A Royal Mess (MxM)

13 - A Lord

To say that Prince Joelin was not in a great mood when he got back from his hunting trip a while back was an understatement. He had told Rahis bits and pieces of what had happened, but was obviously holding a lot back. By the next morning, his mood seemed to lighten up though and had dismissed both Rahis and Camayla from a good deal of their chores in his room for the day. Due to that, Rahis found himself with nothing to do around midday. All of his other servant friends, including Camayla, who had different, longer tasks than him, had their own things to do and the ones he saw looked like having someone helping them would make their task harder, so he continued on. He considered checking the kitchens to see if any of his friends there needed assistance, which they definitely would, but considered having to put up with the Head Cook, Marcira, and decided against it. This left him with a good deal of free time, something he hadn't had in a while, making him antsy.

He had taken to wandering around the castle, re-familiarizing himself with some of the halls and rooms he didn't frequent very often when someone came out of a door while he was walking right by it, making him jump back. He looked up to see a confused man looking at him, his face somewhat familiar to Rahis yet he didn't know from where. As he silently studied the man, he couldn't help but notice he was quite attractive, with strong features made even more noticeable by his clean-shaven face, very soft looking brown hair, and a dark blue pair of the most beautifully colored eyes he's ever seen. With a jolt he remembered where he'd seen this man before. It was around when he first started, the lord he crashed into in the hallways, the one he thought about for at least a week, concerned he'd come for him and imprison him for running into him or speaking out of turn. A glance down showed that he was dressed much nicer than a servant and was likely a pretty powerful lord's son. Realizing that this quiet staring must be pretty awkward, even if the lord hadn't tried breaking it yet and was looking at him with matching intensity, Rahis spoke. "I am sorry, my lord, I wasn't paying much attention to my surroundings."

The lord looked even more confused at what he just said, bringing a wave of confusion to Rahis as well. Was he speaking out of turn again? The lord seemed to shake it off before speaking, his voice a pleasant tone that didn't quite fit what Rahis expected, but was still nice. "No, I should be the one to apologize. I should've opened the door slower."

Rahis tilted his head. "You have no reason to apologize, my lord."

"Neither do you." Rahis smiled. The lord seemed to like that and the edges of his lips tilted up ever so slightly, bringing more or Rahis' attention to them. "I haven't seen you around here that much, why is that?"

"I rarely have duties down here. Not to mention I only recently started working here." Rahis bit his tongue, resisting the urge to bite his lip instead due to how awkward he sounded.

"Really?" Rahis nodded. The lord opened his mouth to continue, but soft footsteps and low chattering coming towards them stopped his words for a second. He looked around. "Come, I would love to hear more." He gestured, walking a door down and opening it, Rahis went in with little hesitation, shocked by the lord's actions. The lord followed and shut the door behind them. Rahis assumed it was due to the fact he knew the people coming and wished to avoid them. He took a second to glance around the room. It was a guest room, obviously either unoccupied or recently thoroughly cleaned.

"I'm sorry to disappoint, but my story isn't very interesting and there isn't much to it." Rahis said as soon as he got his bearings.

The lord sat comfortably at a table not far from where Rahis was standing, gesturing for him to be seated too. With the way the lord so casually moved about the room and touched things, Rahis put together that this was the lord's room,
recently cleaned. He sat down on a chair not too far from the lord but still a decent distance away. Perfect distance for conversing. "Oh, I highly doubt that. I'm sure there is a lot we can talk about."