Now Amarande was close enough that Luca could count the freckles the summer sun coaxed across the bridge of her nose. She smelled of rosewater and the juniper berries crushed under her boots, her skin cool to the touch with the rising morning as she cradled his chin with a knuckle. Luca pressed his forehead to hers and kissed Amarande gently on the tip of her nose.
“I believe you had something to say when we were interrupted.” Luca dropped his hands to the dip of Amarande’s waist, firmly setting them beneath the thick panel of metal of her chest plate. They had not been alone since that moment of disruption from the general. The library and all its comings and goings did not count.
“I didn’t want to leave it unsaid,” he clarified, “if you still want to say it, of course. If you simply want to grab your sword and swat me upside the brow for getting in the way of training, I won’t object.”
A quick grin passed Amarande’s lips. “You are a glutton for punishment.”
“I simply understand the consequences.”
“This is true.”
The joy in Amarande’s expression slipped away at the same time her hands sank to his shoulders, gripping them tightly as she recalled her line of thought in those hours before she would become queen. So much had happened afterward—meetings, arguments, planning, library study, disbursement—that it was hard to believe it’d been a day ago.
Finally, Amarande looked up at him, some sort of embarrassment shining through her typical opaque confidence. Reticence, too. He gripped her tighter about the waist—support and encouragement for whatever gave her pause.
“That day, as I pinned you, my blade pointed against your neck, I wanted you to kiss me. I wished for it—some proof that you loved me.”
One small hand slid down Luca’s arm, resting on his bicep. Amarande watched the muscle react to her touch, a little grin sweeping across her lips before she sighed and continued, catching his gaze.
“You made it clear later why that dream never came true, and I understand—and I’m embarrassed how much I misunderstood about my power in that situation versus yours. How you could never say you loved me before I did, even though you did every day in your actions and your promises of always.” Amarande’s attention fluttered down to his hands upon her waist, that uptick to her lips flickering, strengthening. “So, I must tell you that what you did yesterday—kissing me here like that, likethis—is everything I hoped for that day.”
Luca couldn’t help it, and again lowered his mouth to hers—eyes closed, breath suspended, fingertips claiming the flesh beneath the thin weave of her tunic, hungry. Exactly how he wanted to kiss her that day, if he’d only been able to.
When they parted, his lips were numb with heat, and her cheeks burned with what could only be called both earnestness and embarrassment. Luca placed his palms over the blushing apples of her cheeks, his fingers in her hair, and dove into the warmth of her shallow-sea eyes. “I have loved you for more years than I can remember. I will love you for the rest of the ones I have left. To the stars. I will kiss you every day as long as you will allow it.”
“Always.” She hugged him close then and laid her head upon his chest. He gripped her just as tight, tucking her snuggly beneath his chin. “I realize this sounds ridiculous because we’re now in a place where we can show our affection wherever and whenever, but… I’m unsure the thrill will ever leave me, if I’m being honest.”
Luca kissed the top of her head. “It won’t, Ama. The thrill will stay, it’ll just become different over time. That’s what love is—it’ll grow with us. It’s what we make it, how we show it, how we live it.”
“That seems too good to be true.”
Her words were both wistful and just biting enough that Lucaknew guilt was about to overtake her. That was how it was with Amarande—the moment her mind was solely focused on her heart was also the moment she let all her other responsibilities and worries blow in. It was as if thoughts and feelings untethered to her role were something her mind immediately marked as selfish.
And so, Luca said, softly, “Just because it’s what we want doesn’t make it untrue.”
“You’re correct… but—Beware or be dead.”
Those blue-green eyes flashed to his as she recited one of King Sendoa’s frequent tenets. It was the first rule. The top one. And, the moment Amarande spoke it into being, the words seemed to envelop both of them like a shroud of smoke.
“Settling into this”—Amarande pulled herself away enough to fling her arms about at their situation—the kiss, the quiet, the general air of contentment—leaving Luca grappling to keep ahold of her—“seems dangerous. Foolish.”
That final word hurt more than it should, but Luca did not flinch.
“Happiness is not complacency.” He wove one hand through hers and brought it between them. Driving home his point as she struggled to find an answer. “We can be both happyandaware.”
Amarande nodded weakly, suddenly lost in the middle distance. Not accepting or really believing the argument. Luca’s hands slid to the lithe muscles of her upper arms, her strength silent under the fabric and his palms. “Ama, we’re literally about to spend the next two hours training. We’re not lolling about your chambers eating lemon cake, ignoring the fact that more than half our allies are ensconced in a very precarious succession crisis.”
“Oh, ourallies.” Amarande pushed away from the tree—away from him—in frustration. She rubbed a hand down her face, exasperated. “I don’t know what I was expecting, but resistance from the other kingdoms as they limp home in tatters was not… that.”
Luca hadn’t expected it either. Obviously, he had very little experience with the extended royalty of the Sand and Sky in pretty much any capacity other than equine, yet the pushback and infighting and disagreement—after surviving a hostile takeover by the skin of their teeth—had been stunning.
“They’ll sort it out, we’ll meet at the conclave and rebuild the Sand and Sky into something modern and exciting—”
“Or we won’t.”
The stone-hard tone in Amarande’s voice cut his breath and his heartbeat. Luca had been mid-stride, moving toward her, palms out and reaching. Now they fell to his sides as he watched and waited. Her mind was overfull, like storm clouds gathering over the harbor, pulling in every drop of moisture until they just couldn’t hold on anymore.
Luca stood there, calm for her. Silent for her. Waiting for her.
