Chapter Eight
S tarting awake, Perian groaned at the crick in his neck. He was momentarily disoriented but then realized he had fallen asleep in the chair by the fire. The book had slid to one side but fortunately not fallen off the chair. Perian hadn’t thought to ask what happened if you returned a book in an inferior condition, but he couldn’t imagine that would be acceptable. Whether the book was new or old, it deserved to be treated with care. Perian set the book on the side table and reached up to stretch, his spine cracking as he did so. Gingerly, he twisted his neck back and forth and rolled his shoulders. These chairs were extremely comfortable, but they were definitely not designed for protracted sleeping.
The light coming through the window told Perian that dawn was approaching. Alarmed, he sprang up to go look in the bedroom. Brannal was in bed, asleep. Perian felt his heart sink as the worry that Brannal had been kept out with some sort of demon-related emergency was replaced with the knowledge that the man had come back to the room, presumably found Perian sleeping in the chair, and left him there to go to bed alone.
Perian carefully closed the door again, frowning to himself. Two nights ago, Brannal had roused Perian when he’d dozed off, and they’d gone to bed together. What was different about last night? Perian wanted answers, but part of him was contemplating not saying anything to keep the status quo. He scrubbed his hands over his face, then ran them through his hair, which had half fallen out of its tie. He liked Brannal so much that he was maybe willing to do more than he’d thought to be able to keep him.
He blew out a breath and reminded himself it had only been one awkward evening. His father had always told him it was better not to make decisions in the heat of the moment. Perian would see how today went and then reassess.
He was still standing there when there was a tap on the door proceeded by staff bringing the food in for breakfast. They inclined their heads in respect, and Perian smiled at them.
“Thank you,” he managed to say as they finished their work.
He was still standing there like an idiot when Brannal emerged from the bedroom. He had clearly taken the time to clean up and dress, which made Perian feel doubly stupid for standing here in his wrinkled clothes from yesterday. At the very least, he could have been eating or reading or doing anything other than standing aimlessly in the middle of the room. He could only hope he didn’t look as lost as he felt.
“Good morning,” Brannal said.
“Morning,” Perian returned, not at all sure yet if it was good.
He couldn’t even decide if it was a good thing or not that Brannal had said good morning. Did that mean he thought it was one? That he’d enjoyed waking on his own? Or was he simply saying good morning because that was a standard greeting?
“I’ll just go get dressed,” Perian mumbled, brushing past the other man and heading into the water closet. After relieving his bladder, he splashed water on his face and then stared at his dripping reflection in the mirror.
He’d met Brannal only a few days ago. Admittedly, the man had swept into his life in a dramatic fashion. Perian had been swept along, a little, but he’d also enthusiastically agreed to multiple parts of this experience. He could also leave at any point. Brannal hadn’t locked him in a dungeon, and maybe Perian was getting a little worked up over something that really wasn’t as complicated as he was making it out to be.
They were two people who were effectively living with one another after a very short acquaintance. It was entirely likely that there would be growing pains—and even more likely that at some point one or both of them would decide they didn’t want to do this anymore. That was perfectly fine. Perian needed to get a grip.
He briefly contemplated taking the time to have a bath, which would probably mean that Brannal would finish breakfast and leave before Perian was done. But then he imagined how much more awkward it would be if Brannal waited for him. Perian gave himself a perfunctory scrub at the sink and then went to pull on clean clothes. He felt a bit better just with that done, and he headed back out into the sitting room in an improved frame of mind.
Brannal was still at the breakfast table. Perian sat down and served himself from the array of food. He barely managed not to let out a sigh of relief when Brannal poured him a cup of tea. He’d refreshed his own cup too, but still. Maybe whatever was going on wasn’t too bad after all.
“How was your day yesterday?” Brannal asked.
“Fine,” Perian answered automatically, which made him think of Renny and the lies that adults told one another. But the real answer was entirely complicated and probably a bit much for the breakfast table. “Explored the castle some more, looked through the gallery, saw what the Warriors do to keep in shape. It was very impressive, really.”
Brannal was silent a moment too long, but his voice was mild when he said, “They have a very important duty.”
“True,” Perian agreed. Then he made a face. “Although really, when you think about it, everyone’s duty is important. If you suddenly eliminated the cooks or the cleaners or the weavers or the bookmakers—if you got rid of an entire group of any position—there would be a sudden gap in our lives that we would notice and probably miss quite sorely.”
Brannal stared at him with his cup halfway to his mouth, a somewhat bemused expression on his face, like that was not, at all, how he thought Perian was going to respond. Then, suddenly, he smiled, and Perian could breathe a little easier.
“I would indeed be annoyed if my tea were not brought each morning just the way I preferred. I take your point. I did not mean to imply that a Warrior was more important than anyone else.”
“Although, in fairness,” Perian pointed out, “not every position requires quite that amount of muscle and manual dexterity.”
An eyebrow rose, and Brannal definitely sounded amused now. “I take it you were not watching their ability to fight?”
Perian shrugged. “I can’t tell good fighting from bad, generally. But I am as capable as the next person at gauging an attractive person.”
Brannal laughed. “I can’t argue with that.” Then his eyes narrowed slightly. “But I can perhaps correct it.”
Slowly, Perian said, “Correct my ability to gauge an attractive person?”
Brannal made a face. “No, of course not. I don’t have any complaints about your definition of an attractive person.”
He winked, and Perian couldn’t help but smile, suddenly feeling a lot less confused about this conversation. Blatant flirting, he understood.
Brannal clarified, “I’d like to correct your inability to know good fighting from bad. I can make some time this afternoon. How would you like to learn some basic defense moves?”
Perian was pretty sure this was going to be humiliating in the extreme. On the other hand, he hadn’t exactly acquitted himself well when he’d been attacked. And getting up close and personal with Brannal sounded excellent .
“That sounds like a good idea,” Perian said, mostly truthful.
Brannal smiled and drained his tea. “Excellent. Meet me here after lunch, and I’ll show you the training room.” He rose to his feet, then paused. “Or would you like to have lunch first? I could have something delivered here.”
“I’d like that,” Perian said.
“Then let’s meet here at noon.”
Perian nodded, and Brannal headed off.
That was positive, right? Brannal wanted to spend time with him, maybe having realized he’d excluded Perian yesterday, inadvertently or otherwise, and this was his way of making up for it. He’d go with that explanation, he decided, because it made him feel better, and there was no one to gainsay him.
He finished his breakfast, and then decided to take one of his books out to the quadrangle. He needed to lose himself in something else, or he was going to spend the whole morning imagining this afternoon.
He made sure to head down a different path than the one that led to Renny, though she was probably not there right now. It was a large garden, and it was nice to enjoy more of it, to look at all the plants that were growing as they headed towards summer. He found a public bench that was right out there in the open, no little girls to tell him they were saving spots for their brother.
He cracked open his book and dived into an entirely ridiculous fictional romance between two Warriors who constantly butted heads when it was entirely obvious to the reader that they were totally flirting and just hadn’t realized it yet. Yes, this was just the sort of silly thing to make him concentrate on someone else’s fictional troubles. He could save serious books for later.
The brightening light made him realize that the sun was nearly overhead, and he made his way back to Brannal’s rooms to find that lunch was already there but Brannal wasn’t. Perian put away his book, freshened up in the water closet, and then settled at the table. A few minutes later, Brannal swept into the room and grinned when he saw Perian—or maybe the food.
“Wonderful. I’ve worked up an appetite. I’ll just be a moment.”
Once Brannal was back from the water closet, they had an entirely enjoyable lunch, laughing over the plot of Perian’s book—despite Brannal’s scoffing at Perian reading it, he didn’t seem to mind hearing about it—and discussing Brannal’s reading of reports from the traveling Mage Warriors and Warriors. Later this afternoon, he had to report to the Queen and then the Council.
“Better you than me,” Perian told him cheerfully, and Brannal laughed.
They ate a leisurely meal, and it felt a lot like it had before whatever had happened yesterday evening. Perian began to think that he really had blown things out of proportion. Maybe it had nothing to do with him at all, or maybe Brannal had wanted one evening without Perian. He’d taken the time to make sure someone let Perian know he wasn’t available, so it wasn’t like he’d left him languishing alone and confused.
Yes, Perian had been making a mountain out of a molehill.
He was looking forward to this afternoon, when Brannal had decided to spend time with him. That was going to be enjoyable even if Perian was supposed to be learning defense. Brannal hurried them along a little at the end, which Perian thought was odd—until they got to the training room, and he realized that Brannal simply hadn’t wanted to be late .
Because all those images Perian had had of the two of them grappling together leading to something even more fun?
Not a chance. They weren’t doing this by themselves.
The saving grace was that Cormal wasn’t there. But Molun, Delana, and Nisal were, as well as the man who had been with Molun in the corridor on that first morning, who was apparently named Arvus. That was about as not alone as you could get, and Brannal, who evidently hadn’t been envisioning any of the fun things Perian had, casually explained that he’d asked these Mage Warriors to forgo their usual training session in order to help Perian instead.
He felt a little deflated to realize he’d gotten the idea for this session completely wrong, but it actually turned out to be relatively fun, leaving aside the fact that everyone could beat Perian practically without effort—and that was without resorting to the Mage part of the Mage Warrior.
But he’d known going in that he wasn’t a Warrior of any sort, and while he’d thought he was going to be demonstrating his ineptitude only to one person, they had surely all already been aware he couldn’t match any of them when it came to force.
First, Perian learned how to fall correctly so he was less likely to injure himself if someone brought him to the ground. They’d started in the training room because it had mats on the floor to lessen the impact.
Then he watched the others demonstrate a number of different holds and defenses. It now made more sense that multiple people were there because where you hurt people was different depending on what body parts they had and their relative height and strength. It was actually rather heartening to watch Nisal get away from Arvus, given that he was practically twice their size.
“You’re sure you’re not using air to do that?” Perian asked.
Nisal eyed him. “If I was using air, I’d’ve done this.”
And with a rushing gust of wind, Molun and Delana were both knocked to the ground next to Arvus without Nisal needing to move at all.
“You are my hero,” Perian told them seriously.
Nisal laughed.
He wasn’t sure if they’d tried and failed to pull down Brannal or if they hadn’t thought it was worth the attempt.
Everyone climbed back to their feet, and they kept working with Perian to get the form down so that he, too, would be capable of flipping people bigger than he was. He wasn’t as small as Nisal, but they were strong and trained.
It was more useful than he’d thought it would be to watch other people demonstrate the move for him, especially when they were willing to let him watch closely and slow it down. As much as he was likely to be sore later, Perian wasn’t about to complain about a number of fit people pinning him with their bodies, especially when he then had to squirm around to try to get free.
“You know, I can see why you all enjoy this,” Perian announced as Arvus pinned him.
Brannal pulled Perian to his feet, and Molun laughed when Brannal was the one who paired with him next. Perian hadn’t been trying to make him jealous, but being pinned to the ground by Brannal was his most favorite, so he really didn’t mind the results.
Brannal was an exacting teacher, correcting Perian’s stance and efforts, but it was clearly with the goal of making him better at it. This might not be his favorite way to get sweaty, but by the end of the session, he was out of breath, definitely sweaty, and had succeeded not only in getting away from each of them, but he’d even managed to bring them down at least once as well. Admittedly, they’d been teaching him how to do it rather than exerting their full force or actually making an effort to stop him, but Perian was still proud of himself.
Being able to pin Brannal to the floor was a highlight. And despite the room of onlookers, Perian didn’t have the slightest bit of hesitation about grinding down on top of him.
“Oh, yes, I can definitely see why you enjoy this,” he murmured.
Brannal’s eyes went dark and intense, just the way Perian preferred.
“And on that note,” Delana declared, “we’ll be going.”
Perian wasn’t listening.
“Can’t we—” Molun started.
“No,” Nisal said firmly. “They don’t want an audience.”
“And we don’t need to see that,” Delana said, sounding unimpressed.
“I do!”
The sound of Molun’s pouting disappointment faded away, and Perian didn’t need to announce to them that actually, he wasn’t categorically opposed to an audience. But he didn’t know how Brannal felt about it, and his priority right now was most definitely the man beneath him.
With a move Perian was probably supposed to have been ready to block but didn’t even make an attempt for, Brannal twisted them. He was now on top, strong body pressing Perian into the mats beneath them, mouth hungrily kissing. Perian let his legs fall apart so Brannal could slot his own leg in between them, then he bucked up into the contact. Brannal tugged at Perian’s hair, which had fallen out of its tie, and Perian grabbed the man’s ass. It took what was probably an embarrassingly short amount of time until they were coming in their trousers.
“This was an excellent lesson,” Perian told Brannal earnestly.
Brannal laughed and rose to his feet, offering his hand to pull Perian up effortlessly.
“Come on. We’d better go get cleaned up.”
They did get clean and didn’t get too badly distracted, because Brannal had to go report to the Queen prior to the meeting of the full Council.
Brannal gave him a final lingering kiss.
“I will likely be asked to dine with the royal family afterwards,” he told Perian.
“Better you than me,” Perian repeated.
“I can have something sent here.”
Perian shot him a look. “I am perfectly able to fend for myself, thank you.”
Brannal’s lips quirked. “I’m sure you are. All right, I’ll see you later.”
Then he was gone. Perian felt altogether more settled. Of course, Brannal had to fulfill his role as Summus, and sometimes it meant having dinner with different people.
Food on his mind, he decided to go and ask for his own dinner. He wasn’t hungry yet, but he thought it might be more polite to give the kitchen more warning than he did when he wanted a picnic.
“Do you mind delivering it?” Perian asked. “Or would you prefer me to come and pick it up?”
The woman who’d taken his request looked a little bemused and assured him they would deliver it.
“I’m going to need a picnic lunch again tomorrow,” he told her. “Shall I book it in advance or just show up like I’ve been doing so far. Whatever’s easier for you!”
She assured him it was no problem if he just showed up, since food for one or two people was easy enough.
“Perfect. Thanks again. I’ve really been enjoying everything!”
He decided a breath of fresh air would be nice after the workout he’d had. They’d all warned him he was likely to be sore tomorrow. He rode and swam back home, but he hadn’t been as active in the city. He knew the worst thing he could do was sit around afterwards and not move at all.
He avoided the training yard, since he was not about to volunteer to be knocked down again. He picked a new path through the garden, wondering why Renny hadn’t been available this afternoon and if they were getting to a point where he could ask those sorts of questions. He really didn’t want to upset her, though, and he’d only known her for a couple of days.
Huh. Maybe it was the castle. With both Brannal and Renny, he felt like he’d known them longer than he actually had. Nisal too, although to a lesser degree. Maybe they were just that sort of person. He certainly wasn’t feeling a close, personal bond with Cormal.
Yeah, he was pretty sure they were just that sort of person.
After walking around aimlessly for a bit, he headed inside, making his way back to Brannal’s rooms, where he found that dinner had arrived. It didn’t seem quite as welcoming when it was set for just one person instead of two, but it still looked like a lovely meal. Perian sat down to eat it, reminding himself that he’d just exerted himself rather more than he had in days.
When he was finished, he settled in front of the fire with a book. This one was on the history of the castle, all the way back to its construction and the work that had gone into making it defensible, especially against demons. It had apparently been partly destroyed during the Great Cataclysm and then rebuilt.
Perian thought about how many lives had been lost in order to rid their world of so many demons. But some demons still lingered, and they still attacked in order to consume human energy, and people still died. Since demons couldn’t be reasoned with, they were killed whenever they were found in order to protect humans. Their numbers were far fewer following the Great Cataclysm, but Perian didn’t know if the ones that were here now had bred here or if they continued to come from the demon realm in reduced numbers. He didn’t think that anyone knew. Thankfully, humans had never again been overrun, not the way it had been before the Great Cataclysm. But they’d never been completely free, either.
The castle had remained defensible, but in more recent decades, Earth Mages had apparently helped shift and modify the stone to allow for the retrofitting of plumbing and larger glass windows. That was pretty amazing. He hadn’t realized they could do that.
Perian was startled from his musings by the sound of the door, and he looked up to find that Brannal had returned.
“Hello,” Perian greeted him.
“Reading in the chair again?” Brannal asked.
Perian nodded, but rose to his feet and stretched. “Much better than sleeping all night in the chair, and I think I’d better get out of it before I risk that happening again. It was not comfortable.”
The words were out before he could consider if this was a topic he wanted to bring up. But Brannal laughed.
“Oh, believe me, I know. I’ve made that mistake myself a time or two.”
It was on the tip of Perian’s tongue to ask why Brannal had left Perian there last night, but then Brannal’s lip curled up.
“If you’re done with reading and you don’t want to sleep in the chair, does that mean you want to relocate to the bed?”
And if Perian had to pick between an awkward conversation and sex, there was really no contest.
He grinned at Brannal. “That’s exactly what it means.”
They divested themselves on the way into the bedroom, fell into bed together, and brought one another to very enjoyable completion using hands and mouths. Brannal pulled Perian into his arms once they’d wiped themselves clean, and Perian rested his head on the other man’s shoulder and slipped into sleep feeling sated and entirely content.