“Well, perhaps you’d prefer your friend to me. He is quite handsome, and I’m sure he doesn’t bring with him all the trouble I do.” A ridiculous disguise, a friend who was a spy, an emperor searching for him. Even Flavian knew that was far too much trouble.
“The only trouble I’ve seen is this insanity. I really do believe you’re crazy right now.”
Flavian reeled back at Cathal’s words, words that fell like a slap. “Am I? Well, you certainly wouldn’t want to be around a crazy person, would you? Leave me alone, Cathal.”
Flavian pushed past Cathal and strode away as fast as he could. He waited until he was out of Cathal’s sight to start running.
“CATHAL? ARE you all right?”
Cathal turned from the dim corridor where Flavian had disappeared to face his cousin. “No, Philip. I don’t think I am.”
“What happened? Why was Flavian so upset?”
Cathal thought he might be in some form of shock. Everything seemed a bit removed, a bit blunted, but his stomach twisted, a sick feeling spreading through him. “I have no idea what happened, but I’m scared he might be done with me.”
Chapter 26
FLAVIAN STARED out his bedchamber window the next morning, watching as the sun gilded the city of Jumelle below him. He should be itching to paint it, to capture the play of light on stone and water just right. But he wasn’t.
He hadn’t slept after he left the party, left Cathal standing alone in a corridor thinking Flavian was insane. And perhaps he was. Because if Cathal had still wanted Flavian, he wouldn’t anymore, not after Flavian’s ridiculous outburst. Yes, it had hurt to watch Cathal talking and flirting so easily with other people, but there was a better way of handling it than what he had done.
If only he hadn’t let his fears overwhelm him. He’d thought he might have been beginning to get over them, to silence those voices that told him Cathal would never want him, not as Flavian was. Apparently he hadn’t.
It was time for him to go.
The palace wasn’t really home; Cathal wasn’t really his. Flavian needed to be on his way, and the first thing was to decide if he was going to stay or leave Tournai. Originally, he’d thought to stay, and that plan had only seemed more right the longer he spent in Jumelle. He liked it there. Even without Cathal, Flavian liked it there.
But the emperor was looking for him, and the emperor was also interested in Tournai. Perhaps it would be better to go somewhere else. To pick another city, another country—another name even—and disappear. The emperor couldn’t search everywhere.
Flavian sighed and pushed away from the window. Time to begin.
He bathed and dressed and ate the light breakfast one of the maids left for him in his sitting room. It tasted like dust, but he knew it wasn’t the fault of the cooks. The pastry and fruit and cheese were just the same as they had been the day before, but he’d shared breakfast with Cathal yesterday.
Flavian pushed the plate away.
He waited until he thought it was an appropriate hour for a visit and left his suite with his sketchbook in hand. He hadn’t even thought Prince Amory might not see him until he was stopped by a guard outside the princes’ suite. But the guard only ducked inside the suite for a moment before coming back to admit Flavian.
Prince Amory was in the sitting room, handing his son to a woman who must have been the child’s nursemaid. He gave the young prince a kiss on the cheek, which provoked a giggle in the baby, and let the woman carry him away. Flavian bowed as Prince Amory turned to him.
“Good morning, Flavian.”
“Good morning, Your Highness,” Flavian said as he straightened from his bow. One look at the prince’s face told Flavian that Prince Amory knew what had happened the night before. But that shouldn’t surprise him. Cathal was close to his cousin, and Prince Philip seemed to tell his husband everything.
“How are you?” Prince Amory’s dark eyes were filled with concern, which did surprise Flavian.
“I’m… well. Thank you, Your Highness.”
“Hmm.” Prince Amory watched him with narrowed eyes for a moment, but only said, “What brings you to see me today?”
Prince Amory gestured for him to sit as he took a seat on the couch. Flavian sat on a chair next to him.
“I have something for you. Well, for Prince Julien.” He opened the sketchbook and found the pages he had prepared. “I thought His Highness might enjoy these in his nursery. Probably more when he’s older.”
He couldn’t seem to stop himself from babbling as Prince Amory examined the three pieces Flavian had done. He wasn’t usually so nervous, but he was in front of the prince of Tournai’s consort. Flavian was pleased with how the pieces had turned out, especially since he had almost given up on them after finding out what—or who—the legendary cats of Tournai actually were. But he hadn’t been able to give up the challenge of capturing a legend that was fact. Capturing the power and grace he had seen when Cathal had shown Flavian what his magical Talent did.
He shied away from thinking about Cathal and instead focused on the dragons in the pieces. Also graceful creatures, vivid in color and powerful. He wouldn’t admit it aloud, but after he’d found out about the cats, he’d wondered if the dragons were real too and not just legend.
“Flavian, these are exquisite.”
Prince Amory’s words provoked a wave of relief. “Thank you, Your Highness.”
“I’m sure Julien will love them, but you didn’t have to do this. Go to so much work for us.”
“It was no trouble, Your Highness. I enjoyed it, and I wanted to give you something to show my gratitude for your hospitality, yours and Prince Philip’s.” Any other motive he might have had was moot with his decision to leave Tournai.
“And still, you didn’t need to do this to thank us, but I’m sure Philip will be as touched as I am that you would make something so beautiful for Julien.”
“It’s nothing, really, Your Highness. I would have painted them, but I haven’t the supplies here, and with how things stand, I thought it best to give them to you now.” He looked at the piece Amory held. He did like the red dragon in that one, even in pastels.
“You should call me Amory, at least in private.” While Flavian was still gaping at that pronouncement, Amory continued, “What do you mean, the way things stand?”
“You must have heard what happened last night between me and Cathal. I thought it best—I thought it time that I think about leaving, if Prince Philip will let me go. It’s… time for me to go somewhere else.”
Amory looked at him steadily, his dark eyes far too perceptive. “Why would you go now?”
“I came here to start a new life as an artist. I should do that.”
“I thought you were doing it.”
“I was, perhaps, but now that Cathal and I….” He glanced away, unable to hold Amory’s gaze any longer. “It never made sense anyway, Cathal and someone like me.”
“Someone like you? Cathal’s lucky to have you—you’re clever and a brilliant artist and you challenge him. I’ve wondered sometimes what you see in him.” Amory smiled, an affectionate smile that took some of the sting out of the statement. Flavian found himself bristling at the insult to Cathal anyway. “He can be a bit of a prig, I know you’ve noticed. But he’s mellowed since he met you. You’re good for him.”
Flavian stared at Amory, the statement that he could be good for Cathal stunning and ridiculous. But it didn’t matter. “He doesn’t want me.”
Amory’s eyes went wide with shock. “He wants you. More than that, he needs you. He cares about you deeply.”
Flavian shook his head. “No, he doesn’t.”
“He does. And I’ll tell you this, even though I probably shouldn’t, I’ve never seen him that way about anyone. Neither has Philip.”
Flavian shook his head again. He couldn’t believe that, not just because he didn’t think it possible, didn’t trust that it could be possible, but also because if it was, he had ruined somethi
ng very good.
“There’s a way you can find out.” Amory nodded at the sketchbook in Flavian’s lap. “You could know for sure. Who Cathal is, if you can trust him. I can tell you his good qualities, his loyalty, how deeply he feels, but you wouldn’t have to believe me. You would believe what you saw if you drew him.”
FLAVIAN SPENT the rest of the day in his small suite, pacing like a caged animal. He ate both the midday and evening meals alone in his sitting room, watched the sun climb across the sky and sink again, thoughts whirling the whole time. He wanted to go somewhere, anywhere, but he didn’t want to see Cathal. Flavian had no idea what to say to the man, but that made it no easier to keep from going out of his mind.
He’d considered packing his things, but he didn’t know when he could leave. Amory had promised to talk to Prince Philip about whether Flavian could leave, given the way things were with Velia and another spy uncaught. But even if Flavian could leave tomorrow, he couldn’t just go; he needed a plan. A plan would be the only thing keeping him from being caught and taken back to Ardunn.
But that wasn’t his only reason for hesitating. He didn’t want to go.
Flavian glanced again at the sketchbook he’d left on the table when he got back from seeing Amory. He could do what Amory suggested. He drifted closer to the book and the pencils beside it. He’d retrieved them at some point during the afternoon when temptation had nearly gotten the best of him, but he’d abandoned them there too, scattered on the table. He straightened them into a neat row, but he didn’t open the sketchbook, didn’t begin drawing.
He was too afraid to start drawing.
Maybe Amory was right about Cathal. Maybe the drawing would show Flavian. But maybe it wouldn’t. Maybe it would show that Cathal wasn’t the person Amory said he was. If he drew Cathal, he would know without a doubt what kind of man Cathal was, but cold dread rushed through him when he reached for the pencil again. He didn’t want Cathal to have lied to him.
Flavian wanted Cathal to love him.
He wanted what Cathal said to him to be true. He couldn’t understand how it could be, how Cathal could want him when there were so many people who were so much more than Flavian was. And who didn’t have spies for friends and powerful emperors chasing them.
Flavian dropped his head to rest against the back of the chair and closed his eyes. Cathal’s beloved face appeared in his memory, just the way he’d looked when he told Flavian he loved him. A little worried, sincere, and so very hopeful.
Flavian was an idiot.
He was out the door and into the corridor before he remembered he was barefoot. He didn’t go back. The marble was cold and slick under his feet, but Cathal’s suite wasn’t far. Flavian moved through the corridors at a near run. Decision made, he was eager to get to Cathal and find out if he still had a chance. If it wasn’t too late.
He didn’t realize he wasn’t alone until an arm snaked out and grabbed him around the waist. He instinctively struggled, squirming and pulling until he fell free. Stumbling, his knees hit the marble with a thump and a pain that radiated up and down his legs. He cursed and rolled, coming up spitting mad and ready to yell at whoever thought grabbing him would be a fun joke.
To be faced with three men in dark clothing and cloaks, hats pulled low over their foreheads. Not a joke, then.
“Come along with us now and don’t make it harder than it has to be,” the tallest of the men said. He had a pronounced accent that proclaimed him to be from the heart of Ardunn. Ice flooded Flavian’s veins at the first word in that accent. Somehow, the emperor’s agents had found him. “You’re unarmed. You’ll only get hurt.”
“I think it’s going to have to be quite difficult,” he said and ran.
Surprise only bought him an instant before they were on him again. He fought as they grabbed him, kicking and punching when he could, but he’d never been good at hand-to-hand combat and he was up against three men, all larger than he was. He might lack weapons, but he wasn’t going to give up. He struggled, trying to keep them from getting a grip on him.
Where were the palace guards? Shouldn’t someone be patrolling the corridors? Someone should have noticed three men attacking another in the royal palace. Someone had to hear.
That’s when Flavian started screaming. For help, for the guards. For Cathal.
“Shut him up, would you? Before he brings the palace guard down on us.”
Flavian kept struggling, kept kicking and even scratching, kept trying to yell, to make any noise at all, even as his arms were grabbed, as hands clamped over his mouth. He kept fighting as two of the men lifted him, didn’t stop as someone shoved a cloth in his mouth as a gag.
He twisted sharply, and one of the men dropped his legs. A jarring pain shot up one leg, and Flavian cursed, the words muffled by the gag he couldn’t manage to spit out. But he wouldn’t let pain stop him. He pulled at his arms, still secured in the iron grip of the second man while kicking at the one trying to grab his legs again.
A growling roar froze them all where they were. And a large cat appeared in their midst, leaping at the man who still held Flavian. The man dropped Flavian’s arms to try to defend himself against the cat, but it did him no good. The cat’s leap brought the man down, his head hitting the wall with a sickening crack. Flavian kicked out at the man behind him, scrambling free as the cat turned on the other two men.
Cathal had come for him.
The wave of relief and love was almost overwhelming, but he couldn’t let it distract him. There was still danger. Cathal brought another man down with a powerful leap, this one landing flat on the ground, the impact stunning him but not rendering him unconscious like the other. He tried to push Cathal off, but Cathal didn’t move. It was the final man, the one with the Ardunnian accent, who worried Flavian. He’d pulled a long, wicked-looking dagger and was advancing on Cathal from behind.
Flavian had to stop him, but jumping on him was only likely to get Flavian killed too. He whipped his head back and forth, looking for something… a large urn on a table against the wall caught his eye. Before he could really think about it, he grabbed the urn, turned, and swung it as hard as he could at the back of the Ardunnian’s head. The man crumpled without a sound.
Cathal’s sleek head swung around to look at Flavian, but he turned back to the man beneath him almost immediately, growling as the man tried to move. Flavian stepped closer, though he wasn’t certain what he was about to do, then stopped. Had he heard… yes. Someone was coming from down the corridor. Perhaps the guards he’d been hoping for before Cathal’s timely rescue.
Flavian sagged a little. He turned back to Cathal and saw the cat still crouched on top of the struggling man. “Cathal, someone’s coming.”
Cathal looked at him again but did nothing else.
“Cathal, someone is coming, and they can’t see you like that. Stop playing with him and change back,” Flavian snapped, his patience rapidly fraying after nearly being kidnapped right out of the palace.
He had no idea what he would do if Cathal didn’t listen to him. He couldn’t move the large cat body if Cathal didn’t want to be moved, but Cathal had told him the royal family’s Talent was a secret. It wouldn’t be a secret much longer if Cathal didn’t change back.
Chapter 27
FINALLY, THE amber-gold light surrounded Cathal, and the cat was replaced with Cathal the man. Flavian let out a long breath. The man beneath Cathal, the only one of Flavian’s attackers still conscious, began to curse and struggle again, but Cathal pulled a fist back and hit him. Flavian wasn’t certain if the punch knocked him out or if his head hitting the marble did it, but the result was the same.
“Are you all right?” Cathal asked as he stood and strode the few steps to Flavian.
Flavian nodded and dropped the urn he realized he was still holding. He didn’t protest when Cathal drew him into his arms, held him against his broad chest. He didn’t want to protest. He shuddered as Cathal’s arms closed around him, comforting, protecti
ng, and let himself sag into Cathal’s strength for just a moment, just until guards’ footsteps and shocked voices grew closer. Flavian straightened but stayed close to Cathal, and Cathal stayed beside him, an arm loosely around him, not restricting but providing support, as more guards came and the three men were restrained and taken away, as Philip and Amory arrived at a near run, concerned and asking questions and trailed by the guard captain, who seemed less than pleased that the princes had run into potential danger. Flavian didn’t blame him.
Cathal moved them all into his suite, seating Flavian with perhaps more care than necessary and settling next to him on a couch. The princes, both in dressing gowns, took the couch opposite with Captain Loriot standing at their side. Prompted by their questions, Flavian recounted what happened, leaving out the part about Cathal using magic to turn into a large cat. Even in a state he recognized as slightly disconnected, he knew to leave that out in Captain Loriot’s presence.
At some point, Prince Philip sent for a healer. It was the chief of the palace healers who was admitted to Cathal’s suite not long after. The princes and Captain Loriot left, but Flavian kept Cathal beside him with a hand laid on his arm. Cathal subsided back onto the couch without a word and stayed next to Flavian while the healer, Jadis, examined and treated him. But there wasn’t much treatment necessary; he was mostly bruised. Badly bruised but just bruised. His right knee was sprained, something he hadn’t noticed before but he definitely felt once the commotion was over.
And as soon as Jadis left, Cathal lifted Flavian in his arms, carefully, so carefully that Flavian could have wept, so he had to say something. “I’m not an invalid. I can walk.”
“Humor me, dearest.”
The endearment sent confusion sweeping through Flavian, which at least cleared some of the shock. Flavian said nothing more as he turned that endearment and its meaning—to him, to Cathal—over and over in his mind. He let Cathal undress him and bundle him into bed. Watched as Cathal undressed himself and joined Flavian under the blankets.
The Artist’s Masquerade Page 33
