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Oh, she hadn’t said so explicitly. But he understood. This offer was all he would ever get from her.
Take it? Or leave it? Either way, she wins.
And yet, would she really go to such lengths just to neuter him? The herald wasn’t some honorary position. It was an incredibly powerful role—one that was given to the ruler’s most trusted confidant. A herald had to deliver declarations of war and surrender. To meet with kings and queens, warlords and rulers. To speak with the voice and authority of the archon in far-off lands. If the herald sneezed, Mestibes caught a cold.
After six years of hatred, would she really cede such trust, such power, just to keep me away from home and under her control?
The notes swayed out into a sky filled with brilliant stars. The moon was just as indecisive as he: caught halfway between bronze and sable.
Light or dark? Bronze or sable? Yes or no? Or just stuck on a distant mountain, waiting for guidance from some fickle god?
Aurelius sighed, swapping the pipes for an ornate oil lamp and wandering into the internal courtyard of his estate—richly scented with a rare bouquet of bear’s foot flowers.
Only the richest and most powerful Mestibians could afford a private bathhouse, rather than the communal facilities interlaced throughout the city. And as he walked the cool night, he marveled, not for the first time, that his exile from House Savair had come at a substantial decrease in reputation, and yet a substantial increase in his wealth.
He mostly traded in kind, secret for secret. But he was not averse to having his silence or secrets purchased with riches from across Dynosia—fine silks and finer wine, gold jewelry, and objects of extravagance in glass and marble. All those lovely, decadent, exclusive goods that a wise Mestibian boy was supposed not to covet.
Candles flickered against the cream and umber marble as he entered the bathhouse. The servants had done their job and fucked off, just as they were supposed to. The little space was big enough to fit four, and swirled in the intoxicating aroma of lily of the valley.
Aurelius peeled away the layers of sumptuous fabrics and accessories: his yellow-and-black cloak, held with the golden fibula pin of a bee on an orchid; his zoster belt of luxurious kid leather and sandals of same, their straps twisting up his calves; and finally, a tunic of ruby red, embroidered with a golden motif of a celestial strix, the owl depicted on the arms of Mesti, and the abiding symbol of the senate.
This morning it had seemed a good joke.
As it turned out, the only one laughing was the archon.
He never wore the loincloth undergarments polite society considered proper. At first, it was an act of defiance—for if he was to be considered bestial by the masses, then he would gladly permit them glimpses of his beasthood. But now he had simply grown to enjoy the feeling of his fine tunics caressing his bare body with every step of the day.
The final piece of cloth fell to the floor, revealing his full nakedness. His body was lean and fair. His cock hung long below a patch of light pubic hair, with the pink tip peeking out from his foreskin. His ass was high and round, with surprisingly full thighs, both covered in a soft coat of blond fuzz.
The bath was perfect, giving the slightest sting on entry, before settling into a skin-penetrating warmth.
And as the water massaged the knots from his slim neck, the tension from his baby-soft feet, he thought of the decision before him.
He thought of Ardora.
And for the first time since it happened, his mind turned properly to that moment in the Pentheon with Prince Calix. That moment where every hair had stood on end as if lightning was arcing across his skin. That moment when it felt like he might never breathe again.
What in the gods’ names was that?
Things had been so hectic since the funeral, first the feast and the night that followed, then his mother’s offer, and then this blur of a day. He hadn’t had the chance to consider that moment properly. But it had been... unfathomable. The heat, the immediacy, the realness of the sensation.
At that moment, he had felt the body heat. Tasted the sweat. Known the incredible yearning.
And in the eyes of Prince Calix, he had felt the terror.
Others might try to find a divine explanation for that. To see the meddling of the Five in mortal affairs or the influence of the therians who possessed a fraction of their sire’s power—the satyrs of Ardor, the phoenixes of Rina, the gorgons of Vatic, the sirens of Ondo, and the eidolons of Mesti. After all, it was “well-known” that a satyr could drive people into fits of uncontrollable passion and delirious lust.
Perhaps that was the explanation?
Hardly.
Only fools believed that rubbish—magic and superstition, folklore and secret rituals.
The explanation was far more mundane. He was just horny. That was the only obvious explanation. Overwhelmed by the foreign man, so big and commanding and ferocious.
And the look of terror which crossed the prince’s face? No doubt in his debauched thoughts, Aurelius had shot Calix a look of undisguised lust, and the poor soldier was disgusted. After all, Mestibes may look down upon Aurelius’s waywardness, but that was as far as it went. However, the punishment in Ardora for such depravity was rumored to be far more severe.
Aurelius chuckled.
