Garrett couldn’t speak. White-hot rage lanced along his veins, into his fingertips: unfamiliar, a lightning-shock. The earth coiled like an autumn cat beneath his feet, under his boots, ready to hiss and spit. Marble groaned.
Alex dropped his hand. His eyes were huge, and he’d clearly felt the tightening, the tremor. But he reached out to steady Garrett instead, and somehow that was worse.
“How often—does he—” Garrett heard the thumping pulse in his own ears. Felt Alex’s hand on his arm: solid, warm, unafraid. “It’s not the first time.”
Alex shrugged a shoulder; his eyes flicked down and up, sun-flecked amber now wryly unhappy. “It’s not just me. And it’s only when he’s angry.”
“At you—”
“I’m not doing something he wants. I didn’t plan to bring you trouble. And I will, being here. I can go.”
“No.” Garrett made himself take a breath, and another. Felt the muttering rumble under his feet, in the hills beyond, drawn nearer and nearer. Dangerous, fearsome, protective, and so tempting—to send that shaking down to the capital city, to ask stones to gather and throw themselves—
He echoed, “You’re not doing something he wants. It’s us. Me. Isn’t it?”
“I told you I’d never hurt you.” Alex lifted his hand from Garrett’s arm, let it linger in the air; curled fingers in as if touching the warmth, and abruptly lowered it. “I won’t.”
“I can’t—you can’t just say that and—” Words failed. No naming this, no containing it, too many unfolding edges. Garrett put out a hand before he could stop himself. Touched Alex’s cheek. It must’ve hurt; his prince did not pull away. “Let me help. You’ve been helping. Me. Us. Please. I can—I’ll try to fix this if you’ll let me.”
Alex made a sound that wasn’t a laugh, fractured and affectionate. “You try to fix every problem. I didn’t want to give you one more.”
“You didn’t think I’d want this one?” Earth, rock, deep and rich and flowing—lifeblood, bedrock, the endurance of time and centuries, becoming and knowing itself…heat at his fingertips, easing wrongness out of Alex’s body…taking pressure and dispersing it into marble and limestone and shale and slate…
He sat back, catching his breath. His fingertips stayed on Alex’s cheek, callused and brown against paleness. “Better?”
“Much.” Alex’s voice was extraordinarily soft. “Were you thinking of starting an earthquake for me?”
“I’d do it,” Garrett said, suddenly reckless, truthful, giving it voice, “if you asked. An extremely targeted one.”
“Magicians don’t lie,” Alex said. “You told me that.”
“We try not to.” He’d ended up kneeling at Alex’s side, both of them balanced awkwardly atop his too-narrow bed, Alex supported by the wall and Garrett’s hand. “So believe me. When I say that I want your problems. I want to see you every day. I might have let you seduce me. I’m susceptible. Very. When it’s you.”
Alex actually laughed this time.
“I’m trying to tell you that I think I’m in love with you,” Garrett said, “and you’re laughing.”
“Only because,” Alex said, “I’ve been saying it all along, since I met you, I love you,” and put a hand into Garrett’s hair and pulled him closer and kissed him.
Kissing Alexandre de Berri felt like all the kinds of stone at once, Garrett discovered: a symphony, a delight, a cascade of sensations. Sun-warmed lazy radiant rock. River-lapped stepping-stones, quick and polished. Cool assured shapes finding their selves under a mason’s tool. Surging ancient heat, wild eternal forces at work. He felt it in his body, in the pull of gravity, in the way Alex teased him and explored him and did delicious things with that talented tongue, until Garrett very nearly caused another earthquake.
Alex began laughing again, face hidden in Garrett’s neck. He’d somehow ended up on top, in their tangle of limbs and no longer tidy bedsheets; his shirt was undone, because Garrett couldn’t stop touching him, exploring him, learning every ripple of muscle and every sound of arousal.
“Earthquakes,” Alex said against the line of Garrett’s throat.
“Yes, you’re just that good at kissing, take the compliment—”
“Oh, I am, I assure you.”
“We’re not hurting you—”
“No. You took care of that. Of me.”
“I want to,” Garrett said, “I want to be here—for you—and I want you, I didn’t know how much I wanted this, you, even you laughing at me—”
“Not at you,” Alex said, grin so perfect Garrett had to kiss him. “I’ve wanted this since this first day I came up to speak to the magicians, and there you were, managing magic and apprentices and construction like, well, magic, and pretending you didn’t have a headache and you couldn’t use a fifth cup of tea. You weren’t anything I’d expected, and you were tired and perfect and human. I wanted you. I wanted to help. If I’m laughing it’s because I never imagined this. I never wanted to go through with the politics, the seduction, the whole idea, from that first day. I never wanted to do anythingbuthelp.”
“I know,” Garrett said. “I didn’t know, at first. But I do. Do you want—can we—I want this, I want more, if you want me—”