Rasnake(23)

Cecil whistled, and the wolves barked. "It's safe."

"Let's get inside, then," Milton said. "Rest up, then figure out what to do next—and how the hell that dragon attacked the castle directly."

Getting back across the moat was far easier said than done. It took just over an hour to get ten people across the already foul-smelling dragon corpse and into the castle.

Milton ordered the gates lowered after the men sent out for Amber had returned. "From now on, the castle is sealed. We'll work around the extra manpower needed to do that, because we cannot afford to leave the castle completely open anymore."

"Any other people injured?" Tallant asked as Henry came up to them.

Henry nodded. "A few, they're in the hall." Tallant nodded, and signaled Milton, then strode off to tend to the wounded.

Milton nodded, but never broke from handing out orders and sorting out the people gathering around him. All the while, Tallant could not help noticing the way Cecil stood quietly by, tired but clearly relieved by something—perhaps that he was no longer bearing the full burden of responsibility. Whatever the brothers had exchanged in that embrace, it had clearly started to set all wrongs right, and allowed Cecil to cede the control he had clearly never wanted.

Tallant reached up to touch his pendant, curled his fingers around it. Wolves—Milton and Cecil were definitely that. They were tough, flik, always growling, playing, and working, but at the end of it all, fiercely loyal to each other, to their pack.

He was no longer in the middle of two angry brothers, but it let him feeling rather stranded. Milton was his brother, but Tallant was absolutely certain he'd never be able to see Cecil the same way. No, Cecil was something else entirely.

And now was not the time for such selfish thoughts. Really, he was getting worse and worse about his self-pity. Reaching the great hall, Tallant threw himself into healing the handful of wounded there, then pitched in to pull out the supplies that would be needed to make a temporary bridge. Then he wound up helping serve food and drink.

Eventually, though, he found himself at loose ends, with dusk just beginning to fall. He sent a boy to fetch his satchel, then took it and a mug of mulled wine to a quiet corner of the castle. He settled in comfortably and pulled out his half-dozen books on magic.

He hadn't read more than a couple of pages when his eyes grew too heavy to keep open.





~~*





"Get up," said a sour voice. "God, I can't get you to bed if you don't help me at least a little."

"Grmf," Tallant replied. He stumbled, moved, leaned heavily against…someone was moving him? Thinking was hard. He had the hazy idea that someone was trying to drag him somewhere. Bed? Had he said that?

Magic, he realized vaguely. He'd utterly sapped himself using so much of it in so short a span of time. The dragon. Healing.

Then the thoughts slipped away and he just went along in a daze, until he stumbled, fell, and landed on something hard—and then something heavy landed on top of him, and Tallant sort of heard talking or maybe shouting. Swearing? He didn't know, or care.

Rolling, shifting, he burrowed into the warmth now lying alongside him and went back to sleep.





Chapter Nine





Tallant opened his eyes, awake and refreshed—then froze as he realized he wasn't the only one in his bed.

Of all people, Cecil was curled up against him—all but burrowing into him, really. Their legs were tangled together, Cecil's arm was draped over Tallant's waist, and his head curled against Tallant's chest. Like his brother, he snored softly. Tallant knew the noise drove most people crazy, but it had never bothered him, not after the racket he had grown up with sleeping in a single large common room with dozens of other children and a smattering of adults.

What surprised him was how easily, how deeply, he'd slept with Cecil beside him. The only person he could sleep with that comfortably was Milton, and they didn't curl up like this unless Milton failed to break free of Tallant's leeching tendencies. Even then, it didn't feel like sleeping with a lover.

A lover. The word struck him, warmed him, in a way that he hadn't expected. He truly liked the idea of Cecil as his lover. As much as he'd toyed with the idea before, it hadn't really taken root until now. It was a bit startling how deeply the desire for Cecil, to bond with him, ran after only a couple of days.

Was it really that startling, though? Cecil was strong, honorable, smart, and self-sacrificing to the point of stupidity. He clearly felt things deeply and that depth of passion drove everything he did. Rare was the person who could not only win the loyalty of a band of thieves, but that of wild animals.

On a more base level, he did not feel bad at all pressed up against Tallant. It was too bad there would be no kissing and touching and soft words when Cecil woke. In fact, he was pretty certain he was a dead man the moment Cecil opened his eyes. Getting himself out of harm's way now would probably be a wise move, but he could not bring himself to do it.

How in the world had Cecil even wound up in his bed? For that matter, how had he wound up in his bed? But that was obvious—Cecil had gotten stuck with the duty of dragging him to bed, probably because Milton knew damn good and well that Tallant had a bad habit of getting clingy. Like a leech, Milton always said, though he'd gotten good over the years at breaking away from Tallant's clinginess.