Rey had learned a few things about this place in the long weeks since he’d reincarnated.

For one, things here were…tense. He didn’t know why, or what it meant, but everyone — from the local aristocracy, to the servants, to the guards at their posts — moved like they were being watched. It was an uneasy feeling that wormed its way under his skin, nibbling at the shallow peace he’d found in his new health and quiet repose.

And the more he learned, the worse it got. Apparently the King — his Majesty King Leopold Francis Fisk III, say that fives times fast — hadn't taken a concubine in nearly a century. Rey had the honor of being the very first. Which made most people more anxious than before, some people riotously jealous, and Rey uncomfortably interesting to everyone in a hundred mile radius.

Despite his majesty’s earlier declaration, it had been three weeks, and the King hadn’t once asked to feed. In fact, Rey hadn’t laid eyes on him from closer than a hundred yards. It almost made it worse, to live in this perpetual state of not knowing what he’d truly signed up for. 

All Rey wanted to know was how badly it hurt. 

Surely not more than he was already used to, but he wouldn’t be sure — not really — until he tried. So each night he waited, sitting on a million and one pins and needles — reading another of the books he’d shaken loose of the palace’s dusty library. The ends of his long hair tickled beneath the collar of his shirt. He desperately needed a haircut but didn’t quite feel comfortable asking for one yet.

“Are you awake?”

His Majesty’s voice sent a sharp chill down Rey’s spine. This body — his, now — knew what a predator sounded like. Rey fought hard to calm his racing heart, somehow sure that Leopold could hear it in the stillness of his massive room.

“Yes, your majesty,” Rey said quietly, extracting himself from beneath his duvet with as much dignity as he could muster. “I guess you’ve come to, um…eat?”

The King’s eyes were pinned to his neck, but without that tell, Rey wouldn’t have known just how hungry he was. “Yes, it has become necessary to feed. I have worked hard to allow you time to recover.”

“I understand.” Rey squirmed a little, then drew back the collar from his neck with a confidence he absolutely did not feel. “I’ve…never done this. How do I…?”

The King gave a sharp little shake of his head, but the hunger in his eyes was getting harder and harder to mask. “Not the neck. That means…something else, to us. I can use your wrist.”

“Alright.”

Rey rolled up the sleeve on his left side, presenting his arm, wrist up. “Do you need me to stand?”

“No need.”

His Majesty dropped to one knee, his long, elaborate cloak pooling around their feet. There was an eerie stillness about him, one that Rey hadn’t noticed until now. Like every gesture, no matter how small, was entirely under his control. Those deep-set red eyes fixed on his face, dilated and ravenous.

“Are you ready?” 

Rey shivered, but gave a curt nod.

“I am.”