Chapter Text
Gregor Clegane died beneath the sun. He died slowly enough to understand it. Oberyn Martell had wanted that.
He had wanted the Mountain to hear Elia’s name before the end. He had wanted the watching court to hear the confession torn from the monster’s throat. He had wanted Tywin Lannister to sit frozen behind his golden armor while the truth he had spent years burying was shouted aloud before gods and men. He achieved all of it.
The Mountain confessed. The Mountain fell.
And Oberyn nearly followed him.
Gregor’s mailed fist struck the side of Oberyn’s head as the poisoned spear entered beneath his arm. The blow sent Oberyn spinning across the blood-dark sand. He heard the crowd cry out. He tasted blood. For a few terrible moments, the world became little more than distorted light and roaring pain.
Even dying, the Mountain came for him.
Oberyn reached for the second spear lying several paces away. His fingers dragged through sand. His injured shoulder refused to bear his weight. Somewhere above the noise, he thought he heard Tyrion shout his name.
Then Gregor stumbled and dropped to his knees, finally affected by the first poison tipped spear.
Oberyn fought through the fog and closed his hand around the second spear. When Gregor tried to rise again, Oberyn drove the blade through his throat.
Afterward, Oberyn remembered very little.
He recalled hands dragging him away. Someone pressed cloth against his side. Tyrion knelt beside him, white-faced and speaking too quickly. Jaime Lannister shouted for the maesters while Cersei stared down from the gallery with hatred sharp enough to serve as another blade.
Oberyn tried to stand. He made it to one knee before the ground tilted beneath him.
“I have won,” he insisted, though no one was arguing it. Then darkness claimed him.
*******************************************************************************
He woke in a chamber that smelled of bitter herbs, iron hot blood, and rain upon stone.
Then the pain returned. It lived everywhere. In his ribs which protested each breath he took, in his left shoulder that was bound tightly against his body. In the cut at his side that was freshly stitched. In his head that throbbed along to the beat of his heart.
Ellaria sat beside the bed. Her beautiful face was exhausted. Her hair had come loose from its braids, and there was dried blood on one sleeve.
“You look dreadful,” he croaked out.
Ellaria closed her eyes. For several breaths, she said nothing. Then she struck him across the uninjured side of his chest.
He hissed as pain flared through his ribs.
“That was cruel.”
“You nearly died.”
“But I did not.”
She struck him again, more carefully this time, and repeated, “You nearly died.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“You arrogant, selfish fool.”
Oberyn attempted a smile. “There is the woman I adore.”
Her expression broke. Ellaria bent over him, pressing her forehead against his hand. Her shoulders trembled once before she mastered them. He moved his fingers through her hair.
“I am sorry.”
“No, you are not.”
“I am sorry that you were afraid.”
“That is not enough.”
“It is all I have.”
Ellaria lifted her head, looking at him with her usual mix of love, exasperation, and annoyance.
“The Mountain confessed,” Oberyn said quietly. “They all heard him.”
“I know.”
His throat closed. For years he had imagined victory as a great cathartic release. He imagined a blade entering flesh, a confession before the court. He imagined Tywin Lannister finally forced to sit with the truth of what had been done in his name.
He had not imagined the emptiness afterward.
Gregor was dead. Elia remained dead. Her children remained dead.
His victory had not reached backward through time to save them. Ellaria seemed to see the realization pass across his face. Gently, she touched his cheek.
“You did it,” she said with pride. “You brought her justice.”
“Justice would have been her living.”
“You must return to Dorne,” she continued.
He looked toward the shuttered window. “How long have I been unconscious?”
“Two days.”
“That is inconvenient.”
“You will remain here until the maesters declare you fit to travel.”
“No.”
“Oberyn.”
“I will not lie injured beneath the roof of the people who murdered my sister.”
“You cannot sit upright.”
“I can.” He attempted to prove it. The room immediately lurched. Pain tore through his side and shoulder, bright enough to steal his breath. Ellaria pushed him back before he could collapse.
Oberyn stared at the ceiling while the darkness receded from the edges of his vision.
Ellaria folded her arms. “You were saying?”
“I rose too quickly.”
“You rose less than the width of my hand.”
“A tactical error.”
“You are impossible.”
“So I have often been told.”
Ellaria sat beside him again, fond and worried in equal measure.
“There is another reason you wish to return.”
Oberyn did not answer and refused to look at her knowing gaze.
“He is waiting for you.”
The pain in Oberyn’s chest changed. Loras. He had left the young knight in Sunspear nearly a month earlier. The night before Oberyn departed for King’s Landing, Loras had stood with him on the terrace outside his chambers, wearing a loose green robe and a scowl that had failed to disguise his fear.
Do not make me regret letting you go, Loras had said. Oberyn had kissed the angry line between his brows.
You are not letting me do anything.
Then I shall regret not breaking both your legs.
Such tenderness from my cruel rose.
Oberyn had promised to return. He had not promised to return unharmed. Loras would have recognized that for the lie it was.
“He will have heard what happened,” Oberyn said.
“By now, yes.” Ravens flew faster than wounded princes traveled. Oberyn imagined the message arriving in Sunspear. The duel won. Gregor dead. Prince Oberyn gravely injured.
He pictured Loras reading those words. The thought was unbearable.
“We leave as soon as a ship can be prepared.”
“The maesters—”
“Can accompany us.”
“Oberyn.”
“I gave my word.”
Ellaria studied him. There were few people in the world before whom Oberyn felt no need to disguise himself. Ellaria had seen him laughing, raging, grieving, drunk, wounded, and afraid.
She understood what he did not say. If he remained in King’s Landing, Loras would wait without knowing whether Oberyn was recovering or dying. Oberyn could not do that to him.
“Three days,” Ellaria said. “You will rest here for three more days. Then, if you can cross the room without falling upon your magnificent face, we leave.”
“Two.”
“Three.”
“Two and a half.”
She gave him a flat look.
“Three,” Oberyn conceded.
Ellaria leaned down and kissed his forehead. “You will tell him that I was reasonable and merciful.”
“I will tell him you assaulted an injured man.”
“Then I will tell him why.”
Oberyn closed his eyes and sighed. Loras would likely strike him too.
The prospect was strangely comforting.
******************************************************************************
The news reached Sunspear at midday. Loras was in the training yard when the raven arrived.
He was sparring with Ser Dalt, shirt clinging to his back beneath the Dornish sun, when a palace servant appeared holding a letter.
Loras saw the black seal. Something inside him turned to ice.
Deziel lowered his sword. “My lord?”
Loras did not answer. He crossed the yard and took the message. The parchment felt too light to carry death.
The words were written in Doran Martell’s careful hand. Oberyn had defeated Ser Gregor Clegane. The Mountain was dead. Tyrion Lannister had been declared innocent by the gods. Prince Oberyn had sustained grave injuries during the duel but remained alive under the care of the Grand Maester and Ellaria Sand.
Alive.
Loras read the sentence again.
Remained alive, but that didn’t mean safe. Alive was simply the barest condition of existence.
“Ser Loras?” Deziel asked again.
His hands were steady as he folded the letter. That frightened him more than trembling would have. “When did this arrive?”
“Moments ago,” the servant said.
“When was it sent?”
“Four days past.”
Four days. Oberyn might already be dead.
The world continued around him. Steel rang from the far end of the yard. Fountains poured beyond the wall. Somewhere in the palace, musicians practiced for the evening meal. Loras could not understand how any of it had been permitted to continue.
“Prepare a horse,” he said.
The servant hesitated. “My lord?”
“A horse. The fastest in the stables.”
“Where are you going?”
“King’s Landing.”
Deziel approached carefully. “It is weeks by road.”
“Then I will ride quickly.”
Whatever the other knight saw in his face ended the protest. The servant bowed and hurried away. Loras made it three steps before Doran’s captain appeared at the entrance to the yard.
“Prince Doran requests your presence.”
“I am leaving.”
“He expected you might say that.”
“I do not care what he expected.”
The captain remained respectfully immovable.
“If he means to prevent me—”
“He received another message.”
Loras stopped moving, stopped thinking, stopped breathing. “Another?”
“The prince is returning to Dorne.”
“When?”
“We do not know. A ship is being prepared in King’s Landing.”
“His condition?”
“The message did not say.”
Of course it did not. Loras looked toward the palace. “Take me to Doran.”
*****************************************************************************
Prince Doran received him in a private solar overlooking the sea. He had dismissed his advisers. Only Areo Hotah remained near the door. Doran held a second letter in his lap.
“How badly is he hurt?” Loras demanded, not bothering to even bow in courtesy.
Doran studied him. “Sit.”
“No.”
“Ser Loras.”
“How badly?”
The prince’s expression softened. It made Loras want to flip the table between them.
“A broken collarbone,” Doran said. “Three cracked ribs. A deep wound along his left side. A blow to the head that left him barely unconscious for nearly two days.”
Loras heard each injury and felt them as if they had been inflicted on himself.
“He is traveling with those wounds?”
“He refuses to remain in King’s Landing.”
“Then stop him.”
“I am in Sunspear,” Doran said plainly.
“Send a raven.”
“I have.”
“And?”
Doran held up the letter. “My brother thanked me for my concern and advised me to save my breath for arguments I might win.”
Loras closed his eyes and sighed heavily. It was so precisely Oberyn that for one wild moment he nearly laughed before the sound caught in his throat.
“He could die on the journey.”
“Yes.” Doran did not soften the truth. Loras normally preferred that, but at that moment he hated him for it.
“How long?”
“If the winds favor them, a little more than a week.”
A week of imagining every wave tearing open Oberyn’s stitches. Every storm worsening the fracture. Every hour passing with the uncertainty of whether he would improve or get worse.
Loras paced to the window. Far below, sunlight glittered upon the sea.
“He promised me,” he said. The words escaped before he could stop them.
Doran was silent.
Loras pressed his fist to his mouth. He had not wept when Renly died. At least, not where anyone could see. He had knelt beside Renly’s body with his blood smeared across the tent and felt the world split open. Afterward, he had turned grief into fury because fury could stand upright. Fury could lift a sword. Fury did not beg the gods for something they had already taken.
Oberyn was not dead. But Loras knew now that death did not need to happen twice to destroy a man. Sometimes the threat of it was enough.
“He promised to return,” Loras whispered.
Doran looked down at the letter from his brother. “Then we must trust that he intends to keep his word.”
**********************************************************************
Loras waited while despising every second of it.
There was no enemy to attack. No horse to ride hard enough to exhaust the fear. No tourney to win, no battle plan to study, no useful action that could force the world to obey him.
He trained until his palms split with blisters. He rode along the coast until his horse faltered. He attempted to sleep in Oberyn’s chambers because his own rooms felt unbearable and the prince’s bed still carried a fading trace of citrus and warm spice.
Every morning, Loras climbed the highest western tower to watch for sails. Every evening, he returned after sunset.
Ellaria sent one raven from the sea.
Alive, she wrote. Irritating everyone. Healing poorly because he refuses to remain still. We will arrive within three days.
Loras slept for the first time in nearly a week. On the morning the ship appeared, he was on the tower before dawn. He saw the sails as the sun rose burnt orange against the pale horizon.
Loras did not remember descending the tower. One moment he stood above the palace, staring at the ship. The next he was in the stables saddling his own horse because the grooms were moving too slowly.
He rode to the harbor with six guards struggling to keep pace behind him. The ship had not yet docked when he arrived. Loras dismounted before the horse fully stopped. He stood at the edge of the water while sailors shouted and ropes were thrown ashore.
Ellaria appeared first. The relief in her face when she saw Loras told him more than any raven had.
“He is alive,” she said quickly.
The relief was so profound it left him breathless. “Where?”
“Being difficult.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the most accurate description of his condition.”
Movement appeared behind her. Two sailors emerged carrying a padded chair between them. Oberyn sat in it.
For a heartbeat, Loras did not recognize him.
The prince had lost weight. His skin looked sallow beneath the Dornish sun, bruising dark along one side of his face. His left arm was bound tightly across his chest. Bandages showed beneath the loose black robe he wore.
But his eyes were open. When they found Loras, they became warm.
“You see?” Oberyn called. “Perfectly well.”
Loras could not move.
Every fear he had refused to name stood before him in flesh and black linen.
Oberyn’s smile faltered. “My rose?”
The nickname broke whatever held Loras frozen. He rushed over. The sailors had barely set the chair down before Loras knelt in front of it.
He reached for Oberyn, then stopped himself because there seemed no part of him safe to touch. His face was bruised. One shoulder was broken. His ribs were bound. Even his hands bore cuts across the knuckles.
Oberyn saw the hesitation. He caught Loras’ hand in both of his.
“You took your time,” Loras said brokenly.
Oberyn’s expression changed. The teasing disappeared. “I am sorry.”
“You should be.”
“I encountered some difficulty.”
“You nearly died.”
Oberyn protested. “I did not.”
Loras bowed his head over Oberyn’s hand. For several breaths, he could not speak. Oberyn’s thumb moved weakly across his knuckles.
“I came back.” The prince was watching him with no laughter now, only exhaustion and sincerity. “I told you I would.”
“You were four days late.”
“The winds were against us.”
“You fought the largest man in Westeros.”
“Yes.”
“You allowed him to strike you.”
Oberyn raised one brow. “I did not allow it.”
“You should have moved faster.”
“I was distracted by the spear entering him.”
“Your shoulder is broken.”
“So I have been told..”
Loras stood. Anger came to his rescue at last. “You are a fool.”
Oberyn’s mouth curved. “There he is.”
“Do not smile at me.”
“I am pleased to see you.”
“You returned half-dead.”
“Half is an exaggeration.”
Ellaria moved past them, issuing instructions to the waiting guards and healers.
Loras looked at her. “Tell him.”
“I have been telling him for ten days.”
“Then tell him again.”
“Oberyn,” Ellaria said, “you are half-dead.”
“Betrayed by those I love.”
Loras turned back to him. Love. Perhaps Oberyn had meant it lightly, encompassing Ellaria, his family, and Dorne itself. Oberyn held his gaze. Loras could not ask before sailors and guards. Instead, he tightened his grip around Oberyn’s hand.
“You are not walking.”
“I can walk.”
“No.”
“I crossed the room in King’s Landing.”
“You collapsed against a table,” Ellaria sighed.
“The table was poorly positioned.”
Loras motioned to the sailors. “Carry him.”
Oberyn looked offended. “I am a prince of Dorne.”
“You are an injured fool in a chair.”
“Must the entire harbor hear this?”
“Yes.”
A few nearby sailors hid smiles. Oberyn sighed with great dignity. “Very well. But only because I wish to spare you the shame of being seen arguing with your elders.”
Loras walked beside the chair as they carried Oberyn from the docks.
He did not release his hand once.
**************************************************************
Oberyn’s chambers had been prepared before the ship docked. Fresh linens covered the bed. Heavy curtains blocked the afternoon heat. Medicines, bandages, and bowls of clean water sat at the ready. Two maesters and a Dornish healer followed them inside. Loras remained during the examination. Oberyn attempted to object.
“No,” Loras said.
“I have not yet objected.”
“You were about to.”
“No.”
Loras looked toward the healer. “Has he been this disagreeable the entire time?”
“Worse,” she said. Loras liked her immediately. They removed Oberyn’s robe and unwound the bandages. Loras had thought himself prepared.
Bruises covered Oberyn’s ribs and chest, deep purple fading to sickly yellow along the edges. The wound at his side had been stitched in a long, angry line. His shoulder and collarbone were inflamed beneath the straps holding it close to his body.
Oberyn watched his face. “It appears worse than it is.”
“It appears precisely as bad as it is,” the healer said. “The wound is clean, but the journey strained the stitches. His ribs are healing. The collarbone will require several more weeks of binding.”
“Several weeks?” Oberyn said.
“At least six.”
“Absurd.”
“Eight, if you continue arguing.”
Oberyn looked to Loras for support.
Loras folded his arms. “Twelve.”
“You are all conspiring against me.”
The healer pressed gently along his ribs. Oberyn’s breath caught and his face lost some of its color.
Loras was beside him before he realized he had moved. He took his hand in a grip that was perhaps too tight.
“Breathe,” Loras said.
“I am breathing.”
“Poorly.”
“I have been stabbed.”
“You were not stabbed.”
“The Mountain struck me.”
“With his fist.”
“His fist was the size of an average man’s head.”
Loras brushed damp hair back from Oberyn’s forehead. Oberyn leaned into it shamelessly. Loras had touched him a hundred times with hunger. He had gripped his hair, dragged him into kisses, pressed fingers into his shoulders, and traced his scars beneath the moonlight.
This felt different. There was no heat in it. Only worry, only care.
The healer finished examining the wound and applied fresh salve. New bandages were wrapped around his side. His shoulder was secured again. By the end, Oberyn was trembling with exhaustion and pain, though he tried to hide it by insulting the maesters’ technique.
Once the healers had gone, Ellaria brought a cup of watered wine mixed with milk of the poppy.
Oberyn frowned at it. “No.”
Loras took the cup from her. “Yes.”
“It clouds the mind.”
“You require sleep.”
“I have slept enough.”
“You were unconscious.”
“A deeper form of sleep.”
Loras sat on the edge of the bed.
“Drink.”
Oberyn considered him. “You have become very commanding.”
“You seem to like me that way.”
“Usually.”
“Drink.”
Oberyn accepted the cup. He took one swallow, made a face that would have been comical in any other situation, and attempted to return it.
“All of it.”
“Are you enjoying this?”
“Immensely.”
“You are a cruel rose.”
“You invited me to Dorne.”
“Yes,” Oberyn said softly. “I did.”
Loras lifted the cup to his lips again. Oberyn drank.
“I will speak with Doran,” Ellaria said. “Send for me if his fever returns.”
“Fever?”
Oberyn closed his eyes. “A minor detail.”
Loras turned to Ellaria. “He had a fever?”
“On the ship. It broke yesterday.”
“You should have told me.”
“She knew you would worry,” Oberyn murmured.
“I was already worried.”
“Then she spared you nothing.” Loras glared at him.
Ellaria kissed Oberyn’s brow. “Rest.”
She paused beside Loras, leaned down and whispered conspiratorally, “He would not remain in King’s Landing because he knew you were waiting.”
Oberyn opened his eyes. “Ellaria.”
She ignored him, smiled at Loras, and left. Silence settled over the room.
“You should have stayed until you were stronger.”
“I could not.”
“Why?”
“You know why.”
“I want to hear you say it.”
A faint echo of all the times Oberyn had demanded honesty from him. The prince recognized it too.
“I knew what the raven would say,” Oberyn said. “Victory. Injury. Perhaps grave condition, if Doran’s hand guided the message.”
“It did.”
“I knew you would read it and imagine the worst.”
“I did.”
“I could not lie in that city while you waited here, not knowing.”
Loras looked at their joined hands. “You could have died on the ship.”
“Yes.” The blunt admission hurt. Oberyn’s thumb moved over Loras’s fingers. “But if I had remained in King’s Landing, something in me would have died each day I knew what I was doing to you.”
Loras swallowed. “You cannot say things like that while drugged.”
“I am not drugged,” he slurred, obviously drugged.
“You drank enough milk of the poppy to fell a horse.”
“A small horse.”
Loras laughed despite himself, but it was wet and unsteady.
Oberyn’s expression softened. “There is that smile.”
“Do not.”
“Why?”
“Because I have spent nearly two weeks believing you might die, and if you charm me now, I may forgive you too quickly.”
“I would never wish to deprive you of your anger.”
“It is a considerable amount.”
“I can tell.”
Loras lifted Oberyn’s hand and pressed it against his cheek. For a moment, neither spoke. Oberyn’s palm was calloused from years of spearwork. A healing cut crossed the heel of it. Loras closed his eyes and savored the touch.
“I thought I had lost you,” he whispered.
“You did not.”
“I have heard those words before.”
Loras did not need to speak Renly’s name, but Oberyn heard it anyway. Loras carried the dead man between them more quietly now than he once had, but he carried him still.
“I know,” Oberyn said.
“No, you do not. Renly died without warning. One moment he was speaking, and then—”
His throat closed. Oberyn waited. He did not fill the silence with easy consolation.
“There was so much blood,” Loras continued. “But there was no wound, no blade, no intruder. Nothing I could fight. Nothing I could understand. When I read the raven, I was there again.”
“Loras.”
“I know you are not him. I know this is different. We are different.”
“Yes.”
“But knowing did not matter.”
Oberyn rubbed his thumb against Loras’s cheek. “I am sorry.”
Loras shook his head. “Do not apologize for surviving.”
“I apologize for making you endure the fear.”
“You had to fight him.”
“Yes.”
“I would not have asked you to abandon Elia.”
“I know.”
“I am proud of you.”
Oberyn’s eyes closed briefly. The words healed him in some hidden, wounded place. Loras bent and pressed a careful kiss to his forehead.
“I have been kissed by you in many ways,” Oberyn murmured. “That may be the most dangerous.”
“Why?”
“It makes me want to deserve it.”
“You avenged your sister. You returned to the people who love you. What more must you do?”
“Rest, apparently.”
“For once, you have said something wise.”
Oberyn shifted as though intending to sit higher. Pain crossed his face. Loras pressed one hand lightly to his chest.
“No.”
“I am uncomfortable.”
“Then tell me what you need.”
The question seemed to surprise him. Oberyn was accustomed to taking care of others. Defending them. Pleasuring them. Anticipating their wants before they were spoken. Even injured, he had returned because he could not bear for Loras to suffer uncertainty.
He was less accustomed to being the one in need.
“Another pillow,” Oberyn said reluctantly. Loras arranged it behind him.
“Higher.”
Loras adjusted it.
“A little to the left.”
“You are enjoying this.”
“Perhaps.”
Loras moved it again. Oberyn settled with a small sigh.
“Better?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
The prince considered him. “Share this bed with me.”
“There is the Red Viper,” Loras said. “I had wondered where he went.”
“He is recovering.”
“Poorly.”
“Come here.”
Loras removed his boots and climbed onto the bed with exaggerated care. He lay on Oberyn’s uninjured side, leaving a cautious distance between them.
Oberyn frowned. “You are across the Narrow Sea.”
“I am beside you.”
“Barely.”
“I do not wish to crack another rib.”
“My right arm is uninjured.” Oberyn demonstrated by hooking his hand around Loras’s waist.
The movement pulled at his side. He winced. Loras immediately caught his wrist. Loras shifted closer under his own power.
He rested carefully against Oberyn’s right side, one hand flat upon the mattress so none of his weight pressed against the injured ribs. Oberyn’s arm curled around him.
The prince’s body was warmer than it should have been. Loras touched his forehead.
“You still have a fever.”
“I have always run hot.”
“This is different.”
“You know my body so well?”
“Yes.”
Loras moved his palm from Oberyn’s forehead to his cheek.
“I know when you are truly tired rather than bored. I know when your shoulder aches after spear practice, even though you roll it only once. I know you sleep more deeply when there is rain. I know you pretend not to like sweet wine and drink mine whenever you think I am not watching.”
Oberyn’s eyes softened.
“I know your body,” Loras repeated. “And your body is feverish.”
“You have been watching me.”
“You are worth watching.” Oberyn smiled at the stolen words.
Loras leaned forward and kissed him gently. It was the softest kiss they had shared.
Oberyn made no attempt to deepen it. He simply breathed against Loras’s mouth and held him with what strength remained in his uninjured arm.
“You should sleep,” Loras whispered.
“So commanding.”
“Yes.”
“Will you remain?”
The question was quiet enough that Loras nearly pretended not to hear it. Oberyn Martell feared very little. At least, that was what the songs claimed. But beneath the pride and pain and medicine, Loras heard the fear that Oberyn would wake alone.
“I will remain.”
“Until I sleep?”
“Until you wake.”
“And after?”
Loras brushed dark hair from his brow. “For as long as you need me.”
Oberyn’s eyelids lowered. “I may require an extensive recovery.”
“I suspected as much.”
“Perhaps months.”
“The healer said eight weeks.”
“She lacks imagination.”
Loras smiled. Oberyn’s breathing began to slow. For several minutes, Loras believed he had fallen asleep.
“I killed him.” Oberyn’s eyes remained closed.
“Yes.”
“He confessed.”
“I heard.”
“Elia knows.”
Loras’s chest tightened. “I think she does.”
A tear slipped from the corner of Oberyn’s closed eye into his hair. He did not appear aware of it. Loras brushed it away.
“You came home,” he whispered.
Oberyn’s arm tightened faintly around him.
“Home,” he repeated.
Then at last he slept.
**********************************************************
Oberyn awoke before dawn.
The chamber was dark except for the dying glow of a lamp near the terrace. For several confused moments, he did not know where he was.
Then he felt the familiar sea breeze, smelled the citrus trees below, and became aware of the golden head resting against his uninjured shoulder.
The young knight had kept his word. He lay curled carefully beside Oberyn, one hand resting lightly against his chest. Even asleep, he had positioned himself protectively between Oberyn and the edge of the bed.
Oberyn watched him. Loras looked younger in sleep. Not soft exactly. There remained a tension between his brows, as if he fought even in dreams. But his practiced composure was gone. There was no courtly smile, no armor, no proud lift of the chin.
Oberyn lifted his hand and touched one golden curl.
Loras woke instantly. His eyes opened, confused and alert.
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“Are you in pain?”
“No.”
“Do not lie.”
“I wished to look at you.”
Loras stared. Then anger replaced fear. “You woke me because you wished to look at me?”
“I did not wake you intentionally.”
“You touched my hair.”
“It was there.”
“Where else would it be?”
Oberyn smiled.
Loras touched his forehead. “Your fever is lower.”
“I told you I was fine.”
“You are not fine.”
“Improving, then.”
“That I will allow.”
Loras started to rise. Oberyn’s hand caught weakly at his sleeve.
“Where are you going?”
“To fetch water.”
“Send for a servant.”
“It is not yet dawn.”
“There are always servants.”
Loras looked down at the fingers holding his sleeve. Oberyn released him. The movement was almost embarrassed.
Loras’s expression softened. “I will return.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Oberyn looked away.
“What is it?” Loras asked patiently.
Oberyn considered evasion, but he was too tired for it. “I am not accustomed to this.”
“Being injured?”
“Being tended to.”
“You have healers.”
“They repair wounds.”
“And Ellaria?”
“She has cared for me.” Oberyn traced the embroidered edge of the blanket with one finger. “But she knows better than to indulge me so thoroughly.”
“She told me to make you drink the medicine.”
“She betrayed me to you.”
“She loves you.”
“Yes. Men have desired me. Women have loved me. My daughters climb upon me whenever they please, and Doran has been worrying over my recklessness since we were boys.”
Oberyn looked at him. “I am accustomed to touch. I am not accustomed to being handled as though I am precious.”
Loras’s face changed. “You are precious.”
Oberyn’s breath stopped.
“You are,” he repeated. “To Dorne. To your daughters. To Ellaria. To your brother.”
His hand moved carefully over Oberyn’s chest, settling above his heart.
“To me.”
Oberyn covered it with his own. The sincerity in Loras’s eyes was almost unbearable.
He had been called prince, lover, Viper, warrior, murderer. Precious felt more intimate than any of them.
“You have a cruel way with words,” Oberyn whispered.
“You taught me.”
“I taught you seduction.”
“You taught me honesty.”
Oberyn drew Loras’s hand to his mouth and kissed his knuckles. The gesture was tender, but Loras’s eyes darkened with remembered fear.
“You frightened me,” he said.
“I know.”
“I am still angry.”
“I know.”
“You are not permitted to nearly die again.”
“That may prove difficult to promise.”
“Oberyn.”
“I will try.”
“That is not enough.”
“It is the truth.” He would fight again. They both would. Men like them were shaped by blades, duty, pride, and grief. No promise could make death forget their names. Oberyn touched Loras’s jaw.
“I cannot swear that I will never be hurt,” he said. “But I swear I will never throw my life away while you are waiting for me.”
“You nearly did.”
“No.” Oberyn’s gaze held his. “I wanted justice. But when I lay in the sand and could not stand, I thought of Dorne.”
His thumb moved over Loras’s cheek. “I thought of you.”
“You should have thought sooner.”
“I was occupied.”
“With taunting a giant.”
“It was excellent taunting.”
“You arrogant fool.”
“My beautiful rose.”
Loras leaned down and kissed him. The kiss tasted faintly of salt. Neither acknowledged why.
When it ended, Loras rested his forehead against Oberyn’s.
“I love you,” he said. The words were barely louder than a breath.
Oberyn became utterly still, then reached for him. The movement sent pain through his shoulder and ribs, but he did not release him.
“Again,” he said.
“Do not make me repeat it.”
“I nearly died.”
“That will not win every argument.”
“Only this one.”
Loras’s mouth trembled. “I love you.”
Oberyn closed his eyes.
For a moment, the pain receded. Gregor was dead. Elia was avenged, but the wound remained, as did the grief. All the dead remained beyond his reach.
But Loras was here.
Alive and warm beneath his hand.
Loving him not as the Viper, not as the legend, not as the dangerous prince whose appetites were favored among court gossip.
Loving him injured, stubborn, feverish, and afraid.
“I love you too.”
Loras exhaled as though he had been struck.
Oberyn smiled. “Do not look so surprised.”
“You have not said it before.”
“I have said many things.”
“Not that.”
“No.”
“Why now?”
“Because you have already seen me carried through Sunspear in a chair. I have little dignity left to protect.”
Loras laughed, the sound breaking halfway through.
Oberyn drew him closer with his good arm.
“Careful,” Loras murmured.
“Yes, my love.”
The words made Loras go quiet. Oberyn felt his smile against his cheek. They remained that way until the first sunlight touched the terrace. Eventually Loras rose to fetch water, returning with a servant, fresh bandages, and enough food for several men.
He bullied Oberyn through breakfast. He argued with the healer over the proper height of his pillows, then argued with Oberyn over whether he was permitted to leave the bed.
He was sharp, anxious, overprotective, and beautiful. Oberyn allowed all of it.
He still complained with great dedication. He insisted he could hold his own cup. He threatened to escape to the Water Gardens when Loras suggested another dose of medicine.
But each time Loras touched his forehead, Oberyn leaned unconsciously into his palm. Each time Loras adjusted the blankets, Oberyn watched him with an expression too tender to hide. And when exhaustion overtook him again, it was Loras’s hand he sought beneath the sheets.
Loras gave it without hesitation.
He sat beside the bed as Oberyn slept, sword within reach and sunlight gathering around his golden hair.
Guarding him.
Not because the Red Viper was weak or incapable of defending himself, but because even dangerous men deserved somewhere safe to heal.
Oberyn had returned to Dorne expecting to find a lover waiting.
Instead, he found a home.