King of Dublin

by Lisa Henry

  “Oh, Ciaran! Fuck!” Darragh groaned. “Don’t stop!”

  He wouldn’t. Couldn’t. This was perfect.

  “Say it again,” he said, thrusting harder. “My name. Say it.”

  A brief look of sadness came across Darragh’s face, but then he nodded once and moaned out, “Ciaran.” And again, “Ciaran. Ciaran.”

  Ciaran thrust against him, tossed his head back, felt drunk on his own humanity.

  Darragh came, his body shuddering, gasping the name out like a desperate prayer.

  And when Ciaran lowered his head to look, he caught sight of something out the window of the van, a shadow that quickly came into focus as a person.

  Rabbit, looking through grimy glass and watching them together.

  Darragh mustn’t have noticed, lying as he was, eyes closed and body bucking under Ciaran’s weight.

  Ciaran felt suddenly sick, suddenly cold, but too close to the edge to prevent himself from coming. Too late to stop himself. He came staring at Rabbit’s face instead of Darragh’s, horror tearing up his spine instead of pleasure.

  A pretty sight for a sick voyeur. A prisoner. A spectacle. A plaything.

  A whore.

  “Ciaran,” Darragh murmured.

  Ciaran shuddered with disgust. He wanted to reach down and pull the blankets up over his head, but Rabbit had already seen. Looked Ciaran right in the eye before he vanished from sight again. Ciaran slid down into the warm nest of blankets, into the space that opened up for him in Darragh’s arms. Darragh stroked his hair, his cheek, his throat. Those large, warm hands on his throat.

  “Darragh,” Ciaran whispered, shivering.

  “What?”

  Rabbit had stolen his perfect moment. Sullied it and made it something sick. Reminded Ciaran of what he was and what he always would be. He had reminded Ciaran that there could be no stolen pockets of time, no secret sanctuaries. Boru was still coming for him. Nothing changed that. And he knew what waited for him when Boru arrived. The inevitability of how this would end. Unless …

  “Will you do something for me?”

  “Anything,” Darragh replied without hesitation.

  “Set me free.”

  “I tried. I did.” Darragh’s voice was strained, full of shame and regret, and it broke Ciaran’s heart, to know he had brought this man so much disappointment.

  “You still can,” Ciaran whispered.

  He heard Boru’s teasing voice again: “Do you know how long it takes to kill a man? As long as I fucking like.”

  Why was he afraid of that, when the answer was right here in front of him?

  “How can I?” Darragh asked, confusion in his tone.

  Ciaran reached for Darragh’s hands and brought them back to his throat. Two rough, callused workman’s palms flattened against his trachea. Big fingers curled back towards his spine. “Kill me, Darragh,” he said, in case Darragh—the sweet simple fool—still didn’t understand. His voice cracked, but he wasn’t afraid. He was going to die anyway once Boru found him. At least this way he wouldn’t have to be humiliated. Wouldn’t have to hurt. He stared into Darragh’s eyes. “Don’t let me go back to the king. Please. I can’t stand the thought. It’ll be a mercy. Once I’m gone, the bandits will let you go. Home to Cúil Aodha and your people. I’m sure they will. Please, Darragh.”

  Darragh’s face was placid, unreadable, that complicated guarded expression that Ciaran had once mistook for stupidity. His big hands tightened their grip. Ciaran let out his breath softly and slowly, like a sigh.

  It would all be over soon. Darragh was a strong man. He’d killed animals for food. He’d know to wait until Ciaran wasn’t just passed out but truly gone. He wouldn’t flinch from the brutality of the act. He’d finish it, sure and true. All Ciaran had to do was be steady for him, die with a little dignity. Tiny, urgent sparks of pain flared in his chest. It quickly turned to a burn. His vision blurred and swam.

  Thankyou. Thankyou, Darragh.

  And then, just as Ciaran was wavering on the grey edge of unconsciousness, Darragh relaxed his grip and kissed him. Kissed him, not killed him, as though Ciaran could find any solace in that strange tenderness.

  “I won’t hurt you, Ciaran,” Darragh whispered against his lips. “Not even if you want it. Not even if you think it’s the only way out. Even if it is. I swore I would never hurt you, Ciaran.”

  Tears slipped down Ciaran’s cheeks, hot and humiliating. He didn’t understand this feeling, gulping down air, simultaneously furious and so incandescently happy and grateful to be alive. When he was finally able to speak, though, the fury won out. “But y-you’d let me come to harm?”

  Darragh stroked his hair. “You said we were done, finished. You said we were dead men, but we’re not. Not yet. He hasn’t beaten us yet, Ciaran. And if we’re not beaten, we get up and we keep fighting.”

  Ciaran wanted to hold on to his anger, even in the face of Darragh’s naive hope. “We are. We’re beaten.”

  “No.” Darragh pressed his hand over Ciaran’s heart. “Nobody can take this, remember?”

  Nobody can take this.

  Ciaran had said that, hadn’t he? It felt like another man. But it was true, he’d said it, and more than that, he’d believed it.

  Nobody can take this. Not Boru and not Rabbit. Not even Ciaran himself, wasn’t that right?

  “I think I’m too tired to keep fighting,” he murmured.

  “I know you are,” Darragh said. “But I can fight for the both of us.”

  There would come a time, Ciaran knew, when he’d hate Darragh for saying that, but right now, Darragh’s quiet conviction made it almost possible for Ciaran to believe in hope.

  Right when hope decided to show its grubby face.

  The back door of the van cracked open and Rabbit stuck his head in, blushing to the roots of his messy hair. “Quickly,” he said. “Come on, quickly. I’m setting you feckers free, but yous gotta come right now.”

  “Quickly,” the wild-haired lad—Rabbit, they’d called him—urged. “And shush now!”

  Darragh, dragging his pack, crawled out of the van with Ciaran behind him. The camp was quiet. The fires had burned down overnight.

  “I don’t trust him,” Ciaran whispered, and Darragh nodded shortly.

  No, he didn’t trust Rabbit, either, but whatever he was offering had to be better than waiting in a van for Boru.

  They picked their way out of the haphazard camp, silently following Rabbit up into the trees. Darragh looped an arm around Ciaran’s shoulders, keeping him close. This Rabbit fella may have been offering them freedom, but that didn’t mean Darragh was going to trust him as far as he could throw him. If Rabbit wanted to lay his grubby hands on Ciaran again, he’d have to get through Darragh first. Darragh still felt the slow burn of anger in him that had first struck when he’d seen Rabbit manhandling Ciaran in the boot of the car. Keeping him tied up like he was no better than an animal. Gagged as well, when there wasn’t a living creature in the world that deserved such treatment.

  Especially not Ciaran.

  Ciaran deserved nothing but the kindest and the best.

  Give your head a shake, you spanner.

  He’d gone from furious to lovesick in the space of a day, and all because he’d seen Ciaran in peril. He wasn’t sure if that made his feelings more genuine or less so. He was more conscious than ever of his own inexperience. Was Ciaran special, or was it just because, as he’d admitted the night before, that there were no other boys like Darragh in his village? Would they even have been friends if they’d met on an equal footing? Maybe all they really had in common was biology. Or was it just Darragh’s protectiveness of the man, guilt, and a desperate grasp at heroism spun together into something resembling affection?

  It didn’t matter, of course. Ciaran had suffered enough that he deserved to be returned safely to his people. Who cared if Darragh was doing it because it was the right thing to do, or just because he fancied himself in love with Ciaran?

&nbs
p; They walked in silence for a long time, twigs and leaves crunching underfoot. It was gloomy and cold underneath the canopy of trees, and Darragh had lost all sense of direction. Rabbit, though, whose only contribution so far had been to turn around and shush them every few minutes, seemed to know where he was going.

  “All right,” he said when they’d reached some indiscernible point in the trees that apparently marked a safe distance from the camp. “That’s a good head start, so.”

  He grinned at them.

  Darragh punched him.

  He wasn’t even aware he’d made a fist until it had already landed on Rabbit’s jaw and dropped him.

  “Darragh!” Ciaran hissed. “What was that for?”

  Rabbit rubbed his jaw. “Fuck! I jus’ helped you escape, you dumb shite!”

  “That’s for tying Ciaran up and gagging him,” Darragh told him steadily.

  “All right, so,” Rabbit said. He climbed to his feet. “We square now?”

  “I suppose.” Darragh dusted his hands, trying to ignore the painful ache in his knuckles.

  “I’m not,” Ciaran said. He glared at Rabbit. “Why are you helping us? You think you’ll get to use the king’s Boy too, you little pervert?”

  Rabbit danced back quickly, showing his palms. “Weren’t like that! I was just looking to see if you were awake!”

  “What’d you see?” Darragh growled. He looked to Ciaran, fighting the urge to shield him with his body, as if he could cover prior nakedness. “What did he see?”

  “Enough,” Ciaran said shortly, wrapping his arms around himself in a gesture that mimicked Darragh’s own protective instinct.

  “Weren’t like that,” Rabbit said again, a note of pleading in his voice. “Weren’t … nasty. I jus’ looked, and I saw, and then I couldn’t stop looking. I never saw anyone do that before, is all. Not, you know, two fellas.”

  That pleading note had transformed into something that sounded almost full of awe, and Darragh felt a surprising tug of sympathy for Rabbit.

  “So there were no other boys like you in your village?”

  “You don’t get to touch Ciaran,” he said roughly. “You don’t even get to look at him, you understand?”

  Rabbit bobbed his head quickly. “Yeah. I didn’t see nothing much anyhow, so. Jus’ enough that … well, this whole time since the word came everyone’s been wondering why a king’s man would steal his treasure. But you’re not stealing nothing, are you? Little birdie wants to go free.”

  “That’s right,” Ciaran said, but he was looking at Darragh as he did. “I want to be free. To choose my own fate.”

  Darragh held his gaze. But I want you to be safe.

  I want to be the one who keeps you safe.

  But they couldn’t have this argument, not here, not with Rabbit watching. They needed to present a united front. “That’s right,” Darragh said. “He wants to be free. Free to choose his own fate, and to choose who touches him or looks at him. Whatever you heard about the king’s ‘treasure,’ Ciaran isn’t it. He’s his own man, and he won’t be touching anyone unless it’s his fancy, ever again.”

  Didn’t change how Darragh felt, that jealous possessiveness heating up his insides, but no matter what he wanted, he’d give Ciaran that choice, that dignity.

  And hope that Ciaran chose him.

  And after he went north? What then? Would Darragh follow him? Go home to Cúil Aodha where there were no boys like him, back to a life of celibacy? It had been fine before, but after having tasted the pleasures another man could give him?

  Stop thinking with your cock. Ciaran had to go home. That was that.

  No matter how much it hurt Darragh. No matter if it robbed Ciaran of his precious hard-won freedom. No matter how much the small smile Ciaran gave him now made Darragh want to never let him go.

  “I hear you,” Rabbit said. “No looking at the little birdie, and no touching.” He scratched his cheek. “Come on, then. They’ll be waking up soon, so.”

  They tramped on through the trees.

  Ciaran’s hand found Darragh’s, their cold fingers linking together, and Darragh pretended it wasn’t just that Ciaran was afraid of stumbling. And maybe it wasn’t. Maybe Ciaran took as much comfort from holding hands as Darragh did.

  “He’s not a bad man,” Rabbit said as they followed him. “Garvan, you know. But you’re strangers and all. Stupid to help strangers before your own.”

  “So why are you helping?” Ciaran asked him, lifting his free hand to bend a thin branch out of his way.

  “Because it’s just as easy to say you ran as say you got caught,” Rabbit said. “King might be a mad fucker, but you got past him, right? Makes sense you could get past us as well.” He snorted. “Garvan’s gun’s not even got any bullets, you know!”

  “Will he punish you?” Ciaran asked.

  Rabbit shrugged his thin shoulders. “Dunno. Never done somethin’ so dumb before.”

  Ciaran nodded slowly. “What about Boru? Will he punish your people?”

  Rabbit snorted again. “What’s he gonna do? Make our lives more shite than now? We got nothing to take.”

  Darragh exchanged a glance with Ciaran. He thought of the warehouses full of slaves back in Dublin. He thought of the gunfire at Milbourne Avenue cutting down the people who opposed Boru’s regime, and of the Sacrificial Games. Garvan was right to tread carefully with Boru, and Rabbit … Rabbit obviously had no idea the things that Boru could do. Had no idea that yes, yes, he and his people most certainly did have something for Boru to take.

  Garvan must have known, but Rabbit didn’t. And yet, Darragh’s fear for Rabbit didn’t extend so far as asking him to bring himself and Ciaran back to the bandits’ camp to await Boru’s wrath. He was sorry to have brought danger into the lives of the bandits, but he wouldn’t trade Ciaran’s safety for theirs.

  After all, they could have claimed ignorance and let Ciaran go. They could have. But instead, they’d gagged him and tied him and left him terrified in the boot of a car.

  Darragh couldn’t let himself forget that.

  For all that Rabbit had told Darragh he wouldn’t look at Ciaran, Ciaran felt his gaze. The scrutiny made him uncomfortable. A whore on display, just like he’d been in Dublin. Ciaran found himself keeping Darragh between them as they walked. He didn’t let go of Darragh’s hand, and luckily Darragh didn’t let go of him, either. And didn’t comment or draw attention to the fact that Ciaran needed that comfort in the first place.

  Knowing how close he’d been to returning to Boru’s golden chains terrified him, filling him with an anxious insecurity, a sense that his freedom and dreams of revenge were just that—dreams. And soon, no matter what Darragh said, he’d have to wake up from them. And then?

  He couldn’t go back to that. Not ever. Even now, Ciaran didn’t know how he’d survived it. It seemed like something only a particularly strong or resilient person could weather, and Ciaran didn’t feel like either of those things. He felt fragile and fearful, and didn’t know if he’d ever be able to recapture the careless bravery he’d come to Dublin with, or even the brief confidence being given clothes and his freedom by the Milbourne Avenue rats had restored to him, that Garvan and his bandits had stripped away again. There was probably nothing that couldn’t be taken from him. If he’d learned anything at all since coming south, that was it. It had destroyed things inside him that he hadn’t even known were vulnerable.

  This thing with Darragh … he had a feeling the ruined Republic could take that from him, too. Whatever it was.

  But at least for now he had someone to hold his hand, someone to shield his body with their own, someone to say aloud the things he so needed to hear, even if he couldn’t believe them anymore.

  “Where are we going, Rabbit?” Darragh asked, squinting into the early-morning sunlight.

  “North,” Rabbit said. “Got a good place we can hide out on the way. Old place, kind of creepy. Nobody can as say why, but everybody avoids it. No one goes near it
but me, I don’t think. Can’t light a fire since you can see for miles, but, so, you can see for miles!”

  North.

  Ciaran tightened his grip on Darragh’s hand, wondering if it would communicate all the things he desperately wanted to tell him: No, not north, please. I don’t belong there anymore. I don’t want to go there. I don’t want my da to put me in front of cameras so I can play the poor victim. I don’t want them to use me to show how barbaric it is back here, to keep propping up the Dáil on the North’s charity and keep the borders closed. I just wanted to help.

  But Jesus, he was scared.

  “Road up ahead,” Rabbit said. “We’ll follow it a bit.”

  “Shouldn’t we keep off the roads?” Darragh asked.

  Rabbit shrugged and wrinkled his nose. “What for? This is the bandits’ land, big ’un, and you’re with a bandit!”

  The road was two lanes, smaller than the M1 he and Darragh had been following when they’d fled Dublin, and empty except for the occasional rusting wreck of a car. Hedges had spilled over the walls onto the road, turning it into a green corridor. Ciaran felt better once they were on it. It was easier walking on the cracked surface of the road than through the snagging undergrowth in the woods or through boggy farmland. With the sun up, things felt a little less foreboding, and as they wandered farther into the countryside, the decay of the world felt a little less pronounced. Overgrown fields and sheep wandering wild were so much less depressing than collapsed buildings and barricades constructed from burnt-out cars. It felt like the world going back to nature instead of falling to chaos and anarchy … although he supposed nature was its own form of chaos. A kinder chaos.

  The chaos that had shaped Darragh.

  It had to have been hard, growing up without parents, without any adults at all, relearning skills long forgotten just to survive. But that life had made Darragh strong and resourceful and brave, if a little naive. Would Ciaran have traded his father—all the other adults and role models, all the education and running water and even the handful of romantic and sexual partners he’d had growing up—for that? Because surely there was no guarantee that deprivation and isolation would have made Ciaran strong. Under that sort of pressure, he might have perished instead. Darragh was strong. Skilled. Ciaran was weak. His only value was his body.