Mattin frowned and then finally, much, much too late, realized that he had been given gifts for his nest on purpose. They’d loaned their scents to help ease his pains. The best and worst thing he could have been given.
“Scent matters to the Blessed,” Arden said while Mattin burned with humiliation and flattered pleasure over their thoughtfulness. Arden’s manner was manner-of-fact, because of course, he was experienced and knew how best to help a Blessed through a fever.
“Now, you see,” Mattin said at last, because they both were watching him in a way that suggested they were anxiously waiting for him to speak, “how much of a poor Blessed I am.”
“Poor Blessed, my ass.” Mil took Mattin’s hand and held it in his. Like Arden’s, the touch lasted only a moment. “You’re fine as you are. It’s just that when you should have been learning about and trying these things, the palace was a bloody mess, and trust is a hard thing to grant. Maybe you should have gone back to your family territory then to wait it all out, and learned there. But… I have to say, I’m glad you stuck, Sass. I’m very glad you’re here.”
“Oh,” Mattin murmured again, quite foolishly. That seemed to be all he could say, except for an even softer, “Thank you,” a few moments later when he got his breathing even again.
“Would you like some tea?” Mil asked a bit awkwardly when the silence went on and Mattin had trouble raising his head. When he finally did, they were both watching him carefully. “We can get you some tea.”
Mattin’s heart thumped uncomfortably against his ribs, or seemed to.
“Thank you,” he said, which Mil took as a yes, and got up to ask someone to bring tea before returning to Mattin’s side. “I’m sorry. I’m still very tired and you’re both…”
“Pushy?” Arden quirked a smile.
“Wonderful,” Mattin finished. “It’s embarrassing, really. I can’t… It was especially difficult this time, you see. Harder than before.” Because the two of them hadn’t been there to make sure he ate more, or to give him trinkets worn close to their bodies.
“We’ll do better next time,” Arden promised. “Even if you’re far away.”
That was not their job or their role. But they knew that and had said it anyway.
“Just think on it,” Mil said again. The nobles at court who thought him a brute without gentleness did not know him. He put a new roll on Mattin’s plate and then put more gravy next to it. “Eat now, though, yes?”
“All right,” Mattin agreed quietly, still burning, and felt his heart thump again when Arden began to talk to Mil about the old palace wall so Mattin could fret tiredly, and eat, and inhale the scents he had missed so much it had pained him even before his fever.
But that was something to fret over more and in greater depth later. Or never. But probably later, when he was rested and had time.
Part Three
“If His Highness is so preoccupied by the concerns of the court, perhaps he should consider finding a new consort suited to handle such matters.”
The words rang in Mattin’s ears for hours after he left the council chamber. The beat-of-fours who persisted in troubling Arden had grown tired of petty complaints and had now issued a challenge that could not be ignored.
There was even some truth in it, though Mattin hated to admit it. The country was recovering from decades of war between the noble families. Arden as king they could accept—at least most of them—but Mil was no diplomat, and certainly—and proudly—not from a noble family. It didn’t matter that he was a hero who had helped save the capital; if peace was to be maintained, Arden would need to make another alliance.
That not all alliances were marriages didn’t seem to matter in Mattin’s thoughts. He could not stop frowning during his frozen walk in the snow from the council chamber to his office, and then could not be still, although his feet dragged.
He expected Arden and Mil to be upset in private at the mere suggestion that anyone could possibly stand at Arden’s side as Mil did, but though they had been serious, in their way, they hadn’t been worried as Mattin was. Nor had they been saddened or dismayed or furious. They had been… amused, almost, at the idea of an alliance with some beat-of-four and the possibility of a new spouse in their bed.
That this also meant that they would now be unlikely to help Mattin through his fevers, well, Mattin didn’t have time to think on it and they hadn’t spoken of it. Only that they would need to marry—to ally with but possibly eventually marry—a suitable noble. Someone with an ancient family name of four beats. Someone who could accept and maybe love Mil as well as Arden. Someone who belonged with them in the big bed Mattin imagined they had beyond the second set of curtains leading out of their sitting room. A nest they would not welcome just anyone into. A place that not many deserved, not as far as Mattin was concerned.
And Arden wanted Mattin to help them find this person. Or so it had seemed with Arden and Mil watching Mattin frown and fret and try not to snarl like a hungry Blessed in a fever, and serving him tea to calm him, and saying, “We trust your decision, Mattin of the Arlylian. Who would you choose for us?”
“Who would you put in our bed?” Arden had added alone.
As if Mattin wanted to do that, put someone else in their bed, choose someone else for them.
But he couldn’t deny them and the country was at stake. So he trekked through the winter snows to his office and poured through library records of the other beat-of-four families and made list after list of suitable candidates, of Gifted and Blessed and those in between and some not even a little fae-touched.
He was at it for days, until his vision began to swim and he was sure the assistants had seen how upset he was and pitied him.
A pain in his stomach was making itself known when Elbi rapped on his door and came in with a tray of food that Mattin hadn’t asked for. He accepted it politely and meant to get to it when he was done, but it was pheasant with wine and mushrooms, which was a personal favorite, so he stopped long enough to eat it, and then the breads and pastries that came with it.
Another tray replaced it hours later, this one heavy with cake and tea. He finished that too while scowling at histories of families that contained far too much scandal to be suitable for Arden and Mil’s political needs. He didn’t know how to make a list for their other needs. He would have to ask them what they liked, if Mil liked to only be taken by Arden or if he also did some taking. If they wanted someone as strong and tall as they were, or someone small and weak. Someone simple and austere in tastes, or fond of flowers and clasps and pretty things. They probably would want someone sensible who could be trusted to feed himself or to get enough sleep. Someone who, if he had lust-fevers, prepared for them and knew how to call sweetly and beckon Gifted to his side.
Someone who would make them smile and allow Arden to feel safe enough to show those smiles. Someone to be patient as they fussed, and snap only a little when they went too far. Who would love them in no time at all, and fit snugly between them in sleep or out of it.
