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Lark
When Arin lookedas he did now, all satisfied and bullish, he was scheming and thoroughly enjoying himself. Had Draven not returned, I might have suggested we leave the breakfast and hurry back to my tent to continue what we’d begun last night. Because the idea of seeing him in purple and black, and how fucking arousing that was, had taken me by surprise.
I shifted on the bench, adjusting how my trousers pinched my filling cock.
“We have a plan,” he said. But with images of him coming undone beneath me playing in my head, I was only half listening.
“We do?” Draven and I said together.
I could bend Arin over my bed, lift that tunic, and bury my cock deep. He wanted it, he’d wanted it since our first night together, maybe before that, without even realizing his own desires. If Draven wasn’t meeting his needs, I would.
“And you’re both going to hate it,” he continued.
Whatever it was, if he was there, I wouldn’t hate it. I hated the knots he tied me up in, and I’d make him feel that, but he wanted my hate too. He’d had a taste when I’d made him strip with a knife at his throat. Gods, I needed to get him away from this table and Draven to make this fantasy real—
“Lark pretends to be Razak.”
“What?” I blinked, and my sexual fantasy shattered.
“You look just like him,” Arin added. “We’d need to cut and shape your hair.”
Pretend to be Razak? The idea was ludicrous, not least because I couldn’t do it. “No.”
“What?” Draven said, two beats behind me. “And how does Lark dressing as Razak help?”
“Lark goes into the Court of Pain, pretending to be Razak, steals Pain’s crown while Razak is locked up in Justice, Razak loses,” Arin explained to Draven, leaving the warlord with his mouth open. I shared Draven’s stunned sentiment.
“No,” I repeated, and swallowed my fluttering heart. “I can’tbeRazak. It’s not only his appearance I must mimic. He’s—”
“A dick, yes. I’m sure you can pull it off,” Arin said, casually throwing the barbed insult, then smiling as though he were still all sunshine and honey, when we both knew his light could be sharp and his honey poisoned.
I blinked, then laughed aloud. “Oh my dearest prince—” I cleared my throat of the words that weren’t mine to say. Words like: I love you, you’re a brilliant bastard, but I still love you. “You’re quite something, Prince Arin. You’re just going to sit there and ask me to be my butcher of a brother and you assume I’ll do it for you?”
Arin shrugged and popped a piece of fruit into his mouth. He grinned, chewed, and swallowed. “More than that, youwantto do it.”
“I’m not sure what’s happening here,” Draven admitted. “I leave for a few moments and you’ve both come up with a plan to steal Pain’s crown?”
“You have to admit, it’s perfect.” Arin beamed. “With Razak away, his court is exposed.”
“It’s not perfect,” I said. “Because I cannot do it.”
“Afraid you might like it?” Arin teased, gliding close to the truth.
His words stopped my heart, wedged it in my throat, and choked me all at once. What was it I’d said in the cave? Something about enjoying the pain, making me insane, like my brother. It was true, we did look similar. And if I cut my long hair, cropping it short, and donned some silver jewelry, few would be able to tell us apart. But what did I know of my brother’s life? He attended council meetings, and if they angered him enough, or if he was particularly pleased with himself, he either fucked me hard or soft. I knew his laugh, I knew his mannerisms, I knew his quick wit and vicious rage. I knew him intimately. But I knew nothing of his life, his routine.
“A few days?” Arin urged, losing his smile while trying to pin me under his stare. “That’s all we’d need.”
“It’s a big ask,” Draven said, finally noticing my discomfort. “They’ll kill Lark, if he’s discovered.”
Arin’s eyes widened. His shoulders slumped. “Perhaps it’s too much to ask—”
I sighed. “Nobody will touch me. They’re afraid to.” Arin’s damn idea had merit. “Only Razak has that right. He’s killed others for defying that rule in the past.” Razak was fiercely jealous, as his obsession with Arin proved. Nobody in his court dared hurt me.
Unfortunately, Arin’s plan might work. I knew my brother well enough to act like him, but not his routines. We looked alike, and if the worst happened and I was caught, I wouldn’t be killed. Not until Razak returned. And if he did return, as free as a bird, then it wouldn’t matter anyway because he’d have all four crowns, and Razak with power that stretched beyond his court would be the end of all of us.
“What’s a few days, when you lied to me for four years?” Arin asked, both sly, vicious, and playful. I wanted to kiss him, as well as make him hurt and moan, for being right and brilliant and for knowing how, deep inside, I wanted this.
I narrowed my eyes on the prince. “Perhaps I’ll take you along as a distraction so nobody notices I’m not my brother.”
