And I Darken (The Conquerors Saga #1)(85)

Radu tripped and fell hard to the cold ground, nearly impaling himself on his sword. Because he knew that voice. And he knew the hand that reached out to pull him up.

“Come on, we have to help! The tunnels collapsed!”

In the dark, Mehmed did not know him. But Radu would know him anywhere. He took the hand, held it as though it were his anchor to this world. And then it was gone and Mehmed disappeared into the night ahead of him.

Radu hesitated. If he went back to camp now, Mehmed would never know. They would not speak. Radu could slip back into the blood-tinged monotony of his days. But that was a lie. Because even when Mehmed was not in his life, he was the missing sun at the center of everything. Radu still revolved around Mehmed, even when he was gone.

Radu ran forward, catching up to Mehmed, who had stopped on the edge of a sunken line in the ground. It led from where they stood to within a few arm spans of the wall.

Mehmed dropped to his knees, hanging his head in despair. A couple of men moved up and down the line, calling frantically, but it was obvious that anyone who had been inside the tunnel would not be coming out.

Radu knelt beside Mehmed, putting a hand on his shoulder. Mehmed looked up in surprise, but whatever he was about to say died on his lips as he squinted at Radu. Without a word, he threw himself forward. He wrapped his arms around Radu’s torso and buried his face in his shoulder. The earth shifted again beneath Radu, or inside Radu, the rumbling and collapsing groan of all his promises to himself falling away.

Mehmed.

His Mehmed.

He put a hand to the back of Mehmed’s neck, holding him.

“I failed,” Mehmed said. “They are all dead, and I failed.”

Radu shook his head, cheek brushing the top of Mehmed’s head. “We have all failed. This is not your fault.”

“This was my plan, though. My idea to save the siege.”

“No one can save it. Do not hold yourself responsible for your father’s folly. Learn from it.”

Mehmed nodded into his shoulder, then pulled back. He grasped Radu’s shoulders too tightly, as though he was afraid Radu might drift away. How could he? Mehmed was his sun. He would always return.

“How are you here?”

“I came with your father. I have been here the whole time.”

Shock and hurt played across Mehmed’s face. He did not look well, drawn and pale even in the darkness. Either he had been sick, or he was getting sick. Radu wanted to run his fingers down Mehmed’s cheeks, to touch him, to fix him.

“Why have you not found me before?” Mehmed asked.

“I…” Because I am in love with you. Because I cannot be around you for fear you will finally see what is written across my heart. Because the pain of you is one I cannot bear. “I could not, not without betraying my true purposes to your father’s inner circle. They must think I am indifferent to you.”

“I do not understand.”

“I am spying for you, Mehmed. Learning how everything in the city works, tracing the lines of bribes, corruption, conspiracy. So that when you take the throne again, I can give you what you did not have before. Allies. Information. Plans.”

Mehmed dropped his hands. “This is why you left?”

Radu nodded, shivering against the bitter cold left in the absence of Mehmed’s touch.

“You left to help me. Not because you hate me.”

Radu’s voice trembled with how much he wanted Mehmed to hear, to understand, in the next sentence: “I could never hate you.”

Mehmed drew him close, pressing their foreheads together. Mehmed’s was feverishly hot. “You broke my heart for missing you, Radu.”

Eyes closed, Radu drew a shaking breath. “Mine, too.”

“You are my best, my truest friend. Will you return with me? Come home!”

Radu nearly said yes—could not have said no—when Mehmed continued: “Lada needs you, too.”

Radu dropped his head, pressing it harder against Mehmed’s, then straightened, pulling away. “How is my sister?”

“She breathes fire and pisses vinegar.”

“So, the same.”

Mehmed laughed darkly. “The same. I fear she will never forgive me for leaving her behind, but this is no place for a woman.”

“Lada is no woman.”

“Be that as it may, I could not bring her into so much danger. But you! I could have had you by my side this whole time.”

Radu sat back onto his heels, putting more distance between them. He did not know whether to rejoice that Mehmed would have brought him over Lada, or to despair that Lada was too precious to risk, while Radu would have been welcomed. Everything that Radu had been through, all the things he had done while here. He could never go back to what he was before. He had lost too much. But Mehmed could not see that.

“I have to stay with your father.” Radu stood, his knees nearly betraying him by sending him back down to the ground, to Mehmed. He locked them in place, standing as tall and straight as the impregnable city behind them. “Otherwise…” Otherwise he would be unable to repair the vicious rubble this night had made of the walls around his heart. “Otherwise all my work will be for naught, and I intend to be the more useful Dragwlya for you.” He forced a smile and a light tone. “Lada is already two assassination attempts ahead of me. I have some catching up to do.”