Alec was looking at him. There was no expression at all on his face but his eyes‑‑his eyes were furious, sad. Frightened. He realized that even though Alec had always said he'd known this moment or one like it would come that somehow he'd still been surprised by it, that he wasn't prepared. That he was hurting.
"It's true," David said quietly and Alec's eyes flashed pain and sorrow and something else, something that made David's own eyes sting.
"The lost prince," Michael breathed. The lost look had faded from his face and he was looking directly at him, motioned for him to come forward with one hand. He had long, beautiful fingers.
"Come here."
David looked at Alec but Alec wasn't looking at him anymore, was staring straight ahead, gazing at the crystal walls.
Up close Michael was even more beautiful, with eyes that looked at him as if he was the only person in the room and a smile that was warm, kind. "You really are lovely," he said, and his voice was husky, gentle. He put a hand on his shoulder. His hand was warm and large, stroked up over the collar of his shirt and onto his skin. "Is it true?" he said softly. "What they say about you?"
David nodded jerkily, let everything that was inside him push forth and waited for Michael's hand to fall away. He could feel Michael's hand growing cooler, waited for Michael to look at him like everyone did.
"Oh," Michael said, voice gone surprised but soft, and his hand stroked across David's skin again. The part of himself that David had felt roar to life with Henry stirred, prickled his skin and made him lean into Michael's touch. Painted pictures that made sound vibrate in his throat.
"You'll stay here," Michael said, leaning in to whisper in his ear and when he pulled away his eyes were bright and curious, a slow heat flickering through his gaze.
"I‑‑" David said, surprised and dismayed by how strange everything was, by what he'd learned, what he felt, and looked around for Alec. He wasn't there.
He looked back at Michael.
"He's gone," Michael said quietly and there was kindness in his eyes now, understanding. "It's his way."
"I‑‑gone?" He'd known it was coming but to have it happen like this, to have him not even see it
‑‑ "I have to say goodbye," he said. "Please."
Michael tilted his head to one side a little, looking at David as if he were a puzzle he needed to understand. "I've never been one for farewells," he said softly. "But you‑‑" His smile grew broader, softer. "I guess you are. Go on, then. Say goodbye. Someone will help you find your way back when you're done."
***
She was waiting for him in the hallway. He walked past her like she wasn't there.
"Alec," she said and then he stopped, turned to face her. He looked like he always had, the same dark dust all over his hands, the same thin smile, the same sharp eyes that looked right at you and saw exactly who you truly were. She'd always been able to see what had drawn Michael to him.
"Judith."
"It was necessary. He couldn't stay with you. He's‑‑"
"I know."
"This wasn't done‑‑" she paused, not sure what to say. "This wasn't done to hurt you. I didn't think‑‑I didn't think you'd ever come back here, least of all with someone like‑‑"
"I know," he said again. "Believe me, I never planned on it." He paused for a moment. "I know you love M‑‑the King. I know you want him to be happy. Just…"
"What?" she said, unable to help herself. He'd never asked for anything, not even when she'd been waiting for him when he returned from the mines one evening, when she told him the King would be unable to see him again, that he'd been reminded of who he was, what his duties were.
He had just stared at her and then said, "Tell Michael," slowly, carefully, letting the name detonate between them, "that I understand."
"Promise me you'll be careful with him, Judith. David doesn't‑‑he doesn't understand how things are. He needs…." His voice cracked. "Just promise me."
"You‑‑" she said, shocked by the look in his eyes. When she'd told him about Michael she'd seen that he'd known what was coming and had guarded his heart well because of it. With Michael he'd been hurt. Hurt but able to move on. But now…now she saw he'd tried to do the same and that he'd failed. He'd given his heart, given everything. He'd fallen in love. She hadn't thought he was so stupid.
"Promise me," he said again quietly, brokenly, and she nodded. He turned and walked away.
"I'm sorry," she said after he was gone and she was, a little. Her words echoed back at her through the crystal hallway, unheard. She folded her hands together and walked back down the hall, toward the King.
***
He couldn't find Alec. David ran down one hallway and then another, endless twists of gleaming rock. Then he saw him, impossibly far away, and called his name.
Alec didn't stop. David called his name again, louder, and ran faster, breath rushing out of him, the walls echoing the sound of his breathing, of Alec's name, back to him over and over again.
Alec stopped.
"I just‑‑" David said when he reached him. "You have to say goodbye."
Alec started to say something sharp, cruel‑‑David saw it in his eyes‑‑but then he looked away from him, as if he couldn't bear to see what was in his face. "You'll be fine here," he said. "You'll be happy."
"I won't."
"David‑‑"
"I'm not the Ki‑‑I'm not Michael." His own voice tightened saying that name, at the thought of hearing Alec say it so easily.
"No," Alec said, and now he was looking at him. "You're not."
"I want to stay with you. I‑‑I love you." He'd never said it before and knew, as soon as he did, that he wouldn’t say it again. It didn't matter. It wouldn't change what was happening. It wouldn't change anything.
"No," Alec said softly. "You don't love me. You ran away and straight to me. That's not love.
You don't‑‑you don't know what it is."
David nodded, biting his lip. He couldn't feel it. He bit harder and still felt nothing. He could see the walls around them clouding, crystallizing with cold. He didn't feel that either.
"Don't," Alec said, and touched his face, traced a thumb across his mouth. "I'm not worth it."
"You‑‑" David said and there was something scratching at his throat, clawing up behind his eyes.
He stared at Alec, saw the way his hands were resting shaking by his sides, a dark smear across the glittering black dust that covered his thumb. He could feel bits of the dust stinging into his mouth now, into his heart. "I won't forget you."
"Of course you will," Alec said gently.
And then he walked away.
***
Michael courted him. That's what he'd called it anyway, afterwards, and David thought it was a good word. It sounded nice, slow and gentle and exactly like Michael coming to see him in the rooms he'd had him put in, a gleaming suite with enormous windows that looked out onto gardens sculpted to look like oceans and forests and hollows where nothing but flowers bloomed.
There was even one made into a desert, piled high with brown sand and covered with blue yellow glass shaped to look like sun and sky.
"You can go see them anytime you'd like," Michael said that first day, only hours after David had been led down one hallway after another to a maze of rooms he was told to call his own, the image of Alec walking away still strong in his mind. "And I'd‑‑I'd love to show them to you." He sounded shy and sure and perfect and David hated him so much it scared him. The chair he was sitting on cracked and splintered but didn't fall apart. It just hung there, frozen and broken. He waited for Michael to say something, to do something‑‑he'd seen what was in his eyes earlier‑‑