Part One

Mattin didn't like to think that he stumbled into the king's rooms, but the guards at the outer door moved toward him as if to catch him if he fell, so he certainly wasn't graceful. He ignored his blush and the heat beneath his skin that was fading too slowly for his liking. His cool bath that morning had not soothed any of his aches and pains, but had at least left him clean and smelling of icy mint, which he hoped would keep his mind clear enough for him to get some work done today.

He'd fallen behind, caught unawares once again by his lust-fever despite how it occurred regularly every four months in everyone fae-blessed. Anyone with fae blood was afflicted—given gifts—in some way, although some fortunate souls were granted little more than occasional discomfort and others experienced no discomfort or fevers of any kind but had drive enough to match the needs of the third kind. Blessed, the third kind were called, though Mattin had never felt so.

The lust-fevers, or heats, as he'd heard some refer to them recently, were a messy, sticky, uncomfortable, humiliating business, and that didn't even bring in the care required to not end up with child should Mattin ever be so fortunate as to have a partner, or how the heats interrupted his work.

Mattin loved his work. He enjoyed reading, and studying, and digging through records until he found information that was needed. It helped that books and scrolls didn't care if he was a bit on the plain side for a Blessed, and too insignificant, even for a beat-of-four, for anyone to take a real interest in. Not seriously anyway, not beyond conversation at parties.

Not that Mattin went to many parties these days. The palace was finally starting to feel settled and calm again after years of warring, coups, and chaos, but there was much work to be done to keep it that way, and Mattin was happier to be useful to the new king than he was to fuss over his appearance just to attend a party where he'd end up tipsy on wine in a corner ignored by all and far from the king and his husband on the other side of the room if they happened to be there.

Mattin enjoyed a chance to show off pretty clothes and any new jewelry purchases, but he'd made a special effort to look nice for those parties. It was expected, even though the king and his husband were not the sort to wear much jewelry—or care for parties, to be honest. But Mattin's extra effort had not resulted in much. He'd taken to bringing his work with him to the last few such gatherings he'd attended, and no one except for the king and his husband had interrupted him, which said it all.

Mattin did care. He was honest enough with himself to admit that. But his lack of appeal was only on his mind now because he was fresh, or not-so-fresh, from a fever, and stingingly aware that his lust-fevers wouldn't be so difficult or exhausting if he had help in getting through them. A friend would have done, if he found one he trusted enough to let them see him… like that.

He shuddered a little at the thought, nearly bumping into a chair as he made his way to the king's study—unoccupied by the king, as usual. Arden of the Canamorra was a noble with a noble's education, and had a sharp mind, but he had also spent almost two decades living the active life of an outguard with his guard husband, and sitting at a desk for any length of time was something he avoided when he could.

Of course, at this hour of the morning, Arden would not have been at his desk anyway. He and his husband were still in their sitting room enjoying breakfast. If they hadn't been, Mattin didn't think the guards would have waved him in.

Mattin paused on the other side of the thick curtains that separated the study from the sitting room, straightening his clothes and inhaling the cooling scent of mint to keep all lingering fever thoughts at a distance. Then, with one anxious tug on his long braid, he pushed the curtain aside.

The conversation from the two at the table before the fireplace stopped.

Arden—that was, the king, as Mattin kept forgetting to call him of late—rose to his feet, entirely too much concern on his handsome, scarred face as he towered over Mattin.

Mattin quickly looked away from Arden to Arden's husband, only to find Mil outright scowling.

"You look ready to fall over," Mil growled, not pleased. "Are you ill? It's those useless clothes you wear, Sass." He insisted upon the nickname and Mattin was too flustered and tired to offer his usual polite objection. "They may be pretty and fine, and they suit you well, but we've had weeks of rain and now snow and yet you never dress for it."

"My love," Arden remarked to cut Mil off, "be gentle with him. He seems ready to fall over as it is."

"I…" It was all Mattin managed. Then Mil was up, towering over Mattin even more than his husband did, and Mattin was being carefully but firmly urged onto the cushioned sofa on one side of their table and Arden was sitting back down to offer Mattin tea in Mattin's favorite cup.

Mattin should not have a favorite cup at the king's table and had certainly never been so improper as to say he did. Nonetheless, the cup, painted with delicate nasturtium vines, seemed to be on their table every morning now. At least, every morning that Mattin came here to share information with Arden at Arden's request and to help him and Mil plan their days.

That was a task not required or expected of a Master Keeper at the Great Library, but Mattin was happy to do it, and the palace's Head of House, Cael of the Rossick, was grateful for the help in corralling "their stubborn king and his only slightly more reasonable husband." A funny description, as most nobles in the palace thought Mil was the uncouth, stubborn one and Arden—noble, even if also Canamorra—the one capable of being reasoned with.

Mattin had to hold his cup in both hands to keep his tremors from causing a splash, but he didn't miss how Arden and Mil exchanged a glance at that.

"I'm getting a healer," Mil announced when their look ended, and started to stand up again.

"No, no!" Mattin rushed to assure him, taking one hand from his teacup and immediately spilling some tea onto the plate that had mysteriously appeared on the table in front of him. The tea soaked into a sweet bun. Mattin stared at the bun blearily for a moment, certain he'd heard the king say that he didn't care for sweet buns with raisins and that Mil preferred the buns with cream in the center. Yet there was a sweet bun with raisins and honey, what Mattin liked, and it had company on the plate.

"Yes, I think," Arden calmly overruled Mattin, then reached over to take Mattin's cup and fill it with more tea before handing it back. "You're unwell, Mat—Keeper Arlylian. Drink that now."

Arden said it pleasantly, but it was an order.

Mattin started to grow hotter in a way that had nothing to do with blushes or his proximity to the fireplace. Lust-fevers were slow to fade sometimes, and harder to manage when he was around Arden and Mil, who were fae-touched in the opposite way as Mattin and were unfortunately also large and handsome and smelled wonderful as only those fae-gifted could smell. Mattin couldn't even explain it to himself, but they did.

They smelled like a good nest should smell.

It was dreadfully embarrassing although Mattin tried not to be obvious about sniffing them.

"I'm not unwell," he muttered at last, looking away from Arden's dark eyes as he drank his tea. The cup was plucked from his trembling hands the moment he was finished and filled again, with more milk added. Mil leaned across the table to nudge the plate closer to Mattin.

Mattin kept his attention on the tea, hoping the steam would explain away any red in his cheeks as the king and his husband unknowingly acted like a pair of Gifted out to court a Blessed, offering food and care and the Blessed's favorite things.

He sipped from the second cup, swallowed, then murmured, "Thank you. But I'm not unwell."

"I must disagree." Arden continued to sound mild but Mattin wasn't fooled. Arden was crafty, as many a beat-of-four in the palace had learned too late.

"First, you disappear for three days," Mil remarked, "then you show up looking like the fae brought you back from death."

That wasn't an idle comparison. Mattin raised his head without thinking and found Mil glaring at him and Arden together. Arden had quite famously been brought back to life by the fae after dying in Mil's arms. Mattin turned toward him too, then away when Arden reached out to stroke his husband's cheek with the back of one hand.

"I am sorry, my love," he said, as he always said whenever that day was mentioned. Since it was part of how Arden had ended up on the throne, it was mentioned frequently.

"Be that as it may," Mil continued grumpily after a few moments of silence that left Mattin dizzy, "there's still something wrong with our Sass."

It tricked Mattin into looking up again. He did his best to focus. "There isn't," he insisted. "Anyway, we have more important matters to discuss. I'm sorry I was absent, but I have the information you requested on the old Savirin lands."

"Now that I think on it," Arden commented in a suddenly breezy tone, "I seem to recall you being absent like this once before, Keeper Arlylian. At least once. When you first started to come to council meetings." He took a bun from the plate before Mattin, tore it in two, and held one of the halves out to Mattin until Mattin took it.

The bun smelled amazing. Mattin's stomach gurgled loudly enough to probably be heard by the distant guards and he ducked his head to try to eat with some decorum instead of shoving the whole thing in his mouth.

The rest of the bun was placed in his hand before he'd finished chewing. He looked up. Arden gazed back at him. The light in his eyes might have been fondness or it might have been playful teasing about Mattin's appetite that Arden held in. "There's more," Arden told him, voice a little rough, "help yourself."

Mattin glanced to Mil, who had a similar light in his eyes. For that reason, despite his gnawing hunger, Mattin took his time breaking the bun into smaller pieces to finish it, eating each one as neatly and carefully as possible. Then he went back to his tea. He wasn't about to get teased for eating like a beast in front of them. They wouldn't care; they were used to life outside the palace and the rough work of outguards, but they knew Mattin thought differently about such matters.

Soft hands, Mil also liked to call him. Or sparkly wee thing. The kind of person to use a daintily painted teacup and not the sturdy mugs they used.

"I know how to feed myself." Mattin said it firmly.

"You sure about that?" Mil squinted at him. "Are you thinner than usual too? Fuck me, I know he's a Master Keeper at the Great Library, but a keeper of his own is what he needs. Someone to take a stand when he works all night and falls asleep in his chair or forgets his cloak for the dozenth time."

Arden handed Mattin another bun from Mattin's own plate. Well, from the plate of buns they had given him.

"You could eat your own breakfasts, instead of nitpicking mine," Mattin grumbled at them, then jolted. "That wasn't sass," he added quickly. "It wasn't."

Mil grinned widely. "Feeling better already to be sassing his king like that."

Mattin slouched down in his chair to tear his bun apart. Even with that, he managed to finish it in record time.

"A third?" Arden asked smoothly. "Or perhaps some fruit first?"

"How do you even have those buns here anyway?" Mattin wondered, not with sass, while accepting the orange slice Arden put into his palm. He hadn't even seen Arden peel the orange but he could smell it in the air, the citrus new and sharp among the warm tea and the honey on the buns. Beneath that, he could still smell Arden and Mil, their scents hot in that way that Gifted scents were, strong and only stronger when Mattin was weakened. The cool mint seemed entirely gone.

"Asked for ‘em," Mil said around his slice of orange, which Arden continued to hand to each of them without taking any for himself. "You feeling better? You sure?"

"He doesn't want us to fuss, my love," Arden told his husband, sounding so deeply saddened by this that even though Mattin knew that Arden was doing it to get a response from him, he looked up with his protest ready.

His protest fell to nothing. They were both watching him expectantly, maybe even hopefully. It was a trick meant to tease the truth from him because they were nosy and Arden was commanding, but also because, for whatever reason, they cared.

Mattin shivered. He had forgotten his cloak today, but in his defense, he wasn't chilled. He wouldn't feel the cold again until at least tomorrow.

If he explained that, Mil would argue that Mattin's body was still affected by the cold even if Mattin didn't want to admit it, and he'd do better to be bundled up. Then Arden would gently chide Mil for scolding him before saying something about winter illnesses and how easily they spread, and Mattin would end up going back to his room for a cloak despite how it would take time from his schedule.

It wasn't because Mattin was a Blessed and they were Gifted, though many might think so, assuming that just because a Blessed might demand to be taken care of in bed, they wanted that the rest of the time too. It was simply that it was nice to have anyone care about Mattin here in the capital, far from home and his family. Mattin was, after all, the youngest of a youngest, and except for within the Great Library's walls, he was not especially noticeable or interesting. Unlike his king and his king's beloved husband.

They were both so incredible, Mattin reflected with a sadness of his own. Remarkable for leaving the palace behind when they had been younger than Mattin was now, and returning only out of duty. Heroes, the two of them. They had saved the palace and everyone in it from the last tyrannical and murderous ruler, with one of them dying in the attempt and the other acting so bravely songs had been written about it. Then they'd chosen to stay here to govern despite Arden's fear of acting cruelly like so many in his family had when they had ruled—the Canamorra were a family ancient, proud, and often terrible. Since then, he and Mil had worked hard to keep the peace, which only made them more heroic, at least to Mattin. And then, of course, both of them were fatally attractive in different ways: Mil, big and broad and seemingly rough. Arden, dark and watchful and only slightly smaller than his husband.

And Gifted, when many whispered that the fae-gifted were meant to serve the fae-blessed. It wasn't fair.

Mattin wouldn't have allowed himself to dwell on it if he'd been feeling better.

He sighed tiredly and ignored how alarmed they both grew at the sound.

"If you two weren't so… you, you'd recognize that I'm not ill. I'm just post-fever," he said to the refilled cup of tea set in front of him. "That's all. I'm Blessed. Didn't you know?" He'd always assumed others could smell it the way he could smell them. Most Gifted certainly seemed to have no trouble finding a Blessed if they wanted one, and those in between did as they pleased.

Silence fell and stayed. Mattin considered running but wasn't sure his legs would carry him.

Finally, Mil grunted. "Never seen anyone post-fever look like you did when you walked in."

"Blessed?" Arden asked, tone suspiciously light. "But Cael was surprised along with us when you were absent before. She was worried."

Cael of the Rossick, intimidating both for her family name and for her stern competence, had worried for Mattin. Mattin was going to die of embarrassment.

Arden carried on as if he didn't see Mattin's panic, although of course he did. "I know that though the timing differs for each of you Blessed, your fevers are every four months as long as you are of age and not with child. Which…" Arden's tone slipped into something darker. "Which I do not believe you are."

Mil made an unhappy sound. "Never heard a word of him with anyone, but I reckon mistakes can happen, even with friends and fever-partners."

"I'm not—" Mattin glared across the table at Mil, caught himself glaring, then sank back down to drink some of his third cup of tea. "I'm not pregnant," he hissed at last, horrified at the very idea though humiliatingly damp in his trousers to imagine getting that way. It didn't help that when he thought of a fever-breeding, he thought of Mil and Arden between his legs.

He was more than damp now and shuddered violently before trying to hide behind his teacup. "And I don't have a fever-partner or anyone else. Obviously." He scrubbed one stinging cheek.

Arden reached for him without touching him. "Apologies, Keeper Arlylian. Truly. We were only concerned."

Mattin released another weary sigh and put the cup down. "I know."

He decided not to think about the look they exchanged then.

"So… there's no one?" Mil pressed after a pause, sitting back when Arden narrowed his eyes at him. "I mean," Mil turned to Mattin with innocence, real or false, "it's just that I thought it was easier for you to have someone with you for it. That's what they always said when they asked us to—"

He stopped far too abruptly.

Mattin felt a spike of something, not pain, not pleasure, not even envy. Something.

"You've helped Blesseds through their fevers before?" His voice held something unknown as well, which would never have happened if he'd been properly taken care of, or at least had remembered his fever coming and overfed himself in the days before it hit to make up for the toll it took on his body.

"Well, they asked." Mil glanced to his husband. "He's upset. I've upset him." It was clearly a demand for Arden to do something about it, as though Mil was sometimes like a fae-blessed with his husband and expected to be taken care of.

Arden looked at Mattin. "It was our pleasure to help. Although we haven't done so in some time. Not since before we ever returned to the palace. Mostly when we were younger. But it was an honor to do it." He said it seriously, the way people were supposed to have said it in ancient, and probably still embarrassing, rituals. "And a joy."

Mattin only barely kept himself from squirming in his seat. He was too close to his fever to handle learning this. He opened his mouth, then closed it with a snap and sat there until his stomach gurgled again.

"Shall I order food for you?" Arden suggested, almost tentative. Almost, but not quite, because he was Arden Canamorra. "A solid meal perhaps? The buns are not enough? You're still pale, Mattin—Master Arlylian."

"Did you do this for them too?" Mattin heard himself demand, and then, horrified with himself, jumped to his feet, nearly knocking into the table. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come here today. Usually, I stay in my office so that I can work without seeing anyone and…." He shut his mouth again when Mil growled.

"You work after your fevers? You're supposed to rest." Mil was still growling. It was making Mattin weak in entirely new ways. "Someone should make you rest if you won't, you wee, stubborn thing."

Someone meant Arden, and Mattin got a little more wet at the idea of Arden commanding him to stay in bed, no matter how politely Arden would phrase it.

"I can return tomorrow. I'll be better," Mattin promised quickly. Then his chin came up as the rest of Mil's words sank in. "Stubborn? I'm not… I'm not stubborn. You have to do this all on your own when you're like me. You wouldn't understand. But I'm fine. I just forget, sometimes. I'm working and I don't think to feed myself more in the days beforehand. Then I come out of it and I'm," weakened and exhausted, "more tired than I should be."

"Like you?" Mil asked, echoing him in confusion.

Arden was gentler. "I thought there were signs to warn you. I thought there were cravings, and temperature changes, and slowly increasing desires. You get absorbed in your work, Mattin—Keeper Arlylian, but to the point of that?"

"There's no one?" Mil asked again. "I don't understand."

"You wouldn't." Mattin crossed his arms over his chest. "It's a Blessed problem." Albeit one other Blesseds didn't seem to have. "It doesn't matter, really, except that I'm sorry I fell behind and failed you."

Arden's response was immediate. "You didn't."

"Sass," Mil began. He was probably going to apologize for not realizing the extent of Mattin's plainness.

"Really," Mattin cut him off firmly, "it's fine. Or it will be once I eat some more."

"And rest properly?" Arden wondered, mild again, worryingly so.

Arden Canamorra grew up with palace intrigue and bloody reprisals and the deaths of most his family. He didn't share his softer emotions with others often. Almost never, Mattin sometimes thought. And when he did, even sometimes when he was in the privacy of his sitting room with just his husband and Mattin, he'd hide them.

He did that now, because he was worried. For Mattin.

A long, soft whine escaped Mattin, silencing whatever Mil had been going to say and making Arden pull in a breath.

A weak, hungry, unsatisfied Blessed. That's what Mattin sounded like.

He looked into their suddenly fixed, intent gazes, one after the other, then was ashamed to say he squeaked before bolting from the room.

He bolted past the study in the same manner and then out of the door, leaving the guards to stare after him. His legs carried him to his room before they gave out, and he curled up on the soiled sheets he hadn't had a chance to send to be laundered while he tried to contemplate everything but the king or the king's husband's concern.

At least, until a knock on his door announced the arrival of food, specially ordered from the kitchens for him by the king and his husband.

Mattin waited a day in his room, as he should have done from the start, and then took a few days to keep to the library and make sure his contact with the king and his husband was limited to notes, which Mattin sent to Cael and had her pass them on.

When Mattin entered the council chamber after that, freshly bathed, his stylishly long hair held neatly in place with new clasps of colored glass in the shape of cherries, his stomach full of a meal that hadn't only been cold tea and stale pastries found in his office, he nodded in greeting to both the king and his husband and then kept to the back of the room as he always did.

When he saw them in their sitting room the following morning, Mattin's humiliating post-fever behavior was not spoken of. He spotted a sweet bun on the table, but it was not placed on a plate and set in front of him. His favorite teacup remained, but he poured his own tea into it.

He was warmed with gratitude at their thoughtfulness and saddened to know he would never be accidentally cared for again now that they knew about him. Foolish, to feel both things, but at least they were feelings Mattin could keep to himself.

Of course, it helped that he was far out of his fever time and that he had plenty of work to keep him distracted.

Some of the old families, the noblest of noble blood, of lines so ancient their names often held four beats, were still making trouble for Arden and the country's tentative peace. Their pride could not be allowed to cause more blood to be spilled, especially not Arden's. Mattin would not allow it, although admittedly, unlike Mil and Arden he was no warrior, and the best he could do was providing Arden with whatever information he required to appease or silence the more annoying beat-of-fours.

There was nothing more satisfying than watching Arden do just that. Well, perhaps some things were more satisfying but Mattin was unlikely to find out for himself. It was only unfortunate that Mattin had the regular work of a Master Keeper at the Great Library to keep him busy as well. Perhaps overly busy, at times.

Mattin didn't mean to fall asleep at his desk, as he had assured Mil more than once. He never intended to forget meals. There was just always something else that needed to be done and he got distracted.

The matter of cloaks… that was more that Mattin had other things on his mind. But it didn't matter much anyway. Mattin spent most of his time inside the library, and the spring and summer months meant he didn't need a cloak.

Mattin was sweating in his tiny office already and it was not even noon. He looked to his fireplace more than once, surprised each time to see no fire lit. He pulled at his clothes, newly made and surely not too tight around the collar despite how they tugged and pinched him today. He scowled at the ancient scroll in front of him, written in archaic language in faded ink, which was why the words melded together and were giving him a headache.

He would open the office's small window but the last time he'd tried, he'd unfortunately happened to hear a library assistant and member of the outguard fucking in some alcove behind the building. That happened from time to time. It was a game to the assistants, Mattin suspected, although he'd never been propositioned by any outguards when he'd been an assistant. He had spoken to outguards in the course of his duties, of course, but nothing had ever come of it. The palace had been different then, full of danger and spies and paranoia. Everyone had been tense and afraid, and Mattin wasn't the kind of person who could easily coax smiles from others. He shouldn't ache over it now. He shouldn't even be thinking of it, or how it would feel to have an outguard's callused hands tear away his fine, new clothes.

He wouldn't like that anyway, he was certain. Mattin was fond of his clothing and didn't want it torn, especially not for some one-off encounter with a guard, no matter how big or kind or Gifted they were.

But think of it he did, and the breathless sounds the assistant had been making, and realized he was growing aroused right as someone knocked quickly on the door. Thankfully, Mattin was seated at his desk and all anyone would see that might give him away was his reddened face.

Elbi, an assistant, gave him a small, almost nervous smile. "Apologies," she began before stepping into the room, which put her at Mattin's desk because Mattin's office truly was tiny. "We found these outside," she added in a strange tone, not meeting his eyes as she held up a pair of gloves, "and thought they might be yours or that you might know whose they were. They're very fine."

That they were, although they were obviously not Mattin's. The gloves were large, made of sturdy leather, and well used. They looked more like a guard's gloves than a librarian's, although they were also clearly well-made and would have cost more than most guards would spend. Most librarians too; Mattin was unusual for being noble and choosing to work here. That and his interest in fashions made him a good person to ask about the gloves, although he didn't know why Elbi seemed to expect him to hold onto them. She left the gloves on his desk and then ducked out of the room before Mattin could say a word. She shut the door behind her.

Mattin picked up the gloves to better examine them, so hot he was prickling with sweat and didn't want to imagine wearing anything so heavy. Just the weight in his palm was enough to make his cheeks sting, and the scent…. He knew the scent of the leather, anyone would, but this was something else on top of that. Something familiar. Something hot and strong.

He pulled the gloves away from his face when he realized he was sniffing them and hastily set them down so he could continue his work.

The words did not stop swimming. The room was sweltering. Mattin couldn't wait for summer to end and it had not even begun yet. His clothes were too tight, which was vexing. The gloves were heavy in his hands and warm against his face, their scent pleasing. He thought there was a hint of herbs beneath everything else, the kind that reminded him of remedies from a healer, as though the wearer had been bruised and worn ointment on their skin. The rest of the scent was confusing but good, weighty like the gloves themselves.

Mattin put them down. He picked them up. They were Mil's, he suspected, or maybe Arden's, or maybe shared between them. They shouldn't have been in the library unless Arden and Mil had stopped in. Although that meant they had been near and hadn't come to see Mattin.

Which was ridiculous. They had no reason to.

Mattin took a deep breath. He smelled Gifted. He felt Arden and Mil in his lungs and then in his blood, and licked sweat from his lip only to get the taste of leather instead.

He was so hot.

He was…

"Oh no," Mattin said aloud, and stumbled from his chair to the door. He had sense enough to stop Elbi and tell her he was leaving and why, and to ask if she wouldn't mind having something to eat sent to his room. Then he didn't remember much of anything, not clearly anyway, which he was pathetically grateful for when he woke in a moment of lucidity on the floor by the side of his bed with his face buried in the palm of one glove, and the other pressed to where he was slick and wet.

His fever had only lasted two horrible days instead of three, he was surprised to discover. He was still weakened when it was over—the meal he'd ordered at the start barely touched—and he had once again forgotten to stuff himself in the days before the heat had consumed him. But perhaps because Mattin had asked for food at the beginning of his fever, on his day of rest, Elbi knocked on his door and handed him a basket of sweets from the kitchen and told him to get better soon. She didn't mention the gloves. Mattin silently thanked the fae for that.

In the autumn, Mattin forgot his cloak yet again before his breakfast meeting with Arden and Mil—with the king and his husband—and was given Mil's to borrow, which did not help Mattin scowl any less as a headache plagued him through the day, although he did appreciate the cloak and tried to be careful with it. He'd already cost them a pair of gloves, though he'd never brought up the matter like the coward he was; he wasn't going to take a cloak from them too.

But Mil didn't ask for the cloak's return, and Arden softly requested some of the old Canamorra scrolls from the library while handing Mattin a slice of apple tart, and then another slice, and finally an apple itself for Mattin to take to the library with him, and while Mattin was there, he received a note from Arden with an additional question about Canamorra history. The paper was crisp but Mattin would have sworn Arden had worn the paper close to his skin because Arden's scent filled the cubby Mattin had climbed into to dig through ancient records.

Then he'd found what Arden had last asked for—the copy of a copy of a copy of drawing of a tapestry long since lost to time, which depicted one of the ancient Canamorra on the day of their hand-fasting. A wedding portrait that was still so beautiful, even as a copy of a copy of a copy, that Mattin curled up in the cubby on Mil's cloak to stare at it, with the fur at his cheek and Arden's letter in his pocket.

Master Arlylian, Arden had addressed him, always using Mattin's earned rank at the library as if aware Mattin worried over being taken seriously, being a Master Keeper so young. Mattin liked that.

He liked it when Mil called him Sass too although he could never tell Mil he did because Mil would be smug. Mil thought Mattin had spirit, even though Mattin really didn't. Mattin was dusty and quite boring in addition to his plainness.

He reread Arden's note as took the clasps out of his hair, then ate his apple and felt almost at peace as he made his way through an account of the hand-fasting in question. He didn't know why when nothing of the account was exactly peaceful. The early Canamorra had seized power quite forcefully, something seemingly at odds with the yearning and passion in the stories of that hand-fasting. What Mattin would have assumed was a political alliance was, to the Canamorra, a romance to make Mattin blush and sigh as he read it and reread it.

Canamorra would give their loves anything they asked for, up to and including an entire country. That was what Mattin felt was beneath the story.

He had no idea why Arden would need these records, or why he needed them now, or how Mattin was going to discuss them with Arden without looking at Mil and wondering if Mil was often taken as many had imagined the first Canamorra taking his beloved, how he was going to look at them both and not imagine himself taken as well.

When the first pull from his lower body came—the first sharp enough to make him notice—it was with only quiet surprise and then delight that he'd spotted his fever coming for once. He wished he'd noticed enough to start eating more days ago, but at least it explained why he was so tired and why his pretty hair clasps had pained him. He scooped up the scrolls and climbed out of the cubby before gathering Mil's cloak about him and walking to the king's room.

Arden and Mil were not there, although the guards let Mattin in. Mattin frowned over that a bit, but then another pull hit him, harder than before, and he had to lean against the wall to catch his breath and get his legs to work again. When he recovered, he set the scrolls on their table, a little startled to notice the table held a bowl overflowing with fat, luscious apples and a basket of buns and nut cakes from the kitchen that it hadn't held that morning.

Arden and Mil wouldn't begrudge Mattin either, he knew, but still hesitated. Then his stomach growled with enough force to feel nearly as bad as the tugging, pulling, growing, inexorable need from his lower body. He ended up stuffing a nut cake—two cakes—in his mouth so the guards wouldn't see, and taking an additional apple and pastry with him as he made his way back to his room.

In the winter, Mil unexpectedly took Mattin and Cael with him on a tour of the new barracks for the unattached palace guards, and sat Mattin down next to him to eat a meal with all of them. It was plainer fare than the nobles ate, but Mattin emptied his bowl of stew and half of the plate of bread and butter that Cael insisted she didn't want, and then ate the other half when Mil said he didn't want any either.

Arden told him his brother had been practicing his needlework and had made Arden a chair cushion he didn't need, and offered it to Mattin for his office.

For a cushion Arden didn't need, it smelled of him quite a lot, and of Mil as well, much more than the cloak that Mattin had shoved under his bed and never returned to Mil out of fear of Mil finding out that Mattin had drooled and mouthed at the fur lining while rubbing his small Blessed cock against it, his nose full of the scent of the king, of Mil, while he tried to fill his emptiness with his fingers.

Even thinking of it was enough to make Mattin unable to meet Mil's eyes.

Nonetheless, Mattin piled both onto his bed that evening when he realized the heaviness in his limbs meant his fever was coming on. The cushion and the cloak, and the gloves too, and half a dozen spiced biscuits that Arden said had come from his sister Jola's house.

The items helped make a nest, of course, but Mattin didn't think about that. Not then, and not while he was face down in the cushion and frigging himself with a too-large glove, and not later when he cleaned everything before hiding it all beneath his bed.

He spent his day after in his room without much protest, mostly because Cael had mentioned something of it recently, on account of some relative of hers, and how hard lust-fevers could be on the body. It was pleasant to spend a day lounging in the bath or in bed with a book he chose to read and not one he felt he ought to. Although he'd been itching to get back to work by the time he left his room in search of dinner.

Mattin had never had a fever go so well and thought he understood why so many other Blesseds didn't mind them so much. He could have done without the sweating and writhing and the sounds he sometimes heard himself making, but at least no one else witnessed those.

He went to breakfast the next day as usual, and only blushed faintly when Arden poured sugared almonds into his palm and Mil pushed his cup toward him. If Mattin kept his gaze on his tea, he could imagine they were his Gifted watching intently as he nibbled almonds and drank tea with honey and milk. He could imagine it even when he wasn't staring at his cup, and decided he ought to keep his visit short, since his day of rest after his fever had not cooled his blood enough. Only to then linger at their table anyway, inhaling heat and strength and the plain soap they still used even though Arden as king might have had anything.

Mattin thought of offering them some of his soap, although neither of them likely wanted to smell of mint, or chamomile, or lilies. But he could imagine those scents on them, traces left behind from Mattin's hands or from wherever they had touched him. Mattin used oils on his skin to leave it softer, so they might also smell of that, and the scent of him with them and how Mattin would use them would soak into their bedding along with Mattin's slick. Like a nest. Like the only nest worth having. Mattin wouldn't want to leave it. He wouldn't want them to leave it. He could call them to his nest like a real Blessed would, and they would take him, one at a time or together. However Mattin wanted, as many times as he wanted, like the gifts from the fae they were.

"More?" Arden's lovely voice broke into Mattin's thoughts. Mattin turned to him, still lost in his dream, altogether too warm as Arden swept a look over his face.

"More?" Mattin returned, certain he would always want more but unsure how Arden knew that.

"You don't seem satisfied," Arden declared, the firelight hitting the silver in his hair. He had so many more years than Mattin. So much more experience. Mattin must seem an awkward youth to him. To both of them.

Mattin looked to Mil, no less confused when Mil, unlike Mattin, seemed very satisfied indeed. Almost smug.

"Near ravenous I'd say," Mil offered in response to Arden. "I'm familiar with the expression," he added pointedly. Bruises along one side of his throat had the shape of bites, of a mouth.

Arden placed a slice of a hothouse peach in Mattin's palm. It was warm from Arden's hands and dripping. He gave the rest of the peach to Mil.

"You also seem hungry, my love," he murmured, and smiled when Mil mumbled under his breath, though clearly meaning to be heard, that he was fucking starving and Arden knew it. But Mil watched Mattin eat the slice he was given and then discreetly lick his fingers clean before he sank his teeth into what was left of the stone fruit. He was nearly growling.

The juice went everywhere, down Mil's chin and between his fingers. Mattin found himself studying his cup of tea again and fighting not to squirm when the pit was discarded and Arden tugged Mil to him by his shirt collar to kiss him with their mouths open. A kiss that made Mil groan. A kiss Mattin could taste on his own tongue, still warm from Arden's hand.

"Not fair," Mil complained quietly when the kiss was over, as if he were in Mattin's place.

Arden kissed him again. Mattin thought it was meant to be soothing. Mil did not seem soothed. Mattin certainly wasn't. He should not have lost himself in thoughts of them. They were happy as they were.

He excused himself shortly after that, resolving that from now on he would spend a day of rest after his fevers in his room, and then another day hiding in his office in the library so that he wouldn't forget himself at their table again, or ruin the seats of any more of his pants.

He also resolved to stay far away from peaches.

He had never even especially cared for peaches. Perhaps he really wasn't getting enough to eat. He should work on improving his meals whenever he next had the time.

The time never came. Arden and Mil, together and separately, had taken to bringing Mattin along with them on various errands around the palace and then apologizing for it as if wasn't Mattin's duty and pleasure to help them.

"We wouldn't want to keep you from anyone, Sass," Mil said once while watching Mattin nibble bits of toffee that Mil had apparently purchased at a spring fair in the capital.

"If you have anywhere else to be, Keeper Arlylian…" Arden had said, quietly polite, while asking for Mattin's help in choosing tea blends for his sister and then insisting Mattin take some as well for his trouble. It was not trouble for Mattin to be around either of them. Not in the sense Arden meant.

If there was any trouble, it was in trying not to embarrass himself simply because they were kind, or smelled good, or shared the soft intimacy of their mornings with him as if trying to confuse him. A sitting room with a small table and a cozy fire was not like the comfort of a nest, nor did it hold the passion of one, but it felt so, sometimes, and Mattin was finding it more and more difficult to tear himself away.