Chapter Fifteen #2
An odd thing to say, and Xian stayed quiet. William continued. ‘You know yourself, don’t you?’
One odd question followed by another. Xian’s butterfly thoughts struggled to fathom the conversation. ‘Of course I do.’
‘And who are you?’
Xian had a vague sense that he should be irritated by such persistence, and yet he opened his mouth to answer.
‘I am the thirteenth child of his Imperial Majesty, the Daoguang Emperor, eleventh emperor of the Qing Dynasty, and Consort Ye Keshun.’ He’d last spoken his mother’s name with Song Lim.
The shoemaker had been easy to speak to as well, perhaps easier than this strange foreigner, whose odd questions gave Xian an ache behind his eyes.
‘Everything alright, your highness?’
‘Hmm? Oh yes.’ Xian nodded. ‘I feel quite well actually. You are very pleasing company, William.’
Xian winced. Where, by all the Seven Maidens, had that answer come from?
‘I can be far more pleasing, I assure you.’
‘I shall take your word for it,’ Xian replied, his cheeks flushing with heat.
‘You would not wish to find out for yourself?’
Xian cleared his throat, his midriff suddenly tight; as though he wore one of those corsets the English favoured on their women.
‘I certainly do not. Sir William, I am not flattered by such attentions.’
The Englishman hummed to himself, nodding. ‘No, you are not, are you? I thought perhaps I was losing my touch, but I understand now. You, my veiled friend, are among the rare few I cannot seduce with my charms.’
Xian resented having a mind so clouded. He shook his head again, trying to clear the muddle. ‘You were trying to seduce me?’
‘My dear fellow, I don’t need to try.’ The Englishman’s grin was wolfish.
‘The art of seduction has me as its founder, I assure you. But I understand the carnal holds little interest for you, a sad fact but true, and I certainly shall not force you where you do not want to go. That sort of nonsense does not arouse me. So you are quite safe, from me, at least.’
Xian stared at the stranger, who had assessed him so well on many things now. ‘How could you know that I…’ He stopped short, not keen to speak it plainly.
‘That you are not quick to lust? If indeed you lust at all?’
Xian’s mouth opened with a silent gasp. And William continued, the outrageous fellow winking at him.
‘Desire is not so simple as many would like to believe. Not every living being lusts, and of those that do, many can’t be split plainly by an appetite for either cock or pussy.
In my days spent exploring your world’s delights, I’ve discovered many desires.
Certainly you are not rare, in desiring to keep your legs closed, and cock untouched. ’
Xian touched his fingers to the base of his throat. ‘There are others…who do not wish to…’
‘Don’t wish to be amorous? Of course there are others. What a dull place this would be if it were not so.’
‘But I think I might like…to…one day…’ Xian stopped; too appalled at what he’d already insinuated, cursing the tincture for loosening his tongue.
‘One day you’d like to fuck, if the right person found their way to you?’
Xian drew in a breath; thrilled at the notion he was not so unnatural yet mortified at being so understood.
‘Yes.’ He doubted someone right next to him could have made out his reply, and yet Sir William Black’s sultry smile returned.
He took another sip of his drink, watching Xian over the rim of his glass.
‘And I am not the right person.’ A statement, not a question.
Xian held his tongue, determined not to allow it to embarrass him further.
Sir William laughed. ‘You look as though you fear I shall drag you across these flower boxes and set about changing your mind. Calm yourself, your highness. Though I may briefly mourn the lost opportunity of a prince’s embrace, I won’t suffer a broken heart tonight.
Though, my door is open to you, should you decide practice is in order. ’
‘No, no. You are very handsome.’ Xian’s skin hummed with heat. ‘But I will not be knocking on your door, Sir William.’
The Englishman planted the back of his hand to his forehead and swooned out over the window ledge. ‘I am bereft. This fair Natural does not pine for me. What shall I do to mend these wounds you inflict?’
He was so theatrical and ludicrous Xian’s laughter bubbled up from where he’d thought it had dried out entirely. He clamped his hand over his mouth to stifle the laughter he couldn’t seem to stop. The Englishman grinned, a salacious curl to his plump lips.
‘It suits you, your mirth,’ he said.
‘Sir William, forgive me.’ Xian wiped his eyes, a little breathless, and readily blamed the tincture for the outburst. ‘I don’t know what has come over me…’ He paused. ‘Actually, that is not so. I have worried over my nature for a long time, your words come as a very welcome relief.’
‘The nature of your bedroom is not the one you should concern yourself with, my prince.’
Xian wiped the last of his tears. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘You said you know yourself, but you do not.’ William shrugged, a move like that of an ocean wave; whispering of power rising from beneath.
Xian shook himself inwardly, embarrassed by the grandeur of his thoughts. ‘I told you who I am…that was the truth. Do you not believe me?’
‘That was the truth you’ve been given, but it hides a lie. Do you know what I am, Prince Xian?’
‘What you are?’
‘Hmm.’
‘A nobleman…from the British Isles?’ Xian replied, hesitant. This felt like a game, where the rules of play were not made open to him.
‘Anything else? Look closely now.’
Squinting, as though that would suddenly make the answer more obvious, Xian shook his head. ‘I’m sorry…I don’t understand what you are asking.’
Sir Black’s amusement shifted to something more studious. He eyed Xian with a new intensity. ‘Fascinating. I’ve not met one so dulled and oblivious before. Certainly, I am not showing all of my true colours, but you should be able to see the basics that I allow. Yet, you claim yourself blinded.’
Xian shrank from the sting of the comment. His blissful haze ripped at the seams. ‘Fascinating…and dull?’ He’d been enjoying the late-night conversation until then. ‘Now blind too? You said you were not bothered by my refusal, sir, but your unkindness says otherwise.’
‘I am not a purebred,’ William said swiftly, and with a serene air. ‘Nor are you, but you do not seem to know it at all.’
Xian wondered if he was hearing correctly. ‘Sir, I am a prince of the emperor’s blood, I assure you.’ He had a tragic past to prove it.
‘You are far more than that, silly blind prince. Which means either your father or mother were, too, unlikely to be both of them. What of your mother? Has she borne other children? Does sugar turn their guts inside out too?’
‘Sir Black, stop at once.’
‘But this is grand fun. Almost as enjoyable as a decent fuck. Tell me of your mother.’
‘She is dead,’ Xian fairly shouted, damning his voice as it cracked. ‘Killed whilst saving me from a fire. There, are you happy now? She was a good woman and I’ll ask you not to say another word on it.’
‘Perhaps she was, good, I mean. But a woman? I would suggest she was no such thing.’ He pursed his lips in thought.
‘Though I suppose it may be your father who is the Natural. You carry Purebred blood, so you are a half-ling, for sure. But I don’t know if it is cock or cunt that makes you so.
I’m a talented fellow, but in different fields to this. ’
‘Stop!’ Xian’s voice sliced the cool night air. He glanced out into the courtyard, conscious of how well their voices must carry.
‘Don’t worry. No one hears us. I’ve taken care of it.’ Sir William pointed his finger and circled it, as though indicating an invisible barrier existed.
Scowling, Xian did not bother to question him on it. ‘You go too far, sir, speaking of my parents in such vile fashion.’
Though in truth it was only his mother’s honour he felt any need to defend.
‘Vile fashion?’ Sir William scoffed. ‘Were you not borne of fornication? I suppose I could be completely wrong about you. Perhaps you are a forest sprite who emerged from a pine cone…or however it is they are birthed.’ He sniffed the air.
‘Sprites never shift that waft of petrichor about them, and you don’t smell bad at all, so I’m fairly sure you are not a sprite. ’
‘I am not a sprite, sir!’ Xian seethed. ‘Put that glass down, you have had more than your share.’ Long ago he’d stifled his anger, pressed it like a flower beneath a woodblock, to survive his intolerable situation, but here, lifted high by a tincture he’d been warned against, and with this stranger’s irreverent, nonsensical talk, Xian allowed his fury to siphon through.
‘I am treated every day as though I am inhuman, a curiosity at best, a monster at worst, and I’ll take no more of it from you.
I am Xian, a prince and a man, nothing less, nothing more, and I deserve my place in this world.
’ Sir William Black did not recoil from an enraged prince, but strained forward, drinking in Xian’s tirade.
‘I am tired, mournful, and my feet ache. I do not need you sir, insulting my mother or accosting me with talk of seduction and supernatural creatures…evil spirits—’
‘When the blazes did I talk of evil spirits? Sprites are rarely evil. They are actually quite insipid.’
‘That is not my point.’ Xian glowered, but his blood ran hot and smooth with loosened tension. More clear-headed than he’d felt in weeks. ‘I am not a forest sprite, nor anything else so unnatural.’
‘Never said you were unnatural. Quite the opposite really. Those who are not Purebred, not human, are called Naturals. Here in this world, at least.’
‘I truly cannot understand what you are talking about,’ Xian exhaled, flabbergasted, but oddly unafraid. And rather close to bursting out laughing again, now he’d shouted like a market seller.‘You are by far the strangest man I’ve ever met.’
And this was the strangest evening.
‘Certainly the most handsome, I am sure.’ William drained his glass in one gulp.
Xian’s rage was all but extinguished. Actually, Sir William Black was beautiful; a walking work of art. But no interest flickered within Xian. Song Lim…now there was a handsome man.
‘Your highness?’ The enquiry from his neighbour startled Xian out of the all-too-easy slide of his thoughts towards the shoemaker. ‘Are you imagining me naked? You have come over all kinds of peculiar.’
The man was a devil. ‘I am imagining no such thing!’
‘Don’t be ashamed. I am ravishing.’ To stress his point, he loosened the ties of his shirt further, enough to tug the other shoulder free, the material slipping down and exposing pink nipples.
‘Come now, if you find you have developed a taste for the carnal, not a soul would blame you. I am quite the incubus.’
Now he compared himself to a formidable, demonic creature. It was ridiculous. He was ridiculous. ‘Sir William, put your clothes back on, at once. I am going to bed. Alone.’
Xian pulled away from the window ledge, the bottom of his ribs aching where they’d been pressed too long to the wood. He slid the panelling closed, and leaned against the wall, unfastening his veil and exhaling a long breath.
‘You have me devastated, Prince Xian,’ William called.
The next moment brought a startled cry, a crash of something heavy, and the tinkling of broken glass.
‘Sir William?’ Xian threw open the window panel, leaning out as far as he dared, trying to peer into the room. But he could see nothing of the gentleman’s plight. ‘Sir William?’
A groan was his reply, one of a man in evident discomfort.
‘Hold on, I’m coming,’ Xian cried.
‘Not without me, don’t you dare,’ came the appalling reply.
Barefoot and convinced it was a terrible idea, Xian hurried to his neighbour’s room.