Page 67 of The Prince and the Ice King

Reardon wasted no time, vision unfocused at first from keeping his eyes closed for so long. The washroom was dim but lit by candles, large and luminous, with multiple wardrobes filling the corners, the bath itself up on a pedestal, just as Reardon would have imagined for a king. His father’s washroom was not nearly so grand, however.

The king was not yet fully softened behind Reardon, a solid presence reminding him of how they’d intimately but also only barely connected. Reardon understood why. Too muchhadhurt, his body unused to such experiences. He’d only ever teased himself there before, but even that brief, small conquering from the king had been incredible.

Resting gratefully back against the body behind him, Reardon fought every impulse in him to not disobey and look. This close, however, with the king’s arms coming up to hold him in place, gentler than they’d held him at the desk, Reardon noticed something unexpected just out of eyeline.

A wisp of white hair.

Barely containing the smile on his face, Reardon settled more comfortably. “May I assume it gets easier with… frequency?”

“It does. Your body adapts. Is that why you came here tonight, little prince? For me to treat you like a stable boy?” One of the hands around Reardon’s waist drifted between his legs where he was spent. Still, the touch made him twitch in the king’s palm. “If you saw Josie and the others, I’m sure you caught them in similar states.”

“M-mostly,” Reardon said, mourning the king’s touch the moment he returned to merely holding Reardon against him. “Mostlythat’s how I found them all, I mean, not…. That was not why I came to see you. If I had only wanted someone’s touch, I could have gone to another. I didn’twantanother.” He pressed his head to the king’s shoulder. “I wanted my love.”

The silence that answered was as torturous as if the king had brought Reardon to the brink only to leave him cold. The cynical sigh he released as he drew his hands away completely was worse.

“Is that why you asked the night for a him, some… fantasy? I am not your love. We merely shared a night of passion.”

“You may think me foolish, Majesty, but it is not fantasy. Barclay had a vision.”

“What?”

The pull to turn and look the king in the eyes was strong, but Reardon held still. “Before Barclay was chosen as offering, he had a vision of my love. Well, what he saw was difficult to describe, he said, but it was…love, death, and blue eyes in a sea of white.

“There has been much death here, Majesty, but there is still hope. Your court has all found someone to love. With Branwen and Caitlin, perhaps it is something different or moving more slowly, but they all have someone, even your sister, so content with my friend, who never thought he’d find a love of his own. Don’t you understand what that means?”

“That’s why you said blue eyes,” the king murmured.

“Yes. It’s you. You are my love, and I am yours.” Reardon boldly reached to take the king’s hands, that had fallen away. “We can be the final piece to breaking your curse for good.”

“Close your eyes.”

“All right.” Reardon did so, unprepared for the sharp yank of the king’s hands and push forward as the body behind him got out of the bath.

“Wait—”

“Get out.”

“But—”

“You are going to dry off, get dressed, and get out of my chambers. And if you look at me, I will still throw you from the ramparts.” Those strong hands gripped Reardon’s shoulders and roughly lifted him to his feet, forcing him to stumble out of the bath.

“I-I cannot dress blind!” he protested.

Still rough and harried, the king brought a robe that he used to pat Reardon’s skin. Then he grabbed Reardon’s arm and dragged him down the steps leading from the bath, across the stones, until at last he pushed him forward and left him, just a voice over his shoulder. “Dress and stay facing forward.”

Reardon opened his eyes. He was back by the desk, where his and the king’s clothes lay in heaps. Much as this pained him, he grabbed his shirt and trousers. “Majesty, Barclay’s vision—”

“I amnotyour love.”

“But you could be!”

“You said yourLombardhas blue eyes?” The way the king spat the name made Reardon stagger as he tried to pull up his trousers.

“Yes.”

“You hoped it might be him once, didn’t you?”

“N-no, I….” Reardonhad, but— “He’d never want me—”

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