Sei probably doesn’t have the stomach for a midair meal, so around noon, Marek directs Loska downwards. He taps Sei’s shoulder to get his attention. “Hold tight. We’re landing for a break.”
Sei’s knuckles visibly whiten on the handles. Very obedient.
A craggy cliffside rises below them, striated black and ochre. It’s the southernmost branch of the Nostic canyon, just out of House Komar’s territory. Dark green trees, nearly blue, sway along the clifftop, except for the semicircle Loska angles towards. The clearing is home to only bushes and fragile saplings, unaware of their imminent flattening.
The descent is as gentle as Loska can manage. Sei hisses something inaudible as they jerk to a halt, but doesn’t scream again. Foliage crunches under Loska’s feet, then again at an unnecessary sweep of his tail.
This particular clifftop is a frequent dragon corps stop. The region is too wyrm-ridden for most travelers, but the wyrms don’t bother them with dragons around.
Marek hooks both helmets on the harness, then helps Sei down. Which goes smoothly enough until they reach the ground, where Sei’s knees finally buckle.
Catching Sei is easy since Marek expected him to stumble. Marek didn’t expect the way Sei leans against him for a moment, or the softness of Sei’s breath through Marek’s shirt.
“I’m so sorry.” Sei tries to step back and wobbles again—but stays upright thanks to Marek’s hand on his elbow.
“Walk around,” Marek advises. “You probably want to sit, but you’ll thank yourself for walking a few laps around the clearing first.”
“Thank you, Your Highness.” After a deliberate, deep breath, Sei steadies on his feet. Marek has no reason to hold him anymore, so he lets go.
Loska cranes his neck around, then slowly extends his head towards a treetop. Probably trying to watch a nest of birds without scaring them off. Sitting on a nearby tree stump, Marek watches Sei’s slow circuit of the clearing.
Sei’s heavy coat obscures most of his slim figure, but not the softness of his face. His hair is mussed from the helmet, no longer as precisely perfect as when Marek first saw him. A flush crests his smooth, tawny cheekbones.
Hope he’s pretty, Marek had told Vana when their father announced the betrothal. Sei Mallory is certainly that, and he’s even prettier all tossed around from a dragon ride.
But Sei wasn’t chosen for a royal betrothal because he’s pretty. Supposedly, he’s one of the best grails trained in Fellrin in the past fifty years. Marek doesn’t know exactly how grails are ranked—raw power? There’s no institution like the Porcelain Guild in Draskora. A special school for grails would be a great blazing target for abductions.
If Imrik just wanted a grail for Vana, he could have found one easily. What makes this delicate young man worth half a ton of scalestone? Not to mention the complete reversal of Draskoran foreign policy?
Sei stops. “Why are you sitting, Your Highness?”
“I’ve been riding Loska since you were born,” Marek says easily. “My legs don’t turn to jelly anymore.”
Sei’s eyes narrow. “I know you’re only twenty-five.”
“And you are?”
“Twenty-one,” Sei answers.
Marek forgets whether he knew that already or not. Sei looks young for twenty-one—but then, Marek’s social circle consists of wind-scoured dragonriders.
There’s something else Marek definitely forgot, and he remembers with a pang of guilt. “Hey, I’m sorry about the commotion back at the fortress.”
Sei braces himself against a tree. “What commotion, Your Highness?”
“Given everything that’s happened, His Majesty forbade Lady Naoko from talking to you before the betrothal.” Marek winces inside. The decision was strategically sound, but still cruel to deny Sei a last conversation with his mother at the border.
Sei tilts his head. “Was that Naoko across the courtyard?”
Marek nods.
“I hadn’t recognized her from that distance.” Sei shrugs his coat closer. “That’s probably for the best, Your Highness. I haven’t seen Lady Naoko in two years, and conversation with her is always awkward.”
Marek has a complicated relationship with his own parents, sure. Imrik is his king as well as his father, and Queen Aliza has always preferred her son by blood over Marek and Vana.
But Sei’s detachment is so casual, Marek isn’t sure how to reply.
He doesn’t have to; Sei continues. “Excuse me, Your Highness, I don’t know if this is my place to ask. But what do you mean by ‘everything that’s happened’?” Sei gestures around the clearing. “Why am I here, instead of the caravan they told me about? Why was I delayed so long at Port Avar?”
