When he tried the door of the trade office, it was already locked and bolted. He staggered next door into the shop as the wind caught at him, trying to drag him down towards the quay.
“Emyr will be home by now, dear,” Dilys said, shaking her head. Behind her spectacles, her gray eyes were misty and concerned. “He doesn’t care for storms, poor boy. It was a night like this that the Gwyfyn went down and young Aneirin died, poor soul.”
Heilyn swallowed hard, his heart clenching, and dashed back out into the storm. Father Cian and his trap were gone, probably back to the shelter of the shrine, so he simply ran along the coast road. Here, without the shelter of trees or buildings, the wind kept buffeting him into the hedge, tearing at his hair and clothes with cold claws. He had to slow to a walk in the end, but he could feel the island stirring under him, the wind weeping through the hollows in the rock and the waves lashing up to swipe at the base of the isle, hungry to drag it back below the water.
When he reached the house, it was dark. The sky was so heavy he could barely feel his way across the garden, and he could only see by the dim light of the starflowers tumbling across the sky as the storm ripped them off the boughs of the trees. The front door, when he reached it, was locked and he could hear the bolts rattling and straining against the force of the wind. Swearing, he put his hands flat against the wall and fought his way round to the back of the house. Emyr wouldn’t hear him shouting over the noise of the storm, but the back garden was a little more sheltered.
Once he made it round the end of the wall, the tearing of the wind wasn’t so bad, and he sagged back against it with a sigh of relief. He could still feel the air shaking, and the derwen copse at the bottom of the garden was a blur of light as the wind twisted the branches, but he wasn’t scared he would be blown right off the island anymore. Then a late apple, almost as wide as his hand, slammed into the wall beside his head, shaken from the fruit trees behind the wall. Time to move on, and he could make a run for it now, because he knew this bit of ground, even when he couldn’t see it clearly.
He hit the back door at a run, and groaned in relief when it opened under his hand. Dragging himself in, he slumped against it, catching his breath before he called, “Emyr!”
After the storm, the house felt unnaturally quiet. He could still hear the air raging outside, but it seemed dim and muted now. The quiet was stifling. “Emyr?”
There was nothing but silence, and Heilyn began to wonder if Dilys had been wrong and he’d just made a fool of himself. Surely any sane man would wait this out in the inn? They didn’t get storms like this back home on Rhaedr, tucked away in the central isles as it was. He’d heard that storms in the islands so close to the Veil were bad, but he’d never expected this. Someone who had lived here all his life, though, probably wouldn’t be daft enough to go out in it.
Or maybe Emyr had tried to get home and was lying hurt on the road somewhere, and Heilyn had walked straight past him.
No, that was panic speaking. Emyr had almost certainly found a bed for the night with a friend in the village. As Heilyn had no intention of struggling his way back down the coast road, he’d have to find somewhere to bed down here (no, not in Emyr’s bed, tempting as it might be, and he wasn’t going to snoop through Emyr’s belonging either, no, definitely not). He needed some light, though, and had been here enough to know where the lantern and its flint lived.
The first splash of light revealed the state of the kitchen. The shutter was open, and the wind had thrown the herbs off the windowsill to spill out of their pots and across the floor. There was a great sweep of storm debris, too, dry leaves dancing across the counter and clogging the sink. Heilyn put the lamp down and headed across to drag the shutters closed. He’d clean this mess up, and see if Emyr had some bread left over, and then he’d go searching for some blankets. Stretching over the sink, he grabbed the edge of the shutter.
“Leave it.”
Heilyn jumped. Swinging round, he squinted across the room. Emyr was standing in the doorway, his hands clenched on the frame. He looked like a ghost, pale and tense.
“Aneirin didn’t have any shutters between him and the storm.”
Heilyn swallowed, transported for a moment. Riding on the ropes through the sky was fun on a sunny day with a sweet breeze, when you could prop your elbows onto the side of the ship and natter at the sailors on board. In a storm like this…
All the same, the wind was coming in the window now, and as his mam liked to say, there was a time for sentiment and a time for common sense, and he knew which this was. “I’m shutting the wind out before it ruins everything in here.”
“Don’t,” Emyr said, but it was so soft and hesitant that Heilyn chose to ignore it. He pulled the shutters closed with a heave, slamming the bolt across before the wind could wrench them out of his hand. When he turned round, Emyr had gone, so he picked up the lantern and went looking. He found him in the parlor, sitting on the end of the wooden settle with his head in his hands. Heilyn put the lantern down on the table and went to sit beside him.
“Don’t.”
Heilyn cupped the back of Emyr’s head, rubbing a few strands of hair between his fingers, because he had to give him some affection. Then he backed away, and saw to the room. He’d been in here once or twice before and disliked it intensely. It should have been cozy, with the apple boughs and flowers tapping against its south-facing window, and a clutter of bookcases and chairs, but it just felt sad and lonely. It always felt a little bigger than it was, haunted by a hint of an echo. Now it was cold, so much so that Heilyn tried to rub some warmth into his arms. He was soaked through, and he was beginning to feel it.
There was a cold draft coming down the chimney, but even the worst gust wasn’t bad enough to make it dangerous, so he got a fire started and nursed it until it was going strongly and his face felt well-toasted.
Emyr hadn’t moved, and Heilyn decided that he’d respected his grief enough. He headed over to the settle, peeling off his dripping cloak and testing the cloth of his shirt with a grimace. It felt clammy to the touch, so he said, “I’d ask if I could borrow a shirt, except I’m not sure any of yours would fit me. Are you going to be horribly offended if I walk around without one?”
Emyr tipped his head up. “What?”
“Well, I think I’ve brought in enough rain to fill a bathtub,” Heilyn said, making his tone light and bright. “I don’t really look good in rain. It’s not my color, you know, and I don’t want to get pneumonia and sneeze all over Father Cian’s murals, so I’m just going to strip off, if you don’t mind.”
“You’re wet?”
He could manage a smirk at that, though he wanted to do nothing more than wrap Emyr up and hold him tight. “And it’s not like you haven’t seen it before, though I might have to expose my feet as well today, because I have puddles inside my boots. You’re not likely to be driven mad with desire at the sight of my little pink toes, are you? I knew a man once who swore that he would only marry a woman with perfect toes. I mean, I’d look for a pleasant temper and a kind heart first, if I was planning to settle down. I do love a handsome face, but a kind heart’s worth more, don’t you think?”
“Heilyn.” Emyr was staring at him, the despair in his face giving way to a faint irritation.
Good. Heilyn pulled his shirt off, and made himself keep babbling. “Look, no scars. Pumpkin didn’t do me any permanent damage, or maybe it was just because you patched me up so well. I do think that painting in his field was actually the best decision I’ve made since I came to Sirig.” He turned round to pull his boots and socks off, and patted his own ass, making a face. “Sopping. Can’t really strip those off, though, can I?”
“You… You’re ridiculous.”
That stung a little, but Heilyn couldn’t really deny that he’d been trying for that reaction. Emyr stood up, glaring at him, and snapped, “Stay there and warm up! I’ll get you a blanket.”
Heilyn did as he was told, stripping down to his braies
and crouching in front of the fire. He was just beginning to worry again when the door cracked open, and Emyr came back. Heilyn heard him stop in the doorway, but the crackle of the fire was too loud to guess why, so he turned around to look.
Emyr was just looking at him, his eyes wide and his lips parted. There was color in his cheeks again. After a moment, he swallowed and held out the blanket he was carrying, letting it spill out of its folds. Heilyn went to him, and Emyr folded the blanket around him. Then, with a little broken breath, he wrapped his arms around Heilyn and buried his face against his shoulder with a slow sigh.
Heilyn held onto him, pressing soft kisses to his hair and murmuring vague reassuring things. Emyr was a good man to hug, just skinny enough that Heilyn could get his arms right round him, but still firm and solid and strong. Heilyn could feel the muscles knotted in his back and stroked warm circles over them until Emyr slowly relaxed.
At last Emyr said, his voice muffled in the blanket, “I don’t understand what you’re doing in my life.”
“I like you,” Heilyn said, “obviously. In fact, I like you so much I’m going to cook you dinner tonight.”
Emyr looked up, his face skeptical. “You can cook?”
“Of course I can cook. Well, I can scramble eggs, at least.”
So they had scrambled eggs. Emyr sat in his usual place at the kitchen table and they ate singed and crunchy scrambled eggs as the futile rain hammered at the shutters (Heilyn had never claimed he could cook well, after all, so what had Emyr expected?). It almost felt like a normal evening until Emyr said, “I’ll make up the spare room for you, if you like. Or…”
“Or?” Heilyn prompted, the skin on the back of his neck prickling.
“I… I’m not inviting you to seduce me, mind. It’s just…”
“You don’t want to be alone in a storm.”
“I always thought that was the best way, but…” He swallowed. “You must think very poorly of me.”
Heilyn covered Emyr’s hands with his own. “I could never think poorly of you.”
Chapter 6
BUT WHEN they climbed up to Emyr’s room, Heilyn felt less sure of himself. He’d never shared a bed with someone just for comfort (top to tail in a cheap inn to save pennies once or twice, but that hadn’t been intimate in the way this was). He’d never even stayed until morning with a man before. And this was Emyr, and that was Emyr’s bed, with its sheets rumpled, and this was Emyr’s room, with the books he was reading stacked beside the bed and an empty mug balanced precariously on the edge of the basin.
“If you don’t want to,” Emyr started.
“Just deciding my strategy,” Heilyn said immediately. “I’m an expert blanket thief, I’ll have you know.” And he dropped himself down in the middle of the bed, where he could grin up at Emyr.
“Ridiculous,” Emyr said again, but it was fond this time. “Move over.”
Heilyn rolled over, and shivered a little as Emyr’s weight settled beside him on the bed. He couldn’t quite make his body believe that it wasn’t about to be loved, so he tried to slow his breathing. Emyr snuffed the lantern and shifted in the bed again, the pillows tugging slightly under Heilyn’s cheek. The bed smelled like Emyr, apple and dried spices and ink, and Heilyn wanted to burrow into it and never leave. He wanted to turn and curl up against Emyr, run his hands across bare skin, and press quiet kisses to the back of Emyr’s neck. He could hear Emyr’s breathing, slow and steady, and was suddenly convinced that his own heart was beating at the same rhythm.
“He wasn’t kind.”
“What?” Heilyn said. He’d thought Emyr was asleep.
“What you said earlier, about a kind heart—Aneirin wasn’t kind. He was passionate about life, and he was fun, and he always had a big dream and managed to drag everyone along to fulfill it, but he wasn’t kind.”
“I’m sorry.” Heilyn reached out blindly and found Emyr’s shoulder. He held on, as tightly as he could.
“He was furious when I said I couldn’t go with him, but I had no choice. People needed me here, and so I got angry too, and then he.. he died, and I was never angry enough to want that.”
“It wasn’t your fault.” Heilyn thought about it, all the little bits and pieces of the story people had let slip since he arrived on Sirig. “Nor was it his fault. You were both so young, and it sounds to me like you grew up, because you had to, and he stayed a child and didn’t understand what you had to do. Nobody was at fault.”
“That’s…” Emyr trailed off and went quiet. After a while he said, his voice soft, “He wasn’t, but you are.”
“Are what?” Heilyn asked sleepily.
“Kind,” Emyr said and moved. Suddenly he was on top of Heilyn, their bare chests pressed together. Heilyn bucked his hips up without thinking, his whole body shaking with the sudden contact, and gasped. He could feel Emyr’s breath on his cheek, rough and hot, and knew that he was about to be kissed. Then the hitch of Emyr’s breath and a soft drip on his cheek made his conscience tighten around him like a noose. Putting his hand up, he found Emyr’s cheek and held him a breath away, feeling the slick lines of tears under his palm.
“You’re crying.”
“I’m aware. Let me have some dignity, Heilyn.”
Heilyn swallowed and argued the part of him that was all lust away. He didn’t want to begin like this. He wanted something brighter and sweeter. “When you kiss me…”
“Yes?” Emyr breathed, nuzzling Heilyn’s fingertips.
“I want it to be because I make you happy. Not just because you’re sad.”
Emyr froze. Then, with a groan, he rolled off Heilyn. “You are the most inconvenient thing in my life.”
“This is a noble sacrifice on my part too,” Heilyn said, and curled up behind him, wrapping an arm around Emyr’s waist.
“And inconsistent with it.”
“Your life needs more inconsistencies.”
Emyr snorted at that, but then his hand came up to cover Heilyn’s, their fingers tangling. “Sleep, Heilyn, and stop confusing me.”
And so Heilyn did, as the storm slowly passed over them and faded into quiet rain.
There were more storms after that, but Heilyn started listening to the weather gossips in the morning and made sure he could leave early if bad weather was coming in. Father Cian must have realized what was going on, because he invariably happened to have the pony trap out on those days and, more often than not, was heading along the coast road and it was no trouble at all to take them both home.
Heilyn stayed overnight through a few storms, though now they sat together in the kitchen and talked quietly through the storm. Emyr didn’t invite him back into bed, and Heilyn couldn’t quite decide how he felt about that. He wanted so badly to touch Emyr and be touched in return, to slide their bodies together and take pleasure from other. Simply lying together chastely had been torturous, and so intense he had been giddy with need by the time the sun crept through the crack in the shutters. It had frightened him a little. He had never simply wanted like that before. His purpose was simple: make Emyr happy enough to smile. He was starting to wonder, though, what changes Emyr was making in him in return.
Emyr was touching him more. Nothing sexual, of course, and Heilyn wasn’t even sure he knew he was doing it. He’d just developed a habit of moving Heilyn out of his way as he cooked by slinging an arm around his shoulder and pulling him across the room. When they huddled under the oilcloth in the rain, his arm went around Heilyn’s waist to keep him close. He summoned attention by touching Heilyn’s arm or turning his cheek to see something interesting, his fingers always gentle.
Heilyn wished he could be as chaste and respectful, but his fantasies were getting more compelling by the day. Even as he wandered across the frosty common in the morning, he imagined just stripping naked as Emyr cooked, spreading himself out across the kitchen table and begging. He invented absurd schemes which would get him into Emyr’s bed (possibly even “accidentally” tied to Emyr’s bed, so
Emyr would have to crawl all over him to release him, and then he’d, of course, be overcome with lust and leave Heilyn tied there while he stripped off and nibbled his way down Heilyn’s chest and then pushed his legs apart slowly, those long fingers pressing…and, damn it, he was at the shrine already) or let him fall conveniently onto Emyr’s lap and land on his mouth (or his cock). He could imagine it so clearly he could have painted it: Emyr’s eyes hazy with pleasure as Heilyn stroked him, Emyr’s mouth sliding wetly over the head of his cock.
It made his work a little more challenging, especially now he was down to the fine detail work and needed to concentrate. He was painting fast, aware that the winter pilgrims were starting to arrive. They had filled the old part of the hostel already, and half Father Cian’s volunteers had switched duties to tend the sick. The others were in the rooms Heilyn had finished, varnishing over the pictures.
Today he was putting in the very last details on the long wall in the biggest dorm. This was the most complex picture of the lot, showing the market wharf, from the ships sliding down from the sky to the bustling crowds and the shops and inn along the sides of the square. He had painted in all the familiar faces: the fishermen, Elin in the inn doorway, Math and his brother squabbling by the fountain, Emyr by the door of the trade office, watching the world go by with thoughtful eyes. Father Cian was there, with his daughters flitting around the market, and all of the volunteers who had worked on the walls. They had all been charmed and quick to suggest more island personalities who would want to be included.
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