She had to nearly shout that last as the music swelled and lines began to form on the dancefloor.
The mention of the Sisters made Milo brighten up a bit. A council of nine priestesses, one to represent each goddess, every contract offer went through them to ensure there were no crossed family lines, and no concentrations of power enriching one clan over another. They’d been extraordinarily stingy with their approval of offers when his mam had come of age, and extraordinarily indignant when she’d come home from war with Milo in her belly. According to his mam, they only finally agreed, five years after the fact, to issue him the proper papers so he could inherit because Lilibet had done… something—something neither she nor Milo’s mam ever actually confessed. Whatever it was, it had done the job. That and the fact that Nain had made it clear by then that Milo had been claimed as dragonkin, and Ceri was not only no such thing but had told the Sisters in no uncertain terms she had no intention of expanding her brood beyond Milo. The Sisters could either accept Milo as the heir to Old Forge, or fight it out with all the parish councils as well as Kymbrygh’s parliament over why they wouldn’t.
Surely the Sisters could be counted on to be as choosy with any offers Milo might get as they’d been with his mam. In fact, they might be even choosier just out of petty, bureaucratic spite.
“I’m surprised anyone would have the brass to make an offer at all just yet.” Milo took a good gulp from the cup that used to be Dilys’s, hoping she wouldn’t notice and snag it back. It was metheglin, mead brewed in the traditional Kymbrygh style, and very good. “You’re too young.”
“I’m perfectly eligible to entertain offers, as long as nothing is signed until I come of age next year. I’m not that much younger than you, y’know, O wise one.” Dilys gave Milo a soft elbow to the ribs. “But you’ll be pleased to know I’m as unprepared to start considering contracts as you are.” She paused to watch a pretty girl swoop in to set her jug on the floor as the distinctive notes of the Broom and Bottle kicked up. “Although....”
Milo snorted. “Didn’t your mam just say—?”
“Oh hush, you. As long she’s not of age yet either, we won’t have to worry about contracts just yet.”
“Well, what if she is, though?” Milo only said it be contrary; the girl, in fact, looked to be right about Dilys’s age.
Dilys gave Milo a sly wink. “Eh, people tend to look away as long as there’s no chance of an accidental crotch-goblin.”
Milo nearly choked on his mead. He shook his head, trying to stifle the laugh and maintain his annoyance with his current life in general as he muttered, “Maybe in Tirrydderch,” into his cup.
Tirrydderch might as well be its own little independent realm, for all they adhered to the mores and traditions of the rest of Kymbrygh. They certainly didn’t look away in Whitpool. Wellech… maybe. It had been too long since Milo had been here, and it wasn’t exactly something that might enter a ten-year-old’s awareness—at least it hadn’t entered Milo’s back when he’d been a seasonal fixture.
Ugh, this wasn’t something Milo’d found a need to contemplate much at school. Kymbrygh, Werrdig, and Preidyn, not to mention all the minor islands, were all so very different from one another, for all they rallied under the same flag and loved their queen fiercely. Llundaintref—not only the capitol of Preidyn but of the entire United Preidynīg Isles—was like a microcosm of Preidyn’s generally repressed population, and that attitude leaked into the codes of conduct imposed on, and apparently absorbed by, Milo in his years at school. Even group study sessions had been chaperoned. It had made the occasional breathless stolen moment that much more precious and intense, but it had also delayed Milo in having to deal with… well. This.
Dilys dragged her gaze from the girl to give Milo a lift of her eyebrow. “Boys or girls?”
“Either, I guess.” Milo shrugged. “It’s all just skin in the end.”
“Then I’ll take the girls, you take the boys. Problem solved.”
“Except for the part where it isn’t, because I’m of age. I do have to worry about contracts now, apparently.”
It still kept smacking him in the face. Shouldn’t he feel more… grown up? Something? Shouldn’t all of this have occurred to him before? Like when he’d actually come of age last month?
“Aw, bless.” Dilys’s tone was more mocking than sympathetic, and the way she stuck out her bottom lip was flat insulting. “If you’re going to be a stuffy stick about it, you can just live vicariously through me, then.”
“Meaning you’re getting set to abandon me already.”
“Well.” Dilys was still eyeing the dancefloor. No one had yet succeeded in sweeping the girl’s bottle out from under her. “Call me superficial, but right now, skin is what—”
“Nope, not listening to you grinding on about your sex life.” Milo took a calming sip of mead.
“Your loss, then, but since I’m the generous sort and have no wish to explode your too-genteel-for-your-own-good head, I guess you needn’t take on so, you great prude.”
“Anyway, you haven’t worn your clogs. And you’ve no broom.”
Dilys grinned, wide and wicked. “Clogs, I don’t need.” She gave Milo a smug look, said, “And a broom?” as she snagged one from the hands of a passing dancer fast enough that it took him several steps of the dance before he realized he’d been disarmed. It didn’t matter; Dilys was already gone, calling “Wish me luck!” to Milo over her shoulder as she charged the girl and her bottle, purposeful grin on her face and stolen broom in her hands.
Milo only sighed, raised the tankard in a toast Dilys didn’t even see, then emptied it in two hearty swallows. If he was going to make it through this with no one to run interference, he was going to do it from within a relatively painless haze of alcoholic torpor. He eyed the table laden with casks and jugs, calculating how he might get across the great heaving room and begin his descent into drunken debauchery without running into anyone else who might want to not-so-subtly question him using clumsy euphemisms for stamina and size, and oh by the way, could he actually breathe fire?
“Milo! There you are!”
Milo’s shoulders went up around his ears as he tried to sink into his coat and disappear.
…Now there was a thought. Some mages could cast an illusion of invisibility. Milo didn’t happen to be one of them, but he was a fast learner.
“I’ve been looking all over for you!”
Oh! Oh! He hadn’t recognized the voice through all the noise, but now he whipped around, smile bright and genuine.
“Elly!” He took hold of Ellis’s arm and clamped down tight. “Thank every goddess. Where have you been? Did you know about this?”
Ellis blinked. “About what?” He looked around. “I told you Mam’s been going spare with preparations for some kind of party, but she wouldn’t tell me—”
“This isn’t a party, it’s a damned bloody auction! D’you know how many times I’ve had to say, ‘sorry, I have no representative to entertain negotiations this evening’ because your mam and my mam have conveniently disappeared, and no one told me about any of this, they just left me here, I’ve never had a contract offer in my life and now I think I have nine of them, and I don’t even know who most of these people are!”
Milo was panting.
Ellis looked bemused. “Haia, Milo. How’s your evening been?”
“Augh!” Milo slumped. “I’m sorry. Only, I’m really glad you’re here.”
He drew back, self-consciously loosening his grip on Ellis’s arm. The thick velvet of Ellis’s coat was crinkled where Milo’s fingers had been clenching it, so Milo brushed at it, trying to smooth it out. It was dark, midnight-blue, and worn over a tailored brocade waistcoat done in red with the shapes of dragons woven subtly through in muted silver thread. Ellis’s hair was pulled back into a neat tail at the base of his neck, clean and shining, and his brown cheeks and jaw looked freshly shaved. And he smelled… just. Really good. And. Well. And.
Sav
e him, with all the talk of contracts, Milo was abruptly wondering if Ellis already had one. Or at least offers. He would’ve come of age this past summer. Plenty of time, really. And for pity’s sake, look at him, of course he had offers. Which made Milo a little sad, actually, like he’d missed out on something before he even realized it existed.
“Sorry,” Milo said again, abruptly awkward and a little bit tongue-tied as he made himself stop fussing at the velvet and take a step back. “I’m only.” He shrugged. “Mam’s angry with me, which would explain....”
He waved his hand around, though truthfully no one had really approached him since Nia had commandeered him. Which wasn’t surprising, really—Nia was Pennaeth in Tirryderch, which meant she was a force in Kymbrygh in general. Maybe people thought she’d staked a claim for Dilys. Milo didn’t even want to think about how that might go over with Dilys. Who, when Milo chanced a look at the dancefloor, had roundly captured the bottle, and appeared to be in the process of capturing the girl who went with it.
Ellis was still smiling, but now there was a touch of curiosity. “Why would Ceri be angry with you?”
“Oh, I—” Milo looked around to see if anyone might hear, but there were too many people to risk saying it out loud. “Nothing, only. You know. Mams.” He rolled his eyes and gave Ellis a grin.
Ellis lifted his eyebrows, curious, but only said, “Want to get out of here?”
Milo didn’t even pause. “I really, really do.”
RHEDIAD AFON wasn’t nearly as old as Ty Dreigiau, Milo’s mam’s ancient house that sat at the sea-edge of the Old Forge preserve. It was old enough, though, and infinitely better built, timber cruck framing melded seamlessly to stone-built integrity in a breathlessly beautiful mishmash of long hall building and tower house. When they were boys, all Milo cared about was that the undercroft stayed dry and cool all summer, and made for comfortable sleeping when the slick, fresh breeze from the Aled didn’t quite make it past the open windows of the upper floors. Now, knowing all about what went into the constant upkeep of his mam’s house, he noted the tight seams of the stonework as Ellis led the way up the stairs, the smooth dry gloss of the sturdy timbers that supported the vaulted ceilings.
Milo followed Ellis to the wing that housed the private apartments—maybe to Milo’s guest room, which, now that Milo thought about it, would be nice, since no one had bothered to show him yet where he’d be sleeping or where his bag had got off to. The thick rugs beneath their feet muted the noise downstairs as well as their footsteps. It left a hush between them, something thick and… not unbreachable, exactly, but full and pleasant enough Milo didn’t necessarily want to breach it.
“Here we are,” Ellis said, quiet, as though he felt it too, and eased open a door, gesturing for Milo to go ahead.
The fire was going nicely, gold-red pitching flickers from the hearth and into the small sitting room that appeared to adjoin a well-appointed bedroom, if the glimpse of walnut posts and rich blue duvet through the half-open door were any indication. The massive electrolier that hung from the ceiling was dark; two small gas lamps were lit instead, one on a table set between two fat, squashy-looking chairs. Everything about the room was warm and welcoming, drenched in soft amber light.
It was all too fine and lived-in to be a guest room.
“Whose room is this?” Milo finally asked.
“Ehm. Mine?” Ellis said it with an amused lilt as he moved to the sideboard and took up a carved clay decanter, grinning like he had a secret, and poured its contents into two fine crystal glasses. “Why? Something wrong?”
“Well, no. I mean, of course not, but.” Milo shook his head. “You’ve moved from your old one. This one’s so....”
Grown up.
“It suits me,” Ellis said simply and offered a glass to Milo.
Milo took it absently. “It does. But I thought you’d taken the Croft?”
Ellis shrugged. “When I was a boy, I split my time between here and Oed Tyddyn. Now I split it between here and the Croft.” He gestured to the chairs. “Sit.”
Milo did, waiting until Ellis took the other chair before he ventured, “So. You and your tad, then. Is it really—?”
“However you meant to finish that question,” Ellis cut in, “the answer is yes. It is. Really. And I’d prefer to not talk about it now, if you please.” It wasn’t terse or angry, but it was clear and unbending.
“Fair.” Milo sat back in the incredibly comfortable chair, lifting his glass for a good sniff before venturing a taste, as a childhood spent with Ellis and his endless pranks demanded. This wasn’t anything of the sort. This was—
Milo grinned at Ellis in delight, abruptly and wholly diverted. “This can’t be.”
“Oh, can’t it, though.” Ellis was unapologetically smug as he clinked his glass against Milo’s. “Lilibet’s finest plum wine. Sought after by all, enjoyed by few.”
“Don’t I know it.” Milo took a good taste, sighing as dozens of different flavors—sweet and bitter, fruity and floral and woody—washed together into incongruous harmony and burst like fireworks over his tongue.
He’d only had it a few times in his life, Highwinter presents from Lilibet to Ceri, and Ceri was shamelessly stingy about sharing. Lilibet’s orchard was small and she had no interest in expanding it. The few bottles it produced each year, therefore, were for friends. Lilibet didn’t sell her plum wine—she gifted it to those she deemed worthy, a very short list as opposed to the very long one consisting of those who wished they were on the short one.
They’d tried to steal a bottle once, Milo and Ellis, and it was possible Dilys had been with them, but if she had been, Milo didn’t remember. All he really remembered was getting chased—for hours—by whatever kitchen minion had caught them, escaping and thinking themselves quite clever, and then getting a good hiding from Lilibet anyway when they’d shown up later for supper. They hadn’t even cared much about the wine or getting drunk; they’d only cared that it was coveted, guarded, and therefore a challenge.
Milo grinned at the memory. “Your mam’s going to kill you.”
“Not if she wants her roof fixed before winter.” Ellis grinned back. “Anyway, it was her idea.”
Milo narrowed his eyes. “Your mam gave you plum wine. Gave it to you. Your mam.”
“Think of it as an apology.”
“I knew it!” Milo jolted so hard he almost sloshed some of the precious wine out of his glass. “They did leave me alone down there on purpose!”
Blood and rot, his mam must be really angry with him.
“I don’t know what you did”—Ellis tipped his glass at Milo in a pseudo toast—“but I approve.”
Ten minutes ago, Milo hadn’t approved of any of it, even a tiny bit. Now, coveted wine in his hand and Ellis smiling at him with his white teeth and soft eyes… well.
“You know what?” Milo emptied his glass then held it out for Ellis to refill. “So do I.”
“SHOW ME.”
Milo squinted up from where he sat on the floor. “What?” He’d slid down to stoke the fire a while ago and then just sort of stayed there.
Ellis sat down beside him and cracked open the second bottle of wine. “Show me.”
Milo held out his glass, grinning, because yes, he remembered this—staying up far too late, considering they habitually rose with the dawn, and grinding on like pepper mills about anything, everything, until Lilibet invariably came by to shush them and threaten to separate them. And once they’d quieted, settled down, Ellis would say “Show me.” And Milo would.
He waited until Ellis had refilled both glasses then asked, “What would you like to see?”
Ellis set the bottle aside, propping back on one arm and stretching out his legs. “I dunno.” He waved his glass around. “Something with fire.”
“Fire,” Milo hummed, thinking, then narrowed his eyes.
Shapes first—a dragon, because it was the first thing Milo thought of, wings dripping dainty beads of flame like dewd
rops onto the hearthstone, then a horse in full gallop, and a cat because it was easy. Faces next—Dilys because Milo’d been so pleased to see her, then Bethan from the bridge because Milo still wasn’t over his pique. Conjuring Ellis’s face out of fire was nearly effortless; Ellis had always been so fierce and bright, it seemed as though the flames wanted to take the shape.
“You’ve got better at this.” Quiet. Gaze following every flicker and flash.
Milo shrugged. “I took art classes at school. Learned to draw. It helps.”
“Clearly.”
Milo let the portrait linger for a moment, staring when he shouldn’t, before he let the fire slip then shift and take on the contours of the sea. Rolling swells and crashing breakers rippled across the small fireplace, fierce enough Milo could almost taste the salt.
“Now,” Ellis said, tone soft like spring rain, “show me what it Looks like.”
Even having been expecting it, part of that long-ago ritual, it still made something bloom inside Milo, warm as a kitchen hearth. Secrets shared, and the intensity of the friendship upon which the secrecy depended, the trust inherent to such a massive confidence, and how Milo had never, not once, thought Ellis might betray it. Milo’s mam’d had a right fit back when a tiny Milo thoughtlessly blurted his secret at an equally tiny Ellis, but this—this slotting back into place, this ease and… relief after so many years—this made any risk taken on by the unfledged boy he’d been worth it.
So Milo only tilted his head, concentrated, and showed Ellis as near as he could what Milo Saw: the pearly wisps that gathered in like a fingers to a fist, curling and coalescing to a great swath of might that drove the surf made of fire; the prismatic whorls that roiled into undercurrents that could swallow ships; the legion of colors that twisted beneath the swells and surged up to cap silver to their churning tips.
Ellis dropped back on his elbow, smiled, soft and dear, and said, “Beautiful.”
Milo peered at Ellis, drenched in firelight, and thought… Yes.
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