Chapter Seven
T reeve skidded to a halt in the doorway, breathless and flushed, his gray robe hanging askew. “Hurry! You must—” He gaped at Cador.
Cador glanced down at his own bare body in confusion. “What the fuck is going on now?” Damn Treeve. Cador had been acting like a bastard, but he’d been desperate, grasping for the only connection with Jem he could.
“I—pardon the interruption. My father and his royal guards have arrived early! I’m afraid he’ll take you captive or worse. We mustn’t alert him to your presence. I instructed the servants, and they’ll tell the old clerics not to say anything when they wake.”
“Why will the servants and clerics follow your commands?” Jem asked.
Treeve grimaced. “Servants are rarely enthusiastic fans of my father, and they remember him and his demands painfully well from the spring summit.” He glanced back the way he’d come. “You must hurry! My father will want to soak in the pools.”
“I thought these pools were only supposed to be for the clerics,” Cador said, tugging on his robe.
Treeve barked a laugh. “My father does as he likes.”
Jem grabbed the flask of water, and they followed Treeve up the tunnel. The stone was dusty beneath Cador’s damp feet, and he realized too late they’d forgotten their sandals. His had been stupidly tiny, but they were better than nothing.
The wall lamps cast an eerie glow amid the long shadows. Instead of returning to the main buildings, Treeve pointed down a smaller tunnel.
“I’m told this joins up with the tunnel between the temple and fields,” he whispered. “Do you recall it from your wedding day?”
Jem nodded. “I do. He was probably far too drunk.”
As much as Cador wanted to protest, Jem was right. He vaguely recalled a tunnel and…vomiting. Shame coiled through him. How disgraceful to greet his husband in that state.
A din of voices and movement traveled down the main tunnel, sounding suddenly closer. “Go now!” Treeve hissed, squinting down the smaller tunnel. “Piss and shit, I’ve no lantern or flint to light the lamps.”
“Watch your step!” Tamsyn said too loudly. Too close.
Jem grabbed Cador’s hand and yanked him into the blackness.
They surged forward. With his right hand outstretched, fingers trailing along the dank wall, Cador staggered, the tunnel sloping down once more.
Jem clung to his fingers. This tunnel was also laid with dusty stones, even more grit beneath Cador’s bare feet since it apparently wasn’t used as frequently.
Behind them, Treeve’s voice echoed. “Father! I was just coming from the healing waters myself. Let me accompany you. I’m sure we’ve much to discuss.”
The light was faint behind them, and as the tunnel curved into the black belly of the earth, the glow disappeared entirely. Cador jerked to a stop without meaning to, fumbling for the wall to keep oriented.
Gripping Jem’s hand, chest tight, Cador continued with tentative steps, sweeping his right arm across the tunnel before finding the wall beside him again.
When the voices had faded completely and there was only the sound of their shallow breathing and the odd drips of water in the dank stillness, Cador whispered, “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine!” Jem’s voice was reed-thin. He yanked his hand free.
Frustration and fear swelled, Cador barely managing to keep his voice low. “What are you doing? Don’t be stupid!” Keeping his right hand glued to the wall, he grasped for Jem with his left, catching the loose neck of Jem’s robe.
“I’m not afraid!”
“I am! If we get lost we’ll die down here in the blackness.” He tugged Jem closer, and he’d throw him over his shoulder to keep him safe if he had to. “Stay with me. Please. The sooner we find our way out of here, the sooner you’ll be rid of me.”
Jem’s breath was too quick, but he sounded more confident than Cador felt. “All right. It’s fine. We’ll be fine. We’ll each keep a hand on the wall on our side.”
Jem’s fingers found Cador’s on his shoulder. With their hands clasped once more between them, Cador reached out with his foot, tracing a seam of stone with his big toe.
It would take all night to be so cautious, so he started walking again, following the tunnel with his right hand on the dank wall, hoping there were no sudden steps or drops. He couldn’t imagine why there would be in a tunnel, but his heart thumped as they moved along in the utter darkness.
It’s just a tunnel. Same as it would be in the light.
The crash made him jump so violently he was sure his feet left the cool floor. For a panicked moment, he couldn’t understand what had shattered.
As he realized, Jem whispered harshly, “I dropped it!”
He meant the flask of water, which instead of being fashioned from tusk or animal skin was glass because the mainlanders were ridiculous. Had they crept far enough down the tunnel, or would the noise give them away? They’d find out soon enough.
Yet with the next step, Jem gasped. “Glass,” he muttered, the sound seeming to come through clenched teeth. “It’s deep.”
Twisting while trying to move his feet as little as possible, Cador bent and hoisted Jem into his arms. Jem was rigid, his breath loud in sharp pants that ghosted over Cador’s face. Otherwise, they remained in silence. His fingers dug into Cador’s neck painfully.
Reaching with his foot again and knocking away a large shard, Cador hoped he was going in the correct direction. He whispered, “Can you touch the wall with your toes?” Jem’s dangling feet should have been near the right side of the tunnel.
“Yes.” The whisper caressed Cador’s cheek.
Cador took another step. And another, realizing how familiar Jem’s lithe body had become. How comfortable it felt to have him safe in his arms. He’d had plenty of lovers, yet it had only been fucking and fun.
He’d rarely lain the night—or morning or afternoon—with them. He hadn’t held them close while they slept and felt so unbearably tender toward them. Sometimes, it was hard to believe how deeply he’d allowed Jem to burrow under his flesh.
Yet Jem rippled with tension. Cador could hear the scratch of fingernails as if he was raking his own skin. Cador murmured, “It’s all right. I don’t think they heard.”
After a few more careful steps, reaching out with his toe to push aside any shards of glass that had scattered across the tunnel, Cador walked faster. But without being able to reach out into the blackness, he stumbled and hesitated.
“Put me down. We must be past any broken glass now. I’ll get this shard out.”
Reluctantly, Cador bent and placed Jem on his feet. It was the most practical thing to do, even though he would have happily carried him for miles inhaling his sweet musk. Jem sucked in a pained breath.
“It’s stuck in my foot.”
“Here.” Cador dropped to his knees, running his hands down Jem’s slim hips and thighs, the robe bunching. “Which one?”
“My left.”
Carefully, Cador slipped his hands past Jem’s knees. Jem hopped, trying to balance on his other foot. “Hold on to me,” Cador whispered. A shiver ran down his spine as Jem’s hand brushed over his head before dropping to his shoulder.
On the Cliffs of Glaw, he’d knelt this way and declared his devotion, and Jem had caressed his hair before walking away from him.
In the blackness, it was still and silent but for their breathing.
It felt strangely like they were floating—like nothing else existed.
He spread his hands around Jem’s calves, needing to ground himself, to feel flesh and bone and know he wasn’t alone.
Cador wanted to lean into Jem and rub his face against his stomach. Wrap his arms around his waist—
This isn’t a dream. You have to keep moving. Get out of this fucking tunnel.
Concentrating, he lifted Jem’s injured foot, skimming over the arch of it with his fingertips. Jem gasped, squirming and clutching Cador’s shoulders.
“Tickles,” he mumbled. “It’s near my heel.”
Ah yes, there it was. A small piece of glass—yet far too thick for Cador’s liking—lodged in the flesh. Working blind, he struggled to get a grasp on the shard, knowing that as he poked and prodded as gently as he could with his big hands, he was causing Jem more pain. But it had to come out.
Finally, a whimper of relief escaped Jem, and Cador eased out the glass, barely able to grasp it with the tips of his fingers. He tossed it away, and it landed with a faint plink . “Try a step.”
Jem relaxed his grasp on Cador’s shoulders and did, hissing in pain. “It’s out. Let’s go.”
“I should wrap it.” He tested the hem of his robe. He could tear it, though it would take some effort.
“Later. We need to get out of here. It’s too dark.” He urged Cador up and took his left hand. “Go!”
The darkness did seem to press in suffocatingly around them, and Cador reminded himself that if they had a lamp this would merely be a tunnel.
There was nothing to be frightened of. Well, aside from King Perran and his army.
And the wildfires that apparently would keep burning until it rained. If the sevels were lost…
Sweeping his arm out and following along the wall, the stone of the tunnel feeling wetter as the path angled down again, he ordered himself to focus on one problem at a time.
If he must fight the king’s guard, he would battle with his head high and sword higher.
Except he didn’t have his sword because he was a piss-poor fighter.
Oh, for his spears. When would he have them again? He was a hunter, not a warrior. Tas and Bryok had seemed to think one was like the other, but Cador wasn’t convinced. After all, here he was scurrying away like a rat from the enemy.
“Perhaps I should have faced the king,” he said before he could silence himself.
Jem’s fingers twitched, and he sounded confused. “What?” he whispered. He rhythmically tugged lightly on Cador’s hand as they walked, giving away that he was limping. “You mean now?”
“Yes. The bastard’s here. Apparently trying to turn the mainland against Ergh. I shouldn’t be running away.”