Chapter 14

“How,” Morgan gasped at his best friend in a rare moment of stillness, “is this even worse than training with Brevaer?”

“I don’t know,” Garen said, not quite as out of breath but bent over with his hands on his knees. “I wouldn’t have thought it was possible before now.”

“He’s a ruthless taskmaster.”

“Cruel.”

“Downright mean.”

“Vicious, even.”

“All right, that’s enough of that,” Auban said from where he was smoothing out the side of the boat with the stone Morgan had brought him … what, was it two weeks ago already? Two weeks had gone by since Auban had promised to train them to fight against an opponent armed with a sword, and he had certainly kept his word. Every day they could, they came to him. What Morgan had been anticipating would be nothing more than some simple exercises and lots of time to talk and admire his human friend’s improving health, however, had turned into the kind of training that made him wish he hadn’t woken up that morning.

“There is nothing vicious about wanting the two of you to be the safest you possibly can be,” Auban said, scraping another thin shaving of wood from the boat. He was spending all his spare time evening its weight out and making it seaworthy, and the results were quite promising. Between their bouts, he either forced himself to work on his own muscles, paddling doggedly back and forth until he was slumped over from exhaustion, or worked even harder on the boat.

He had good reason to hurry up. The enormous shoals of migrating fish were gone as of last week, which meant the clan’s hunters were spending more of their time in the village now. With the threat of another ship mostly forgotten by the clan, this meant more time spent working on their homes, preparing them for the winter storm season that was heading their way, or bringing in the end-of-season harvests that were occurring more and more frequently with their various crops. There were just a few things left to gather before the fields would be abandoned for the rest of the year, and then Brevaer would be around all the time.

Auban had to be gone by then.

Morgan was still able to excuse his absences for the most part, convincing his brother that he was training or collecting seaweed to dry and save for winter. He did, in fact, collect a lot of seaweed, but that was secondary to coming and training with Auban. Just spending the extra time with him now felt precious, even more so because Auban was, for the first period since Morgan had met him, able to interact without being in the role of patient. He could stand up straight, he could walk on his own—he was even hunting his own food with the slender spear Garen had loaned him! It was impressive, and it painted Auban in a whole different light than before.

He had gone from a thing to be admired and cared for to a person who Morgan longed to spend time with, even when it came at the expense of his personal comfort.

Like now.

“Aren’t we safe enough?” Morgan whined, drawing it out so that he could tempt Auban into making that face which said—yes, that one there! It was a beautiful mixture of amused and annoyed, with a hint of something deeper to it—did Morgan dare hope it was genuine affection? He knew Auban liked him, knew he was grateful to him, but … that wasn’t what he wanted. Not precisely. It didn’t hurt, yet it wasn’t enough.

He was unnervingly aware of the fact that nothing he ever got with Auban might end up being enough.

“We can defend against slashes, pokes—”

“Stabs.”

“Stabs, high strikes, low strikes, even that sneaky one with the spin. What more do we need to know?”

“You need to know how to defend against them without thinking about them,” Auban said, setting the stone down. He stood up and held his hand out to Garen. “If you would let me borrow that, please.”

“Of course.” Garen passed over the stick he was pretending was a sword with no small amount of glee. He had grown fond of Auban over the past few weeks, which was much better than before. Much! But Morgan wondered if maybe his friend was growing a bit too fond.

Wouldn’t want Brevaer to have competition, after all. Especially now that Garen was taking almost every evening meal with them, and he and Brevaer talked about hunting and planting and the needs of the village for hours, and the way they looked at each other when they thought the other one wasn’t looking, never bothering to notice there was a third person in the room, thank you very much.

Not that Morgan was bitter or anything.

“Good.” Auban motioned for Morgan to pick up his staff. “Now, you’ve had a decent amount of practice attacking each other. Let’s see what happens when you attack me.”

Morgan froze. The very thought of it made him suddenly sick to his stomach. “Um …”

“Go on,” Auban encouraged him. “I promise I can handle it. I’m not asking you to use full force or anything resembling it, but it will be easier for me to show you some of the trickier ways to defend yourself if I can work with a direct attack.”

“I don’t …” Morgan was stunned to find his hands were shaking. “I …” He stared at Auban, at this person with his red-fuzzed hair finally growing in, the sharp beauty of his feature and the brightness of his eyes, and he knew without a doubt that he couldn’t do this thing. Not even in jest, not even gently, not even when Auban asked him to. “I can’t.”

He couldn’t. He wanted to shower Auban in gifts, make tiny sculptures in the sand for him to look at, carefully stack crooked rocks for him until they were as tall as his beloved in a delicate show of the perfection of balance …

Courting behaviors. He wanted to court—he wanted to—oh shit, he wanted to court Auban. He was already courting Auban, with the food and the care and the visits and the lessons, and he had thought it had just been friendly, but it wasn’t, it wasn’t, it was worse than that because Morgan had never even imagined courting someone before, and now all of a sudden, he was realizing that he was in love with Auban, and it was hopeless. Absolutely hopeless, and …

“Morgan?”

He dropped his staff, whirled around, and stalked off to the edge of the water.

“Morgan?”

“What’s wrong?”

He hastily stripped off his clothes, waded into the cool, clean water, and dove into it. He changed quickly and used his powerful tail and his stubby little limbs to push him deeper into the water, ever deeper, deep enough to drown out his stupid, stupid heart.

How could he let himself do this? How could he think it was a good idea? He had always known Auban wasn’t for him, and that was fine, it was—he was resigned to that, truly. When Auban was sick, he had been more an ideal than a person. But now, now that he was well again, now that he was funny and active and more interesting than ever, Morgan knew he had let himself go too far, get too deep.

He was in love, and he would never be able to tell Auban that. It wouldn’t be fair, not when there was nothing the other could do about it. Not that Morgan expected his love in return, but oh, if things had been different … if he was allowed to court Auban, to convince him of his love and care … oh, the beauty he would bestow on him. The adoration. The finest shells, the softest clothes, the most beautiful pearls …

A touch to his tail had him swirling around in a hurry, but it was only Garen, inky in the water but in a clear posture of concern. He solicited a reply, but Morgan just shook his head. How could he confess to his friend what he had barely begun to understand himself? Garen nudged him again, then began swimming back toward the shore.

The swim had been too brief to settle Morgan’s mind, but as he got close to shore, he found he was feeling rather ashamed of himself. He had been given a simple request from Auban, and he’d run off without a word of explanation. Auban must think he was childish, must think he was a brat, someone spoiled and silly and—

Warm hands touched his face the moment he emerged from the wave near the shore. Auban stood there, thigh deep in the water, and even though he’d seen next to nothing of Morgan’s Agnarra form, he wasn’t afraid. He cupped Morgan’s chin and looked deep into his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I won’t ask you to do that again.” It had the air of a promise, and a vow, and Morgan …

He fell in love just a little bit more. How could he not, when he was being looked at like he was beautiful, like he was important? When the person he loved was treating him with understanding and not contempt?

“It will be all right,” Auban said, and Morgan—probably foolishly—let himself believe it.

It will be all right.

For a little bit longer, at least.