“Just tell me and get it over with,” he said into the awkward silence his last remark had left. “I’m sure there’s a private room we can—”
“No need,” Sir Gustave’s companion interrupted him. “We are here to ensure that the king’s decree reaches you and your guest specifically, Sir Corin, but a copy will be posted for everyone to read on the notice board of the temple, also. Well. If one can call it a temple. It’s more of a shack, I suppose. And assuming someone’s available to read it aloud to the populace.” He tittered, a hand covering his mouth.
The innkeeper, who’d been standing by their table watching the show, muttered something under his breath and turned away, his posture suggesting his guests would be getting his worst wine for the rest of the night.
Corin didn’t blame him in the slightest.
“Sir Gustave,” he said, “control your companion, or I’ll be forced to do it for you.” The young courtier started to speak, but apparently he wasn’t completely stupid, either, because a glare from Corin’s narrowed eyes was enough to deflate him. “Read the fucking thing, then. Let’s have it.”
“The fu—the royal proclamation, you mean?” Sir Gustave demanded.
“Yes. That.” Corin crossed his arms and glowered, a move he’d found to be effective in the past. If he’d been wearing a sword he’d have fingered the hilt instead. Worry raced along his nerves. “Now, if you please.”
Sir Gustave sniffed and held out his hand, and the other fellow reached into a satchel on the floor and pulled out an envelope.
Corin counted to ten, very slowly, during all the throat-clearing and seal-breaking and so on and so forth, but finally Sir Gustave began to read aloud.
The first part had the same nonsense as any royal decree: to all subjects and guests in the kingdom, a list of all the king’s titles and honors, and on and on. Even the locals seated in the taproom, who probably hadn’t had anything this interesting happen since Corin took up residence in the first place, started to fidget.
But at last Sir Gustave reached the meat of the proclamation:
“The guardianship of Lord Aster of Cezanne having been duly reverted to the crown in the person of His Majesty King Theobert the Fourth on the petition of Lord Cezanne of Cezanne, subsequent to his abandonment of his betrothal to His Grace the Duke Marellus, His Majesty King Theobert the Fourth hereby decrees that any unmarried man of noble arms and in the crown’s good grace who causes Lord Aster to yield, and then brings him before His Majesty King Theobert the Fourth, shall receive, along with Lord Aster’s hand in marriage, a sum of gold as a marriage portion equal to the value of the aforementioned perquisite as a token of His Majesty King Theobert the Fourth’s favor.”
Someone off to the side hooted with laughter and called out, “Is this procla-what-thing from His Majesty King Theobert the Fourth, then? Weren’t clear on that!” And the room erupted in chuckles and agreement.
Sir Gustave bit his lip, face going alarmingly red. “It’s the way these are written, and I wasn’t even done read—don’t make me arrest you all for treason!”
A fresh chorus of laughter and the thumping of ale mugs was his only reply.
If the proclamation had been on any other subject imaginable, Corin would’ve laughed right along with them. The kingdom’s laws set a high bar for treason charges, and a bit of heckling in a tavern came nowhere near, as everyone present knew perfectly well.
But he had no inclination whatsoever to mirth. Lord Cezanne, Duke Marellus, and the king had somehow and for reasons yet to be determined conspired to give Aster away to anyone who wanted him, dependent on a trial by arms that Aster would be almost certain to lose to the very first comer. The kind of man who’d hear this proclamation, and see it as a way to become wealthy overnight…Aster himself, with his sweet smiles and bright eyes, his self-deprecating humor and his awkward, eager, irresistible inexperience in bed would be nothing to such a man. It chilled Corin’s blood and raised his temper to the boiling point all at the same time.
“IfI may continue?” Sir Gustave shouted, making no dent whatsoever in the din.
“You may not,” Corin said. Everyone went silent. It took him a moment to understand why, and then he saw the faint haze in the air in front of his face: he’d puffed out a chest-full of smoke, and possibly a bit of flame, too. Fuck, his draconic nature had always been strong, but it’d been enhanced almost to a worrisome degree of late. “We’ve heard the important part. And now that everyone knows the gist, you and I are going to talk. Privately.”
The other man rose, clearing his throat. “I will of course—”
“You will not,” Corin said, his voice dipping to a quelling sort of growl, fists clenching. He didn’t need a fucking sword. His claws would be far more than adequate.
The fucker sat back down again with a slight thump. Sir Gustave shook his head, opened his mouth, closed it, and then finally said, in a tone suffused with impotent irritation, “If you’ll accompany me, then.”
Corin nodded, glanced at the innkeeper, said, “Have some food and supplies packed up for me, will you? Twice as much as usual. I’ll be leaving soon,” and followed Sir Gustave out of the taproom.
ChapterFifteen
When he tucked Asterinto bed, Corin had strongly implied that he’d come up and join him soon—or at least eventually.
But Aster woke to an empty, silent bedroom, far less cold than he would’ve expected without Corin’s dragon heat, but chilly enough that he’d curled into a ball in his sleep with only his nose poking out.
A few blinks confirmed the reason for the change in temperature: the part of the sky Aster could see was pure blue, and sunlight gilded the side of the southeast-facing window casement. He stretched luxuriously—and then immediately snapped back into his previous position, cursing himself, Corin, Corin’s cock, and all of the decisions he’d made the day before.
Cautiously, he tried again to straighten out and stretch, more gently this time. Mmm. All right. When he experimentally clenched the muscles of his ass, that felt…God, he hadn’t realized some of those muscles existed, and now they seemed to be eagerly awaiting having more to do.
He rolled to his back, cock half hard and a smile spreading across his face.
So Corin hadn’t opted to spend the night with him. His smile faltered. But that didn’t mean anything, necessarily. He’d said something about not wanting to keep Aster awake, so perhaps he’d simply been a gentleman. (Although gentlemanliness, after the way he’d so thoroughly and filthily wrecked Aster’s body and mind yesterday, seemed a bit of a moot point.)
