Bloodraven (90 page)

“And I,” Yhalen rose up onto his knees so that he was eye to eye with Bloodraven. “Can do a great many things that she cannot. The least of which I’d be more inclined to practice if prompted by the occasional courtesy.”

Bloodraven met his eyes, golden gaze speculative as he considered the implications of Yhalen’s statement. It had been no threat, certainly, but ogres—even half-human ones with particular skills in the art of politics—needed reminding that power did not always come in large, overly-muscled packages.

“Human courtesies don’t always come easy.” Bloodraven’s fingers trailed down his hips.

“You manage well enough when there is gain.” Yhalen leaned in and touched his lips.

“Pretty words?”

“Never.”

Yhalen laughed a little at the thought. He straddled Bloodraven’s lap, reaching down to stroke the cock that had never quite retreated to full flaccidity. It stirred under his touch.

“You’ll endeavor to discover,” Yhalen urged him back onto the bed, adding, “I’ll help along the way.”

Dusk was falling, cool with the shrinking of the sun below the mountains. Yhalen shivered—clothes hastily donned but not entirely laced—in the shadow of one of the balconies overlooking the courtyard.

There was sweat drying still on his skin from the last groping embrace in the haven of his room, and his hair was mostly out of its braid, loose and clinging to his face and shoulders. His body was slack and languid with the exhaustion of the well sated, though. Strangely, utterly calm after months of unease that he’d hardly realized he carried.

“Well.” Elvardo strolled down from the shadows of a winding stair, elegant as always in close fitting black. “Shall you be sleeping among the half-men under thatched roofs, from now on?”

“No,” Yhalen said, not turning, watching Bloodraven pass through the courtyard towards the main gate. He was not ready for that yet, though Bloodraven had asked. He would be, eventually. In due course, he’d be prepared to face the ghosts of the malicious inhuman faces that had stripped him to the bone, up there in the mountains. There would come a time when he would finally separate them from the refugees that had come here. Bloodraven hadn’t pressed the issue, and perhaps he remembered 284

even more clearly that Yhalen, and understood.

“Really? Will I have an ogre under my roof at night then?”

“An ogr’ron. I’d imagine it very likely.”

Elvardo made a soft sound of derision, accompanied by a careless wave of the hand that Yhalen noted from the corner of his vision before he stopped paying attention to the dark lord completely, more invested in watching Bloodraven’s passage through the tall grasses of the vale. It would be a long walk to the other end. And a long walk back, but Bloodraven would undertake it—perhaps not tonight, with a hatchling village to contend with, but tomorrow night....

And from there a great many things were possible.

The End

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