—
Edwin knew Louis was in Stag Keep somewhere, but he couldn’t find him. He wasn’t in Edwin’s bedroom or the study or the roof, and he’d poked his head into all the other rooms on his way down and not been able to find them. He figured he’d head for the dungeon and see if Louis was there, but Robby wasn’t home and Denver was napping, so Edwin wasn’t sure who’d be in there with him.
“You seen Louis?” he asked Nikolai, who was sweeping in the great hall.
Nikolai shook his head, then paused. “I heard him in the kitchen earlier.”
“Thanks,” Edwin said. He didn’t need Louis for anything, it was just weird that he was here and Edwin couldn’t find him. It wasn’t like he was subtle or quiet.
The kitchen was warm and Nigel was chopping vegetables with his tongue out. He didn’t look particularly debauched, but that could just mean that Louis hadn’t fucked him on his way through. “Is Louis in here?”
“Not when I got here,” Nigel said. “The cellar door was open, though.”
“I thought you usually left it open for the cats,” Edwin said.
“Not wide open, just a little. I left it open because I need to go get some wine to cook these in anyway.”
“I’ll get it; one of the cheap ones, right?”
Nigel nodded. “The cooking wine is on the nearest shelf to the stairs and they all have blue ribbons on them. Don’t feel like you have to…”
“I’m going down to there anyway,” Edwin told him, and he headed down the steps. The cellar was kind of cave-like, Edwin thought. Maybe Louis had wanted to hang out somewhere familiar. Or maybe he was eating all their food, it was a toss up.
He heard Louis’s breathing as he came down. “Louis?”
“Shh,” said Louis, and Edwin poked his head around the shelf. Oh.
All the kittens were just sitting on Louis, mostly on his wings, and he was perfectly still as he lay on the ground. “You…okay?” Edwin asked.
“Yeah,” Louis said, voice low. “I just, uh, can’t move? I don’t want to bother them. They’re really small.”
They were really small, yeah. Edwin sighed, shook his head. “Okay, well. Call out to Nigel if you need anything.”
“But I don’t want to wake them up,” Louis protested. One of the kittens shifted.
Edwin smiled at him and grabbed a bottle of wine. “Then I’ll come hang out with you in a minute.”
He went upstairs, ignoring Louis’s protest that he wasn’t lonely. He was cute, was Edwin’s dragon.
—
How Best to Use a Sword 