To Target the Heart Read online

  Years. His stomach fluttered. Hamish wordlessly lowered his head, sliding his tongue over the man’s length before wrapping his lips over the tip and sucking.

  With a loud open-mouthed moan, Darshan arched his hips. His hand slid from Hamish’s shoulder and up, digging into Hamish’s hair. “Gods,” he slurred. “Would you be offended to know that is just as I imagined?”

  Hamish glanced up to find his gaze locking onto Darshan’s. He released the man, ignoring Darshan’s faint, disappointed whine. The spellster would more than get what he wanted soon enough. “You’ve imagined me sucking you off?”

  Darshan’s answering blush was all Hamish needed for confirmation.

  He adjusted his position, abandoning sitting passively back on his heels in favour of a more upright kneeling stance. He kissed along Darshan’s inner thigh even as he hoisted both of the man’s legs over his shoulders, grinning at the spellster’s surprised grunt. Sliding his hands beneath Darshan’s buttocks and lifting him higher allowed Hamish to return to his previous actions with full control over them.

  Darshan shuddered in his grasp. The spellster struggled only to contain his deep moans. The slap of his hand clapping over his mouth spoke of stinging skin. His fingers wove through Hamish’s hair once again, trembling and vaguely attempting to guide. Words escaped the Darshan’s lips, mumbled past his bejewelled hand and colliding with his moans. One such word, sibilant and long, repeated over and over.

  Hamish slowed, listening as the soft tone of the man’s voice grew thick with need, before he registered the words were also entirely foreign. He lifted his head. “I cannae understand a word of Udynean, you ken.”

  Darshan gave an exasperated huff and, as he altered his grip on Hamish’s hair, Hamish found his head directed back towards the spellster’s crotch.

  That he understood.

  He opened his mouth wide, letting Darshan’s gentle thrusts dictate how fast he went, and swallowed the man whole. Hamish couldn’t see the spellster’s face, tipped back as it was. But he heard him.

  Darshan no longer tried to muffle his moans—which grew deeper with every downward bob of Hamish’s head—opting to plant his shoulders in the mattress and thrust his hips. The spellster’s legs tightened around Hamish’s neck, using him as leverage.

  Words escaped between the pure noise, mostly gibberish to Hamish, but his name came warbling out. Hamish almost stopped the first time. He hadn’t ever heard it spoken in such a rich tone, almost on the verge of begging. Only a handful of those he’d been with had known who he was and, of those, just the one beforehand.

  Darshan stiffened. His backside, still firmly in Hamish’s grasp, clenched. With the man halfway down his throat, Hamish only felt the faint pulse of Darshan’s length against his tongue as the spellster emptied himself.

  Only once Darshan’s body began to sag did Hamish pull back. Breathing deeply of the cool air, he lowered Darshan back onto the bed with far more care than he had hoisted him up and sat back on his heels.

  A strange scent drifted on the air, like the sea after a thunderstorm. A glance at the window confirmed only clear sky with the shadows indicating it was far later than he had originally presumed.

  Beyond time his guest left.

  Darshan slid his fingers into Hamish’s beard, cupping his jaw and tilting Hamish’s head up. The man’s thumb stroked from the corner of Hamish’s mouth, continuing on across his cheek, following the natural lay of his beard. He bent forward, their lips close enough to share breath.

  Reflexively, Hamish withdrew. “Have you forgotten where me mouth’s just been?” No man he had ever been with had wanted to kiss afterwards.

  Darshan shook his head, his eyes creased with amusement. “Come here.” He threaded his fingers into Hamish’s hair, holding him fast as their mouths met. Darshan’s tongue parted their lips, moving in gentle strokes.

  By the time Darshan let them separate, Hamish was breathless.

  He wobbled on hands and knees to the bed post, using it to steady himself as he stood. The man’s smalls were draped over the edge of the bed. Hamish gently tossed them back to their owner. “You have to go.”

  Darshan blinked up at him, those hazel eyes still dazed with pleasure. “Go?” he echoed, frowning. “I just got here.”

  Hamish nodded. How he wished he didn’t have to do this. But if there was any chance, any minuscule possibility, of Darshan being more than another one-time fling—even if only for the duration of his stay—then the ambassador had to leave now. “Tomorrow, climb up the cliffward tower at noon. I promise, I’ll explain everything then, but you have to leave now.”

  On legs made uncertain by excessive kneeling, Hamish crossed the room to the door. Pressing an ear to it revealed nothing. Peeking showed only empty corridor. They had time.

  Glancing back revealed Darshan still lounging on the bed.

  “Please,” Hamish stressed. “Before the first guards arrive for the evening shift.”

  “You will have sentries outside your door? Still?” Even puzzled and questioning, the man hastened to dress.

  I always do. Yesterday’s kiss wouldn’t have changed anything beyond making them more vigilant. “Tomorrow. Noon. Cliffward tower.”

  Darshan pressed a hand to Hamish’s chest. “I shall be waiting.” Adjusting his glasses, he slipped out the door, trailing the room’s heat and that strange thunderstorm scent.

  Hamish leant on the door. If Darshan hastened down the corridor, then he would avoid the guards. That would just leave tomorrow. Bubbling uncertainty joined the mixture of relief and lingering lust already churning in his stomach.

  How, in the name of the Goddess Almighty, was he ever going to explain his predicament to a man who’d never had to hide himself?

  Darshan stared out at the view his elevated position afforded him. The city of Mullhind stretched out far below, buildings set in clumps rather than the strict curves and lines of home. To his left, the remains of a large building tentatively peeked out from the treetops. The breeze drifted in from the sea, colder and sharper than the warm salty tang of Minamist’s onshore winds. He clutched the parapet and breathed deeply nevertheless.

  This small space atop the western tower seemed almost remote. He hadn’t met another soul on his way up here.

  An explanation. That’s what he’d been promised. Did he really want one? Was it even needed? It seemed pretty straightforward. The man was terrified of being caught, of his mother and her punishments. Which, if he wasn’t mistaken, must have involved locking Hamish in his room for days on end.

  If he could find a way to get the man far from here…

  Darshan dug his fingers into the edge of the parapet. This is not your fight. From the way others around them had reacted to a simple kiss, it was clear enough that what he’d done was seen as unacceptable. Practically criminal. Any further interference from him could only make things worse. Hamish didn’t deserve that.

  So, he lingered.

  All this would’ve been simpler back home. His father might not approve of him bouncing from one fling to the next, but he was at least permitted to be himself. To a point. There was a line. Crossing it was how he had ended up in Tirglas.

  The faint creak of hinges heralded the arrival of another.

  Darshan squared his shoulders. He twisted part way around, peering over his shoulder to check that it was indeed Hamish who shared this small space, an excuse on his tongue in the faint off chance someone else had seen him come up here.

  Hamish stood halfway out of the trapdoor, those sapphiric eyes wide and his mouth gaping like a stunned fish. “I didnae think you’d actually be waiting.”

  “Well, I am apparently owed an explanation.”

  “Aye.” Hamish rubbed at his neck. “About that. You see—”

  “I have been thinking,” Darshan interrupted. If he let Hamish just explain, then the man might not stay to discuss anything else and he wasn’t ready to leave it at that. “The other day? When your mother called me
ungodly… amongst other things?” he mumbled, turning his gaze on the harbour. He would not let those words bother him. He’d been called far worse in the Crystal Court, some of them even to his face.

  Another glance behind him revealed Hamish had climbed the rest of the way out of the trapdoor. He looked a touch off-colour. Clearly, not at all prepared for a theological debate. But then whoever was? Beyond those who dedicated their lives to service of their deity, at least.

  “I am well aware we have different beliefs,” Darshan continued. “But I will admit to some curiosity. Your people worship a single Goddess, correct?” His tutors hadn’t considered such information important enough to more than touch on it during his briefings, but he remembered that much.

  Hamish slowly nodded as he joined Darshan at the parapet, his heavy brows lowering in quiet confusion.

  “And what does your Goddess think of…?” He waved his hand, indicating the both of them.

  Hamish leant on the parapet. “I see,” he murmured, causing Darshan to raise his brows. Was he truly so transparent? The man cleared his throat. “They say nothing specifically on the subject. At least, nae that I’m aware of. Most of the sermons are about the usual things, of how her strength can be found in birth, creation and the harvest.”

  Sounds familiar. A few deities—amongst the several dozen the Udynean citizens worshipped—were associated with various stages of growth and vegetation, with the oldest and most widely accepted being the High Mother. But making such comparisons blindly could very well lead him to the wrong assumption. “Who taught you about sex, if I may ask?”

  Hamish sighed. “That would’ve been me dad. And before you ask if he was aware I’d nae interest in women…”

  “He was?” An easy assumption to make. Someone eventually had to be the first to become aware of Hamish’s lack of desire in pursuing women.

  He nodded.

  “Did he ever—?”

  “—tell me it was wrong?” Hamish finished, shaking his head. “He’s never said such in those words. But then, me dad’s always been more puzzled than against it like me mum.” He shuffled his weight and scratched at his jaw, his fingers all but disappearing into his beard. “I ken what you’re looking for. There isnae some rule written down saying men cannae be with each other, it’s just… you pick up what’s considered acceptable behaviour and… that’s nae part of it.”

  Darshan swallowed, his throat far tighter than it should’ve been. He could’ve handled a rule. They came with ambiguous clauses that enabled people with the right knowhow a way to ignore the law without technically disobeying. That’s how things happened in the Udynea Empire. His father, and the senate he oversaw, had slews of legal scholars at their command, their task always to be one step ahead of those seeking to skirt the law.

  “I ken there are other men living normal lives out there who have nae interest in being with a woman,” Hamish continued, staring vacantly out at the city. “The priesthood is pretty unilateral on whom they frown upon and they tend to focus on any couples without children regardless of whether they are two men, two women or nae. They make it clear that two men alone cannae create anything, but they’re nae demonised any more than any other childless couple.”

  Darshan sucked on his teeth. Already, he could see a few flaws in that statement. No more than. That didn’t exactly mean they weren’t. “One would be hard-pressed to deduce I was not some sort of rock pool slime based on your mother’s reaction.”

  Hamish nodded, his gaze lowering further. “That’s because me mum adheres to the ancient scriptures, which say—”

  Darshan sneered. “Now there is a phrase that could not make me shudder any further if it tried.” The imperial library boasted hundreds of ancient texts. Not only of when Udynea had yet to become the empire it now was, but from the fallen Domian Empire and other lands few even remembered the names of. They had rather polar outlooks on how a person’s life should be lived.

  Hamish leant further over the parapet, his head hanging well out from the edge. How he was able to do so knowing the drop should he misjudge his balance was beyond Darshan’s comprehension. “Plainly put, me mum’s aversion is largely due to the fact it willnae produce children. If it did…”

  That sounded far more familiar than Darshan would’ve liked. “It always boils down to children and heirs, does it not?” Everyone seemed so unreservedly obsessed with the idea. Even his own father had trouble understanding Darshan’s utter disinterest in siring another chain in the imperial bloodline.

  Hamish’s head cocked to one side, but his attention seemed rooted to the world far below them. “By your tone, it sounds like you’ve nae interest in becoming a father.”

  “That is because I—” His tongue froze. Once, he would’ve been certain of the answer; a most empathetic no. But that’d been when there’d been only one way to make children. There’d been whispers in the Crystal Court as of late, rumours coming from Niholia of other means. “—do not know,” he finally managed.

  Hamish lifted his head to frown over his shoulder at Darshan. “Oh?”

  “Do not get me wrong. I have met some absolutely charming women, but they just… fail to spark something in me.” That included Rashmika, a dear young lady who he had once considered living a lie for; an idea that had come from a place of pity for a friend rather than any desire to sleep with her.

  They’d first met when he was but six years old. Although she had spent much of her early teenage years being groomed to become his twin’s handmaiden, they’d grown close with time and she had been one of the first he had informed of his desire for men. With her noble bloodline, she was also strong enough to be considered worthy as a future imperial bride by the senate. His father had made numerous rumbles about Darshan marrying her.

  Ultimately, it wouldn’t have been fair to either of them and she was far happier with her current husband than she ever could’ve been with himself. He was content knowing he’d helped her find a man worthy of her gentle nature in a distant cousin of his. “But then I have also met brutes of men who elicited a similar reaction.” Including Rashmika’s father, who used to take great delight in beating his daughter.

  The wretched man didn’t do anything now. Darshan had made certain of that, his wedding gift to the happy couple.

  Hamish nodded. No doubt he had met his own fair share of men not worthy of his time. “To be honest, if I didnae have to lay with a woman, I’d nae mind the father part. I adore me wee niece and nephews. And, sure, I have thought about adding a child or two to the clan. Except…”

  “And therein lies the rub, yes?” There was more than the obvious driving Darshan’s lack of interest in siring an heir of his own. But it was a formidable hurdle nevertheless.

  “Aye.” Hamish’s head drooped. “Call me daft if you want, but I’ve been hoping me mum would come around. Eventually.”

  “No doubt she has been thinking the same thing. How old did you say you were?” He had vague memories of what they’d spoken about during his far-too-short-a-time in the man’s room. Most of it had been eclipsed by the mind-wiping pleasure Hamish had offered. “Thirty-five, was it? Six?” Older than himself.

  “Seven,” Hamish gently corrected. “I’ve been thirty-seven since the midwinter just gone.”

  “Right, of course.” Midwinter? When the land would be enveloped in snow and the very air was rumoured to freeze the lungs. How ever did they manage to keep babies warm enough to withstand such a time without magic to heat the air? “You are that old and she still insists on you marrying a woman? I am sorry, but I do not foresee her changing her mind. Ever.”

  Hamish returned to frowning at the land below. He said nothing. Although, judging by the tension running from his squared shoulders to the fist he clenched and unclenched, there was a definite battle raging through his thoughts.

  Darshan’s stomach turned leaden at the man’s continued silence. He had come to the same conclusion with his father years ago, and it’d been a hard lesson to
swallow, but he hadn’t faced it alone. He sidled up to Hamish. “How long have guards kept a close eye on your door?”

  “Dinnae your people worship a divine being?”

  Darshan jerked back, momentarily dumbfounded by the sudden swing. Very well. He knew better than to press a topic best left alone. “A?” He chuckled softly, hoping a show of amusement would ease Hamish’s mind. “We have several gods and goddesses. Araasi sits at the top of the pantheon, their queen as well as the Goddess of Home and the Hearth.” One of the more widely-worshipped deities alongside the High Mother.

  “Queen?” Hamish echoed. He lifted his head. Those blue eyes, slightly red around the edges, trained on Darshan. “Does she have a king?”

  “She does.” Not that anyone took him seriously. Where Araasi was the welcomer of departed souls, he was the doom of anyone found unworthy. Those who found themselves in Jalaane’s embrace faced an eternity of suffering in the icy depths of the Forgotten Place. “And a once-mortal lover,” he added.

  Hamish frowned. “How does that work?”

  He grimaced. This wasn’t at all the direction he wanted to take. “I feel a little ridiculous reciting a love story I learnt in the fānum to you, but it goes something like this.” Keenly feeling his face warming, he cleared his throat. “Araasi was supposedly intrigued by the beauty of a woman’s artistic craft and she entered the mortal realm in disguise to watch this woman work up close, spending a great deal of time in the woman’s presence and, eventually, they fell in love. And that—”

  “All right,” Hamish interrupted as he returned to standing upright. “We’ve similar legends about people falling for demons. They dinnae generally end well for the mortal, though. I cannae imagine your god king was pleased with such an outcome.”

  Darshan shook his head. “Jalaane—the ‘god king’ as you put it—is just as powerful as his wife. He caught wind of their affair and, no, he was most definitely not pleased. The priestesses say he chased after the woman, seeking to remove her from existence, but his wife was always one step ahead and would hide her lover from his grasp. The tale goes that the chase continued for years.” Sometimes, the priestesses would insist it was decades, but everyone knew that a mortal life was only so long. “Finally, there was nowhere in the world left for the woman to hide.”