Chapter Eighty-Six: Animal Ferocity

As the horses pushed further inland, the temperate clime of forested Elmaluk gave way to a mountainous winter chill. Included in the escort from Şebyan were Osmund’s mercenary friends, a welcome surprise, though Osmund was feeling rather untalkative. They greeted him heartily—Nienos with his usual boisterousness, the twins with their usual silence, and so on—he in turn offered them a fraction of their enthusiasm, and that was that.

Cemil had gifted him a handsome coat before the journey, blood red with fur trim, and so Osmund did not feel the cold. He cut an attractive figure wearing it—Gudrun actually whistled the first time he put it on. The boost to his ego was short-lived.

“Be careful of him,” Sakina cautioned the young tambur player, Nur, as they rode side-by-side. “It can be dangerous to catch the eye of a powerful man.” She spoke of the impostor, who was unfortunately joining them on this journey, and had been pestering the lovely (and impressionable) musician for days.

“It’s all just a game. A bit of fun. Besides, he’s quite handsome for a Tolmish man, isn’t he?” the girl said carelessly in Osmund’s hearing. “I don’t think I have ever seen one half so good-looking. On the whole, they are all so ugly!”

Osmund didn’t waste time on a sour stare or an eye-roll. One day she’ll insult the wrong person, and then she’ll learn, he thought.

On the third day, there was snow, and so they made camp before the sun was fully gone. Osmund sat on a log by the tied-up horses and began another of his misshapen sketches—he’d consented in the end to giving the hobby another try. It was a waste of effort, but he found it made people leave him alone. Mostly.

“I had heard you’d started drawing.” It was Sakina, and the words were said with overdone cheer. She took a seat beside him. “You like it better than journaling, I take it?”

“Yes, I like it.” He hoped the words would suffice. His inexpert hand moved over the page.

“Osmund? I don’t wish to call attention to it, but…you’ve been a bit cold towards me.” Blast her perceptiveness, why couldn’t she pretend it away, as he did? “In fact you’ve barely said a word on the road to anyone… Are you sure you’re well?”

“I’m fine,” he muttered, staring down at the drawing, full of disdain for his creation. Less a horse than a dog, and an ugly one at that. He crumpled the wasted paper to start fresh.

“Are you really certain? Because ever since…well, the raid on the Guild house, you’ve been…”

Osmund looked up. “The Guild house?” he echoed. “You think this is about that? Not about Elmaluk? Or Yücel?”

He hadn’t meant to reveal his hand, but keeping secrets was so maddening, and he tired of it. Sakina’s face went ashen just as it had before. “So it’s true,” he mused. Her reaction was all the confirmation he needed. “You and Mirhan conspired behind Cemil’s back.” 

“Osmund.” Her voice was hushed and urgent. “Please listen.”

“You’re going to try and explain?” He laughed. “Yücel seems about the only half-decent brother Cemil has on his father’s side, and you tried to murder him in cold blood.”

“Cemil never would have been able to do it himself,” Sakina argued, which made Osmund scoff. “Yücel is vying for power. He is a threat, as surely as Safet is, regardless of appearances.”

Osmund shook his head. “So you know, Yücel was upfront about it all,” he said. “He told Cemil his intentions. You’re right, he does want to be emperor, but he wants it with Cemil’s help! They weren’t about to go killing each other!”

Sakina’s face slackened with surprise. She was quiet awhile. “I can guess how that went.”

“Yücel offered him another role. Said he could marry who he liked if he took the post.” Osmund’s lips twitched in a humorless smile. “Cemil was insulted, of course. Furious. As if he could be moved by some inconsequential thing like that…”

“It was a smart angle,” Sakina said. “Using you.”

Osmund couldn’t agree. “It didn’t work.”

One of the horses whinnied. Another snorted irritably from the cold. Banu nosed around in the grass.

“You think I’m evil.” Sakina was studying her folded hands very carefully. “So you know, I regret it with all my heart and wish I had never been talked into it. But I was.”

“You aren’t evil.” He was unable to stand that cloying, pitiful tone in her voice a moment longer. “It’s all of this that’s ruining us.”

The imperial succession. The scheming. The secrets.

“…Mirhan wanted to use you as assurance.”

Osmund stared. “He heard Yücel was planning to invite Cemil to dinner, and encouraged him to extend the invitation to you, too,” Sakina confessed. “I think he thought that…if you were there, and Cemil could only save one of you…”

The information sickened him anew. “Oh, so I could have died for the sake of your plan, too. Lovely.”

“Osmund, I told him I would take his head off before I let him endanger you.”

“You let him endanger Cemil.”

“Cemil would never have eaten. Figs give him a nasty rash. He didn’t want to say as much in front of you.”

Osmund laughed darkly. “Well! I’ve learned a lot about him the last few days, it seems.”

He’d seen how abruptly Cemil could switch from courtesy to cruelty, when insulted. One would think Yücel had offered him the role of imperial chamberpot-emptier, instead of one that by all accounts sounded more fulfilling and more glamorous than that of emperor, and involved a great deal less fucking people you didn’t love.

The subject hurt like a bared hand to the flames. Osmund turned away from it. “Mirhan cannot stay,” he said in a hiss.

“I’m keeping a close eye on him. Just don’t tell,” Sakina begged. “Things are delicate. We must not be divided now.”

Osmund looked at her incredulously. “After the scheming fox has already marked me as expendable?! Are you waiting until he throws you to the wolves, too? You’d have me keep another secret from Cemil!”

“…What other do you mean?”

Osmund had spoken without thought. “Nothing,” he said savagely, and rose to his feet. “Alright then, get us all killed! At least we’ll be spared the wedding.”

She was left calling after him. But Osmund didn’t slow, and she didn’t pursue him.

In recent days, Osmund had gotten very good at balling up on the furs in the tent and pretending to sleep, though he surely could have done with a little release. Maybe it was to punish himself. Or to punish the both of them.

That night, however, Cemil surprised him in the tent before Osmund had the chance to peel off his coat. Standing against his back, Cemil breathed against his ear and kissed his cheek, and Osmund stood stone-still. He was determined not to want this, but his neglected body had other designs.

Cemil surely discovered this as his hand traveled down, lower and lower still. “I like you in this,” the Meskato prince murmured.

He meant the coat. Of course he would preen at the sight of it. “You’ve put me in your color,” Osmund said. It was a display of ownership, and they both knew it. Perhaps Osmund might enjoy the scandalized look on Nicoleta’s face, when she saw her future husband’s lover standing by his side, burning red like a beacon. Or maybe it would just make him want to drown himself. He’d find out which soon enough.

Cemil’s hands deftly maneuvered open a few buttons, and his hand moved to fill the gap, caressing the thick wool doublet underneath like he was fondling a woman’s breast. Osmund stood and woodenly watched, waiting for the arousal to travel from his groin to his brain, but he existed outside himself. “Osmund?” Oh, damn it all, here came the infernal question again. He heard it in that suddenly hesitant tone. “Are you—”

“Heavens, quit asking me if I’m alright!” Osmund snapped. “I’m fine, I’m fine, will you all shut up and listen for a change?! Let’s just fuck and get on with it!”

A stab of hurt flashed across Cemil’s face, and Osmund felt simultaneously a vicious thrill and a desire to find a sword to fall onto. “Alright then,” the Meskato prince returned, his voice hard. He made towards the exit of the tent. “If you find my presence so offensive, I’ll come back when you’re asleep.”

Then he was gone, and Osmund was alone with his anger, which soon abandoned him just as faithlessly. He stood panting, eyes wet, heart pounding, willing the other man to return, to let Osmund’s inept rage wash against him harmlessly like a weathered stone by the sea. But Cemil was only human, after all.

He stood there motionless a long time. At last he lay down and tried to sleep, keeping the coat bundled tightly around himself like an embrace, but his thoughts were merciless. An hour later, Cemil still hadn’t come back.

Anything, he decided in the end, would be better than lying here. He braced himself against the chill and stepped out of the tent.

At the center of camp, the imperial mages had set out an enchanted fire, a wide, open, low-burning pyre, and many had gathered at its fringes. Osmund saw a handful of mercenaries (who days ago had lost interest in his dour company) and imperial soldiers. They were all swapping stories. Among his friends Kemal and Ayaz was Cemil.

On his lips was an easy smile. He was laughing.

Osmund nearly fled back to the tent, but Gudrun in the crowd saw him and beckoned him over, and then Cemil noticed him too. After some agonized deliberation, Osmund took a seat near the Meskato prince when a retiring soldier left it vacant. He stared resolutely at his own knees rather than chance a look at Cemil’s face.

The stories continued. Osmund had no ear to listen, not really, but he lost himself in the rhythm of their tellings. Excited, bold, boisterous tales. Eerie and understated ones. Dramatic recountings that made rambunctious voices howl with amusement.

Some unknown time later, the noise and chatter had chased all Osmund’s demons away. All that remained was a bone-deep exhaustion. Osmund made to stand, but before he did, he reached out and touched Cemil’s shoulder to steady himself. It was only the smallest contact. “Goodnight,” he murmured.

Their tent was a little further from the others, partially hidden from view by a copse of skinny pines. Osmund was huddling past them, already missing the warmth of the fire, when he heard the footsteps advancing on him in the snow. “Osmund,” Cemil said. His tone was plaintive, almost pained.

Osmund didn’t wait for whatever would follow. He spun to find the other’s silhouette in the dark, and with animal ferocity he collided their bodies together.

Cemil made a noise of surprise, and attempted to draw away to speak, but Osmund didn’t let him, and the effort was soon abandoned. The Tolmishman pulled his lover towards a stand of those knobby young trees, kissing him without quarter, tugging open the red coat whose fur lining was warmed from his own heat and dragging Cemil’s hands onto his body, inviting him to touch. “Here,” he babbled when they parted for breath, “please, yes, I want you, touch me please.”

It was a reliable incantation; Cemil had never been able to resist his begging. His hands dug into Osmund’s thighs, hard. “Here?” he asked heatedly.

They were so close to the main camp, close enough that voices carried easily over the scattering of shrubs which were their only barrier against prying eyes. Osmund’s cheeks stung with the thought, but he nodded vigorously. That was all the preamble before they were both pulling at buttons and laces, and then Osmund’s legs from the knee up were pimpling against the cold, and he bent at the hip to lean his weight against a tree.

He’d never know if they were discovered or not. His eyes had nothing to see but the rimed, wet earth, and all he could hear were his own stifled sounds. He focused on the familiar bolts of discomfort, and the pleasure of being wanted.