"You're right, I don't understand." Elthrinn shook her head, trying to make the new information make sense, but her mind felt smothered with unspun wool.
Jorm took her hands, and closed them in both of his. His palms felt warm, warm enough that Elthrinn knew her own skin was chilled.
"If Gorren had been allowed to carry on, if his mother hadn't stepped in, Dorll would be dead, and Gorren would be king now."
Elthrinn tried to pull her hands free, but Jorm wouldn't let her go. "You're saying I nearly made him kill his father?"
"No. I'm saying that Gorren loves you, loves you so much it makes him crazy. He loves you so much he didn't realise that he'd almost taken on the weight of a nation, because he was intent on defending you, in exacting revenge, for you."
"So what do you want me to do about all that?"
Jorm offered her a thin, but kind, smile. "The only thing you can do, love him, just love him."
~o0o~
Jorm had wanted to walk with her all the way back to the cottage, but Elthrinn had asked him to leave her be. She had a confusion of thoughts stewing in her mind, and she wanted peace to be able to think them.
She wasn't sure that she'd managed to sort her thoughts into any discernible order by the time she got home. Gorren had been terrifying to her, but she could see now that there was no shame in that; he was supposed to be, he had to be. That he could be so should give her a feeling of security. He could, and would, protect her from anything. That was what Jorm had been trying to show her.
She hoped that it wasn't too late, that her fear and confusion hadn't struck an irretrievable wedge between them. She would make this last.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Gorren felt sour and toxic. It seemed that his mood had infected his body, as well as his spirit. There seemed to be a constant rancid taste in his mouth, and no matter how much water, or how much ale, he drank, it wouldn't go away. But that didn't stop him trying to drown it.
He supposed, in a way, that he could understand. Elthrinn had known nothing of the Dorvern culture only a handful of moons previously. Coming to the country, being his wife, hadn't even been her choice, but he thought she'd accepted him. He thought they'd formed a bond, a strong one, against the odds. He'd never thought to have reason to show her his battle form. He knew it for what is was, brutal and deadly, but it was still him. She'd seemed comfortable enough with his fully wolven form. He laughed bitterly into his mug of ale. His wife was more comfortable with that form now than she was with him as a man. It might have been some sort of joke, if it had been funny.
He had no business at the barracks that day, and he knew he should have been at home, helping Elthrinn with the daily chores if nothing else, but he couldn't take any more of her nervous glances. She had a way of flinching if he even happened to pass close by her, and then trying to make it look as though she hadn't flinched. That was bad enough, let alone when he tried to touch her, and it was driving him mad. Worse, it was bringing out his hunting instincts. They hadn't been intimate for some time, and Elthrinn was beginning to scent less and less like mate, and more and more like prey. He was beginning to be worried that he might hurt her, despite all his assurances that he was no danger to her. He laughed to himself again, but the sound was devoid of any humour.
He was sitting on his own in the tavern. His friends had been patient, were being patient, but they were past the point of trying to reason with him, or advise him. Now they were leaving him to stew in his own juices, until he could find a new way of being. Gorren suspected that Jorm, usually his most patient friend, had reached the end of his endless tether. Jorm didn't become demonstrative, he didn't shout, he didn't yell or argue with anything other than quiet reason, but when faced with stubbornness, he usually responded in kind. Gorren had a feeling that Jorm was about to take matters into his own hands. What that action might mean, Gorren had no idea. Whether Jorm might manage to talk some sense into Elthrinn, or whether he might manage to find a way to get her out of Cranak, out of Dorvek, Gorren would not have been surprised.
But the thought of Elthrinn leaving, the thought of her not being there, even distant and afraid as she was... that made something twist painfully in his gut. Gorren drained his glass, trying to ease the discomfort.
"You look lonely." The soothing, overtly sweet voice came from behind him, but he didn't bother to turn. He could scent that it was Deffry, and as he'd known she would, she invited herself to sit at his table anyway.
"I'm alone, there's a difference."
"There's no need for you to be."
Apparently she wasn't taking his surliness for the dismissal that it was. Gorren flicked his eyes up from the table. Nope, she was leaning over the scarred wood, her elbows pressed together against her breasts, which were damn close to spilling out of the dress that she'd pulled down to exhibit them better. To be sure, they were a fine pair, and Gorren remembered how much she liked her nipples to be sucked, hard, but they weren't the breasts he wanted to be caressing. Still, his neglected cock responded enthusiastically to the mental imagery he'd recalled.
"It's the choice I've made."
"No, it's the choice that's been made for you."
"Don't you have somewhere else to be?" he asked with exasperation. The idea of spending a mindless hour forgetting his troubles in a willing body held some appeal, too much appeal. He needed Deffry gone before he did something he regretted.
"Not particularly, even if you are going to growl at me."
Gorren grunted. "I'm surprised you'd even want to be seen with me. I'm sure the whole town is muttering about my lack of restraint."
Deffry licked her lips, and leaned closer. The increasingly distracting view of her cleavage, as well as the reminder about what those moist, pink lips looked like wrapped around his cock, was beginning to fray Gorren's concentration.
"Not at all. In fact, I'd say they're muttering rather the opposite." Gorren grunted his disbelief, but that didn't seem to deter Deffry. "Mostly they're muttering about how the king had to be saved by his mate. There are mutterings about your restraint, that perhaps you showed too much. Understandable, I suppose, given that he's your father, but most seem to think that fight should have ended on the night of Dythegg. The town's in a sort of limbo."
Gorren refilled his mug from the jug he'd purchased. It was only his second drink; he hadn't been at the tavern long. Deffry might have been watching for his arrival; that wouldn't have been surprising. "No limbo as far as I'm concerned. Things are just as they were."
"You don't believe that." She placed a hand on his thigh, high, too high. He could tell from the way her lips curved into a satisfied smirk that she was aware of the effect her presence was having on him. She continued in a low, confidential, tone, as if every patron of the bar with their superior hearing capabilities wouldn't be able to hear them. "That wasn't the first time you've proved your pace on the run, and it wasn't the first time you've held your own against your father in a fight. In fact, this time, you did more than that, far more. Some are saying that Dorll should step down. If there's any shame to portion out, he's getting it all." Deffry inched her fingers a little further up his leg, too far. Gorren's cock nudged the hand that brushed over it, impatient to be free of his trews, and to take advantage of some affection. "I don't believe things are just as they were at all," she murmured.
Gorren took a deep breath. Regardless of his loneliness - and he was lonely, but he was lonely for Elthrinn - accepting Deffry's blatant offer would only make things much, much worse. He hadn't had enough to drink to be blind to that inevitability. He gripped her wrist, and moved her hand away. Their physical interaction was hidden by the table. "They are, as far as you're concerned."
Deffry smiled, and shifted her chair closer. She was determined not to be thwarted, and Gorren knew that he'd have to leave the tavern, because his self-restraint was not limitless. Then a heavy hand descended on his shoulder. Gorren's head snapped up at the touch. The opportunity to let off steam in
a fight against one of Deffry's peeved admirers might be beneficial, but he found himself looking into Jorm's scowling face.
"Lorch is looking for you."
Grateful for the reprieve, but not a little frustrated by an interruption for business, Gorren drained the rest of his mug in a long swallow, and set it back on the table with a thump.
"You'll have to find another amusement," he shot at Deffry as he stood.
"I believe I'll wait," she simpered, sitting up, but making sure that her breasts were displayed no less advantageously. They were close to bursting free altogether. "You'll be thirsty when your work is done."
"He won't be coming back," Jorm growled.
Gorren bristled at Jorm's terse tone, as much as at the controlling hand his friend laid on his neck to steer him away from the table. He felt like a pup being dragged out of a scrum. Jorm dropped his hand once they were outside of the tavern, but he didn't speak until they were away from listening ears. Gorren was intrigued that they were walking towards the hall, rather than the barracks.
"I've spent the afternoon trying to convince your wife of your worthiness, and then I find you in the tavern, getting shit-faced with that trash," Jorm groused.
"You sound like my father." Gorren hated that his tone came out so petulantly. It seemed to be his default setting under chastisement.
Jorm snorted. "How drunk are you?"
Gorren gave his friend the look that comment deserved. Jorm had seen him drunk, his friend knew well his capacity for ale. If Gorren had been drunk, he would not have been walking upright. "I'm not."
"Then stop acting like a drunken fool. If I'd been any later you'd have been upstairs, availing your cock of the same mindless diversion she offers to everyone." Jorm gave him a hard look. "If you hadn't decided to just bend her over the table in your impatience."
"Fuck you. I'd just told her to be on her way."
"Yes," Jorm nodded sagely. "She had the look of someone who'd just been rejected. All bursting tits and wet lips. You know, just how she gets when she's been knocked back."
"Fuck you. She's persistent is all."
"And you're wallowing in self-pity. No," Jorm sidestepped. Gorren had been on the verge of throwing a punch, and the motion of his shoulder had telegraphed his intent. "Fighting me won't help. You need to speak to Elthrinn."
"Then we're heading in the wrong direction."
"Because I wasn't lying. Lorch is looking for you."
"Then we're still heading in the wrong direction," Gorren said obstinately.
"He's at the hall."
Gorren pulled up short. "I don't want to go there."
"Fuck you." Jorm shot his words back at him. "Pull up your trews, and act like a man instead of a spoilt child. This is business."
"But my father will be there."
"Of course he will, he's the king, and you have to face him sometime. Unless you're planning to leave the country?" Jorm asked with a raised eyebrow, as if Gorren might have actually been contemplating such a plan.
"Don't be ridiculous, of course I'm not, but I don't see how I can be so close to him after..."
"It's unfinished business, and one day it'll have to be finished. But until then, you carry on as you acted before, but without the harlots and the ale, and you prove to people round here that when it does get finished, you'll be worthy successor."
"That's a cold way of putting it."
"You disagree?"
Gorren started walking again, and continued in silence for some steps. "No, but we're casually talking about ripping my family apart, literally."
"Which is why I've always been glad that I'm not royalty. Now, act like a prince, not like a spurned wolf, and set your face straight." They'd reached the hall. "We have visitors."
Gorren stopped again before Jorm could push the door open. "How come you were here? How is it that they sent you to find me?"
"I was lurking, trying to speak to the queen. Lorch asked me to find you, he thought I'd know where you were. It doesn't please me that you were exactly where your father said you would be."
"At least I'm not drunk."
"Or stinking of pussy. Small mercies, and all that," Jorm said as he pushed open the door to the hall. He led the way through the building to an ante room off the throne room, one often used for private discussions that weren't suitable to be held in the grandeur of the main room. That usually meant that the talking would last some time.
The king and queen were sat at the head of the table, occupying large chairs that were slightly less ornate versions of their carved thrones, but no less imposing. Noridan was sat at Dorll's right hand, and on seeing him for the first time in over a moon, Gorren had to fight the powerful urge to leap over the table, and pound his brother's face into the stone floor, until all that was left was pulp, and blood, and bone. Lorch and the other Generals were seated next to Noridan, and the look he turned on Gorren was at once unfriendly and understanding. Gorren thought he saw disappointment there, too, and that made him want to hang his head in shame. He should have acted as more than the degenerate his father thought he was.
Two men, foreigners, were standing at the foot of the table. From the heraldic insignia on their outfits, and from the spattering of dirt and mud on their legs, Gorren could tell that they had travelled a great distance, and in a hurry. If he wasn't mistaken, their sigils were Felthissian. Emissaries from the First Mother, then. His heart stuttered, and the ale in his stomach churned.
"You're here, so you may as well sit." The king gestured brusquely at the empty chairs.
Jorm backed out of the room as Gorren took a seat, leaving several empty seats between himself and anyone else. Gorren glanced at the visitors again. They had been made to stand, and offered no refreshment. The king was unhappy with whatever message they had borne.
"You requested my presence?" Gorren asked his father.
"No, but Lorch seemed to think it appropriate. He wouldn't continue these discussions without you." His father glared at General Lorch, and then at Gorren. Gorren thought he saw disappointment there, too, but he suspected that it might be because he hadn't needed to be rolled into the room. As Lorch was saddened that Gorren had been found in the tavern, Dorll was frustrated by the evidence of his self-restraint. "These travellers come with a message from the First Mother."
"And you need me to hear it?"
Lorch spoke in his deep voice. "It concerns your wife, and therefore you." The General shot a pointed look at the king. "If one prince should be involved in these talks, so should the other, especially when they directly concern him."
"Should Elthrinn not also be here, then?" Gorren asked the table in general.
His father growled, but it was Noridan who answered with a voice like oil. "It concerns the safety of Dorvek, and your wife has no say in that."
Gorren was beginning to think himself a fool for not seeking out his brother, and ending this trouble once and for all. But he knew what the effects of that fight would be, and he had shied away from them. To fight his brother, to kill him for the insult he had laid on Elthrinn, that he was still insinuating about her, would be to invite the wrath of the king. To provoke his father would be to begin to end the unfinished business that he had talked of with Jorm. Such a fight would result in his own death, or his father's.
Gorren turned to the emissaries. "What is this message?"
One of the messengers, the most senior, Gorren supposed, looked anxiously at Dorll, and then cleared his throat to speak. "The First Mother of Felthiss wishes to visit her niece."
Gorren looked around the table, essentially comprised of the people needed for a council of war. "That's all? Why does that warrant such a meeting as this? Why are the Generals here?"
The king scowled directly at the messengers, and there was derision in his tone. "It seems that the First Mother imprudently wishes to bring her husband with her."
Gorren looked around the table again. "You're treating this as an act of war." From his father's dee
pening scowl he knew he was right. "There's no need for such hackle-raising. General Jorrell is Elthrinn's brother, after all."
"He's an infamously, vicious and sadistic invader of lands." Noridan spat. Gorren knew his brother was being groomed for the throne, but his opinion was unnecessarily dramatic. It was so in the opinion of the Generals as well, judging by their looks of disgust.
The emissary coughed again. "The First Mother only requests the opportunity to introduce her niece to the newest member of her family, once the baby is born."
Gorren blinked. "Excuse me?"
The emissary looked confused for a moment. "My apologies, I did not explain, and news has obviously not reached you. The First Mother and General Jorrell are expecting a child. It is expected around the time of the sixth moon. When they visit, if permission is granted, they plan to travel with both of their children." The messenger turned his eyes on the arrayed Generals, but his look hardened, imprudently, Gorren thought, when he reached the king. "This is no raiding party, it is only a familial visit."
Searching the Darkness (Erythleh Chronicles Book 2) Page 25
