Page 42 of Something Human

That was real: the bull remembered him from the attack on Tios, and of course Rus remembered that bull. Pain had receded in the tide of exhilaration. He and his horse, as fearless as he had known she would be, rode toward the bull.

“Come! Come, let us finish this!” he called. And the bull came for him.

When it came together the right way, it was like riding the wind, like the hawk’s flight, and the hawk’s brutal impact with its prey. He threw unerringly, just catching the bull’s shoulder with his spear, wheeled his horse, and leapt. He landed flawlessly, retrieved his spear, and the hard part was over. He’d never had any difficulty with the actual killing, which required a calm precision as well as strength and speed.

It wasn’t until he jumped clear of the bull’s body and stood up, and it felt as if someone had just thrust a burning brand through his leg, that he remembered he was injured. Still for a moment he did not react, because he was looking across the clearing at Adares, and the look on the Phemian’s face …

Of course it hadn’t been just Rus and the bull at all; it had been Rus facing the bull with his lover watching him.

There was an anecdote in a Kossian book Rus had read once—it was a book of philosophy, and the anecdote was meant to illustrate something, he couldn’t remember what—about a boy athlete winning a race against the odds because he saw his lover in the stands at the crucial moment. Of course Rus was not a boy, he was a grown man of nineteen, and after all this had been a matter of life and death, not showing off in a sport contest like an effete Kossian. But he had shown his skill in front of the man who had traced over his tattoos with his fingers and his tongue, and he thought he had an idea how the boy in that anecdote must have felt.

So they rode on toward the Daine camp, and things became easier between them after that. Rus, no longer afraid to let Adares see that he was in pain, and more at ease now that the bull was dealt with, found a more comfortable but less secure way to ride, and agreed to stop several times to stretch and drink water and rest. They had almost reached the place where the Daine were camped when he remembered that he still had to tell Adares that he knew who he was.

He couldn’t think of any other way to do it, now that the moment was upon him, so he just explained what he had said when he poured out the last drops of wine beside the bull’s body.

“What I said was: ‘Nuthar give his blessing to the people of Tios, because they chose the right man to rule them.’”

He watched Adares react, his expressive face going still, his gaze dropping briefly, then meeting Rus’s again, apologetic.

“Do you think that?”

That is your question? Not “How long have you known?” or “How did you guess?” OF COURSE I think that—what is this nonsense?

“I do,” he said.

He wanted to say, “I knew you were someone special the moment I pulled you out from under that cart. You were covered in mud, but you looked like a prince.” He still did, sitting there in his battered armour without a sword, his cloak knotted on his shoulder, heavy black stubble on his chin. Rus wanted to say, “I think the people of Tios probably elected you for your looks.”

He didn’t say that, and later it occurred to him that it was good he hadn’t, because it was probably more or less what Adares seriously believed. He was lavishly good-looking, and he knew that, but he was less certain of his other merits. Of course he would go through life thinking that people only liked him for his looks. All the while Rus had been searching for a way to compliment his beauty, he would have done better to praise his kindness and courage and wit.

All that would occur to him later. First they rode into the Daine camp, and Rus watched his laughing, boyish, carefree lover unsheath his claws like a cat and become casually commanding, a young, aristocratic leader to whom even the Daine headman respectfully deferred. Rus thought of the philosopher’s anecdote again. Now he felt as if he were in the other role, except that he didn’t really think the Phemian needed him cheering from the sidelines at this point. What he needed was the practical help that Rus could provide, slight as it was.

While Adares was busy conferring with the Daine headman and his men, Rus considered the lie he would tell his own people. He could ride to the watch-towers first—he would have to disguise himself somehow—and tell a story that would make the men abandon the towers. Then he could ride into the camp with a different story …

It all sounded good in his head for a few minutes while he thought about it, but it was a plan for some other man, not something Rus could ever do. He doubted whether he could tell the simplest lie convincingly. So after all there was going to be very little he could do to help Adares’s deception.

“I think I should go,” he said.

Adares made a token protest but accepted the necessity of it. He had even thought to ask the Daine headman to leave some tents up so that Rus’s lie would be harder to detect.

“You think of everything,” Rus said.

Adares shrugged, the claws disappearing for a moment. “I can be efficient, sometimes.”

Rus made an effort to stick to practicalities. “I will try to make sure the towers by the harbour are abandoned. But if I can’t—”

“If you can’t, you can’t, and we’ll have to take them by force. If anyone seems suspicious, don’t press the issue. I don’t—”

You don’t want me to risk my life for you, Rus thought. He waited for Adares to say it, and he didn’t. Rus realized he wasn’t going to. Unexpectedly, that moment of silence lanced through him with a kind of piercing happiness. He knows how much he means to me, Rus thought.

“Well,” Adares finished. “Do what you can.”

“I shall.”

He hesitated a moment.

“Well,” said Adares, “I guess … ”

He should probably have waited for Adares to finish his sentence, but he couldn’t. He reached out a hand, touching Adares’s face. He leaned down.