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“I doubt anyone knows you well, Raider, not even the gods.”
“How could they? We’re not on speaking terms.”
Ahmet shook his head woefully and slung a damp towel over his large shoulder. Turning toward the kitchen, he promised, “I will pray for you.”
“I cannot imagine that your prayers would do me much good, my friend.”
Ahmet huffed a laugh and vanished into the back.
As Raider poured himself another cup of raaki, he considered his afternoon. He would love to get delightfully drunk, but he had sand in places it was not at all welcome. Perhaps at the bathhouse he would find the kind of company that was absent from the tavern this afternoon.
No one, unfortunately, was likely to interest him quite like the magnificent man he’d encountered in Yusef’s shop. So serious. So intense.
What a delicious challenge.
But Raider would need to look for an easier prospect if he wanted to feel hands on his body tonight—and he did want that. He hated his nights alone. He wanted to laugh. He wanted to drink raaki and fuck and listen to a voice that wasn’t inside his own head. For that, he needed someone playful and flirtatious.
Yet, when he twisted on his barstool to give the tavern’s prospects a second look, there, in the dusty light of the open doorway, stood the man from Yusef’s shop. Raider couldn’t help but grin.
“You took my advice,” he said as the powerful body came striding his way, boots thumping across the mudbrick floor.
Raider never wore boots. Not only were they far too hot for the climate, his toes, like the rest of him, required more freedom. He loved the billow and glide of his silk kaftan and pants, the unrestricted movement.
Even though the man—gods, that face. Broad but refined, well-cut jaw, brilliant green eyes …
What was he saying? Oh, yes. Even though the (distractingly attractive) man looked perfectly capable of any movement he pleased, the structured black clothing was so unsuited to the climate that it could only be arcane. Add to that the heavy shoulder guards and forearm bracers, the utility belt strapped with oddities that included a razor-sharp, circular chakram for throwing, the hunting knife in his thigh sheath, and the sword strapped across his back?
There was no question of what he was.
“I did not take your advice,” the Curator said. “I asked two other people, and this was identified as one of three probable locations for Jamil. Because it was the closest, I stopped here first.”
“What an exhausting mind you have! But no matter. Here you are! Raaki?”
That perfect jaw clenched visibly, and the green eyes seemed to spark with emerald fire as the man scanned the tavern. “Where is the proprietor?”
“Turning the lamb spit, I imagine. Raaki?”
“It’s too hot for alcohol.”
Raider scoffed. “It is never too hot for alcohol. And it looks like you’re having a rough day. Or are you always this uptight?”
Those green eyes locked on Raider with an intensity that meant trouble, though what sort was yet to be seen. That kind of heat generally led to fighting or fucking. Raider had his preference, but he was flexible.
The man’s iron jaw unclenched enough for him to say, “I can see how someone like you might consider me uptight—”
“Someone like me?”
“—but I am simply focused on my work.”
“For the Arcanum?”
The man’s powerful body stilled briefly then loosened in the telltale way of an experienced fighter readying himself, his hands going loose while his gaze sharpened. Well … sharpened more. If it got any sharper, it might actually start slicing things, and then where would they be? That would make a terrible mess of the tavern. Not to mention Raider.
He turned in his seat and propped an elbow on the bar top. He made a show of looking the man up and down, from his close-cropped hair and clean-shaven face to the well-muscled arms shown off so nicely by the buckled black vest with its heavy shoulder guards. The formfitting top made a fine display of an obviously muscled torso, and the pants hugged his powerful thighs enviably.
It wasn’t just the clothes giving him away. There was also the arcane scope strapped into the utility belt, the sword and chakram, and the thigh sheath with its not-flashy, not-useless knife.
“You didn’t imagine yourself in disguise, did you, Curator? I’ve seen your kind before, and he looked exactly like you.”
