Part Two #5
Westin did not generally knit designs into his work. His scarves were plain compared to jewelry, and yet Sun’s wriggle said Westin’s answer had better be yes.
“It is now.” With his palm full of jewelry, the stirring inside Westin had calmed enough for him to leave the final cuff at Sun’s nose in place, although he tucked the rest of the cuffs into his pocket instead of handing them to Sun.
He would eventually, but for now, they were out of sight.
Sun must have approved, because he closed his eyes to allow Westin to rub the places where the cuffs had pinched.
His ear was bare now. For Westin, although really for Sun.
For both of them, Westin reasoned, with faint worry at what his family might think of that.
“I’m not normally one to care about territory,” Westin rationalized out loud.
“I can’t be. But I do care for what’s mine, that is true.
What is the family’s,” he added, to be fair, but then sighed heavily.
“What is mine. Not that I would ever demand….” He fell to silence when Sun turned to look at him directly, eyebrows raised.
“I can’t be that interesting.” It slipped from him in disbelief.
He got sulky attitude. “I’m too young to know better?”
“Urgh.” The inarticulate noise would have shocked Westin on any other day.
Tonight, it was just one more discovery about himself.
“Brat.” The brat smiled with pleasure to hear that.
Westin nearly made the noise again. “I meant that I am….” He suspected that if he claimed to be boring, Sun would gesture to the curtain and all the people who had heard them in here.
“I am only like this with you,” Westin tried, then realized that was not a strong argument either.
“But that would still not be enough for someone as lively as you. That’s what I meant.
I don’t expect to be your one-and-only.”
Again, he fell silent, watching Sun stare at him and then look away, his chin still raised high, his eyebrows still up. Waiting.
“Oh.” Westin wondered if he was blushing.
He was too old to only now realize all the things he wanted and how much he wanted them—and how he was allowed to want them.
Sun had claimed Westin’s cock for himself, but Westin hadn’t considered the rest of him to also be part of that claim.
“Do you want me to be your one-and-only?”
Sun turned back to him, all attitude. “Does Hely share?”
“Do you?” Westin pressed, a thrilling sort of greed in his blood.
A dangerous thing to feel and yet he didn’t run from it.
“You may be a lark in my hand but not in a cage, and….” He waited a moment when Sun scoffed but then repeated himself, hardening his voice.
“Not in a cage. No matter how much you pout or look at me like that. But,” Westin cupped Sun’s cheek, “in my hand. There would only room for you there. I never thought to be a one-and-only, but I’m not the sort to keep both hands full anyway. ”
Sun gave him another crisp look of challenge.
“But you already demand that,” Westin realized, warm with relief and growing pleasure, “both of my hands full with you. That’s what you like.
” He nearly purred it, limbs unexpectedly heavy with contentment.
He saw the sulk beginning to form around Sun’s lips and warded it off with a kiss.
“If you wanted to put chains of gold around my cock, brat, I won’t stop you.
I told you it was yours and then gave it to you.
Right here, for Hely and others to hear. That was the point, was it not?”
Sun slid against him hot as melted candlewax, his face back at Westin’s shoulder. He released a shaky breath and clutched Westin’s waist. “Mine.”
Westin wondered if he was meant to hear, it was said so quietly. Thunder rumbled somewhere far away.
Sun spoke again before Westin could ask.
“Are you sure you want me in your home with your family? All those children your sister has, with me around?” Sun said it as though he didn’t know lullabies because one of his first tasks at a very young age had been to watch over village children younger than him.
“Your mother who sends you letters that wait for you at the barracks, all about your business and what your father has been up to. What?” He pulled back to give Westin an accusing look.
“You speak of them often. I listen to you.”
“You do, don’t you.” Westin did not ask.
“I always listen to you.” Sun’s lower lip trembled on the verge of a pout before he put his cheek to Westin’s shoulder. The sulk stayed in his voice. “You don’t listen to me.”
“Brat.” Westin kissed the top of his head and smiled like the sapwit he was.
“I listen to you but perhaps I wasn’t paying attention to what you meant.
I didn’t think you, well, anyone, but especially you, could mean it if they said that they will go where I go.
But you did say it, and I’m sorry I didn’t understand. ”
He expected a snide comment about how the words could not have been more plain. He got Sun pushing out a long, pained sigh.
“You’re good.”
“Too good?” Westin prompted after a moment, unclear if this was like being “too generous.”
Sun shook his head. He continued to cling to Westin, but finally offered the complaint Westin had previously expected. “I would ride with you no matter where you go. I was very clear, West. I was… I was too clear. I didn’t like that.”
Demand next time, Westin nearly said, because possibly the asking was what had confused him. But even without Hely, he had the sense to keep that unsaid. Anyway, he hoped there wouldn’t be a next time.
“I will try to do better when you visit me. I’ve wanted to bring you for a while, though it will be dull for you.
We largely farm, although there is some business elsewhere, which is more of what I do.
My mother hasn’t been interested in that for some time, and I’m traveling or in the capital anyway. ”
“You were going to bring me home to meet your family?” Sun made a funny sound. “Before all of this?”
“I was going to invite you, if I ever got the nerve.” Westin’s cowardice was still bothersome.
“I think I was worried you’d say no, and then I’d be forced to confront how much I wanted you to visit.
If you visit now,” something Sun still had not agreed to, “and you didn’t mind it, the offer remains for you to stay there.
If you need to, or perhaps during the worst of the winter months, for me and my worries. ”
“I go the longest without seeing you in the winter.” Sun reached up to card his fingers through Westin’s hair, unraveling the last of the braid before flinging the tie elsewhere.
“And the whole time I know you’re afraid.
I don’t like it.” That was a declaration.
“I offered to travel with you, stay with you. I said I’d go with you, always.
I said that, West.” That was a pout. “That hasn’t changed.
I can work with you. Farming, you said?”
“As well as some other land and business matters. Dull, to many.”
“I like dull.” It was said slyly.
Westin was strangely not offended. “Brat.”
Sun kissed the side of Westin’s throat before continuing to pull his hair. “You said too much peace was boring.”
“I did say that,” Westin agreed absently. “That doesn’t mean… ah, Sun, there’s something I need to tell you before you decide on any visits.”
“Visits.” Sun scoffed again. “Well, go on. If you can only tell your secrets in Solace House, then you should get on with it so I don’t have to drag you back here.” He sniffed. “Hely would be too pleased.”
Stroking Sun’s back to calm him was reflex. So was tightening his hold to prevent Sun from darting away.
“Lyeth is not my entire name.” Westin nuzzled a frozen Sun for what was hopefully not the last time.
At the clenching of the hands in his hair, telling him that Sun had understood what hadn’t been said, Westin continued, quickly.
“Corilyeth is a hindrance in my work. It’s an embarrassment around other nobles and yet drags me into noble business.
I rarely tell anyone unless I’m back in the family territory. ”
When Sun pushed against his chest, Westin allowed it. He deserved Sun’s narrow-eyed stare.
“Are you the landlord here?” Sun demanded, then gasped. “Does Hely know? He knew before me?”
“Sun.” Westin gathered Sun’s hands and brought them up to kiss them, a gesture he’d seen apologetic husbands do and never once thought he’d be one of them.
“We are… well, the land the inn is on is ours, conditionally. It depends on other nobles getting greedy or the ruler doing so, though rulers have thankfully have been inclined to peace for years now. Nobles grow ambitious and it only leads to trouble. Which is not what we are after. Not trouble as nobles know it.” He kissed Sun’s fingers again.
“Bless the current queen for being peaceful and may all our future rulers continue to be so.”
“So, yes he did know before me,” Sun summed up.