By the time the ball began, Valemont Keep bled candlelight from every arched window, like a jewelled beast glowing from within. Music wound through the halls, lutes and harps and airy flutes, all woven into the din of noble laughter, clinking goblets, and the rustle of silk. In the grand ballroom, spun gold and jewelled brocade twirled beneath chandeliers like fireflies caught in crystal cages.

Aerion Valemont arrived late, as was his habit. He let the delay sharpen anticipation, then descended the stairs one deliberate step at a time.

His silk robes clung like a lover, the bodice dipping scandalously low, revealing collarbones dusted with shimmer and a long, lean chest meant to be looked at.

The room was his stage and every glittering guest, his audience. Smiles bent toward him, whispers followed him, hands itched to reach for him. Aerion basked in it all, eyes glittering with wicked delight.

Everyone watched him.

Everyone but Clyde.

The knight stood sentinel by a column, clad in a black uniform clean and sharp but stripped of any ornament. No jewels, no cape, no flourish; only the stark outline of a man who belonged more to war camps than ballrooms. He didn’t mingle. He didn’t drink. His gaze was a blade, cutting across windows, exits, balconies. Always watching. Never indulging.

Aerion spotted him instantly. Of course he did. And once he had, he made his way straight through the tide of noble dancers, their perfumes and protests swirling around him, until he stood before the one man who did not bend to him.

“I do hope you’re enjoying yourself,” Aerion purred, swirling ruby wine in his glass, “though you seem more likely to turn to salt than dance.”

Clyde said nothing. His eyes kept sweeping the room.

Aerion tilted his head, the shimmer along his collarbones catching the candlelight. “That was a joke,” he said, as if Clyde were too dense to notice.

Still, silence.

“Oh, come now. Not even a twitch?” Aerion took a deliberate step closer. The perfume clinging to him, sandalwood, smoke, and sugared fig, rose in a haze between them, rich as heat. “Is there anything that stirs you? Surely even stone has cracks.”

“I’m not here to be stirred,” Clyde said at last, his voice gravel and iron.

Aerion’s lips parted into a smile, sly and serpentine. He leaned closer, voice dropping just above a whisper. “You know, I was warned about the silent ones. Dangerous. Hungry. Boiling under the skin.”

Clyde’s jaw flexed. His eyes never left the crowd.

Aerion smirked, delighted. “Ah. There’s a crack.”

He leaned in so close his lips nearly brushed the shell of Clyde’s ear. His words dripped honey and venom both: “Would you fuck me if I asked nicely?”

The words clung in the air, thick as smoke, daring, poisonous.

Clyde turned his head, not sharply, but with the deliberate weight of a wolf deciding whether to bite. Grey eyes locked onto Aerion’s sapphire ones.

“No,” he said. His voice carried no heat, no hesitation. “Not even if you begged.”

The words struck like a slap.

Aerion flinched—not much, barely the twitch of a muscle—but enough to feel the crack beneath his own skin. The smirk returned at once, pasted on like porcelain. Fragile. Gleaming. “So, it speaks,” he said, letting laughter lace the words, though they rang thinner than before.

He turned sharply, cape flaring, and drifted back into the sea of brocade and laughter. The smirk stayed on his lips, but something gnawed beneath it; half a pout, half a curiosity he hated to admit.

Behind him, Clyde returned to watching the exits, impassive as stone.

And for the first time, Aerion found himself watching him back.

The night dragged on, noblemen puffing themselves up like strutting cockerels, noblewomen whispering venom behind jewelled fans, all of them spinning endlessly beneath painted ceilings and plaster smiles. The chandeliers blazed above, dripping gold light onto the whirl of gowns and cloaks.

Aerion played the host as only he could; every smile sharpened with mockery, every laugh dipped in venom, every toast a performance to remind them that he, not his father, held the room. He danced once, perhaps twice, but more often prowled the edges, swirling wine, leaning close to whisper something wicked in a girl’s ear, or worse, in her husband’s.

And through it all, Clyde never moved from his post.

He was a dark pillar by the column, shoulders squared, eyes cutting across the room with the focus of a hawk circling prey. While others drank, he watched. While others preened, he calculated. Tension coiled through him like a drawn bow.

Then—something shifted.

It was subtle. The music stuttered. A single violin string snapped, the note breaking into a sharp, ugly wail that made every head turn.

Clyde moved.

Aerion blinked, confused at the sudden blur of black across the floor. He turned, wine still in hand, just as a figure slipped from behind one of the marble pillars. Masked. Hooded. Blade glinting in the candlelight.

They rushed straight toward him.

Gasps tore through the ballroom like a wave. A goblet clattered to the floor. The dance fractured, nobles stumbling back in a flurry of silk and lace.

Time didn’t slow. It stopped.

Aerion’s eyes went wide, but before he could move, Clyde was there.

The knight crossed the expanse in two great strides, faster than any man that size had a right to move. His sword was half-drawn, but not fast enough, because the assassin’s blade was already arcing, silver and hungry, aimed at Aerion’s heart.

And Clyde took it.

The sound was dull. Wet Sickening. The hiss of breath leaving lungs too fast.

Aerion screamed. The goblet fell from his hand, wine scattering like blood across the floor.

The masked figure was already gone, vanishing into the chaos, slipping between shrieking courtiers as guards surged far too late. Shouts echoed—“Seize them! Block the doors!”—but Aerion didn’t hear.

All he saw was Clyde.

The knight dropped to one knee, blood blooming dark across the fabric at his side, wetness staining through the linen. One hand braced against the floor, the other still clutching his sword, though it trembled with the effort.

And even now, bleeding, bent, the world shattering around them, Clyde was watching him.

Always watching him.

“You—stupid—fucking—dog!” Aerion fell beside him, his voice cracking, panic tearing through the mask of his composure. His hands pressed frantically to Clyde’s chest, useless against the heat and blood spilling between his fingers. “Why didn’t you move?”

Clyde’s mouth twisted, more grimace than smile. His voice was ragged, broken with pain, but iron still underlined it.

“I did,” he muttered. His eyes did not leave Aerion’s. “Toward you.”

Then his strength gave way.

Clyde collapsed, sword clattering against the marble.

Aerion caught him before he hit the ground.

The ballroom was a hive of shrieking panic, courtiers stumbling over silks and goblets as guards bellowed orders and musicians fled their posts. The chandeliers still blazed overhead, indifferent to the ruin below, spilling golden light over overturned platters and spilled wine that looked too much like blood.

Aerion never left his side.

Not when the first servants came rushing with armfuls of towels, their faces pale, their hands shaking as they tried to press cloth against Clyde’s wound. Aerion snarled at them to move faster, to hold tighter, then shoved them aside altogether when their hands slipped.

Not when the court healer arrived, her satchel clattering to the floor as she dropped to her knees beside them. She muttered incantations under her breath; fingers slick with blood as she pressed herbs and poultices to the gash. Aerion’s hands never left Clyde’s chest, clutching at him as if sheer will could knit him together again.

Not even when his own body betrayed him, knees screaming from kneeling so long on cold marble, muscles trembling beneath the weight of panic. He didn’t shift. He didn’t rise. He only leaned closer.

Aerion’s cheek was streaked with wine and blood, his golden hair fallen wild across his face, his jewelled rings sticky as he clutched at Clyde’s doublet. The mask of venom and poise was gone. In its place was something raw. Terrified.

“You’re not allowed to die, you bastard,” he whispered hoarsely, over and over, the words tumbling from his lips like prayers to gods he had never believed in. His voice cracked on them, thinned to threads. “Not like this. Not for me. Do you hear me? You don’t get to leave me.”

And for once, the words weren’t laced with mockery or malice.

They were raw.

Afraid.

Human.

The world around him swirled in chaos—guards still shouting, the Archduke’s voice bellowing from across the chamber, courtiers weeping behind fans and sleeves—but Aerion heard none of it. All he heard was Clyde’s laboured breathing, shallow and uneven, each inhale a battle against the blood soaking the floor.

When Clyde’s eyes fluttered, Aerion’s hands tightened, his breath catching. “Stay with me,” he begged, his voice breaking. “Stay.”

And in that moment, heir and hound, lord and knight, were nothing but two men on the floor, bound together by blood, terror, and the shattering realization that one could not bear to lose the other.