Aimeric cried out. The blow snapped his head to one side, as the heavy gold impacted on his cheekbone with a sick, solid sound. It left him reeling in the arms of his guards. Jord made a violent move forward, and Damen felt his whole body come under strain as, instinctively, he pushed in to halt him.
‘Keep your mouth off my brother,’ said Laurent.
In the first burst of movement, Damen had flung Jord ungently back, then held him off in a restraining grip. Jord had gone still but the strain of muscle was still there, his breathing harsh. Laurent replaced the goblet, with exquisite precision, on the table.
Aimeric just blinked with glazed, stupefied eyes; the contents of the goblet had sprayed outward, wetting Aimeric’s stunned, slack face. There was blood on his lips, where something was bitten or split, and a red brand on his cheekbone.
Damen heard Aimeric say, thickly, ‘You can hit me as much as you like.’
‘Can I? I think we’re going to enjoy each other, you and I. Tell me what else I can do to you.’
‘Stop this,’ said Jord. ‘He’s just a boy. He’s just a boy, he’s not old enough for this, he’s scared. He thinks you’re going to wreck his family.’
Aimeric turned his bruised, bloody face to the words, in disbelief that Jord was defending him. Laurent turned to face Jord at the same time, his golden brows arching. There was disbelief in Laurent’s expression too, but it was colder, more fundamental.
It took Damen a moment to understand why. Uneasiness swept over him as he looked from Laurent’s face to Aimeric’s, and realised suddenly and for the first time how close Laurent and Aimeric were in age. There was six months’ difference between them, at most.
‘I am going to wreck his family,’ said Laurent. ‘But it’s not his family he’s fighting for.’
‘Of course it is,’ said Jord. ‘Why else would he betray his friends?’
‘You can’t think of a reason?’
Laurent’s attention had returned to Aimeric, drawing close to him, so that they faced one another. Like a lover, Laurent smiled and touched a stray curl, tucking it behind Aimeric’s ear. Aimeric flinched, violently, then repressed the flinch, though he wasn’t able to control his breathing.
Tenderly, Laurent drew a fingertip through the blood that welled from Aimeric’s split lip.
‘Pretty face,’ said Lauren
t. Then his fingers dropped back to brush Aimeric’s jaw, tilting it up as though for a kiss. Aimeric made a choked sound in response to pain; the bruised flesh under Laurent’s fingers was white. ‘I bet you were a peach of a little boy. A pretty peach. How old were you when you fucked my uncle?’
Damen went still, everything in the tower went very still, as Laurent said, ‘Were you old enough to come?’
‘Shut up,’ said Aimeric.
‘Did he tell you you’d be together again, if you’d just do this one thing? Did he tell you how much he missed you?’
‘Shut up,’ said Aimeric.
‘He was lying. He wouldn’t take you back. You’re too old.’
‘You don’t know,’ said Aimeric.
‘Thick-voiced and rough-cheeked, you’d make him sick.’
‘You don’t know anything—’
‘With your ageing body, your overripe attentions, you’re nothing but—’
‘You’re wrong about us! He loves me!’
Aimeric flung the words out defiantly, they came out over-loud. Damen felt the bottom fall out of his stomach, a feeling of total wrongness passing over him. He found he had let go his grip on Jord, who, beside him, had taken two steps back.
Laurent was looking at Aimeric with curling contempt.
‘Loves you? You paltry little upstart. I doubt he even preferred you. How long did you hold his attention? A few fucks while he was bored in the country?’
‘You don’t know anything about us,’ said Aimeric.