"You speak their language?" H'Reth remarked, astonished.
Von mumbled, "I picked up a few words." The truth was he squirmed every time he reached for Reetion and found it planted in his brain like it had always been there.
H'Reth touched the small of Von's back.
"It's all right," H'Reth soothed.
Von had to let H'Reth touch him. He knew it. And why not? It wasn't as if this was new. But now he could fight back, and even if he died in the end, just the same, at least he could enjoy the satisfaction of expressing himself thoroughly, first. Would that be just as good as getting H'Reth lost in that new jump? The compulsion said, no.
H'Reth moved up beside him as they neared the room. Von found himself thinking of the day, in the Bear Pit, when he gave up and stopped trying to fight Jarl. He let the girl die because he was frightened, and what good did it do? First he accepted H'Reth's offer of rescue. Then came the conscience bond.
No, he was not afraid to die. Not anymore. It would be a relief to die honestly. To uphold every poem he had ever soared with and cried for, every noble motive that he wanted to believe in. If he could not disprove Jarl's truths, he could refuse to live with them. But dying was not what was required. Not yet. First there would be some span of time alone with H'Reth in a private room. And he did not know if he could reconcile his new found strength with letting H'Reth touch him again now that he had the power to refuse. Not even to obey the new compulsion.
For H'Reth, having Von back was like clutching at a thorny rose. He was happier than he thought possible, but he suspected Von was taken with the woman and he wanted to have it out with him, alone.
He hurried his sweet boy down the passage to the guest rooms with Jarl pushing and dragging the bound Reetion along behind. At least Von seemed pensive, and did not react to the female's every grunt.
"Take the girl in there," H'Reth told Jarl when they reached the room in which Ann had first been lodged. "Don't kill her until I've heard Von out."
"I'll entertain myself, then," said Jarl.
"No!" Von snapped out of his reverie with a surprising flare of aggression. He nearly went after Jarl and Ann. H'Reth caught him and turned him back, saddened by the wild concern on his boy's expressive features. "You wanted to talk to me," he reminded him.
Von swallowed. H'Reth drew him into a little sitting parlor heavily webbed for travel except for one large couch.
"Now then," H'Reth said, taking Von by either arm. "We're alone."
The way Von wet his lips to speak sent shivers through H'Reth. He had to struggle not to silence him with kisses.
"We will need Ann on the far side of the jump," Von explained in a rush, backing up a step. "The new jump. Without her, we won't know where to go to find civilization on the other side."
Such eyes he has! H'Reth thought, staring into their multi-faceted clarity as he closed the space between them. But it irked him to feel Von growing brittle beneath his touch, like usual. It irked him that Von didn't mention the cut on H'Reth's face, which stung terribly.
Von was getting agitated. "Please!" he urged. "She won't help us if you let Jarl hurt her!"
And why is she willing to help us, I wonder, H'Reth thought unhappily. Because she's in love with you.
Von's pulse was jumping in his throat. He trembled with that delicious, isometric tension that welled up from his core to sensitize all his reactions, until he gasped when you stroked him, fainted when you kissed him, moaned if you touched his groin.
"Why can't we stay in this reach?" H'Reth complained, mesmerized.
"It's empty!" Von exclaimed, and caught his breath as H'Reth touched his flank. H'Reth cupped his boy's face, feeling him tremble.
"If we don't leave soon we might be stranded here," Von finished like a runner crashing through the finish line. "Th-the jump we used to get here is unstable. That's why the Reetions and the Monatese haven't used it in two hundred years. And — and there's nothing much here. No planets."
"And this other jump," H'Reth asked reluctantly. "You've learned it?"
Von nodded vigorously, looking pale. "Yes, Ann showed me. The worlds of Rire are on the other side. But I don't know how to find them. She does. Let me go help her!"
H'Reth's ardor was doused by Von's agitation on behalf of the brown-skinned woman.
"You want her, don't you?" H'Reth accused his dear one.
"I—" Von choked on the word, turning his head aside, his lovely cloak of shivering emotion turning wooden in H'Reth's arms. H'Reth hated that. He let go. His voice became thunderous. "I'm your bond master!" he told Von. "You will answer when I ask you questions!"
"I want her, yes," Von confessed in a gush.
H'Reth's heart sank, then he struggled to be magnanimous. He knew in his heart that Jarl was right. Von couldn't help liking girls. But maybe it would not matter if Von had them, so long as he had Von. He still wanted to strangle Ann, but he could wait until Von lost interest in her.
Von took a handkerchief from H'Reth's own vest pocket, nodding at the cut on H'Reth's cheek. "You've been hurt," he said, trying to force compassion. H'Reth could tell he didn't really care. But the hand holding the handkerchief was as graceful as any Golden lady's, while still unmistakably male; Von's skin was suede-soft and colored like the finest porcelain, but warm and living. H'Reth took the lovely hand in his, making Von drop the handkerchief, and drew Von's palm to his mouth until his lips brushed the mounds below Von's fingers, the fingers straining backward to avoid his touch. To banish the sight of Von's rising tears he let his eyes close. Then he slid his tongue between Von's fingers where the skin was sensitive.
"W-We n-need Ann," Von pleaded. "Let me help her. Let her show us. And afterwards — I will try to love you. Really love you. If you want that."
H'Reth drew back, releasing Von's hand. Von let it fall to his side, holding it away from him a little.
"I've thought about things while I was with the Reetions," Von said with a gulp. "I am bonded to you. So I obey you. But I know you want more. It is a miracle that you have shown me so much patience while I was young. But I'm older now — I can accept the inevitable."
H'Reth's eyes widened. Von filled them, so intense and so beautiful.
"Really?" H'Reth breathed. He couldn't quite believe it. "Do you mean that? Can you love me?"
"I will try," Von backslid just a little. "I can't help liking girls. But I know you are my life now. I will try."
H'Reth was too thrilled to resist kissing him. After so much pain and disillusionment, to finally have what he wanted felt too good to be true. Von endured the kiss as usual, but for the moment at least H'Reth didn't care if he turned into a marble statue without constant nagging and admonishment to relax.
"Maybe," H'Reth murmured, feeling too happy to be stingy, "we could do something with this Ann of yours, like we did with Anatolia. Until you get tired of her. Then I am sure there will be lots of other brown women available in this new place. But you do know this new jump?" H'Reth fretted, belatedly, knowing he shouldn't take all the miracles Von offered him too much for granted.
"Oh yes," said Von, with conviction.
H'Reth stroked Von's feathery black hair and the shapely head beneath it, not caring that he had sticky blood on his hands. When they were done with the jump and the rest of it, they could take a bath together. Von would tend his cut and he would wash Von's hair with his own hands. Von looked impatient.
"The Reetions have spread terrible pictures around Killing Reach," H'Reth warned Von. "I don't know how the Reetions got them, unless they were somehow in league with Anatolia. Everyone betrays me! But that is just another reason to get one more reach away, since the real Liege Monitum knows the jump that brought us this far. Better not to stay in reach of Fountain Court."
Noises coming from the room next door distracted Von. He pulled away, drawn by the sounds coming through the wall.
"Oh, let Jarl have his fun!" H'Reth scolded. "It won't spoil her for you."
"Master — Garn, please," Von forced a smile. "Let me go now!"
Each expression Von performed was as much a work of art as one of Delm's interminable portraits and transparently eloquent. All H'Reth saw now was anguished concern about Ann. Well, he was not going to let him go running off to save her just like that! Not without proving he meant what he said about trying to love him better!
H'Reth kissed Von forcefully on the mouth, seeking proof of a real change of attitude, but his dear boy was no more responsive than the last time Anatolia had fetched him to the Bear Pit for their rendezvous. He would never change. H'Reth would always have to urge and command his responses. But then, without a word of threat or promise, Von's hands moved to H'Reth's shoulder, and he kissed him back.
Overjoyed, H'Reth would have taken the time to make love, but Von stopped giving back as suddenly as he had begun, pushing H'Reth away with a frightening new show of force.
"Please," Von gasped, his face drained of blood as thoroughly as if he was going into shock, "we'll have so much more time after we have taken the Rose through the new jump!"
"How can I believe you?" H'Reth whined. Von's desire to rescue the girl was so palpable he felt that he could all but strangle it in his hands, like a living animal.
"I cannot lie to my bond master!" Von exclaimed, alarmed by a bump in the other room. "I have to do better! And I will! But later!"
H'Reth took pity on him. "All right, Von. Go tell Jarl that I want to see him and make yourself a hero with the wretched girl."
Von tore free like a bolt loosed from one of the big, heavy crossbows used for hunting on the game reserves of Demish lieges.
H'Reth inhaled with a full, but still troubled heart. It would take a long time, but at least he had Von on the right track, at last.