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Inez looks thoughtfully at him. “The Immurite is wise,” she says. “It would be a fine way to mark your triumphant return from war. For the Feast of Surrus we will open Sanglora to the great and good of Attar. We will show the wealth of this estate and you will cover me in the coupling grove. That will end the rumours and Surrus will bless us with a child.”

Damon takes a steady breath. Truly, he does not know if he can do what is required. But he must. He has done more difficult things, surely. “If you wish.”

“Thank you, husband. The Immurite has given you wise counsel. I will tell the servants to begin preparations. And,” she looks up at Damon with big, cautious eyes, “you will keep your promise. It will not happen again, with the Juran slave?”

“It will not,” Damon says, meaning it.

Damon leaves the solar, glad Inez is happy. This is the only way, he thinks. He will follow the advice of the Immurite. He will not see Lyr. He will stay away from him. He will not go down to the kitchens in a fit of weakness as he did today. He will forget the way Lyr looked, sobbing for Damon’s touch on the narrow cot on the Azurian Ascendant.

He will be an honourable man. Master of Sanglora.

10

LYR

After Lyr had wandered back into the kitchen, dazed from his encounter with Damon in the orchard, he waited for Damon to come and speak to him.

But Damon doesn’t come. Not on that day, or the next, or the next. Lyr waits half a moon’s turn and Damon doesn’t come.

Damon ran from him, ran from Lyr as seed was drying on Lyr's belly. Ran after his wife. Lyr doesn’t know what it means, but perhaps after Lyr spent Damon decided he’d taken all he could risk. Or all he wanted.

Lyr thinks that if this is the case, Damon could at least explain. If there is to be no more, Damon ought to tell him so.

But he doesn’t.

The days roll into each other, filled with nothing but the frantic work in the busy kitchens, thoughts of those sweet moments with Damon in the orchard and the aching, sad knowledge that Damon is here with him, under the same roof.

Sometimes Lyr washes the dishes from the manor and wonders if Damon’s dish is amongst them. If he is touching something Damon has touched. Sometimes he lingers by the pump in the yard by the stable, hoping Damon might come by. He never does.

Lyr is nothing but a kitchen slave. A scullion. The lowliest person in Sanglora Manor.

His only solace in the bleak passing days is that, as his obsession with Damon fills his thoughts, his memories of his time with Jareleezi in Blackstone Castle are fading. He has a new life. He has escaped.

He spends most of his time thinking instead of the feel of Damon’s fingers curling around his cock, whispering filthy things in his ear as he urged him to spend.

On this particular day, Lyr is collecting more herbs for Cook when he sees Damon for the first time since he fled the orchard. It’s late morning and Damon rides up to the stable block on a large grey mare. Lyr pauses with the basket on his arm. His heart beats hard. Damon looks as majestic as ever in his usual sleeveless leather jerkin and with sweat on his brow from a hard ride.

He swings down from the saddle and passes the reins of his steed to a stablehand. Lyr waits for Damon to say something to him. To speak to him, or even simply look at him. Look at him with heat in his eyes.

But when Damon glances in his direction he looks right through Lyr as if he were simply an invisible scullion. Lyr returns to the kitchen hurriedly. He hands over his basket of herbs and makes an excuse about needing to fetch something from the servants’ hall. He makes it there before he starts to sob.

Everyone is so busy. He knows he will get a clip around the ear or worse for not returning swiftly to the kitchen for his next duties. But he still ends up, lying face down on his bed and weeping.

Damon will not even look at him.

It is Mina who finds him. “Lyr,” she says from the doorway. “I was sent to fetch you. Are you sickening?”

Yes, Lyr thinks, yes I am sickening. He rolls over and sits up. “I don’t know what to do.”

Mina comes over to Lyr’s bed and sits down beside him. “About what?”

“About Damon, Master Damon.”

“What about him?” Mina sucks her bottom lip. When Lyr doesn’t reply, she says, “Lyr, if you don’t hurry back Cook or Kres will tan your hide for this slacking.”

Lyr swallows. “Mina, if I tell you something, will you keep it a secret?”

“Of course, you can tell me anything.”