This Dark Mirror

by Tricia Owens

  "In addition to spreading rumors among the ignorant, he’s laid magickal traps across the countryside," Jessyd told them, earning a gasp from Syellen. He nodded at her. "He doesn’t care who they kill, although he hopes they will be harming you, of course. Hadrian, most of all."

  Caled’s mouth twisted with distaste. He didn’t like that last comment, spoken so carelessly. The idea of a father eager to murder his own offspring did not sit well with him. The sentiment had sickened him in the forest village and it sickened him now. It went against everything he had been taught. Caled came from a large and very loving family. Though he no longer saw his two older brothers as much as he wished due to them being at sea most of the year, he remained in touch with the rest of his family. It had been painful for him to renounce his family name in order to pursue his revenge. But he had done it to protect the ni Agthons. His family would not be touched by blood or death if he could help it. Which made the ni Leyanon situation all the more vile to him.

  What kind of parent wished his child harm? Caled’s eyes slid over Hadrian, seeing what he always saw—a defensive young man who knew less than he admitted to. The icy glare and the standoff-ish attitude were meant to cover insecurity. Hadrian was uncomfortable everywhere he went and with every situation he encountered. He should never have left Shard’s Point Isle at all. Caled stilled as he realized Hadrian was never meant to. Gavedon had planned this for years, trying to entrap his son on the island with enforced ignorance.

  "What do you want from us?" Manix asked. The Elder had not shown whether he believed or distrusted anything Jessyd had so far told them. A wise man, Manix, but Caled still didn’t fully trust him.

  Jessyd pressed his palms flat upon the table as if to prove he was weaponless and meant no harm. "I seek your protection for as long as you may provide it. The Order is growing, its influence spreading. If I travel on my own, it’s only a matter of time before I’m murdered."

  "Our group is large enough as it is." Caled nodded at Gam and Lio, who had remained silent throughout the meal. "My friends there have asked to join us. That would make us six, though being thieves, they travel lightly and won’t hinder us. Why should we burden ourselves with one more who knows little of traveling the way we do?"

  Jessyd looked deep into Caled’s eyes. "You’re so certain I’ll be a nuisance to you?"

  Caled smirked at the other man’s veiled attempt to offer value. "If you’re anything like Hades—coddled and ignorant of the ways of the land—then yes, you’ll be a nuisance. This isn’t like traveling to enjoy the scenery. This is hard riding, little food, and bad weather. Oh, and Syellen snores like a fieran."

  "I do not!"

  Caled idly spun his dagger upon the heel of his hand. "I don’t see any reason why we should keep you with us, Jessyd. You’ll be more hindrance than not."

  "What if I told you I know the exact places where Gavedon has laid his traps for you? Without me, you’re certain to fall into every one of them."

  "You could point them out on a map," Hadrian suggested. He looked hesitantly to Caled for agreement and the mercenary nodded, choosing not to point out Hadrian’s recent introduction to the concept of cartography.

  "You could do that," Caled agreed. "If you truly knew where they are as you claim."

  "No, I couldn’t." Jessyd settled back on the bench and crossed his arms over his chest. A lock of brown hair tumbled over one eye and he left it there. "I couldn’t point them out on a map. The areas are too small. They need to be pointed out in person. Only if I’m with you can I keep you safe."

  Caled sheathed his dagger into the armguard on his left forearm. "That remains to be seen."

  "You said you had a message for Hadrian," Gam spoke up for the first time. The thief leaned forward with interest. "What is it? Who is it from?"

  Jessyd’s eyes went to Hadrian, who returned the look frostily. When that look wasn’t leveled upon himself, Caled could appreciate its force. Hadrian surrounded himself with a wall of ice so cold it blistered. But because it was ice, it was capable of being cracked. Caled had done it, he wondered if Jessyd had, too. Caled didn’t like the possibility, but it would explain Hadrian’s animosity towards his fellow sorcerer. Strong emotion like that most often stemmed from personal conflicts. Caled should know.

  "What I wish to speak to Hadrian about is between him and me." Jessyd’s voice wavered, and again, his eyes became misty as if he held back tears. "I wish his help in dealing with a difficult matter."

  If anything, Hadrian grew colder at the suggestion. His eyes were little more than chips of ice hidden behind a fringe of black lashes. Caled was curious what common bond the men could share that would make Jessyd become teary-eyed and cause Hadrian to close down?

  "I can help you with nothing," Hadrian said in an emotionless voice. "Take your troubles elsewhere."

  Caled’s eyebrows lifted. Even Manix seemed surprised by the heartless wording.

  Jessyd’s eyes were definitely moist now. "But Hadrian, only you know what I’ve been through. And it was worse. What he did to me—"

  "I don’t wish to hear it!" The platters rattled as Hadrian shoved his chair from the table and stormed from the room in a swirl of black.

  Manix pushed his own chair back, though much more slowly. "You two are contrary. I think it best you keep your distance from him, Jessyd. I shall go make sure he is settled for the night."

  Jessyd shook his head helplessly. "I don’t understand why he hates me so."

  Caled drummed his fingers on the table thoughtfully, his mind turning over the possibilities.

  ~~~~~

  Manix considered the places Hadrian might retreat to and soon found himself in the stables where their horses were being kept for the night. As he’d assumed, Hadrian was in the stall with his mount, anxiously brushing the beast’s gleaming coat.

  "You have a habit for grooming your horse," Manix said gently as he stood in the opened door of the stall. He patted the beast on its velvety nose. "You do it most often when you are upset. Does it bring you peace, Hadrian?"

  The young sorcerer didn’t look up from his strokes, but his answer came to Manix, softly and wearily spoken. "Not often enough, but sometimes it does. It reminds me of a time I wish could be repeated. A time I’ve lost forever."

  Manix studied Hadrian’s downcast face. "A time when you were with Caled?"

  Hadrian didn’t reply, which was answer enough. Manix nodded and continued to pet the warm nose nuzzling into his palm.

  "You spoke the truth about Jessyd," Manix continued quietly. "He is not your friend, is he?"

  Hadrian’s mouth thinned. He brushed the horse more quickly in his agitation. "No, he’s not. Every word out of his mouth is a lie."

  "Or perhaps his perspective is different," Manix suggested. When Hadrian looked up with narrowed eyes, Manix smiled at him. "Mayhap he always wished to be your friend, and in his mind thought you to be one to him."

  Hadrian frowned at that. "I never gave him a reason to believe I was his friend."

  Manix considered what little he knew of this young man and found himself perplexed. "Did you enjoy the isolation your father forced on you?" He could see by the pinched skin around Hadrian’s eyes that this was not the case. "Then why would you reject this boy?"

  "Because he rejected me in favor of my father’s good will! Instead of being my friend, he tried to take my place as my father’s son. Tell me why I should show him kindness, Manix, because I can’t think of a reason."

  Manix’s heart went out to the younger man. "Blaming Jessyd for Gavedon’s poor choices helps no one. Gavedon was not a good father to you, Hadrian. This is his fault alone."

  Hadrian smiled bitterly. "My father was not so bad. He loved me more than you think."

  Manix heard something in Hadrian’s voice that made him question if Hadrian viewed the past with clear eyes or if he harbored an illusion of his childhood. To admit that Gavedon didn’t love him would be to admit, in Hadrian’s eyes, that he was unworth
y of that love.

  "Hadrian, your father was not kind to you."

  Hadrian’s head whipped around, black tendrils of hair curling around his throat. His gray eyes shone like metal. "You don’t know what he was to me."

  Hadrian’s hissing voice and the eerie deadness of his expression made Manix’s skin break out in gooseflesh. To his dismay, he could see the killer that Hadrian had been in Rhiad. It worried Manix gravely, because however foolish it was to think so, he had begun to think Hadrian truly innocent of the crimes of which he was accused. But the evidence of guilt had always been before him—there was no hiding the present condition of Rhiad.

  It had seemed impossible to reconcile the man who had burned it down with the shy, troubled young man Manix had come to know. But here, in Hadrian’s denial of an abusive past, Manix caught a glimpse of the viciousness that must have been required to destroy a town. This Hadrian—this embittered, hurting version of him—was a man who could commit mass murder and survive with conscience intact. It didn’t matter if the persona had been born out of a need to survive Gavedon as a father, the effect was the same. Gavedon had created a killer.

  Manix was shaken, when he rarely ever was.

  The Elder bowed his head and stepped backward out of the stall. "I am mistaken," he said humbly. "I apologize. You are right. I know nothing of your relationship with your father save what you choose to tell me."

  Hadrian hesitated, the coldness seeping from his face, replaced with confusion at Manix’s demeanor. From one breath to the next he became the Hadrian that Manix had become fond of. Such a swift transformation troubled the Elder greatly. Which was the real Hadrian?

  "I’m sorry if I was short with you just now." Hadrian rubbed the brush in circles over his horse’s flank in short, agitated strokes. "I’m not angry with you. Truly. Jessyd’s presence is a thorn in my boot. I wish we’d never come back here. He—he upsets me."

  "But we have come back," Manix replied, studying him with new eyes, "and we must come to terms with all that we have learned here."

  Hadrian gave him a guarded look. "Are you going to permit him to travel with us?"

  "He is our only link to Gavedon and the Order. Yes, he will come with us."

  "I think it’s a mistake." Hadrian’s gaze turned inward. "But it’s not my decision to make, is it?"

  "No," Manix agreed, "it is not."

  When Hadrian leaned forward and rested his forehead against his horse’s back, Manix could not resist the impulse to comfort him. But as he gently stroked Hadrian’s hair, Manix wondered which was best: to help this young man overcome a lifetime of neglect and abuse, or to encourage the powerful sorcerer within him who would be called upon to destroy when the final confrontation arrived.

  ~~~~~

  After Manix left him in the stables, Hadrian waited an hour before returning to the inn to find his room. An hour to get his thoughts in order. An hour to rebuild the walls he wanted firmly in place before he rejoined the others. He was determined that no one would see him weak. Jessyd might have known him while Hadrian cowered beneath the domineering rule of his father, but no one else would know that version of Hadrian. Not if he could help it.

  Manix had informed him that they’d managed to rent two rooms. Jessyd would be staying with the Elder and Syellen while Hadrian was relegated to rooming with Caled and the thieves. It wasn’t ideal because Hadrian was aware Caled would prefer Hadrian not be with them. But it was preferable to sleeping in the same room with Jessyd, which Hadrian flatly refused to do.

  He received no response to his knock on the door, so he let himself inside. The thin light drizzling in through the two windows at the back of the room was the only illumination, but it was enough to show him that room contained three beds, two of which had been shoved together so that the three men could share them.

  They were already at play.

  Hadrian’s face washed with heat as he looked over their naked, writhing limbs. He had expected this after what had happened the last time they were all in Tagwar—had half-dreaded it. That Caled had wasted no time in reacquainting himself with his two friends brought up little jealousy in Hadrian. Maybe he accepted it because Caled had chosen the thieves and not Jessyd. Gam and Lio were already a couple with no permanent room for Caled. They posed no threat to Hadrian because their dalliances with the handsome mercenary were all in fun.

  They love each other as friends. What must that feel like? Don’t you wish you had friends too, Hadrian? Don’t you wish you’d given Jessyd a second chance? He made one mistake because he was afraid of Gavedon. When did you become so unforgiving? So cruel? You ask Caled to forgive you and yet you will not grant the same to Jessyd. Why not?

  The answer was simple. Jessyd was what Hadrian was not: a man who had been able to find favor with his father, a man who was comfortable with his body and with his sexuality. Jessyd was right in claiming Hadrian was in many ways the same boy he had been when they’d first met. Hadrian resented that truth. He wanted to be the man Jessyd was. The man he thought Caled wanted him to be.

  The man Caled might one day love again.

  Jessyd brought all of Hadrian’s insecurities to the surface for Caled and the others to laugh at. Why wouldn’t Hadrian hate him? Jessyd was the past he wanted to hide.

  Moving quietly, he stripped to his undertunic and slipped beneath the clammy sheet covering the other bed. Instead of turning his back on the other men, he hesitated. Holding his breath, he turned and faced them, his eyes wide open so he would see everything.

  As he watched Caled loving Gam and Lio, Hadrian was reminded of his own time with the mercenary. But his memory wasn’t of their violent sexual encounter in the boat at Shard’s Point, but of their time in Rhiad before the fires.

  Though Caled handled the thieves roughly when needed, for the most part he was gentle and sensuous, slowly guiding their limbs to better positions, kissing any skin available to him, and constantly stroking the other men to keep them in a state of mild anxiety. It was Caled’s show. He’d obviously been with multiple partners enough to know the most erotic positions, the most pleasurable pace. It made Hadrian hot to think of how often Caled had been wrapped in the arms of more than one person, how many lips had been on his skin at one time, how many bodies he’d penetrated before the sun rose.

  Caled’s strong, firm body dominated the two beds and the skinnier men lying beneath him. He was glorious to watch. Hadrian clutched the pillow under his head as arousal burned on a slow wick down his body. He shifted restlessly as his cock lengthened and thickened. He wished he were there with the thieves. He wished he could replace them and hoard Caled’s attention for his own.

  He bit his lip when Gam moaned because Caled had touched him between the legs. He rocked his hips forward when Lio gasped because Caled had sucked the thief’s nipple between his lips.

  When Gam and Lio suddenly rose up and pushed Caled onto his back, Hadrian had to bite the pillow to suppress his moan of excitement. He wanted to be there with them, licking and biting at the golden body laid out so wantonly. He wanted to taste Caled again and know that Caled permitted it, wanted it, was desperate for it because it was Hadrian, not because an aphrodisiac tainted his blood.

  Sweat beaded on Hadrian’s forehead as Lio and Gam crouched around the mercenary’s groin and bent their heads. He sucked in his breath as their tongues twined around Caled’s thick, erect flesh. Hadrian tried to remember what it tasted like, what it smelled like. He licked his lips in yearning and let out a small moan.

  Caled turned his head on the bed and looked at him.

  It was as if a hand suddenly grabbed Hadrian’s erection and squeezed it. His fingers whitened in the sheets as he fought off orgasm. He couldn’t look away from Caled’s magnetic gaze, and he didn’t want to. He remembered Caled in the boat, snarling “Mine.”

  When the mercenary smirked at him, Hadrian couldn’t find it in him to be upset. Caled taunting him was better than Caled shutting him out and Hadrian wanted to be
included in this, even if only as a voyeur.

  He watched Caled gently urge the thieves away from his groin. The mercenary’s cock, fully erect and glistening, was a thing of beauty to Hadrian. The masculinity it represented made him ache. This man, this body, had once been Hadrian’s and he’d forsaken it. Gazing upon Caled was nothing short of torture.

  But Hadrian continued to look, growing more excited as Caled urged Gam and Lio onto their hands and knees before the mercenary. The thieves faced Hadrian, though neither had noticed yet that he watched. Their heads were bowed, buttocks thrust into the air in offering. Behind them, Caled prepared to mount them, all the while watching Hadrian for reaction.

  When Caled pushed into Lio, the green-eyed thief gave a long drawn-out moan that lifted the hairs on the back of Hadrian’s neck. Caled began to use the thief with long, slow strokes that soon picked up pace. Hadrian panted in time with the two men, his body unconsciously rocking back and forth as if he were in Lio’s place. After several minutes of this, Caled pulled out with a groan and switched his attention to Gam. Hadrian trembled as the mercenary slowly eased himself into the scarred thief. Gam’s moan of ecstasy barely masked Hadrian’s. Caled pounded into Gam even harder than he had Lio.

  Hadrian’s hand drifted down the mattress, hovering over his groin. He could feel the heat from his erection like a brand just removed from the fire. He needed desperately to touch himself, to relieve the relentless pressure that was making his insides begin to cramp. He needed to squeeze and imagine it was Caled’s hand. He needed something inside him to fill him up like Caled would. To merely watch was becoming more punishment than pleasure, and Hadrian let it show on his face. He couldn’t prevent it.

  He pushed his hand beneath the sheet. He touched his thighs and felt how hot they were. They were damp with sweat and clenched, the muscles quivering. His fingertips grazed the scant hair at his groin but went no further. He’d been taught that this was wrong. He couldn’t do it. He wasn’t like Jessyd.