Chapter 40 #2
“Well—” Richard pretended to study the brawl—one man was only in his undergarments. “I only thought—at the ball, that is, you—you looked at him as though he were the most beautiful creature. And I thought that perhaps—though you do not say—perhaps thoughts of him still linger.”
A flush rose up Kaelen’s neck, and he cleared his throat. “He was lovely. I shall not pretend otherwise.”
“Yes. Quite. As I observed.”
“But.” Kaelen chewed on his lower lip. “He was not the loveliest creature I saw that night. Not by a great distance.”
“No?”
“There was a man.” Kaelen swallowed hard. “I had thought I knew the whole shape of him, but then I—I saw him in a corset he had never worn before—maroon it was, with gold thread—and I…I forgot, for a moment, how to stand upright.”
Richard stopped breathing.
“I looked up, and there he was.” Kaelen’s eyes grew distant.
“And I thought—I thought the gods must have started on him long before the morn he was born. I thought they must have closed their workshops and put aside the rivers and the mountains and the stars, and worked only upon him, upon the man he would become, for an entire age, with the very finest of their tools. And then, when they were done, they must have stood back, and looked at their hands, and known that nothing they ever shaped again would compare.”
Richard gaped. The street below had gone distant. The drunkard’s shanty was barely audible over the whoosh of his pulse in his ears.
“Oh,” he said faintly.
It was, he registered, an entirely inadequate response. But his throat had closed, and his tongue had become a useless thing, and his face blazed hot.
“Oh,” Richard tugged at the ties of his shirt. He looked at the floor, at Kaelen’s bare feet, and then quickly away. “I—well. That is. That is a great deal kinder than I had—I should be getting back. To—to Flint. He shall worry.” He took a step towards the door. “Goodnight, Kaelen.”
“Goodnight.” Kaelen’s face had gone red, and his voice an octave higher than usual. He coughed and corrected it. “Goodnight. Yes. Sleep well. Rest. That is—um—the thing to do. At night. The—the moon is out.”
“Quite.”
“Quite,” Kaelen echoed and spun so abruptly that he stubbed his toe and yelped a curse.
Richard fled.
* * *
Flint had not stirred. He lay as Richard had left him—an arm flung across his face, breath whistling through his agape mouth.
Richard shook the man’s shoulder. “Flint.”
Nothing.
“Flint, I must speak with you.”
A grunt. The arm plopped down.
Richard shook harder. “Flint, wake. This is a matter of some urgency.”
One bleary eye cracked open and regarded Richard with distaste. “What hour is it?”
“Just past midnight—”
“Then fuck off, handsome.” The eye closed. “Let me sleep.”
“But Flint.” Richard knelt by the bed. “He called me beautiful.”
The eye opened again. Flint sighed, voice croaky. “Did he, now?”
“Well—” Richard rubbed his nape. “He did not use the precise word, but the meaning was—Flint, you must hear it for I cannot keep it inside me. I—I only asked him, you see, casually, whether he intended to purchase a gift for Ravi—”
“Mmmm.”
“—because well, at the ball we attended as soldiers, Ravi was his date, and I had convinced myself that Kaelen harboured some affection in that direction, but, Flint, he then said—he told me of a man he had seen at the ball. In a maroon corset with gold thread. My maroon corset, Flint, with my gold thread, for it was I who wore it, and he said—he said the gods had set down whatever else they were making before I was born and shut their workshops and put aside the rivers and the mountains and the stars, and worked only upon him—upon me, Flint—with their very finest tools, and that when they were done they stood back and looked at their hands and knew that nothing they ever made afterwards would compare—”
Richard’s chest heaved. His heart was at it again. The hammering. The fizzing. The tingling in the fingertips. Why, his own face would not stop feeling like a bonfire.
Flint rubbed at his eyes. “Lovely. Are we done?”
“Have you not heard a word I said? I do not know what to do. I do not know what is to be done—”
“Handsome. I am begging you. Let me—”
“Flint, I must court him. Properly, you understand. I must show him that I—” Richard tugged at his ear. “That I am also—that he is also—that the gods, when they set to work on him, also did rather well with—with him—”
Flint huffed. “Just get on your knees and suck him off like everyone else.”
Richard cringed. “Must you be so unspeakably vulgar?” He rose and flopped onto the foot of Flint’s bed, narrowly avoiding the man’s shins. “I shall court him as is fitting. I—I shall buy him something.” His eyes widened. Yes. That was a good thought. “Tomorrow, I shall purchase Kaelen a gift.”
“A man,” Flint intoned, facing the ceiling, “would simply be happy to get sucked off.”
“I am not—” Richard spluttered. “I merely sought advice for his gift. Not—not vulgarity.”
Flint hummed and raised his foot under the blanket to nudge Richard’s shoulder. “No better gift for a man than to have his cock sucked.”
Richard rolled his eyes. “Perhaps in your depraved world.”
“In every world!” Flint lightly kicked at Richard’s head. “Who doesn’t like having their—”
“Regardless”— Richard caught the foot and wrenched it down—“never shall I kneel and show such submission.”
Flint snorted. “Submission? There’s no greater power, my friend, than to have a cock in your mouth. In a single move, you grant either the sweetest pleasure or the most agonising pain.”
“Must you escalate all conversations into carnality?” Richard gave him a withering look. “You have quite dulled my excitement.”
“That’s because you are bloody dull. Now, can I fucking go to sleep?”
“Wait.” Richard scrambled forward on his hands and knees until he loomed over Flint. “Please. I need your help.”
Flint’s brows climbed. “You’re giving my large cock mixed messages.”
“You have two lovers,” Richard said. “You know of these matters. You must come to the market with me and help me find something. Something that says that I—I see him. As he sees me.”
Flint’s expression was a mix of amused exasperation. “Fine. I will drag myself to the market and help you pick out some bauble, and you will allow me to sleep for what remains of this night, do you understand me?”
“Yes.” Richard rolled off with a smile and retreated to his own bed. “Thank you, Flint.”
“Mm.”
“Truly. I am most—”
“Another word, and I’ll knock your fucking teeth out.”
Richard grinned and settled on his back, hands folded across his stomach.
He shut his eyes.
“I thought they must have closed their workshops and put aside the rivers and the mountains and the stars, and worked only upon him, for an entire age, with the very finest of their tools.”
His heart gave another kick against his ribcage, and he resigned himself to a restless night.