Page 67 of A Taste of Gold and Iron

Very softly, Kadou said, “This morning, you asked to talk about . . . about what happened last night.” Evemer inclined his head, just once. “I said no. I told you I didn’t want to.” Evemer swallowed, his jaw tightening. Kadou took a slow breath. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.”

“There is no need to apologize, my lord.”

“You would have given your life for me last night,” Kadou said. “You told me to run. And this afternoon . . .”

“Yes,” he said.I’d do it again. I’d do it a thousand times,Evemer thought.

“And all you want in return is for your sacrifice to be honored and accepted.”

Evemer could only nod, still rinsing oil out of Kadou’s hair, letting it stream out of his hands in silky ribbons down the perfect curve of Kadou’s spine.

“This was what I meant about my obligations earlier,” Kadou added. “How it was my duty to go looking for the counterfeits. I’m bound by fealty too, but my liege is . . . partially abstract.”

“The nation.”

“The nation,” Kadou agreed. “My house. Her Majesty my sister. Our continued prosperity. The entire populace of Arast. I’m charged to care for them, as you’re charged to care for me.”

Evemer felt that warm glow of light in his chest again. This was what he had always felt was right and good—and Kadou understood it. Could verbalize it. “The commander is correct that it isn’t your place to run headlong into trouble for their sake. Your death or injury would be a source of chaos—and your duty also includes warding the kingdom against that. Sometimes that is the best way to care for it.”

“Would you have stayed out of the fight last night if I’d told you it wasn’t your place? If I said your duty was to stand back and protect only yourself?”

His stomach twisted and felt cold and hard at the very thought of it.

“I need to wash your hair again,” Evemer muttered, occupying himself with the tray of soap once more. It wasn’t at all necessary—it wasn’t like Kadou had been caught in a dust storm or walked through a room full of cobwebs. Evemer was just being thorough. Thoroughness was valuable and appropriate.

“Don’t dodge the question.”

“No, I wouldn’t have,” Evemer said. “I would have ignored you entirely.”

“Obviously,” Kadou agreed. “But suppose you had to. Suppose that four or five people—including me, including Commander Eozena—had all held you back from it, or had locked you away so you couldn’t be there. Suppose they kept you from my side when I needed you.”

Evemer didn’t want to suppose any such thing.

“You’d feel lost then too, wouldn’t you? You’d feel like you didn’t have a direction or a purpose.”

“You’re trying to convince me to side with you,” Evemer said, glaring at the back of Kadou’s head as he lathered the soap in his hands and began finger-combing it through Kadou’s hair. “You’re going to talk to the commander again and you want me to back you up.”

Kadou glanced back over his shoulder. “Can you blame me?”

Evemer huffed.

“Just think about it,” Kadou said.

He didn’t speak again until Evemer was rinsing the next round of thick oil-soap from his hair with bowl after bowl of warm water, leaving it glossy as unspun silk. The water streamed down Kadou’s shoulders and back, keeping the white robes around his waist drenched, the water running in rivulets off the marble bench and onto the floor with a sound like rain. Evemer rubbed the impossibly soft locks of hair between his fingers, working the soap out gently, enraptured in a way that felt . . . dangerous. Like standing on a cliff edge and thinking about leaning forward just slightly.

Kadou broke the silence to murmur, “You said earlier that you don’t dislike me anymore. Do you . . . think we could be friends, eventually? Or . . . or friendly, at least?”

It took Evemer a moment to find his tongue, and then to put words to it. “I would never wish to presume.” The water from Kadou’s hair was running clear now, and Evemer found himself acutely disappointed. He couldn’t wash it a third time. That would begin to inconvenience His Highness.

“Oh,” said Kadou, and his hands twisted in his lap again, fiddling with a hem of the robe. “Would you find it difficult, if we were?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’d like it if we were,” Kadou said softly. “I’ve never had many.”

Evemer stepped away and replaced the jar of soap, occupying his hands with organizing all the little bottles until they were neat. “Of course you have. Everyone loves you.”

“At a distance. I haven’t had many friends up close. It’s . . . hard to get close to someone in my position.”

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