He didn't reprimand Damen. He didn't seem particularly displeased with barbaric behavior, as long as it was directed outward. Like a man who enjoys owning an animal who will rake others with its claws but eat peacefully from his own hand, he was giving his pet a great deal of license.
As a result, courtiers kept one eye on Damen, giving him a wide berth. Laurent used that to his advantage, using the propensity of courtiers to fall back in reaction to Damen's presence as a means of extricating himself smoothly from conversation.
The third time this happened Damen said, 'Shall I make a face at the ones you don't like, or is it enough to just look like a barbarian?
Tags: damen captive-prince laurent
The advice of his father came back to
him, never to take your eyes off a
wounded boar: that once you
engaged an animal in the hunt, you must
fight it to the finish, and that when a boar
was wounded, that was when it the most
dangerous animal of all.
That thought nagged at him.
You're so loyal to him. Why is that?"
"I'm not a turncoat Akielon dog," said
Aimeric.
He's private about it. You saw his
personal training ring, inside the palace.
He'll go a few rounds with some of the
guard occasionally, with Rochert, with
me--laid me out a few times. He's not as
good as his brother was, but you only
have to be half as good as Auguste to be
ten times better than everyone else.
You really do have ice in your veins,
don't you," said Damen.
It’s not naive to trust your family.’
‘I promise you, it is,’ said Laurent. ‘But I wonder, is it less naive than the moments when I find myself trusting a stranger, my barbarian enemy, whom I do not treat gently.
Stop enjoying yourself," Damen murmured. "We're going to be killed, any minute."
"Giant animal," said Laurent.
"Stop it.
I'm not going to use the knife," said
Damen, "but if you're willing to put it in
my hand, you underestimate how much I
want to."
"No," said Laurent, "I know exactly what
it is to want to kill a man, and to wait.
Damen had
found his gaze drawn to the easy
arrangement of Laurent's limbs, the
balance of wrist on knee, the long, finely
articulated bones. He had been aware of
a diffuse but growing tension, a
sensation almost like he was waiting . . .
waiting for something, unsure what it
was. It was like being alone in a pit with
a snake: the snake could relax, you could
not.
Laurent flushed. The colour hit his
cheeks hard, and a muscle tightened in
his jaw as whatever he felt was forcibly
repressed. It was not like any reaction
that Damen had ever seen from him
before, and he couldn't resist pushing it a
little further.
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