Chapter 12: Not What He Expected
By the time they reached Old Town Mossgrove, the forest had taken on the shape of a settlement. A proper Forest road ran ahead of them now, flat stones laid between the roots, slick with moss and old rain. The air smelled of wet bark, fern, woodsmoke, and mushrooms. Water moved somewhere under stone. Ahead came voices, footsteps, a door shutting, wind in the canopy.
The first people they passed looked as though the forest had dressed them. Hair braided with feathers, bone, beads, and copper. Paint and old tattoos curled across skin like leaves. Leather, woven cloth, fur, cord, metal. Nothing polished. Nothing careless. No one stared. They simply noticed everything.
Dorian noticed the change in Toren at once. Not much. Just enough. His stride loosened. His shoulders settled. Something in him answered the place without effort. Dorian smiled to himself. Forest boy suited Toren rather well.
Liana stayed sharp as ever, eyes moving over people, doors, paths, exits, the sort of things sensible travellers noticed before trouble introduced itself.
Old Mossgrove gathered around them in bark, root, and living wood. Houses were set into trunks and moss-dark stone so naturally they seemed grown rather than built. Amber light glowed from round windows. Fungal lanterns cast pale gold over the paths.
The tavern stood inside a vast tree, sunk into root and stone beneath a shelf of pale fungus. Inside, the air was warm with food, ale, smoke, damp wool, and pine resin. Low voices drifted. Cups touched wood. A chair scraped.
They took two rooms. Toren would stay with his father.
Liana decided they needed supplies. Dorian stood.
“No,” she said.
He looked at her. “A charming tone. Very hospitable.”
“You are noticeable from across a room.”
“That sounds like a flaw in other people.”
“It sounds like a problem for me. Sit down. Try not to become memorable.”
Toren, the traitor, looked amused.
Then they left together, and Dorian was abandoned in the tavern with his boredom, which had never once improved any situation.
Dorian washed properly, which was already generous by the standards of travel, changed into cleaner clothes, and went back downstairs instead of surrendering himself to his room like an obedient invalid.
Amber light filled the tavern. Low voices drifted by the hearth. Cups touched wood. Smoke, ale, resin, and hot food hung in the air. Dorian chose a dark corner where he could watch without being obliged to join in. Travel-worn and bored, he was not at his best.
That was when he noticed the music.
A man stood at the far side of the room with a lute in his hands, singing as though he had no need to demand attention in order to keep it. Hard to place his age exactly. Black hair. A face built for trouble. The sort that tended to create unnecessary complications in otherwise manageable evenings.
The song was about love. Passionate without becoming embarrassing. A rare achievement. Dorian listened at first because there was nothing better to do. He kept listening because the man was actually good.
By the end of the song, half the audience looked as though they wanted to be him, and the other half wanted to shag him.
The bard looked local enough, but his coat was entirely wrong for Forest fashion. Cut close through the body, with clever fastenings and boots made for roads rather than roots, it belonged somewhere beyond bark, moss, and fungal lanterns.
Interesting. Inconvenient, but interesting.
At some point the bard’s gaze found the corner and lingered. Not long. Just long enough. Dorian, naturally, did nothing about it. When the set ended, the bard spoke to someone by the hearth, and crossed the room toward Dorian. Up close he was prettier still. Also, annoyingly, self-possessed.
“I was beginning to think you’d vanish before I finished,” he said.
Dorian leaned back in his chair. “I was merely bored.”
The bard smiled. “And now?”
“Less so.”
“Good.”
He rested a hand on the empty chair. “I finish in a couple of hours. If you are still here, I’d be happy to share a drink with you.”
Dorian looked at him for a moment, then inclined his head. “Very well.”
The bard returned to the centre of the room as if he had not just improved the evening. Dorian stayed where he was, listening with actual attention now. Waiting a couple of hours, he decided, might not be the worst use of his time.
Liana and Toren crossed into the market beneath roots and fungal lanterns. Liana bought what they needed with her usual efficiency. Food, lamp oil, cord. Toren gathered his own things for the monastery, then slipped several packets of herbs into her satchel.
She caught him at it. “I am not carrying all that.”
“You are taking them.”
“I will be travelling with a Walker.”
Toren’s hand stilled. “Yes. But not with me.”
That took the argument out of it. A moment later he lifted part of the weight onto his own shoulder, and they turned back toward the tavern together.
A couple of hours passed. Dorian remained where he was in the dark corner. When the bard finished, he came back exactly as promised and settled beside the table with the same easy confidence as before.
“You are still here,” he said.
“You sound surprised.”
“Pleased,” the bard corrected. His gaze travelled over Dorian with open interest. “You stand out badly, you know. Wrong clothes. Wrong manner. Wrong face for Mossgrove. You look like a man who has never once been overlooked in his life.”
“A terrible burden,” Dorian said.
The bard smiled, then looked at him more closely. Properly this time. “I have seen eyes like yours before.”
That caught Dorian’s attention.
“The last man I knew with eyes like that was a Walker,” the bard said. He did not lower his voice. He did not need to. “Are you one?”
Dorian gave him a faint look. “Afraid so.”
The bard’s interest only sharpened. “My room is upstairs,” he said. “I have drinks there. Better company too, I hope.”
Dorian rose.
At that exact moment, Liana and Toren came back into the tavern with their supplies and saw more than enough. The bard was already turning for the stairs, and Dorian was following, because of course he was.
Liana took it in with a single glance that confirmed, with irritating efficiency, exactly what she had already known.
Toren went still for half a beat. Not long. Just long enough to feel it. Then he shifted the weight in his arms and said, a touch too evenly, “Right. I’m going to my father’s now. I’ll see you in the morning.”
He left.
Liana watched him go, then glanced once toward the stairs where Dorian had already vanished. Of course. Leave him alone for one evening and he immediately found a new way to become administratively inconvenient.
The room was small, warm, and smelled faintly of old wood, ale, and skin.
Dorian had half a mind to laugh. Here he was, kissed against a tavern wall by a black-haired bard with warm hands and questionable instincts.
“I’m Finn, if you care,” the bard murmured.
“Dorian. In case you want to remember it.”
The kiss began clumsy with haste, then deepened properly. Finn tasted of ale and something sweet. Dorian’s hands slid under his shirt, over warm skin dampened by the heat of the room. When he touched the corset beneath, Finn stepped back.
“Before we go further,” he said, and pulled the shirt off.
The leather was harsh, tightly laced across his chest. Brutal enough to explain the flatness of his tone when he said, “True-soul. That’s what Loteri call people like me. Wrong body, still a man. If that ruins your evening, best say so now.”
Dorian looked at him for a moment. Then his gaze moved, calm and thorough, over the line of Finn’s throat, the stubborn leather, the narrow waist, the strength held tight under all of it.
“You’re a man,” Dorian said. “I had managed to gather that.” A faint smile flickered across his face. “And you chose me. I see no cause for complaint.”
Finn’s mouth twitched.
They undressed each other without hurry. The corset took time to undo. Dorian did it carefully, fingers working the laces while Finn stood close enough for their breath to mix. When the leather finally loosened, Finn let out a long breath, and Dorian kissed him again, slower this time, sweat already beginning to gather where skin met skin.
Then Dorian slid his hands down Finn’s body. “You tell me what I can touch.”
Finn’s eyes were already blurring. His “yes” came out low.
Dorian moved him to the low bed and knelt on the creaking wooden floor between Finn’s thighs. Finn’s fingers traced Dorian’s scars. He didn’t ask. Just touched, careful, like he was memorising.
Once Dorian’s hand slid to Finn’s low belly, Finn inhaled and froze. “Wait. Too much.”
Dorian adjusted without comment. Finn’s reactions were plain enough after that, and Dorian read them right. He stroked the swollen length, gentle, then took it in his mouth - steady, lips working up and down. Finn’s fingers twisted in Dorian’s curly hair. “Bloody hell, Walker.”
Dorian slid lower, tongue exploring. He pulled back a fraction. “What do you want?”
“Front first,” Finn murmured. “Then the rest.”
Dorian did. Mouth and fingers until Finn came first: bitten-off curse, thighs locking hard.
Dorian eased Finn onto his belly. Impatient. Finn felt the blunt heat of Dorian pressing against him, skin already wet and fevered. Dorian entered him slowly, front first, deliberate and controlled, his lips trailing warm, possessive kisses over Finn’s shoulders. He built the rhythm in small shifts, attuned to every catch in Finn’s breath, every unconscious arch. When Finn’s hand slipped beneath to stroke himself, matching the steady pulse, Dorian answered with deeper rolls of his hips.
Finn flinched, sharp, and Dorian stilled for a heartbeat. Then he eased out. His oiled fingers found Finn’s tighter place and started gently but firmly stretching it, pressing in slow. When Finn’s hips rocking back for more, Dorian oiled himself generously once again and pressed in, inch by careful inch. He held still until Finn’s breathing steadied, then asked, voice rough, “All right?” Finn’s voice broke open, raw exhale, half curse, half plea. “Don’t stop.”
Then Dorian started with slow glides that gradually sharpened. He kept the pace even, relentless, until Finn’s thighs began to shake with the new wave. Only after Finn came did Dorian let himself follow, the last few thrusts losing what little restraint he had left. He released deep inside Finn and ended with his face buried in the crook of Finn’s shoulder, breath rough against sweaty skin. He stayed there for a moment, then pressed a kiss between Finn’s shoulder blades.
He collapsed onto the bed beside Finn. Once he was composed again, Dorian gently stroked Finn’s hip. “Well then. Still alive, are you?”
Finn snorted, still catching his breath. “Apparently. Better than usual.”
That, Dorian thought, was close enough to praise. He passed the waterskin and started to get up.
“Stay,” Finn said.
Dorian paused. Considered for a moment. Then got back into bed. Finn curled into Dorian’s side with a soft sigh. Dorian drew him close at once, until their legs tangled and Finn’s cheek rested over his heart.
Morning light slipped through the shutters. Dorian woke to the sound of leather being pulled tight. Finn stood by the window, lacing himself back into the corset with the flat concentration of a man performing a daily irritation. The fit looked cruel. Familiar, too.
Dorian watched for a moment. “That looks barbaric.”
Finn let out a breath that might have been a laugh. “Very perceptive.”
“No magic for it?”
“Not the kind that lasts.” Finn tied one section off and pulled again. “That takes a proper surgeon. In a proper city.”
He hesitated just enough on the last part. Dorian recognised it at once. Not self-pity. Money.
“Expensive,” Dorian said.
“More than I can afford from taverns.”
Dorian watched him a while longer. Then reached for his coat, found the crystal, and held it out.
Finn looked at it. “What is that?”
“A cooling crystal. Same sort welders use in Steamhollow. Useful. Not cheap. Keep it or sell it.”
Finn stared at him. “You are serious.”
“Regrettably.”
He took it carefully, as though it might disappear if handled too roughly. “That is an absurd gift after one night.”
“I have always had poor judgement.”
That earned a quieter smile. Finn tucked the crystal away, then stepped back to kiss Dorian. Brief. Warm. Unfeigned. When he drew back, he looked at Dorian differently.
“That was dangerously decent of you.”
Dorian sighed. “A serious error in judgement.”
By the time Dorian came down, breakfast was already on the table. Liana and Toren waited. He looked passably fresh, which was close enough.
She gazed at him, unimpressed. “Planning to sample the local talent across the Loteri Lands, are you? Do let us know when you intend to resume the actual journey.”
Dorian sat, reached for tea, and ignored that entirely. Across from him, Toren said nothing. He looked composed enough, but quieter than usual. Dorian noticed. Liana noticed. Toren would probably have preferred neither of them did.
After a moment Toren set down his cup. “My father insists we see him before we leave. Ashen Valley is dangerous. He does not think you should go there without protection.”
Liana’s expression sharpened. “What sort of protection?”
“A ritual,” Toren said plainly. “An old one. For travellers crossing into the valley routes. It is meant to turn aside certain things and make others less eager to notice you.”
Dorian buttered a piece of bread with great attention. “How flattering. I do enjoy being less noticeable.”
Toren let that pass. “Liana is not going toward the valley without it.”
Liana opened her mouth, then thought better of it.
Then Toren added, still looking at the table, “And the Walker is valuable too.”
Practical wording. Sensible enough. The tone betrayed him anyway. Dorian heard it. So did Liana. She said nothing, which was louder than comment.
At last she gave a small nod. “Fine. We go to your father first.”
Dorian sipped his tea. “Splendid. Breakfast, ritual protection, probable doom. A very balanced morning.”
No one smiled, though Liana looked close.
They finished eating, gathered their things, and left the tavern together, the road delayed now by one more necessary stop before Ashen Valley.