In the Darkness
Charles Edward
www.loose-id.com
In the Darkness
Copyright © August 2011 by Charles Edward
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eISBN 978-1-61118-452-5
Editor: Venessa Giunta
Cover Artist: Valerie Tibbs
Printed in the United States of America
Published by
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San Francisco CA 94142-5960
www.loose-id.com
This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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* * *
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Dedication
To Daryl, for everything
To Becky, for friendship
Acknowledgement
I owe a debt of gratitude to Bob Davis, who gave me the glimmer of a character idea, which led me to ask the questions answered in this story.
I’m grateful to my editor, Venessa Giunta (www.venessagiunta.com), for her guidance, patience, and the things I have learned from her.
This book would not exist without the encouragement of my beta readers (in order by draft):
Becky Spain-Kaiser
Krista Robinson-Lawlor
Jade Archer (www.jadearcher.com)
A. B. Gayle (www.abgayle.com)
Roger Kean (recklessbooks.co.uk)
My models for “how to write naughty” in this book were Brandon Fox and Amanda Young.
Several critique partners provided guidance on portions of the manuscript: L.C. Chase, William Cooper, Casey Cox, Lissa Kasey, Evie Kiels, Piper Vaughn, and Xara X. Xanakis.
I am grateful for the advice and support received from authors and readers on Goodreads.com:
The On Fiction Writing Group: especially Anna from Alaska for help with the bear.
The M/M Romance Group and authors I “met” there: moderators Lori, Jason, and Jen; everyone who participates in the discussion threads; Heidi Cullinan for teaching me how to write a blurb; Jordan Castillo Price for her fantastic erotica-writing podcast and book recommendations; and Josh Lanyon for Man, Oh Man: Writing M/M Fiction for Cash and Kinks.
Chapter One
The ghost watched the boys’ campsite from a discreet distance. They had set their tent in a place they should not be, and for that he was truly pleased.
They were young men from the nearby village. Maybe they didn’t know they trespassed, or maybe they didn’t care. Either way, the ghost could watch them more closely than ever.
He had learned to be a ghost when he was very much smaller, when his parents first let him go out to do chores alone in the darkness that would conceal him. He worked out how to do his jobs quickly so there would often be time to go near the village, to learn about the people who lived there. But, always cautious, he remained far enough away that they wouldn’t see his eyes upon them.
The three who trespassed tonight were the most interesting of the villagers, youths older than his own eighteen summers. Often they did things he understood, like having practice battles in the field, hunting, or fishing in the river in the early morning. Sometimes, like all villagers, they did things he didn’t understand at all.
By now he knew their names: Tyber, Evin, and Johan. He had seen them many times in the evening or early morning, unloading crates and barrels from barges that came downriver, or searching in the woods for plants. They and others did these tasks at the direction of an old woman. What did they do with all that stuff? Whatever it was, they did it during the day when he couldn’t watch, so he had never managed to find out. Yet.
He had come to observe them at nightfall, and as the protective darkness deepened, he crept yet closer to their riverside camp. They danced around a fire, waving swords and axes, boasting to one another about how many boggarts or demons from the underworld they might kill to protect their village.
Arms and tongues soon tired of that game. They dropped their weapons, shed their clothing, and went to wash in the river. While bathing, they laughed and shouted and flung water at one another.
Their laughter made the ghost happy, but it also made him hurt because he couldn’t join them. He liked to play in the water too, but of course he had to do it alone. It was strange—exciting but somehow embarrassing—to see them cavorting naked and unashamed. He couldn’t imagine doing such things, but he understood why they could be so carefree: they were normal. They didn’t have his filthy, cursed skin.
After bathing, they did one of the things he didn’t understand. They carried their clothing into the tent and closed themselves inside. For a long while, they made noises like they were hurting each other—except that one or another would giggle sometimes. Tyber gave orders and they called Evin ugly names, and sometimes there were moans like his mother made one time when she was very sick.
Eventually they settled down and slept. The ghost decided they were probably okay, so he went off to do his chores.
Morning threatened when he returned to wait for them to awaken. The ghost himself should not be here in the day, but he wanted to see them come out of their tent. He wanted to know how they would behave today and if they were all well after the strangeness of the night.
He glanced up at the sky, trying to judge the growing light and determine how much longer he could stay and still be able to leave unseen. He was being stupid and he would be in trouble when he got home, but he didn’t want to go yet.
Evin emerged first, still naked, into the cool morning air. He yawned, stretched, and walked over to the river to relieve himself by pissing into the moving water. The ghost was close enough to smell it.
Faint morning light gave Evin’s light brown hair a coppery sheen. An almost invisible down covered his entire body. He wasn’t hairy, like Tyber was in places, or furry like an animal. Just fuzzy. Still pissing, he started to wave his cock around, making the stream arc and loop in the air. And he laughed.
The sound of it touched the ghost deep inside somehow, making him feel tight and very happy for no reason. But then his own cock began to get stiff, like it did sometimes after sleeping, and the feeling crept on that he was doing something wrong, stealing something by watching this private moment. He would have been ashamed to be seen that way, after all.
Evin certainly seemed none the worse after last night. That was good.
Slowly, taking care not to be noticed, the ghost slipped away and headed up the mountain toward home.
* * *
It was getting a little too light outside, but the ghost was su
re he had not been seen or followed on the way home to his parents’ cabin. The rough house stood in an area of thick forest high up on the mountain. The cabin’s front door opened onto a path that eventually led down to the village. He had never used that door or path. He always entered by the back door, which opened onto trails around the mountain where Father placed his game traps. Here in the back, no outsider would ever see him approach his home.
As he reached the door, it was ripped open from within by his father.
“Gareth, get in here now!” Father clawed at Gareth’s shoulder, gripping it as if it were a stone he might use for murder, and tried to drag Gareth into the cabin. “Get in! Are you trying to drive us mad, boy?”
Gareth didn’t protest as he was urged inside and Father slammed the door behind them. As usual when returning home at dawn, something warm snuffed out inside of him when the door closed on the morning’s light.
Farther into the room, Gareth lifted aside an armoire that stood over the cabin’s cellar door—a trapdoor covering the mouth of a pit. Gareth or his parents always lifted the armoire to move it. It would never be dragged to leave telltale marks on the floor. Mother sat knitting in a rough-hewn chair. At first she just glared at him, but as he revealed and then lifted the door, poised to leap down, she did not restrain her anger.
“The queen’s agents will be here today. They could come at any moment, you little piss-eyed fool! Were you trying to get yourself killed?”
He replied in a low voice. “You’d be better off then. Rid of me.”
A shadow of fear flickered across her face, one he had seen many times before. Though he was a terrible burden to them, his parents were terrified for Gareth—and for themselves, if he was found in their care.
Before Mother could make a reply, Father shoved him hard in the back and he had to jump down into the cellar in order not to fall.
Now alone, he lay down on his bed of burlap and straw, pulled his boots off, and tossed them aside. Gareth’s parents expected the tithe collector today, and because of the official visit, he might have to wait for hours in the cellar, even longer than he usually slept during the day.
The cellar door closed with a slam that jiggled the knotted rope he would use to climb out later. A soft thump followed as his parents put the armoire back in place. Then the floorboards creaked and groaned as they went back to their work above and awaited the arrival of one of the few visitors they could not refuse. He could picture them, talking nervously to one another as Mother continued to knit and Father repaired one of his animal traps or cages.
Gareth thought of himself as a ghost because he was good at spying on the villagers in the valley below and because he wished he could go unnoticed and unpunished at home. But he was all too real and solid. He couldn’t float invisibly up through the floor and go to the village to see more of the people and their homes. He could only wait for nightfall.
Gareth rolled onto his stomach and fumbled beneath the bedding. He gathered a group of thumb-sized figures he had woven from the bed’s straw and stood them up around one another to make a little scene.
There were several: The hunched figure of the old woman with her cane and a little piece of straw sticking straight out to represent her bony nose. Tyber, the tall one, who ordered the others around and sometimes picked on them. Johan, with dark red hair that Gareth had painted using a bit of blood from a skinned animal. Marc, the smallest, with a tiny scar also painted in blood on his face. And Evin.
Gareth had used some of the lightest brown straw to represent Evin’s hair. He couldn’t get it to lie down right and there was more of it than Evin really had, but he was not unhappy with his work. He ran a finger over it, imagining how Evin’s hair must blaze in the daylight and wishing he could see it.
When all the figures were arranged, he wiggled the old woman so that she gave orders to the boys. They struggled to carry cumbersome, invisible crates for her until Marc stumbled.
“Kshhh!” Gareth made the sound of fragile somethings breaking in the crate.
No, Marc! You’re doing it wrong! You’re stupid! Look what you done! cried Tyber. Gareth tweaked the tall stick figure between a thumb and forefinger so that it twisted and its arm slapped little Marc.
Waaaaah!
Wah, wah, wah! Tyber said.
Don’t hurt him no more! Evin said.
Tyber laughed. He’s just being a baby!
Gareth brought a new figure into the play, one that was larger than any of the others.
It’s Gareth! said Johan.
Yay! said Evin.
Marc ran to hide behind Gareth.
Stop! said the figure of Gareth, who looked just like the others so they wouldn’t be scared. Don’t hurt him no more! You’re not the leader!
Who’s gonna be our leader, then? said Marc.
Evin will! Gareth said. He’s nice to everyone!
Yayyyyy! everyone shouted.
Okay! Evin said. I’m the leader! But what do I want to do?
Let’s go play in the river! Gareth said.
Yayyyyy! everyone shouted.
“Spshh! Spshh!” Gareth made the happy sounds of young men splashing and wrestling in the water. They all had adventures together at the river until Gareth’s yawns and droopy eyelids made everyone too tired and they all curled up in a heap on the bed’s burlap shore.
* * *
Vibrations rumbled through the cellar walls and interrupted Gareth’s dreams. Horses approached and stopped somewhere outside the cabin. Footsteps thumped on creaking floorboards. A door opened, and voices exchanged muffled words as his parents received their guests.
Gareth remained quiet and still, though he was deep enough underground that it could hardly matter. His hiding place was good.
Father always complained that the queen’s taxes kept everyone poor, but he was sure to keep perfect records and pay every coin. He would never give the queen’s men a reason to wonder if there were places on his property where goods or money might be hidden.
After the rumble of horses signaled to Gareth that the men were gone, he slept again until evening. He was next awakened by the light bump of the armoire being set aside and the crash as Father threw open the trapdoor—his signal that Gareth could come up to dinner.
When he climbed into the main room, Father was already eating at the table. Mother glanced at him, then dished stew onto a rough wooden platter. Without speaking, she placed it on the table as Gareth sat.
Before Gareth could pick up his spoon, Father asked, “Didn’t get your fill of rats in the cellar, eh?”
“No, sir.”
“That was too close today, boy. You took too long making the rounds.”
Gareth thought it hadn’t been close at all. But he wouldn’t argue or make excuses or do anything to draw attention to the question of why he’d stayed out so long. If his parents ever suspected he spied on the villagers, they wouldn’t trust him with his chores and he’d never get to go out by himself. So he said, “Yes, sir,” in a hushed, respectful tone. Head down.
“We’ve moved out this far to keep you hid. You can’t risk it like you did today.”
“No, sir.”
“You know you can’t risk it, don’t you, boy?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And why is that? Why can’t you risk it, eh?”
Gareth’s face ignited. He kept his eyes on his platter and remained still, wishing he wouldn’t have to answer. Not again.
“Why? Why, can’t you risk it? Answer me.”
“Because.”
“Answer!”
“Because I’m a monster!” He clamped his mouth shut tight and tried to keep it from quivering. He wouldn’t cry. He wouldn’t.
With a grimace of disgust, Father grabbed his hand and jerked it up to hold it in front of Gareth’s wet eyes, so that the horrible, sickening green of it filled his vision.
When Gareth closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at himself, Father made a fist around the unresistin
g hand and smashed it into Gareth’s face. “You have got ta be careful. You can’t never be seen by nobody.”
Father released Gareth’s hand. Gareth dropped it to his lap and struggled to keep himself calm. A couple of tears escaped to run down his nose, but he didn’t compound his humiliation by weeping. He snorted the wetness up when it irritated him and glanced up quickly to see Father still glaring at him.
“Is that snot, or just you?” Father stood up, scraping his chair back from the table, and walked away with his food as if he could no longer bear to sit so close.
Gareth took a deep breath to push all the hurt down, away from the tight throat and leaky eyes threatening to betray him. He wouldn’t be a baby. He swiped an arm across his face to dry it, then spared a guilty glance at Mother, who snapped, “Eat!”
His supper was a greasy stew of deer meat, gone too soon. There was never enough.
After finishing the meal in silence, he prepared to take the bath he had missed this morning. He went to the fireplace and, being careful not to burn himself, poured some of the hot water from the kettle into a large copper tub standing nearby. A block of the soap his mother made from animal fat rested on a shelf within easy reach, so he only needed to drape a rag over the side of the tub to be ready to bathe.
He looked around to be sure that his parents had averted their eyes—they didn’t want to endure the sight of him as he cleaned himself—and stripped off his clothing. Then he stood in the tub to wash. As long as he didn’t look down at himself, it felt good to wash away last night’s dirt and today’s tension. It tickled a bit when he scrubbed his cock, which tried to embarrass him by stiffening. Lately that happened far too often. He moved on to other parts of his body, made himself very clean, and enjoyed the water’s warmth as much as he could without wasting time. He didn’t want to inconvenience his parents further.
Once dressed in clean breeches and chemise, he was ready to go out, but his parents made him wait until well after dark to leave the house. Finally they did let him go, and he went straightaway to the campsite to check on the trespassers.
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