Cross Purposes (Chronicles of Ylandre, Book 5) (12 page)

“This is excellent,” he said with an appreciative smile.

He leaned back in the chair and half-closed his eyes, savoring another scant mouthful of the cordial. They went on to make small talk, as was their habit when they had a moment of leisure to themselves. While Tristen reported his progress at university and related a few adventures out of school, Keosqe spoke of matters that affected the land though he was always careful to leave out sensitive information. This secretiveness occasionally irked Tristen for such issues piqued his curiosity. The limited divulgences of details were hardly satisfying.

“By the way, now that Veare is back in Nivare, I’m thinking of visiting him before winter sets in,” he informed Keosqe.

“Oh? Then you’ll finally meet your nephew.”

“Yes. I’m looking forward to it. I wonder who he took after.”

“Hasn’t Veare described him?”

“Not so much as the color of his hair. But then Veare has never been good at describing anything save for the latest fashion.”

Keosqe chuckled. “Yes, one has to draw it out of him.” He regarded Tristen curiously. “I trust he remembered to greet you this year?”

Tristen smiled crookedly. Veare had forgotten his begetting day the year before and he had taken it badly. “He remembered. I wouldn’t forgive him if he did forget.”

“I wouldn’t blame you.” Keosqe paused. “But I do fault you for one thing.”

“And pray what is that?”

“You let someone else introduce you to bodily pleasure.”

Tristen nearly choked on his last sip of cordial. Wheezing slightly and eyes watering, he stared at Keosqe in mingled abashment and indignation.

“Did you spy on me?” he asked with some acerbity.

Keosqe shook his head. “I came by to see how your dinner party was doing, but you were not in the common room. One of your instructors said you’d gone to the outhouse with a friend but that you seemed to be taking a long time.” Tristen felt his cheeks warm considerably. “I dare say there could have been only one reason for your extended absence.”

“I didn’t sleep with him,” Tristen blurted. An instant later, he wondered why he’d felt compelled to inform Keosqe of that fact. His face turned even hotter.

“I didn’t think you did,” Keosqe replied with a small smile. “But thank you for assuring me of that fact.”

Tristen focused his gaze on his glass. “Would it have disappointed you if I’d already slept with someone?” he murmured.

“Not disappointed. Say rather, it would have saddened me.”

“Why saddened?”

“Because that would have meant you don’t like me enough to share yourself with me first.”

Tristen looked up with a jerk. “Then you haven’t changed your mind?”

“What? About loving you?” Keosqe snorted. “Of course not. What made you think that I had?”

“Because you didn’t try to—” Tristen grimaced and folded his arms defensively across his chest. “I thought you would do something … make a move.”

“To seduce you?”

“Er, yes.”

Keosqe huffed a rueful chuckle. “You have no idea how badly I wanted you in my bed that night.” He shook his head. “But you were so determined to spend the evening with your friends, I didn’t think you would welcome an overture from me just then.”

“Oh … well, maybe not then.” Tristen frowned. “But the following days? Weeks?
Heyas
, it’s been five months!”

“Why the umbrage? Are you so eager for my tutelage?”

Tristen glared at him. “That isn’t the point! You kept suggesting all those months beforehand that you were just waiting for me to turn thirty! But when I finally did, you didn’t do anything! What was I supposed to think?”

“That I was so busy, the most I could have given you was a quick tumble, which would have made for a less than memorable first time for you.” Keosqe reached over and gently cradled Tristen’s cheek in his hand. “Would you have been happy with that?”

Tristen swallowed. “Nay, I wouldn’t have been.” He drew a shaky breath. “Truth be told, I decided to put
that
off and wait for the right person to teach me.”

“I hoped you would.” Keosqe withdrew his hand and leaned back. His eyes glittering, he said, “So, is your waiting done?”

The huskiness with which he uttered the question threw Tristen into a giddy state. He tried to look away but time and again, his eyes were drawn back to Keosqe—his golden hair, his sculpted features and his strong, well-made body. If anything, he seemed to grow ever more beautiful with each passing year. And overlying his physical attractions was his aura of authority, confidence, and sensuality. It was a potent combination and Tristen owned himself far from immune to it.

“I can’t answer that,” he protested. “You expect too much of me, Kes-
tyar
.”

“Do I?” Keosqe smirked. “Well, maybe I do. Nevertheless, I warrant I merit a reward for being so patient, don’t you think?”

Tristen was briefly rendered mute by the apparent non sequitur. “What kind of reward?” he cautiously asked.

Keosqe shrugged. “A kiss, perhaps. You’ve had some practice, I dare say.”

“That’s none of your business!”

“You mean you haven’t?”

“I didn’t say that!”

“Well then, convince me that you have.”

Tristen pursed his lips. It seemed the conversation had a taken a familiar turn. Judging from the twinkle in Keosqe’s eyes, he was teasing Tristen to distraction again.

“All right then,” Tristen muttered.

He stood up and walked to the noble. Taking a deep breath, he bent and pressed his lips hesitantly to Keosqe’s.

When the latter responded with a gentle, almost feather-light kiss, he thought they would go no further than this tentative caress. But all of a sudden, Keosqe groaned and pulled him down onto his lap. Tristen gasped as he all but sprawled on Keosqe’s lap while the kiss turned distinctly unchaste.

Keosqe’s mouth slanted against his and before Tristen knew it his lips were parted and he was engaged in a hot-tongued, plundering kiss. Veres almighty, he had never known a kiss could undo one so thoroughly! It was his last coherent thought before the rest of his musings were thrown into a chaotic jumble and pure sensation took over.

By the time Keosqe released his lips, he was all but breathless. And his heart pounded so madly, he felt as if he’d run around the city limits thrice over. He regarded Keosqe with dazed eyes and discovered the noble was similarly affected. His face was faintly flushed, his breathing was a tad erratic and his eyelids were half lowered, giving him an irresistible sensual appearance. Tristen knew a thrill of triumph at having that effect on Keosqe. At the same time, he quivered in some apprehension at what this intimate prelude portended.

He did not wait long.

Keosqe suddenly stood up, lifting him in his arms. Tristen started to protest at being handled thusly, but found himself at a loss for more words than a faint “Saints above” when he realized Keosqe was bearing him to the adjoining master suite. He turned his burning face into the noble’s shoulder as they passed through the connecting door into the sitting room of the apartment. But when Keosqe carried him to the bedchamber, he made a stab at some autonomy.

“Please, let me walk,” he managed to say.

For a moment, he thought Keosqe would ignore his request. But after a pause, the noble smiled and let him down.

“You’d rather be led than borne to your fate?” he teased as he ushered Tristen into the bedchamber.

Tristen flashed him a glare. “More like doom,” he retorted.

About to utter another tart remark, he stopped when they entered the room. He gave scant notice to the massive canopied bed half concealed by gauzy drapes, the pair of elegant yet comfortable chairs upholstered in mahogany brocade stationed in the reading nook in one corner of the room and windows and balcony doors framed by heavy bronze-hued curtains edged with burgundy tassels. What drew his full attention was the stoppered bottle of clear liquid on the right-hand bedside table.

“Deity’s blood!” he blurted, turning a slightly accusatory glare on Keosqe. “You planned this!”

Keosqe chuckled. “And why not?” he countered. He put his arm around Tristen’s waist and pulled him close. “Some things have to be planned in order for them to actually happen. I also thought you’d like a more traditional approach your first time.”

Tristen frowned. “Traditional? What do you mean?”

He gasped when Keosqe shifted him around into his arms and treated him to another searing kiss. Trying to keep his wits around him for as long as he could, Tristen did not register how adeptly the noble had walked him backward to the bed until the back of his knees hit the edge of the mattress. Unbalanced, he started to fall but Keosqe caught him and eased him down, following him closely to cover Tristen’s body with his.

Tristen started to speak but groaned instead when Keosqe pressed his lips to his throat and kissed the length of it from under his jaw down to the small hollow at its base. His hand snaked under Tristen’s shirt to caress his belly and flank, every touch of his fingers like a white-hot brand on Tristen’s skin.

“Sweet,” Keosqe whispered against Tristen’s throat. “So sweet.”

His roving hand emerged from under Tristen’s shirt to travel lower to the waistband of his sleeping trousers. Tristen gasped when he felt Keosqe’s fingers slip under the waistband and alight on his shaft.

“Saints preserve me,” he gasped when Keosqe curled his hand around the column and gently stroked it. This was not the first time someone else had touched him thusly. So why did it feel different? Almost embarrassingly intimate in fact.

Feeling his shaft quickly harden, Tristen whimpered, disconcerted by how easily Keosqe could arouse him. He was not even stroking him in earnest yet Tristen’s body was already thrumming with intense sensation.

Once more Keosqe sealed their lips, enticing Tristen into a molten kiss that, coupled with the fondling of his nether parts, made him feel as if he were drowning in sheer pleasure.

Frightened by the further loss of control, he broke away with a ragged gasp and sought to plead with Keosqe to slow down. Before he could pull his wits together enough to speak sensibly, Keosqe dragged Tristen’s trousers down his hips and pulled them off his legs in one practiced motion. Freed of constraint, his shaft rose stiffly, its hue still the warm pink of youth. Tristen yelped and tried to cover his groin but Keosqe caught him by the wrist and pulled his hand away, shaking his head.

“I want to see you,” he murmured. “Don’t ever hide yourself from me.”

He nudged Tristen’s legs apart with a knee, his eyes riveted in open desire on the youth’s groin. Tristen moaned as he was once more pleasured by hand, fingers raking through the sparse curls on his groin, his seed sac tenderly cupped and fondled, and his shaft repeatedly stroked from tip to base.

“Kes-
tyar
, please…”

As if in response to Tristen’s unspoken plea, Keosqe shifted lower and leaning low, drew his tongue up the length of Tristen’s shaft. That elicited another yelp followed by a shuddery moan when Tristen felt himself engulfed in the moist heat of Keosqe’s mouth.

He bit back his cries as best as he could, but that proved increasingly difficult as Keosqe repeatedly sucked his shaft to its base and occasionally swirled his tongue around its extremely sensitive head. Tristen shook his head in protest but his body told another story as he lifted his hips in an instinctive bid to push his shaft deeper into the wonderful warmth of Keosqe’s mouth. He released a groan of frustration when the noble briefly paused his pleasuring.

He opened his eyes when he caught a whiff of something mildly minty in aroma. He almost stopped breathing when he realized Keosqe had opened the bottle of oil and was dipping his middle finger into the fragrant liquid.

“What are you going to do?” he asked a little breathlessly.

Keosqe smirked at him. He stoppered the bottle and tossed it aside. “Surely you can guess,” he challenged, his smile turning positively wicked.

He reached down between Tristen’s thighs. Tristen nearly jerked away when Keosqe slid a finger into the cleft of his backside and prodded the tiny entrance within. But Keosqe held him down by the hip with his other hand.

Tristen raised himself on his arms and, looking desperately at Keosqe, said, “Wait, I’ve never done this before. You must—”

Keosqe resumed sucking Tristen’s member. The pleasure drove all thought of protest out of Tristen’s mind and he fell back with a drawn out moan. Lost in rapture, he failed to realize the entry of Keosqe’s finger into him until the noble had slid it in to the knuckle. He emitted a startled cry at the intrusion. The cry evolved into broken gasps as Keosqe withdrew his finger and then thrust it in again in mimicry of what was to come. All the while he did not cease to draw upon Tristen’s shaft.

The ensuing maelstrom of pleasurable sensations robbed Tristen of comprehensible speech and rendered him unresisting to his body’s initial pillaging.

As he’d earlier intimated, he had not attempted anything further than the use of hands and mouth to give pleasure, not caring to be initiated into full sexual communion by anyone as green as he was. The fumbling alone would probably ruin the mood. And Tristen refused to suffer more discomfort than was necessary. If that entailed waiting for a more experienced and considerate partner, so be it. In the meantime, he’d enjoyed what there was to be had. It was pleasant despite the limitations and he always gained the release in any case.

But none of his previous encounters had prepared him for the ferocity of sensations or depth of emotions wrought by simply having Keosqe’s mouth on him and his finger in him, each thrusting motion brushing a place inside Tristen knew about but had never thought could intensify pleasure to such a degree. Tears trickled down his cheeks as rapture mounted to an excruciating peak and all thought centered on the swiftly unraveling coil of tension in his belly. He stuttered Keosqe’s name. Uttered plea after inarticulate plea for relief from the maddening pleasure.

Keosqe responded by taking him to the root while pushing his finger deep into Tristen’s arse to lengthily caress that point of pleasure within. The coil in Tristen’s belly came undone in an orgasm of such force and suddenness it left him struggling for breath in between increasingly voluble sobs. He pressed clenched fists against his mouth in a vain attempt to stifle the embarrassing, much too revealing sounds.