by Kirby Crow
Scarlet took a deep breath and set to work on Liall's shoulder. Liall shuddered a few times as Scarlet cleaned the wound thoroughly, but otherwise held perfectly still and made no protest, even when Scarlet's fingers dug inside his torn flesh to check for bits of metal or wood lodged in the wound.
The cut had bled profusely. A smaller man, a Hilurin or Aralyrin, would have been dead already from it. Liall began to shiver as Scarlet wiped the last of the blood away and heaped blankets over him and around him, leaving only the wound bare.
"I'll get the thread,” Scarlet said.
"Do you know how to do this?"
Scarlet took a deep breath. “Yes. Scaja showed me. I've done it for horses, but never a man."
"Flesh is flesh. You will do fine."
Scarlet smiled wanly over his shoulder. “I should be the one comforting you, not the other way ‘round."
There was a knock at the hatch and Liall snapped to alertness. Scarlet answered it and found a straight-faced mariner with a bundle in his hands. The bundle proved to be clean linen for binding and dressing a wound. Scarlet thanked the man, but the mariner turned on his heel and left, not acknowledging him. It seemed that Byzans were still enemy even after they allied with Rshani in battle.
Scarlet set the bundle near Liall and opened his small packet of medicines to take out the needle and boiled thread. There was some yellow sulfa powder in there, too, fine as dust and smelling faintly of rotten eggs. This he sprinkled painlessly on Liall's wound before he put the needle through the candle flame. It took him three tries to thread the needle. He sat beside Liall.
"You'll need to hold very still,” he warned.
"Just do it."
Liall held quiet, aside from an occasional tremor as his muscles tightened. Scarlet forced himself not to think of it as living flesh as he concentrated on making the stitches small and neat. The wound was cleanly-made and the cut had slid deep sideways, rather than in. To Scarlet, it appeared that Liall had spun out of reach before the blade could thrust forward, and the edge had slid over the top of his muscle, creating a long, deep gash that bled much, but had failed to strike any vital areas.
Liall was barely awake when Scarlet cut the last stitch and readied the linen packing for the wound. He wound strips of linen under and around Liall's arm, and then made a small, careful knot.
Scarlet nodded with satisfaction. “That should hold."
"Good job,” Liall said faintly. “Now ... I will rest for a bit.” But he struggled to open his eyes. “I told you to stay below."
Scarlet shrugged.
"I looked for you,” Liall said. “At the end, when the battle turned to our favor, I could not see in the mist and the smoke. I was frightened,” he admitted.
"You?” Scarlet scoffed. “Never."
"I realized,” Liall said slowly “what an opportune moment it was to be rid of an unwanted passenger.” He flinched when he saw the shock in Scarlet's eyes. “One well-placed knife in the midst of battle and no one would think it strange."
"I know the crew doesn't care for me,” Scarlet said, shaken. “But why would any of them want me dead?"
"I did not say they did. And I do not truly believe that anyone is planning it, but ... my experience with the nature of men does not allow me to take risks.” He reached for Scarlet's hand and his voice turned softer. “I really did not believe you would stay below. You have too much heart to stay hidden while others fight for their lives."
"Don't bet on it,” Scarlet returned tartly. “Now that I've seen a battle, I realize I don't care to see another. Ever. If those pirates come back, you might find me hiding in a barrel.” Scarlet belatedly remembered Liall throwing the blade into the Morturii's throat. “Thanks for throwing that knife."
Liall produced a sickly grin and Scarlet pulled the last blanket over him. Scarlet burned the cloth he had used to clean Liall's wound in the brazier, and when he finished this task he saw that Liall was fast asleep. Now he could see to his own injuries, if there were any.
His clothing was beginning to stiffen with blood, so he stripped to the skin in the cold cabin, shivering as he washed himself with the last of water. It was then that he discovered that some of the blood on him was his own, after all. He had a few slashes here and there, nothing that cleaning and salve would not take care of. He washed the cuts carefully with water and pressed the yellow powder over the red lines and forgot about them.
Captain Qixa entered the cabin without knocking just as Scarlet had finished dressing in his only other set of clean clothing. Qixa cast a narrow look at Scarlet as he checked Liall's wound, pursing his lips and nodding in grudging approval.
"Very good,” Qixa said in heavily-accented Bizye. “He will sleep now, and wake strong. Watch for fever."
Scarlet nodded. “I'll care for him.” It was the first time he had spoken to Qixa since the voyage began.
Qixa stared at Scarlet. “You fought hard, lenilyn child. The odds were very bad, but we won anyway. Perhaps you are not bad luck, after all,” Qixa said, and then went out quickly, as if he were afraid Scarlet would take it as a compliment.
Scarlet gave the hatch a sour look and piled their bloodied clothing into a heap. Later, he would see about washing them, but just now the constant, brassy stink was making his head hurt. Liall was snoring softly.
"Sure, leave me all the work, just like at Volkovoi,” Scarlet muttered in amusement. “I'd rather be working than hurt, though, so you sleep on, Wolf."
Liall sighed in his sleep. Clean and dry, Scarlet carefully crawled into the bunk beside Liall and closed his eyes as exhaustion claimed him. They could all have died out here in the cold sea, their bodies dumped, the ship stolen, and no one would have known what happened. Annaya would never have known, and Liall's Kasiri tribesmen would have waited and wondered until Liall the Wolf faded from memory.
He fell into dreamless sleep, but woke later with a start, his heart leaping in his throat. It was near dark, and he reached over to feel Liall's skin, which was warm and damp to the touch. He pressed the back of his hand to Liall's throat to feel the rapid beat of his pulse, wondering if blood loss caused fever in these strange Rshani or if the wound were becoming inflamed or if he should wake the captain.
But the symptom did not seem strange, given the nature of Liall's injury. He fell back asleep. The next dawn, he was sorry that he had not called for the captain. Liall was sweating and tossing in the bunk, his bronze skin gone gray as ash. Liall slept much, and when he did rouse to partial consciousness, it was only to slap aside the cup of water Scarlet tried to force down his throat or to cry out a name—Nadei!—in a tone so heartbroken that it wrote questions across Scarlet's mind.
Qixa, when he came again, did not seem concerned. He made a see-saw motion with his beefy hand. “It is often so. Wait a day or three."
Or three? Scarlet scowled, but there was little he could do. He stayed with Liall throughout the day, feeding him broth and the delicate, rose-scented che that he whispered a withy chant over, first being careful to check that Liall was sound asleep. Liall never woke fully, and the fever did not want to depart his bones. It would leave him for an hour and then flare back again. At sunset, Scarlet slept beside Liall, one hand on Liall's chest to serve as an alarm should the man stir or thrash out of the bunk. At dawn, Scarlet was woken by Liall trying to get out of the bunk.
Scarlet seized hold of Liall's arm and pulled him back. “No, you must lie down."
"Scarlet, let me up before I piss myself,” Liall growled.
He let go. “Oh, you've been feverish, I thought ... never mind."
Liall wrapped a blanket around him and stumbled out of the cabin. When he returned, he lit a candle before seating himself heavily in the chair to survey the wreck Scarlet had made of the cabin. Liall looked years older, sitting there with nothing but a blanket around his waist and the bandages covering his shoulder and chest.
"You stayed with me, cared for me.” Liall said, as if this were a puzzle he was tr
ying to solve.
"Did you think I'd pitch you overboard?"
Liall gave Scarlet a weary look and rose. Scarlet moved over to make room as Liall climbed back into the bunk. “Some would.” Liall tried to peer under his bandage.
Scarlet pulled Liall's hand away. “Leave that alone."
Liall clasped Scarlet's hand. He looked at the slender, pale fingers against the dark skin of his palm. It was Scarlet's left hand, the one with only four fingers. “I owe you my thanks."
"It was nothing."
Liall released him. “Then it follows that my life is nothing.” He stared stonily at the ceiling. “This is the second time I have reason to be grateful to you. Your debt to me, if it ever was a debt, is paid."
Scarlet rose up on his elbow. “That's not for you to decide."
"Even so,” Liall said stubbornly “I consider it paid. We are even now."
Scarlet did not know whether to be amused or annoyed. “Because you say so?"
"I...” Liall faltered and stopped. He turned his head to look up at Scarlet. “I do not want you to be grateful to me any longer. I want nothing from you that you do not give willingly, of yourself alone, and not from gratitude or your sense of duty. Do you understand?"
Scarlet thought he might. Steeling himself, he reached over and placed his hand upon the thickened pad of bandages over Liall's wound. “This was close, just above your heart."
To Scarlet's surprise, Liall suddenly shifted away from him and turned his head. “The man was not trying for my heart. He wanted my head, but he was clumsy."
It felt like a rebuke. Scarlet withdrew his hand slowly and rolled over on his back. He watched the sway of the lantern and wondered if he should try again to reach Liall or abandon the effort. Perhaps he had made a mistake. Perhaps Liall had changed his mind about desiring him some time ago.
Liall broke the silence. “You say this was your first real battle?"
"Yes.” Then, suspiciously, “Why do you ask?"
"Not just because you are Hilurin,” Liall said, divining his thoughts. “Because you are young and you were never trained as a warrior should be, and I know how dealing death can haunt a man."
Scarlet nodded. He could accept being seen as young, but not as weak simply because he was not a ten-foot-tall foreigner with pale hair. “I don't like killing,” he said slowly “but I won't be killed without a fight."
"You are a brave man,” Liall said softly, and just that quickly, he closed his eyes and was asleep again.
Scarlet felt Liall's skin again and sagged in relief when he found it cool and dry. Shivering dully, he pulled the blankets up to Liall's chin, too weary even to feel the cold before he drifted back into sleep. He woke perhaps an hour later and went out to fill the water skins and fetch fresh bandages from the mate who was on watch, an affable man named Ulero who was Mautan's replacement, and—like Mautan—much less hostile than his fellows. Qixa was nowhere to be seen, and Scarlet remembered that Liall had commented that he and Mautan were close. At least Mautan would be missed by someone.
When Scarlet returned, he was afraid he would wake Liall if he got back into the bunk, so he made another pallet on the floor. When Liall woke later, he cursed Scarlet roundly for freezing himself on the floor. Scarlet was so relieved that Liall felt well enough to be angry, he didn't even argue.
4.
Rough Seas
Liall tried to sleep. The roll and pitch of the ship soothed him, as it always did, but it also deviled his memory. Sleep, fool, he thought with his eyes closed. Some of my best and worst memories are tied up in the sway of a deck beneath me. It was on a ship that I fled from Rshan the first time, an exile, disgraced and aching and tormented by what I had done. I loved sailing as a boy, and Nadei...
He cut the thought short, knowing through long experience that it was unwise to think of that person in the aftermath of a battle. His thoughts would only become darker and fouler until the cage of his brain threatened to drag him down into darkness.
Liall concentrated on breathing, eyes still shut. The timbers of the cabin creaking and the rush of the swell against the hull should have gentled him to sleep, but it did not.
Nadei was eight and Liall was seven, and they were on the water. The air was cold and Nenos was teaching the boys how to row. Liall had shouted at him, laughing: Nadei! Do not stand up in the boat, you will tip us over! Nadei was always so certain of himself, so stubborn and reckless. Liall had to watch out for him in a hundred ways, as if he were the elder and not Nadei. They were always together, day and night, sleeping in the same room, learning from the same teachers, eating from the same plate, brothers in blood and bone.
Liall gritted his teeth and rolled over in the bunk, squeezing his eyes tighter against the smarting tears that threatened. He mentally ticked off the numbers: sixty years and a handful of months since he had last seen Nadei. What had happened to Rshan in that time, to his home, his family? He flung out his arm, expecting to find warmth next to him, and touched a cold, empty space. He opened his eyes and rolled over.
Scarlet was sitting silent in the chair beneath the port hole, wide awake. It was perhaps eight days after the pirate battle.
"You have done that before,” Liall said slowly. “Watched me while I slept."
Scarlet blinked lazily and nodded.
The timbers creaked and the thin shadow of a fingernail moon flowed into view through the porthole, just over Scarlet's head. It had waxed and waned three times since they had left Volkovoi. Liall watched the silver sickle drift in and out of the black eye as the ship rode the waves, gazing at him. It was a weightless silence with comfort in it, and words seemed an intrusion.
It was Scarlet who broke the spell. “I like to watch you sleep. You look ... more like someone I'd know."
A curious thing to say, but it made sense. Since Scarlet had begun, Liall decided to forge ahead. “There is something between us, is there not? Something more than just my attraction for you and yours for me. Something we haven't spoken of yet."
After a long moment, Scarlet sat forward a little in the chair and folded his hands as if in prayer. “I dreamed about you last night. You were riding a gray horse with a blue banner."
A sharp hurt struck Liall in the center of his breastbone. “Go on."
"I called out to you, but you wouldn't answer me, and then you left on a ship with great white sails, and I stood on the shore and called to you, but you wouldn't come back.” Scarlet rubbed his hands together slowly. “It made me sad. Then I woke up and I was here with you, and after all these months when I thought you wanted me, now you don't seem to. Plus, the crew...” he bit his lip and struggled with the next part of it. “These men look at me in a way I'm unused to. They don't have any respect for me, not because I'm young or because I'm a pedlar, but just because I'm Hilurin and they assume I'm with you because you pay me to be with you, or because you own me like you would own a dog or a horse.” He looked down. “It hurts my pride to be thought of as a bought thing."
"Thank you,” Liall answered at length “for being so honest with me.” He began to get up.
"Whoa,” Scarlet quickly rose and pushed him back with the flat of his palm on Liall's chest, his knee on the bunk. “Hold on. You got the truth out of me. I'll have my measure in return, thank you."
"Ah. Of what?"
Scarlet blew his breath out in exasperation and shook his finger in Liall's face. “See here, if you weren't hurt, I'd clout you one for that. I've about had enough of your fancy language and smart ways. Just give me plain talk for once."
Liall raised my hands in surrender and fell back on the bunk, smirking. “Spare me, gentle lord."
"Very funny. Now tell."
His smile faded. There was something too honest in Scarlet's eyes, something that looked too deep into him. It seized any words he had and held them back. “I do hold a ... a certain affection for you. You already know this"
"And?"
"And I..."
"Yes?"
"Scarlet, please.” Liall averted his eyes, turning his face to the wall. “You cannot know what this is like for me."
"I certainly can't, if you don't tell me."
Damn him. “My heart,” Liall began, feeling his throat begin to close up. “Good gods, Scarlet, if you think the seas here are cold, you do not know what my heart was like before I saw you. I have not loved another in a very long time."
Scarlet's mouth twitched into a small, hesitant smile. “Are you saying—"
Liall pushed himself up and him away, his pulse hammering. Suddenly, the cabin felt small and airless. I am about to suffocate, he thought wildly. “Cease this questioning, can you not?” he snapped, almost gasping.
Scarlet reached out to him. “Liall."
"I will not be badgered!” Liall shouted, and Scarlet recoiled.
"But,” Scarlet stammered. “You started this."
Liall was frightened enough of the feelings woken inside him to lash out. “I asked if we were going to be lovers, if we were going to share our bodies. What you are asking me to share is something altogether different."
The words took a moment to sink in, during which time Liall had serious visions about cutting his own tongue out.
Like dousing a candle flame, the warmth went out of Scarlet's young face. “I see.” He rose and began putting on his coat, his gaze averted.
"Scarlet."
Scarlet busied himself with his buttons and turned away, ignoring Liall even when he stood and drew near.
"Scarlet, wait."
"I'm going out on the deck to look at the moon,” Scarlet told him conversationally, pulling on his gloves. “If you want to stop me, you'd better hope that your stitches hold, for I'm tired of being told what to do by a man who wants nothing more of me than what's between my legs."
"I lied.” Liall grabbed his arm and turned him around. Scarlet hissed in pain and Liall let him go, mindful that he had wounds, too. “I lied, Scarlet. I care about you very much.” He took a deep and shaking breath, watching Scarlet. “It costs me greatly to say that, so you can believe me."