Kennet is happy for his friend Brennar, chosen as the Lady’s Herald, a position of honor that his friend deserves and which will serve him well. But happy for his friend is not the same thing as happy about the situation, since becoming the Lady’s Herald means that Brennar will forever and irrevocably be out of Kennet’s reach.
Kiss Me Quick is a collection of short and sweet stories from authors familiar and new, celebrating the season of love. Come and enjoy these tales of misunderstandings, lonely singles, pining lovers, and so much more! Because if there is one thing that is never in doubt, it's that LT3 knows the way to your heart, and these stories are a straight shot.
The Lady's Herald
By M.J. Willow
Published by Less Than Three Press LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the publisher, except for the purpose of reviews.
Edited by Samantha M. Derr
Cover designed by London Burden
This book is a work of fiction and as such all characters and situations are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is coincidental.
First Edition February 2012
Copyright © 2012 by M.J. Willow
Printed in the United States of America
The Lady's Herald
Kiss Me Quick
MJ
Willow
"What're you doing cooped up in here?" Selba asked, nudging Kennet's door with one shoulder. The din from outside ceased spilling into Kennet's small apartment as the door closed, the sounds of thousands of excited people, interspersed with fragments of music and singing, shutting off from one moment to the next. "Everyone else in your neighbourhood is watching the Herald's procession; he's coming down your street, like, right this very second."
Kennet shrugged and turned back to his work, trying to focus on where he had trailed off halfway through translating a sentence when Selba had let herself in unannounced. "I'm happy for Brennar that he got picked, but I have no desire to stand in a crowd and gawk at him." Crowds were loud, unruly, and messy; and the thought of standing anonymously in a throng of people screaming their adoration at Brennar, whom he had known since they were boys, was simply sickening, even if being chosen as the Herald was an honour.
"Your loss," Selba said and dumped the bags she was carrying onto Kennet's couch, flexing her shoulders before unbuttoning her jacket and unwrapping her scarf. "He's looking mighty fine in those robes, though. Got any coffee?"
"Er, maybe," Kennet said, blinking at the speed with which she changed subjects. "I made some this morning."
"Cold, then," she concluded and headed into his kitchen. From where he was sitting at his desk by the one window that didn't look out onto the street he could hear her grab the pot and give it a cautious sniff. "You want some, too?"
"Sure," he said and, giving up working as a lost cause for now, grabbed his coffee mug from where he'd left it on that morning's newspaper, only remembering as he did so that he'd put it down over the picture of Brennar in the official Herald's golden robes and the little metallic half-mask that did not hide his distinctive, handsome features at all. The picture had been taken the night before on the Spire's largest balcony, where Brennar had been announced as the Lady's Herald for the year. There were clerics of Lady Iduna on either side of Brennar, but the focus was clearly on the newly appointed Herald. Brennar looked unflinchingly, confidently, out over the crowds gathered below outside the frame of the picture, waving as though he were the Crown Prince instead of the spoiled heir to a small estate out in the country.
That was what being the Herald did to a person: instantaneous fame and influence, for a whole year, and the chances of being picked were pretty much the same whether a man was a poor shmuck or a Duke. And while it would surely work out beneficial to Brennar's political ambitions, all Kennet could think was that any hope of Brennar's ever seeing him as more than the son of his father's best friend had just gone out the window.