by Lisa Henry
Darkness made the city beautiful again and hid the worst of its scars. Darragh would have liked to take his meal and eat it outside, in the cool and the quiet, but this was a King’s Night, Hugh told him. When the man himself would strut across from his court and feast with his men at Trinity.
There was a strange sense of ceremony about it. A carpet had been rolled out, and a shining cloth laid over the table at the top of the dining hall. Candlelight flickered in the gloom, swallowed by the darkness of the arched ceilings. Solemn, church-like.
When Boru entered the hall, the men stood and cheered him. Darragh stood with them and added his voice to theirs. The sound echoed for a long time.
Boy was with the king, his gaze fixed on Boru’s back as he followed him to the main table. Boru sat, his top men with him. Seamus was one, but Darragh hadn’t met the others yet. And Boy knelt. Darragh could just make out the top of his golden head behind the table.
“Tonight your king dines with you!” Boru announced, and the men cheered again.
The food was the same bland fare as always, but Darragh shovelled it down quickly. He was hungry, and it filled him well enough even if it had hardly any taste, though he still spent the entire time wishing for a freshly roasted chicken and green beans with butter. If Boru was a king, in Cúil Aodha they were emperors. Darragh smiled at the thought.
The scrape of spoons against plates filled the room, along with the low hum of voices. After a while, Boru rose to his feet and the room fell silent.
“For service to his king, for catching a nest of rats who thought they could live under the king’s nose, tonight Red-Haired Sean is to be rewarded. Red-Haired Sean, come up here!”
A thin man from the table next to Darragh’s stood and, grinning, walked up to the main table.
Boru smiled at him. “Ask your boon, Sean.”
Darragh glanced at Michael, who was sitting beside him. Michael fiddled with his spoon, his gaze fixed on the king.
Sean beamed at Boru, then at the room. “Use of Boy would be a fine thing, Majesty.”
Boru’s smile widened. “As you like, Sean.” He spread his arms. “Am I not a generous king?”
The room cheered him.
Darragh’s stomach clenched as Boy rose to his feet. They wouldn’t, not here, surely? And then he remembered that Boy was shameless. Still, when Boy dropped his pants and leaned over the table, Darragh looked away. When he accidentally caught the eye of one of the serving men, the pitiful fellow ducked his head and hurried off.
A few men cheered, a few clapped, and then most turned their attention back to their food.
“You do well, you get rewarded,” Michael said, nodding towards the top table. Darragh couldn’t understand why anyone would choose a fuck over a better meal, or new boots, or … medicine. His stomach clenched. Michael, not noticing his unease, continued on. “You can try and sneak a woman behind the king’s back, but Boy goes along well. Doesn’t scream or fight like some. He loves it.”
“I see that.” Darragh didn’t want to look, but couldn’t stop himself. Boy was pressed facedown on the table, Sean behind him. Darragh couldn’t see the expression on Boy’s face, but Sean was grinning like a loon. As Darragh watched, Boru reached out and patted Boy’s head while he was being fucked.
Darragh tore his gaze away. No way would he fuck a man in public. A thing like that should be secret, for just the two of them. Not shameful, but special. That’s how he’d always imagined it. That’s how Maeve and Conor were. Darragh had seen the glances that passed between them, whole conversations in the meeting of their eyes. Smiles in the silence. Something shared. Darragh envied them that.
He looked up again when Sean swaggered back to his seat. Boru pushed Boy gently back onto his knees. The king leaned close to him, murmured something. Boy nodded, rose to his feet, and left out a side door. To get clean, probably.
Darragh made a face. The less he understood this place, the better. He didn’t want to ever understand it. He wanted to look back on his time here when he was old and wrinkled and wonder what the fuck had happened.
Michael finished eating and slid his plate away. “Free time now, culchie. See you in the morning.”
Darragh watched him leave, feeling strangely torn. He didn’t like Michael, although he seemed the kindest of any of the king’s men he’d met, but he didn’t want friendliness borne of obligation—free time and Michael’d dropped Darragh like a hot potato.
Darragh left the dining hall, hoping he remembered the way to his room. He headed outside into the square, tagging along with a group of men he didn’t know, but didn’t follow them as they branched off and disappeared between two shadowy buildings. This place was like a rabbit warren. Following the path he was currently on led him to a huge stone building, several of its many windows broken and boarded shut. It definitely wasn’t the way to the barracks where the men—and Darragh—made their bunks, but as he continued walking to the building’s central door, he realised he wasn’t too keen on spending his free time with the men anyway. Maybe this dark, deserted building could give him some time away from them all. Although God knew the quiet would just give him more time to think up examples of his newfound hypocrisy and why he ought to hate himself. Ah well, better to spend the time contemplating his misdeeds than committing more of them, as he was sure to do if he spent any more time than strictly necessary with the king’s men.
The building’s main door opened up onto the wreckage of what appeared to have once been a gift shop, if the rotted rack of postcards and selection of old guidebooks were any indication. A hideous, miserable place, a monument to an Ireland that was once part of a greater world and not just in shadowy trade with it. The sight of it depressed him, and he could still hear the voices of men outside, their callous tones making his skin crawl.
He fled deeper into the building, up a flight of stairs into a long, cavernous room, dim and musty. A library. A massive, two-storey library with thousands of old, leather-bound books that nearly reached the high arched ceiling. Dark except for a flickering light from somewhere deep inside.
Darragh walked towards the light, curious. He rounded a fallen shelf, and stopped.
Boy was sitting on the floor, his legs crossed, with a book open on his lap. The glow of the small lamp made his skin appear golden, and made his golden ornaments appear like flames. As Darragh watched, Boy lifted his hand from the book and raised it to his face. Scrubbed it furiously against one eye and then the other.
Boy was crying.
“Hey,” Darragh said before he could stop himself. He shouldn’t be going near Boy, and he shouldn’t be getting involved, but Dublin hadn’t hardened him yet. You saw someone crying, you stopped. You offered comfort.
Boy jolted, sprawling backwards. The book fell to the floor.
“I scared you,” Darragh said. “Sorry.”
He felt big and clumsy and dumb.
“I’m not scared,” Boy said, tilting his chin up defiantly.
“You have tears.” Darragh risked stepping closer. He crouched down.
Boy wiped at his face again, flushing red, but he didn’t look away. “It’s none of your concern.”
“You’re hurt maybe,” Darragh said. “From what happened.”
“No. I’m not hurt.”
“Why do you cry if you’re not hurt?”
Boy scowled at him and reached for the book. “Because of this! Because it’s falling apart. Every page I turn crumbles, and then it’s gone forever, but if I don’t read it, it’s gone forever anyway, without anyone ever … reading it. Knowing it.”
Crying for books. Darragh felt a stab of sympathy for the strange boy, and for the books themselves. Entire shelves of them, slowly rotting away. Another bridge to the past falling into the abyss. “These are old books, older than we have at home.”
Boy’s scowl faded. His grey eyes widened. “You have books?”
“The library,” Darragh said. “We learn from them. A lot we don’t understand. To
o much English, maybe.”
“You’re from the Gaeltacht.”
That was a word Darragh hadn’t heard in a long time. “That is what they called it once.”
“There are books here in Gaeilge.” Boy’s face grew animated for a moment, then fell again. “No matter. They’re rotting too.”
“You read them? The books here?”
“Some of them.” Boy looked away. “Someone should. Although knowledge …” He smiled strangely. “It was knowledge that brought us to this, wasn’t it? They say it was something that escaped a lab. Maybe, or maybe … The Black Death killed a hundred million, but it was limited by how far and fast ships could travel. But we had planes, didn’t we? The sky was literally the limit. Either way, it was knowledge that destroyed the world, but I still can’t stop from reading these books.”
Darragh watched him for a moment, unease gnawing at his gut. How could the king’s naked little slut be a … a scholar? “What are you called?”
“I’m called Boy.” Boy’s frown returned.
“What are you called in your home?” Darragh pressed.
Boy opened his mouth and then clamped it shut again. He shook his head.
Darragh didn’t understand that response at all. But then, he understood almost nothing when it came to Boy. “You are from here?” he asked.
Boy showed him an odd smile, hugging his knees to his chest. “Thought I was.”
Darragh wrinkled his nose. “You made a mistake?”
“I made a big fucking mistake,” Boy said. “Thought I belonged here. Thought I could help. Thought I knew better than my da.”
“Your da?”
Now Boy was shaking his head. “Forget I mentioned it. Him. Why are you here?”
“Am I not allowed to be?”
A shrug. “You can go wherever you please, according to the king’s whim. But as a rule, the men don’t usually come here. Because it’s stuffy and it stinks, but mostly because I think it forces them to confront how stupid they are.” There was a jagged edge to Boy’s smile, a sort of fierceness Darragh had never seen in him, but it was gone again soon enough. “If they had it their way they’d probably burn it down, like they’ve destroyed so much else of the old world.”
“They don’t have their way?”
“They don’t. This place is mine. The king decreed it.”
“A gift,” Darragh murmured. Maybe there was fondness between Boy and the king, intertwined with the cruelty and pain and sex. Maybe that was why Boy was so loyal to him. Of course, Darragh’s meagre upbringing had taught him that true affection didn’t need lavish gifts, which once again cast doubt on everything he thought he knew about Boy and his king.
“From the ard-rí to his hostage,” Boy said with a nod.
Ard-rí, now that was an Irish word. High King. Strange to hear his own language here, and spoken by Boy, no less. Hostage, though, that was English, and Darragh didn’t understand quite what it meant or how it fit.
Boy must have seen the confusion on his face, and matched it with a strange smirk that seemed almost proud. “It’s complicated, culchie.”
It was more than the word that Darragh didn’t understand. Boy was a twisted knot of contradictions that Darragh didn’t even want to unravel. To understand him would be to understand this place. And to understand this place would be to be corrupted by it.
As suddenly as the smirk had appeared on Boy’s face, it vanished. Boy traced a rubric letter with his index finger. He looked up at Darragh furtively. “My name is Ciaran,” he whispered. “Forget you heard it.”
“I don’t understand you,” Darragh said, rising to his feet again.
Ciaran pressed his lips together, flattening what might have been a brief, rueful smile. He looked down at his book again. “Good for you.”
Darragh stepped back. Boy—Ciaran—lifted his head and watched him.
“I will go,” Darragh said.
Ciaran nodded sharply.
Darragh hadn’t even passed the fallen shelf before he heard footsteps and voices and saw the light of lanterns.
“Ah, here it is!” someone exclaimed.
Darragh stepped back to let the men pass.
“You found him, culchie,” another man said, slapping Darragh on the back. “Good lad.”
Boru swept around the shelf behind his men. “The culchie found Boy? What was your name again, culchie?”
“Darragh,” he said. “But I didn’t …” Didn’t find him? Well, he had. He hadn’t been looking for him, though. Darragh looked from Boru to Ciaran. Ciaran had risen onto his knees, his head bowed. The book lay in front of him, like an offering.
Boru smiled at him. “Well, it seems you’ve earned a boon already, Darragh. That’s a happy coincidence, isn’t it, Boy? We’ll soon have the answer to our little question, won’t we?”
“Yes, Majesty,” Ciaran said to the floor.
“You lot, get out,” Boru said to the men who had accompanied him. They filed out. “Not you, culchie. You get a boon.”
A boon. Darragh’s stomach clenched at the thought of what he’d witnessed in the dining hall. “I don’t want it.”
He heard Ciaran’s sharp intake of breath.
Boru’s smile vanished. “When your king offers you a boon, you take it.” His eyes gleamed. “Ask to fuck my Boy.”
Darragh’s mouth was dry. “I …”
I don’t want to. He doesn’t want me to.
But he didn’t want to die here. He needed to get the medicine and get home.
Boru watched him closely.
“Can I fuck your Boy?” he asked, and forced out a final word, “Majesty.”
Boru smiled. “Am I not a generous king?”
“Generous,” Darragh said woodenly.
“That’s right,” the king murmured back, and then he snapped his fingers and Ciaran’s body stiffened a moment before shifting to liquid acquiescence. He pushed the open book aside and crawled to Darragh’s feet, arse raised like a cat in heat and swaying as he moved. When he was close, he rose up again, pressing his hands and face to Darragh’s trembling thighs. “No need to rush things,” the king directed, and there was an odd vibration in his voice, a tenderness and a hunger and an awed hush all at once.
But I don’t want …
Ciaran raised his face and caught Darragh’s gaze. Something passed between them that was almost like understanding, and suddenly Darragh thought he knew what the word hostage meant. It meant unwilling. It meant forced. And it meant desperation. They were both hostages here, to the whims of the king.
Do it, Ciaran’s look said. We both know you must do it.
This was never what Darragh had wanted. There were no other men in his village like him, but Darragh had imagined what it might be like, to satisfy the quiet hunger sleeping at the core of him.
He’d pictured himself with another man, but not like this, not with his partner on his knees. Not with someone else watching. Not like trained animals putting on a show. He reached out a hand and touched Ciaran’s golden hair. Saw a shudder of relief run down Ciaran’s spine as Ciaran bent towards him. Then Ciaran’s hands were at the buttons of his fly, then through them, and Darragh’s body jerked as Ciaran touched his cock.
What if he couldn’t harden? Convince himself to perform?
No, Ciaran was beautiful, and he was—well, not eager, but willing. Darragh could do this, to protect him, to protect—no, not Ciaran, he wasn’t the priority here—but his people, his home, his village.
Ciaran was beautiful. What would it feel like to kiss him?
Ciaran dropped his gaze, curling his fingers around Darragh’s hardening cock. With his other hand he tugged Darragh’s trousers down, and Darragh felt a moment of panic as he was exposed to Ciaran’s gaze. No, not just Ciaran’s, but Boru’s as well. Still standing there, so close that Darragh was sure he could hear the king panting. He didn’t dare turn his head. He didn’t want to see the man looking back at him.
He wanted to pretend th
at what was going between him and Ciaran now was as precious and sacred as he’d always imagined it would be.
At least he knew Ciaran’s name. Names had a power, a sort of dignity even in this place. He no longer had to think of Ciaran as the king’s slutty Boy. He was a man now, both of them men, connected by their secret knowledge. If only Darragh could have given Ciaran something in return. Something more than his silent complicity.
Darragh fought the urge to close his eyes as Ciaran stroked his cock with both small hands, fists working him in opposite directions. Darragh had done this to himself more times than he could count, but it had never felt like this. This was so much bigger than he had imagined, somehow. Another man doing this. So much more than a furtive release, quiet under the covers, to the sounds of other sleeping breaths. If it were just them, if the king hadn’t been standing there, Darragh would have touched Ciaran as well. Would have felt the other man’s cock, measured its heat and heaviness in his palm, seen what touching it would do to Ciaran’s lean body. Make him tremble, maybe. Make him arch and moan. But this was his boon, not Ciaran’s.
And he wasn’t supposed to be enjoying it, either. Because he didn’t want it.
Didn’t—oh. Now this was something he’d never felt or experienced. Soft lips caressing the crown of his cock, plush against the cushion of his foreskin. And then those small, skilful hands slid his foreskin back, exposing the head, and a wet, curious tongue teased the sensitive skin it had uncovered.
He grunted.
A quiet, low laugh. “There now. Isn’t my Boy clever?”
Darragh’s stomach clenched. “He is so.”
“More than a mouthful, Boy?” Boru asked, turning his cruel eyes on Ciaran. “This one’s big all over, isn’t he? Show him what you can do.”
Ciaran shuffled on his knees for a moment, made a small, soft noise of acquiescence, and opened his mouth wide. He bobbed his head down on Darragh’s cock, taking him into his mouth.
Fuck. Darragh couldn’t stop from shutting his eyes as the hot, wet sensation enclosed his cock and Ciaran began to suck. He took Darragh in deeper and deeper, impossibly so, until Darragh felt sure he must be choking. Darragh opened his eyes again and stared down at him. Ciaran’s face was red, his lips straining around Darragh’s girth. Tears streaked down his face. Darragh pulled back quickly, strings of saliva clinging to his cock. Ciaran’s shoulders heaved as he drew in deep breaths in rapid succession.
