Page 5 of His Summer Prince

“I know.”

After a minute, Elior drew back and popped open the faerie wine. It did nothing to fae but fill their stomachs. For humans, it was a different story. Elior handed Wren the bottle, watching as he lifted it to his mouth. Wren’s lips met the cool glass, and as he tilted the bottle, the sweet and spicy liquid sluiced onto his tongue. Notes of cinnamon, clove and warm apples hit his taste buds, and a guttural moan rose in his throat. He swallowed it with the faerie wine. The drink was a known aphrodisiac. Wren had no idea why Elior was giving it to him, and he didn’t care. Elior could feed him poison, and he’d eat it with a smile. After a few greedy gulps, he passed Elior the bottle.

“Thank you.” Elior said the words with an intonation more suitable to “fuck you.” It made Wren laugh every time. Elior loved breaking the faerie taboo of saying those words. They grinned at each other in the near-darkness.

Elior put the bottle to his mouth, plump lips closing around the top. Warmth spread through Wren’s core, and he wasn’t sure if it was the faerie wine’s doing or the sight of Elior drinking straight from the bottle. Need flared, and Wren bit his bottom lip.

Over the past two winters, Wren had courted a couple of girls in Castlehill. Each had come “recommended” by his mother—meaning he better comply or else. The girls, nice as they were, meant nothing to him, and with neither had he gone further than five minutes of awkward hand-holding to appease his mother, wishing the entire time it were Elior’s fingers interlacing with his.

Elior took another gulp, then let the bottle sink to his side. He pressed his brow to Wren’s and asked, as if reading his thoughts, “Are you going to court another girl this winter?”

Wren tasted sweet faerie wine on Elior’s breath. They’d talked about courting, of course. They talked about everything.

“No,” Wren said, and Elior exhaled.

They were so close. The proximity sparked the need to reach out and take what he wanted to be his.

“Are you?” Wren bit out. Elior had seen a fae girl the previous winter, feeling as lackluster about the courtship as Wren had felt about his. Wren wished the tender affection budding in his heart was returned, but that dream would never come true. Supernaturally beautiful fae didn’t find plain humans attractive.

“No,” Elior said, and Wren shook with relief.

Elior must’ve mistaken it for a sign that Wren was still cold because he pushed closer, trapping him against the tree. His heat washed through Wren.

“I won’t court anyone,” Wren said, cheeks glowing. “I don’t care how hard my mother pushes me to marry; I’m not going to.”

“Same. And I bloody hate winter.”

“Fuck winter.”

Elior put a hand on Wren’s chest, on the place where under his shirt, a golden locket rested against his skin. Elior splayed his fingers possessively, exerting pressure, and Wren’s eyes closed.

A couple of years ago, Wren had taken the money he’d saved over the summer and asked a local painter to capture his portrait in a golden locket. He then had a small bird engraved on the outside—a wren. The locket and portrait were expensive, and Wren was far from rich. He’d lied to his family about how much he’d made selling milk and wool and hidden the surplus for the locket. The overflowing emotion on Elior’s face when Wren gifted him the necklace was all the reward he needed.

But Elior reciprocated, commissioning a matching locket with a stylized sun on the cover, his portrait on the inside. He glamoured their necklaces so they were invisible to everyone but them. In lonely moments over the long winter months, Wrenwould pull out his locket and stare at Elior’s portrait until he could almost feel his warm embrace. The necklace was the connection Wren clung to when they were apart and all he could do was dream of summer.

Wren wrapped an arm around Elior’s waist, pulling him impossibly closer. They shared air and warmth, the cold of the night a steady and unwelcome reminder that time was running out. Six months of loneliness spread before Wren.

Time passed differently in the faerie realm than in the human world—once, a whole winter in the human world had condensed to a month in the faerie realm. Another time, Wren’s winter had stretched into a whole year for Elior. When they saw each other again, Elior had cried and clung to him for an entire day, at first not even able to tell him what was wrong. Only when night settled, and Wren cuddled with him in front of the fire, had Elior been able to share what had happened and talk about the terror of the prolonged separation. Elior had choked on his words, Wren’s hands gently rubbing his back, the only thing capable of soothing him.

No matter how painful and lonely winter was for Wren, at least he could count the days until spring, mark them off one by one, and cut the cold season into manageable chunks—first, he had to get to midwinter, then the equinox, and finally, the spring festival. Elior didn’t have the luxury of counting days; he could only hope that in the faerie realm, six months would shrink to the shortest time possible. But no matter how long they were apart, there was never any awkwardness when they saw each other; they felt nothing but a keen sense of relief at being reunited.

“I hope winter will be short for you,” Wren said.

“Yes.” Elior let go of the locket and trailed his hand down Wren’s body, sliding from his chest to his side and down to his waist. He clasped Wren’s middle, and it felt so good.

Out of his mind with the need to touch, Wren sank a hand into Elior’s copper mane, fingers tangling in the silky strands. The faerie wine coursed through his veins; his heart hammered. He’d never touched another person intimately, had never yearned to be with anyone but Elior, and here he stood, in his best friend’s arms, praying winter would pass in the blink of an eye.

Chapter Two

Elior

At his mother’s court, summer was eternal. Elior had opened his bedroom windows, the sounds of nature and the heavy scent of flowers drifting inside. Outside the palace, the wild, verdant garden was brimming with life. The leaves were thick and green, the grass lush and growing fast.

It had been hot and humid all day until a gentle afternoon rain brought relief. Elior welcomed the cool breeze drifting into his chamber, the soft pitter-patter on his window sill accompanying him as he played the lute. He’d put his locket on the small mahogany table before him so he could look at Wren’s portrait as he played, pretending the music was for him. The rich, melancholic notes made him ache. Expressing his swelling emotions with music was Elior’s favorite outlet when they were apart. He couldn’t wait for summer to return to the human world. Then, he’d play the pieces he’d practiced for Wren. In the evenings, when they sat by the campfire, he’d let the lute paint pictures of ancient times, foreign lands and star-crossed lovers. No other instrument managed to encapsulate his longing as well as the lute, its rich timbre telling stories of unfulfilled desire.

And oh, the desire. Whenever Elior closed his eyes, unbidden images of Wren arose. He could see that grinning face with its sea of freckles, the short and messy copper hair and those bright blue eyes, which flashed at Elior daringly. The things he’d do to make Wren smile… They were no longer boys, and the changes in Wren’s body had Elior salivating. Over the past year,Wren’s shoulders had broadened, muscles growing with every day of hard work in the sun. By the end of summer, Wren’s pale complexion had darkened to a faint gold. It was a cruel twist of fate that when he looked his very best, they had to part ways.

Elior had loved Wren for a long time, but when they’d said goodbye this autumn, a new, urgent craving had mixed into his feelings. Wren had turned into a young man, and it showed. Whenever they touched, Elior’s heart raced, and Wren’s scent had taken on an animalistic edge that drove him mad with yearning. Not-so-innocent thoughts would fill his mind, and he did his best to push them away. It wasn’t like Wren felt the same—the only people he’d courted had been girls. Elior had cheekily tested Wren by sharing a bottle of faerie wine with him, but when not even that provoked a reaction, he’d resigned himself to his fate.

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