Kylar sat in the tub and washed the road from his skin, working the cake of soap over his shoulders and chest. It had a clean bite to it, pine and resin, sharp as cold air. It reminded him of the northern front, of mornings when breath smoked in the barracks and the pines marched all the way to the horizon.

  Up there, they’d collect sap whenever they could, patched gear with it, mixed it into salves, made do the way soldiers did. He filed away a thought before it could slip: next time he was posted north, he’d bring some back. Kairi would probably find six uses for the sticky stuff he’d never think of.

  He rinsed the soap away, dunked his head, and scrubbed both hands back through his hair. Water sheeted down his face, the heat loosening knots he hadn’t admitted were there. When the worst of it was gone, he splashed his face once more, then rose from the tub and stepped out, catching his balance on the worn edge of the mat. He grabbed the towel from its peg and began to dry off in brisk, efficient sweeps.

  Steam still ghosted the mirror when Kylar stepped off the mat. He raked the towel once more through his hair, slung it around his neck, then leaned on the washstand and checked his eyes in the glass: travel-tired, but clearer than they had any right to be. He looked down over the healed patches where his skin still remembered the blast. Turning, he twisted just enough to see his back in the wavering reflection—most of the bruising gone to yellow, some still faintly purple across his ribs.

  Are you that concerned with your looks?

  He flinched so hard his hip clipped the washstand. “Saints—” The word died. He stared at his own reflection, jaw set, then deliberately breathed out.

  All right, Dato. Let’s have a conversation, Rush said in the back of his skull, dry as a lecture. Think your answers. First thought only.

  “Of course,” Kylar said, pacing before he remembered he wasn’t meant to be talking out loud. The floor’s faint chill pressed up through his bare feet; a drip from the tap ticked like a metronome for bad ideas.

  First thoughts. Saints. What kind of questions was he—

  Have you kissed her?

  Yes.

  The answer leapt ahead of him before he could dress it in words. Asking first— the image slid after it anyway: Kairi’s hand at his collar, taking what she wanted, his knees going weak like a fool.

  Rush’s presence made a soundless, satisfied ah in his head. She likes you that much.

  Kylar scrubbed a damp palm over his mouth, pacing faster. Don’t give him pictures. Words only, he told himself.

  When you look at her, Rush went on, what’s the first word that comes to mind?

  The answer arrived before he could shape a safer one.

  Safe.

  Kylar stopped, fingers tightening on the edge of the washstand. A second thought tried to rise—mine—and he shoved it hard back down into the dark.

  Rush heard enough anyway. Safe, he repeated slowly. For you or for her?

  Both, Kylar thought, throat tight.

  Hnh. Rush sounded like he’d just found a seam in armor. All right. Different angle. Have you ever pressured her to do something?

  “Yes,” Kylar said aloud before he could catch it, then grimaced at himself in the mirror. Not that. Not what you mean. He edited fast. Nothing intimate. I push the drills. Breathing, grounding. Tried to coax her toward fire again. Slow. Face her trauma a little.

  Her trauma?

  The thunder that cut like a blade. The fire she was afraid to touch. The place in her that shook when it thought no one saw. His fingers tightened on porcelain until the glaze squeaked.

  Rush went quiet for a second, like a man choosing not to step on a buried wire.

  Have you ever hurt her?

  Yes. The answer sat heavy. Unintentional. Learned from it. He felt the ghost of that particular flinch in his own body and shut his eyes.

  Has she ever asked you to stop? Rush pressed. Anything. Touch, drills, questions.

  Yes. He swallowed. I stopped. Every time. Even when it felt wrong to step back. Her rule is first.

  Good, Rush said, and there was no sarcasm on that word at all. He didn’t give Kylar time to breathe.

  Have you slept with her?

  “Yes.” Another wince. Not what you’re asking. He dragged in a breath. Sleep. Actual sleeping. Naps. Holding her while the world shuts up.

  …Napping, Rush repeated, flat.

  “Yeah,” Kylar muttered to the towel, hearing how pathetic it sounded and hating the heat climbing his neck.

  Saints above, Rush said. You sound like a very badly written morality tale.

  Kylar glared at his own reflection. Why are you asking any of this?

  Because, Rush said, maddeningly calm, from where I’m standing, you are a boy who has been sneaking into my sister’s room every night for the past six years.

  Kylar blinked at himself in the fogged glass. Put that way, it sounded… worse. Much worse. A brief, bitter humor flickered up. And you’re being… relatively kind about it, he thought, surprised by the accuracy of that word.

  Rush actually laughed, sharp and low in his head. Yes, Dato. This is me being kind. I’m only intruding on your thoughts and contemplating whether you should wake up tomorrow.

  Kylar went very still. That took a turn toward scary, he thought, a little dryly.

  I would like to know which kind of idiot you are before I decide whether to break your nose or drag you to an altar.

  Kylar froze. Those are the only options? Breaking my nose, murdering me in my sleep and marrying your sister. Only one of those sou—

  If you’ve been in her bed, yes, Rush said. Next question.

  Kylar groaned and rubbed at his face. This was, unquestionably, a mistake.

  Do you love her?

  The question landed without warning, harder than any of the others. His first thought flashed up, bare and bright.

  Yes.

  He felt it hit Rush as cleanly as if he’d spoken it aloud. Panic chased after it a heartbeat late, clawing for softer words—I care for her, I’m fond of her, she matters—but the truth was already out.

  Kylar gripped the edge of the washstand until his knuckles went white. Don’t—

  Rush didn’t laugh this time.

  Do you plan to tell her who you are? The dragon prince’s voice had lost most of its teasing; it was all blade-edge now. Not dream names. Your name.

  Yes, Kylar thought, and the word felt like stepping off a ledge. When it won’t put her in more danger than she’s already in. When I can protect her from what it means.

  When’s that, exactly? Rush shot back. Before or after she finds out from someone else and stabs you with something sharp?

  Kylar winced. Before, he thought. I won’t let someone else weaponize it first. She wouldn't stab me.

  You're right, she would electrocute you. Would you marry her, if she wanted it? Rush asked, as if he were asking about weather, not futures.

  Kylar’s throat went dry. First thought.

  Yes, his mind said, helpless. Then, because he couldn’t stop himself: If she’d have me. If she were free to choose.

  Rush’s presence went very, very still.

  Saints, Rush said at last, a ribbon of sarcasm wrapping tight around something more dangerous. With answers like that, I may have to drag you both to the altar tomorrow morning.

  Kylar’s first thought wasn’t horror. It was a brief, blazing I wouldn’t fight you, followed by the dizzy flicker of Kairi in festival white, her hand in his, a future he had no right to picture but was anyway. He realized too late he hadn’t managed to smother it.

  Rush stopped dead. The silence in Kylar’s head was its own kind of thunder—stunned, incredulous.

  …You’re not entirely against the idea, Rush said slowly.

  Kylar shut his eyes. I am trying very hard not to be thinking about altars at all, he thought, mortified. You started this.

  For a heartbeat, Rush seemed torn between laughing and swearing.

  We are absolutely not doing it tomorrow, he said finally, each word precise. But you and I are going to get to know each other very well over these two weeks, Prince Dato. And if, at the end of it, I still believe you…

  Kylar felt the weight of his attention sharpen.

  …then I might drag you to an altar in the capital instead. A very grand thing. Proper vows. Witnesses. The works.

  The image that tried to rise, Kairi walking up the palace aisle, light in her hair—nearly knocked Kylar off his feet. He braced both hands on the washstand and didn’t let it finish forming.

  Survive these two weeks first, he thought, a little hoarse. Then we can discuss grand things.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  A faint huff moved through Rush’s presence, not quite a laugh, not quite a threat.

  Would you walk away if she asked you to? Rush pressed, quieter now. Even if it broke you in half.

  Kylar shut his eyes. The answer hurt, but there was nothing complicated about it. Yes. He swallowed. If she asked, I’d go. I’d stay away. I’d send guards instead of being one.

  Something in Rush eased, like a fist slowly loosening. Silence stretched between them, thin as steam.

  What if she chooses someone else? Rush asked finally. Someone from here. Some farmer’s son or shopkeeper. What do you do?

  Kylar’s stomach lurched. The first thought was ugly and sharp—take her back, fight for her, don’t let go—but he shoved past it, made himself look that future in the face.

  I step back, he thought. I don’t punish her for not choosing me. I keep her safe anyway. That’s the job.

  Rush was quiet a beat, weighing that.

  Have you ever lied to her? he went on. Not little lies. Anything that would change what she chooses, if she knew.

  Kylar’s fingers tightened on the washstand again. No. He grimaced. Then, more honest: I’ve softened things. Let her think I was less hurt than I was. Tried not to hand her more guilt. But I haven’t lied about the things that would move her feet.

  Hnh, Rush said. Not approval, not disbelief. Just filing. If the dreams stopped tomorrow, he asked, would you still come back here? Still care this much? Or does it only count if the magic hands you to each other every night?

  Yes, Kylar thought, before he could even form a defense. I’d still come back. I’d still care. The dreams make it easier to find her. They’re not the reason I want to.

  Rush let that settle between them like a weight on a scale. What would hurt her more, do you think, he asked, you lying… or you leaving?

  Kylar’s throat closed for a moment. Leaving, he thought at last. Then, with a wince: But if I lie, she’ll make me leave anyway. She deserves the truth, even if it cuts us both.

  For a heartbeat, the only sound in the little room was the plink of a slow drip into the basin. Last question, Rush said.

  Kylar braced. Of course there is.

  When the storms come, Rush asked, softer than any he’d asked yet, do you hold her because it helps you… or because it helps her?

  He didn’t have to go looking for that memory. It walked toward him: willow hair and rain, her shaking in his arms, his heart pounding too fast, too loud, and the rule they’d written between thunder strokes. Kylar let his grip on the washstand loosen. Both, he thought. But if it stopped helping her, I’d let go. Even if it tore the world out from under me.

  Rush was quiet for a long moment.

  When he spoke again, the edge in his voice was still there, but it had changed its target. All right, he said. That’s enough for tonight. Get dressed. Don’t let her see you rattled.

  Kylar snorted. “You're rattled” he muttered, reaching for his shirt.

  I’m an older brother, Rush shot back. This is me being reasonable. You don’t want to see me unreasonable. Ask the last idiot who tried to court her.

  Kylar pulled the shirt over his head, easing it carefully over the last of the bruising, and let the fabric settle against his skin like armor. He straightened, meeting his own eyes in the fogged glass one more time. “Understood,” he said quietly. Rush’s presence shifted, just shy of gone. Then, like a thought pressed into his mind and quickly withdrawn: Dato… thank you for holding her in the storms.

  Kylar’s breath hitched. He didn’t trust himself to send anything back but the truth, so he let the answer be simple. I’m not letting go, he thought.

  Another pause, softer.

  We’ll see, Rush said. Two weeks, remember. And, Dato—

  Kylar felt him lean in, as much as a presence could.

  —when you do decide to ask her, don’t propose like Ryder did.

  That hit harder than half the questions. Kylar blinked at his own reflection. I’m not— What did he do?

  You can ask him yourself, Rush said, already pulling away. Later.

  The room held its steam and its silence. Kylar’s heartbeat, now that he was listening, had found a steadier cadence again, marriage altars and Ryder’s mysterious disaster circling in the back of his mind like storms on a far horizon.

  He squared his shoulders, set his hand to the latch, and opened the door. The little sitting room had softened in his absence. Someone had turned the lamp down to a low, warm pool; the shadows in the corners went easy instead of long. Rush sat by the far wall with Tessa in front of him, their chairs angled toward each other, elbows braced on their knees. Tessa was teaching. Her hands moved in slow, deliberate shapes, pausing between each for Rush to mirror them. He watched her fingers like they were a blade form, brows drawn in concentration. When he fumbled one, she caught his wrist, nudged his hand into the right angle, and tapped his knuckles once in approval.

  Kylar made a mental note as he crossed the threshold. Learning a new language with his hands while carrying on a casual mind-conversation with a man in the bath. No wonder Rush sounded so unbothered by the idea of altars and executions. The thought that this might be his future brother-in-law was both comforting and terrifying in equal measure.

  He dragged his gaze away before Rush could feel it and found Kairi on the opposite couch. She was leaning lightly against Jayce’s shoulder, a book open in her lap. Jayce had a small journal balanced on one knee, pencil moving in his neat, spare hand. Every so often Kairi’s head tipped as if she were tracking his progress; every so often his shoulder shifted a fraction so she had a better angle to read.

  This must be a normal thing between them, Kylar thought. An old habit worn smooth. She’d leaned against him like that in the meadow hundreds—thousands—of times by now: dozing on his arm after storms, tucking herself into his side when she was cold, stealing warmth and calm like it belonged to her.

  Seeing her in that posture with someone else… even someone he trusted with his own throat… made something small and tight pinch under his ribs.

  Easy, he told himself. Jayce is family to her. You are a stranger with a half-mask and a borrowed name.

  His pulse, which had finally settled after the bath, climbed a notch anyway. For no good reason, the room felt too narrow. He caught himself reaching for his breathing drills and cut that off before he started counting like an idiot on the couch. Shadowguard, he reminded himself. Not her dream boy. Keep your feet under you. He crossed the room and lowered himself onto the open stretch of couch beside her. The cushions gave under his weight; he let his head tip back against the wall and closed his eyes for a heartbeat, trying to make his body believe the fiction of “relaxed.”

  “Wasn’t kidnapped,” he muttered.

  Kairi’s mouth curved. She didn’t lift her eyes from the page, but the smile lived in her voice. “Good job.”

  He breathed out through his nose, a sound that might almost have been a laugh, and focused on staying still, on being the calm, competent guard she’d only just met, not the man whose heart kept tripping over itself every time she leaned on someone’s shoulder.

  Across the room, Rush and Tessa went back to their careful, quiet work. Jayce’s pencil scratched on. The house breathed.

  Kylar held himself in the middle of it and tried, very hard, not to feel like he was standing at the edge of two worlds at once.

  Kairi placed a finger to keep her place and let the book close around it as she tilted her head to look at Kylar.

  He’d come back from washing with a faint, clean scent clinging to him. Not mint—that sharp wake-up note she used on mornings after bad storms—but something deeper, resinous. Pine, she realized, pleased in a small, private way. He’d picked the pine. She made a quiet note of it in the same mental shelf where she kept things like he takes his tea hot and he pretends he doesn’t like honey, but he does.

  His hair was still a little damp, flattened back from his forehead in a way that made him look younger and more tired all at once. His eyes were closed, head tipped against the wall like he was resting… but his shoulders were wrong. Not the loose, easy line he wore in the meadow when the world finally let him lay his weight down. Here, his back stayed just a touch too straight, the muscle along his jaw working every so often like he was still chewing on something invisible.

  He’s not relaxing, she thought. Not really.

  Part of her wanted to reach over and check his pulse with healer’s hands, the way she had a hundred times in the dreamscape—fingers light at his wrist, counting out the beats while she talked him down from whatever his mind had dragged in with it. Part of her wanted to simply lean the way she did there, to tuck herself against his side and make his body admit it was tired.

  But here wasn’t there.

  Here, she was leaning against Jayce, as she had done for years in this very room, reading while he wrote, sharing the same patch of lamplight. Here, Dato was Kylar: a shadowguard on escort, a man she’d technically only known for days. Here, she couldn’t just move closer because worry and habit told her to.

  She watched him for another moment, comparing the careful almost-lounge on this couch to the way he sprawled under the willow when he finally surrendered to sleep. Not the same. Not even close. If he were in the meadow, she thought, she’d already be asking, “What happened?” and refusing to let him dodge the answer. She’d walked him through his own thoughts more times than she could count; it felt strange now to sit this close and pretend she didn’t see the echo of that tension.

  She let the wanting sit where it was and opened her book again, sliding her finger back to her place.

  Pine, she noted once more, just to keep the small, pleased thing close. He likes pine.

  That’s right. The brave duke was running into the woods to rescue the kidnapped young lady he favored and was trying to court.

  Her eyes tracked the words, but part of her attention stayed on the man at her side, the one who had just walked back into the room, not kidnapped, not quite relaxed, carrying some new, quiet weight behind his closed eyes. Jayce’s pencil slowed, then stopped.

  Kairi realized a beat too late that she’d been staring over the top of her book, eyes fixed not on the printed words but on the line of Kylar’s throat where it met his shoulder.

  Jayce cleared his throat softly. The pencil lifted. He flipped to a fresh page in his journal, angled it a little toward her, and wrote in his neat hand:

  What’s got your attention?

  He nudged her elbow with his own, just enough to break the line of her worry.

  She blinked, then looked down. The question sat there, patient. Jayce turned the pen in his fingers once, then offered it to her without a word. She twisted at the waist to take it, careful not to jostle Kylar. His shoulder was close enough that she could feel the heat of him, even without leaning in. Kairi hesitated for half a heartbeat, then wrote beneath Jayce’s line, the letters compact but firm:

  He just seems like he can’t relax. Worried.

  She handed the pen back. Jayce read it, mouth twitching at the corner, then wrote:

  New place. New people. Lots on his plate.

  He waited a beat, then added, a shade smaller:

  You’re not wrong, though.

  He turned the book so she could see both lines. She chewed the inside of her cheek, then reached for the pen again.

  He looks like he hasn’t rested in weeks, she wrote. Like his head is too loud.

  As soon as the words were down, a tiny alarm bell went off in her own mind. That sounds like you’ve watched him for weeks, she scolded herself. She almost scratched it out.

  Jayce’s brows rose a fraction. He underlined hasn’t rested in weeks once, slowly, then looked from the page to her face and back again. After a heartbeat, he wrote beneath it:

  You noticed that already?

  Kairi made a face at him, then hurried to add, squeezing the words in beside her own:

  Rush looks the same after bad weeks.

  That felt safer. True enough. Not you look like you do in the meadow after drills, even if that was the picture in her head.

  She underlined: Worried, once for emphasis, then added, a little more briskly, He keeps checking the doors, even when he pretends not to.

  Jayce huffed a silent laugh through his nose. That part is just “guard,” he scribbled. Then, after a small pause, as if he’d decided to be generous: The rest is “Kylar.”

  Kairi felt something warm and unsettled press behind her ribs at seeing his name written there, plain on the page between them.

  Jayce saw the way her eyes snagged on it and filed that away somewhere behind his steady expression. For a man she’d “just met,” she was watching closely. He didn’t dislike that. He just wanted to know what kind of watching it was.

  She tapped the pen once against the margin, thinking how to ask without sounding strange, then wrote:

  Do you think he regrets coming?

  Jayce’s mouth flattened. That was not the question of a girl who was merely pleased to have an escort. He thought longer this time before answering, choosing each word.

  No, he wrote at last. I think he cares too much about getting this right. That can feel like the same thing from the inside.

  She stared at the words for a moment, then drew a small arrow from cares too much and wrote, neatly beside it:

  Why?

  Jayce’s eyes flicked up to her face, then back down. That why tugged at more than curiosity; it had the shape of someone testing the edges of a secret. He tapped the pen against the spine once, thinking how much he could say without writing prince or Ryder or capital anywhere near her lap.

  New town, he wrote. Important escort. Your brother watching his work.

  Another line, slower: He wants a good report when we go back. Maybe even a better assignment next time.

  He hesitated, then added beneath it, smaller:

  He’s the sort who doesn’t like failing people. Even once. He gives a damn.

  Kairi let out a slow breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding and underlined gives a damn when he added it under that, almost like a summary. The phrase felt right in her chest.

  Jayce watched her underline, then added, almost as an afterthought, though it wasn’t, not really:

  He’s not the only one worried in this room, you know.

  She wrinkled her nose at him and held out her hand for the pen again.

  I know you worry, she wrote. And Rush. I see both of you.

  That earned the smallest crack in his composure. He’d thought he’d hidden that better. He circled you once, then, because dodging wasn’t his style, wrote:

  So why are you this invested?

  He’s only been here a day.

  Kairi paused, pen hovering. A dozen answers rose at once—because I’ve known him for years, because I’ve held him through storms, because he’s mine—and she had to sort through them fast, looking for ones that belonged to this house, this night.

  She let her healer’s instincts speak first.

  He was blind this morning, she wrote. Now he’s pretending everything is fine. It usually isn’t, when people do that.

  That much was safe. She’d say the same about any patient.

  The pen hovered a heartbeat longer, and then, to throw some harmless shade over the deeper truth, she added, smaller, as if it were a joke and not:

  Also, he’s cute.

  Jayce’s brows climbed, then settled into something halfway between amused and wary. There it is, he thought. Not just healer’s worry, then. He circled cute once, very lightly, and wrote:

  Terrible motive. Acceptable answer.

  She rolled her eyes at him, cheeks a touch warmer than before, and pushed the journal back into his hands.

  He smirked and turned the page, but he didn’t start writing again right away. For a few breaths he just sat there, listening to the quiet, feeling the weight of Kylar’s presence on the other side of her and the careful shape of her concern pressed between the pages.