‘I… am all right…’
‘Please do not lie to me.’
Meilyr leaned into his hand. In the ache, it was absolution.
‘You need fresh clothes. You will make yourself sick otherwise.’
It did not matter. That hand glided through the hammering behind his eyes. He did not ever want to move again.
‘May I…?’ Osian asked.
The hand slipped away.
Meilyr’s mind caught on the words before he nodded, which was a terrible idea. ‘Yes,’ he managed, voice cracking like a wet twig.
Osian disappeared, then returned with fresh clothes. With care and palpable hesitance, he began to unbutton Meilyr’s hunting tunic, gently brushing aside the feeble attempt to help.
Something about the prince brought clarity, the clear ringing of water through the haze. Meilyr studied his profile: his sharp jaw and the angle of his cheeks, taut in concentration. His strong nose, and the storm of his eyes, broiled to dark waves in the shadows and firelight.
Meilyr should stay quiet. He should remain silent, and hidden.
He touched Osian’s fingers, where they had reached the buttons towards Meilyr’s thigh. ‘They believe I killed him,’ he said.
Osian met his gaze. ‘They believe someone of Cyngaleg blood killed him. You are an obvious choice, but that will be put right.’
Slowly, the prince continued with the buttons.
Realisation crept in. ‘You do not believe I did it…’
Those eyes returned. ‘Am I wrong?’ It was almost coy.
Meilyr did not answer.
The prince unfastened the final button. ‘Can you sit up?’
He needed help. They tugged the wretchedly heavy tunic off together, and Meilyr’s mind chose that moment to connect with the situation. To recognise how it looked and felt: the confoundingly handsome man with his hands on him, undressing him, leaving him in only his thin under-tunic and breeches.
Startled heat distorted the edges of the tent. ‘I can manage now, Majesty.’ He made himself mean it.
‘As you wish.’
The prince moved away to stoke the brazier and stir something in a metal pot that started to smell delicious.
Meilyr regretted protesting. His hands still shook and the cold-hot gnawed at him, but eventually he freed himself from the slightly damp under-tunic. Paused before struggling into the soft, thicker sleep-robe Osian had brought him.
‘Will I… be required elsewhere tonight, Majesty?’
‘Not tonight. We are to be undisturbed until necessary.’
There were raised voices if he listened, but the camp felt muted, far away.
Osian ladled something piping from the pot into a bowl and brought it to him. Even cuffed by a square of cloth, it was hot as it met his hands: stew.
‘You have more colour in your cheeks,’ the prince said. He took one of the blankets from the bed and draped it around Meilyr’s shoulders. ‘Please eat, if you can.’
A little dumbfounded, Meilyr said, ‘Thank you, My Prince.’
My Prince.