“You wouldn’t understand.”
Jasper narrowed his eyes, and a faint twinge of something like guilt prodded at Dorian’s conscience. “You think I don’t understand loyalty? I know I don’t have the most sterling reputation, but I thought we were past that.”
“No,” Dorian said. “I didn’t mean that. It’s…different. It’s more. I don’t know how to explain it.”
I was in love with him for a hundred years went unsaid.
Jasper was never one to give up without a fight. “Try.”
Dorian snorted. To explain his and Caius’s connection was far easier said than done. Caius had saved Dorian’s life and given him a purpose. He had given Dorian friendship, loyalty, unwavering faith. Each morning, Dorian had risen with a light heart, knowing that the path before him was clear: to be beside Caius, to protect him, to be his second. Love was the least of what Dorian had felt for Caius. There was no Dorian without Caius. Without Caius, Dorian would have bled out on that beach, another nameless casualty in a war that had already claimed so many before him, so many after. But he didn’t have the words to say that aloud. Verbalizing it made it seem paltry. Words would never be enough. So he told Jasper the only thing that made sense to him: “I owe him everything.”
Jasper held Dorian’s gaze for a long moment. The sun was setting behind him, its dying rays skittering over the gleaming ridges of his feathers. Jasper blinked his long-lashed yellow eyes slowly as he breathed in deeply, as if a great decision had just been made. “Fine.”
What? “Fine?”
Jasper heaved a dramatic sigh as though Dorian were being unbearably stupid on purpose. “I mean, fine. I will help you find Caius. We’ll save him and he’ll be fine and you can move past this unseemly self-flagellation phase and I can get back to living my life and not feeling guilty about every double entendre I throw your way.”
“Jasper, I’m not asking you to—”
“I don’t care,” Jasper said. “He matters to you, so no matter how much his smug, handsome face grates on my nerves, and it does”—he said this with a knowing look, as if the entire history of Dorian’s painful, one-sided love were written across his forehead—“then he matters to me. So I’ll help you however I can. We’ll find him and then we’ll bring his smug, handsome face back in one piece.”
Dorian didn’t know what to say to that other than “Thank you.” Two little words, but they contained multitudes. Wait. “You think Caius is handsome?”
“Of course I do,” Jasper said. “You have impeccable taste in men. I’d be insulted if he weren’t.”
Dorian couldn’t help but smile at that, at least a little. “You’re ridiculous. I hope you know that.”
Jasper’s shoulders rose in a nonchalant shrug. “Some may find me so. Besides, I owe him, too.”
“For what?”
The question was greeted with an enigmatic grin. “You.”
“Me?”
“No, the other Dorian. Yes, you.”
The Avicen at the other end of the courtyard had drifted off, but Dorian was keenly aware of the few who remained within earshot. He knew that every word, every gesture was being reported to Sage and the Ala and whoever else was in charge of ensuring the safety of the Avicen’s refuge. He wasn’t sure he wanted this conversation to go any further, but curiosity was a bright, burning thing. “What does that mean? A straight answer, please.”
“The day we first met, when you were bleeding all over my white carpet and Egyptian cotton sheets—”
“Yes, yes, I’ve heard this complaint a thousand times.” Dorian rolled his eye skyward. “My apologies for the inconvenience.”
“Well, you and Caius and Echo were in a tough spot and you needed my help. Caius and I made a deal.”
Dorian did not like the sound of that. Not one bit. “What kind of deal?”
For what was likely the first time in his life, Jasper had the grace to look marginally abashed. “Long story short, he agreed to stay out of my way while I courted you.”
The manner in which Jasper hedged his words made Dorian think that the deal, whatever it was, hadn’t been framed as innocently as that, but to complain about it now would have been the height of hypocrisy. He wasn’t distraught over how it had worked out. Not entirely. Not when Jasper had so deftly worked his way past Dorian’s defenses and made him feel things he’d long since given up hope of ever feeling.
“Is that what you call this?” Dorian said. “Courting?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Did you want flowers? I’m sure I could scrounge up a nice bouquet.”
Jasper eyed a clump of stubborn weeds sprouting through the cracks in the flagstones. “Those would look lovely on your windowsill.”
They were the saddest little weeds Dorian had ever seen. “You wouldn’t.”
Jasper came even closer to Dorian, daring him to step back. He didn’t. A tentative hand reached up to touch the edge of Dorian’s jaw. There was a scar there, barely visible. It had the same white tint as the other scars on his face. There were so many. He didn’t even remember how he had acquired that one. A cool fingertip traced the line of the scar. Dorian flushed. It was the most he had allowed himself to be touched in weeks.
“Don’t shut me out,” Jasper said, his voice a hairsbreadth above a whisper.
Dorian swallowed thickly. He was both intensely aware of the Avicen still watching them and wholly unconcerned by their presence. Let them run to Sage and tell her all they saw. Let her know that he was wrapped around the finger of one of her people.
Weak, weak, weak.
It would be so easy to lean in, to slide his cheek against Jasper’s open palm, to let himself rest his burdens at Jasper’s feet just so he wouldn’t have to carry them for a short while. But he had sworn an oath, and he would let nothing get in the way of that. Not even the face of temptation itself.
Dorian stepped away. Hurt flashed in Jasper’s eyes. It was gone as quickly as it had appeared as he schooled his achingly perfect features into something almost nonchalant. Almost.
“I’m sorry,” Dorian said.
Jasper turned away. “Don’t be.”
His steps were light as he made his way out of the courtyard. Anyone who didn’t know him would have mistaken his posture for one of ease. But Dorian knew. Disappointment was written in the way Jasper moved, the set of his shoulders, the tightness in his hands. The refusal to look back, to see the regret written just as clearly on Dorian’s face.
Weak, he told himself. Weak, weak, weak.
CHAPTER FIVE