Fyskar

Chapter 24

Clothes lay scattered about Mirza's room. Eoin, exhausted as he was, woke to a low sun. He lay spread out on the prince's bench, rugs having been moved to leave him bare to the cold tile. Mirza's mantle blanketed across him protectively. Fearchar lay asleep on his wife's lap on the floor. His hair had come loose from its ties, braids cascading across her lap in a fiery river. She rested her head on her arm on the bench, breathing softly.

Eoin tried to pull his brain back into his skull. His stomach churned. He took in the room to find the prince scratching on manuscripts at his desk. Eoin extracted himself from the bench. His hips twinged in protest. Sitting up, his head spun, and his stomach tried to lurch into his throat. He calmed for a moment, waiting.

"Are you not well, Eoin?" the prince asked quietly, shifting to leave his seat at the unease in the white-haired man's eyes.

Thank you for the cold of the tile. It helps if I go too far. I'm a bit out of practice. Sore at best, Mirza, he reassured. Must you be so large?

Mirza settled back into his chair and took back up his quill. "So, that is what a White Horse can do? The way you explained it before, it didn't sound as intense. To be able to feel so distinctly another person's entity that is not you. It was fascinating. I can see, though, why it would not end well with my wives," the man mused, a satisfied grin spreading across his lips.

You have several. I do not wish to contemplate what balancing you and one or more of them would be like if that was ever an option. I've never had it spiral so far out of control before, Eoin admitted, finding his unsteady feet, his head throbbing. Never managed that many emotional inputs either. Memories of their time refused to unfurl, though fragments weaselled their way back in some semblance of order. All that came to mind clearly was too many emotions snapping across his conscious, too much heat, too much lust. The concept of coming together like that again was enough to make his hands sweat. He was not sure if it was terror or anticipation that caused the reaction.

He glanced about, trying to place where his plaid had made itself off to. His hired hand lay on most of the clothes and Seonaid's skirts. Eoin laid the prince's mantle over the sleeping couple.

"Why did you come back to me? You could have had the bracers, the bangles removed, you know? The gold alone, not to mention the gems, would have seen you to the end of your days." The prince looked back down at his ink, not entirely wanting to meet Eoin's searching gaze.

Eoin walked over to the prince, his legs shaky as a new lamb. The prince glanced up, fixated for a second before turning away. Eoin sat down on the cold floor near the desk and leaned his back against the tile wall. Mirza's pen scratched across the parchment rhythmically. The physician stared up at the prince curiously. When Mirza did not look to him, he tapped on the tile to direct the man's gaze. Mirza swung his focus down to Eoin.

Why did you insist on gold rather than iron manacles? Eoin held his arm up, watching the setting sun glint through the stone embedded in the metal.

"That necklace of yours - "

My torc? Eoin blinked at the man, confused. He fingered the terminal at the base of his throat.

"I thought it had come from a prior master. That first day you came to my rooms and gave me everything to keep your family safe and to keep me from taking it? It was too lovely to break, but I wanted to-I don't know. I wanted to show that I valued you more, that I had more power than whoever put it on you and let you go. I was jealous someone had you first." He rubbed at the back of his head, trying to find the words. Eoin fingered the torc again as Mirza stumbled over words. "It's a position in your people, though. I didn't know it held that kind of weight.