Kacper busied himself lacing his boots and Serefin lifted his head to study the side of his face, wondering about the little things he didn’t know. He was very good at getting to know every soldier under his command’s broad strokes, but the little things? Those were hard for him.
Serefin didn’t have friends. He didn’t really know how. Ostyia was all he had because they’d been attached at the hip as children and mutually decided that was how it should be always. She’d gone to war because he was being sent.
And with Kacper … sure, if he thought about it, he could remember when he’d promoted Kacper and pulled him into his inner circle. He remembered when the formality finally broke between them. It had been a slow build. Kacper warming up to telling jokes at Serefin’s expense, cracking him across the face during a training drill and laughing instead of immediately apologizing, treating him like a person and not the prince. It had been gradual, this thing between them, whatever it was that burned through him when Kacper smiled. He hadn’t realized how much he trusted Kacper until the chaos in Grazyk when he repeatedly turned to Kacper to keep him grounded.
So, what was the hesitation?
He reached up, brushing his fingers against Kacper’s jaw, rough with a few days of stubble.
“Ser—?”
Serefin caught the end of his name with his lips. Kacper made a low plaintive sound, one hand lifting to curl against Serefin’s neck, thumb brushing up his throat.
He wanted to know Kacper in a way that he was too aware he simply didn’t yet. And he wished they weren’t in a situation so deeply antithetical to making that happen.
“What was that for?” Kacper asked breathlessly when he broke away.
“Why do you always tense when I touch you?”
Kacper blinked, visibly startled. “What?”
Serefin backtracked, looking away. This was going to start something. “N-no, I—never mind—”
“Serefin, wait,” Kacper said, turning Serefin’s face back toward his. “I didn’t realize I did.”
“Oh.”
“It’s because you’re the king.”
It was not the answer Serefin wanted to hear. “I’m just Serefin,” he said, a little desperately.
“I know. You are. But you’re also not.”
Serefin pursed his lips, tugging away. They needed to get moving. Kacper scowled.
“No, you’re shutting down on me, don’t do that,” Kacper said, sounding frustrated. “Can we talk about this?”
“What’s there to talk about?”
“A lot, actually.”
“It’s too much trouble.”
“It is. But it shouldn’t be. I don’t care about that.” Kacper took Serefin’s hand, stroking the inside of his palm with his fingertips, before releasing it. “I’m sorry. I’ll be more aware of how I respond. And it would be nice if you remember that I’m breaking a thousand different rules with this and it might take a little getting used to.”
“What rules?”
“Don’t act dense, Serefin. You need an heir. Your court hated my proximity to you enough as it was.”
Serefin sighed. He had spent so long thinking the crown would never pass to him that the things he should keep in mind never occurred to him. Not that he cared much about the heir problem. Not that he cared about the opinions of his court, either, but Kacper cared because Kacper had to. Serefin wondered, not for the first time, if he had done more harm than good dragging Kacper into this life. “There may be no Tranavia to return to, so.”
“Deflecting by way of catastrophizing is a great strategy,” Kacper replied dryly.
Serefin shot him a look. He closed his eye, knuckling the bridge of his nose. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. He buried his face in his hands, immediately drawing back at the shooting pain. “Ow.”
“You just came out of a fortnight-long fever, so I can’t really be too upset with you.” Kacper kissed his cheek. “We both need to get better at talking, I think.”
“Gross.”
“I’m going to leave you here. I’m walking back to Tranavia without you. I’ll be the king.”
Serefin grinned. “That’s treasonous.”
“I guess I commit treason now.”
But the jokes made Serefin relax, which was what Kacper always managed to do. He squeezed Serefin’s hand.
“What are you actually worried about?” Kacper asked, his voice low and gentle, and it felt like an unfair question. Serefin was worried about everything.
He was worried that if—if if if—they made it back, this would be over for all the reasons Kacper was worried about. He was worried that Ostyia wasn’t with them and he didn’t know if she was alive. He was worried that every single thing they’d done had been in vain.
He was worried they were going to die, and he would never know all the things about Kacper that he didn’t know yet.
“Do you think the priestess was telling the truth about Tranavia?” he asked. It was a horrifying thought that blood magic was gone as if it had never been in the first place.
Kacper’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t know,” he said after a long pause. He picked up his spell book and his brow creased. He held it out to Serefin.
Serefin swallowed hard. “That’s yours.”
“I…” Kacper trailed off. “That feels right, but—” he shook his head “—it’s also wrong? I don’t know what to do with it.”
“Kacper, you’ve known how to use magic your whole life.”
Another reason Serefin was terrified of returning to Tranavia. What had happened to make Kacper forget such an intrinsic part of himself? Why could Serefin remember? Why had he been spared?
“I can tell something is missing.” He tilted his head. “But I don’t know what it is.”
Tranavia was built on blood magic. The country would crumble without the small spells everyone used without thinking. Serefin couldn’t confront how he might not have a country to go home to. Kalyazin could very well already be moving in to raze it to the earth.
But shouldn’t he try to save it? After everything? He’d likely lost the throne to Ruminski, but he could take that back. The noble was no more than a nuisance, those who followed him would eventually have their self-interests turn them back to Serefin. Court politics were the least of Serefin’s concerns. If he went back to Grazyk, he worried he would be letting something even worse fester.
Kalyazin wasn’t his problem. Their capricious gods were not his problem.
But …
What had he set free? What had he done? He wasn’t so naive as to think that the consequences of his actions would stay in Kalyazin, that he could go home and forget about it while this nightmarish kingdom burned. Katya had warned them that no one would be safe if one of the elder gods returned and Serefin had a bad feeling he knew what the second god he had been dealing with truly was. He had cast that voice out, but that didn’t mean it was contained, or powerless.
“I don’t know what to do,” he said.
“I can’t say I do, either,” Kacper agreed.
“But you’re my voice of reason!”