered. “You’re… infuriating.”
“I’ve been told.”
Aerion’s gaze drifted again—this time slower, without pretense. Across Clyde’s torso, the hard plane of muscle, the constellation of scars. One, near his hip, looked like the kiss of a beast’s fang. Another ran down his ribs like a drawn blade. The sight did something strange to Aerion’s stomach.
He swallowed. “Those are from battle?”
Clyde nodded.
“All of them?”
“No.”
Aerion raised an eyebrow.
Clyde didn’t elaborate.
The fire popped in the small hearth. A long silence stretched, taut with something Aerion couldn’t name. He hated silences, usually. They made people reveal too much.
Yet this one… this one felt like an invitation.
He stepped forward, gently placed something on Clyde’s desk.
It was the torn sash.
“You dropped this.”
Clyde glanced at it, then at him. Their eyes met—close, too close.
Aerion’s breath hitched, just slightly. He stepped back before it could become a tremble.
“Well,” he said, straightening his tunic. “Don’t die again. It was… inconvenient.”
Clyde gave him the faintest smirk—barely there, more in the eyes than the mouth.
“I’ll try, my lord.”
Aerion turned quickly, muttering under his breath, “Arrogant dog.”
But when he reached the door, he hesitated.
He looked back once.
