The Merchant of Dreams (Night's Masque, #2)(45)

Ned fumbled with the latch for a moment before getting it open, and they stumbled through. The passageway was narrow, with blank whitewashed walls on either side that caught the moonlight so that Mal could easily see the ground ahead. Fortunate, since it still felt unsteady under his feet. He followed Ned down the passage and out into a street running along the back of the inn. Ah, that was the reason for the bar on the door. They were outside the inn.

"I think we came the wrong way," Ned said, voicing his own thoughts. "Let's go back."

As they turned to retrace their steps, two men stepped out of the shadows of a doorway opposite. Mal froze, instantly far more sober than he had been moments before. Neither of the men appeared to be armed, but both were broad of shoulder and hard of eye. Mal decided he had enough aches and pains already, without adding fresh bruises to the list.

"Can I help you, gentlemen?" he asked in Occitan, the nearest dialect he knew to the local language.

The Sicilian drawled a reply; Mal could only make out something about "English", and possibly an obscenity involving his mother and overweight poultry. To emphasis his point the Sardinian followed it up with a raised middle finger.

"Fuck yourself, sirrah!" Ned returned the gesture.

The Sardinian spat on the ground and assumed a fighter's stance, knees slightly bent and fists at the ready. When Mal held his ground, the man made a beckoning gesture, tilting his head back. Mal caught movement out of the corner of his eye.

"Forget it, Ned," he murmured. "Go on, back down the alley."

"But–"

"Just do it."

He heard rather than saw his friend comply. All his attention was on the Sardinians, who were grinning now. Mal sighed and drew his rapier.

"Go home, lads," he said in English, circling round towards the alley mouth, "unless you want your kidneys served up on a platter."

The Sardinians eyed the yard-long blade for a moment, then melted into the night.

"What was all that about?" Ned asked as Mal followed him down the alley to the inn door.

"Just drunkards on the lookout for trouble," Mal replied, sheathing the rapier. Even their assassin's unknown master could surely not have discovered them here, so far off their intended route.

He ducked through the doorway back into the inn and the safety of several dozen of his own countrymen. Rather than trust to Ned's sense of direction he hailed a passing serving girl.

"Our room?" he asked, miming laying his head on his hands to sleep.

She smiled and gestured to herself. Mal shook his head; after what had just happened, he was reluctant to put himself in a position of vulnerability with any stranger, no matter how comely. He made the sleeping gesture again, and she pointed to an outside staircase in the far corner of the courtyard.

At the top of the stairs, Mal signalled to Ned to halt and took the lead, rapier drawn once more. Though it seemed unlikely they would meet any more trouble tonight, it never hurt to be careful. Pushing the door open with the point of the blade, he looked inside without stepping over the threshold.

Moonlight etched the bedchamber's scant contents in lines of silver and black: a wide bed, a washstand with a basin but no ewer, and a short bench under the window. Mal kicked the door wide and entered, sweeping the rapier in an arc at waist height. No Sardinian brigands leapt out at him, however, and he beckoned for Ned to follow. A few moments later they had a candle lit and were able to assure themselves that they were alone in the room. Mal bolted the door and closed the shutters on the window.

A room to ourselves, eh? I suppose Raleigh didn't want any more trouble between Ned and the crew, although this is just going to stir more rumours.

Ned placed the candle in a smoke-blackened niche near the bed and sat down to pull off his boots.

"Almost like home," he said.

"Aye, it does take me back."

Mal sat down on the bed next to his friend and pulled off his own boots, dropping them noisily on the floorboards. They both undressed to shirt and drawers and lay down side by side, staring at the ceiling. Mal groaned. The bed seemed to sway underneath him like the deck of the Falcon. He knew he ought to sit up, but it was too much effort.

"You and me. Mates again," Ned murmured.

"Aye."

Ned rolled over and propped himself up on one elbow. "Really?"

"Of course. Why do you think I asked you along?"

Ned leant closer. "I've missed you," he said, and kissed Mal on the cheek.

Mal turned his head towards him, acutely aware now of Ned's closeness, the warmth of another body only a finger's breadth from his own. Ned kissed him again, on the mouth this time, and a shiver of lust passed over Mal's skin like a hot breeze. He pulled away reluctantly.

"Don't be a damned fool, Ned. Raleigh's crew have already put two and two together and made five."

Ned made a rude noise. "They're going to think it anyway, be we chaste as virgins."

He sat up and pulled his shirt over his head. In the candlelight his skin was smooth and golden, as flawless as Mal's had once been, long ago.

"What about Parrish?" Mal asked, groping for another objection. He really didn't want this. Did he?

"What about him?"

"Aren't you and he…?"

"We have this agreement," Ned said. He lay back down on his side, head cradled on an arm grown hard with muscle from their recent labours. "What with him disappearing off on tour with the Prince's Men for months on end and all. Private performances for Lord This or Earl That, know what I mean? So, I don't ask him who he's f*cked, and he doesn't ask me. Only difference this time is, I'm the one who's far from home."