Raised By Wolves 1 - Brethren (59 page)

He glared at us. “I am not up for another fight.” He leaned heavily on the wall, and I remembered he had been using a crutch, which he did not have at the moment.

“Where are you sleeping?”

He shrugged. “We intended to go to the beach.”

I swore. We could not leave him standing there, or rather not standing there. His cronies could be hours and not remember to look for him at all, depending on how many blows they took or beers they drank.

I looked to my matelot and remembered I still needed to strangle him. I sighed. Gaston shrugged.

“Come on then,” I told Cudro.

He regarded me curiously, until I offered him my shoulder to lean on. He seemed as reluctant to take my help as I was to give it; but he was as quickly bound by my offer of assistance as I was bound by some shred of human decency. We made our slow way back to Theodore’s in silence. Once there, I deposited him in the office, where we would be sleeping for the night.

“Thank you,” he said sincerely.

I shrugged. “You are welcome after a fashion. I still do not like you.”

“It is mutual.” He smiled.

“It is good that we have this understanding, then.”

Theodore had roused Samuel and they brought Cudro some water.

I looked about; Gaston was not to be seen. I knew he had accompanied us to the house. I exited through the front door and found him leaning on the wall, with his arms crossed and one leg bent. It was a moonless night illuminated only by the lantern at Theodore’s door. Half of Gaston was in shadow, the other half harshly lit in yellow.

“I am sorry. I was possessed,” he whispered ruefully.

“Truly?” I approached him until he was within reach. I crossed my arms to prevent my hands from bridging the distance between us. “And what, pray tell, possessed you?”

“I have been trying to determine that.”

He finally deigned to look upon me, and we studied each other in silence for a time.

“I wanted to,” he whispered. “You had been so far away, and then you were so close, and it felt…correct.”

I was greatly heartened by this, and I moved toward him again until we almost touched.

“I have missed touching you, also.”

He was so close I could feel his breath. He did not flinch from me. My mind grasped the memory of the softness I had felt for just a moment in the tavern and the two times we had kissed before boarding.

I imagined how his lips would feel under mine again. I could start with the gentlest of kisses, a mere twitch of my lips on his, and then I would rub across them lightly. My manhood sprang to life, not a slow unfolding, but a near- painful rush of need and desire.

I would kiss him. And then he would stop me.

I smiled sadly. “I would kiss you if you would but let me. I wish to count your teeth with my tongue.”

His eyes widened, and he drew in on himself in an effort to pull farther away from me. I allowed myself amusement at my foreknowledge. I had phrased it somewhat crudely on purpose. If desire had been upon him, as it was upon me, he would not have reacted so.

“I do not know when,” I continued softly. “Whether it be when you first feel my lips or after our tongues are entwined, but you will stop me.

And no matter what your reason for it, it will be as a knife in my gut, and it will cause far more pain than any blade you carry. I do not blame you for this. It is the way it is. In truth I fear it is my problem, a thing resulting from my scars.”

Another realization visited me, and I winced from it. “I know now that I am not as scared of the possibility of you hating me for what we might do – as I am of me hating you for what we will not do. I am a horrid bastard, I truly am.”

He frowned with concern and shook his head ever so slightly. “You are not the only one afflicted here.”

I could still only see half his face in the lantern’s light. I reached into the shadow and traced his brow and cheek, as if I could truly find the part of him lost in the dark somehow.

His eyes flicked down and I followed his gaze. My manhood was evident in my britches. I chuckled softly and let my fingers fall from his face. “I am quite predictable.”

As I started to turn away, his hand closed over my crotch; and my manhood leaped, as it was captured in strong fingers through the cloth.

I gasped and found myself leaning with my hands on either side of him.

I regarded him curiously, our faces mere inches apart.

“You have my complete attention,” I whispered.

“Hush.” With his free hand, he laid his fingers across my lips. His other hand moved, gently stroking, and I closed my eyes and moaned.

He turned his hand so that it covered my mouth with his thumb below my chin and then his other hand moved a great deal more. I groaned quietly into his palm until I came, and slumped against him. He wrapped his arms around me and held me for a long while.

I heard approaching voices and footsteps and I began to straighten.

He grasped my head and held me close to whisper fiercely in my ear,

“Will, I will never hate you for that, sane or mad. I will never hate you.” I hugged him to me and kissed his cheek.

Then the rabble was upon us. It took a good hour to clean the lot of them up and bandage those who needed it. Gaston was actually called upon to stitch a gash on Pete’s head and a cut on Davey’s lip. He boiled the suture needle and thread before using it on each man, and liberally doused their wounds in rum. As they were drunk, they did not complain overly much about being steeped in more liquor. Belfry had wrenched his wrist in some fashion and required a sling. One of Cudro’s friends had received a nasty hit on his head, and Gaston ordered that he be sobered up and kept awake until the darks of his eyes became the same size.

“You are a surgeon, aren’t you?” Striker asked. He was drunk and sitting on the ground near the cistern, with Pete’s snoring head in his lap. Gaston rewarded him a disparaging snort. “Of sorts.”

“We will need a surgeon,” Striker said.

“I do not wish to be a surgeon,” Gaston said.

“But if you have the skills, and so few do, how can you deny your fellow buccaneers?”

Gaston squatted in front of Striker and stared into his bleary eyes.

“It is very easy. You just say no.”

Striker waved him off. “When the four of us get a ship. You get to be surgeon. Pete will be quartermaster.” He looked at me. “I don’t know what we’ll do with Will. He doesn’t know much about sailing. We need the Bard, God damn it.”

“Hold, hold,” I said. “What do you mean, when the four of us get a ship?”

He shrugged. “I have enough money to buy a ship and outfit her, but not by much. It would be better to spread the cost and risk between more people. That way everyone doesn’t end up in debt when she sinks or there are no prizes.”

“I see your point. How much do ships cost?”

“Four to five hundred pounds.”

I was surprised, as I had thought they cost more. In all, the idea appealed to me, but it was not my decision alone. I regarded Gaston.

He shrugged. “I have nothing against purchasing a ship.” He appeared thoughtful as he packed his surgeon’s kit away. “I have the funds; it is not something a man like me does. Yet with Striker as captain, we could attract enough men to sail.”

“Aye,” Striker said. “Men like me.”

“Why is that?” I teased.

He frowned, not out of umbrage, but due to being so intoxicated he considered the question bona fide.

I patted his head. “Nay, I jest.”

“I would ask why you seem to favor me,” Striker said.

I gave this due consideration, and decided a shorter response would be better, and it encompassed all that need be said, anyway. “You are a good man, in my book anyway.”

He nodded somberly. “I am honored.”

“As well you should be.”

This time he knew I jested; and he smiled and leaned his head back on the cistern.

“Will you be joining us inside?” I asked. “Or will you sleep out here?”

Striker poked Pete’s shoulder a few times. The man did not move.

“Out here.” Striker shrugged and pulled a pistol. He flopped sideways, so he lay partially on Pete with the pistol in hand. It did not appear comfortable, but he was snoring before we finished cleaning ourselves and extinguished the lamps to retire inside.

In the front room, Cudro and his cronies occupied a large part of the floor behind the desk. They were playing cards and trying dutifully to keep their comrade awake. Davey and Julio had another corner and were sprawled in their sleep. There was little room left, with the exception of the middle or the doorways. This appealed to neither of us.

We eyed the back room speculatively, and Gaston moved the chairs from about the table and hefted one end of it. I regarded him curiously, and he indicated I should take the other end. I did so, and followed his lead to move the table to the wall. Then he climbed under it. I followed suit.

“Are you attempting to insure that they wake us for breakfast, or should I find a cloth and we can make a small house?” I asked. “Did you do that as a child?”

“You were allowed to make houses with the dining furniture?” he asked incredulously.

“In my room, but nowhere else.”

“I can scarce imagine that,” he sighed. “You can put out the lamp.”

I regarded the lamp and then turned to face him again. “There are things we should discuss.”

He shook his head. He appeared exhausted as he arranged weapons and our bags. “We should sleep. We will both be here in the morning.

Now put the lantern out and lie with me.”

I realized there was little I could refuse him on. I did as he bade, and he pulled me to him, to rest with my head on his shoulder. As I have never been comfortable sleeping in that manner, with my arm under my person, I squirmed about until my back was to him but my head was nestled on his upper arm.

I lay there a while and considered the events of the past few hours, specifically between him and me, as the rest were not things I would lose sleep over. Where were we now, and what would I discuss with him on the morrow? Did I trust him not to wound me again? My resolution to protect myself was so much dust in the wind. As I gave it all great thought with an exhausted and beer-addled mind, I came to realize that I would rather risk injury than deny myself this. I was home; and I was, for the moment, content.

Sometime in the morning, at least I guessed it was morning as it was not dark but not fully light either, I woke to a gentle rapping on the table leg. Beside me, I could feel Gaston’s body tense. Clutching a pistol, I looked toward our feet and saw one of Cudro’s men regarding us with anxious exhaustion, or perhaps exhausted anxiety.

“Benjo’s eyes, they be all right now. He sleep?” the man asked.

With an incoherent groan of annoyance, Gaston rolled from under the table and followed the man into the other room. I crawled out and made my way into the yard to the latrine. Once finished, I emerged to find my matelot waiting.

“He will live,” he grumped and slammed the latrine door. As he relieved himself, I stood in the grey light and looked about. The fires had been started in most of the cookhouses near us, and servants could be seen working in the other yards.

Pete and Striker were still sprawled on the ground where we had left them, but Pete had apparently been startled by the door slamming; and his tousled and bloody head peered over the cistern. I waved. He belched and fingered his bandages curiously. I entered our cookhouse and woke Samuel, and retrieved a couple bottles of water. I handed one to Pete before meeting Gaston at the house’s back door.

Pete was exploring the wrapping and what might lie under it in earnest now.

“Do not touch it,” Gaston snapped. “I put five stitches in your head last night.”

Pete’s hand obediently left his head; and he sat still, looking all the world like a little boy who had been scolded.

“You may want to drink some water,” I suggested quietly, before following Gaston inside. Once there I teased, “With that demeanor, you will never be able to maintain wealthy patients.”

He glared at me over his shoulder before crawling beneath the table.

I joined him.

He shook his head, and a small smile finally graced his lips. “Can you envision it, me calling upon the rich to cure gout?”

“As you are dressed and armed now, and even with the Carribe face paint,” I chuckled. “I can see it all as clearly as if I stood in some great drawing room and listened to the matron of the house squeal and the servants rush about for the salts.”

We laughed quietly, until he sobered and sighed. “I think I shall never return to the Old World. I do not know what I would do there. As we have discussed before, I cannot conceive of living within the confines of civilization.”

“Which is that in name only. I understand.” This brought to mind Morgan’s words, and I frowned. “I cannot conceive of returning, either, at the moment; but there is that matter of the title and all hanging over my head, and my life rarely follows the course I think to set for it.”

We regarded one another. In his eyes I beheld my own consternation at the realization that there was the potential for our futures to be quite incompatible.

“Alonso asked me to join him in Panama,” I said. Gaston frowned, and I held up my hand to bid him to hear me out. “I refused, obviously, since I am here and not there. I knew that if I were to accompany him, we would not have lived as we had in Florence, and he would marry and have children, and I would be this curiosity in his life. I want you to know that I would never expect that of you. Even if you were willing to do such a thing, I cannot see being married to some woman for the sole purpose of producing heirs, while you have a room down the hall. And that,” I paused as the ramifications of what I was about to say became clear to me. “If it is a choice between my inheritance and you, I choose you.”

He hugged his knees and smiled sadly. “I am truly honored, but you are a fool. I will not hold you to it. Think of all the sheep you could herd, Will? And we cannot know what the future will bring.”

His words reminded me of the epiphany I had experienced with Rucker. I did indeed have sheep to herd; yet I could not now bear to think of doing it alone. “Do you judge me insincere?”