Page 107 of The Wild Prince's Favorite
“No,” he chuckled, assuming she was confusing the two, and pressing her palm against his cheek to correct her. “Cheek.”
He touched her cheek too for good measure, and then, brought her fingertips back to his beard.
“Beard,” he said.
“Beard,” she repeated, struggling with the pronunciation of that word for some reason.
“Yeah, beard. ...Do you like it?”
He remembered his sisters and mother being quite critical of his facial hair and that of his brothers and father on the smallest occasion, although he hadn’t been around the siblings’ banter in a while.
Now he was curious about Alezya’s thoughts.
“Beard?” he asked her again. “Yes? No?”
He let out a faint, rare smile as she squinted her eyes, visibly assessing his jawline. She had seen him with and without as he usually shaved every now and then. After a while, she shook her head and put her fingers on his cheeks.
“No,” she said.
“No beard?”
“No beard,” she nodded.
“Alright.”
Under Alezya’s confused stare, he let go of her hands and got up, going around his sister’s tent to find water, a bowl to put it in, and some soap. Then, he came back to put it all on the small table in front of the mirror, sitting back in his spot next to Alezya. Quickly, under her amused eyes, he used the soap and water to wet and lather his beard, and then, he gave her a smile.
“Dagger,” he said.
Alezya took out the one she’d taken from his tent and handed it to him, but instead, Kassein waited expectantly, until she raised her eyebrows, and shook her head.
“Kassein, no. Not Alezya. Kassein.”
“No. I want you to do it. Alezya.”
She frowned and shook her head again, but he grabbed her wrist and gently, using the mirror for reference, had her scrape the first inches of beard off his jaw. She gasped but stopped trying to pull her hand away as she realized she might hurt him. Kassein chuckled and kept going until he let go of her hand to let her do it. Very slowly, and after giving him an almost apologetic glance, Alezya slowly moved the dagger to keep shaving him, Kassein moving his chin up to give her better access.
He wondered if she realized that, even if she did cut him, he would only have a thin cut and his scales would appear, but there was something endearing about watching her so nervous to shave him. She kept her eyes focused on his jawline, while he kept his eyes on her and all the micro-expressions of her face.
Even from so close up, she was beautiful. Her skin was incredibly smooth, and of a color he’d never seen in the Empire; not dark like his father’s nor as pale as his mother’s, but instead, a warm but pale color that reminded him of the sand on the beaches of the Empire where he and his siblings sometimes went to play as children. Her eyes were uniquely shaped too, thin and long like a feline. When she was so close to him like this, he couldsee how they were not simply black, but instead, a rich, dark, and earthy brown color.
“Kassein.”
She had caught him staring, and now, was giving him a disapproving look that meant he was distracting her.
“Green,” she said.
“My eyes.”
“My eyes?”
“No. Eyes. Kassein eyes, green eyes. Alezya, black eyes.”
“Eyes.”
“Yes.”
She pointed two fingers at his eyes and made a motion down.
