Page 58 of The Lost Art of Revealing Hidden Truths (The Lost Arts #3)

Chapter Twenty-Six

B rannal got them through the door, glanced around, and then made directly for the bed.

He crawled onto the mattress, carrying Perian with him easily, until Perian was on his back on the bed and Brannal was on top of him, settling against him, all strength and muscles that Perian hadn’t thought he was ever going to experience ever again.

They kept kissing, kept groping, but Perian wanted more.

“More,” he demanded out loud, and accompanied this with a tug at Brannal’s clothes, which he thankfully correctly interpreted as a need to get undressed.

He pulled back, sliding off the bed so that he could more rapidly divest himself and not leave any daggers in the bed. Perian wriggled out of his own coat, vest, and shirt.

He unfastened his trousers and started to wiggle out of them, but then he remembered his boots.

“Allow me,” Brannal said, and he came over to unlace and tug the boots off, then his trousers and underclothes.

Perian was now completely naked on the bed, and Brannal was staring at him with raw appreciation in his eyes.

He wasn’t fully undressed yet because he’d paused to help Perian .

“Why are you still wearing clothes?” Perian wanted to know.

Brannal grinned at him. “The better to tease you with, of course.”

“Oh,” Perian said, lips tipping up. “Is it teasing you want?”

He wrapped his hands around his own cock and made very appreciative noises as he pumped it.

Brannal’s eyes went even darker, and moments later, he was completely naked and crawling back onto the bed to settle on top of Perian, just where Perian wanted him.

He hissed as their cocks bumped, all warm skin on warm skin.

“I missed this,” he whispered.

Brannal kissed him. “Me, too. So much.”

Perian leaned into him, kissed him again, delving into his mouth like he was searching for treasure, but the actual treasure was the man’s mouth, was this connection, the desire that Perian could feel pouring off the other man, so much eagerness and so much want, without a hint of fear or revulsion or reluctance.

Brannal was definitely not lying about how much he wanted Perian, despite the whole castle knowing what he was.

Perian was so very glad.

Brannal rocked them together, and Perian hummed happily, but he wanted more.

“Want you inside me,” Perian moaned. “Right now.”

There was a time for teasing, and this was not it. Brannal seemed to feel the same way. It had been the longest the two of them had ever gone without having sex, and apparently, they’d both noticed the lack.

Perian let out a deep moan of satisfaction as Brannal pressed into him in one long, firm slide, stretching him open and burying himself like he belonged there, because he absolutely did. Because he was here in Perian’s bedroom—he’d come to find him!—and they both wanted this so much.

Brannal paused for a moment when he was fully settled, so they could both appreciate how perfect this was.

And then he fucked Perian just the way he wanted to be fucked, filling him up and then pulling out so that he could push into him again.

Every second was delightful, exactly what Perian wanted, the pleasure filling him up from the bottoms of his toes to the tip of his head and everywhere in between: his pleasure, Brannal’s pleasure, the pleasure they made together.

He couldn’t tell where one ended and the next began, and this, this was what Perian wanted from sex.

This didn’t feel like something that had to be done to feed him.

This was something they both wanted that had nothing to do with Perian being a demon.

They urged one another on desperately, driving straight towards that cliff and then tipping over it together.

The pleasure was a wave that washed over Perian but seemed to affect Brannal in practically the same way, leaving him breathing heavily and with a blissful expression on his face as he managed to fall to Perian’s side so as not to crush him.

He wrapped an arm around Perian, though, because he knew how much Perian liked that.

“So good,” Perian said on a sigh.

“Yeah?”

“The best,” Perian confirmed. He eyeballed the other man. “After all, I now have a broad base of comparison. You made half the castle jerk off or have sex to feed me.”

Brannal groaned. “That was, hands down, one of the most embarrassing things I have ever had to do.”

“You don’t get to say that it was embarrassing,” Perian told him sternly, poking him in his very firm chest. “I had to feed while the doctor and Cormal were in the room.”

Brannal made a sort of disgusted face, and this made Perian laugh, a lot of the stiffness fading out of his form.

“Sorry, I know that can’t have been easy,” Brannal told him earnestly. “I only did it because it was what you wanted to do. For the Prince and Princess, I mean, not the feeding itself.”

Perian made a face. “I definitely couldn’t have done it without it, but it was so awkward.”

Brannal was silent for a moment. “Did it feel good?”

“Possessive again?” Perian asked.

Brannal turned to look at him properly. “No, not at all. I mean, I’d like to talk about it if it’s something you need or want on a regular basis, but that was absolutely not sex-related, beyond the technical obviousness. It had nothing to do with our relationship.”

Perian nodded. “It sustained me, but it was nothing like what we do, truthfully. It scarcely even turned me on. Well, it did once.”

Brannal looked surprised and maybe a little embarrassed. “Ah. I didn’t realize you could tell.”

Perian nodded. “If I knew people well enough. I didn’t recognize every single person, but I recognized most of them.

And with you, I thought that was the last time I was going to get to experience anything like that.

It was, um, a little bit awful, actually,” he confessed quietly.

“I spent the whole time crying. The doctor gave me a handkerchief and sat with me.”

Brannal looked horrified. “I’m so sorry! I had no idea. I wouldn’t have done it if I’d realized. I just… it was a way for me to be close to you without raising any eyebrows, because we needed volunteers. I never meant to upset you.”

Perian clutched at his hand, squeezing it.

“No, no, don’t feel bad about it. Were our situations reversed, I’m sure I would have done the same. You didn’t know I thought it was the end.”

“But I should have thought more about it. I should have insisted on going to see you.”

Perian shook his head. “Cormal was there a lot of the time, and I imagine when he wasn’t, he had people he trusted guarding me. I’m not actually sure he slept. I understand, Brannal, truly. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad.”

But it was Brannal’s turn to shake his dead.

“Don’t apologize. Please. We can call it a joint misunderstanding if you’re feeling extraordinarily generous, but I wasn’t the one locked in a dungeon cell.

I should have been more conscious of how it would look to you.

” His expression lightened. “I’m sure I could have gotten the Princess to cause a distraction, if only I’d thought of that. ”

This made Perian laugh. “Yeah, that would have been a terrible idea, but it would absolutely have worked. How are Renny and Kee? The Queen and Cormal would only tell me that it wasn’t fully effective. I am sorry.”

Brannal pulled his hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to it.

“Don’t you dare apologize.” His voice was intense. “You practically killed yourself doing something that should have been impossible, and anyone who complained because you didn’t do even more is a self-centered, awful person.”

Perian blinked at him, because he’d never heard Brannal insult the Queen before. Brannal had already made clear that he supported Perian and that he was not all right with what the Queen and Cormal had done, but this was very firm evidence of that, and it made Perian smile.

He huffed a laugh. “Thank you. I, uh, do wish that I’d been able to do more, though.”

“We all wish that we could do more,” Brannal pointed out.

“We’ve all wished it for years, and you’re the only person in the entire castle who actually could.

The Princess is better than she’s ever been since the attack.

The Prince does, of course, wish that he were, uh, solid.

” He seemed to be struggling for words, and Perian couldn’t really blame him.

This was a weird situation. “But he’s so grateful that he can be seen and heard by everyone now.

And he’s no longer tied to the Princess.

Although they were certainly still spending a lot of time together when last I saw them, they don’t have to.

The Prince’s rooms were prepared for him; he’s going to have privacy again and everything. ”

“Mm, good,” Perian said, still wishing he could have done more, but truly glad about what he had been able to accomplish.

“I meant to mention to you—well, all right, I thought I wouldn’t ever get the chance to mention to you—that Kee’s gone from sixteen to twenty-two without the opportunity to, uh, have a lot of alone time , and certainly not to have any, er, couple time.

Or more! I don’t know what he likes. I might have mentioned our book to him, and while we all agreed there was no way I could sneak it to him when he was tied to Renny, now that that’s been solved, maybe you could loan it to him? I think he has some catching up to do.”

Brannal looked entirely surprised for a moment, and then he laughed and suggested, “Maybe we can get him his own.”

Perian thought the loan was a lot more practical, but maybe Brannal didn’t think it was appropriate to let a prince look at a book that they’d… kind of enjoyed themselves over.

“He’s still going to need someone to turn the pages,” Perian reminded him. “Maybe you could just page through without paying any attention and then stop when he said stop and give him a bit of alone time?”

Yeah, that sounded really awkward the more he thought about it.