The Summer Palace (Captive Prince #3.5)(4)

‘Why?’ said Laurent, quietly. It came out like a throb, a child’s question, that couldn’t be answered.

The sun above them felt too exposing. Damen found that couldn’t look away from Laurent. He thought of his father and mother, of Auguste, of Kastor. It was Laurent who spoke.

‘The night you told me about this place, it was the first time that I ever thought about the future. I thought about coming here. I thought about... being with you. It meant something to me that you suggested it. What we had on the ride to Ios, it was already more than I... At the trial, I thought it was enough. I thought I was ready. And then you came.’

‘In case you wanted me,’ said Damen.

‘I thought, I have lost everything and gained you, and I would almost make the trade, if I didn’t know it had happened that way for you, too.’

It was so close to his own thoughts—that everything he knew was gone, but that this was here, in its place, this one bright thing.

He had not understood that it was like this for Laurent until it was like this for him too. He wanted to talk about his own brother in some small way, because as children they had come here together—or rather, Damen had been a child and Kastor had been a young man. Kastor had carried him on his shoulders, had swum with him, wrestled with him. Kastor had brought him a conch shell, once, from the sea.

He said, ‘He would have killed us both.’

‘He was your brother,’ said Laurent.

He felt the words touch that place inside him. He had not spoken about Kastor, except on the night after he had recovered enough to leave his bed and attend the viewing. He had sat with his head in his hands for a long while, his mind a tangle of conflicting thoughts. Laurent had said, quietly, Put him in the family crypt. Honour him as I know you want to.

Laurent had known, when he hadn’t known himself. Damen felt the same bewildered acknowledgement now, even as he wondered what other parts of himself Laurent might touch and open, what other closed doors waited. His mother, his brother.

Laurent said, ‘Let me attend you.’



Bright and open, the baths of Lentos were in sunny atriums, and the water was of different temperatures, warm in some, cool in others. Each bath was a sunken rectangle, with steps carved into the marble leading down into the water. A few of the more private baths were under shaded colonnades, others were open to the sky, and parts of the bowered gardens.

It was a pretty summer spot, different to the maze-like descent into marble of the slave baths in Ios, or the oversteamed tile of the royal baths in Vere. Attendants had already opened and readied the baths in case royal whim desired to use them, elegant pitchers, soft cloths and towels, soaps and oils, and the baths filled with exquisitely clear water.

He was glad that these baths were not underground.

He remembered the sole occasion that he had been called to attend Laurent in the baths in Vere, Laurent’s cool voice baiting him as his hands moved over Laurent’s skin. Laurent had hated him then. Laurent had been inhabiting a private reality in which he had been allowing his brother’s killer to put hands on his naked body.

Knowing that did nothing to lessen his own memories of that time, the claustrophobic overripe palace, the debaucheries, and his own fixed hatred of the Prince, his captor. Damen remembered the baths, and what had happened after, and he understood that there was one more closed door that he didn’t want to open.

‘You served me,’ said Laurent. ‘Let me serve you.’

In Akielos as in Vere it was customary to be washed by bath attendants before entering the soaking bath. He thought—surely they were not going to do that together? If they were, it would be in the traditional fashion: as King and Prince they would be undressed and washed by dedicated bath attendants, then descend to soak and talk. That was common enough among nobles in Akielos, where nudity was not taboo and bathing could be a social pastime.

There were no attendants waiting for them. They were alone.

Laurent stood in sandals and simple cotton, a white-petalled flower in his hair. If you ignored his manner, he looked like a slave of the old style, the face too beautiful to be anything but handpicked, the white chiton like a garment chosen for him by a follower of the classical ways, who preferred their household to embody simplicity and natural beauty.

If you did not ignore it, he looked like what he was: Veretian aristocracy, royalty in his every movement, in the tilt of his chin, in the sweep of his gaze. He might have been extending a signet ring to be kissed, or tapping his boot with a riding crop. His blue eyes gave little away, his full lips that Damen had recently kissed were most often seen in a hard line, or curled in cruelty. He had strolled into the baths as though they belonged to him. They did.

‘How does a bath slave usually attend you?’ said Laurent.

‘They undress,’ said Damen.

Laurent lifted his hand to his shoulder and pulled out the pin. The white cotton fell to his waist. Then Laurent turned slightly to the side, and undid the single tie there.

It was a shock, to have him stand naked with the chiton pooled at his feet. He still wore the knee-high sandals. He had not taken the flower from his hair.

‘And then?’

‘And then they test the heat of the water.’

Laurent took up a pitcher and let the stream of water fill it, then lifted it and deliberately poured it over himself, so that water splashed down over him, and over his still-sandalled feet.