Not wanting to poke the wasp nest of his father’s temper again, Fen had his charm drill with the kheiron legions the next day. No war paint, no agenda, no stunts. They stayed synchronized and seamless within the herd mentality. Fen exhausted himself walking the fine line between showing off and not giving his best effort, knowing his father would recognize either from a mile away.
Between exercises, he had to endure Lenge’s moody silence and passive-aggressive sighs. Rubbing her off back in Zeuxis had been a grave error of judgment. It broke his professional rule of not getting too intimate with his charm, and violated his personal prohibition against lovers.
The giants had a word: gelang. It meant at hand. Or together with. It described great romances, but also great friendships. A soul bond. The endearment gelangos literally meant “my one at hand,” or “the one I belong to.”
Fen il-Kheir had known only one gelangos in his life and that was when he was twelve and stupid. Belmiro was fourteen and not much smarter, but the most beautiful creature Fen had ever seen in his life. A head of dark waves that didn’t behave and eyes the color of mint leaves. The sun rose in his wide smile and set on his sleek, thoughtful brows. A skilled archer, he drew his bow, touched the tip of his tongue to his upper lip, and Fen bared his chest for a target.
Hit me. My heart is yours so don’t miss.
They started out shy and quickly became seamless. Bel finished Fen’s sentences. Or he did a double-take at something Fen said and breathed, “I was just about to say that.” Soon they could communicate with a glance, a lifted chin or arched eyebrow. They became inseparable as yolk and white in a scrambled egg. With the edges of their minds so perfectly aligned, their bodies followed easily. The first time they kissed, Fen saw new stars in the sky. The first time he slid a hand between Belmiro’s forelegs, Fen lost his mind. When he came down on Belmiro’s palm, his soul exploded. A single, whispered “I love you,” and he was finished.
He believed it was gelang. When Belmiro left to train with the legions and asked Fen to wait for him, Fen promised. But that didn’t feel gelang enough, so he slipped out of the pavilion and flew away from Alondra. He tracked the legions at a careful distance, following them to the summer encampment in Sudenlo. Here Belmiro was one among fifty first-year archers, but the only one in Fen’s longing heart. He declared his love again and like a fool, he gave Belmiro his moonstone.
“I’ll wait for you on two legs,” he said. The sentiment was idiotic but he meant it. It was what he felt, it was the truth in his heart. And Belmiro was a fool for taking what was offered, but he did it because he believed in it.
And I spent two years as a slave for it, Fen thought.
He came home to learn his father had hobbled Belmiro and cast him out of the herd. Shunned and shamed, Fen’s gelangos was living on two legs, prostituting himself in the pleasure houses along Alondra’s wharves. On the rare occasions his path crossed Fen’s, they had nothing to say. They weren’t bitter or angry. Any concept of them was simply impossible now.
It felt like gelang, Fen thought, but it made whores of both of us. So even if it was gelang, it wasn’t worth it.
Il-Kheir ran the herd ragged and flew them until their feathers blanketed the ground. After cooling off at the grotto, Fen felt like a wrung-out towel. Walking through the atrium between the palace and the pavilion, his stomach rumbled, ravenous, but the thought of dinner across a table from Lenge was unbearable. He didn’t often ask the White Mares for favors, but he might ask for supper in his room tonight and then topple into bed.
Mid-yawn, he stopped.
Pelippé Trueblood stood by the stone balustrade. Right where Fen would have to pass, godsdammit.
He froze, waiting for the shift. Oddly, it didn’t come. Either his body was too exhausted, or his soul had grown used to seeing Trueblood on a regular basis and didn’t need to grandstand.
He ignored the thump in his chest. I lived two years on a chain. I’m not afraid of a sailor.
He started walking again, formulating a script. Salutos would be sufficient. Maybe a polite inquiry to Trueblood’s health.
Would “sorry for shitting on your feet” be overdoing it?
Could his heart pound any harder?
“Héjo,” the mariner said over his shoulder. “This is awkward.”
Fen drew a deep breath. “Salu, Kepten.”
“You can drop the Kepten. I haven’t been formally invested yet.”
He’d wound blue thread around the ends of his plaits and a single silver hoop pierced his ear. His brown arms crossed on the stone rail, he stared out at the rooftops and spires of Valtourel.
Fen followed Trueblood’s appreciative gaze. His heart didn’t have much connection to Valtourel—like Trueblood, he was born in Alondra—but tonight, the young city tossed its head back and stood tall with accomplishment, handsome under the last of the sunset.
“What happened?” Trueblood’s index finger started to reach toward Fen’s face, then abruptly retreated and touched his own cheekbone instead.
“My father wasn’t happy about my little farewell gift to you yesterday,” Fen said. “He likes me to wear my not-so-finest moments on my face.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault.”
“I didn’t rat you out, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“No, the White Mares did.” He shrugged, embarrassment itching his back where he couldn’t scratch. “I had it coming.”
Trueblood leaned further on his elbows. “So where do you wear your finest moments?”
“Good question,” Fen said. “Where do you?”
“Let me get back to you when I have enough fine moments to make a garment.”
The mariner laced his fingers, thumbs tapping together. One ankle crossed over the other and his hips kicked back a little. His shoulders rose and fell in slow, easy breaths.
Fen took a taste of humility and swallowed its bitterness. “I apologize.”
Trueblood turned his head, eyebrows drawn down a little.
“For shitting on your feet,” Fen said. “It was…uncalled for.”
With a snort of air through his nose, Trueblood burst out laughing. “You think?”
“What’s so funny?” Fen said.
Trueblood ducked away, trying to get himself under control, which only made him laugh harder.
Anger bubbled up in Fen’s throat and then dissolved away because Trueblood’s head was flung back and his smile was full of laughter. It put an arm around Fen and leaned on him, slapping his shoulders in the camaraderie of a private joke.
We own this. Me and him. Like a jacket made of one fine moment.
“Sorry,” Trueblood said through the fading chuckles. “I thought it was hilarious. Let’s just forget it. Apology accepted.”
He settled back into his crossed-ankle stance, leaning on the balcony with the tiniest smile still wreathing his chin. “Asshole,” he mumbled.
“First impressions are important.”
“You nailed it.”
A beat of silence.
“I’m sorry about your father,” Fen said.
“Thank you.” Trueblood kept staring straight ahead, chin on his hands now.
“I remember when you were born.”
“Do you?”
“I was fifteen. I was finally walking again.”
Why are you telling him this?
“I see.” Trueblood nodded, his eyes closed and chin tilted up toward the sun. “I don’t remember much about living in Alondra. My memory wakes up when I was at sea with my father.”
And my memory never goes to sleep, Fen thought. “It’s a lot to carry in your heart,” he heard himself say.
“What is?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know what I meant by that.”
Smiling, Trueblood turned around and
put his back to the balustrade. “What I don’t know would just about fill the Gulf of Pellandro.”
The smile faded and Fen missed it.
He didn’t like missing it.
A dark trepidation twisted in his stomach, making every hair of his coat bristle. If he were in the field with his charm, he’d pull them into a tight wedge and look for signs of an ambush. Even now his eyes were flicking around the atrium and his instincts told him to retreat. He was outnumbered here.
“Goodnight, Kepten,” he said. He walked away, hooves solemn and deep on the stones.
“What, no farewell gift?” Trueblood called after.
Fen looked back over one shoulder and touched his wounded cheek. “One bruise is a statement. Two would be showing off.”
Walking away again, his shoulders shook with the effort of keeping his wings retracted. They wanted to unfurl, spread and launch him into the sunset over Valtourel. For no other reason than Trueblood watching.
Look at me, he thought, reading from the story of his life.
Look at me, see me, watch me.
And when I slip out of sight, take the world apart to find me.
“Da always said he didn’t like the way il-Kheir treated Fen,” Trueblood said to Abrakam.
“Your Da wasn’t alone in that opinion,” the centaur said. “If Sevri didn’t have as many military accomplishments in his panniers, I don’t think he’d have a shred of respect from Nyland. People and creatures are loyal to him, but few admire him.”
They were having a drink in the palace library. A fire crackled in the big hearth and the lamps made bubbles of gold light against the tall shelves. Abrakam was perusing a restored set of novels. Raj sat at a table surrounded by atlases. Trueblood lounged on a sofa, feet on a leather hassock and Lejo’s dozing head on his thigh.
His notebook balanced on the arm of the sofa, he sketched the mast of a ship. Lately he was a little obsessed with masts, drawing them and their yards on every scrap of paper. The juncture of vertical strength and horizontal power niggled with a deeper meaning, like the sole, lingering fragment of last night’s dream.
“Il-Kheir couldn’t care less who admires him,” Raj said, not looking up from his reading.
Trueblood smiled. The horrible dead expression had finally leeched out of Raj’s eyes and he was finding more and more reasons to stay awake. Lejo, thank Gods, had escaped from the coils of insomnia. He was sleeping through the night and catnapping every other hour.
“Fen’s an odd one,” Trueblood said, running a slow hand through Lejo’s hair.
“He’s magnificent,” Raj said.
Back off, map boy, I saw him first.
Lejo burrowed his head against Trueblood’s leg with a small smile.
“You shut up,” Trueblood mumbled.
Lejo smiled wider, showing his dimple.
“What Fen suffered would leave anyone magnificently odd,” Raj said.
“It’s a lot to carry in your heart,” Trueblood said. His pencil doodled meandering, diagonal lines out from the mast, making it into a tree.
“Aye,” Abrakam said. “For both son and father.”
“But il-Kheir is… All right, Fen was out of line down at the grotto. But I thought it was funny and it didn’t warrant a punch in the face.”
“I agree. On the other hand, Sevri’s not only raising a son, he’s training an heir. And there are better ways to show your distaste for a man than shitting on his feet.” Abrakam tugged Trueblood’s plaits. “Your father didn’t hesitate to discipline you when it was warranted.”
“Yes, but he thrashed my ass, not my head.”
“And never because you’d been foolish. Only disrespectful.”
He and Trueblood both sighed.
“Gods, I miss him,” Abrakam said.
“He misses you more,” a woman’s voice said behind them.
Lejo sat up and Trueblood twisted in his seat.
“Your Majesty,” the centaur said. “What a surprise.”
“Gods, Abrakam, do I look majestic?”
Trueblood didn’t say a word as Naria, the hereditary queen of Nyland, came into the library. She was dressed in her armor, burnished bronze over green silk. Her crowned helmet in one hand, the other reaching to draw off her leather hood.
“Holy…” Lejo whispered as her hair fell down.
“Horses,” Raj finished.
Like a waterfall, Naria’s hair unrolled to her waist in damp tangles, unleashing an earthy, elemental scent of sweat and travel and woman.
And metal.
Trueblood stared as he stood up. Walking toward the fireplace, his head floated far above his feet. Naria set down her helmet and held her hands out to him.
“Kepten Trueblood.”
He kissed her palms. “General Nyland.”
“I’m so sorry about your father.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re feeling better?”
“Much.”
She raised one eyebrow. “You scared the shit out of us.”
“Forgive me?”
“I’ll think about it. I’m in dire need of a bath right now but I’ll expect you at dinner?”
He ignored the giggling vision of Naria in the bath and said, “I’ll be there.”
“Sit next to me. I have a hundred questions.” The words were soft but around them, her smile was hungry. Like he was a meal she could devour standing up.
“I love questions.” He inhaled her metallic fragrance again, wanting her to fill his mouth like a feast.
I could, legantos, write a separate book about Naria Nyland. If you ask nicely, maybe I will. This is Trueblood’s story, but his affair with the queen, though brief, was not insignificant. So while he stands there with his mouth watering, let me tell you a little about Naria.
She was the only daughter of Queen Nysiema, who joined forces with the kheirons during Tehvan’s War. Naria rode with her mother’s legions, all of six years old but inherently attuned to both the glory and horror of the battlefield. She’d been groomed from birth to be queen, general, peacekeeper and statesman.
In other words, a mother to her people.
Ikharus-Lippé True was correct in saying Nyland endured thanks to the women who protected her. Her warrior queens walked with their feet deep in the earth and their fealty was to the forests.
Like Pelippé, Naria Nyland was a young commander. She headed a legion at sixteen and took the throne at twenty-five. There the similarities ended, for while Trueblood struggled with his new title of Kepten, Naria didn’t know the meaning of self-doubt. Whether on the battlefield or in the bedroom, her confidence and self-assuredness was rooted like a Nye tree. A scion of an ancient, matriarchal society, she didn’t have to marry to secure her place in the world, and what she wanted, she went after.
And it was clear she wanted Pelippé Trueblood.
Trueblood knew nothing about pursuit and courtship. Until now, he’d only nibbled around the edges of his sexuality, and only with Lejo. They certainly hadn’t wooed each other into bed. They never danced around a flame, or spun flirtation on a spindle, seeing how long they could draw out the thread of unfulfilled desire. Lejo folded back the covers and Trueblood got into bed. They blew out the lamp and there they went and there they were.
Trueblood remembered his complex emotions when looking at the illustrations of women in books, and he knew the uncomplicated response of his body in Lejo’s hands. But he’d never felt the heat of someone’s frank and immediate interest. Never knew the delicious thrill of being an apple ripe for picking. The heady rush of being instantly desired and the mind-blowing discovery that gratification could be instant. Or at least, lasting no longer than the length of a dinner.
Over four courses and between questions and answers, he and Naria couldn’t keep their eyes off each other.
<
br /> “Come see me later?” she murmured as they adjourned.
“I’ll think about it.”
Her hip knocked against his. “I have some boring business with horrible people. Your company can be my reward.”
The notch at the base of her throat beckoned his finger, but he didn’t know the etiquette of touching a queen in public. He kept his hands to himself, savoring the anticipation like dessert.
“I’ll send for you,” Naria said. “Don’t wander off with another woman or I’ll jail that fine ass of yours.”
With a last smile, she swept away.
Trueblood stared after, thinking, My ass is fine?
Trueblood spent the hours after dinner with the twins, filling up their reservoirs so he could leave. Overnight, he presumed. He hoped.
Raj’s aura was nearly back to normal, settled down at Trueblood’s periphery with only the occasional flare-up. But Lejo struggled hard tonight, his pinpricks of light spilling across Trueblood’s entire field of vision, making his heart constrict and burn. The longing in Lejo stretched until it pulled, pulled until it yanked. It tightened, twisted and torqued until it cried, like a child for his mother. It drew Trueblood backward in time, into the locked closet of memory, until it lay dead on the floor in the smoke and blood and…
“Lé, stop,” Raj said. “You’re hurting him.”
Lejo bunched his fists against his forehead. “I’m sorry.”
“Let go,” Trueblood said, his voice fraying at the edges. “I know you’re not doing it on purpose, but when you pull too hard, you tear open things I don’t like to think about.”
“Let go, Lé,” Raj said.
“I’m trying.”
“Come on. He’s not leaving you forever and I’m right here.”
“I know. Be quiet and let me do this.”
Lejo’s body stilled. The light cleared out of Trueblood’s eyes and curled at the edges. He tried to fasten it there with something good. Something reassuring.
You kissed me once and it tasted like oranges, he thought. You said at hand was fine but you liked the together more. You slept all over me. It was what you liked best. You want someone with you all the time. You can’t help it. You were left behind on a ship. Left alone in the dark but who left you together with only Raj in your hands but he was over there far away and alone and you were left on the floor in the smoke and blood and Mami wake up her dress the blood is in her dress and the smoke in my eyes and the light in my eyes and—
The Voyages of Trueblood Cay Page 15
