5. Damon

5

DAMON

I t's dark up on deck. Night has fallen and the ship is ploughing on through the inky waters. Damon can see the dark shape of Pluma-Ferris to the south, just visible in the moonlight.

He looks over the ship's rail at the water slapping against the side of the ship. He thinks of Lyr on his knees in front of him. Lyr's beautiful mouth, just a whisper from his straining cock.

It would have taken nothing at all to use that beautiful mouth for pleasure. A nod of his head or a twitch of his hips.

It's quiet where he is, no one around. He slides his hand into his breeches and fists himself.

His mind is full of Lyr. Lyr on his knees. His sweet mouth, ready, wanting. Eager to suck. He strokes himself and imagines it, imagines his fist is Lyr's throat. Imagines he can feel it, moving hot and wet over him. He grips the ship's rail tight with his free hand and groans out loud at the thought, knees weak. Then stops, looking furtively around in case his lust had been overheard. But there's nothing, no one, and a moment later he resumes, stroking himself in frantic, greedy movements, imagining himself taking Lyr roughly, using his strength to hold him down as he takes that filthy, teasing mouth, that pretty, greedy mouth, the mouth of his slave.

Lyr's name is on his lips as he spends in his fist, gasping through the deep pleasure.

Zai, he has wanted.

What a curse it is to want men the way he does.

The shame follows the pleasure like a rush of freezing seawater.

He is a married man. His wife Inez is a truly exceptional beauty. Of fine stock too. Willing and eager to share his bed and give him sons.

But his body does not respond to her the way it does to men. And his body has never responded to a man the way it responds to Lyr.

He's always protected himself by rarely acting on his desires. He knows the risks are too high. But Lyr is different. Too different. Too hard to resist.

It had taken everything he had to leave Lyr in the cabin tonight.

He finds a pile of old sacking on a quiet part of the deck. He's slept in worse places.

When the dawn starts to light the sky a shade of purple, he goes to the galley, collects food and ale and returns to his cabin.

He finds Lyr sleeping in the cot. Curled in a small ball.

Lyr opens his eyes and looks at Damon. "I brought food," Damon says, "Ale and gruel. Come and eat."

Lyr sits up. The sheet slips down his body. Damon can see the intricate pattern of scars on his chest and shoulders for the first time. The spirals on his arms continue onto his shoulders, and across his chest are four large runes, in no language Damon knows.

Lyr leans out of the bed and picks up his white robe. He wraps himself in it. As he does, Damon sees more. The way those scars cover his legs too, endless lines of cuts that circle round, and there are more runes on his back and down onto his ass. Tiny ones. Hundreds of them.

Damon tells himself that anyone would look at Lyr. Would wonder about his body and the decorations that cover so much of it. But, as he watches Lyr climb from the bed, he also takes in the slight plains of Lyr's belly. The lines of his thighs. A small glimpse of his soft, relaxed cock.

Lyr smiles at Damon as he sits down, looking at the food on the table.

"Thank you," he says.

"I can't let you starve."

Lyr starts to eat his gruel. Damon does likewise. It's good for ship food. Rich and satisfying. Damon has eaten his share of bad gruel, lumpy, tepid grey concoctions, thin as seawater, fuel for battle. But this is luxurious, made with pig fat, barley malt and nuts, rich with the spoils of a successful conquest.

Damon has eaten half the bowl when Lyr says, "You said yesterday your father had many bastard sons. How many brothers and sisters do you have? Apart from Atticul and Endrew?"

Damon says, "Officially I have six brothers and one sister. But I do not think even my father knows for sure how many children he has."

"I have many brothers and sisters too," says Lyr, who is eating more slowly and delicately. Damon finds himself staring at Lyr's mouth as he says. "It was a big family. Have you met many of them? The ones that your father begat on other women?"

Damon nods, glad for the simple topic of conversation. "I grew up with my brother Lukas. Another of my father's bastards. We are very close in age. He is only a moon younger than me. He was fathered on a washerwoman at the Rose Palace. But she died when he was seven and he came to live with us in the Tower of the Heir."

"Does he live there still?"

"No," Damon shakes his head as he finishes his gruel. "He ran away when we were both fourteen, just before I was sent to war. He's currently in the Mortingale Mountains. He's one of the Mortingale Outlaws."

Lyr looks blank at the mention of the Mortingale Outlaws.

"Fools," Damon says. "Rebels and fools. Five years ago they tried to attack Emperor Selim. They got into the palace. It went badly for them. Many ended up dead."

"Did your brother survive?"

Damon takes a sip of his ale. "Yes. He's good at running away."

"Do you miss him?"

"I've not seen him for a long time."

"So that's Lukas. Do you know any of the others?"

"Not as well as Lukas, but there's Tobi. His mother was an actress with a band of travelling players. I am not sure if my father would have acknowledged that the child was his, but Tobi looks a great deal like my father's other children. Endrew had not yet been born when Tobi arrived with his mother. But he looked so much like Atticul and Ferra, it could not be denied who he was."

"Ferra is your sister?"

"Yes. Legitimate sister. "

"There are so many. How do you remember them all?" Lyr stretches his eyes playfully wide.

Damon laughs. "They're my family. My father's children. The royal children, Atticul, Ferra and Endrew. My father's bastard sons me, Lukas, Tobi and Kerik. As far as I know."

"You have not mentioned Kerik."

"I have not got to Kerik yet. Kerik is different from the other bastards. Kerik's mother is not a whore or a washerwoman or an actress. His mother is a noblewoman. Lady Ilyne of Fanost. He is of noble birth. There were calls at one point for him to be legitimised by Selim. He would have been ahead of Endrew in the Royal Line. He's older than him, but…" Damon pauses.

"But what?"

"He vanished. Kerik. A couple of years ago. No one knows where he is. Even Chancellor Vindar, who keeps track of everyone of note. They call him Thousand Eyes. Or some people do."

"Everyone of note? So Prince Rafus's bastards are still of note."

"I suppose. We have royal blood. Darek blood."

"So there's you, Lukas, Tobi and Kerik. No more."

"Apparently not. But after Kerik was fathered, Selim became Emperor and made fathering bastard children a crime against Zai."

"So you think that meant your father stopped fathering bastards?"

Damon shrugs. "I think it made him much more cautious about admitting to it."

"So you could have any number of secret half-brothers? Wait, are there no half-sisters? No female bastards? "

"I'm sure there are, but my father has never acknowledged them."

Days pass like this. Damon resigns himself to letting Lyr ask him questions during the day and sleeping on deck every night. Ignoring his desire until it becomes nothing more than a low hum in the background, spiking only when he sees a glimpse of Lyr's scarred skin as he climbs from the bed to break his fast, or when he licks his lips, or when he smiles.

When Damon asks Lyr why he is so interested in him, why he has so many questions, Lyr says, "I suppose I have never met the son of a prince before."

Damon had never really considered that his family was so interesting. His family just were , just an ever-present complication in his life. Most of the complications coming from either Atticul or his father. But Lyr seems sweetly fascinated to hear about everything and asks many questions. It passes the time on the voyage. Damon laughs when Lyr stretches his eyes in amusement at Damon telling him his half-sister Princess Ferra is married to Chancellor Vindar the Thousand Eyes. "On their wedding day, she was a maid of twenty and he was fifty and four. But they have a son now. Prince Umbert. My father's only grandchild."

"So he might be Emperor one day."

Damon hasn't seen Umbert since he was a babe, named before Zai. "He's in the royal line, yes. And any more sons Ferra bore would be too, behind any children of the male line. Although I have heard that she cannot have more. Umbert is a very sturdy child. He was a large baby. And Ferra is frail. Delicate but beautiful. At court, they call her The Lilac Doe."

"That is a strange name," says Lyr plainly. "Lilac can poison a doe."

On the last evening of the voyage, Damon leaves to fetch food. When he returns to the cabin he finds Lyr lying on the cot.

He is surprised. It is still early evening. He sets the plates down on the table and walks over to the cot. As he approaches Lyr rolls over. He smiles and says, "Damon." Lyr usually speaks Artemian with little trace of a Juran accent, but tonight his voice sounds thick, his vowels distinctly Juran, even in that one word. And there is a sweet note of pleasure to his voice.

Damon frowns at him. "Lyr, are you feeling well?"

Lyr gasps aloud. A sound that makes Damon's body respond with sudden prickling heat.

Want.

"I feel good," Lyr says. He runs his hands down his body. Damon notices Lyr's white fabric garment is lying on the floor. Lyr is naked under the thin sheet. "I had the drink," Lyr says in his Juran-accented Artemian.

Damon frowns. Dealing with his feelings about seeing Lyr naked is one thing, but something more is wrong here. Lyr's eyes are dull and slightly unfocused. And Lyr is being quite wanton. He is moving his hands over his bare skin. That beautiful decorated skin. Where the sheet pulls tight over his slender hips, Damon can see the shape of Lyr's roused cock.

Damon says, "What drink? "

Lyr takes a long breath, acting as if even breathing is quite delicious. " Mn . Someone knocked on the cabin door. When I opened it, that was waiting for me." He points to the table.

There's a carved wooden goblet on it. Damon marches over. Next to the goblet is a small piece of parchment. On it is written, in Juran.

Lyr,

Drink this, I'll be back soon.

Damon Darekul.

It's not Damon's handwriting.

"And you just drank this?" says Damon, turning to Lyr, who is writhing on the cot, shot through with pleasure. Damon is sure he knows what this is.

"You said you were fetching supper," Lyr says breathily.

"And you thought I would just put it outside the door and leave. You thought your supper was just a cup of wine?"

"I thought you might have been called away to attend to something," Lyr smiles at him. That smile is beautiful, teeth showing against blood-flushed skin, eyes lighting in Lyr's pretty fine-boned face. "What does it matter? Just a cup of wine? I thought perhaps you sent a servant so you could avoid me, for the last night. I'm glad you changed your mind." His voice drops to a breathy tone, " Master."

Damon picks up the goblet and sniffs it. He doesn't need to. The familiar scent merely confirms his suspicions.

"You've been drugged," Damon says. "That wine contained foribunda. The pleasure drug."

Lyr laughs, tinkling and breathy. "I haven't been drugged. This isn't foribunda. I've had foribunda. This is you . Looking on you is pleasure. I like you. I like you so much, Damon. I didn't expect you to be like this."

"You're acting like a whore."

"A whore ?" Lyr says sweetly. "But I am a whore. I'm your whore." His voice drops low again. " Master… Your pleasure slave." He wets his lower lip with his tongue. "You should command me to please you."

"I will not," Damon says sharply. "Wait here. Stay right there. Do not move. Do not go up on deck no matter how desperate you become to find a man to fuck you. Do you understand?"

"A man to fuck?" Lyr looks hurt. "Damon, I wouldn't. I only want you. I told you." Lyr reaches for Damon with both arms.

Damon pushes him down on the cot and Lyr groans at the touch. "You might think that now. Foribunda is savage. This is just the start."

Lyr makes a soft sound. "Damon, come lie with me."

"No. Stay there."

He leaves Lyr writhing like a slut and marches to the front of the ship. He hammers on the door of Atticul's cabin. Atticul answers the door himself, wearing only a loose shirt. Behind him, Damon can see Opeth sprawled on the bed again. She's naked.

"Yes?" Atticul says as if Damon is interrupting some vital business.

"Did you drug Lyr?" Damon spits.

Atticul huffs out a breath. "What? What's Lyr?"

"The pleasure slave you forced on me."

"Lyr?" Opeth comes from the bed, wrapping a sheet around her hips and stands behind Atticul. Her naked body is pale and shaped like a work of art. "What has happened to him? How is he? "

"Oh, him. Your sinful pleasure slave," Atticul drawls, stroking Opeth's naked body, without a care for what Damon might see, or think of it. "What of him?"

"Someone gave him foribunda."

"Really," says Atticul with a smirk. "Was it you? Did you want to persuade him to open those thighs for your hard cock?"

"I have not touched him," Damon growls. "I still have not and you have drugged him to try and encourage me to fall into sin."

Atticul steps back from the door. "Do I look like I have the time to drug your whore, Bastard?" He pulls Opeth in front of him, showing her naked body to Damon.

Opeth squeals. She pulls out of Atticul's grip and slaps his face, before storming back to bed.

Atticul laughs. "Get back to your whore, Damon, and leave me to mine. We dock in Attar tomorrow morning. This is your last chance to indulge your foul desires." Atticul shuts the cabin door in Damon's face.

Damon storms back to his cabin, enraged. Atticul might not have admitted that he dosed Lyr with foribunda, but he didn't deny it either.

He returns to his cabin to find Lyr moaning on the cot, sheet flung on the floor and his naked body completely displayed. Damon freezes in the doorway looking at him. He feels his anger drain away. He is dumbstruck. Lyr is beautiful.

Damon's cock thumps. He's hard. His blood is so high.

Zai, he wants.

He could take him now, he thinks. He could pull Lyr naked from that bed and press him to the cabin wall and kiss him deeply. He could touch every inch of that marked skin. He could throw Lyr onto the floor and bury himself deep in that pretty ass. He owns him. Lyr is his slave. Part of his spoils from the ruin of Pellex. He can do what he wants. Who would know? What difference would it make?

Everyone on this ship thinks he's fucking him anyway.

How much would the situation really change if he fucked Lyr now?

He walks over to the cot, slowly, like he's approaching a sleeping wolf. Lyr looks up at him, eyes glassy. He looks almost surprised for a moment like he'd forgotten Damon was there. But that soon passes. He gasps and reaches for Damon.

"Please Damon, lie with me. Please. Use me. I want to please you. Please let me. Please. "

Damon kneels beside the cot. The lust he is feeling for this slave burns through him like fire.

He reaches out and puts a hand on Lyr's shoulder, touches his skin. "You want this? Me?"

"Yes. Gods. Yes. I want it," Lyr whines. "By all the Sidusia, yes.".

"You know that you are drugged."

"I wanted you before. I wanted you as soon as I saw you. You are so beautiful I cannot think. Please kiss me. Please ."

Damon's heart hammers in his chest like a marching drum. He is balanced on the edge of a precipice. This will make him weak. But he also knows it's too late. He's not balanced at all. Not on the edge but already falling. He can't stop this. No power in the Azurian Empire could stop him. The wrath of Zai means nothing. Even Atticul's plotting means nothing. The fact Lyr is drugged, is a slave… he puts it from his mind. He leans down. He puts his mouth on Lyr's. Lyr's wild moan of desire as their lips connect goes straight to his cock like a sharpened dagger.

Damon answers it, growling his need into Lyr's mouth, his own hips canting with his desire, need so great he wants to swallow Lyr, consume him. Lyr opens his mouth under Damon's, urging him deeper. Damon slides his tongue into Lyr's mouth with a profound urgency to take all of him, every last part of Lyr's mouth, before either of them comes to their senses.

Damon slides a hand around the back of Lyr's skull and pulls him closer. Their bodies meet. Lyr's bare skin against Damon's leather jerkin. Lyr's slender, delicate chest against Damon's broad muscle.

Damon holds Lyr, keeps their mouths connected as he swings a leg up on the cot. He puts his body over Lyr's and pushes him down under him. Lyr is so pliable. So soft and sweet and open. Lyr is beautiful, moaning as Damon bears down on him, tongue deep in Lyr's sweet mouth, hands on Lyr's chest, waist, thighs.

They kiss and kiss on the cot. Damon's soul is on fire. His cock is like iron. He will not be able to make love sweetly and gently. He will not be able to control his desire. He will take this whore roughly, cruelly. He will… He will…

"Please," Lyr moans, a word leaking out through a tiny break in the kiss. "Please, Damon. Take me."

Lyr is drugged, Damon's conscience says. He's drugged and he's a slave. He's a man. It's a sin of the body. But it means nothing. The sweet life he has built for himself in Attar means nothing. Cannot compete with the way Lyr sets every part of him aflame, desire making him helpless.

His hands slide over Lyr's skin. Touching him as he moans in response to every movement. Damon pulls back from the kiss and lifts himself, pulling back so he can look at Lyr, wanton on the cot, burning for him. He runs his palm over the centre of Lyr's chest. The four runes there. He looks at Lyr's arms, covered in spirals, swirls and small dots. Most are faint, just delicate pale lines. Old scars, not noticeable at a distance, but higher up his arms they are heavier, darker, some of them clearly branded there with irons, not cut. Damon can see all of it. The complex pattern of marks that cover Lyr's skin. The most noticeable are the ones on his chest. Just four runes where every other part of him is crowded with marks and symbols. Those four runes catch the light. But the cabin is dim. The sun is setting outside. The candles on the table are unlit. Damon looks again. He realises the light comes from the runes themselves, glowing softly on Lyr's chest.

He runs a finger over the lines of the four shapes. There's some strange magic in him, woven into the scars on his body.

Damon pauses, "Who made these?" he says.

"Made what?" says Lyr, dreamily. He reaches up for Damon, his arms arching as if he wants to pull Damon back down into another kiss.

But Damon shakes him off. "These marks all over you. They are from rituals. They have magic in them. What are they? Did King Ramel do this to you?"

Lyr blinks, "Ramel, no. Jareleezi did them. Queen Jareleezi."

"Queen Jareleezi? Ramel's step-mother? The old queen. Why did she mark you so? Why would King Ramel allow that?"

Lyr smiles, sweet and soft. His voice is soft too. "Ramel had nothing to do with it. He had no say over what was done to me. I belonged to her. To Queen Jareleezi. I was never Ramel's slave. I was hers. I wasn't her whore. I was… something else. She was a sorceress. She used me for her rituals. Sometimes she used my body." Lyr's voice is still dreamy. He ends with a whining noise and tries to reach for Damon again. "Kiss me, please."

Damon grabs Lyr's wrist and slams it down on the cot. " No," he says sharply. "Listen to me. Why were you in Ramel's harem if you were not his pleasure slave?"

"Jareleezi put me there when she ran." Lyr tries to pull his wrist free of Damon's grip. He can't. "Please, you're hurting me." Then, darker, "Do you want to hurt me, Master?"

"No," Damon snaps and lets go of Lyr's wrist. He slides back, off the cot and kneels on the floor beside it. Queen Jareleezi, that was who they sent his ship to chase. "Tell me more about Jareleezi. What did she do to you?"

Lyr keeps talking, still sounding breathy and loose. "I was her slave. Always and only hers. She was cruel to me. Extremely cruel."

"Queen Jareleezi was the last Hevelikar. She was a descendant of the old rulers of Azuria."

"I know," Lyr moans. He reaches for Damon, but Damon pushes him back.

There are two uses for foribunda, Damon knows. The first and most usual is as a sexual enhancement. Its use for such things is banned in Azuria, with small exceptions made for love draughts, allowed in some rare circumstances. But foribunda is permitted for the use of the Imperial Army and the Enforcers of Zai. For interrogation. For torture. Foribunda makes truth spill from the lips of those who have it roaring in their blood. Because with foribunda, nothing matters except satisfaction of a desire so great it is painful to ignore. Nothing.

Some say foribunda is a terrible way to gain information. Foribunda, they say, will make a person say anything to be touched, to be fucked. And that what they say cannot be trusted.

But others say foribunda opens the doors of the soul. Shows a truth that cannot be hidden in the state of extreme lust it creates.

"Do you know where she has gone? Did she have friends in Ik-Sundal?"

"She hated the Sundals," Lyr says breathily. "It must be a trick if they think she has gone there. She loathed the heat of Pellex. She'd never travel into the desert."

Damon notes this and says, "What did Jareleezi use you for?" He reaches out as he speaks and strokes Lyr's wrist.

Lyr coos as Damon touches his skin. He is shaking with need. He whispers something. Not in Artemian or Juran, Damon thinks it's Magaar. "Meru," Lyr moans again, gazing into Damon's eyes. " Meru. " He's begging please in Magaar. It sounds beautiful. "She burned me and she cut me because sometimes her rituals needed pain, she said. She needed to cleanse me so I could be a vessel for her Gods to speak to her. Sometimes she needed other things. She coupled with me often. She has given me this drug before. Sometimes she used my seed. Sometimes she had men take me. There were many rites." He looks into Damon's eyes and blinks. "Please, Damon. Please fuck me." He slides from Artemian back into Magaar. "Meru, Akai."

Akai , the Magaar word for Master.

Damon shakes his head. He strokes Lyr's cheek. This creature was Jareleezi's, he thinks. He belonged to the Hevelikar witch that the Imperial army chases in Ik-Sundal. And none of them know. None of them know what Lyr truly is. Her slave. Part of her rituals. If they did know, they'd take Lyr, take him from Damon. Torture him for information. Maybe even try and trade him back to Jareleezi, use him as bait in a trap, sell him back to her in return for what she took from Blackstone Castle .

And more than that. Something that sits in Damon's soul like a knife between his shoulder blades. Jareleezi hurt Lyr. Jareleezi raped him. And now he lies before Damon, drugged, helpless on foribunda, just as he was for her. Damon is sickened he came so close to taking Lyr like this. He'd be no better than her if he did so. It cannot be like this. He will not take Lyr like some pleasure slave from the backstreets of Attar.

It can't happen like this.

Not like this.

Not for them.

"Meru," Lyr whines again, throwing out an arm and looping it around Damon's shoulders. It catches Damon by surprise and Lyr manages to pull him down so their lips meet in a kiss, but a brief one. A touch of their lips before Damon pulls back again and Lyr's moan of pleasure turns into a whine of need.

Damon looks at Lyr and shakes his head. "I cannot," he says firmly. "Not on Atticul's ship. Not when you are drugged. And not after what Queen Jareleezi did to you."

"Not on Atticul's ship," says Lyr woozily, slipping back to Artemian. The foribunda comes in waves. He blinks and seems a little more lucid as it recedes for a moment. "Damon, if we were somewhere else, if I asked you with a clear heart, then would you allow me to pleasure you? Please." His arm reaches for Damon again. Damon grabs Lyr's wrist but allows the palm of Lyr's hand to rest on his stubbled cheek. "Please," Lyr whimpers again. Damon can see his hips moving under the thin sheet, his cock still painfully hard, leaking wet, making a translucent patch in the fabric. "At least tell me that you would?"

Lyr strokes Damon's face. Damon can feel the soft rasp as his stubble prickles over Lyr's skin. He can't take Lyr like this, he knows, but his blood is roaring from how beautiful he looks, desperate, wild and stupid with need. He nods. "I would. In another life, I would."

Lyr makes a soft moaning noise, half a sob.

Damon carefully takes Lyr's hand from his face and stands up.

He pulls off his shirt. He sees Lyr's eyes light at the sight of his upper body. Damon is strong, and he knows he looks it. His body is big, solid muscle covered in fat. He's built like a bull. His shoulders are broad. His chest carries scars. In Pluma-Ferris Trysta's sword point nearly reached his throat, and its path still traces his chest. In Jur-Mattan, only days ago, he fell heavily against a pile of stone and the side of his body is still scuffed red and grey from it. He's a mess, he knows. Bull body, all bruises and scars. Outside and in.

But Lyr, clearly, sees nothing but something desirable. His beautiful blue eyes are dark with desire as he stares at Damon like he's drinking in the sight.

"Roll over," says Damon, "face the wall."

Lyr does as he's told with a sigh of pleasure. The sheet slips off his body, revealing his ass and the delicate curve of his pale back. Damon sees those small runes, something more complex is written there. Damon traces a fingertip over them. Is this information? Information the empire wants? Would kill for? Would kill Lyr for?

No one else must know about these marks.

Damon climbs onto the cot behind Lyr. He slides his arms around Lyr's body. He lets himself feel it, the warmth of pressing close to another person, the scent of Lyr's skin, Lyr's sweat and the sharp odour of the foribunda. Lyr sighs and presses his ass back against Damon's breeches.

Damon's hard. That can't be helped.

"You're big," Lyr says, in a soft voice, as if he dare not say it louder. "I want you inside me. "

"No," Damon says firmly. "What did she want with you? "

"Who?"

"Queen Jareleezi. I know you must know something of what she did with you?"

Lyr rolls over in Damon's arms to face him. His expression is desperate, lips parted, eyes dark. Through panting breaths he says, "Jareleezi wants to take Azuria back in the name of her ancestors. She hates the Dareks. She cursed the name of King Sarelik Darek, who took their land from them. She would have hated you. And your brothers. All of you."

"The Hevelikar were corrupt. When Sarelik led the revolution the people of Azuria followed him. The Hevelikar were letting people starve."

"People always starve."

"Not like that. There was no failed harvest. Azuria has always been a rich and fertile land. But the Hevelikar were cruel and greedy. They taxed people unfairly, their enforcers were savage. The people rose up in the name of Zai and put Sarelik on the throne…" Damon tails off. Lyr clearly isn't listening to him. He's grinding his own hard cock against Damon's.

"Damon," Lyr whines, "please, I can't. Fuck me. Take me, please, do it roughly. I need it. Hold me down. Hurt me if it gives you pleasure. Do anything you want."

Damon takes a breath. His head is swimming with desire. He forces it away. "Did Jareleezi use you for magic rituals? Is she using magic to try and destroy Azuria?"

"She told me the Hevelikar are the only ones who can protect Azuria."

"Protect it from what?"

"I don't know. Something bad. Something terrible will come and the Hevelikar need to be ready. She is getting ready. I'm part of it. You're part of it."

Damon frowns. Lyr is growing delirious. "This is what Jareleezi told you?"

"Yes. She didn't tell me exactly. Not really. She never told me things, but I listened. Please let me pleasure you. Kiss me again." Lyr moans something in Magaar as he surges forward and smashes his lips to Damon's. Damon should resist, but he doesn't. He opens his mouth. He lets Lyr's tongue touch his own. It's so sweet he wants to cry.

No battle he's ever fought has been as hard as this one. This battle with his own heart.

He lets the kiss go on a moment before he finds strength in himself. He pushes Lyr off and holds him down on the cot. Lyr feels shaky in Damon's arms. He can't answer any more questions about Jareleezi or the runes on his body. Damon knows he isn't going to make sense for much longer.

He rolls Lyr over to face the wall again and holds him, pressing up against the back of his body. He looks at the hundreds of runes all over Lyr's back. Were all of these branded onto his skin?

"Shush," Damon says, "shush now."

"Please kiss me again," Lyr says. "Meru, Damon. Meru, Akai."

Damon shakes his head. Instead, he says the first line of All the Roses Die in broken, clumsy Magaar, "The roses raise their faces to the sun."

Lyr whimpers in his arms.

Damon says the line again. The last two words have a rhythm to them. "Karaa," he says, "Juzu karaa karu."

"Karaach," Lyr says, making a sound at the back of his throat. He recites the whole line ending, "Juzu karaach karu." But then he whines, the foribunda hitting him in another wave. He arches back to grind against Damon. "Please," he says, "please, take me, I know you want to. Who would know? Make love to me."

"It is a crime," Damon says quietly. "I made a vow."

"Not a crime. Not here."

"We can't," Damon says. "Not like this. It will pass soon, I promise." Gently, in Magaar again, he whispers, "All day they drink the sun's rays like honeywine. But the night must always come. All the roses die in their beds. They never drink the sun when they are dead." He pauses. "The final two lines, the new ones, what were they?"

In Magaar, Lyr says, "Their petals rot into the earth to rest with the demon king as he sleeps in the soil forever. Their death is permanent, but his is not. The demon king will rise."

Damon holds Lyr close as the ship rocks and recites the whole thing through again. Over and over.

Over and over.

Damon holds Lyr's shaking body and when the waves of the foribunda take him, Damon listens to Lyr beg and beg for Damon inside him, sometimes in Artemian, sometimes in Magaar, until eventually, after what feels like half the night, Lyr's words grow slurred and he falls asleep.

Damon untangles himself from Lyr's body and goes to sleep on deck. He finds his spot and lies down under the stars. It's a warm night, but he doesn't sleep a wink.

He thinks about Lyr's naked body. He thinks of little else.

He packed his desires away when he was caught with Plumillar. That showed him there was too much at stake. It was too dangerous. Desire, sex, even love, could never be worth throwing everything away for. Since then he has kept things simple. He has resisted most men who wanted him, drunkenly flirting inspired by rumours. Wanting his body or the favours they imagined he would be able to give his lovers as a General or as a Darek.

Even Markle had been nothing to him. He'd felt little when Markle died, except irritation that he'd lost an easy route to pleasure.

He thinks of Lyr smiling, Lyr begging for him. Now he has that in his head, his desires will never leave him in peace again.