Sunblind

Chapter Two

Giles reined in his horse beside Ethan’s and glanced around. “I had not realised we had climbed so high.” His eyes went to a flash of darker blue on the horizon, where the sea met the summer sky. “We can see for miles.”

“You feel less confined up here?” Ethan said. “My land has other places like this; now we have good weather at last, I’ll take you to them. For today though – as we started out so much later than we had planned –” Giles raised an unrepentant eyebrow and grinned, “- we’ll have to settle for the villa.” Ethan pointed with his riding crop at the summit of the grassy hill. “It lies over there. We can tether the horses to a tree and let them graze a while.”

Within a few minutes they were walking over springy, thin grass, laced with a variety of tiny wildflowers that gave it the look of a garden gone wild, rather than moorland. Empty of all but some sheep in the distance, cropping away placidly at the grass, the moor was still far from silent; the air alive with bird song and the drone of insects. Giles sighed out an appreciative breath. “The air is like honey,” he said. “Sweet and –”

“Sticky?” Ethan said. He sniffed. “It smells good, yes, but I think you need to choose a different simile if you wish me to agree with you.”

“Wretch!” Giles said. “I hope you’ll not be so harsh with Spike’s poetical effusions. Oh, I did not tell you; he wishes to be called ‘William’, as it’s more fitting now he’s on the verge of becoming famous for his verse.” Giles shook his head in disbelief.

Ethan stepped over a rabbit hole, keeping an eye out for snares, and frowned. “That seems unlikely, given what you’ve told me of his work, but I cannot see why dropping that ridiculous nickname makes you look so.”

“He always despised his given name as being hopelessly commonplace,” Giles explained. “Since acquiring his nickname, the only people who use ‘William’ are matchmaking mamas during the Season, wishing to entice him into paying court to their daughters –”

Ethan snorted. “I wish them luck with that endeavour!”

“Indeed...and by Angel when he is truly enraged with him. So this latest start surprises me a little, d’you see?”

“I do, yes.” Ethan shrugged. “I’ll call him whatever he wishes, if he’ll refrain from reading his poems to me.”

“It depends on his mood,” Giles said. “If he thinks you sympathetic he might, and if he thinks it would annoy you, he almost certainly will.”

That made Ethan smile. “Caught between Scylla and Charybdis? Thank you for the warning, Rupert. Perhaps I can discover I, too, have a Muse and retaliate with verses of my own.”

Giles fixed him with a look designed to quell any such idea and watched Ethan’s eyes gleam with mischief. “Come here,” he said, crooking an imperious finger.

“Why?” Ethan asked, even as he obeyed. “Do you have a rhyme for ‘silver’?”

“Incorrigible,” Giles said, sliding his hand around Ethan’s neck anllinlling him closer, “but you do not make a convincing poet. You lack their die-away airs and your cravat is much too neatly tied.”

“Oh, I wrote it in my youth,” Ethan said, reaching up and running a finger along Giles’ jaw line then pinching his chin. “’Lines to One Whose Blue Eyes Hold my Heart.’ A sonnet, I believe, though the scansion limped most lamentably.” He frowned, looking thoughtful. “As, sadly, does the inspiration.” Giles looked a question and he added, “Lord Lethington; gout, poor soul.”

A face appeared, culled from memory and Giles pursed his lips, considering it. “Your tastemen men improved,” he said, seeing the laughter leap into Ethan’s eyes.

“If I thought it would please you, love, I’d write one for you, but somehow I feel sure it would not.”

Giles kissed him for that, closing his eyes against the sunlight that dazzled them, as his mouth sought Ethan’s. When the lips against his parted willingly, he deepened what he had intended to be no more than a brief kiss and felt Ethan respond warmly. Time stilled. Keeping his eyes shut, Giles shifted his hand enough to stroke his thumb up to the hollow behind Ethan’s ear, where the hidden, secret skin waited, a light touch that made Ethan shiver. He swept his thumb down, scoring the skin lightly with his nail and did it again and again until Ethan broke the kiss, panting. Giles opened his eyes, and was glad he had, because Ethan was worth looking at, with his hair tousled slightly from the ride and his face unguarded.

“I think you should show me the villa,” Giles said, “before I forget we’re visible for miles and tumble you on the grass.”

“I could render us invisible to all but the most determined eyes,” Ethan said with an inviting look. “It’s a simple enough spell and one I intend to show young – ah, Wesley, that is.”

“I remember that spell,” Giles said a little grimly. “And I remember you assuring me you had mastered it and yes, ‘twas perfectly safe for me to pleasure you on my knees in the gazebo while my mother showed Cousin Theresa around the garden. I can only pray Wesley has a lighter touch than you as Theresa took nigh on an hour to recover from the shock of seeing the gazebo vanish – and then reappear with me in a decidedly compromising position.”

“Your mother said she was prone to the vapours and begged me to ignore her,” Ethan said with a reminiscent smile.

“Oh, she was all apologies – until you had gone,” Giles said. “And then – by God, Ethan, I’ve not paid you back for the scolding I got that day!”

Ethan laughed, the sound rising up as joyous as the birdsong. “Do your worst, my Rupert,” he said, lifting his hands in appeal. “I’ll endure whatever punishment you feel is fitting for such an elderly, inconsequential crime.” He blew a mocking kiss at Giles and then composed his face into grave lines. “Well? What shall it be? Will you flirt this night with the lovely Miss Susan as she flutters those long eyelashes at you and beg your help in turning over the pages of her music? ‘Twill break my heart, but I suppose it’s no more than I deserve.”

Giles snorted. Susan had four and thirty years in her dish and had never made any secret of her relief that an ample inheritance had allowed her to remain single and free to pursue her two loves of riding and gardening. Her brother, James, was equally well-suited to the single life, being a rake whose amatory exploits had rivaled Ethan’s; though his taste ran rather to married women. A duel had left him crippled and enforced seclusion on his estates and the discovery, hitherto unsuspected, of a love for reading that amounted now to an obsession, made him a most entertaining friend. To have such congenial neighbours was a blessing, and Ethan and Giles spent many evenings with the couple, who, though they knew the bond between the two men went beyond friendship, were unruffled by it; Sarah through indifference, James because he was possessed of an easy tolerance and a liking for Ethan that stretched back to the time Ethan had helped him in one of his affaires de coeur. Once assured that Giles had not returned only to bring more sorrow to their friend, they welcomed him and he was treated with the same refreshing informality they showed all their friends.

“Susan would have you weeding her rockery for that,” he observed. “No – I’ll think on a suitable punishment, have no fear. It will do you no harm to possess your soul in patient trepidation as you await my rightful vengeance.”

“It really would,” Ethan said, turning to lead the way to the villa as Giles pulled out his watch and studied it meaningfully. “You know how much I dislike wait- ah. Clever.”

“Thank you,” Giles said, giving him a smile. “It’s good to have one’s stratagems appreciated.”

They walked in a companionable silence to the remains of the villa, pacing along the grassy humps that once were walls, digging, in an increasingly desultory fashion as the heat of the sun increased, amongst the turf with sticks to see what they could uncover.

“Oh, this is of no use!” Giles said, wiping his brow with a handkerchief that had once been snowy white. “Ethan, we would need men with shovels and a month of Sundays to reach anything of great antiquity. I’ve found nothing but a farthing, five nails and a distaste for gardening. No wonder Susan falls asleep so often when I play the piano of an evening. ‘Tis exhausting!”

“Susan’s no music lover,” Ethan agreed. “I, on the other hand, could listen to you play for hours, my love.”

Giles gave him a suspicious look, as Ethan was usually less complimentary about his playing, and then cocked his head. “What have you there?”

Ethan tossed him a misshapen lump. “Not sure. Bring it down to the lake and we’ll see if it proves to be of interest, or if I’ve just grimed my nails excavating it, to no purpose.”

“The lake...” Giles said longingly. “Shall we bathe? I’m hot and filthy.”

“I see no reason why we shouldn’t,” Ethan said, “though the water is always cold – spring-fed, you know. We’re not likely to be interrupted; the villagers swear it’s haunted up here and won’t come within a half-mile of it.”

“Is there a story?” Giles asked, stripping off his clothes as he walked over to the deep, clear water, eying it with pleasure.

“There are a dozen!” Ethan said with a chuckle, “and I suspect all were begun by my grandfather.” He tossed his shirt on a rock and sat on it, extending his booted foot to Giles.

“I’m to play valet now, am I?” Giles said. “I managed to take my own boots off. Why would your grandfather do such a thing? It seems an odd start.”

“If you can remove them unaided, they do not fit,” Ethan said with asperity. Giles pulled a face, knowing that Ethan considered him to have fallen into barbarous habits in his years at Oxford. “He met his mistress here. You cannot see it, but further into the hills is a little summerhouse, all tumbled down, where they would tryst.” He looked pensive, which, as he was balanced on one foot as he took off his breeches, was no mean feet, Giles reflected. “If any ghost haunts this place, it should be hers. Her husband was a local squire who killed her when she delivered a child he knew was not his. The babe was fostered out, and died of the pox soon after and the squire, well, my grandfather saw to him.”

Giles shivered, more for the matter of fact delivery than the story itself. “What did he do?” he asked, walking carefully over flat, sun-warmed pebbles to a strip of sand.

“He drowned him in this lake,” Ethan replied, as Giles waded in knee deep.

“What?” Giles spun around, felt his foot slip and ended up sprawled in a foot of water, spluttering with the shock of the cool water.

“Oh, it was years ago!” Ethan said, picking up the lump he’d unearthed and going to help Giles to his feet, keeping back his amusement rather well.

“Even so,” Giles protested, standing in the shallows, undecided.

“You’re wet already,” Ethan pointed out, giving him a swift glance. “Doesn’t it feel good?”

“I suppose so,” Giles said, resigning himself to the inevitable. If he refused to bathe Ethan would tease him mercilessly...

He strode forward, finding that the bottom of the lake shelved quite sharply, and struck out for the opposite shore, swimming with the strong stroke he’d mastered as a boy. Deliciously cool, the water lapped at his face and he pushed his head under water, eyes open as he strove to glimpse the sandy bottom. It shimmered palely beneath him but he was too wary to attempt to dive down to it, guessing it to be beyond his reach, no matter how temptingly close it appeared. Lifting his head clear and shaking the water from his face in a spray of droplets turned to diamonds in the sun, he heard a splash behind him and turned, treading water, to see Ethan, dark hair sleeked back, and smiling, swimming towards him.

“See what I found!” Ethan called.

“Take care you don’t drop it,” Giles cautioned him, wondering why Ethan could not have left it on the shore, whatever it was.

Ethan reached his side. “I’ll not do that.” He kissed Giles, an exuberant buss on the lips that sank them both as Giles forgot to kick and reached out for Ethan instinctively, pulling them both under the water for a second.

“Fool!” Ethan spluttered, a grin splitting his face as he blinked away the water from his eyes. “Do you not wish to see it, then?”

“On dry land,” Giles said, turning towards the shore. Ethan held out his hand as Giles swam past him, so that it ran the length of him from head to toes, following the contour of his body. He twisted onto his back and floated there, staring at Ethan, shivering with a lust that took him by surprise. Ethan’s lips curved slightly.

“Still wish to return to shore, love?”

“I’m no merman,” Giles retorted, “and you’ll lose that trinket for certain if we try to make love here. We’ll most likely drown too, so perhaps that will be a secondary consideration.”

“I wonder how the merfolk manage?” Ethan said, distracted for a moment. “No matter. Follow me.”

He began to swim to the far shore and Giles followed him, curious, but willing to stay in the cool water a little longer. The lake was surrounded by grass, with the occasional willow tree trailing its leaves in the water, thick roots exposed where the bank had eroded. Giles squinted against the sun and saw that what he’d taken to be part of the shore was actually a small island, no more than a dozen yards across. As they reached it, the water grew shallower until they found themselves waist deep in warmer water.

Ethan smiled and pulled Giles around so that his back was against a smooth rock, flat-topped and hot to the touch from the sun, kissing him with a deceptive gentleness as one hand began to roam Giles’s body. Eyes closed against the glimmer of sun on water, Giles was only dimly aware of a metallic sound as something was dropped onto the rock behind him. “What was that?” he murmured against Ethan’s lips.

“It will keep,” Ethan said, his caresses bolder now both hands were free, thrusting up against Giles, his movements slowed and exaggerated by the water in which they stood. Giles held onto Ethan’s hips, pulling him closer and then holding him still.

“You’re impatient,” he said between kisses, spreading his legs apart slightly as Ethan leaned against him and feeling the coarse sand shift against the soles of his feet. “Too much so.”

“This is a recent discovery, is it?” Ethan asked, following his final word with a gasp as Giles loosened his grip and reached between them, sliding a flat hand behind Ethan’s cock and pulling it against his own, trapping it there.

“Far from it, but it does not mean I should let it pass unremarked, nor strive to correct your fault.”

Ethan laughed at him, the soft sound merging with the lap of water against their bodies as they began to move, Giles’ actions being rather more eager than his words. Soon words were lost, as their lips met in kisses that warmed them more than the sun, kisses that, eyes closed, Giles might have been forgiven for thinking were from the Ethan he first met so fresh, so sensual were they...he did not doubt that they would have felt so even had he and Ethan not been parted.

As he thought that, they ended, Ethan tilting his head back and smiling, as he sank to his knees. The water was shallow enough for that to leave him with his head just above water, but as he clearly intended to use his mouth on what his hand held firmly, well below the water, Giles began to move, intending to climb up on the rock behind him.

“No, love,” Ethan said. “Wait but a moment.”

As Giles watched him, a little bemused, he dipped his head down and sheathed Giles’ shaft in his mouth, working it with his tongue and sealing his lips around it so that Giles felt nothing but warmth surrounding him. He sighed with pleasure, staring down at Ethan, whose dark hair was spread out in fronds around his head, his body tinted with a faint green hue from the water, until Giles could almost fancy he was being seduced by a water spirit, intent on luring him into another element.

Sooner than he’d expected, Ethan parted his lips and Giles cried out softly as the water rushed in, shockingly cool against his flesh, making him harden still further. Ethan could not laugh, but Giles felt one final, teasing suck at the head of his cock and then Ethan raised his head clear of the water, eyes gleaming darkly rich like pebbles in a river bed. “You do not taste the same,” he complained. “Now you may move, Rupert.”

The rock was low enough to make it simple for Giles to climb up onto it – and at a perfect height for Ethan to stand between his legs and finish what he had started. They’d made love outside before of course; a score of times or more, but rarely in a place so exposed and yet so secluded. The faint breeze that dried the droplets of water clinging to Giles’ back carried the wordless sounds spilling from his mouth and took them to the nearby trees, setting the leaves to murmuring a reply. As he arched backwards, thrusting up into Ethan’s mouth, his palms flat against the rock, Giles fancied that they spoke for Ethan; that he, with lips so delightfully busy, had used air to convey his message, as earlier he’d used water to arouse.

Water at his feet; a fiery sun above, rock under his hands and air that swirled about him in restless surges – and as he reached out to touch Ethan’s hair, needing that point of contact as his climax approached, his fingers brushed what Ethan had left lying on the rock, and he caught it up in his hand without thinking. Etharhytrhythm faltered and Giles looked down to watch him come, a slender brown hand wrapped around his cock, the sight triggering his own release. He slid down off the rock into Ethan’s waiting arms, kissing him fiercely.

“Such heat,” Ethan murmured, sliding his hands down Giles’ arms. “And I see you found my treasure. What do you make of it?”

Giles held out his hand, glancing down curiously. “A necklace?” he said a little doubtfully. It was made of bronze, roughly circular and pierced through in an irregular pattern. A slender chain twisted through the holes, weaving back and forth until Giles could not see where it began or ended. It looked old and as Giles studied it he felt it grow warm in his hand, for so fleeting a moment he thought himself imagining it.

“No,” Ethan said as Giles gave him a questioning look. “I felt it too. It has power of some sort.”

“Yes,” Giles said, glancing upwards and grinning. “It makes it rain.”

Ethan stared at the swiftly gathering clouds and sighed. “Is it too much to hope for that we reach home before the storm?”

“No, but if we do not make haste we most certainly will not. See; you have made me as impatient as you; are you not ashamed of yourself?” Avoiding the lunge Ethan made towards him, intent on ducking him in revenge, Giles began to swim back to the shore, the medallion locked tightly in his hand.


TBC