The Exile Prince

by Isabelle Adler

  Stephan’s amused snort was anything but ladylike.

  “Will you save me, then?”

  “I have the feeling you’ll save me right back.”

  Stephan turned to kiss his fingers, his hand slipping down to Warren’s crotch, to caress the hard bulge that tented his pants. Encouraged by Warren’s soft moan, he slid to his knees, ignoring the slick dampness that immediately seeped into his clothing, but was halted by a hand placed firmly on his right shoulder.

  “We can’t do this now. What if someone—”

  “This might be our last night together,” Stephan said, looking up. From this angle, his lover’s face was all odd shadows and broken planes gilded by candlelight. “If I die, I want to die with the memory of your taste still fresh on my tongue.”

  Warren gave off a strangled laugh. “That’s quite a dramatic way to say you want to suck my cock.”

  “Well, I am trying to seduce you. Is it working?”

  “Gods help me, yes.” Warren closed his eyes briefly, and Stephan took it as his cue. Warren’s cock, when he freed it out of the confines of his pants and undergarments, jutted proudly upward, dark and stiff, as if challenging Stephan to the task.

  The first drops hit the roof of the shed, timidly, and then the rain came down hard, drowning all other noises, cutting them off from the outside world in an embrace of false security. Stephan closed his eyes and gave in to the familiar sensation of Warren’s flesh filling his mouth, running his tongue along the shaft, sucking on the head. He decided to forgo the gentle caresses of foreplay, going instead straight for prize, determined to make this experience as intense as he could in the short amount of time they dared to allot it.

  His own erection was begging for attention, but he embraced the discomfort, letting it fuel his lust and doubling his efforts. His head bobbed up and down in a cresting rhythm, the tip of Warren’s cock hitting the back of his throat again and again, the heavy musky scent filling his nostrils.

  Trying to keep himself steady, Stephan clutched the edge of the crate next to Warren’s leg, giving himself more leverage. The awkwardness of crouching on a slime-covered floor was well compensated by the tremors that rocked Warren’s body, the half-strangled noises he made, and the way his hand tightened in Stephan’s hair, messing up all that careful plaiting. The pulsing heat was there under his tongue, raw and untamed, ready to burst, and he clamped his lips, sucking so hard his head swam.

  Warren’s hand tightening on his nape was the only warning he had before the spurt hit the roof of his mouth. Stephan held on, swallowing, letting Warren ride the waves of his pleasure, going under and emerging anew with each pulse.

  He finally pulled away when Warren’s cock went limp in his mouth, and met his lover’s gaze, perfectly aware of how he must look, with half-lidded eyes, his lips moist and swollen. His own arousal clamored for release, but he kept still when Warren traced the outline of his mouth with his thumb.

  “That was incredible,” Warren said wonderingly, and drew him up for a kiss, thorough and lingering. But, as sated as he was, he wasn’t forgetting about Stephan’s needs, because he prompted him to stand, simultaneously lifting the hem of his tunic and sliding to his knees before him.

  Stephan gripped his shoulder, unable to form a coherent request or hold on to a clear thought beyond the anticipation of Warren’s eager mouth on him. He was glad for the pummeling rain, at least, the noise masking the needy moans he couldn’t quite hold back.

  Warren seemed to understand exactly what he needed, because he attended to Stephan with the same unwavering focus, intent on pushing Stephan to the finish as fast as he could, pumping his fist around the base of his cock as his lips locked around the crown. Stephan thrust into his mouth, his broken cry the only warning Warren had before orgasm shook him. Stars danced before his eyes, and he was only dimly aware of strong hands catching him mid-flight, cradling him in a cocoon of safety.

  He desperately wished they would never let him go.

  Chapter Seven

  THE MORNING AIR greeted them with the smell of wet dust mixed with salt, and a sharp bite of chill, so unexpected after the stifling heat of the past few days. Rain drummed on the stone wharf and the low roofs of the warehouses, the sound in odd harmony with the rhythm of the waves. The sky above the sea was still dark, the thick veil of the rain obscuring the line of the horizon, but to the east, above the highest domes of the city, dawn was already rising, tinging the heavy clouds in pale pink.

  Warren stood at the entrance to their little shelter, peering outside, holding the door ever so slightly open. The docks were slowly coming to life despite the rain, the loading workers shouting to each other as they prepared to put the awaiting cargo into the incoming boats. The rain, a welcome respite, would not last for long. The storm was passing, and the favorable shift in the weather meant all the work that had been postponed was now to resume with doubled vigor for the mariners to set sail and the fishermen to replenish the markets with a fresh haul.

  “We cannot wait any longer,” Warren said, turning to Stephan. “We have to get on that ship as soon as possible, or it’ll leave without us.”

  “She must be delayed by the downpour.” Stephan came to join him. The waft of crisp air through the crack in the doorway was a welcome change from the rank staleness inside the shed. “We can spare a few more minutes till the rain lets up.” And at Warren’s look, he added, “I just want to make sure Mala is all right.”

  “I know. Me too.” Warren sighed.

  They watched the faint pallid light spread through the sky as the sun slowly woke from its slumber somewhere far to the east, still hidden by the storm clouds. People were scurrying about the wharf now, too busy to mind getting soaked, and Stephan tensed every time someone walked too closely to their row of warehouses. Worry was beginning to gnaw at him when at last he caught a glimpse of the familiar patterns on a tunic of a slight figure darting furtively around the backs of the dockworkers.

  “Sorry I’m late.”

  Mala sounded a bit winded when she finally came up to the door, wet clothes clinging to her skin.

  “For a minute, I fancied someone was following me along the market street, so I hid until I was sure no one was watching. I think nerves just made me jumpy.”

  “We must hurry,” Warren said. Standing close to him, Stephan could feel the tension reverberating through his body, resonating with his own. “The cargo loading pier is that way. The Gazelle ’s supply boat should still be there, gods willing. The surfman knows who I am; if he’s there, we’ll have no trouble getting on board.”

  Stephan’s tunic and the new scarf he wrapped around his head—made of thin cotton rather than silk—were soaked through in a matter of seconds as they slipped through the doorway and walked briskly toward the wooden piers, keeping to the sides of the warehouses. He shivered, but there was something oddly nostalgic about being caught in the rain, a memory of much simpler adventures of a childhood he could no longer revisit.

  Warren, who was leading the way with Stephan and Mala creeping behind him, suddenly stopped, shaking Stephan out of the momentary melancholy.

  “What is it?”

  “Here,” Warren whispered, and they all huddled, hidden by the tall pile of crates he’d indicated. His short hair was plastered to his forehead, and the gray light washed out his features. “There, by the flagpole.”

  Stephan peeked cautiously around one of the crates. The rain beat against his face at an angle, and he blinked rapidly, squinting until he saw Otis, wearing the same sailor’s attire when he’d attacked them in that alley what seemed like ages ago. The man stood on the edge of the wharf with his back to the water, turning this way and that. Every once in a while he’d run his hand over his wet face in irritable, jerky motions, as if the rain that was currently thwarting his efforts was a personal affront.

  “Shit.” Stephan slunk back, his heart hammering. “I knew they’d be watching the port.”

  “Do you think he followed
me here after all?” Mala’s brow creased in dismay. “If it’s my fault—”

  “It’s not,” Stephan hurried to assure her. “It only stands to reason they’d try to prevent us from leaving, and the harbor is the most obvious route. Besides, he’s probably been standing there for a while.”

  “The pier we need is right there,” Warren said, frustration lacing his voice. “See the boat with the red stripe on the stern? That’s the Gazelle ’s marking. But however we approach it, he’ll spot us. Not to mention there’s certain to be others looking for us.”

  “Do we wait until there are more people about?” Stephan asked. The rain was slowly easing up, the heavy gray clouds drifting away into the distance.

  Warren shook his head. “We might miss the ship. It’s getting late already as it is. Maybe if we could distract him somehow?”

  “I have an idea,” Mala said, turning to them. “But it’s risky. Do you two trust me?”

  “Yes,” Stephan said without hesitation. Warren nodded. Stephan knew it wasn’t easy for his lover to cede control of any situation, much less one that involved their safety, but it appeared Mala had earned his confidence.

  “Warren and I could create a distraction.” Her Segati pronunciation lent his name a foreign flare, making it sound like “Vareen.”

  “How?”

  “They’ve already seen you adopt a feminine style, and he is hard to miss.” Mala nodded toward Warren. “If they see me with him, they’ll assume it’s you in a woman’s clothing. That way, we can draw them away while you hide on the boat, and none would be the wiser.”

  What she was proposing could work—in theory. Wearing the same clothes, standing at about the same height, sporting the same length of braid that held their hair, they could pass for twin sisters, if it weren’t for the difference in their skin tones—which was less noticeable now with both of them having wrapped white scarves around their heads and necks against the rain. If they kept their faces averted, a casual observer might have difficulty telling them apart. But Otis was no casual observer, and he knew Stephan’s face all too well.

  “That’s too dangerous. What if they catch you?” Stephan frowned.

  “They won’t,” Mala said firmly. “I have a plan to throw them off course.”

  Stephan knew better than to doubt Mala’s capabilities, but this was still a far greater risk than he could in good conscience allow her to take on his behalf.

  “No,” he said emphatically. “If something happens to you—Mala, wait! What are you doing?!”

  Unheeding, she’d grabbed Warren by the hand and was running, dragging him after her by power of will rather than force. Warren had no choice but to follow, glancing over his shoulder at Stephan and gesturing frantically to the red-striped boat.

  Stephan cursed under his breath and hunkered down in the shelter of the crates, ready to bolt at any moment. He watched with growing anxiety as Mala and Warren ran down the wharf, jostling the dock workers and the loaded carts that brought the shipping cargo to the piers.

  They were definitely hard to miss. The mules hitched to the carts shied away in agitation as Mala and Warren sprinted past them, followed by the shouts of the annoyed longshoremen. Stephan saw Otis’s head snap their way. He raised his hand, signaling to an unseen accomplice hiding, it looked like, somewhere among the larger boathouses, and ran after them, seemingly more oblivious of the growing crowd than they had been. Seconds later, he was joined by another man, whom Stephan recognized as the brute who’d held him in a viselike grip in the empty alley the day before. He flinched, instinctively trying to make himself as small as possible, but the men didn’t glance in his direction. It seemed that despite Otis’s hypervigilance—or maybe because of it—Mala’s pretense at disguise had worked after all.

  Stephan waited for a few more seconds, just to make sure no one else was lurking nearby to pounce on him unawares, and then bolted toward the pier where the Gazelle ’s boat was moored. Instead of wasting precious minutes speaking with the surfman (whom Stephan, unlike Warren, had never met) and risking being spotted, he planned on climbing into the boat from the tie-off piling which secured the boat in place while being loaded. Hopefully, the crew wouldn’t notice and he could explain his presence there once Warren safely joined him. But he came to a halt by the boat’s mooring bollard, riveted by the scene unfolding on the breakwater that protruded into the sea where the natural shoreline gently curved outward.

  The rain had finally stopped, and a beautiful rainbow shone in the clean sky, brilliant under the rays of the rising sun. The top surface of the breakwater, awash in white foam, was clearly visible from this vantage point, and several people turned their heads to watch tiny figures running along the straight, narrow path away from the harbor. At this distance, Stephan could make out Warren’s tall silhouette and Mala’s slender figure, the long scarf trailing behind her. The two pursuers were hot on their heels, and Stephan thought he could glimpse a flash of light reflected off the blades of the knives in their hands.

  His throat suddenly dry, he clutched the slimy top of the bollard without the action properly registering in his brain. All his attention was on the breakwater, where Warren and Mala had just about reached the rocky edge with nowhere left to go. There was only a sheer, high drop into the sea.

  What in the world were they thinking? Stephan had been sure they would lead the assassins back into the city, where it’d be easier to lose them in the commotion of the opening markets and the twisting of jumbled streets before doubling back to meet with him. But taking the worst possible route that would expose them, with no means of escape?

  He should not have agreed to it. Well, he hadn’t agreed to it really, but he should have stopped them from going off like that. And what was he doing, standing there, gaping in disbelief with the other spectators while his lover and his friend were out there fighting for their lives?

  Stephan broke into a run toward the breakwater, though he knew he could never get there in time. The men were closing in on Warren and Mala fast. There wasn’t anything he could realistically do to help them, either; he was unarmed and injured, exhausted after a long sleepless night. But he didn’t care. Even if they all ended up dead, there was no way he was leaving them to their fate. He didn’t want to live in a world that didn’t have Warren in it anyway.

  But as always, it seemed he was too slow to make any difference. Shoving his way along the wharf, he didn’t dare take his eyes off the breakwater, and so, stricken with impotent horror, he saw Warren and Mala reach the very end of the stony elevation, and, without breaking stride or letting go of each other’s hand, leap into the churning waters below.

  Everything around him slowed, coming to a screeching halt. Stephan stopped too, staring at the spot where they’d gone under, the waves crashing furiously against the wet rocks. His heart skidded, missing a beat and then another, as if he’d forgotten how to breathe.

  Otis and his accomplice paused at the edge, peering down and then at each other. The Seveiharian gestured furiously, probably in frustration at having lost their quarry once more. Other people who had witnessed the spectacle were now running along the breakwater too, shouting, either to see what had become of the couple crazy enough to jump into a stormy sea, or to try to pull them out. Otis and the other man pushed their way back among the rapidly gathering onlookers, but Stephan hardly paid them any attention.

  He strained to see if something, someone, had broken the surface of the water, but he was too far away, and the sea too turbulent, even within the confines of the harbor. Dock workers and longshoremen shouted to each other around him, and the gulls cried overhead, but he could scarcely hear them over the rising high-pitched noise in his ears that had nothing to do with the surrounding din.

  It was all wrong. Stephan’s first impulse was to run to the breakwater to look for them, maybe dive into the sea after them. But he knew Warren too well to believe the man would do something so singularly reckless if he didn’t believe he’d live th
rough it. He wouldn’t do that to Stephan. Not after everything they had said to each other while hiding in a doorway on a back street, having narrowly escaped falling off a rooftop while dodging pursuit. He had to know Stephan had meant every word. He’d much prefer offering his throat up to Robert’s minions than letting Warren sacrifice his life for his well-being.

  Besides, Mala was with him, and she’d practically grown up on these waters, tending her father’s boat. She’d know if that maneuver was too dangerous. And she did say she had a plan. It was probably nothing more than a ruse to confuse and throw off their pursuers. But in the wake of a thunderstorm, the sea was too restless, the waves too violent. What if she’d misjudged their chances of emerging unscathed?

  The crowd on the breakwater was beginning to disperse, driven away by the gale. The sun was climbing up above the city, relentless in its progression. The day was starting, and time was running out. Stephan turned his head, gripped by helpless indecision. His hands began to shake, and he clutched the hem of his wet tunic with his good hand, forcing himself to focus on something other than the paralyzing panic.

  Mala had asked if he trusted her, and he did. He had to. There was simply no other option but to believe she knew what she was doing, and that her gamble would pay off. If everything had gone to plan, they would be coming here after him. The best thing he could do was to stay by the boat and wait for them.

  Reluctantly, he turned back to the pier, keeping his head low and his gait as feminine as possible so as not to give himself away. He couldn’t help glancing backward to the breakwater every so often, but to no avail. He didn’t try to get aboard the boat, choosing instead to wait by the wayside, trying to scan the entire port all at once, on a tense lookout for both friends and foes. Stephan had little doubt there were more people out there hunting him, and after everything Warren and Mala had gone through for his benefit, it wouldn’t do being spotted by another spy.

  The sailors gave him curious looks, probably puzzled by the presence of a strange young woman pacing in agitation up and down the pier, but Stephan paid them no heed other than noting that the boat was almost finished loading. He resolved to delay the surfman for as long as he could before giving up on that particular route. There was no question of him boarding the boat to the Gazelle alone.