Chapter Seven

Someone put a crystal glass of wine into my hand, and I threw it back, wishing it were spirits. I saw Akyran surrounded by menfolk, lifting a gilded flask to his lips, and replying to something someone said with a laugh. His eyes met mine and he smiled, but it did not have the brilliance behind it that his smiles normally held.

Leamoira caught my face between her hands and kissed both my cheeks enthusiastically. “A long time coming,” she declared. “We have been expecting an announcement now for... oh, at least fifty years.”

“Was he coerced into this?” I asked her under my breath.

She hesitated for just a moment. “Not into asking you to marry him,” she replied carefully. Fae do not lie. We omit, avoid, and mislead. Leamoira was omitting something, but the relief was overwhelming. Not into asking me to marry him.

There is no one I would marry, if not you, he had said. It was not a lie. But there was a lot unsaid within that statement.

I did not have the chance to ask her more, for King Treyvin embraced me, a rare physical expression from the stern king. “Well done, Ecaeris,” he said with approval. “I am very pleased to finally greet you as my daughter-in-law. Your father and I have long aspired to unite our families. We are very happy to see it to its fruition.”

I opened my mouth to ask him and closed it again. One did not ask questions of the King. “Thank you, my King.”

He nodded and his eyes were amused. He knew I had bit back my questions.

My father embraced me. “Congratulations,” he said, his voice thickened by emotion. He was on the verge of tears. “Your mother and I are very happy that you have made this connection for our family.”

“Thank you,” I replied stiffly. How much had Akyran’s actions been influenced by our parent’s wishes, and how much had been motivated by a genuine attraction? Had I lost my best friend in becoming his bride?

As the congratulations continued, I was plied with glasses of wine, half of which were removed from my hands without being touched. Over the heads of those around me, I saw that Akyran was somewhat more successful in drinking the alcohol brought to him.

When the excitement died down sufficiently, I escaped the ballroom, and made my way back to my chambers as if I were being pursued. Fiena and Tillie were awake and excited, the news having spread through the castle. They gushed over the announcement as they undressed and bathed me.

“So romantic,” Tillie told me. “To ask you so publicly.”

I met Fiena’s eyes, and she sighed. Tillie was very young and innocent and did not understand that marriages were meant to be private affairs.

I lay into my bed unsure about the etiquette. Should I lie down in his room? It would feel odd to do so with Ithyles waiting for him to return. I lay awake and fretful as Fiena and Tillie withdrew into the dressing room, closing the door behind them. Would he come here? I wondered. I tossed restlessly upon the bed. What would happen if he did?

Unlike Akyran, I had not taken many lovers. It was not something as indulgently looked upon for Fae noble women as it was for noble men. Those I had taken, I had done so very discretely, very carefully, and only where there was a genuine attachment. I did not know if Akyran even knew that I had done so.

What if we went to bed now, and he thought I was a virgin?

What if he thought I had more experience than I did?

What would sex actually be like with Akyran? Would we even have sex? The marriage rites needed three consummations… but there was some game afoot that I was not privy to. What if this marriage was a sham? Did he expect me to realise it was?

Everything was out of order, I thought. I was not sure how it had come to be so, how our relationship had become so public before it had become private, but surely now... surely, now it would even out. If the marriage was genuine… If…

I heard the door open, and my breath caught.

I heard him curse as he collided with a chair, crossing the room.

“Are you alright Akyran?” I smothered my laughter.

He had sat into the offending chair in order to remove his boots and looked up at me with a quick grin. “Didn’t see the chair. You moved it since the last time I was here.”

“Last time you were sitting on it,” I reminded him.

In the moonlight I could see him pull off his top and trousers, and the silhouette of his body, the slide of moonlight across muscle and skin as he approached the bed, the inky darkness of his hair echoed lower... He was so beautiful he made my heart ache with longing.

He would not come naked to the bed unless he intended to consummate our marriage. One knot within me released with the assurance that Akyran did not intend for the marriage to be a sham, at least, and intended to follow the rite to its completion.

He slid into the covers and lay for a moment on his back before drawing in a deep breath and turning and reaching for me. I could smell the spirits on his breath as he pulled me towards him. He pressed his face into the curve of my neck and shoulder, pressing his lips against my skin, but did not try to kiss me as he arranged me beneath him, making room between my legs.

His hand tilted my hips to him, but he pushed against me in vain, before cursing, reaching between us to grasp himself, and I felt the movement of his hands as he stroked himself to hardness, before trying again. I winced, tense and... unwilling. Unseduced.

In all my nights of dreaming of his body against mine, it had not been like this.

“Gentle,” I protested, and reached between us. I felt his breath indrawn sharply as I closed my hand around him, stroking him. If he had doubts of my experience, my touch would have dispelled that, I told myself.

His forehead dropped to mine, his eyes closing, and he groaned. “- Ecaeris,” he swore, his tone appreciative, desirous. I released him and adjusted under him, so that when he tried again, we both sighed out in relief as he joined us. His lips grazed against my jaw and cheek as he began to move against me, his eyes still tightly shut.

It was... perfunctory. It was not a seduction, not a joyous merging of people, it was... meeting obligations. Oddly uncomfortable and intensely polite, and utterly bereft of passion. He did not kiss me, did not look at me, his face contracting in a scowl as he increased the speed and vigour of his thrusts. I felt the heat of his seed, and he gasped, before pulling from me and falling onto his back.

I could see his chest rising and falling as he recovered himself. “Alright, Ecaeris?” he whispered.

“Yes,” shame burnt in my throat, stung tears to my eyes. I was bitterly disappointed. I might not have had much experience, and those times I had might have been clumsy and rushed, but they had been more than this.

Three times we had to consummate the marriage and after this first, I wanted nothing more than for it to stop. It was just so… awful, that this was all that there was between us. After so many years fantasizing… The courtiers he had taken to bed had seemed well pleased, why was I not? Because I told myself, he was not… he was just not… wanting to have sex with me. It was a soul crushing embarrassment.

This was a mistake. We should have just stayed friends... If I stopped it now, perhaps I would save us a long lifetime of regret. But I would also be answerable to the whole court after our declarations being made so publicly. What had we done? I wanted to weep, but I was a war mage, and we did not do such things as weep over broken hearts.

He sighed. The moonlight picked out his profile. “There’s word of a bunch of ogres in the outer edges of the forest. We should go roust them in the morning, make sure they’re behaving themselves,” he said, moving onto his side. “Maybe hunt some deer whilst we’re out.” Suddenly we were back, camping around the fire after having a few too many drinks, friends sharing a bedroll and company. Though normally we did not do it without a stitch of clothing between us, admittedly.

“That should be fun,” I agreed, trying to let go of the resentment and settle back into the comfort of our friendship. “You could use the practise.”

“Hey,” his teeth flashed in the darkness. “My spear hit the chest plate. Yours was just a lucky shot.”

“Why is it that everyone else has luck, whereas you have skill, Akyran?”

“I still think you have cast a spell to help your aim,” he retorted with a laugh. He reached out and stroked a lock of my hair back from my face and then leaned forward, brushing his lips over mine gently.

I threaded my fingers into his hair and stroked down to his shoulder feeling the shift of his muscles beneath his smooth skin, the rise and fall over his arm as he drew me under him, joining us as he opened my mouth with his.

His eyes were closed, the lashes heavy on his cheek, and although the kiss heated and I could feel the response of his body, although his heartbeat increased and his breath grew unsteady, there was a formality to his touch, that edge of politeness.

Enough was enough, I decided. I gripped his hips, and held him closer, changing the pace and lifting to meet him. He drew in a sharp breath and let it out on a moan, lowering his torso closer to mine, relaxing at last, his hand pulling me closer to him, changing the angle. I felt my body respond and worked hard to bring it to pleasure against him, and he cried out with me, pressing his hips against mine as he spilled his seed.

“That was better,” he said, sounding surprised and pleased. He did not roll from me as he had the first time but stayed above me and in me. He brushed his lips against mine, trailed them along my cheek, lover-like. “I wasn’t sure if being friends would be... uncomfortable in bed.”

“Well, the first time was pretty awful,” I told him, reaching up to stroke his hair from his face.

He grimaced. “Sorry. Too much to drink and a case of nerves.”

“You, nervous?” I scoffed.

“Very,” he grazed his lips over mine and then lifted from me onto his side, and I did the same so that we were eye to eye on the cushion. “You are my friend, Ecaeris,” he stroked his hand down my arm, taking my hand and threading his fingers in mine so that our joined hands rested between us. “I’ve known for centuries that we would marry, it just... made sense. But crossing into being physical without damaging the friendship... Yes, I was nervous.”

I sighed out a breath. “So was I,” I admitted and was rewarded with another quick flash of a grin. Another knot of tension within me released. Nerves, I told myself. Just nerves.

“I’m sorry,” he released my hand and drew me closer to him. His skin against mine was divine, the texture of him, the skin that was crisp with hair, his chest, his legs… and the silk of him that was not, along the curve of rib, the point of hip... My hands drifted over him, and he did not stop me, in fact seemed to welcome the touch, his eyes hooded, and his body relaxed. “About the first time. I thought it would be easier to just get the first time done... The drink did not help. It was awful.”

“It would have been better if everything hadn’t all been so... tense,” I reached up to touch his cheek, feeling the rasp of stubble under my fingertips. “It was just so awkward, with everyone knowing what was to come... I was nervous, too.”

“We should have just gone camping, drunk too much, and done it in the heat of the moment,” he agreed. “I had rather had that in mind… Next time we get married, we’ll do it that way,” he joked.