Page 53 of The Warlord's Secret Heir

I sit.

Close. But not close enough to touch.

For a long stretch, we just watch. Warriors drink, slap backs, retell the same stories louder every time. One of them tries to reenact Kyldak’s pit fight with Riven using two bits of bone anda tent peg. Everyone howls when he gets the arm-breaking part wrong and nearly knocks himself into the fire.

I expect Kyldak to laugh.

He doesn’t.

He looks up at the stars.

In a low voice I’ve never heard him use before—soft, unarmored—he starts to sing.

The crowd goes still. Like someone hit pause on the entire damn world.

It’s not in Standard. Not even in Alliance-accredited dialects.

Vakutan.

Deep, low-vowelled, rich with grit and echo. Like stone being smoothed by centuries of wind.

The melody is simple. Slow. Something about it hits behind my ribs, like a memory I’ve never had. Warm and dangerous.

And the way he sings...

It’s not the voice he uses when barking orders or breaking bones. It’s not Red Eye. It’s not the monster the war reports painted.

It’shim.The man I met on Earth. The one who slept on the couch because I had nightmares. The one who never touched me without asking first. The one who read medical reports out loud like bedtime stories just to keep me calm.

My throat closes.

He glances at me mid-verse. And doesn’t look away.

He sings the next line like it’s meant for me and me alone.

I forget how to breathe.

My hand curls tight around my thigh. The fire cracks and pops beside us. Someone weeps openly on the far bench. Another mutters a quietbless himin some dialect I can’t parse.

He finishes the last line. Lets the silence breathe for a beat.

Then the camp erupts.

Cheers, whoops, even a few half-drunken warriors thumping fists to their chests.

Kyldak just sits there, calm and still, like the song pulled something raw out of him and left it at my feet.

I whisper it before I can stop myself.

“He’d be a good father.”

And immediately wish I could rewind time and chew my own tongue off.

I flinch. Eyes wide.

Kyldak doesn’t react—not right away.

But he turns. Slowly. Looks at me with that unreadable face of his, the firelight dancing across his golden skin and glowing eye.