Brute by Fielding Kim

Author:Fielding, Kim [Fielding, Kim]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Published: 2012-12-03T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

HE WAS merely being kind, Aric told himself. The weather had turned very cold, and even with the stove lit, his chambers in the Brown Tower were freezing at night. He would have been comfortable enough in his bed, which was close to the stove, but Gray shivered and coughed on the cold stone floor of the cell, even with all Aric’s quilts. So Aric forsook the bed entirely and slept every night in the cell with Gray. They spooned together with some blankets below them and the rest above, and Aric’s big body kept Gray nice and warm. Of course, they made love—Gray’s term for it—almost every night, so their blood moved briskly right before sleep, and neither of them felt the least bit chilled.

Besides, with Gray already in his arms, Aric could do his job more efficiently. No more stumbling across the room, half asleep. Now, as soon as Gray began to stir, whether he cried or screamed or simply breathed raggedly, Aric was already holding him, immediately humming and stroking and murmuring words of comfort. And when Gray awakened soon afterward, he had only to whisper the particulars of his dream into Aric’s ear, and Aric would rush to tell the guard.

On an especially miserable night, when the rain outside had turned to sleet that clattered noisily against the cobblestones, Gray awakened Aric by moaning and twitching. “Shh,” Aric crooned as he always did. “It’s all right. Everything’s all right.”

“So cold.” This time Gray’s voice was deep and mournful, like the wind when it rushed across the plains near Aric’s village.

Aric held him more tightly. “I’ll keep you warm.”

“No one. No one to hold my hand and ease my way.”

“I’m here,” said Aric. Gray had told him that, even though he couldn’t respond to Aric during his nightmares, he could feel him and hear him, and that he was grateful for it. It was as if he were possessed, he said. Possessed by the spirit of someone not yet dead. “I’m here and you’ll wake up soon and I’ll make some tea to warm you up.”

“Please. Just a thin blanket and a kind word, someone to remember my name.” Then Gray’s voice devolved to incoherent mumbles, and Aric just held him because he could do nothing else.

Gray shuddered and awoke a few minutes later. He moved backward, pressing himself more firmly against Aric’s body. “Itan. He’s g-going to die from cold and hunger and… and emptiness, I th-think.”

“Gods.”

“D-don’t bother t-telling the guard.”

“Why? Is it too late already?”

“Itan’s j-just a beggar. Th-they won’t do anything for him.”

“But he’s going to die!”

Gray squirmed around until he was facing Aric, getting himself slightly tangled in his chains as he did so. Gods, Aric hated those fucking chains. “P-people die every day, Aric. Wh-when I dream of someone important, or s-someone who’s in the p-p-palace, they’ll try to stop it. But when it’s n-nobody, only a beggar… n-n-not worth the effort, I guess.”

“I’m nobody,” Aric said.

“You’re n-not.” Gray’s breaths puffed against Aric’s shoulder, and then he planted a quick kiss on Aric’s cheek.

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