Bee Among the Clover (108 page)

Aron glared, brushing the makeshift sword away. “Do not gloat, slave. It doesn’t become you.”
Roman laughed, dark eyes sparkling. “Do not pout, thrall. It doesn’t become you.” His tone was taunting, but not mocking, and if Aron didn’t know better, he would say he was being teased. He certainly did like the look of the smile on Roman’s face.
“Pay attention to everything around you, at all times,” Roman continued, circling Aron on light feet. Aron watched him with intent eyes. He’d learned by now Roman could attack anytime, even in the midst of a lecture. “When you’re sparring, when you’re in the hall, even when you’re with Wulfgar. You’ll learn no end of things that can be useful.”
Aron hadn’t missed how Roman would stay quiet, and though he kept his eyes lowered the majority of the time when they were around others, he knew the slave didn’t miss much. “Just how much do you know of what goes on in Wulfgar’s hall?” he asked, genuinely curious, cursing and barely getting his sword up in time for Roman’s attack. Once again he’d let the other man distract him and was hard pressed to hold him off before once again he was disarmed.
Roman chuckled. “I know everything.” Then he turned serious, shaking his head. “Well, I know enough to keep me alive at least.” He smiled again at Aron and bent down, retrieving Aron’s sword and handing it to him. “You’re doing well,” he said with unexpected candor. “It takes much time and practice to master the sword.”
Aron shook his head. He knew now that Osric had been toying with him that day outside of his croft hall. The battle-lord could have disarmed him in seconds, but he’d dragged it out, probably laughing at him the entire time.
Aron took the sword with a rueful smirk, nodding in acknowledgement of Roman’s praise. “I think perhaps you’ll be teaching me a bit about dealing with bruised pride as well as how to handle a sword, darkling.”
Roman shrugged, pausing before beginning their sparring again. “Pride is nothing to be ashamed of, Aron, though most inconvenient in the position we find ourselves in. Swallowing it can be a bitter draught, I know.”
Aron nodded… then dodged in, and the wooden blades crashed together over and over. For a second Aron thought he might get the best of the other man, before a flurry of movements sorely pressed him and he found his sword again in the snow. He sighed and waved his hand when Roman moved to pick it up.
“Leave it for the moment, darkling.” Aron dropped down onto the ground, his back against a tree. Roman watched him before slowly following suit and seating himself against another tree. He acted as if he did not trust Aron to be so close to him.
Roman watched Aron out of the corner of his eye and shook the hair out of his face. “Have you heard any news of your father? You said he was ill….”
Aron snorted. “I doubt they’ll bother to send any news to someone in my state.” That was true. As long as Aron was a thrall, his family, in all likelihood, wouldn’t acknowledge his existence, though they would welcome him as if he’d just been away on a long absence when he obtained his freedom. “As for my father, I expect he made a speedy recovery or else my mother made use of a wicce.”
Roman considered that. He’d wondered how much of Sverri’s illness had been real or feigned at the time. He certainly wouldn’t want to face an angry Wulfgar, and Sverri’s earlier actions had only spoken of deceit. He studied Aron, curious to know who had been the real influence in his life. From what he knew of the other man, Roman couldn’t imagine him foisting off a punishment intended for him onto an innocent person or even, for that matter, trying to cheat his thane out of his rightful share.
“What is it like at your croft hall?” Roman wondered how different the environments were. Since being enslaved, he’d spent the majority of his time at the mead hall and had only visited the outlying farms at certain times of the year for short periods. Adding to the curiosity was the fact that he wanted to know more about Aron, about what had shaped him.
Aron shrugged. “There isn’t much to tell. The days are all the same, or so it seemed: up with the dawn, the same work to be done, then to bed with the sun most days. There’s the occasional break for a day of celebration, though not often.” Aron chuckled wryly, and Roman hid a sigh at the way the smile so changed Aron’s appearance. “It’s not the most exciting tale I’ve ever told.”
The two of them settled into a silence, and Roman sought for something, anything, to end the quiet, for he feared where Aron’s thoughts would go if his mind were idle for too long.
Too late, however, as Aron turned to look at him and spoke. “Darkling. Tell me about your home.”
Roman didn’t know whether to be relieved that Aron had not brought up anything to do with the unreasonable tension that lay between them or distressed by the subject he had chosen.
His voice was soft when he replied, and he did not meet Aron’s eyes. “This is my home now, Aron. And you know it as well as I. I need not tell you of it.”
Aron shook his head, making a frustrated sound. “You say one thing and do another, Roman. You act one way and yet are not what you seem. How do you know of war craft? Of swordplay and tactics and other skills a slave shouldn’t know? And why do you tense when I ask you, as you have just now?”
Roman looked up for a brief second, meeting his eyes before gazing downward again. Aron pushed and pushed, first in one direction and then another. Why couldn’t he just leave well enough alone? Aron must truly enjoy tormenting him. “I tense because it hurts to think that it will be a very long time indeed before I return to Rome.” Roman tried not to acknowledge the fact he might very well never see it again. The only way he would was if he ran away again. He’d given up on being rescued a long time ago.
Aron watched Roman, his eyes intent in a way that made Roman squirm, as if Aron was seeing inside him. Past the layers of protection he had spent years building, tearing them down as easily as if they were made of parchment. “You couldn’t have been a slave before Wulfgar owned you.”
Roman looked up, his temper sparking. Aron was a selfish brat who cared for nobody but himself and his desires. He would insist on still talking about it despite Roman’s obvious discomfort. “In Rome we value slaves who are skilled or educated over those who are not. But I suppose your heathen barbarian race wouldn’t understand that.” He kept his eyes fixed on Aron. “Since you’re obviously not going to respect my wishes, no, I wasn’t always a slave. Until four years ago I was a free man who was trained in many disciplines over the course of my life, some of them being swordplay and warfare and things of that nature which interest you so much.”
He prayed Aron would leave it be. He didn’t care to talk about his past.
“How did it happen? Wulfgar coming to own you?”
Roman’s eyes narrowed even further. Damn Aron for forcing him to recall things he would rather leave buried in the past. It was not as if he could ever return to what had been.
“It was my own foolishness that led to my slavery. I have no one to blame but myself.” He could still remember it as vividly as the day it had happened. He doubted that there would ever come a time when he thought of his capture and it wasn’t a raw, open wound inside him.
“So you keep saying.” Aron cocked his head, examining Roman. “But somehow I find it hard to believe you acted in a foolish manner.”
Roman closed his eyes, turning away from Aron. Damn him. He would never give him any peace. Opening his eyes again, Roman caressed the wooden hilt on the sword with long fingers, feeling instead of rough wood the smooth, cool brush of steel. His mind was lost in memories he normally struggled to keep at bay; when the words came out, they were halting at first but then sped up, almost tumbling over each other.
“My family had just arrived on these shores. A villa had already been built for us outside of Londinium. My father was the praetor for the area, charged with keeping the local populace in check and warding the northeastern borders. To that effect, he often sent out scouting parties that would sweep the area several days out, making sure that all was still quiet. I wanted to go with them.” It had been beyond mere wanting. He’d craved to go. He’d spent his entire life in Rome, reading about places in books and imagining going there, exploring those places. He’d been ecstatic when his father had been reassigned to Britannia, but, much to his dismay, he had found himself cooped up in the villa. What good had all of his training been if he wasn’t allowed to use it?
It was as if a dam had burst as the memories surged forward, flowing out of him like a flood. He barely noticed Aron was there, he was so lost in remembering.
“Father had sent out a scouting party, and I decided I was tired of staying behind, so I followed them. I waited until we were far enough out from the villa to announce my presence so they couldn’t simply send me back with a reprimand.” Roman’s arms hugged his waist, and he stared at the ground as he spoke.
“Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one following the party, and when we made camp that eve Wulfgar and his men moved in. The battle, if you could even call it such, was short-lived, and before any of our party knew what was happening, we were defeated.” Roman trembled, remembering with vivid clarity that night so long ago. The fear, the look in Wulfgar’s steely gray eyes when he’d approached him. He took a deep breath and shook his head. “Wulfgar claimed me immediately as his own. The others… some were killed in the fray, others made prisoner. My fate had been sealed before Wulfgar’s party had ever struck, I later found out.”
When he fell silent, his memories running dry, Aron said nothing for a long moment. His voice was quiet when he did speak. “Did no one attempt to rescue you? The son of a powerful man, weren’t you offered for ransom?”
“I don’t know.” Roman’s voice was hoarse with emotion, and he continued staring at the ground with unseeing eyes. That was a question that still haunted him as well. When he’d brought up the question of ransom Wulfgar had just laughed at him, and when he’d pushed, Wulfgar had made it quite plain to him that he had no intention of releasing him. That was when he’d conceived his ill-fated plan to escape. “The ones who were made prisoner with me have been traded or given away over the years. I don’t know if any of them have ever made it home to tell of my whereabouts.”
Roman lifted his eyes to meet Aron’s, and the raw pain in them, the longing, struck Aron before the slave looked away again, breaking the contact. Aron tried to remember how long Roman had said he’d been with Wulfgar, something like four years or so. Roman had been about his age when he’d been captured, mayhap a little younger.
Aron decided that he very much did not like seeing Roman in pain of any sort. The slave had a quiet dignity about him that he had noticed before; he wondered how he could give comfort without offending before he remembered how Roman reached out to him the first night of Aron’s own indenture. Aron rose from his place across from Roman and settled down next to him, his arm wrapping around his shoulders, saying nothing but offering his understanding without words.
Roman tensed as his arm slid around him, but Aron made no other advance, simply drew him close, like he did at night when he held Roman and slept, and as the seconds ticked by the slave relaxed, leaning against him.
Aron settled back against the tree trunk, the slave close at his side, surprised Roman hadn’t pushed him away. He’d been sure he would, or at least glare at him in accusation.
“I’m sorry I forced you to speak of it, darkling.” That was partially true. Part of him was sorry because it caused Roman pain, but another part of him had wanted to know badly enough to risk it.
Roman shook his head, shrugging. “It’s the past, Aron, for me a distant past that is never going to be revisited. I shouldn’t find it so hard to talk about.”
Aron ran a gentle hand over his silky dark hair, toying with the ends of it. He wondered why Roman’s father and his men had not searched for him, had not mounted a rescue for him. How could he simply leave his child to this fate? Roman might play at slave very well, but he was not born to be such. He was meant for far more than spreading his legs, and he had more value than the pleasure of his body, however great that pleasure might be.
It was a novel feeling for Roman to be held merely for the sake of intimacy and not sex. Wulfgar was not one to give comfort. At best the thane would offer something he thought Roman might want as long as it wouldn’t spoil him, but most of the time he ordered him to not be petulant.
He was surprised that he’d given into Aron’s questions at all, but they were even now. He knew how Aron had come to be in Wulfgar’s bed, after all. In his own way, he’d contributed to Aron’s predicament, as unintentional as it had been, though he was plagued by guilt over it from time to time. Talking about his past had relieved some of the intolerable weight that had lain on his heart. He knew instinctively that Aron would keep his confidence, and it was nice that someone outside of his captors knew his story.
“There’s so much more to you than you seem.” Aron’s voice was quiet, and Roman wondered what he might be thinking but didn’t ask. He suspected he did not want to know.
Instead, Roman said nothing, eyes assessing Aron’s clear, pale blue ones. He found it ironic that, of everyone, it was this prideful, selfabsorbed young thrall who had somehow managed to see through his veil. Only a little, it was true, but that was more than any had even cared to since he’d come to Wulfgar’s household. He knew he probably should be worried about it; a chink in his armor was risky, and his entire existence was a delicate balance. But he longed so much for someone, anyone, to talk to, to perhaps allow him to be even a glimmer of who he had been without fear of punishment.
He wanted that to be Aron.
Aron smiled, stroking his soft cheek with his thumb before forcing himself to drop his hand. Touching Roman was risky; it invited more and more until any semblance of control was gone and he had the slave beneath him. As tempting a scenario as that was, he had the strong feeling that if he so much as attempted to kiss Roman just then, all sense of camaraderie would be lost.
After several long moments of companionable silence Roman smiled, then rose from where they had been sitting, holding out his hand to Aron.
“Come.” Roman’s voice was soft. “I still have much to teach you.”
Aron took the hand up and nodded, moving over to fetch his sword. He hoped that the teaching would be a long, drawn-out process so that he had the excuse of spending the better part of the day in the other man’s company. “I’m yours to command, darkling.”