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But Kadouworriedso, and Evemer longed to undo the knot of this particular worry, even if he couldn’t undo any of the others. Kadou should never have reason to doubt him. Not in any realm of their lives. There were so few certainties, but Evemer wanted fiercely to be one of them.
So perhaps the words were important after all. “Yes,” he said, his voice rougher than he’d been expecting. “Please.”
Kadou turned, already smiling, and slid fluidly up onto the divan beside him. “Just kissing,” he said. “It won’t count if it’s just kissing.”
“Yes,” Evemer said. His arms had come around Kadou of their own volition, and something in him fell still and calm just to be able to touch him. Kadou met his mouth and draped his arms over Evemer’s shoulders.
He felt so clumsy, always, in Kadou’s hands. He could run sword-forms with his eyes closed all day and never trip, but whenever Kadou took hold of him, in an instant he felt as blundering and ungainly as a gawkish new cadet, unsure of what to do with his hands or his tongue or his nose. But Kadou was deft and graceful enough for the both of them, correcting for each slight awkward angle as if he didn’t have to think about it.
It was better than the kiss in the wine cellar. It was better than the kiss in Evemer’s bed, in his mother’s house. Evemer wondered with a wild swooping moment of mixed anticipation and dread whether each kiss was always going to be better than all the ones that had come before.
Oh, he was not going to survive this.
He kissed Kadou, ran his hands through all that luxuriously beautiful hair, touched his cheekbones, his neck, his back and waist.
When Kadou broke off to catch his breath, Evemer pulled him close, most of the way into his lap, and nosed beneath Kadou’s collar, kissing his clavicles and breathing in the scent of him—warmth and salt and a ghost of fragrant incense and the perfume Yasemin had dabbed at the corners of his jaw. Kadou laid kisses in his damp hair and hugged him close, breathing him in too.
“I should go to bed,” Kadou whispered.
“Not yet.” He hadn’t meant to say that aloud, but it made Kadou laugh and kiss his hair again. “Not yet.” He turned his face up, and Kadou kissed that too—his forehead, his cheeks, his chin.
“I know,” Kadou breathed against the corner of his jaw. “I know. Me too.”
Evemer tightened his arms, burying his face in Kadou’s neck, the soft fall of his hair. A little longer, just a little longer. That was probably going to be his unspoken chant right up until Kadou’s wedding day. Not yet, just a little longer.
“It’s all right,” Kadou whispered, kissing the shell of his ear. “It’s all right, I’m safe. We made it.”
He was being too selfish. Evemer loosened his grip, lifted his head. “I apologize.”
“Why?”
“You wanted to go to bed. I shouldn’t keep you.”
“I said Ishouldgo to bed.” Kadou leaned forward and kissed the corner of his mouth. “I want to stay here and keep kissing you but . . . It wouldn’t be a good idea.”
Evemer let out his breath slowly. “Of course. You’re right.”
“You sound so formal suddenly, why?”
Because if he wasn’t formal, he might forget himself and say something he shouldn’t. “Force of habit.” Kadou looked unconvinced—Evemer could see the creeping edges of worry already shifting the set of his shoulders and ducked in to press another kiss to Kadou’s neck, letting Kadou catch his mouth again, just briefly, when he pulled away. “You should go to bed.”
“You could come to bed too, if you wanted,” Kadou whispered. “I liked it, last night, and you’d sleep better than on the divan.”
No. No, no, too much, it would be far too much. He couldn’t do that again, now that he knew what was happening to him, and still keep his heart secret—he’d give it all away somehow, by whispering in his sleep those things he shouldn’t say or clinging too desperately to Kadou.
It was the thing his heart yearned for with a sharp stabbing pain—just to be allowed to be close to him, to hold him quietly, to rub his face in Kadou’s hair and feel the gentle rhythm of his breath in sleep. It was the one thing he could not allow himself to have, not even a second taste, never again. He already knew too much of it from the night before.
But that, he insisted to himself, wasdifferent. He hadn’t known he was in love then.
“Thank you for the offer, but—” No, stop, not like that. Kadou had noticed formality before; doing it again would worry him. He picked up Kadou’s hand and laced their fingers together. “I mean to say, thank you, but I . . .” He couldn’t lie that it was because of the marriage. It hadn’t counted last night; it wouldn’t count now. He couldn’t even admit that he wanted to sleep next to him, or else Kadou would invite him again sometime in the future, and Evemer would have to come up with some other excuse not to do it.
“You don’t have to have a reason, you know,” Kadou said, watching him closely. He had a worry line between his brows. “You can just say ‘no, thanks.’”
“No, thanks,” Evemer said. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” He squeezed Evemer’s hand. “Did that help take your mind off whatever was bothering you?”
“It helped.” Not with taking his mind off of things, not in the slightest, but Kadou didn’t need to know that. He leaned up to kiss Kadou again, and Kadou held him there a moment longer, kissing him deeper, hotter.
