“I’ve got you,” Gregor had said, and his voice had cracked. “I’ve got you. You’re safe. I’ve got you.”
It hadn’t been the first time he’d saved Fergal’s life. It had also not been the last time.
Gregor put the shoulder guard down and flexed his fingers. They were trembling. When was the last time his hands had shaken? He genuinely couldn’t remember. Maybe the night he’d?—
No. He slammed that door shut with practiced efficiency, the mental equivalent of throwing a deadbolt. He wasn’t going there. Not tonight. Today’s crisis was bad enough without dragging that one into the light.
But it did reinforce the problem. He couldn’t let Fergal close while carrying this secret. The foundation of any relationship was trust, and the foundation of Gregor’s relationship with Fergal was a lie. The most important lie he’d ever told. The most necessary lie. But a lie nonetheless.
If he told him, he’d lose him. That was the calculation, clear and cold. Fergal would never look at him the same way again.
So the secret stayed. And because the secret stayed, the wall stood. And because the wall stood, Gregor had to stand on one side of it and watch Fergal press against the other and pretend he couldn’t feel the warmth of him through the stone.
A sound from outside. Footsteps on gravel.
Gregor knew the gait of every person in the compound. These steps were quick, slightly uneven, with the forward-leaning momentum of someone who moved through life like they were perpetually late for something important. Fergal. Gregor’s pulsedid something it had no business doing, and he clenched his jaw until it stopped.
Gregor didn’t look up when the workshop door opened. He reached again for the cracked shoulder guard and the pot of leather oil, giving his hands something to do that wasn’t reaching for the man who had just walked into his sanctuary.
“You forgot your tea. I made you a new cup.”
He looked up. He hadn’t intended to, but Fergal’s voice had that quality it sometimes did—warm and certain and amused, like the world was a joke they were sharing—and Gregor’s body responded to it before his discipline could intervene.
Fergal stood in the doorway, holding Gregor’s teacup like it was Exhibit A in a case he was about to argue. He’d changed into a worn gray hoodie that was slightly too big for him. His hair was a disaster. He looked, Gregor thought with the resigned despair of a man who had lost a war and knew it, absolutely beautiful.
“I didn’t forget it,” Gregor said, his voice steady. “I chose to leave it.”
“You’ve never left a cup of tea behind in all the years I’ve known you.”
“There’s a first time for everything.”
Fergal stepped inside. Uninvited, unapologetic, as if the workshop door was a formality rather than a boundary. He set the teacup on the workbench and looked around with open curiosity, his gaze traveling over the weapons on the walls, the tools, the scarred wood, the small stove in the corner.
“I’ve never been in here,” he said.
“There’s a reason for that.”
“Because you haven’t invited me?”
“Because it’s private.”
Fergal’s eyes found his. “And yet you didn’t lock the door.”
Gregor had no response to that, largely because Fergal was right. He hadn’t locked the door. In all the years he’d used thisworkshop, he’d always locked the door. Tonight, for reasons he refused to examine, he hadn’t.
Fergal didn’t press the point. He simply wandered deeper into the space, stopping to examine a sword on the wall. “This is beautiful,” he said, running a finger along the flat of a blade Gregor had restored last winter. “Where did you find it?”
“An antique market in Inverness. About a hundred and eighty years ago.”
“You must have a story for every one of these.” Fergal’s voice held genuine interest, not performance. He wasn’t trying to be charming. He just was.
And it was worse. It was so much worse than the loaded questions and the deliberate touches during the lesson because Gregor could defend against an offensive. He had strategies for that, counterattacks, ways to deflect and redirect.
He had no strategy for Fergal simply being in his space, warm and real and interested in the things Gregor cared about. He had no defense against the way Fergal’s face softened when he looked at the old swords, or the way his fingers traced the dragon on the cross guard of the blade Gregor had been sharpening, or the way he asked questions and actually listened to the answers.
“Some of them,” Gregor said, and his voice sounded strange to his own ears. Softer. Less guarded. He cleared his throat and reached for the shoulder guard again, resuming the oiling with more concentration than the task required. “Not all of them are interesting.”
“I doubt that. It’s like stepping back in time, coming here.”
