Page 23 of A Gaze So Longing (The Fall of Livenza #1)
The room continued into a large bathroom on one side and a closet on the other.
Clothes were strewn around, some on the floor, some on the bed, and some on the backrest of a desk chair, the secretary providing a full view of the courtyard from the double windows.
Candles and oil lamps coated every surface, pronouncing the concept of the dark impossible, as if the mere idea of it were unthinkable.
The walls were an agglomeration of greens and yellows, emeralds and golds.
Forests, animals, and flowers, colorful blossoms interspersed in the lush tapestries of trees and moss.
The ornate details intimately felt like Leonardo, expressive yet delicate.
“I think,” the prince eventually said. “That I’m already doing a lot. I spend almost every day discussing the situation with my father, and I sit in countless meetings with the advisors to make sure he doesn’t treat you the way he used to.”
Favian couldn’t help himself—he laughed.
The sound echoed off the walls, bitter and harsh.
“He’s so much nicer to you now!” Leonardo insisted. “He hasn’t hit you in weeks, has he?”
Bitterness was seeping into his tone. “No, because instead, he is taking it out in other ways. You are protecting me, but at the same time, you are putting other people at risk.”
“I’m working on that, too! You know that!” The prince’s voice was growing louder with every word; Favian had upset him. “Sometimes people do something wrong, and the council and I are already thinking of more punishments that do not harm them.”
“Fuck, Leonardo, do you hear yourself? ”
The sunflower seeds had burned, the honey spoiled.
Favian and Leonardo had stepped closer to each other with each argument, merely a few feet separating them now.
The prince’s eyes grew wide.
He looked unsure, almost small, as if the inches Favian had on him had suddenly become more than just a difference in height.
“What do you mean, punishments that don’t harm us ?
It doesn’t matter if we are being hit or not.
We may not be tending to physical wounds as much anymore, but that doesn’t mean the punishments don’t hurt .
We’re always tired. Hungry. We barely get to rest. Those with children barely get to see them, and the kids barely know their parents.
We get to eat stale bread and barley, the tiniest drizzle of your fancy olive oil if we’re lucky.
” Favian’s voice rising louder, too, the words tumbling out of him with no regard to the careful phrasing he had intended for them.
“People do something wrong all the time because they have to! Because they are hungry or sleep-deprived or simply sick of it! Have you ever wondered what happens to those of us who are too exhausted to do our duties? Those who cannot bear the hunger? Have you ever been down in the dungeons? Because I have!”
Leonardo tried to interrupt, had done so multiple times, but Favian kept going with an uncharacteristically utter disregard for the prince’s feelings.
“When I miss a meal and nobody replaces me, when my work remains undone, I end up in the dungeon. Usually only for a day, for three meals, but it is enough. I have seen those who have crossed the line one too many times with your father. Have you seen them, Leonardo? Have you been down there?”
The prince’s gaze was trained on the floor. Favian was pointing at him, finger almost touching Leonardo’s blouse.
“Have you?”
“I don’t know how to make it better,” Leonardo said by way of answering. “Tell me. Tell me what to do, and I will!”
A groan erupted from Favian’s throat, his frustration growing unbearable.
“I can’t! You have to figure that out yourself, Leonardo.
” Favian placed the tip of his index finger right in the middle of the prince’s chest. “Just like I have figured out how to get you to The Moonlit Sunflower and back so many times, even when you refused to listen to my concerns. I spent a night wide awake in the godsdamn woods for you.”
Now it was Leonardo’s turn to grow agitated. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I was also not having a great time that night either!”
“Yes, I’m aware, and I am genuinely sorry you’re going through that, but these realities can coexist.”
He made to drop his hand, but the prince caught it in the air, wrapping his slender fingers around Favian’s wrist. A shiver ran through him. The touch burned.
“Coexist how?”
“You have experienced things that cause you pain. So have I, so has everyone in this place. The fact that one of us suffers does not make the other one’s experiences less important.
” He had realized this after talking to Nia, after sharing with her what had kept them in the forest that night.
“You expect me to take your pain seriously, and I do. But I don’t feel like you’re doing the same for me. ”
“Maybe that’s because you never share with me. I try all the time, but you won’t ever tell me what’s going on with you!”
Favian shot back, “And doesn’t this make you understand why?”
That shut the prince up. He was still holding on to Favian’s wrist, thumb against his pulse. They were both breathing hard, their exhales mixing in the little space between them. Despite it all, Favian longed for more.
There was no denying it anymore: he wanted this.
He wanted Leonardo. He wanted him to recognize, to understand, to change.
Despite it all, he wanted to touch him, feel Leonardo’s skin on his, explore him.
But he wouldn’t allow it, not until Leonardo understood the responsibility he had, until the prince finally recognized the severity of the situation they were in.
“You want to know why nothing can happen between us? Your family is the reason. The system we’re in is the reason. If you actually want to be with me, you will make an effort to change things.“
The prince’s gaze dropped down to Favian’s lips.
“Alright,” Leonardo said. “I will try.”
The fight went out of them then, the static energy in the room subsiding until there were only two people left, two desperate hearts fighting for their lives.
“Will you help me?” the prince carefully asked.
“You’re right, I haven’t been asking enough questions.
If I’m to change things, I have to understand what it is you need me to approach most, and how.
” His hand was still holding on to Favian, thumb carefully stroking the inside of his wrist. “I don’t want to risk messing this up and making things worse. ”
Was he talking about the situation of the palace or the relationship between them?
Would that change Favian’s answer either way?
“I will do as much as I can.”
A familiar softness returned to the prince’s eyes. “Thank you. And please give Nico my apologies for whatever it is that my father did.”
Nia.
Oh.
Nia!
How long had he been here?
“I have to go,” Favian declared. “I will see you at breakfast.”
He freed his hand from Leonardo’s, the shape of the prince’s fingers burned into his skin.
He left without waiting for a reply, knowing he did not need to be dismissed, and rushed down the corridors back to the kitchens.
He needn’t have worried. Dinner had just reached its final course, plates of carefully arranged tiramisu making their way to the dining hall.
When Nia spotted him, she dropped the pan she was in the middle of cleaning and rushed towards him.
“How did it go?” she asked.
“As well as it could, I think,” Favian replied.
She nodded, gave him a once-over, and returned to the dishes.
That night, Favian could not sleep. His thoughts kept returning to the conversation with Leonardo, the prince’s frustration, his reluctance to acknowledge the extent of the court’s violence, and his role in all of it. He hoped his words were enough to convince Leonardo of the gravity of it all.
Now that he had allowed himself to imagine a different world, he could not bring himself to stop.
Favian thought of the prince’s bed, the cushions, the layers of blankets, the body nestled among them at this very moment.
Leonardo was right about one thing: whatever had been between them when they were kids, it was still there.
The difference was that now, Favian was able to recognize the desire as such, had begun to understand it.
The question, then, was what he wanted to do with those desires, how to act on them.
And how not to lose his head in the process.