Chapter Seven
Trill
It had taken four more nights before the pretty man and his partner were back at the pub.
Trill blew out a breath in relief when he saw them.
Although it had probably been unlikely, they might have decided not to come to the pub anymore, or gotten into an accident, or the pretty man’s pain could have gotten worse.
Trill didn’t want anything to happen to the pretty man.
They sat at the table at first, nursing pints of ale, both of them together, and Trill made himself wait.
He could stumble into the table, but it seemed more risky to try with them both there, more likely that Arvus would notice or object.
Trill hadn’t seen yet, after all, if they were interested in him.
He hadn’t seen them pick up a third more than once, so it might be rare or dependent on if they found someone appealing.
Just because they sometimes did it didn’t mean that Trill could assume that falling all over them at the table and wanting them a lot would be in any way welcome.
Trill could bide his time. It was not, perhaps, his best skill, or maybe it was more accurate to say that it was not his favorite skill.
But he’d learned to be patient with his mother and grandmother (until patience hadn’t worked anymore).
Yannoma had helped him learn that sometimes, waiting was what saved your life.
But if you could learn to be patient and learn when you should act…
Well, that allowed you to explore. You could get everything you needed from the world, and you could survive.
You could flourish, even. He feared, sometimes, that Yannoma had forgotten what it was like to flourish.
But he’d done his best to make her life happier and to make her more hopeful.
As he’d learned with his mother and grandmother, though, there was only so much that you could do for another person.
Some of it—most of it?—had to come from them.
So Trill could wait, and he could be patient when he needed to be.
Trill liked to have the odds stacked in his favor.
Yannoma had taught him that. He wouldn’t hurt other people, but when he could easily arrange things so that there was a better chance of getting what he wanted? Well, it only made sense to do that.
But he didn’t ever want to make the pretty man or his partner uncomfortable, so he waited.
Waited and wanted. There was so much desire around him.
Once upon a time, Trill had needed to learn how it worked, and Yannoma had had so much practical advice for him: what he could do, what he shouldn’t do, and how to reduce the chances of getting caught.
“You need to do this to survive, little one,” she’d told him.
“You have to be smart if you want to survive for any length of time.” She shrugged.
“Some things are simple. People like sex. But you have to make sure that they think it’s all right to have sex.
They always want it, but they can’t always have it—or don’t always think they should have it—and it can get complicated if you don’t respect those lines.
You can always just take what you want, but you might not like what happens if you do. ”
He’d appreciated how practical the advice was, a guiding hand but not a grip that was so tight it restrained him. Trill had followed much of the advice, but… not all of it.
He knew exactly what she would say about picking two Mage Warriors as the people that he most wanted in a city with so many people to choose from. But he also knew that her lip would curl up and she would shake her head when he went on and on about how pretty they were, how much he could help.
She knew what it was to be attracted to so many people. She would likely think it smarter to choose different pretty people, but she understood the strength of an undeniable pull.
So Trill waited and watched, and he managed not to cheer out loud when they went out to the dance floor. The pretty man’s limp was more pronounced now—Trill hadn’t been able to touch him in days—but he was still out there.
Trill slipped closer, wanting to see them. Arvus had pulled the pretty man close, back to front so that he was cradling the man, hands on his hips, controlling their movements, making sure he didn’t hurt himself. The pretty man had his eyes closed, lost to the music and the touch of his lover.
Arvus was watching, though, so Trill stayed around the periphery, sliding through other dancing people, shifting through the crowd and drawing in their energy, leaning into a hand here, a body there, letting them touch if they wanted, but not for long, always continuing to move, because he couldn’t be stuck with someone else if the moment came that he could approach who he really wanted.
And then his gaze was snared by the pretty man, who was looking straight at him. Trill felt strangely as though he’d been caught, frozen, held immovable for an unexpected moment.
And then the most wonderful thing happened.
The pretty man crooked his fingers. Trill slid out of the grasp of the person he’d been dancing with, already forgetting them, all of his attention on the two men in front of him, on those beckoning fingers.
A moment later, Trill was at their side, and the pretty man’s hands were on his hips, and he could feel each finger like a brand, even through his clothes, and it was delicious.
He pushed a thread of energy into each of those fingers, directed them to the man’s injured leg.
“Hello again,” the pretty man said.
“Hi,” Trill said, feeling unaccountably tongue-tied, given that this was exactly what he wanted.
“Do you want to dance with us?” he asked.
“Yes, please,” Trill breathed. “You’re so—”
But he cut off abruptly as he remembered. The last time he’d talked about pretty people, he’d made the man sad.
“You’re very pretty,” the man said, lips tipping up, eyes bright. It seemed like he remembered, too, and tonight, thank goodness, he sounded all right about it. Instead, with a beguiling smile, he requested, “Come here. I can’t move like I used to, so you need to be close.”
“I’ll get as close as you want,” Trill promised.
Those beautiful blue eyes flashed, and then Trill was pressed against him, chest to knees, and oh, this was everything he wanted.
Correction. Almost everything, because suddenly someone was plastered against his back, and he realized that Arvus had slipped around the pretty man, and now Trill was sandwiched between them.
He brought his own hands to the pretty man’s hips, holding on carefully.
He would make sure the man didn’t move too much, that he wasn’t hurt.
Trill pushed another thread of energy to the leg, imagining the pain wisping away to nothing.
The pretty man let out a hum of noise that sounded pleased, maybe a little relieved, and he leaned down to rest his head against Trill’s shoulder. Trill was a handful of inches shorter than the pretty man, and a lot shorter than Arvus.
Arvus tightened his grip on both of them, his hands coming round to touch the pretty man too, and Trill was completely encased in them.
Arvus leaned down to press a kiss to the pretty man’s head, and then he shifted a little and pressed a kiss to Trill’s neck as well.
Trill sucked in a sharp breath and didn’t let himself pull in any of the energy that had sprung up between them.
(Careful, careful, these are Mage Warriors.
Yannoma was very practical, and Trill’s practical thoughts often sounded like her.)
“This all right?” Arvus’s voice was a low rumble.
Trill sounded breathless. “So all right.”
The pretty man’s lips were now pressed against the spot where Trill’s neck and shoulder met.
Trill felt the soft swipe of a tongue. He shivered, felt that bite of arousal swell in the air, and carefully didn’t let himself draw it in, just let himself feel it, telling him without him needing to ask just how much the two of them were enjoying this.
“Yeah?” the pretty man’s voice was soft, teasing. He licked again with his tongue, nibbled a little on Trill’s skin.
Trill shivered again, and he could feel the pretty man’s lips tip up into a smile against his neck.
“Yes,” Trill said. “I hoped you’d want me. I wanted you.”
Another smile. “Is that why you kept visiting?”
Trill shrugged. “You’re so pretty. But I didn’t want to interfere. Only then I saw—”
A roll of the hips, bringing him into close contact with a hard bulge that matched his own. Arvus pressed closer, another hard length pressing deliciously against him.
“Saw what?” the pretty man prompted when Trill lost his words.
“Saw you choose someone else. So I hoped that maybe you’d want to play with me.”
They were barely swaying to the music, but Trill was trapped deliciously between their two hard bodies, and it was—almost—everything he wanted.
The pretty man lifted his head, which was a loss, except that his bright blue eyes looked straight into Trill’s green ones.
“Oh, we definitely want to play, don’t we, Arvus?”
“We certainly do, baby.”
A thrill ran through him. Yes, this was so very much what Trill wanted, and maybe Yannoma was right, and sometimes you really should be patient.
“Will you come home with us?” Arvus asked, voice low and rough.
Trill nodded enthusiastically, words momentarily deserting him in the face of his urgent need.
He wanted so much to go home with them. To the castle.
Full of Mage Warriors and Warriors. But maybe also his uncle…
though probably not in their bedroom. It was fine.
Probably. Unless it wasn’t. But given the way the two of them felt right now, that hot tide of desire, even if Trill wasn’t going to let himself taste it, he was sure it would be worth it.