Timshel

by Lillian Turner

  There was nothing for him here. He understood that as sharp and clean as a heated knife cutting into his heart, letting out all the poison inside.

  Perhaps if he’d never met Charon and seen the things he had, he could have lived out his life in Summerton with some kind of happiness—but it would have been a blind, dumb existence, like a cow that never tested the fence of its pen.

  Eiland loved Summerton, loved the sweet memories of golden fields and boughs hung heavy with fruit, but he knew instinctively that he had passed out of that place already, that even if he went back now he would never again know that kind of beautiful, awful ignorance. Even if he’d lost Charon on the ferry, he couldn’t have gone back to that life.

  But he hadn’t lost him. Charon was here, sitting alone at a table with a cup of spiced wine held in both hands.

  Eiland crossed the dance floor and that gave him a different kind of thrill—to know that he could go to Charon, that he could even kiss him in front of all these people, and no one would stop him. It would still be anathema but no one would dare protest while Charon could defend himself.

  He reached Charon’s side and said, “Dance with me.”

  The lanterns reflected in Charon’s eyes as he stared up at Eiland. He looked surprised, as if he really had intended to sit here all night and watch Eiland dance with other people.

  “I don’t remember how,” he admitted.

  Eiland took away the untouched cup of wine and caught both of Charon’s hands. “I’ll show you, I can dance the girl’s part. Come on.”

  He couldn’t really, though. Charon’s knees still trembled and he stood with his hands gripping Eiland’s forearms. The stance made it near impossible for Eiland to take the girl’s movements, but he set his jaw and tried anyway.

  At first they faltered. Charon put all of his weight into every step instead of staying on his toes; he gripped Eiland like a child on his first horse ride. Behind Eiland the other dancers had formed two circles, one within the other and interchanging, but Eiland ignored them. He watched Charon watch their feet, repeating the same simple three-step pattern until Charon’s hesitations lessened.

  When Charon lifted his head, Eiland smiled at him. He had to tilt his head back to do it and oh, oh, he was touching another boy, openly, without fear. He wanted to sing.

  Charon stared at his smile. His fingers slipped a little on Eiland’s arms, sweaty, and he stumbled. Their feet stilled but they don’t move apart.

  “Are you tired?” Eiland asked.

  “Yes, but,” Charon shook his head, “I don’t want to sit down.”

  Eiland hesitated then stepped even closer, slipping one arm around Charon’s waist. “Here, lean on me.”

  They resumed dancing, slower than before and out of time with the music. Their positioning felt awkward at first: Eiland was leading from the girl’s steps, while Charon’s hand rested, fingers uncertainly curled, on the back of Eiland’s neck.

  Yet when Eiland broke from the three-step and moved them into a star-shaped pattern, Charon followed him smoothly.

  Eiland smiled into Charon’s collarbone. “You do know how to dance.”

  Charon laughed softly against Eiland’s temple. His fingers brushed the back of Eiland’s neck, making Eiland shiver; he wondered if Charon could feel it. They were close enough.

  They danced. Distantly Eiland noticed several people glancing in their direction, but no one told them to stop. No one would. He could kiss Charon right here on the dance floor, and no one would do anything.

  The thought made him flush hot, his heart drumming. Tilting his face up, he rested the side of his face against Charon’s. It was impossible for Charon to see their feet now, but he still followed Eiland’s lead. Their bodies moved in sync.

  The song ended, and they stilled. Charon stepped back first. Eiland caught his hand and held it all the way back to their seat on the edge of the crowd. Charon shot him a quick look but said nothing.

  They sat together, still hand in hand, watching the dancers. It reminded Eiland of that night under the ridge, when Charon had asked him for this, just their hands intertwined. Such a simple thing. He rubbed his thumb over the fragile place where Charon’s last two fingers ended in scars and smiled to himself.

  They left long before the end of the dance, before any of the young village men got rash enough with drink to try anything.

  Voices called out to one another in the waning hours of the festival: teasing laughter, mothers admonishing their sons not to stay out too late, cries of drunken excitement that indicated they would anyway.

  Eiland closed his eyes and squeezed Charon’s hands. They held on to one another as they passed into the dark.

  Beyond the light of lanterns they slipped through the grass like pale ghosts.

  When they reached where they had hidden their packs underneath a grove of cherry trees, Eiland stopped and thought clearly, This is where I jump.

  Turning, he pulled Charon closer. Charon resisted. “Eiland.”

  “Shhh, shush. How about we sit down?”

  “Eiland,” Charon whispered brokenly. He turned his face to the side when Eiland tried to kiss him. “Please—please don’t do this unless you mean it.”

  “I mean it.” Eiland kissed Charon’s cheek, his jaw, the uneven, scarred skin of his throat. “I swear I do.”

  “But are you still—” Charon broke off. For a long moment he stood frozen, his breath surging in and out. Then his hands flew up to grab Eiland’s sides, pulling him closer. “You know what, I don’t care, I don’t care…Eiland…”

  “I mean it,” Eiland tried to say, but the words got swallowed up by Charon’s mouth.

  This time Charon tasted of spiced foods and cool air. Eiland slid his hands up his arms then down over his chest, stopping at the hem of his shirt.

  “I haven’t done this,” Charon whispered as Eiland lifted his shirt up to his shoulders, rising even higher as Charon put his arms up in the air.

  “I haven’t either,” Eiland whispered back. In the dark Charon’s bare shoulders were a faint line; they felt cool under his palms and he ran his fingertips over the curve of collarbones. His breath caught in his throat. “It’s all right, it’ll all be okay.”

  Either Charon believed him or he was simply too far gone to care. In the dark it all looked the same—but oh, the way it felt. The way it felt.

  * * *

  In the morn Charon roused first and hurried to slip his shirt back over his shoulders. Eiland caught him at it, though, tugging the cloth away. Charon covered his face with his hands, only lifting them when Eiland straddled his hips.

  In the predawn light Charon was all gray lines turning gold as the sun slanted across the meadow, filling up the hollow of his throat. It caught on the short hairs of his arms and set the ends of his eyelashes afire across his cheeks, forgiving scars and hurts with its soft glow.

  Eiland kissed the skin between his eyes, the edges of his cheekbones, his chin, chasing the sunlight with his lips and fingertips. He could do that; he was allowed, here between the deep blues and bright yellows of dawn.

  “Don’t be shy,” he whispered when Charon plucked at his shirt again, not pulling it on but only just. “I’ve seen it all before.”

  “Not like this,” Charon mumbled. The narrow slits of his eyes peered up at Eiland, bright clear blue peeking between his lashes. Eiland grinned and let him look.

  “Not like this,” he agreed.

  Epilogue

  Summerton seemed a great deal smaller than Eiland remembered. Not much had changed: a large branch had fallen off the tree above the well, and the smithy had expanded his forge.

  A dozen other things drew his eye, though, all the things he had simply accepted as part of the world before now. He saw the three young girls begging on the temple steps; their parents had died, and no one else in the village would take them in. He saw the miller’s oldest son in the street; they’d only kissed the once and that was ages ago, but the boy quickly averte
d his eyes as he always had when he saw Eiland in public.

  Eiland walked slowly eastward out of town, memorizing every detail. Objectively he could say that Summerton was very much like a dozen other small villages Eiland had seen in his travels. Yet even its most prosaic features were embellished by his memories, filled with meaning beyond their simple existence—with joy, with laughter, with sorrow, and with home.

  This was not an easy choice to make. But, Eiland had begun to realize, the important ones were never easy.

  The topmost leaves of the apple trees in the orchard were tinged with gold, the first breath of autumn. Eiland walked through the rows of their trunks until he saw Charon’s familiar shape sitting with his back to a trunk, poking at the ground with a stick.

  When Eiland called his name Charon’s head jerked up. He stared at Eiland for long enough that Eiland realized he hadn’t really been sure Eiland would come back. That maybe he still wasn’t sure.

  Eiland moved nearer and Charon looked away. “How was your family?”

  “They were well. They were all well.” Two days had been long enough for Eiland to visit all of his brothers and sisters and their families. When he’d told them he was leaving again, each one had made their own pleas for him to stay and once the children had joined in it had grown almost unbearable.

  Then he’d thought about how Charon had left his own home, slipping away into the night to escape this same heartbreak, and his resolve had strengthened.

  Charon poked at the ground with his stick, drawing aimless designs. “What did you tell them?”

  Shucking his traveling pack, Eiland crossed to Charon and sat on the ground directly in front of him. Charon raised his head then ducked away again.

  “I told them that I had been a long way from home,” Eiland said, “and I had met a lot of different people, and that some of those people need my help. That I was going to be a traveling healer, and try to help as many people as I can.”

  “I thought you hated lying,” Charon said shortly. His eyes were fixed on the ground by Eiland’s knee.

  Eiland shrugged easily, refusing to rise to the bait. “It’s as close as I can get if I ever want to come back for a visit.”

  Charon’s mouth tightened and Eiland was not blind, he saw the unfairness. He could go home to see his family while Charon could not—for now, anyway. Eiland had plans and he felt certain that Mara and Sierrach would help.

  This was not a perfect world, though, and Eiland could only try to make the best choices available to him.

  He saw, too, how Charon was still pulling away inside himself, too hurt and afraid to hope even while Eiland sat right in front of him.

  Catching Charon’s face in both hands, Eiland dragged his head up and kissed him.

  Slowly, slowly, the ice melted and Charon breathed out shakily. His hands curled around Eiland’s, hesitantly tangling their fingers together.

  “I chose you,” Eiland told him. Would tell him, again and again, until he believed it.

  And this, this moment. Eiland thought, This is where we can begin. This is what his heart had been looking for without him ever knowing: to make his own choice, unfettered but not unbound. This was his, now.

  Once upon a time there were two boys who lived in a great house on a hill with their friends, and then some other friends and their many children, plus some goats and a kitten named Shadow.

  And they lived happily ever after.

  ~ About the Author ~

  This is Lillian Turner's first published novel, though when she was four years old her mother compiled a series of Lillian's short stories into a book called "The Baby Animal Tales." We're not sure if that one counts. Lillian lives in Oregon and has the tattoo on her arm to prove it. When she's not writing like a crazy person, she works in a hospital and plays the drums.

  Find out more about Lillian Turner here:

  Google+: http://profiles.google.com/100665832214820029097/about?np=1&hl=en

  Blog: http://lillianturner.blogspot.com/

  Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/stele_3

  Insanejournal: http://stele3.insanejournal.com/

  ~ More YA M/M Romance from Etopia Press~

  Dodger

  © 2011 Amanda Hash

  First love wasn’t supposed to be this hard...

  Sixteen-year-old Dodger was raised to be a thief. He’s always been good at it too, until he’s caught red handed robbing one of the most expensive mansions in the city. The kid who lives there isn’t much older than Dodger, and things get weird when the kid seems more interested in talking than calling the cops. When he tells Dodger not to forget his loot—it’s only money, and his parents have plenty—Dodger’s sure the guy’s playing him. But the cops never do show up...

  Dodger’s suspicion of the wealthy Augustine Dante makes it hard to face his growing attraction. Not to mention that Dodger’s “family”—the band of thieves who took him in as a child—would freak if they caught him hanging with the “enemy.” Dodger knows he can’t keep Augustine a secret forever. The time will come when he’ll have to make a choice: follow his family, or follow his heart?

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Also Available