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'You will be married off to the barbarians,’ people had said when Laurent had come of age. 'They’re a barbaric lot, the Akielons — alien to delicacies and the warmth of love, built big as boulders and stern of heart.’ The court had whispered variations of the tale behind his back.
'Poor thing,’ some would say. 'Serves the frigid bitch right,’ would say the others.
This way or that, Laurent was determined. If a marriage would mean Auguste ascending the throne, he would go through with it.
Their marriage starts with a jolt, with Damen pursuing him and Laurent pushing him away. Until, one day, Damen confronts him. 'I apologise if this is not what you had expected out of your marriage. This is your country as much as it is mine, Laurent. I want you to feel at home here. If nothing else, you will always have a friend in me.’ If the tilted lines of Damen's otherwise joyous face stir something in Laurent, he chooses to make nothing of it.
Damen stays true to his word. He remains a friend — defending Laurent’s suggestions in court, helping him sharpen his Akielon, or showing him around Ios on horseback. In private quarters, Damen maintains a respectable distance, choosing to sleep on a narrower bed that surely isn’t made for his burly build.
Laurent realises belatedly that the food brought into his chambers is less spicy and includes more Akielon sweet treats; that there is more Veretian literature tucked away in the Akielon library than before; and that, somehow, the Akielon tailors have grown more knowledgeable in Veretian stitches and embroidery. It’s all Damen’s doing — Laurent knows. Damen doesn’t breathe a word, and Laurent doesn’t mention it. A silent agreement between them.
Friends, Laurent thinks wryly. Strange, how he once believed Auguste to be his only.
At least their friendship strengthens.
In the public eye, however, he’s the king’s consort. Laurent attends ceremonies and festivities with Damen, walking and dining at his side.
Laurent looks forward to the time he and Damen spend together — discussing politics late into the night, exploring the rolling landscape on horseback, or walking leisurely through the gardens of Isthima. When Damen is occupied in court, Laurent unconsciously seeks him out, watching from the sidelines as Damen rules, the confidence in his voice, the might of his posture, the kindness in his words, and the honour in his deeds.
Laurent seeks him at other times as well, when Damen spars with Nikandros, his bulk offering no resistance to his swift movements. Laurent watches silently as the strong muscles that etch the bronze skin of Damen’s bare torso ripple with every motion he makes. Damen catches his eye sometimes — and sometimes, their gazes linger.
Their hands brush at dinner now and then, seated side by side as they are, or Laurent’s clothed shoulder grazes Damen’s bare one when they’re forced closer along the narrower garden paths. Sometimes, before an audience, Laurent loops his arm through Damen’s and doesn’t withdraw until they’re in their chambers again.
As spring shifts into summer, the Akielon heat becomes unbearable. The nights are worse still, bringing another kind of heat Laurent doesn’t dare name. Then, he looks towards Damen’s form on the opposite bed, his husband’s body compressed to fit the narrow space and silhouetted in moonlight. Laurent’s drowsy mind wonders how the contours of those firm muscles might feel beneath his fingertips. Quickly, he drags his thoughts away and recites Veretian poems in his head until sleep claims him.
It’s on his twenty-second nameday that Damen pulls him out of their chambers. When they stop in front of the stables, a white mare waits for Laurent. Its hide is a smooth expanse, like a blanket of fresh snow. The mane falls over its back like the purest silk, lush and gleaming.
‘Happy nameday,’ Damen says with a dimpled smile and a hesitant peck on the cheek. ‘It doesn’t have a name. I thought you might like to give it one.’
‘Rose,’ Laurent whispers, raising his hand for the mare to sniff.
‘Rose,’ Damen repeats. And if he looks at Laurent then, as though he’s something precious, it’s only Laurent’s wistful imagining.
That night, Damen hosts an opulent dinner in Laurent’s honour. Laurent watches helplessly as Damen — dizzy with wine — laughs at something the court-singer says, his head thrown back and eyes bright. The dinner he’s eaten churns uneasily in his stomach. He slips away to their chambers unnoticed. Laurent hardly sleeps that night.
He knows he’d wounded Damen’s pride by pushing him away. No man would ever forget something like that.
Laurent avoids Damen for the next few days, more for the sake of his heart.
‘Is something wrong? You haven’t been yourself lately,’ Damen asks one evening as they walk along the gravel path in the gardens.
‘Tell me how it would be between us,’ Laurent says without preamble, surprising even himself, ‘if we weren’t married out of convenience?’
Surprise flickers across Damen’s face before he recovers and answers with quiet surety, ‘I would have courted you properly and knelt before your brother to ask for your hand in marriage.’
Laurent laughs bitterly. ‘Well, it’s too late to ask for my hand in marriage,’ he says, then adds more hesitantly, turning away, ‘but it’s not too late to… court me.’
There’s a soft rustle beside him, and when Laurent dares to look, Damen is standing there with a flower in his hand. Damen steps forward slowly and gently tucks the flower between Laurent’s strands. Laurent has read enough Akielon literature to know that, here, it’s an intimate gesture between lovers.
‘It’s never too late,’ Damen whispers, bending to kiss him sweetly on the mouth.
Strange, Laurent reflects later, reading a love letter written in broken Veretian in Damen’s impatient hand, that when the poets of his court had sung of his fate, none had foretold that in a foreign kingdom, speaking a foreign tongue, he would be courted by his own husband.
They had never told him that his husband would have a heart of gold, and that he would fall in love with it irrevocably.
That, Laurent discovers for himself.
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