“I don’t know,” Fen admitted. “Because I don’t know yet what you’re after.”
Lan raised his head. Fen’s tongue was again too big for his mouth. He didn’t understand how so many thought he was pretty, when Lan stole his breath every day. He tore his gaze away to give himself a moment to clear his thoughts of Lan’s stern brow and supple mouth. “You don’t trust me—which I understand. I’m the child of an Earl… an Earl even other Earl’s fear. So you won’t tell me. But I can imagine the many ways this might end and I worry for you. The nobles will have the upcoming winter to stew in resentment and come up with plans. They will strike by late spring and they won’t show mercy.”
Fen bit his lip, then continued on. “I know you must have more people elsewhere, as well as spies, and I’m not going to ask where or how many—you wouldn’t answer anyway—but where are we going? Over the mountains? Back down to take another territory and stay there for the winter before leaving again? You won’t tell me that, either, of course. But I predict you’ll have until late spring, maybe not even then. Or you will act soon, make another strong stand or reach out for alliances.” He paused again, glancing away. “Better alliances than ours. Though I will help you discuss the terms for those if you like, when the time comes.”
“I said tonoteat the berries!” Race shouted in the distance. “What are you even doing?”
“I am not afraid of the fae,” Dol answered, quite calm. “Did they not lead me to you?”
“Is that all?” Lan’s quiet question drew Fen’s attention back to him.
“Well, there is the one thing you could…. It is better not said, I think. Like a wish. Especially in this place. And it worries me more for you.” Fen’s heart beat faster. “Although I also believe,” he dropped his voice to a whisper, “that you could do it.”
“This thing you will not say?” Lan didn’t press for what that thing was. “But will help me with? Sounds dangerous.”
“Alliances can be.” Fen looked to the side of Lan’s face, which was easier on his distracted mind. “Will you need the shirt done soon?”
“Danger is not for you.” Lan did sometimes use his soft voice as a warning. Fen gave him another almost-look. “And even if it were, I would hardly confess my hopes or my plans to an Earl’s cub. Would I?”
He slept nightly at Fen’s side, but Fen supposed those were different levels of threat to him. Fen might hurt only Lan. An Earl could hurt everyone in the camp and their families too.
“They sayyou’rean Earl’s child,” Fen pointed out, making his voice as honeyed as he could.
Lan’s entire body tensed. He worked his jaw before speaking. “That is because they are unable to imagine that a child of anyone else could defy them so well.”
He said that, but did not actually deny the rumor.
“Youarean Earl’s child?” Fen asked with real surprise. Earls and nobles with multiple alliances and marriages often had many children. But nobles often claimed even people not of their direct line or of their blood. To not give their own children their name was a wretched act that would only be done out of malice and cruelty. “And the Earl did not claim you?”
It had to be The Maben. No wonder Lan had not killed him though he could have. That was his father. Such an act would make anyone hesitate.
From the line of Lan’s shoulders, Fen thought he would be angry at the question, furious enough to walk away, if not lash out. But Lan glanced up to Fen, expelled a breath, then said quietly, “My mother had too much pride to approach him to insist he give me the name. Then I grew up and come of age, and it became obvious I was… too large for a small house or a small territory. I was too much not to travel or do things that only a relation of an Earl might do. But I was from the morra, like Race and many others, and there was nothing to be done about it. Except… I could claim him instead. I could claim whatever I wanted. So I did. And then I claimed what was his.” His voice hardened. “And I will keep it.”
Fen wondered if Lan could hear his ferocity as Fen could hear it, if he knew that he sounded almost like an Earl when he spoke that way.Almost. But ‘too large’ was the correct way to describe him. Lan was too large to be a mere Earl. The Earls now devoured the lands of their neighbors, but did not raise armies from nowhere to take an entire territory, or stand there in a peasant’s clothing and bare their teeth to make an impossible vow.
“Then I will help you,” Fen promised sweetly, bringing Lan’s focus back to him. “Are you and Race family?”
Lan smiled for the briefest moment. “The morra, flower, is any strip of unwanted land that is no good for cultivation and barely good for grazing. It is a name taken or given.”
“Oh.” Fen nodded his understanding. “Unwanted land for unwanted children. I would be from the morra too, I think, if The Acana had been able to get out of the expectations of his alliance with the Bal.” Lan regarded him steadily, unsmiling, but his gaze was so approving Fen finally turned from it. “And you keep the name now instead of using his in order to shame him? I can help you continue to do that while I try to earn your trust.” He didn’t wait for Lan to tense up again. “You don’t have to tell me your plans. But will you listen if I have any?”
“I have yet to silence you, cub.”
The sentence rumbled through Fen like Lan’s voice when they were together at night. It felt like permission. It warmed him and yet made him want to kick his feet like a restless child, or jump and hope that Lan would catch him.
Fen realized he was smiling and ducked his head, looking down once to Lan’s mouth to find it was also curved upward with gentle amusement.
“I’ll mend your shirt next,” Fen promised recklessly, though he had no idea how long the light would last.
A hand landed on his knee, there and gone as Lan turned away. Fen watched Lan walk off, staring with wide, dry eyes until Lan stopped and seemed to about to turn around toward him again.
He quickly looked elsewhere.
Race stood with his back to the ruins as Dol kissed him. Both of their mouths were stained purple-red.
Fen politely looked away from that too.
Ten
