Chapter 1
It is very early in the morning and Evran is very warm.
It's not the thin, hesitant warmth of spring that has begun to creep in through the stones these past weeks, but a deeper, closer kind. It's the unmistakable heat of a body pressed against his back, of a heavy arm draped across his bare waist, of a bearded jaw tucked into the curve where his neck meets his shoulder.
He does not open his eyes. He does not need to. He has woken this way nearly every morning for six months, and his body has memorized the feel and structure of being held by the Warlord of the Drakkari.
Vaike's breath moves warm and slow against his throat.Asleep, Evran thinks, though he knows better than to assume. Vaike sleeps like a hunting cat, surfacing and submerging in increments, and more than once Evran has thought the man fully unconscious only to have a low voice murmur against his ear in perfect, knowing response to some small sound he made.
The light through the shutters is grey-gold. Dawn, then, or close enough that Eira will already be in the upper terrace,pulling on her gloves and casting an impatient glance toward the gates.
Evran shifts, experimental. A slow, gentle attempt to extricate himself from the bed without waking his lover.
The arm around his waist tightens at once, hauls him back, and a pleased, half-awake rumble vibrates against his shoulder blade.
"Stay."
Evran laughs, soft and startled. "That's cheating."
"Mm." Vaike's nose presses further into Evran's neck, nuzzling, and Evran's breath hitches and he curls into Vaike's body despite himself because gods, Vaike knows. He knows what happens when his beard drags along that curve of sensitive skin, knows the way Evran's whole body goes traitor on him, knows exactly how unfair it is to wake him this way when there is a morning to be gotten to.
"Vaike."
"My love."
"I have to get up."
"A tragedy."
"Eira will tease me if I'm late." He tries to twist, to look at the warlord, but all he can see is the crown of Vaike's head and the edge of one cheekbone. "She'll give me the sunny patches and take the shade for herself. She'll hum all morning. You know how she hums when she's pleased with herself."
"Mm." A slow breath. "The sun brings out your freckles."
"I have plenty of freckles. I don't need more."
"Hmmm. But they're such a good distraction when I'm bored in counsel."
Evran means to reply. He has something clever ready, something about how the Warlord cannot possibly need more distractions if he cannot even manage to release his consortbefore breakfast. But then Vaike's hips shift, a small, deliberate roll against him, and the clever retort dies on his tongue.
Because Vaike is hard.
Of course he is. He wakes like this most mornings, warm and heavy and pressed against Evran's back, and this morning is no different except that Evran can feel the precise shape of him nestled into the cleft of his ass, can feel through the thin damp smear at the base of his spine that Vaike is already leaking, and something hot and liquid uncoils low in Evran's belly.
He inhales, sharp and involuntary.
He will never get used to this. He is certain of it now, six months in. The wanting does not wear down. If anything it has sharpened, because the fear is gone and the strangeness is gone and what is left is only the clean, dizzying knowledge that this man, the Warlord of the mountain, broad and scarred and steady, wants him. Wants him first thing in the morning, with his hair a wreck and his mouth stale and his skin warm from sleep, as if there were no better thing in the world to wake up wanting. Sometimes he thinks Vaike might want him more now than he did in the beginning, and that's a flustering thought, that the longer they're together and the more Vaike learns him the more he wants.
He didn't even notice himself going still, but Vaike does. Vaike notices everything.
The hand at Evran's waist slides flat across his stomach, broad palm splaying over the soft rise and fall of his belly, and then presses. Firm, unhurried. Pulling Evran back flush against the long line of him until there is no space left between them, nowhere for Evran's body to retreat. Vaike's teeth graze, just barely, across the tendon of his neck.
Evran makes a small sound that is not going to help him argue his case.
"Eira will wait," Vaike murmurs.
"Eira will not wait."
"Eira has waited every morning since you moved to my bed. One more will not undo her."
