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The glow of candlelight flickered all around them; shadows rose and fell across Radovid’s face. My beautiful muse, Jaskier thought, and his heartbeat thundered in his ears. This was only ever supposed to be a fling, a passing fancy. He always loved with his whole self, but usually like a mayfly: only for a breath.
Radovid, though.
Radovid never left his thoughts.
Radovid made him laugh, made him sing.
Radovid made him feel cherished.
Radovid…
“Would that I could always see your face before me,” Jaskier said, brushing his prince’s hair back, tucking it behind an ear. “I could write endless songs about your eyes, your lips, your laugh.” A slight blush painted Radovid’s cheeks. “Perhaps I’ve already begun,” Jaskier went on, his tone light, “and someday I’ll sing them all to you.”
“How long does it take to sing ‘endless songs’?” Radovid teased.
Jaskier kissed Radovid’s pink lips. “A lifetime,” he said, soft. Another kiss and then, even softer, “If you’ll have me.”
There was no hint of uncertainty in Radovid’s reply. “Always.”
Neither of them felt the need for words, after that. Fingers in hair, lips on skin, these spoke more clearly than even a poet could sing.
~
The night pressed in on Jaskier. The cold was as relentless as the dark, and he longed to stop and build a fire, to feel warmth on his skin.
But he longed for his prince’s arms more, so he kept moving.
“Should have started out earlier,” he muttered, just to hear something besides his feet crunching dead leaves as he trudged onward. His voice felt small in the dark of the wood. He thought about getting out his lute, but the thought that the night might swallow up his music stayed his hands. Still, his fingers twitched, playing at imagined strings.
When the path widened and Jaskier saw the warm glow of lamplight ahead he’d written two verses and started working out a chorus to go with them, but the outline of the windows he’d been looking for thrust all thoughts of music from his mind. The stone cottage loomed before him, promising warmth and, in all likelihood, heat. Every part of him ached for Radovid’s touch.
Jaskier let himself in when he reached the door. Radovid’s men watched from their posts, but even in the dark, with only a few stray bits of lamplight on his face, they knew Jaskier. Likely they recognized even the fall of his steps on the hard packed earth.
“Miss me?” Radovid asked, snaking his arms under Jaskier’s coat and around his waist.
“Always,” Jaskier said, hugging back and tucking his face into the curve of Radovid’s neck. “Mmm,” he hummed. “You feel good.”
They stood that way for uncountable minutes, time ebbing and flowing around them. Radovid broke the silence, pulling Jaskier away from the door, towards the hearth. “Come,” he said. “The fire will take away the chill, and once you’re warm I’ll do something about the loneliness.”
“Lead on, my prince.”
~
“With you I could summon the gods and the stars…”
The room was full of people, Radovid’s friends and hangers-on and possibly even enemies, but Jaskier had eyes only for the prince. He was performing for them all, and perform he did, flirting and winking and laughing in turns, but the song was Radovid’s alone.
Rapidly, inexplicably, Jaskier was hurtling towards something like love.
Love.
Not a flash of passion—bright and hot and gone in a moment—but the lingering heat of love and longing.
Jaskier didn’t know what Radovid held in his thoughts, but there was something in the way he held Jaskier’s gaze, in the long, lingering glances, in the way he leaned in whenever Jaskier was near. A small, wingéd thing fluttered in Jaskier’s chest.
His listeners applauded as the last notes faded. Some even shouted for another. But Radovid caught Jaskier’s eye and there was a question in his gaze. Jaskier nodded his answer, earning him a smile.
The winged thing inside Jaskier leapt.
When Jaskier stood before him, Radovid said, “Walk with me.” His words were commanding, but voice wavered with uncertainty.
Jaskier bowed, gently kissing Radovid’s knuckles. “As my prince wishes,” he murmured.
~
“Only gift me with your smile, o muse, and my lute will sing.”
Radovid looked up at Jaskier from where he knelt at Jaskier’s feet. He offered a lopsided smile, eyes dancing with mischief. “I don’t hear any singing, bard,” he said after a beat.
Jaskier hummed, a melodic, amused trill. “I said my lute will sing. And since it’s not within reach…” He made as if to stand. “Shall I fetch it?”
Hands gripped his thighs, almost enough to bruise; Jaskier laughed. “I daresay I can stay, for you.”
Radovid winked and went back to opening up Jaskier’s breeches.
~
“There are myriad stars in the sky, but none so lovely as the stars in your eyes.”
They stood in a garden, close but not quite touching. Radovid’s eyes were bright, sparkling with reflected moonlight.
“Are you a poet now?” Jaskier teased. “I’m touched, you know. Such sincere flattery, imitation.”
The prince’s laugh was a burst of sunshine on Jaskier’s night-cooled skin. “I speak but truth. If all the stars were taken from me, I’d only need to look at you to remember their light.”
“Radovid,” Jaskier said. And then, somehow, all his flowery words left him.
“My songwriting is shite, though,” Radovid continued, as though Jaskier hadn’t spoken. “Perhaps you could offer some pointers?”
Jaskier tried to swallow, his mouth suddenly dry. “Find a muse,” he said. His voice was raspy, barely audible even in the silence of the night.
“That bit won’t be a problem,” Radovid murmured. “He’s been engraved upon my heart.”
“In letters deeply worn.” The air between them crackled. “You pay attention. That’s one of mine.”
Radovid moved closer; Jaskier could feel the heat from his nearness. “I see more than people expect.”
“Yes,” Jaskier said.
The kiss, both sudden and inevitable, surprised them both.