“I rest better armed.”
Aerion gave a theatrical snort and rolled his eyes. The chair creaked dangerously beneath his weight as he shifted, but he sprawled anyway, legs draped over one armrest, his cup dangling loosely from his fingers. “Gods, you’re exhausting.”
The faintest tug pulled at Clyde’s mouth, not a smile, but something perilously near to one.
The storm growled around them, hammering at the cabin walls. The fire popped, shadows rising and breaking across rough stone and rotting beams. Aerion let his gaze rest on Clyde’s hands, the deliberate patience in each pass of the whetstone, the sound like a heartbeat carved from stone. It should have been dull, but it wasn’t. It was steady. Soothing. Like survival given shape.
After a long silence, Aerion muttered into his cup, “I couldn’t sleep. The thunder sounds like—” He stopped himself, scowled, and drowned the words in a sip. He tried again, lighter, feigned: “Do storms bother you?”
Clyde paused, steel hovering over flame-light. “No.”
“Of course not,” Aerion scoffed. “You’d probably spit at a hurricane.”
Clyde said nothing, only dragged stone over steel again, unhurried.
Aerion let his head fall back against the chair, lashes low, lips curved in a bitter parody of a smile. “You know, I’ve had three men try to seduce me this week. One was a baron’s son. Another was married. And the third just wanted the bragging rights.” He tipped the cup, wine sloshing. “I told them all no.”
Clyde stopped. The blade slid back into its sheath with a quiet click.
Aerion’s eyes flicked to him, sharp even through the veil of weariness. “Surprised?”
“No.”
“Disappointed?”
Clyde’s gaze found his, calm and steady, firelight deepening the grey. “Not my business.”
Aerion’s smile twisted, brittle as glass. “Ah. The Hound bites but doesn’t chase.”
The storm chose that moment to roar, thunder crashing overhead, the roof shuddering as if the sky meant to cave it in. The fire guttered, throwing them into near-darkness before flaring again.
Aerion tipped the cup to his lips, swallowing hard, then licked a drop of red from his mouth. His eyes stayed fixed on the flames. His voice was softer now, stripped of its edge. “Have you ever loved someone?”
Clyde didn’t answer. Not right away. Not with words.
But his gaze… his gaze lingered. It held. It didn’t waver, didn’t sharpen—it softened. Just barely. Like a crack opening in iron. Like frost giving way to warmth.
Aerion’s breath caught.
It wasn’t a yes.
It wasn’t a no.
And for a man like Clyde, that was louder than a confession.
Aerion tore his eyes away first, throat tight. He drained the rest of his wine, the swallow loud in the charged silence.
“You’re a very dangerous man,” he whispered, and for once, there was no mockery in it.
Clyde didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.
Aerion toyed with the empty cup in his hands, tilting it until the dregs slid across the bottom like dark blood. The firelight made his rings gleam, though his hand trembled faintly from drink… or something else.
At last, he spoke again, voice low, restless. “If you’ve felt that way,” he said, still staring into the flames, “then why?” His head tipped, eyes narrowing. “Why never a word? Never a touch? Not so much as a glance that meant something?”
Clyde’s jaw shifted, just slightly, but he didn’t look away.
“Do you not want me?” Aerion pressed, his laugh sharp and humourless. “Or is the thought of it beneath you? A jest to share with the barracks when the wine runs low?”
