Lance turned his head aside on the pillow, closing his eyes. He snatched up the edge of a blanket and pressed it to his lips. A cry would bring doctors, Coel and probably the Merlin in here, stool or no stool. A storm of anguished joy was building in the cauldron between his hips. Art closed his mouth hard around his cock—held him back for a few seconds with a restraining squeeze of finger and thumb around his root—then plunged down, opening his throat. The storm found passageway. After a floating, flailing instant when Lance thought deliverance would tear him apart, he went rigid, every muscle clenching.
Art held him in place until he was done. He swallowed, coughed, let Lance’s spent shaft ease out of his mouth, and knelt grinning in delight at his work. Then he folded, bright-eyed and feverish, into the bed beside him. “Better?”
“Let me show you how much.”
“Oh, that fine beast of yours has spilled all its fire for now.”
“I still have a hand.”
“Better put it on me, then. Ah, like that. Harder. Tighter. Oh, God.”
***
“You can tell me who did this to you now.”
Lance frowned. In the wake of passion, his mind clear, his shame was undiminished. “It was Garbonian.”
“What, that little rat?”
“Yes. It was how he got away from me.” He shifted in Art’s embrace. The temptation was enormous, to bury his face in the warm, rough silk of his hair and hide away. “He said something to me… I can’t remember. Anyway, I let him go. I was distracted. It was unforgivable.”
“Oh, Lance, as if anyone cares. You’re Coel’s favourite son now, in case you don’t recall. The heir to Din Guardi.”
“I do recall. And I can’t accept it.”
“I told him you’d say that. He said I must persuade you. And I knew you wouldn’t be swayed by how useful you’d be to me personally, holding a stronghold up here, so I thought I’d try a dirty trick.” He kissed Lance’s brow, his left cheek, his right, and finally his chin, a Celtic cross of love, more ancient and sacred than he could know. “Vindolanda’s very fine, but that long winter hurt the place. The soil’s exhausted. How would it be if you brought your people here?”
“My White Meadows villagers?” Lance broke into laughter. “We’d rattle like peas in a barrel.”
“What, all those little princes and princesses Ban’s no doubt already conceived? You said he was a terror among the milkmaids.”
“My mother said it kept him occupied during her pregnancies. And she didn’t mind if the milkmaids didn’t, and the bairns were strong and well cared for. You’re right—I doubt he’s changed.”
Arthur sobered. “This would be a chance for you to restore his honour, if you still care for that.”
Lance lay and watched him in silence. This view of things hadn’t occurred. As for Ban’s honour, that was Ban’s own to win again or lose, but the idea of lifting the whole struggling community he’d fought so hard to protect away from their poverty and into this safe refuge… That was almost intoxicating, the kind of sweeping miracle only a king could perform. A king with a castle as well as a name. He smiled.
Arthur nodded at him, aware he’d scored the point. An urgent rapping at the door broke their silent communion. “Here they come—the doctors and the sorcerers. The butcher, the baker, old King Coel and his fiddlers three.” He sprang out of the bed, pausing to see that Lance and his clothing were decent before he turned away. “Think about it. I’ll leave you to the mercies of your medical men. You should get some rest.” He stretched, yawned till his jaw cracked. “God knows I have to.”
He was halfway to the door when Lance asked, “What happened to Aedilthryd, by the way?”
“Who?”
“Oesa’s woman. The mouse-wife.”
Art looked at the ground. “I had her killed.” Then he sighed, shoulders sagging, and shoved the stool more firmly into place. “Wait a damn second, out there! Look, Lance, I know how you feel about women. You set them aside, away from our mess and our blood. But she was man enough to help Garb and Oesa crack this castle wide open, and I gave her a man's death for it. A soldier's. I don't know, love. Which of us really treats them according to their deserts?”
He tugged the stool away. Immediately the door swung wide, admitting a torrent of servants and physicians. Arthur entered the stream like a salmon, flashed Lance a last grin over his shoulder, and disappeared.
When the kind souls of Din Guardi had finished with him, Lance lay tucked up in his clean bedding, wound dressed, poultices and witch hazel applied. He was lost in thought. Art needn’t have run away from him. Lance had no easy answers, and was in no more of a hurry to pass judgement now than he had ever been.
That there was ice in Art’s nature, acquired since their brief spring at Vindolanda, Lance knew. He wasn’t sorry for it. It would keep Art alive longer than his boyish readiness to compassion, which Lance thought had probably been interred along with poor Sir Ector. And as for how Lance felt about women, he wasn’t sure he knew. Art had been wrong. He didn’t think them fragile and pure, to be set aside for those reasons. Nor were they less than men - impure, untrustworthy, and therefore also to be set aside.
Yet he was cold with shock, that Aedilthryd had been put to the sword. The kingdom of Britannia belonged to men. The scales had tipped, he believed, in his mother’s time. Something had died with her passing, though he couldn’t define the loss. What was gone?Sanctity, his mind told him.Sacred strength. The dragon...
He shivered: perhaps Garb's poisons were at work in him still. He was anyway too tired to think for long about anything. Arthur hadn’t tendedhimwith coldness, hadn’t spent a sleepless week cajoling him back into life out of a ruthless heart. Right or wrong, that was enough for Lance. Art loved his friends blindly, and God help his enemies.
Sleep tugged at him, strong as spring tides. Curling onto his side, he let his eyes close in the bright sun that gilded Din Guardi, the Joyous Gard which was and always had been his own.
