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“Four lumps.”

“Madman.” Rosbert delivered the sugar. “I know you won’t trifle with her affections, if she is serious—there’s a decency about you.”

Osric wished to assure him that between himself and Fairhrim there was no affection to be trifled with whatsoever, but he choked on his tea, becausedecency.

“Don’t be modest,” said Rosbert. “She’s told us all about you. You’ve apparently saved her from a hostage situation. And you donate to paediatric disease research. And you rescue dogs.”

All of which was simultaneously true and strikingly inaccurate.

From her parents Osric saw where Fairhrim got her brains, but her sharpness was entirely her own invention. These were soft people. There was a purity in their hospitality and an innocence in their concern forOsric that felt foreign. There were no knives here—no plots, no backstabbing, no need to look over one’s shoulder.

On the second day of his convalescence, Osric took Fairhrim’s hint about ending his career as a mandible-twitching larva to heart, and began to make forays on his feet. His first was remarkable; he declared to Fairhrim that he was, in fact, ready to leave, then strode to the first available door, swung it open, and walked into the toilet.

“That’s the toilet,” said Fairhrim, unnecessarily.

The world spun and Osric almost cracked his head open on the toilet bowl, and so he lay back down and decided to try again later.

Exploring the house was an adventure. The mark of the Ingenaut was everywhere. Radia had equipped her home with all of her Order’s luxuries and combined them with the artistry of her homeland. Elaborately carved doors swung open as Osric approached. A lift that was a magnificent, soundless marvel of engineering carried him from floor to floor, all gleaming brass levers and bright buttons, decorated with seas and stars. Globes of light etched with geometric patterns recessed into the ceiling when they weren’t needed, and descended when required. The corridors used by the servants were camouflaged with mirrors and paintings. Illuminated curio cabinets lined walls. Radia had an extensive collection of timepieces, beautifully polished, one or two of which caught Osric’s eye, but she also had an impressive alarm system, so Osric decided to let only his eye be caught, and not his hand.

Fairhrim could have lived a soft life here. She was generally a logical sort, but this was inexplicable: why did she toil and sacrifice at Swanstone and live in a spider-filled attic? Altruism? The toilets here had contraptions that washed one’s entire undercarriage. A French import. There was simply no way Swanstone had those. That was what altruism got you: spiders in your arsehole.

At night, Fairhrim slept on the sofa, wrapped in a spare blanket, and dressed in oversized flannel pyjamas that looked as though she’d borrowed them from her father. Osric liked to think that he hadrecovered from his blood-loss-induced delirium and ceased to find her stunning.

However.

However.

One night—when he was still, he would later tell himself, in the delirium of his recovery—there was one moment—he blamed it on the drugs in his system—one moment—he wasn’t himself yet—when he succumbed to a low, terrible weakness.

It was four in the morning. He woke up hard. The dream had involved a woman—possibly Fairhrim, but he preferred to tell himself that he didn’t remember.

In normal circumstances, he would have rubbed out a quick wank and gone back to bed, only he was in Fairhrim’s room, and Fairhrim was asleep right there.

He did not, in his defence, touch himself.

Not immediately, anyway.

He thought of unsexy things. He thought of disgusting things. He thought of episiotomy scissors. Gangrene. Torn nipples. Mathematics.

His erection remained, achingly hard. His balls felt heavy. He was so aroused that the merest twitch of his hips upwards against the resistance of the sheets made his cock jump. Small blessing: his torpraxia had not advanced to his cock; it could still feel perfectly. Was it a blessing? Perhaps not in this specific moment.

He knew what he wanted to do. He didn’t know if he was filthy enough to do it.

Fairhrim was right there. It would be wrong. It would be profane.

He was filthy enough to do it.

He watched her through half-lidded eyes, telling himself, at first, that it was to make sure that she wouldn’t wake up while he relieved himself. That was all he was doing: relieving himself. It had nothing to do with her.

He observed her hand, dangling from the sofa as she slept, her tacnhalf-visible. He—to his shame—imagined that hand running along his cock as he slipped his own hand under the sheets and stroked himself. He watched her breathe. He tightened and relaxed his grip upon himself in keeping with the rise and fall of her chest. He thought of the chapped roughness of her palm along the underside of his erection. Thought of her fingers swirling around his head as he mirrored the movement under the sheets. Thought of her lips next, kissing their way upwards, and then opening—

Gods. He was disgusting. He was abhorrent. She had just saved his life, and slept exhausted next to him, and this was how he repaid her?

He continued his imaginings. Her lips—that tongue that she wielded so masterfully against him in their verbal spars—ran up his shaft. His cock jumped under the sheets; pre-come dribbled onto a knuckle. He was ashamed. His cock throbbed. He imagined her breath feathering across his wet tip. His hips bucked. This was obscene. He should stop.

He tried to stop. Saw the outline of her hip in the dark. Stroked himself again. Slipped into a new phantasm. His mouth on her hip, kissing and biting its way to the delicious inside of a thigh, then dragging wet kisses upwards. Pulling away her underthings. Delving into her, tasting her, intoxicating himself on her arousal, smearing it all over his mouth and chin. The press of thighs on either side of his head. Fairhrim sighed in her sleep. He imagined that her lips parted thus because of his tongue. Trembled. Gave himself a final stroke. His free hand gripped sheets, grasped at something—anything—on the bedside table to catch his come. He found a bit of napkin. Held back a gasp. White light bloomed behind his eyelids.

His orgasm came in bursts of guilt and pleasure. He rode it out in silence as he spilled himself into the napkin. When the pleasure-guilt pulses twitched out their last in his fist, he stared at the ceiling. Recovered his breathing. Found that his face was burning.