The Fever King (Feverwake #1)(75)

“It’s beautiful craftsmanship,” Lehrer said at last, and for a moment, Noam didn’t know what he was talking about. But then he felt fingertips—likely Sacha’s, as he couldn’t imagine the chancellor letting Lehrer get so close—touching the steel rim of the circlet. Noam could picture the look on Lehrer’s face so clearly, the small smile and the emotionless eyes. “I recognize the handiwork.”

The sofa shifted: Sacha, standing up. Noam felt him put down his glass on the end table as well, the click of crystal on wood. His voice, when he spoke, was incredibly calm, such a departure from just a few moments ago that Noam got mental whiplash.

“You know, Lehrer,” Sacha said, “if you treated your toys better, maybe they wouldn’t break so badly.”

The silence that followed was lethal.

“You should leave.”

“Yes, I think perhaps you’re right. Thanks for the drink.”

Noam didn’t breathe until he heard Sacha’s footsteps retreat down the other hall and the study door open—then shut—behind him. Even then he didn’t move. In the sitting room, Lehrer stood. The nails in the soles of his shoes paced toward the window, then back again. Stopped.

Noam clutched the empty glass between both hands and shut his eyes.

“You can come out,” Lehrer’s voice said.

Noam sucked in a breath and opened the door with his power. His gaze met Lehrer’s as he stepped out into the hall, Lehrer silhouetted against the sitting room with his hands in his pockets.

Words tumbled in the back of Noam’s throat, but none felt right enough to say aloud. He put his glass down the first chance he got, Lehrer turning to allow Noam to move past him into the room.

“Sir,” Noam said, when he couldn’t stand it any longer.

“It won’t be long now,” Lehrer said. The tips of his fingers pressed against Noam’s back, right between his shoulder blades, propelling him the last few feet farther into the sitting room. Even that small contact was a rush akin to standing on a high peak, looking down. Noam shivered and hoped to god Lehrer didn’t notice. “We need to be prepared.”

“Brennan won’t let them riot,” Noam said.

“We’ll see about that.”

Lehrer’s hand fell away. In the absence of his touch, Noam felt both relieved and strangely bereft.

Noam turned to look at him, and Lehrer nodded. “Go on back to the barracks. I’ve kept you very late already, and you have basic in the morning.”

He said it like an apology. For that, Noam gave him a smile. “All right. Good night, then, sir.”

Dara was still awake when Noam got back. He sat alone in the den by the window, the book on his knee tilted toward the light. He looked up when Noam came in, folding down the corner of his page and slipping his feet off the seat cushion.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.” Noam toed off his shoes by the door. “You’re up late for a weeknight.”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

Noam edged around the coffee table so he could sit on the arm of the sofa nearest Dara’s chair. The corner of Dara’s lower lip was flushed, like he’d been chewing on it. “You have this problem a lot,” he said. “You should talk to Howard. She could get you some kind of prescription.”

“I have one,” Dara said dryly. “But thanks for the suggestion.”

Noam couldn’t stop looking at that spot on Dara’s lip. He wanted to lean over and kiss it, find out for himself if the flesh was as warm and swollen as it looked.

Concentrate.

Dara glanced away from him, turning his face toward the window. “I don’t mind being up,” he said. “It’s a nice night. No clouds. You can even see Mars—look.”

There was no way to look without sliding off his armrest and moving into Dara’s space. But Dara seemed to want that. His hand caught Noam’s wrist and tugged him closer, until Noam was leaning over him with his free hand braced against the windowsill, Dara’s left thigh perilously close to Noam’s groin, and, fuck.

Dara shifted in his seat, perhaps oblivious—but then again, perhaps not. His shoulder bumped Noam’s, Dara squirming in the narrow space left between Noam’s body and the armchair to face the window properly. Only then did he let go of Noam’s hand.

Noam wanted to place it right there, at the small of Dara’s back where his shirt rode up to expose a slice of naked skin.

“Do you see it?” Dara said.

Noam put his hand on the back of the chair instead. Just behind Dara’s head, close enough that one of Dara’s curls grazed the underside of Noam’s wrist.

“No. Where?”

“East of the Lucky Strike tower. The reddish-looking star.”

That wasn’t what Noam wanted to look at. He looked anyway. And there it was—tiny, only slightly ruddier than its fellows, glinting like a dropped garnet in a field of diamonds.

“Now?”

“I see it,” Noam said. His voice came out rougher than usual.

Dara smiled. The book slid off the seat of his chair and fell on the floor, and neither he nor Noam moved to retrieve it.

“It’s strange,” Dara murmured. He was still looking up at the sky, eyes overbright. “Any one of those stars could be dead now. And we’d never know.”