It had been good. Very good. He might get her again. If he could remember her name.
Ah Lufra, he was tired! He rolled his shoulders, feeling the bones creak, the sweat slide down his ribs. Fort grimaced at the thought of slipping his greasy body into the clean blue silk of his bedroll. As he entered the Fairgrounds, he turned automatically toward the ablutions tent, only to slow to a halt. Now he had a place of his own, he could boil up water and take a bucket bath in private. Smiling, he swerved away, jogging past the menagerie tent, the acrid smell of vranshit catching in his throat.
The hot water was as good as he’d imagined. Inside his wagon, Fort stood on a folded towel, wiping away the dirt and sweat with a warm, wet cloth. And his gods-be-damned cock was behaving. Good, excellent.
So what if he’d desired another man, just for a few moments? It happened, of course it happened. He was only human. Everyone had their secret desires, their dirty little fantasies. And Griff was…well, he was…not beautiful the way a woman could be, not handsome either, not… The movement of the cloth slowed, as Fort thought it through. He was so completely himself, Griff, with his crooked tooth and his acrobat’s grace and his quick wit. And his bloody kindness.
No one could be seduced if they didn’t want to be. Griff would find the conditioning of a Straight Church boyhood hard to kick, no matter that Fort knew on an intellectual level there wasn’t anything particularly wrong about manlove. He picked up his only dry towel and rubbed his chest and shoulders.
Mind you, speaking of fantasies, what he wouldn’t give to share a woman with Griff! Soldiers in his company had spoken of it, but Fort had never felt close enough to any man for such an intimate act. He sat on the edge of the bed and ran his thumb over his burgeoning cock head. In his mind’s eye, he saw the plump whore, down on all fours, her red lips wrapped around Griff’s shaft. Beautiful, the tumbler’s cock would be sure to be beautiful. How could it be anything but fine and straight and hard, given the rest of the man?
As for Fort, he’d be sunk deep in her ass, watching Griff’s expressive face as the woman suckled and licked, pulling back to nibble under the ridged head, where the sweet spot was.
Slowly, Fort sank down full-length on the bedroll, stretching his long legs with a sigh of relief. Automatically, his fist closed over his stiff cock. Ah Lufra, that felt good! Now where was he?
Griff’s mouth would open on a gasp, that pouty lower lip slack with desire, as the woman pushed him closer and closer. He’d throw his head back, the firm muscles in his shoulders and chest shifting with fluid power, the tendons in his neck taut. But at the last minute, just as his buttocks clenched, just as he offered in the woman’s mouth, his dark eyes would snap open, to stare deep into Fort’s, deep into his soul, his heart…
Fort’s hand moved faster and faster, pumping. He gasped for breath, his head thrashing on the bedding, inadvertently inhaling the scent of Griff’s skin. The smell sped straight to his hindbrain, bypassing every rational faculty, a sensual sucker punch deep in his balls that pushed him off the edge and sent him flying. The seed boiled into his cock in a seething flood of excruciating pleasure. His hips arched, a helpless groan tearing from his chest. Hot, musky jets splattered his abdomen, covered his fingers. It went on and on.
Lufra, he hadn’t come so hard since that first time with Bekah. What an offering!
A gleeful voice whispered in his ear, So what are you going to do now, love? The dusting?
Fort lay, his chest heaving, completely drained. He struggled to his elbows and looked down in disgust, mixed with utter dismay.
Wash, that’s what I’m going to do. All over again.
You little shit.
Chapter Five
Travelers—Religion:
The god of the Travelers has two faces. As the Traveler, he is a deity of good luck, whose cheerful charm and cunning wiles protect his worshippers. In his darker aspect, however, he is known as the Twister, the Great Liar—manipulative and heartless. It is the Twister who “runs the con”, fleecing the helpless and preying on the weak.
Excerpt from the Great Encyclopedia, compiled by Miriliel the Burnished.
“Twister take me, what biteme stung your ass, Fort?” Leo the roustabout leaned against a vran’s feathered rump and shot him a filthy look. “That’s how I always do it.”
“Not this time,” growled Fort. “You missed the corners. Vranee get hoof-rot in wet straw.” He ran a critical eye over the stall Leo had mucked out. “Change it. All of it.” He turned away, suppressing the urge to pick the man up by the scruff of his neck and slam him head-first into the water trough.
Where the hell was Griff? Still in bed, the lazy bastard?
From behind, he heard the roustabout’s muttered curse. Slowly, he turned, laying a clenched fist against the side of the stall. “You got something to say to me, Leo?” His lips drew back from his teeth.
The blood drained from the other man’s face. “Uh, no, Fort.” His Adam’s apple bobbed in his skinny neck as he swallowed. “No.”
“Good.” Fort strode out into the day, feeling somehow diminished. Lufra, he’d been in a hell of a temper all morning and he’d taken it out on all of them, especially Leo. Now they’d walk more carefully around him, leave him alone. Which was good, wasn’t it?
He squinted up at the Sun and its Shadow, shading his eyes. Plenty of time to clean up and get into Valaressa, to Barnaby’s shop on the Leaf of Gems.
Griffid Ringman could go to hell.
* * * * *
Fort slapped a silver quarter-mark on the battered counter. “Thanks, Barnaby.”
The old man returned the nod. His veined hand shot out and the coin disappeared. “You signin’ on with the Fair then?” He cocked a bushy gray brow.
“Ay,” said Fort, lifting the strongbox to his shoulder. This was his second visit of the day. He’d sat with the old scoundrel earlier and taken a cup of roberry, prepared the Valaressan way, darker than the innermost hells and strong enough to strip the fur from a fellwolf. Then he’d extracted nine gold marks from his box, slipped them into a pouch and taken a scull down the blue canals to the Noble Leaf.
At the Winged Envoy’s palazzo, Mirry received him, frowning as he tallied the coins. “You’ve miscounted. She said seven.”
Fort held his eye, trying desperately not to stare at those incredible wings, let alone the tail. “No, I didn’t. That’s what it’s worth.”
The raptor’s gaze pinned him a moment longer and then the Aetherii smiled. Fort caught his breath. Lufra, he was a gorgeous creature, but dead uncanny with it!
“Thank you,” murmured Mirry. “I’ll be sure to tell her, but she may not want it.”
Fort shrugged. “Then give it to a home for fallen Aetherii.”
The smile congealed for a second, then broadened. “Jan was right about you, Fortitude McLaren.” Mirry’s tail snaked out and clapped him companionably on the shoulder. “You’ve got balls. Here, take the deed.”
And that had been that. The wagon was his. His own.
Now Barnaby said, “Go with your gods, Fort.”
“And you.” Fort lifted a hand in farewell and turned. As he did so, someone shoved the door open and a shaft of late afternoon sunlight laid itself across the crowded, dusty interior of the shop like a bar of butter taffy. Fort tilted his head, his attention caught by a fugitive gleam coming from the wall where Barnaby had hung musical instruments, two flutes, an old hand drum, a lap harp, a mandolin with a ding in it, a penny whistle.
Drawn, he ran a finger over the dusty wood of the harp’s forepillar. An elderly aunt had given his sister Constance a small harp like this, a child’s toy really. Surprising for such a pious woman, but it all went to show you never knew. He could recall Constance sitting hunched over it at the farthest end of the barn loft, plucking strings at random, strangely graceful in her coltish way. A girl on the verge of womanhood. She’d had no ear at all, but she’d enjoyed the gentle, discordant sounds. Their father, on the other hand
, had been a conservative even among the Brethren, condemning music as both frivolous and sinful.
In the end, the old man had found them out. Fort remembered how he had turned, shielding his sister with his body, knowing the guilt was writ large on his face. “’Twas me, sir,” he’d stammered, his stomach cramping with the knowledge of what was to come. “Just me. I made her play it.”
“Ay, but she led you on, didn’t she? Led you into sin!” Slowly, Sobriety McLaren unbuckled his belt. He wavered a little on his feet, but his children knew better than to think the liquor would defeat him. They’d long since stopped thinking of the irony of their father’s given name. Sobriety’s huge hand had circled Fort’s skinny biceps, sour breath gusting into his face. Though Fort had been as tall as his father, he was all broad, bony promise, yet to fill out. “What else have you been doing up here, boy? What else?”
It sickened him now, what his father had been thinking. Then, he’d been too young to understand, sick with terror and impotent rage. Constance was tall too, but so slender, he still wondered how she’d survived that beating, because—
“Pretty, isn’t it?” said old Barnaby at his elbow. “Do you play? I can do a good price, a special price.”
Fort let out the breath he’d been holding. She’d be dead now, his sweet, shy sister, worn out with childbearing, with beatings, with labor in the fields. Like most of the females who belonged to the Brethren of the Straight Church.
“No,” he said sadly, stroking the small chips of lighter, contrasting wood inlaid in a sinuous pattern on the pillar. “I don’t.”
“I do.”
Griff stood directly behind him, bathed in a waterfall of sunlight.
Fort blinked and something stirred low in his belly. “You? What are you doing here?”
Griff shrugged and stepped forward, out of the light. “Buying a harp.”
“No, you’re not. I am.”
“Gentlemen, gentlemen.” Barnaby shook his head in delighted reproof as he shut the door. “Let me brew the roberry.” He disappeared behind a curtain, rubbing his hands together.
Fort stared. He couldn’t think of a word to say. It wasn’t the sight of Griff that was disconcerting. It was the way all the fury of the morning had drained away, leaving only uncertainty, laced with a dark thread of need—so disturbing Fort had to move to break the tension or go mad. He picked up the little harp, turning it over and over in his hands, his head bent.
A whisper of displaced air and Griff’s nimble fingers reached past him to caress the carvings on the soundboard. “It’s a gaeta vine. See?” Their shoulders brushed.
Casually, Fort stepped away from the contact. “So it—”
The words tangled on his tongue.
There were dark smudges on the golden skin of Griff’s smooth throat, perfectly visible because he wore a loose shirt only half-laced, almost as if he wanted the world to see. Fort knew if he raised his hand, his fingers would fit over those bruises with absolute precision.
Marked. He’d marked the man, as surely as if he’d collared him, attached a leash. Pleasure rolled through him, an all-encompassing tide of bone-deep satisfaction. My marks.
His gaze flew to the tumbler’s face, but Griff was finishing a sentence. “…agreed then?”
Fort shook himself out of his daze and turned to take a roberry cup from Barnaby. “Tell me again.”
“You buy it. I’ll teach you to play.” Griff held out his hand. “Done?”
Shit, he mustn’t touch, not even formally. “Never mind bloody music lessons.” He ignored Griff’s hand, draining his cup instead. Griff went completely still. He let his arm drop, hurt pinching his expressive features. Fort stiffened his spine. “I’ll buy the harp anyway.” It was better this way, by far. “How much?”
Barnaby named a price so outrageous both men snorted with derision. But Griff sobered quickly, launching himself into the haggle with a shrewdness Fort found a little alarming. He was no fool, Griffid Ringman, and no pushover either. Good-natured he might be, but if the tumbler made an enemy, Fort suspected he’d be a formidable opponent, subtle and focused, attentive to the fine-grain detail vendetta required. He’d have to be pushed though. The basic decency of him, the goodness, would flinch from causing pain. Fort stifled a sigh. No wonder Griff posed such a danger to his sanity.
Barnaby complained bitterly and at length, but in the end, he threw in a spare set of strings and a battered case made for a larger instrument. They left the old man muttering over his money, shaking his head, but Fort thought he was well-pleased with the transaction.
“Bruise had to come in to buy extra straw for some reason.” The tumbler’s lips tipped up at the corners, very slightly. “We can catch a lift back in the cart with him.” He squinted into the sky. “If we get to the vranee market before the Shadow catches the Sun.”
* * * * *
How Griff did it, Fort was unable to determine, but by the time they’d found Bruise and settled themselves on the dusty, sweet-smelling bales in the back of the cart, he’d soothed the last of Fort’s bad temper away. He showed no self-consciousness, no awareness of his transgressions of the previous evening, which made it easier for Fort to shove them into a dark recess at the back of his mind.
Instead, they talked politics. Unlike most men, who backed down at Fort’s first frown, Griff was more than happy to argue his point to the death, a militant gleam in his eye. As the cart rattled along, they barked and growled at each other in perfect accord, but in the end, Griff threw his hands up and agreed to differ on the finer points of Valaressan foreign policy and the sovereignty of the Empty Lands.
Fort glanced up in surprise as Bruise swung the wagon onto the rutted meadow behind the menagerie tent. Griff leaped down, all power and grace, while Fort had to stand and stretch his stiff limbs first, especially the scarred thigh.
Griff strolled away toward the concourse. “Come to the show tonight and we’ll have supper after,” he called over his shoulder. “Ember promised me an egg and noodle thing.” He winked. “Plenty of cheese.”
“Don’t bother, Griff, I’ll be fine.”
But the other man just flipped a hand. “I’m late already. See you later.” And he disappeared into the press of Fairgoers.
* * * * *
Griff waited ‘til he was past the menagerie tent, past Magrit’s stall and the Big Top, before he allowed himself to blow out a long breath. Slowing his pace, he turned away from the chattering crowds into the narrow space between two brightly painted wagons. He leaned against one, bracing a hand against it and resting his forehead on his clenched fist, grateful for the solidity.
He still had a chance then. But gods, the power of the man was nothing next to the power of what he was holding inside him. For a horrible moment, in old Barnaby’s shop, he’d thought Fort was going to strike him. The way he’d looked up, the delicate harp incongruous in those powerful hands, his mind obviously in the grip of an agonizing memory… A killing rage had burned in his eyes, glittering like a drawn blade.
A long shiver rolled up Griff’s spine, raising gooseflesh on his chest and neck. He rubbed at his arms. Traveler save him, Fort had seen some things. And gods, he knew the man been a mercenary, but what had it done to him?
Not for the first time, Griff doubted his own common sense. Because if it meant Fort would smile at him, for him, he’d get to the root of it, try to drain the festering poison from the wound. He squeezed his eyes hut. Twister, he must be mad.
Did he have the resources? More to the point, did he want enough? Really want?
Standing deep in the shadows, the Fair bustling around him, Griff relived that mind-numbing kiss. It wasn’t difficult. He’d spent the night fixing every detail of it in his memory—the unexpected softness of Fort’s lips, the way he’d nipped his chin, the uncompromising power of that big body rolling him under and pinning him down, chest to chest, thigh to thigh, the strong hands restricting his breathing. He’d known then, with every fiber of his being
, that he was safe. Needed. It was crazy. The shiver became a shudder of longing.
Oh yes, he wanted enough. His decision to take the initiative last night had been a crazy impulse, so strong he’d had to go ahead with it even though he’d been almost certain he was going to get himself killed. But he’d risked everything in that little wagon last night and Twister’s balls, he’d won!
He hadn’t been alone in that kiss, not after the first frozen second.
Without the beard, Fort was somehow revealed and concealed simultaneously, the line of his jaw stern, his cheekbones broad and high. The planes of his face held secrets in an iron grip, despite the smooth, freshly shaved olive skin. He was going to be a handsome old man, Fortitude McLaren, very much in the patriarchal style. Griff smiled, but painfully. In all that masculine severity, Fort’s mouth, the generous shape of his lower lip, was startlingly sensual.
And he had no idea how he affected Griff, none at all.
* * * * *
Ruler God, never again!
Unobtrusively, Fort inhaled lungfuls of cool night air, scented with the odor of grilled meats and spun sugar and beer. He hadn’t realized that Griff was part of the trapeze act, nor that, as part of the grand finale, he threw the knives blindfolded. Fort had come within a hairsbreadth of charging out of his seat and into the ring to— What? What had he intended to do?
He flexed his fingers. Gods, he’d lived long enough to see men do some breathtakingly stupid things, but this—! Someone should grab Griff and shake the life out of him ‘til he promised—
He clamped a hand on the tumbler’s shoulder as he strolled along beside him, chatting cheerfully about nothing in particular.
“What?” Griff came to a standstill. He studied Fort’s expression for a long moment, the stage makeup giving him the look of a hard-muscled faerie, a creature made of mists and legend. “You’re pissed about something, aren’t you?”
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