by Ginn Hale
He guessed that it would be a while before Javier joined him, so he laid his coat and vest aside and went for a run along the new racecourse. The lane cut through a small stand of willows, where Kiram passed two young women, then looped back to the training hall. As Kiram circled to take a third lap he heard someone running behind him, fast. For an instant Kiram thought it might be Javier chasing him, but when he glanced back he recognized Musni, dressed only in linen trousers and bearing down on him.
As they reached the willows Musni closed the distance between them. Glancing back, Kiram caught the assurance in Musni’s expression. No doubt he expected to overtake Kiram easily. Kiram threw himself ahead, his heart pounding as he pushed himself into an all-out sprint. The cool spring air burned in his lungs.
He could hear Musni pounding the track behind him and breathing just as hard. He felt Musni’s hand brush his back, tracing his spine.
A wild, competitive energy surged through Kiram and he pulled ahead. His legs burned and the first pang of a cramp bit into his side, but he pushed himself harder. The red clay track and surrounding green grounds blurred. Kiram tore past the training hall and crossed the iron posts of the starting line.
As he turned back to gloat, Musni hurtled into him and both of them fell onto the grass lawn.
“You ass.” Kiram tried to rise but Musni remained sprawled on top of him, laughing.
“Keep squirming.” Musni grinned at Kiram. “It feels good.”
Kiram stilled, too tired to fight. The pungent tang of sweat and cut grass rolled over him.
Musni shifted but didn’t rise. He pressed the damp heat of his bare chest against Kiram. Almost casually he pressed his hips against Kiram. Kiram’s entire body responded to the familiar weight. They had wrestled like this so many times before.
“Get off me,” Kiram insisted.
Musni’s expression was no longer teasing but aroused. The fragrance of honey wine drifted on his breath. He held Kiram fast.
“Seriously, Musni,” Kiram said. “Get off of me.”
“Why would I want to do that?” Musni asked.
“Because you want to keep breathing,” Javier’s voice was a low growl.
Startled, Musni recoiled from Kiram. Javier stood less than a foot from Kiram’s head with one hand clenched around the hilt of his sword.
“Who the holy fuck are you?” Musni demanded.
“He’s a friend of mine.” Kiram scrambled to his feet, placing himself between the two men. “Javier, this is Musni.” Kiram suspected that he could have been shouting gibberish for all the impact his words seemed to have. The look of cold murder on Javier’s face was matched by the angry contempt in Musni’s expression.
“What the fuck are you glaring at, Cadeleonian?” Musni snapped at Javier. “You’re in the Haldiim district! We have our own laws here and if you don’t want to see lovers embrace then you shouldn’t be here!”
“I wasn’t seeing lovers embrace,” Javier replied. “He told you to get off him.”
“What’s between Kiram and me is none of your concern.” Musni’s hand dropped to his hip and Kiram suddenly realized that he had reached for his knife.
Out of the corner of his eye Kiram glimpsed the black-clad forms of several Civic Guards walking from the archery range towards them. Kiram caught Musni’s hand and pulled it off his knife. He looked to Javier.
“How’s Lunaluz?” Kiram asked in Cadeleonian. Javier blinked, then he too caught sight of the approaching group of guards. He released his sword hilt and let his coat fall closed.
“He’s still tired after our ride from the academy,” Javier said. “He just wanted me to feed him and brush him. Make much of him.”
Kiram nodded. Javier at least could be counted upon to control himself.
“So.” Kiram released Musni’s hand. “Let me make the introductions again. Javier, this is my childhood friend, Musni. Musni, this is my friend and schoolmate, Javier.”
The two of them exchanged a cold smile but made no move to shake hands.
“How’s the racing?” one of the four Civic Guards called out.
“Better than minding your own fucking business, obviously!” Musni sneered back at the guard.
“What is wrong with you?” Kiram demanded of Musni. “Are you looking for a fight?”
Musni just gave Kiram a crooked grin as if he couldn’t be held accountable for himself. “A fight or a fuck. Whichever you want, lover.”
“Neither,” Kiram replied flatly. He guessed that Majdi had been right about Musni. It was disconcerting to see how much he’d changed in a year.
The Civic Guards—there were four—surrounded them in an almost casual manner. One of them seemed very familiar with Musni and after a couple of minutes of conversation the man convinced Musni to join him in the new bathhouse. The other guards watched their comrade escort Musni away, then one of them turned back to Kiram.
“You’re Mother Kir-Zaki’s youngest?” the guard asked. He was older and appeared to be a career guard with his deeply tanned skin and tightly braided white hair.
“Yes, sir,” Kiram replied.
“My son had a wonderful time at your party last night,” the guard said.
“I’m glad. Please thank him for coming.” Kiram had no idea who the man’s son was but he smiled and Javier followed suit.
“Welcome back home. You and your friend be safe.” The guard turned and followed his fellows back across the grounds to the archery range.
“Well,” Javier said quietly. “That was awkward.”
“You think?” Kiram found his vest and coat and dressed despite the sweat clinging to his back and chest. He certainly wasn’t going to use the public bath now. “Did you have to go for your sword?”
“He had you down on the ground. How was I supposed to know that it was some kind of love play for the two of you?” Javier’s face colored just saying the words.
“It wasn’t anything even close.” Kiram scowled at Javier.
“No?”
“No,” Kiram replied.
Javier raised a brow as though he found this all suddenly funny. “It would have been if I’d been the one lying on top of you.”
Kiram smiled in spite of himself but then shook his head. “Last night you couldn’t bring yourself to dance with me at a party but today you’re going to make love to me on a public race track?”
“Now that I have this piglet talisman,” Javier held up the little copper disk, “who knows what I might find the poor judgment to do?”
“Why don’t we visit my uncle for lunch and you can show your piglet to Alizadeh?”
“I’d like that.”
They left the broad streets of the civic buildings, open markets and teahouses behind. Kiram led Javier past simple private homes and down the narrow lanes that Cadeleonians rarely traveled. Almond trees hung their fragrant clusters of blossoms low and from time to time couples leaned close beneath the trees and flirted.
A block from Rafie’s house Javier caught sight of two men kissing and he stopped in his tracks, staring at them. From Javier’s expression Kiram would have thought he was witnessing a miracle. They were handsome enough, though neither of them struck Kiram as worthy of the gaping Javier seemed to be giving them.
The young lovers broke apart and one caressed the other’s arm and then, hand in hand, they retreated into a house.
“Did you see them?” Javier asked in a whisper. His gaze lingered on the almond tree where the two men had stood. “I’ve never seen that.”
“A kiss?” Kiram asked.
“Not like that. They were like lovers in a poem, but both men…” Javier looked at Kiram suddenly and his expression seemed both tender and searching. “Like us.”
“Adari,” Kiram said. “That’s the Haldiim word for men like you and like me, who are drawn to other men. Lots of adari live on this street.” Kiram continued towards Rafie’s house and Javier walked beside him. Doves sheltered in many of the trees, but here Kiram sighted
crows as well. The glossy black birds seemed to return Kiram’s gaze.
“Your uncle Rafie is…an adari?” Javier asked.
“Yes,” Kiram replied. “His husband Alizadeh is one as well.”
“And everyone knows?” Javier asked.
“It’s not like it’s illegal here in the Haldiim district.”
“Maybe not illegal but still…” Javier trailed off.
“Shameful?” Kiram supplied and Javier’s expression told him he’d guessed correctly. Kiram stopped at Rafie’s door but didn’t pull the bell just yet. “It’s not even shameful. It’s just normal. Why did you think all those men were dancing with each other at my party last night?”
“There weren’t many women there and Cadeleonian dancing seemed new to most of them. I just thought they didn’t know any better.” Javier stared at Kiram with a strange look of dawning comprehension. “All of them at your party were adari? Not just that Hashiem?”
“All of them,” Kiram confirmed.
“Even the young Bahiim?” Javier asked.
“Vashir?” Kiram raised his brows. “Especially Vashir. I told you he was courting twins.”
“Twins could be women,” Javier pointed out.
“He said that he wanted to ride you, Javier.”
“Like an animal,” Javier protested. “He called me an animal.”
“He meant it as a sexual overture.” Kiram couldn’t keep from smirking. “I suppose I should have told you that last night when he asked me to. But I thought you knew.”
“No.” A shadow of anxiety crossed Javier’s face. “Did they know about me? All of them?”
“No, Majdi’s the only one who knows. Well, Rafie and Alizadeh obviously know that I’m close with you but I haven’t told them anything. No one else would even suspect. You’re just too Cadeleonian.”
Javier seemed to relax. “It’s strange how different things are here.”
“Too different?” Kiram recalled how overwhelmed he had felt the first few weeks he had lived in the Cadeleonian world of the Sagrada Academy. And he had even known what to expect; he’d studied Cadeleonian literature, language and history. He’d spent days wandering through the Cadeleonian district of Anacleto in preparation.
“It just doesn’t seem possible that all of this could be real.” Javier studied the red physician’s star above Rafie’s doorway. “This all seems like something I would find in one of those ancient Yuan travel journals.”
“Like the one that said that all Haldiim are born women?” Kiram asked.
Javier smirked at that but nodded.
“I do know what you mean,” Kiram said. “There were times at the Sagrada Academy—especially early on—when I couldn’t quite believe what was happening.”
“Like what?” Javier asked, as if he couldn’t imagine anything about Cadeleonian society as strange.
Like you, Kiram thought but he decided against it. Instead, he chose the most obvious difference. “The complete absence of women for one thing. I couldn’t believe that there could actually be an entire academy without a single woman scholar or student. That’s just unheard of in any Haldiim school. And then there was all the riding. To most Haldiim riding horses is a sure sign that you’re from a family of thieves or raiders of some kind.”
“Really?” Javier smiled, clearly liking the idea of being taken for some kind of wild raider. Just now, with his crooked smile and wind tousled hair, he did look like a dangerous and daring highwayman from one of Kiram’s favorite books.
“But it’s different, isn’t it?” Javier leaned against the doorframe close beside Kiram. “You hadn’t wanted to ride horses all your life and then come to the Sagrada Academy and seen everyone around you riding.”
Kiram nodded but his mind was hardly on the conversation. There was something in Javier’s motion, perhaps the angle of his head, the slight parting of his lips that told Kiram that he was going to kiss him. A rush of heat and excitement flooded Kiram, despite how common such exchanges might be in the Haldiim district.
Javier’s lips grazed Kiram’s mouth; his hand touched Kiram’s hip. Kiram pulled him close, opening his mouth to Javier’s. Javier’s hesitation broke and he pushed Kiram back against the door. Their kiss deepened into a rough desperation. Kiram arched his hips against Javier and Javier pulled Kiram so close that Kiram could feel Javier’s heart pounding against his own chest.
Above them, a crow let out a sharp call and they bolted apart. The bird swept past them and swooped over Rafie’s roof. Kiram laughed, feeling stupid for being so nervous. He wasn’t Cadeleonian and yet he’d startled as easily as Javier.
To his relief Javier too laughed. Then he reached out, and Kiram thought he would embrace him again, but instead Javier pulled the chain for the doorbell.
Chapter Eleven
Rafie welcomed Javier and teased Kiram about his inborn ability to time his arrival with the service of any given meal. Then he led them into the garden.
Sunlight filtered through the glossy leaves of plum and almond trees. The perfume of spring flowers paled before the strong aromas of hot oil, garlic and cinnamon. Kiram drew in a deep breath and felt hunger growling through his belly. He noticed that familiar voracity in Javier’s expression as well. If they had still been at the Sagrada Academy all pleasantries would have been forgotten in favor of wolfing down hunks of food.
As it was, they both tried not to stare at the spread of aromatic foods. Simple clay dishes heaped with lamb, rice, toasted nuts, sugared fish and greens waited on a low table near a gnarled tree. At Kiram’s mother’s house it would have been a simple meal, but Kiram knew that for his uncle Rafie this variety of dishes represented a feast.
Alizadeh smiled at them as he filled four cups with stream-cooled tea. He had already laid out plates for Kiram and Javier. Kiram thought that he really shouldn’t have been surprised at Alizadeh’s prescience by now.
“It’s an honor to meet you again, Lord Tornesal.” Alizadeh stood carefully, leaning on his cane. He offered Javier a respectful bow.
“Please call me Javier. There’s no need for formality,” Javier assured Alizadeh. “Have you been ill since we last met?” Obviously Alizadeh’s frail condition surprised Javier far more than the lunch preparations.
“A winter malady. It’s already passed. I keep the cane so that Rafie will pity me and fetch me things when I’m feeling lazy.”
“Which is most every day,” Rafie commented.
Kiram thought Alizadeh did look healthier than he had even three days earlier. He toyed with his cane more than leaned on it. Rafie still watched him with that measured, physician’s gaze, but he didn’t hover as much he had before.
All four of them settled on the ground and ate. Above them crows gathered in the tree branches and from time to time flew down to accept bits of food from Alizadeh’s hand.
Rafie tossed one a chunk of fatty lamb and the crow caught it like a trained dog.
“Are these your familiars?” Javier asked Alizadeh.
“Very familiar, yes.” Alizadeh laughed and then considered Javier with a sly smile. “I take it you read the book I sent to you.”
“I did,” Javier said, after gulping down a mouthful of lamb. “I believe I understood it pretty well.”
“Really? I can’t say that I understand most of Alizadeh’s texts.” Rafie grinned at Alizadeh. “Crazy old Bahiim aren’t the best authors, you know.”
In response Alizadeh stole an almond from Rafie’s plate. Kiram noticed the attentive way Javier studied the two of them beneath his lowered lashes.
“What about you, Kiri?” Alizadeh’s voice pulled Kiram’s attention from Javier. “Did you read any of it?”
Kiram shook his head and frowned down at his simple clay plate. He shouldn’t let himself fall into the habit of gazing longingly at Javier. They were both going to have to return to Cadeleonian society and mooning wasn’t something either of them could afford to indulge in there.
“Should I have read it?”
Kiram asked. He’d missed eating sugared minnows and now he helped himself to several as well as a heap of rice.
“No. I was just curious.” Alizadeh’s attention returned to Javier. “Most of the text concerns the obligations and duties one must accept when becoming a Bahiim. It doesn’t make for the lightest of reading nor for the easiest of lives.”
“A lot of travel, deprivation and battle. All for very little worldly reward, that’s what it sounds like.” Javier sampled one of the small sweet fish and then took two more, reverting to an air of nonchalance beneath Alizadeh’s direct scrutiny.
“Still better than being hunted all your life by a curse,” Alizadeh replied, “don’t you think?”
“Yes, the thought had occurred to me,” Javier agreed. “Even before you sent the book, but it’s…it’s a lot to give up.”
Kiram looked between Javier and Alizadeh as he realized what they were discussing.
“You’re not serious?” Kiram demanded. “If a holy father even suspected that you were suggesting to Javier that he should convert—”
“No one has said anything about conversion,” Rafie cut Kiram off. “Not a word.”
“No one’s said a word about lamb fat either but we’re all eating it!”
Alizadeh laughed at this and Rafie gave Kiram a pained scowl.
“I haven’t decided on anything.” Javier gazed down at his long hands, his expression troubled. “But I have questions that need answers and I haven’t found those answers in the Cadeleonian church.”
He seemed so serious that Kiram kept his peace.
“I’ll tell you what I can,” Alizadeh offered.
Javier lifted his gaze to meet Alizadeh’s.
“If the white hell is a shajdi, as you and Kiram say, then why haven’t I been able to use it break the curse on my family? Why can’t I make Fedeles right again?” Javier asked.
“Your white hell is definitely a shajdi,” Alizadeh assured Javier. “But you aren’t in direct contact with it. Right now you hold it like a man might hold an oil lamp. You can light its fire or snuff it out, but the flame doesn’t burn in your bare hand.”