The Royal Series 0 - A Royal Archive

Chapter 2

Three Days Later

† Harrington †

"He is so romantic, Jaycob!" Harrington gushed to his best friend, as he lounged on the sofa in his living room.

Across the room, Jaycob chuckled and finished writing his letter to Henric. "So you have said. Countless times!" he retaliated, playfully enough that Harrington took no offence.

How could he? He had been lying here in a daydream for an hour, visiting with his best friend while he waited for Camryn's duties to end, so that they could venture on another outing together. They had been out together for the last three evenings in a row; the first to the park to see a play, then on a long walk around the riverbank and, tonight, they were going to take a short carriage ride to a nearby village he had never been to before so that Camryn could collect some purchases for the hospital.

The reason for their trip did not sound romantic, but Harrington found it charming, all the same. He knew how much his work for the King and his family meant to Camryn. The fact that he could never shirk his duty to them was one thing, but he was also quite aware that Camryn could have cried off their night together, to go alone. Instead, he had thought about Harrington and the promise he had made to take him somewhere new; sticking to that promise was what had caused him to lie here, so useless to his best friend, and linger in his thoughts.

"Jaycob," he said, turning to look at his friend, across the room, "do you think he loves me?"

Jaycob froze in the middle of writing, then slowly turned to face him with a look of shock. "Do you not know?" he replied, quickly leaving his task and moving across the room to sit on the floor by his seat.

Harrington pushed himself to sit up, making room for his friend, and patted the empty seat beside him. "I am not sure what I know, to be honest. Sometimes, I believe so strongly that he loves me, because of his actions. The things he does – including me, thinking of me, writing letters and making time for me – convince me that he could not possibly feel anything but love for me," he confessed, only to draw his knees up to his chin and sigh. "But, then I wonder if it is simply nature, tradition and the life mate bond that he feels."

He did not doubt Camryn, as such, but the life mate bond. It had been cruel to Henric and Davian, once upon a time, and he had heard some truly awful things about vampires being life mates to humans but being incapable of loving them. He had never heard the full story, but rumours suggested that the life mate bond could cause a vampire to accept their life mate, no matter the circumstances or the feeling between them, and it was only later that the human learned the terrible truth.

An unhappy life with a mate who only accepted him because it was tradition was not what Harrington wanted. And, though he trusted Camryn to be honest, it was possible that the life mate bond had caused a rush of hormones or emotions that would not last forever. Could he bear to learn the truth when they finally disappeared?

A hand on his arm startled him, but Harrington managed a smile for Jaycob. "I am sorry. I just feel...scared," he admitted, though he would never tell Camryn such a thing. "I am scared that we will be one of those unlucky couples who are bonded but who never feel real love for each other. Or, at least, that Camryn cannot feel real love for me. I have heard the stories, Jaycob; the humans never see it coming," he explained, lowering his voice to a whisper because even he did not want to hear the words.

It sounded so awfully like he did not trust Camryn, but he did. He truly did. It was the bond that he did not trust and that could trick them both so cruelly, in the end.