by Lane Robins
Again Maledicte flushed, the pale skin staining pink over cheeks and throat. Maledicte turned in Janus’s arms, kissed him as if to devour the taste of him. Maledicte guided Janus’s steps until he tumbled backward onto the bed, a golden expanse over rich crimson. Maledicte crept up Janus’s body, touching, kissing, tasting, with the same greedy, gloating hunger a starving man mustered for a sudden feast.
Janus arched his body into a bow, let Maledicte slide his breeches off and to the floor. Maledicte nestled warmly between his legs and allowed himself a leisurely reacquaintance with Janus’s body. Measuring tongue tip by tongue tip how Janus had grown, how he continued to do so, until Janus gasped and strained against Maledicte’s teasing kisses. Janus drew him up, and they tangled, each trying to map the other in touches and kisses and the shiver of skin against skin. Janus licked the shell of Maledicte’s ear, stirred gentle fingers through her heat. In return, Maledicte lapped at Janus’s throat, tasted their mingled salt, and chased the taste up to his jaw. Janus obliged him, tilting his head back, and then erupted into choking laughter. Maledicte raised his head.
“There are some quite perverse cupids watching,” Janus said.
“Vornatti’s obscenely fond of them. He had them commissioned for every private room of the house,” Maledicte said, flinching even as Vornatti’s name slipped his lips.
“Vornatti,” Janus breathed, catching Maledicte’s hands, stilling the caresses. “What are we to do with him? I gather he will not be pleased to share you. Come to think on it, neither am I.” Though the words were indifferent, the tone was not.
Again, Maledicte hovered on the brink of explanation. Again, he slid away—what could he say? That to regain Janus, Miranda would have done far worse than forswear oft-stated avowals and barter her body? Surely Janus knew that already. So instead of an explanation of how this came to be, he found himself murmuring an explanation of why it would continue, sweetening the sting of it with a meandering touch that teased nipples, traced ribs, delved into his navel, and wrapped warmly around his shaft.
“I have no name of my own, no funds that he has not granted. To leave him would be to leave with nothing save what we could carry.”
Janus laid his hands over Maledicte’s, slowing the pleasure so he could find words. “I have no funds either, save for what I won from Kritos. And we can’t risk your exposure, so you say—still, something must be done. You killed Kritos….” Janus lay back, rested his head on his hands, silently urging Maledicte’s caresses to resume.
“A gambler with a multitude of foes,” Maledicte said, frowning. He traced swords and feathers across Janus’s skin.
“One old man should prove little challenge. Especially one who grants you such access to his person.” Janus’s jaw tightened; Maledicte licked; the tension in Janus’s face traded anger for pleasure.
“True enough,” Maledicte said slowly, letting his thoughts turn dark, his movements still, sifting memories of Vornatti’s demands, his threats, comparing rewards and chastisements, against the lure of money to hand. He shuddered a little and climbed up to nestle into Janus’s strength, soaking in his surety, the pleasure of scheming with him once again.
“Is there any reason to wait?” Janus asked. “If not—”
Maledicte kissed him again, stopping his words. “He’s promised me an inheritance. I’m minded to collect it.”
“Then I’ll not stop you. Not when you look so fierce. So mercenary,” Janus said, toying with the black curls that lay over Maledicte’s shoulder. He raised the lock to his mouth, kissed it. “So bewitching. I’ve missed you….” He rolled them both over, pinned Maledicte between his arms, under his thighs. “But inherit soonest, Mal.”
Maledicte drew Janus’s head down to kiss him. “Anything for you.” He gasped, parted his thighs, and lost his hold on his courtier’s mask. This physical definition was so much more real than the shadowy grasp of personality and will.
With Janus sliding in, possessing her, there was nothing left but Miranda, clawing Janus still closer. “Janus—” she breathed, her voice caught by the damage in her throat, muted.
“Shh,” Janus said, “my love, my courtier, my dark cavalier…”
Maledicte’s fingers tensed and dug into Janus’s back, scraping the sleek indentation of the spine between muscle, the gas lights streaming and filtering through the pale gold mesh of Janus’s hair, the cherubs watching, coaxing, laughing. Maledicte closed her lashes against the incandescent blue flame of Janus’s eyes, lost in this blissful heat of touch and friction, of scent and sound. Janus’s panting was in her ear, and for a brief moment it sounded like the rasp of feathery wings, and Maledicte’s eyes flew open, trading quick startlement for rushing pleasure in the wash of blue and gold and velvet voice that was Janus in ecstasy.
Janus’s moan gave way to a breathless laugh, his blond hair drifting like spiderwebs. “And they think you a man….”
Maledicte ran speechless fingers up Janus’s chest, tugged him down to lie beside her, and slowly reassembled the guise she lived within.
Janus continued, “You always were good at misdirection, though. Remember when you bullied all the rats into pretending to be street players at the market? While we muddled along, shouting our lines, jeered at by everyone within earshot, you and Roach stole a feast for us all.”
Maledicte turned his face in the pillow; his lips quirked. “Small potatoes only. I have a larger scheme now.”
“How can that be? Am I not your end-all and be-all? Are you not completed now that I am here?” Janus said, looking at Maledicte with apparent sincerity. “Are we not bound together from childhood to death?”
Maledicte broke into a rasping laugh. “False sentimentality from you? I’d say you were disguised, and yet I know you are sober.”
“Drunk on you,” Janus said. The archness that underlaid his last set of pretty words was missing, though his expression never changed.
Maledicte touched Janus’s pale lips, slid from the bed in a sleek line of white flesh. He pulled the drapes back from one wall.
The curtain pull revealed not the outside world, glazed through silvery glass, but a small alcove with a tall, narrow table. After Mirabile’s visit, Maledicte had stored the poisons chest out of easy sight. Maledicte dug through the bottles, and retrieved a small bit of bright gold.
Maledicte approached, hands held out, fisted before him, to play their long-gone guessing game. At the last second, as Janus reached forward, he opened his right hand to reveal the ring. He could not bear to have Janus misguess.
“I saved it; Kritos let it fall. It’s not much now, but it’s still for you.” Maledicte looked at it once more, remembering it through Relict eyes, the treasure that had fallen into his hands. Gilly said such rings were common during the war—bits of jewelry melted down, reshaped, and engraved with some false trumpery, extolling the glories of battle and the hearts left at home. Knowing now the gold was of questionable quality, and the sentiment looted from a dead man’s hand, Maledicte still found it apt.
Janus took the ring, rolled it in his hands, chasing the chill of the metal away, measuring its width against his forefinger. Once, it had been too big. Now it was almost too small; it required some effort to slide it down to sit above his signet ring. He took it off again, tilted it so he could see the inscription. “I remember this. Only each other at the last.” He turned the ring around in his hands. “It was warm where you had kept it in your mouth and when I put it on, it felt like a kiss. My signet reads: Only a Last at the Last.” His mouth twisted, and he tugged his crested signet off, trading it to his left hand. “I like this motto better,” he said, sliding the plainer ring on in its place.
He reached for Maledicte, drew him back into the nest of linens, stroked the dark head resting on his chest. “It’s been so long, I don’t want to loose my grip for fear you’ll slip away. All this because I wanted to rob Kritos before he was properly out, steal his gold for you. And still, I haven’t any gold to give you, nor
jewelry.” He grinned lazily. “Probably for the best. I would never have thought of stickpins, watches, and cuff links.”
“Can you get jewelry?” Maledicte asked.
Janus laughed again. “Some, I suppose. Greedy?”
Maledicte leaned close, listening to Janus’s heartbeat, a steady sound, a companion from long ago, listening to the quiet sound of Ani’s wings answering. “It’s only that I mean to kill him, you understand. And if Vornatti’s promises are lies, we’ll be penniless.”
“Last,” Janus said, his voice flattening.
“The jewels I own will be needed for our flight. If we’re careful, we could stay in Antyre,” Maledicte said, voicing plans he had barely allowed himself to think through, too afraid to plan beyond this reunion. “We could live in the country, away from this rat-hunted city. But if the murder goes badly, we’ll have to flee Antyre completely and that takes funds.”
Janus’s supple mouth frowned, his pale eyes narrowing.
“What is it?” Maledicte said, frightened. For one moment everything had been as planned, but in the wolf-pale eyes of his lover, something forced changes. “Never tell me you love him,” Maledicte said. “I’ve sworn to kill him. I must kill him.”
“You need not scruple otherwise on my account,” Janus said, pushing himself up against the pillows, propping his chin on his knee. “I bear him no fondness, but his title, his land—” Janus’s tone dropped to an intimate whisper. “It’s a tricky business being a nobleman’s bastard, especially if one has ambition. To allow me access to the courts, Last pretended the past had happened otherwise, that Celia and he had wed, that I am legitimate. No one believes him, of course. Whoever heard of an earl not searching for an infant heir stolen away? But Aris supports me, and if I can gain the support of the counselors, then—”
“Then what?” Maledicte interrupted. “How will this see Last dead?”
“It won’t, you’ll have to do that,” Janus said, “but it will give me his title if done at the right moment. You crave Vornatti’s money. I want the title.”
Maledicte said, “It’s only a word—”
Janus shook his head. “A title is power. Listen, Mir—Mal, listen. This position of ours, of yours, is precarious.”
“I’ll kill Last; we can rob his coffers and flee.”
“And then what?” Janus said. “Money runs out. You used to teach that to those rats of yours. What happens then? Stealing? Starving? Whoring? Hasn’t Vornatti been enough for you? I suppose we could take up a profession, but what are we suited for?”
Maledicte trembled; Janus stroked her belly, soothing.
“You used to cry,” Janus said, sliding back down to lie beside Maledicte. “In the cold, when the hunger was so bad. I’d bleed myself just so you could have something warm in your mouth. I swore every year it would be better and it never was. I never want to feel so desperate again.”
Turning, Maledicte kissed Janus’s throat and whispered, “I must kill him.” As if in counterpoint, the sword, resting against the bed, fell with a hiss of scraped velvet.
“With your pretty little blade?” Janus asked. “Last is a brute but a damn good swordsman. And I mistrust the steel in painted blades.” Janus reached out a long arm, picked up the sheathed sword, and drew it. “Too often the paint dulls the edge.”
Janus fell silent, studying the blade, his fingers caged in the feather hilt. He raised a hand, curled it around the thin edges of the blade, and flinched. Blood beaded up along his fingertips and thumb and dripped to the sheets. “Where did you get this?”
When Maledicte hesitated, afraid to wake Ani from Her cautious slumber by invoking Her name, Janus shrugged. “Vornatti? Generous of him.” He attempted to sheathe the sword; the feather hilt clung and bloodied his knuckles. He dropped the blade.
“Ani gave it to me,” Maledicte said, the first time he had acknowledged Her gift aloud, a small act of worship. But far better to wake Her attention than to let Janus think Vornatti’s touch reached so far into his life. Another frisson licked his nerves—would Janus share this, the specter of a vengeful god?
“Black-Winged Ani is a myth meant to frighten superstitious bastards like my father. The dead gods returned? They never existed at all.”
Maledicte clambered over Janus, recovering sheath and sword and mating them with a practiced motion, albeit with a tinge of temper. “Ani exists. I swore I would kill Last. I swore it to Her.”
“All I ask for is delay,” Janus said. “Time to insure myself the earldom. After that it doesn’t matter what happens—we’d be as safe as we never were before.”
Maledicte trembled again, not in half-remembered dread of the Relicts, but at Ani listening to Janus’s casual blasphemy, at the thought of staying his hand when She yearned for the kill.
“So you’ll wait?” Janus said, lying back, licking the tiny cuts on his fingers closed.
“Ani willing,” Maledicte whispered, too low for Janus to hear.
“I think I’d make a splendid earl,” Janus said, smiling. He snuffed out the last low-burning lamp and dropped them into darkness.
· 16 ·
I T WAS EARLY AFTERNOON BEFORE Janus and Maledicte bestirred themselves. Maledicte, hunting Gilly, found him reading in the parlor. He leaned over Gilly’s shoulder, eliciting a start, a flush, and a guilty twitch. Tweaking the book from Gilly’s unresisting hand, Maledicte sighed. “The Book of Vengeances again? You spend more time thinking on Ani than I do.” He flipped the book into the ashy fireplace, avoiding the snatch Gilly made, and shifted to stand before the hearth.
“Come, we’re going to Whitspur Street. Janus wants to explore the city. We’ll stop at Rosany’s Booksellers and you can buy something less inclined to bring nightmares.”
“Mal—” Gilly started, but Maledicte, hearing footsteps in the hall, turned, his skin warming as Janus approached. Janus met his eyes and smiled, leaning in and kissing his temple. Maledicte wove his fingers in Janus’s hands, content, Gilly’s dark dreams and Ani’s rage insignificant.
“Ready, Mal?”
“We both are,” Maledicte said, releasing Janus to pull Gilly to his feet.
“Without luncheon? What kind of host would I be if I allowed my unexpected guest to leave hungry?” Vornatti rasped, drawing three heads to where he rested against the doorjamb. Maledicte stepped away from Janus, unnerved by the intensity of Vornatti’s gaze, by the simple fact that, though Vornatti’s morning dose of Elysia would have worn off, the man confronted them on his feet. He should have been a pitiable sight, all grayed age and aches; instead, he radiated the wary strength of a veteran soldier.
Maledicte’s thoughts raced. He had assured Janus that Vornatti would be still abed, had played up the baron’s poor flesh and feebleness to soothe Janus’s jealousy, and more, to keep Janus from slipping out at dawn. He had believed it himself; this moment found him flat-footed. Janus was more sanguine than he. A bare flicker of distaste crossed his lips before he smiled at Vornatti. “Too gracious of you, sir. I hope my presence hasn’t troubled you overmuch.”
“Visitors are always a pleasure. Trouble only comes from allowing them to stay past their welcome,” Vornatti said. He limped heavily into the room, and said, “I do warn you it is only bachelor fare. I have no hostess, though this is a lack I mean to remedy.”
Maledicte said, “If it’s Mirabile you mean, she leaves today with the Westfalls to the countryside. You’ll have to be quick, old man, or chase after her like a hound on a scent.” He tried for insouciance though his lips were cold with dread and his body crackling with nervous energy. Vornatti had the power to throw him to the streets, to throw Gilly out; did he have the power to finish the blow and see Janus sent away also, when it was Aris who wanted him in Murne? But Aris preferred lives to land once; he might put the kingdom’s fortunes above his own this time, if Vornatti made it too costly to do otherwise….
“A message will suffice to bring her to my side,” Vornatti said.
“Messeng
ers are often unreliable,” Maledicte said.
Vornatti grimaced at him, then glared at Gilly, who lowered his gaze in wordless agreement. Janus studied the bookshelves with polite courtesy.
“Perhaps you could spare me the trouble,” Vornatti said, “of hunting a reliable messenger, and play hostess yourself. I could find you a dress—” He crooked an arm; Maledicte saw no alternative other than an immediate unmasking, so with a quick look at Gilly, he took Vornatti’s arm in his own.
Vornatti leaned on him, wrapping a possessive arm about his waist, and pressed his lips to Maledicte’s cheek.
In silence, Maledicte led Vornatti into the dining room, all too aware of Janus’s watchful eyes on his back, on Vornatti’s stroking fingers. Maledicte settled Vornatti into his seat and attempted to slip free of his grasp. Vornatti only shifted his grip, tugging. Face scalding, Maledicte sat before him, pressed tightly against Vornatti’s chest and wandering hands. Janus sank into the seat opposite and Maledicte shivered at the placidity in Janus’s face, wondering what the mask hid. Rage at Vornatti’s manhandling? Or, worse, kindling disgust at Maledicte’s obedience?
Vornatti bent him back, hand in his hair, and tasted the hollow beneath Maledicte’s ear, overlaying the bruise Janus’s kiss had made. Maledicte jerked free, rocking the chair, and winding Vornatti. “Our bargain,” Vornatti warned.
“Still holds,” Maledicte said, biting back rage, trading it for calculation. “But surely your generosity will allow me one day with my old friend…. Like a bride-to-be bidding her old life farewell.”
Vornatti chuffed with disgust, but let Maledicte claim an empty seat, out of his reach. Janus drank tea as if their conversation were only the usual pleasantries. Once served, the three dined in silence, Vornatti pushing his food around the plate, his eyes never leaving Maledicte; Janus eating steadily and with appetite. Maledicte removed bones from the fish without eating anything, finding solace in the steady ruination of flesh before him.