Page 72 of Heart of Winter
“But I’m…” Revna’s voice popped into his head:Let’s stop using the B-word, shall we?“They wouldn’t mean anything, like yours do. Won’t – won’t everyone think it’s ridiculous? That I’m playing dress-up. Or even insulting you and your people? I would be making a mockery of a long-standing tradition.”
Erik stared at him a long, long moment, brow slowly smoothing. “No.” His voice had gone deeper. “You wouldn’t.”
Oliver shook his head, frustrated with himself for expressing his doubts – and for not even expressing them clearly, at that. “But I–”
Erik’s heavy hand landed on his shoulder, and squeezed – gently, but Oliver could feel the latent strength in that grip, held back on his account. “You’re not in Drakewell anymore, Oliver. Our feasts and festivals are not full of gossip and petty slights.” He lowered his head a fraction, bringing them in closer – close enough for Oliver to feel the heat of his breath on his face, his own breath catching in his throat. “If you come braided and finely dressed to my hall” – Erik’s voice was a rumbling whisper, now, his eyes deep, blue, unfathomable – “then my people will know you’ve earned the honor of sitting at the high table.”
“The – the high table?” Oliver asked, weakly.
The hand on his shoulder squeezed. “Yes.”
Sound of the door opening.
“Your majesty?” one of the guards asked.
Erik held his gaze a moment longer, then stepped back, and turned away, sighing. “What?” he asked his guard.
Oliver shifted so he faced the horizon, the sunlight only a hot line of red etching the mountains, the sky above gray fading to indigo. His pulse pounded in his ears, drowning out the conversation happening behind him.
Earned the honor. He flat-out refused to analyze that. To imagine. It was too dangerous. But he could do nothing about his body’s frenzied tumble into nervous anticipation, want, longing. Ithurt, wanting something he couldn’t have like this, an ache that gripped and burned like his marsh fever.
He’d finally managed to collect himself when Erik said, right behind him, “Oliver, are you coming in?”
Gods. “No. No, I think I’ll stay a moment longer. The stars are coming out.”
“Hm. So they are.” He heard a rustling, felt a rush of air – and then something heavy fell across his shoulders. It was warm, and smelled of horses and forest, and fur tickled his jaw. It was Erik’s cloak. Erik had draped his cloak over him. “Don’t stay too long. It gets cold up here.”
Oliver squeezed his eyes shut and listened to the king depart with his guards. He stayed like that a long moment, clutching the cloak tighter around his throat, breathing in the smell of it – of Erik – and the only stars he saw were the ones blooming behind his screwed-shut eyelids.
18
Erik dreamed of eyes the blue of deep water. His own were pale, glacial, the blue gleam of sunlight on snow. But these were the boundless sapphire of a lake in winter, evidence of the life that still teemed down beneath the ice. Water that looked cool and inviting, but would kill you if you let it.
There were worse deaths.
He dreamed of firelight dancing in copper curls, grown longer over the last weeks, soft and slippery as Southern watered silk through his fingers. Beneath his fingertips, the fragile shape of a skull, the heat of skin he wanted to follow down, and down, and down. A longing like a spear through his chest, an unexpected wound whose pain was sharp and breathless.
There were worse wounds.
But none yet had left him so restless.
Erik rolled over on his feather mattress, skin prickling and over-hot as the dream faded out, and his eyes opened on his dark bedchamber. Every time he managed to fall asleep, Oliver was there, sometimes peacefully sleeping in the chair in the study – sometimes naked and pink in the bath, winding one of Erik’s braids around his finger and talking of staying.
It was still night beyond his window, the sky lit only by a sliver of moon. With an impatient huff, he threw back the covers and got to his feet. Dragged a fur across his shoulders and ventured out into the common room in search of distraction.
It seemed he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t sleep. Leif sat before a built-up fire, the light from the flames flickering over a thoughtful – and not at all happy – countenance. He held a cup loosely between both hands, rolling it absently between his palms. His head didn’t turn, but Erik saw the flicker of his lashes and a firelight-bathed flash of blue as he glanced toward him.
“Can’t sleep?” Erik asked, softly, and crossed to pour a cup of his own.
“Up early,” Leif countered.
Erik took the chair across from him, and a sip of wine; it was a pale, Veniscalli white, nearly clear in the right light, and tasted faintly of apples, beneath the tang of the grapes. He rolled the wine across his tongue, savoring it – tomorrow night, at the feast, he would drink dark red, and then ale, perhaps a shot of mistress when his men toasted him. But here in private, with his family, he could own up to his taste for the soft dessert wines his mother had brought from her homeland, once upon a time.
Across from him, Leif stared into the flames, his unbraided hair wavy and gilded against his cheeks, his brows notched together.
“What’s troubling you?” Erik asked. He realized, with something of a start, that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been alone with his heir like this, and felt like a neglectful sod for it. Leif had no shortage of tutelage and training, and his brother was his constant companion and best friend – but Erik intended the boy to rule this nation some day, and he’d failed, lately, in providing any sort of direct counsel.
Leif shrugged. “Do you think Ragnar will come?”
