“Herfod!” Ugoth stepped in and dropped the canvas behind him. “You bastard!” He pulled off his helmet and threw it to the ground. It bounced with a rattle and rolled off. “Another week gone! We needed you!”
“I thought you wanted me declared a traitor,” Herfod said testily. “At least that’s what I heard on the castle wall climbing up to your window.”
“What? Climbing up to my window?”
“Yes! Climbing up to your window! I always wondered if I could make it up the stupid wall.” He stomped closer to Ugoth. “Only instead of hearing you snoring, I hear you shouting at Samel what a bastard I am and how you were going to have me hung.”
Ugoth grabbed him by the front of his habit and lifted him off the canvas tarp. He shook him violently. “Son of a bitch! I don’t snore, and we thought you had disappeared again!”
“I was only thinking for a bit!” Herfod shouted back. “I didn’t mean to be gone again!” He grabbed Ugoth’s upper arms and forced him to stop shaking. Ugoth desisted, but Herfod’s feet continued to hang above the ground. “It was your fault I disappeared this time! Go ahead! Hang me!”
Some guards thrust there way into the large tent. Ugoth dropped the monk and turned in surprise.
Herfod caught his balance and looked at the soldiers angrily. “Well? Have them cart me off to be hung!” he spat.
“Get out!” Ugoth shouted at the men. They retreated quickly, and without a question. It was only Herfod arguing with the king as usual. There was nothing to be concerned over. In fact, this was a good thing. Brother Herfod was back!
“You idiot!” Ugoth snarled at Herfod. “It was anger talking. I gave up the stupid idea in minutes.”
“Kings shouldn’t mouth off stupid ideas,” Herfod snarled back. “That’s how regrettable accidents happen.” He turned about. “Like falling off walls.”
“What?” Ugoth pulled him back. “You fell off the wall?”
Herfod scowled. “Yes! I fell off the wall! Surprised me too.”
“Herfod! You could have been killed! Were you injured?”
“I broke my back, but it’s fine now,” Herfod muttered, as if unwilling to admit the unbelievable words, and rightly so, considering Ugoth’s reaction.
“Broke your back?” the king repeated. “Stop jesting with me.”
Herfod jerked out of his grasp. “I’m not jesting! I broke my back. I broke my head too. I forgot who I was. I spent three days with the blind kennel master right in your castle yard. I slept in a kennel. The dogs licked the blood off me and whatever other mess I made. The kennel master took me for a one of his curs. He’s senile!”
“You liar!” Ugoth roared. He started in shock as the shorter man jumped up and down in sheer frustration.
“I’m not lying! For once in your life, believe me when I say I’m not lying!” Herfod shrieked. With his arms waved over his head, he looked like a mad man. “Do you think I like admitting to being a dog for three days?”
“You can’t break your back and head and survive!” Ugoth bellowed.
“I can,” Herfod whispered into the silence that followed. “I can survive. I can survive a stab in the heart, a broken neck, perhaps even a severed head. I can survive it.”
Ugoth stared at him in utter silence.
“Go sit down, Ugoth. You wanted all of the truth. Well, I’m giving it to you this time.”
For a second longer, the king stared. Then he walked past Herfod to one of the chairs in the pavilion. Herfod commenced the chant that would seal the tent from eavesdropping and spying, seal it even from interruption. No sound would emit, nor would light escape the tent. No one could get in to see them. That alone told Ugoth that Herfod intended to admit the full truth this time. He was taking no chances that his confession would be overheard.
Seated, he watched Herfod end the chant, observed the flash of blue lift from his skin and rush in a wave across the canvas flooring, to rise up the walls of the pavilion, spike a brilliant azure and fade. Slowly, the monk faced him, and his expression was dazed, almost as if he were bemused by what he was about to do. Herfod’s mouth opened, and Ugoth listened as he told it again, this time leaving out little.
Herfod included what Nicky had been to Marun and to him. He detailed his early life up to the cleansing in the church and the need for a new name. Once he finished, he stared at Ugoth and waited for the king’s decision. Their friendship would either begin again or end completely. Herfod guessed the latter. He knew he deserved it.
Ugoth rose from the chair and approached. He set himself in front of Herfod and spoke calmly. “Do you know, it’s very stunning to suddenly realize that, all this time when you thought you were an important player in the story, you have only been a minor character.” Herfod stared, hazel eyes just about bleeding his soul. Ugoth ignored the hurt and continued speaking. “Were you Nicky’s lover back then?”
“No,” Herfod said.
“Were you in Durgven?”
“Yes,” he admitted. Ugoth’s fingers curled around his neck. Herfod remained perfectly still, his gaze fixed upon the cloak pin with its single sapphire eye. He had the inane thought that the gryphon was about to leap to life and rip his flesh from his bones.
“And you say nothing can kill you?” the king said.
“Yes,” he repeated.
Ugoth’s fingers choked his breath off. Herfod did nothing to fight back. He let the man strangle him until he tumbled into oblivion. His last clear sight was the colour sapphire, but he wasn’t sure if it was Ugoth’s irises or the gryphon’s single-eyed glare.
***
He awakened on the floor where Ugoth had left him. The tent had become gloomy; dusk muted the sunlight. The king was back in the chair, an assassin’s dagger resting athwart his lap, a goblet of wine in his hand. Ugoth had removed all his armour and padding. He’d taken his tunic and undershirt off. He wore only his black leather leggings and his boots. He watched, face an impassive mask, but beneath the clear brow, the eyes were an icy, predatory blue.
Herfod became conscious of a sensation of cold air upon his middle. He lifted himself onto an elbow. His habit was up, the assassin’s suit down. His genitals were bare. He looked at Ugoth, this time with horror speaking from his eyes. His gaze fell on the knife again. Ugoth spoke.
“I thought of cutting them off,” he admitted. “But I suddenly understood what I was really angry about, so I stopped.”
Herfod yanked his pants up. He rose to his feet, eyes fixed on the king. His habit fell down over his assassin’s costume, a false shield.
“You took your time coming back to life,” Ugoth said. “It’s been nearly an hour. I was about ready to give up.” Herfod glanced down at the dagger. Ugoth laughed. “I shall let you have it back, but not just now. You can take it out of my heart after the war.”
“Ugoth!” Herfod pleaded. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to take her from you!”
“I never had her to begin with! Did I?” Ugoth drained the goblet and poured himself another cupful. He moved with perfect grace, setting the bottle back on the small table without thumping it, but Herfod knew his poise lied. Ugoth had swallowed enough fortified wine to become inebriated.
“Does she love you at least?” the king demanded.
“She said it once. But she must have done the same with you.”
“No. Never,” Ugoth said. “She kept her mouth shut or she distracted me, but she never said it.” He lifted the goblet. “You bastard!” he whispered with the rim against his lips. He sipped the wine.
“Ugoth, I’m sorry,” Herfod offered again.
“Did you enjoy being with Marun?” Ugoth asked suddenly, projecting this question immediately upon the last word Herfod spoke.
“Ugoth! Please—!”
“Answer me! Did you enjoy him?”
“Yes,” Herfod said.
“So. You are like Vik and you are not like Vik. I had wondered about that. You kiss very well.”
“Ugoth! I only did that to keep y
ou from hurting Nicky!” Herfod cried in protest.
“You’re about to start lying again. You promised not to.”
Herfod shut his mouth. Ugoth was far gone in the cup. That had to be the reason for this quiet, smouldering rage.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” Ugoth continued, “what it is about you that attracted Nicky, why I’m still fond of you despite everything, why Marun wanted you so much he sent kidnappers yearly to get you back. I discovered an answer. Would you like to hear it?”
Herfod said nothing in response. Ugoth was going to tell him in any case.
The king guessed what he was thinking and smiled coldly. “Yes, that’s right. I’m just going to keep on and on.” He lifted the goblet and drank. “You think it’s because I’m no longer sober,” he said after a few seconds. “Just let that comfort you, if you like.”
“Just finish what you have to say,” Herfod shouted. “Then I can get the fuck away from you!”
Ugoth smiled frost. “Not without my leave. Not this time. Nicky actually gave me the clue I needed to solve this mystery. She told me you had been her best friend. Remember that, when you saw her in Durgven the first time? I said you were good at that. You were my best friend too, after all. You see? I already knew somehow, even back then. Do you remember that conversation?”
“I remember,” Herfod admitted guardedly.
“That’s what made me understand. I think you were Marun’s friend. Am I right? His closest friend? His best friend? I think you were. You just quietly wormed your way into his heart, your first victim. He never knew how lost he was until it was too late. Isn’t that so, Herfod?”
Herfod refused to answer. Tears of frustration and anger leaked from his eyes. Here was an accusation far too close to the truth, and he had no lesser truths left to defend himself with.
The king’s next words were whispered, but they hit with the force of stones. “You seduce with friendship, perfect sweet friendship. Don’t you, Kehfrey?”
“You bastard! Are you blaming me for Marun’s abuse?” he shouted desperately. “I was a slave! I didn’t lie about it!”
But he still hadn’t said it all, had he? No. Not the part about the uncontrolled power that transpired from his skin, that perverted the minds of the unprotected. No, he hadn’t said that bit.
But that was over. The monastery defended his victims. Blessings prevented the affliction from setting in, blessings incanted by monks other than him, purer than him. He’d been a perfect craven and hidden behind the power of the gods all these years, the secret of Tehlm Sevet’s induced madness hidden from his superiors, hidden even from Vik. He was too ashamed to reveal his sin to anyone. And yet his monarch looked at him now with undisguised scepticism. Somehow, Ugoth knew the truth.
“Perhaps you were a slave,” Ugoth said, “but you weren’t an inoffensive chick either. Were you? You did everything right to keep the Shadow Master under control, up until he couldn’t take it anymore.”
Herfod opened his mouth to refute this very true remark, but paused when Ugoth stood suddenly. The king set his goblet down on the table, placed the borrowed dagger next to it and stalked toward him.
“Are you going to strangle me again?” Herfod spat. “You can’t kill me. You’ve already tested the truth of that.”
“No,” Ugoth snarled. “No, I’m going to make you mend the heart you tore to pieces, you unconscionable liar.”
“How can I do that? You married Nicky off!”
Ugoth laughed. “We’ll get her a divorce. Derell can keep his parcel of land and his silly, useless title.” He grabbed Herfod by the habit and pulled him closer. “Between the two of us, we can at least see that she’s faithful until she drops dead of old age.”
Herfod gaped at him in astonishment, and then Ugoth’s lips came down on his. Herfod froze, incredulous, and stared with unfocused eyes at Ugoth’s nose, too conscious of stubble above the lips and more below, of a vague image of gold at the corners of his vision.
Honey gold, Ugoth’s hair. Realizing what was happening, he hooked a leg around one of Ugoth’s, thrust forward and tripped him. “Ugoth! Ugoth, you’re drunk! You’ll hate me later!”
The king laughed up at him from the tarp. “I hate you now! You don’t understand, do you?” He laughed again. “You did it to me! You bastard! You seduced me too! I even managed to get the woman you love into my bed instead of you. How’s that for twisted fate?”
“You idiot! I never did this! How could I know I was doing this? I wasn’t trying!” But he never had to, did he? He just did it. He twisted everyone. Ah, gods! He needed Samel!
“That’s why you’re so perfect at it!” Ugoth roared. “You’re just as Nicky said the day you married her off! You’re as innocent as a saint!” He grabbed Herfod’s ankle and hauled him off balance. He leapt on top and pressed the smaller man down, a jealous grimace upon his face. “Did you love Marun?” he shouted. “Is that why you went into the stone with him?”
“I told you why I went in!” Herfod cried, confused and mortified. He didn’t struggle, too bewildered and distressed that divine blessings had failed his friend and king.
“Do you love him?” Ugoth roared.
“Don’t!” Herfod begged. “Don’t make me answer! Please don’t!” With a soft cry of frustration, Ugoth’s lips came down again. Herfod twisted his head away. “Ugoth! Don’t do this! You’re drunk! Let me get Samel! Samel can fix this!” Getting his palms beneath, he forced the man upward, but Ugoth smashed his arms out of the way.
“Stupid monk! I have to have you both to make this work! Otherwise I have to kill you both! And I can’t live without either of you!” Ugoth kissed him. This time he felt a hesitation, just a small slackening of the lips, but then Herfod averted his face once more. Stubborn, the most stubborn man in existence. And he smelled like a dog and something else, something intoxicating, something bizarrely potent.
Ugoth couldn’t believe he’d never understood before. He did now. His friend of nearly eight years, his confidante, his trustworthy servant—it had all been illusion. Herfod had been the lord and teacher, while the prince of the realm had been the wretched student crawling in his master’s wake, desperate for a touch, a glance, a mere second of his time. Power and will incarnate—the taste of him made Ugoth want to dissolve until he was nothing but a malleable glow sinking into the molten pool that was Herfod’s soul. He tried to have the lips again, but Herfod twisted aside.
“What the hells are you saying? Get off, you drunken fool! You’ll just hate me!”
Ugoth snatched one of Herfod’s hands and drew it down between them. “Does that feel like hate?”
“Idiot!” Herfod jerked his hand off. “That’s lust! Gods busted drunken, vengeful lust!” And a perversion of power twisting the mind. Ah, gods! “Let me get Samel! Ugoth, get up!”
“Were you this difficult for Marun?” Ugoth shouted.
“I made him wait seven years!” Herfod bellowed.
“I’ve waited almost eight!” Ugoth screamed back.
An ominous silence filled the pavilion. They stared at each other in mutual shock, Herfod at last gleaning the fact that blessings had never been of service to Ugoth. The affliction had set in long ago, entrenched so deeply it had smouldered within the roots of his soul where no blessing could ever douse the fire. Only a kiss had been required to fan the spark.
Ugoth crumbled first. His head lowered to Herfod’s shoulder and he commenced to sob brokenly. “You ripped my heart apart, you bastard! Make it right! Make it right between all three of us! You selfish son of a bitch! I miss her!”
“Oh!” Herfod said. He had forced Ugoth to weep. He couldn’t bear it.
He set about mending the disaster. He pulled his king’s lips to his own and commenced the final act of the dance they had begun nearly eight years earlier.
He tried to make it about relief, tried kisses and touch and a sure grasp that forced his inadvertent victim to groan against his lips; but the kisses stopped being
enough, the touches on Ugoth’s skin inadequate, the possessive grasp not nearly satisfying. With Ugoth still above him, he kissed golden curls at the neck and chest, slipped lower and lower until he’d taken into his mouth the organ he’d seized and wouldn’t release.
Ah, the smell of him. There had always been something very animal about Ugoth, something predatory and so very male. And he tasted good. And he felt good. Herfod pulled Ugoth’s foreskin as far back as he dared and sucked the head in deep. Such a sweet sensation of power when his victim groaned and tensed like a man struck by a whip—he could have done it for eternity, been happy with only that, but then it became not enough for Ugoth.
Ugoth touched his forehead to the tarp and moaned. For minutes, he shivered and suffered on the verge of a massive orgasm, and then he missed the lips and the taste of molten power, and nothing would be perfect without it. The effort to regain control was a wrench both physical and mental. He jerked upright onto his knees, away from the mouth that tortured. Herfod tried to follow. Ugoth grabbed him by the hair and slammed his head back.
“Get it off! Get that damned habit off!”
Herfod lay there as if in a daze. Ugoth swung off him and yanked at the grey wool. The smell of dog was horrible. Blood, shit, piss, whatever else had been in the kennel; it was all there on Herfod. It enraged and provoked him that dogs had taken three days of Herfod’s life, three days he’d wanted for himself.
Herfod seemed to return to the present. He lifted his hips that his habit could be raised higher. With Ugoth’s help, he drew it up his torso. Ugoth wrenched it off his head and tossed it away. And there was that damned black suit beneath, a veritable maze of straps and strings and buttons, the crossing flaps at the front such a barrier that Ugoth almost ripped it apart. Herfod seized his wrists to stop him.
“Gods bust it! There are poison darts hidden in there, you great fool!”
“Get this fucking thing off now!”
In the end, Ugoth settled for the front flaps left open, because the straps were just too many, and he had no patience left to wait. He tasted the neck under Herfod’s chin, the cavity where neck met chest, the light brush of crimson curls that formed a triangle down the sternum, the bare expanse of abdomen above the navel. He attempted to go lower, but the smell of dog at last became too much. He returned to the molten power of kisses and let his hands dare the anatomy further down.
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