Page 105 of The Sun King's Noon

Richard’s heart pounded harder with every word that Flint said. His ears buzzed, and his vision blurred. He only realised why when he blinked, and a tear slid down his right cheek. Startled, Richard brushed it away with a knuckle.

Flint looked just as alarmed. “Don’t go bawling on me. I’m no good with the sappy stuff.”

“I am well, Flint,” Richard rasped. “It is only that…I had not considered…Always, I had believed that to love meant to...” His throat ached too much, and he stopped talking.

Ahead, Kaelen had stepped back from the woman’s horse and was wiping his brow with the back of his wrist. He turned, scanning the line of carts, and his gaze caught on Richard and Flint together. The dark eyes held a moment, then Kaelen looked away to pull on his tunic.

“But for him,” Richard whispered, “he would wish to bed, would he not? He has bedded many before. I know he has dreamt of bedding me. Why would he want me if I cannot answer in the same?”

“I don’t have all the answers, handsome. But here’s a bright thought.” Flint’s lopsided grin returned, teasing and exasperated. “Why don’t you fucking ask the man?”

CHAPTER 38

By noon, Richard was certain this was what dying felt like.

The pounding in his chest began soon after Flint left him. It filled his whole ribcage—a persistent hammering and fizzing that crowded out his breath and made his fingertips tingle. Twice, he had stopped on the road to place a palm flat against his sternum and will his heart to calm. Surely men did not survive such tempos for long. Surely there was a name for this affliction in the physicians’ tomes.

But Richard was far from home and a healer, and it was with some gloominess that he resigned himself to perhaps perishing on this dusty road.

The fields grew sparse, and shortly after the sun reached its peak, the procession crested a low rise of yellow grass, and the troupe gathered to gape.

For Vexmara lay below them.

The capital sprawled across a long sweep of coast, ringed by a wall of ivory standing forty feet high. Vast antlers crowned the wall at intervals—stag horns mounted in iron brackets, some so enormous they could only have come from the bull-stags of the Estaran southern moors. Banners snapped from the gate towers, each stamped with the antlered head of the Estaran royalhouse. Beyond the wall, the city climbed in tiers of white stone, ceramic roofs, and spires of gold. Past it all, the sea glittered—an immense plate of blue, dotted with sails.

“By the gods,” Tilda breathed.

Richard didn’t share her awe. He’d seen it several times before as a prince on his diplomatic ventures. The city was nothing compared to High Ardenia. Certainly, there was more intricate architecture, with spiralling towers, beautiful canals, and organised roads, but it lacked charm. Why, there weren’t even many trees. Beauty without substance.

Especially—Richard rolled his eyes—once the weekly burnings were factored in.

“Aye, aye, stop yer gawking, the lot of you.” Master Clemens mopped his brow with a handkerchief. “We’ll rest the horses and eat. Vexmara will keep till evening.”

The wagons fanned out. Tents stayed packed, but tablecloths were laid down, and stools dragged out. Within minutes, the camp had transformed into a scattered picnic on the hillside. Richard counted the children, who ate on the same blanket, then settled on a fallen log at the camp’s outskirts.

On sitting, his hand immediately went to his chest.

Stop,he ordered his heart.There is no need for this. We are still angry, and he has not yet apologised.

When it refused to listen, Richard tipped his head back and stared at the blue sky.

He was in love with Kaelen.

He was in love.

How strange that Flint should land so easily on what had been afflicting him all these weeks. It was as exhilarating as it was terrifying, for love meant, of course, courtship.

His father had courted his mother for over a year before she commanded him to marry her. Aralynn and Haldric had delighted in regaling their children with the details oftheir courtship. How Haldric had gifted Aralynn jewellery and flowers, had begged her to accompany him to balls, and taken her on rides through the eastern woods. He’d sent her letters scented with perfume, fought in her name in tourneys and forced Dain to help him climb the ivy to Aralynn’s tower at midnight to profess his love.

That was how it was done, Haldric had said. That was how a man told a woman he loved her.

What, then, was Richard to do?

He gnawed at the edge of his thumbnail.

Flowers were a given. He could pick flowers even now. The road had hedgerows full of them—though he’d have to choose carefully, for some blooms carried meanings, and how mortifying it’d be to present Kaelen with a bouquet that, on closer inspection, transpired to mean ‘farewell forever’.

Richard groaned. No, flowers were too much of a risk.