Maschi’s hands came up, then dropped. He stared at Dahl intently as Dahl pulled back, and it might have been how Dahl’s smile slowly gentled, but after another moment, Maschi smiled in return and touched his fingers to his lips.
Dahl was a good choice, Owin thought distractedly, the music a whining hum at the back of his mind. Dahl was someone Maschi liked and trusted, and that kiss had been friendly. Anything else would be friendly as well, with Dahl. With DahlandWolfe, Owin’s thoughts added helpfully, although Owin had no basis for such an idea except the closeness of the pair.
The idea was ridiculous. Maschi was, in some way, regarded as a priest, who lived a lonely life. He touched his mouth now like someone new to kisses. He would not… They would not….
“Why, Maschi,” Aubrey’s voice carried through the din and the rush in Owin’s ears, “I see you’ve succumbed to the spirit of Ara.”
Hardly drunk, but with a loose grace that spoke of recent pleasure, Aubrey sauntered into the yard and straight to Maschi. Dahl moved smoothly out of his way, and Owin had a moment to blink before Aubrey was tipping Maschi’s face up and sweeping his thumb along his painted lips.
Maschi brought his hands up again, this time leaving them to tremble against Aubrey’s forearms. His eyes were wide as Aubrey took his time leaning in. He did not close them, though Aubrey’s kiss was soft and slow and made him curl his hands around Aubrey’s wrists.
There were others in the yard with them. Owin spared a glare for some of them at their vocal objections but was otherwise frozen. Aubrey eventually pulled back and swept a hand through Maschi’s hair before standing straight.
Aubrey was next to Owin only moments later, yawning and calling for a drink, not seeming to notice Owin’s distraction as he began to talk about the trip to see the King.
Maschi’s sideways glance over to them was there and gone.
Aubrey was a good kisser. Owin knew it well. Maschi might consider Aubrey a better friend. He was also a good choice if Maschi was going to take more from this day.
“Oh, hang the King,” Owin muttered despite telling himself all of that, and ignored the shocked, then thoughtful look Aubrey gave him.
Part Two
IT only grew worse from there.
Dahl kissed Maschi twice, apparently deciding that he needed to do better than the first. Steph appeared, seemingly just to press a quick, embarrassed peck to Maschi’s cheek. Denys was nearly as slow and torturous as Aubrey had been. By the time Bartlemeo was done, ostentatiously urging Maschi back and cupping his cheek to kiss him breathless, the people around them had learned to silence their complaints or face two or three united, implacable guardsmen.
Wolfe was the real danger. Of course, it was Wolfe, who, without a trace of drunkenness as an excuse, swept his tongue into Maschi’s mouth until Maschi made a small, startled, hungry sound that carried to Owin’s table where Owin still sat like a stone, unwanted, and Dahl sank his teeth into his bottom lip but could not contain his whimper.
Those in the crowd not appalled or disgusted began to cheer, banging cups for drums, or shaking whatever bells they wore to show their approval.
Red and yellow sparks flew up into the air around the two of them, like traces from a bonfire. Owin surged to his feet at last while everyone’s attention was elsewhere.
Inside the pub, it was dark but for candlelight, and there was not a spark to be seen. Owin ordered wine and drank it, and thought it nearly the same color as Maschi’s kiss-swollen lips. What an experiment for their studious mage. What a way for him to discover he was wanted, and to realize how much the others cared for him.
As for Owin, they were barely friends. The little priest had said it himself. The others were the ones Maschi felt closer to, and they would treat him well without Owin there to witness it. Owin would stay inside, drink his fill despite his early morning, and find someone else with blue on their lips and no flowers behind their ear or in their hair.
That was a sensible, reasonable plan for a melancholy giant with an ache in his chest. Owin had never expected more, after all, and Ara was a day for beginnings. The rest he could deal with tomorrow when the ache was also in his head and he would be nicely distracted by it.
OWIN consumed a small bottle of a decent wine, and an even smaller bottle of something cheaper, and then tea, because Madame Carel clucked her tongue at him for his unusual frowns. Some of the other guards came in and went back out, but did not seem to notice Owin at his lonely table, despite his size. The servers passed to and fro around him, often as drunk as the customers, and it took Owin a while to notice the chains of tiny blue flowers some of them wore pinned in their hair, and which others kept in their apron pockets to hand out to anyone interested.
None of the guards had bothered with that, not even Margaret, who might have gotten away with it without much teasing. But it would be a good thing for Maschi, Owin could not help butthink. Maschi, who was no fit priest, and should have family with him, and someone to keep his mouth soft and to draw more hungry moans from him and hold him back when his honest words grew too sharp. He should wear a bloom or two in his ruffled, short hair, or tucked into his cowl, if he kept that aspect of his vocation. Someone should see them there and answer his request, and take the little mage somewhere nicer than an alley or behind a tree. Someone should take him to their home and keep him there.
Owin would have rested his forehead against the tabletop if he hadn’t been so much higher than the table and could bend comfortably that way. He slouched in his chair instead, determined not to go back outside until it was safe to do so, and was asking for brandy to put in his tea when a slender, soft-about-the-middle fellow with the stained hands of a dye merchant sat next to him and rested a hand on the band of blue around Owin’s thigh.
Friendly and large was more than enough for some.
THE merchant, if he was one, pulled Owin to him before they were even out of the pub, asking to be pinned against the doorway and moaning before Owin had done more than press him still with his hips and his hands and exhale heavily beneath his ear.
“Not here,” Owin murmured, not nearly drunk enough to pretend he was elsewhere, that his friends might not still be outside. He took the man’s hand to ensure he followed, and let him believe whatever he would; that Owin was shy, or concerned with what others might think. Some caution, even on Ara after the sun was down, was always wise, and he might have agreed for that reason.
Owin didn’t particularly care which, except to wish for someone less obedient, which was unfair of him as well as impossible, and he swept them out of the pub almost recklessly before noticing that the tables out front were empty.
He stopped, inexplicably thrown, then realized his mistake a moment later when a slight figure rose from the chair Denys had used.
The figure swayed, though staggered was a better word, and dropped a cup to the ground that rolled into the shadowed places where the light from the lanterns did not reach. Maschi’s cowl was rumpled and pulled loose around his throat. His lips remained dark. His hair was a mess of soft waves and a small, thin chain of aras flowers, which hung crookedly from his crown and had been partly tucked behind one ear. One of the blooms must have been crushed during the act, leaving a smudge of blue across his cheekbone. His eyes were round and fixed on Owin for as long as it took Owin to catch his breath, which had rushed from him at the moment he had recognized those fragile blue petals.
All the softness of Maschi’s mouth was counterbalanced by the severity of his frown, his displeasure like something from that book the priests read so much. He staggered again, as though a weight pulled him to one side, and Owin half-expected to see a sword in Maschi’s hand based on nothing more than the pain in his expression. But not even sparks rose up from him to challenge the lantern-light.
