Stalking Darkness - Chapter Fifteen

[kalinara]

Last time, Alec had a much more enjoyable (and consensual!) sexual experience, and also seems to be slowly figuring out the concept of bisexuality! Go him!



We rejoin our heroes as they're heading toward the lower city. Seregil's apparently got a "special horse" for "this one". I'm not sure what that means, but as Alec seems unbothered, I'd imagine it will become clear soon enough. Seregil then spills wine down his surcoat. Alec grins, realizing they're playing drunk. Or at least, Seregil will be. Alec will be the sensible friend.

"Don't I always?"

That question actually makes me wonder if maybe Alec would like to play the more eccentric role for once. I wonder if he can pull it off.

So anyway, they reach the Ostler, where Seregil plays drunk and arrogant nobleman, demanding mounts. The ostler seems wary, but accepting of the coins. Seregil ends up picking a rawboned gray, which causes the worried ostler to advise Alec that Seregil's making a bad choice.

Alec gives him a wink and a bigger bribe, explaining that they're going to play a joke on a friend, and they'll have the horse back before dawn. Alec has gotten very good at these kind of innocent cover stories, hasn't he?

Seregil seems pretty sympathetic to the horse's respiratory troubles, and promises to have a drysian look at him.

Alec asks about their target, but Seregil doesn't know much yet. We get a pretty good lesson here when Alec asks if he's Plenimarian:

“Too soon to say. At times like this it’s best to keep an open mind until you have hard facts. Otherwise, you just run around trying to prove your own theory and overlooking important details that may turn up in the process. It could be there’s nothing to it at all, but it’s more interesting than anything else we’ve seen in the last few weeks.”

Seems reasonable.

So they make it to Sailmaker Street, to a neighborhood that's mostly asleep. It seems common folk and craftsmen aren't nearly as likely to have late nights as the nobility. That makes some sense. Seregil pulls out a mantle that had belonged to a White Hawk Infantryman, and has the usual sort of "who'd you steal that from"/"borrowed, dear boy" kind of thief exchange. It's cute though.

So Alec's on guard and getaway duty (Seregil doesn't think his horse will be sturdy enough if they have to run for it), while Seregil plays drunk:

“You! In the house!” he bawled, swaying precariously in the saddle. “I want the leech, damn him. By Sakor, send out the bastard son of a pig!”

A shutter slammed back just above his head and an old woman popped her head out, glaring down indignantly.

“Leave off with that or I’ll have the Watch down on you,” she screeched, swinging a stick at his head. “This is an honest house.”

Seregil accuses Rythel of being a leech and ruining his horse. Leech meaning healer, I assume, as he accuses him of giving the horse a dose of salts that half killed him. The old woman swings her cudgel at him and tells him that Rythel the Smith lives here, not Rythel the leech.

“Smith?” Seregil goggled up at her. “What in the name of Sakor’s Fire is he doing dosing my horse if he’s a smith?”

It's a pretty good farce, Alec and I are heartily amused. Apparently Rythel is a very common name, and per the woman, Rythel the Smith is an honest man, who works for a Master Quarin. She also tries to empty a chamberpot at him, though he sidesteps it with experience. He apologizes to the woman and is off.

So they've determined Rythel is a journeyman smith - which means he probably shouldn't have enough gold for the Street of Lights or a lord's papers.

Alec notes that having BOTH that amount of gold AND the papers is significant too. (Meaning he hadn't sold the papers for it, I assume). Clearly the guy's been doing what he's doing for a while. They'll have to start investigating tomorrow.

Seregil's poor grey is wheezing dejectedly. Aw. Seregil rides with Alec instead. And...oh dear.

Alec kicked a foot out of the stirrup and held his hand down. Grasping it, Seregil climbed up behind him and wrapped an arm around his waist.

Alec felt another unexpected twinge of sensuality at his touch, faint as a bat’s whisper, but unmistakable. There was certainly nothing seductive in the way Seregil gripped a handful of his tunic to keep his balance, yet suddenly he had an image of that same hand stroking the head of the young man at Azarin’s brothel, and later embracing dark-eyed Eirual.

Seregil had touched him before, but never with anything more than brotherly affection. Alec had seen tonight what sort of companions his friend chose—Wythrin and Eirual, both of them exotic, beautiful, and undoubtedly skilled beyond anything Alec could conceive of.

What’s happening to me? he wondered dejectedly. Maker’s Mercy, he could still smell Myrhichia’s lush scent rising from his skin. From some neglected corner of his heart, a small voice seemed to answer silently, You’re waking up at last.

Repressed but allosexual it is. Oh dear.

Seregil decides to return the cloak to Eirual's, so the girls don't get in trouble. But he sends Alec in. He won't be too far away. Alec realizes that means Seregil's going back to Azarin's.

He heard a throaty chuckle behind him. “Fowl never tastes as savory when you’re hungry for venison.”

The chapter ends with Alec's slightly resentful thought that at least Seregil knows what he wants.

Oh, I don't know, Alec honey. "Venison" is a particular word choice here. Which character's "intrinsic nature" turned out to be a stag again?