by C. S. Pacat
The last time he had seen her, she had been enthroned on a dais of furs, giving orders. Her flinty voice was exactly as he remembered, although this time when she spoke, it was in heavily accented Veretian:
‘We will re-light the fires. We camp here tonight. The men will be guarded. A good fight, many captives.’
Laurent said, ‘The clan leader is dead?’
‘He is dead.’ To Laurent she said, ‘You fight well. It’s a shame you do not have the size to breed great warriors. But you are not malformed. Your woman may not be displeased.’ Then, in the spirit of benevolence, ‘Your face is well balanced.’ She slapped him encouragingly on the back, ‘You have very long eyelashes. Like a cow. Come. We will sit together, drink, and eat meats. Your slave is virile. Later he will service at the coupling fire.’
Damen felt the tenderness in his left side with each breath, and in his arms, when he did not repress it, was the fine tremor that occurs in muscles that have been restrained in bindings for too long, or pushed for an extended period beyond their usual limitations.
Laurent answered in a hard, unyielding voice, ‘The slave lies in no bed but mine.’
‘You couple with men, in the Veretian style?’ said Halvik. ‘Then he will be taken and prepared for you; he will be given good cuts of meat, and hakesh, so that when he mounts you, his endurance will bring you great pleasure. You see? This is Vaskian hospitality.’
* * *
Damen braced himself, gathering his remaining strength, for what was to follow, but almost to his surprise, he did not have his mouth prised open and hakesh poured immediately down his throat. He wasn’t forced into anything. He was treated as a guest, or at least, as the possession of a guest, to be buffed and polished and taken to where the guest would want him.
That was to the other side of the camp, to be washed of the dirt that was the inevitable result of a day’s ride during which one has been thrown to the ground several times by one’s captors, then killed several of them.
The women flung buckets of water at him, then scrubbed him with brushes, then dried him, briskly. Then they dressed him in a Vaskian man’s loincloth, a single leather string tied around the hips, then between the legs, with a hanging panel in front that could be lifted to one side for convenience at the appropriate time, as one of the women helpfully demonstrated. He weathered the demonstration.
By this time, the camp was cleared, and the newly pitched tents looked like softly glowing globes, the light from lamps inside turning the tent skins to warm gold. The prisoners were placed under guard, the campfire was re-lit, the dais erected. Damen was presented with food, generously and courteously, also to his surprise.
He was under no illusion that he was going to be taken to the campfire to roll around with Laurent. If anything, he was going to be taken to the campfire to watch Laurent do some inventive sidestepping.
But he wasn’t taken to the campfire. He was taken to a low tent. The hakesh was poured into a jug, and placed with a carved cup inside the tent for him to drink at his leisure. The woman lifted the flap of the tent with the same economic motion she had used on the loincloth.
Laurent was not inside the tent. Laurent would, Damen was made to understand, join him later.
Laurent had already done the sidestepping.
It was a very small tent; long, and low, the inside intimate, thick with furs, layers of chamois, and on the top fox fur, treated and softer than the underbelly of a rabbit. And it was hospitably equipped, for men’s pleasure. The foot of the tent held the jug of hakesh, a second jug of water, a hanging lamp, cloths, and three small stoppered bottles containing oils that were not for the lamp.
Entering, Damen could sit, but with barely a foot to spare above his head. If he stood up, he would take the tent with him. Having nothing else to do, he lay down on the furs, in his minimal garment.
The furs were warm and the tent was a cosy nook to lie with a partner, but alone it was hard not to think about where he was, and what might have happened today, if things had fallen out differently. He let all the aches of his body settle, stretching out.
His foot hit the tent hide with his knee still bent. He shifted onto a diagonal. Not that way either. On his side, he bumped the tent pole at his back. Looking around for somewhere to put his left leg, he let out a breath of amusement. Weary as he was, he could see the humour in this situation. Considering the size of the tent, it was lucky that Laurent was not going to be joining him until morning. He curled, found a position for all of his limbs, and let them grow heavy against the soft furs and cushions.
And that was when the flap lifted on a golden head.
Framed in the entry, Laurent had also been washed and dried and dressed. His skin was fresh, and he was wrapped in a Vaskian cloak of fur, like the one Halvik had worn. In the lamplight, it looked like a rich garment that a prince might swathe himself in, on a throne.
Damen pushed himself up on an elbow, and propped his head on his hand, his fingers in his hair. He saw that Laurent was looking at him. Not watching him, as he did sometimes, but looking at him, as a man might look at a carving that has caught his attention.
Meeting Damen’s eyes eventually, Laurent said, ‘Here’s to Vaskian hospitality.’
‘It’s a traditional garment. All the men wear them,’ Damen said, eyeing Laurent’s fur cloak with curiosity.
Laurent dropped the cloak from his shoulders. Beneath it he wore some kind of Vaskian bedclothes, a tunic and pants of very fine white linen, with a series of loose ties in front.
‘Mine has a little more fabric. Are you disappointed?’
‘I would be,’ said Damen, rearranging his legs again, ‘if the lamp weren’t behind you.’
It arrested Laurent’s motion, in a pose with one knee on the furs and a palm too, just for a moment, before he stretched his body out alongside Damen’s.
Unlike Damen, he did not fully lie himself down on the furs, but sat, leaning his weight on his hands.
Damen said: ‘Thank you for—’ There was no delicate way of saying it, so he gestured generally to the inside of the tent.
‘Asserting droit de seigneur? . . . How inflamed are you?’
‘Stop it. I didn’t drink the hakesh.’
‘I’m not sure that’s quite what I asked,’ said Laurent. His voice had the same quality as his gaze. ‘This is close quarters.’
‘Close enough to see your eyelashes,’ said Damen. ‘It’s lucky you do not have the size to breed great warriors.’ And then he stopped himself. This was the wrong mood. This was the mood if he were here with a warm, amenable partner, someone he could tease and pull in towards himself, not Laurent, chaste as an icicle.
‘My size,’ said Laurent, ‘is the usual. I am not made in miniature. It’s a problem of scale, standing next to you.’
It was like being pleased by a thorn bush, feeling fond of every prickle. Another second and he was going to say something ridiculous like that.
The soft fur had warmed with his skin, and he gazed up at Laurent feeling languorous and comfortable. He knew that the corners of his mouth were curved up a little.
After a slight pause, Laurent said, almost carefully, ‘I realise that in my service you do not have a great deal of opportunity to pursue the usual—avenues for release. If you need to avail yourself of the coupling fire—’
‘No,’ said Damen. ‘I don’t want a woman.’
The drums outside were a low, continuous throb.
Laurent said, ‘Sit up.’
Sitting up meant taking up all of the extra space in the tent. He found himself looking down at Laurent, his eyes passing slowly over the delicate skin, the lamp-darkened blue eyes, the elegant curve of cheekbone, interrupted by a stray strand of blond hair.
He almost didn’t notice when Laurent drew a cloth from his cloak, except that Laurent was holding it bunched in his hand like a poultic
e, and was looking at Damen’s body as though he was planning to apply it with his own hands.
‘What are you—’ he said.
‘Hold still,’ said Laurent, and lifted the cloth.
A shock of cold, as something wet and freezing was pressed to his ribcage, just below his pectoral muscle. His abdominal muscles flinched at the contact.
‘Were you expecting a salve?’ said Laurent. ‘They brought it for you from further up the slope.’
Ice. It was ice wrapped in cloth, pressed steadily to the bruising on his left side. His ribcage rose and fell with his breath. Laurent held it firm. After the initial discomfort, Damen felt the ice start to draw out the heat of the bruising, spreading cool numbness, so that the tense muscles around it began to relax as the ice melted.
Laurent said, ‘I told the clansmen to make it hurt.’
Damen said, ‘It saved my life.’
After a pause, Laurent said, ‘Since I can’t throw a sword.’
Damen took hold of the cloth himself, as Laurent withdrew. Laurent said:
‘You know by now that these were the same men who attacked Tarasis. Halvik and her riders will escort ten of them with us to Breteau, and from there to Ravenel, where I will use them to try to lever this border deadlock open.’ Adding, almost apologetically: ‘Halvik receives the rest of the men, and all of the weapons.’
He followed that thought to its conclusion. ‘She has agreed to use the weapons raiding Akielos to the south, rather than anywhere inside your borders.’
‘Something like that.’
‘And at Ravenel, you mean to expose your uncle as the sponsor of the attack.’
‘Yes,’ said Laurent. ‘I think . . . things are about to become very dangerous.’
‘“About to become,”’ said Damen.
‘Touars is the one who needs convincing. If you hated Akielos,’ said Laurent, ‘more than anything, and you’d been given one chance to hit them as never before, what would stop you? Why would you put down your sword?’
‘I wouldn’t,’ said Damen. ‘Maybe if I was angrier at someone else.’
Laurent let out a strange breath, then looked away. Outside, the drums were ceaseless, but seemed like something distant, apart from the quiet space in the tent.
‘This is not the way I planned to spend the eve of war,’ said Laurent.
‘With me in your bed?’
‘And in my confidences,’ said Laurent.
Laurent said it as his eyes returned to Damen’s. For a moment it seemed as if he would say something more, but instead of speaking he pushed the cloak out of the way, and lay himself down. The shift in position signalled the end of the conversation, though Laurent drew his wrist to his forehead, as though still locked in thought.
He said: ‘Tomorrow will be a long day. Thirty miles of mountains, with prisoners. We should sleep.’
The ice had melted, leaving a wet cloth. Damen removed it. There were droplets of water on the planes of his torso; he wiped them off, then tossed the cloth to the far end of the tent. He was aware that Laurent was looking at him again, even as Laurent lay relaxed, his pale hair mingling with the soft fur, a line of very fine skin visible all the way down the loose opening of his Vaskian bedclothes. But after a moment Laurent turned his eyes elsewhere, and then closed them, and they both made their way to sleep.
CHAPTER 14
‘Your Highness!’ Jord, on horseback, was hailing them. He was accompanied by two other riders with torches, lighting up the dark. ‘We’d sent out scouts to find you.’
‘Call them back,’ said Laurent.
Jord reined in, nodding.
Thirty miles of mountains, with prisoners. It had taken twelve hours, a slow plodding trip with the men swaying and struggling in the saddles, occasionally clubbed into stupefied obedience by the women. Damen remembered what that felt like.
It had been a long day with an abstemious beginning. He had woken stiff, with his body protesting any change in position. Beside him, a pile of markedly empty furs. No Laurent. All signs of recent occupancy had been a handspan away from his own body, suggesting a night spent in close but not transgressive proximity: some kind of self-preservation had apparently prevented Damen from rolling inward during the night; from throwing his arm over Laurent’s torso and drawing them together to make the small tent seem larger than it was.
As a result, Damen was in possession of all his limbs, and even had his clothing restored to him. Thank you, Laurent. Nosing down steep declines on horseback was not something he preferred to do in a loincloth.
The day’s ride that had followed had been almost unsettlingly uneventful. They had reached gentler slopes by mid-afternoon, and—for once—there had been no ambushes or interruptions. The spreading rise and fall of the hillside had been quiet, stretching out to the south and the west, the only break in its peace the unlikeliness of their own procession: Laurent riding at the head of a band of Vaskian women on shaggy ponies, escorting his ten prisoners, roped and tied, and lashed to their horses.
Now it was nightfall, and the horses were exhausted, dropping their necks, some of them, and the prisoners had long since stopped struggling. Jord fell into formation beside them.
‘Breteau is cleared,’ Jord was saying. ‘Lord Touars’s men rode back to Ravenel this morning. We chose to stay on and wait. There has been no word from any direction—the border or the forts or—yourself. The men were starting to get twitchy. They’ll be glad of your return.’
‘I want them ready to ride out at dawn,’ said Laurent.
Jord nodded, then glanced helplessly at the band and its prisoners.
‘Yes, they are the men who caused these border attacks,’ said Laurent, answering the question that had not been asked.
‘They don’t look Akielon,’ said Jord.
‘No,’ said Laurent.
Jord nodded grimly, and they crested the last rise to see the shadows and the points of light of the nighttime camp.
* * *
The embroidery came later, in the retelling, as the story was told again and again by the men, taking on its own character as it passed over camp.
The Prince had ridden out, with only one soldier. Deep in the mountains, he had chased down the rats responsible for these killings. Had ripped them out of their hiding holes and fought them, thirty to one, at least. Had brought them back thrashed, lashed and subdued. That was their Prince for you, a twisty, vicious fiend who you should never, ever cross, unless you wanted your gullet handed to you on a platter. Why, he once rode a horse to death just to beat Torveld of Patras to the mark.
In the men’s eyes the feat was reflected as the wild, impossible thing it was—their Prince vanishing for two days, then appearing out of the night with a sackful of prisoners thrown over his shoulder, tossing them at the feet of his troop and saying: You wanted them? Here they are.
‘You took a beating,’ said Paschal, later.
‘Thirty to one, at least,’ said Damen.
Paschal snorted. Then he said, ‘It’s a good thing you’re doing, standing with him. Staying with him, when you have no love for this country.’
Instead of accepting the invitations to the campfire, Damen found himself walking the edges of the camp. Behind him, the voices grew distant: Rochert saying something about blond hair and temperament. Lazar reliving Laurent’s duel with Govart.
Breteau looked very different to the last time Damen had seen it. Instead of piles of burning wood, there was cleared ground. The half-open pits were filled in. The broken spears and the signs of fighting were gone. Dwellings that were damaged beyond repair had been neatly stripped down for materials.
The camp itself was a series of ordered geometric tents pitched west of the village. Sloping canvas was pulled taut in rigorous lines, and at the far end of the camp stood Laurent’s tent, which had been prepared for him despite his ab
sence. Between the ranked columns, men proceeded in friendlier, less rigid paths to and from the campfires.
It was not a victory. Not yet. They were still a day’s ride out from Ravenel. That meant their absence would be four days, at least. Assuming good horses and good roads, the Regent’s messenger would certainly have arrived by then, beating them to Ravenel by at least a day.
It had probably happened this morning, while Damen was waking to an empty tent—the messenger pounding into the fort’s dwarfing open courtyard, being quickly ushered into the great hall, and all the lords of Ravenel gathering around to hear his message. This, in the absence of the wastrel prince who had flitted off during a crisis and not returned as he had promised, missing the moment when he most needed to be taken seriously, to forge decisions and shape events. In that sense, they were already too late.
But today’s unlikely procession through the hills was planning on a level he had not previously attributed to Laurent. Laurent had negotiated the counterstrike with Halvik the evening before hearing the first news of attacks on his border. The messages and bribes that had flowed from Laurent to Halvik’s clan had begun days earlier than that. Laurent must have guessed the way in which his uncle would trigger a border conflict, and begun his own preparations to counter it, well in advance.
Damen remembered the first night at Chastillon, the sloppy work, the fights, the poor standard of soldiering. The Regent had thrown his nephew a chaotic rabble of men, and Laurent had stamped it into ordered lines; had given him an ungovernable captain, and Laurent had vanquished him; had unleashed a dangerous force on the border, and Laurent had brought it back, neutered and strapped down. Check, check, and check, as each element of disorder was brought under Laurent’s monumental control.
Heart, body and mind, these men belonged to the Prince. Their hard work and discipline were evident in every part of the camp and the surrounding village.
Damen let the cool evening air pass over him, and let himself feel down to his bones the virtuosity of this journey he was a part of, and just how far they had come.
