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“Fuck me,” Mathias said, surprised, and then beat me to the punchline by sulkily adding, “yeah, I know. Invitation issued and accepted, right?”
“Damn straight,mi cielo.”
I was already imagining the food that awaited us. The bed. The fantasy of lashing Mathias’ wrists to his ankles tomorrow morning before he was properly awake to growl at me, and then once he was, fucking him like that, bent in half for me and unable to move as he was forced to take whatever I choose to give him.
I opened my mouth to describe those plans in detail, and then decided to save my breath for the wild dash we made towards the settlement, pleasantly surprised to find it was in fact a village and not just a hamlet.Vallalavega, the sign read as we re-joined what passed for a road in these parts, and although it wasn’t familiar to me, the wooden board swinging on creaking chains outside of the largest of the buildings sure was.
“An inn,” I murmured with relish, tugging Mat’s hood down low over his face before anyone could catch sight of my northerner and decide he was as tasty as he looked. Or that he deserved to be stoned for being the enemy...either reason, really.
The rain or the recent nightfall had driven the whole village’s occupants inside the inn, it seemed, for while the street and square were empty, the taproom was a lively, humid atmosphere of music, enticing smells, and raucous chatter. Ensuring Mathias kept his head bowed, I pushed my way through the throng of people to reach the worn bar, only just catching myself before I could make the mistake of resting my hands on its sticky-looking surface.
When I met the eye of the bartender, a short man with a balding head and wide smile, I started to request a room when I was spoken over by a man who had pulled up to the bar a few seconds after me. I opened my mouth to snarl out a curse to the queue-pusher and then snapped it closed again, letting the asshole order his drinks before trying again. The meekness grated on me, but I could easily picture Mat’s disapproval at causing a scene and drawing attention to us, as satisfying as it would have been to put the drunken villager back in his place.
The bartender looked me up and down, wiping his hands on a rag. I could see the moment he took in my shabby coat because his lip curled, obviously reassessing whatever value he’d assigned for my custom in his head.
“We need a private room, hot food, and a bath,” I said, flashing a gold coin before he could turn us back out into the rain. “And discretion – my parents and I are in a little disagreement about who I’m to marry, so I’d prefer to keep them off mine and my lover’s tail should they come around these parts.”
That had been Mat’s idea. We knew that story wouldn’t hold up if soldiers were to arrive asking about people matching our descriptions, but the lie and small bribe were less about actually keeping the man’s mouth shut and more to give the village a plausible reason for our suspicious behaviour in turning up without horses or baggage and keeping to ourselves despite the open revelry in the taproom. We’d rather have the locals gossiping about a pair of naïve elopers who thought love would be as easy to live on as daddy’s coin, than speculating about what we were trying to hide from.
The bartender’s tongue roved over his teeth. “Four gold.”
“Two,” I said. I might have been a prince drowning in wealth – usually, anyway – but I wasn’t an idiot. I knew the market value of everyday goods and services used by my people, for how else could I manage my country’s finances without it? And even with the bribe and the lack of other nearby inns driving up the price, four gold was extortion and we both knew it.
The man shrugged, the demands of his other patrons clearly lessening his desire to haggle. “Fine.”
He whistled to a serving girl and barked out orders to draw us a bath, and the surprising efficiency of the place had me and Mat seated in the corner of the taproom with a jug of ale and two plates of overcooked rice and vegetables within a bare minute.
We ate as quickly as we could, hungry enough to stomach the unappealing dinner, and only had to fend off one too-interested local who decided to join us without waiting for an invitation that was clearly never coming. The red-faced man faltered as his proximity at the table allowed him to catch sight of Mathias’ pale features under his hood, but even the presence of a northerner this far south didn’t interest him enough to withstand the tedious droning I piled upon our unwanted visitor, and I talked enough shit about basalt quarrying extraction methods that he soon excused himself to find more interesting company.
My lover let out a soft whistle. “I didn’t realise you knew so much about the properties of stone.”
“I don’t,” I told Mathias. “I repeated the same sentence a dozen times using different words.”
“You could have just told him to fuck off,” Mat commented darkly, chasing a rubbery bean with a fork that was missing a prong.
“Confrontation would be too memorable,” I said, eyeing the rest of the room to see if anyone else would be stupid enough to bother us. “Dullness wipes itself from the memory easily enough.” I’d been exposed to enough of it from the courtiers back inla Cortinato make the statement with nothing less than certainty.
He gave a low laugh. “No one could ever accuse you of being dull, Renato.”
“Hmm,” I said, although I knew he was just being kind. With my loss of royal status, my face unmade, and my clothes not having a splash of colour – let alonestyle– I was no more interesting than my latest joke, and I was feeling decidedly short on those since leaving my three guards to die in the capital.
Yet Mathias’ smile was earnest, even shadowed under his hood as it was, and it softened something deep in my heart as he was so often prone to doing. My lover didn’t give false compliments.
I swallowed, and then stole the elusive green bean from his plate to distract us both.
“Asshole.”
I chewed with audible relish, not because it was at all tasty but because it had been the last mouthful on his plate. Unseen beneath the table, his boot found my shin.
I sought his gaze, indignant. “Did you just kick me?”
“Did you just eat my dinner?”
“Barely.”
“Then...barely.”
“Oh, no,” I told him. “That’s not going to work.”
