Stalking Darkness Read Free Page A

shake the bed enough to awaken its other occupant.
    “You’re so cold!” she said with a hushed giggle, pulling his hand still lower. “Kiss me, my brave lover. I’ll warm you.”
    Holding his hood in place with his free hand, Alec pressed his lips hastily to hers, then motioned warningly at the other woman. Pouting prettily, the girl released him and tucked the token away beneath her pillow.
    With his heart hammering in his ears, Alec extinguished the lamp and hurried back out into the corridor.
    “Seregil, I—” he began in a whisper, but his companion cut the apology short, grabbing him by the arm and hustling him off the way they’d come.
    Damn, damn, damn! Alec berated himself. A simple little delivery job and I cock it up.
    Braced every moment for an outcry, they hurried down to the kitchen and weaseled back out the storeroom window. Outside, Seregil was still implacably silent. Climbing over the wall, he set off at a run. Alec followed, grimly convinced he was in disgrace.
    Three streets from the villa, Seregil suddenly stopped and hauled him into an alleyway, then bent over, hands on knees, as if to catch his breath.
    Braced for a scathing lecture, it took Alec a moment to realize that Seregil was laughing.
    “Bilairy’s Balls, Alec!” he burst out. “I’d give a hundred sesters to have seen the look on your face when that ring rolled away. And when she tried to pull you into bed—” He sagged against the alley wall, shaking with laughter.
    “But it was so stupid,” Alec groaned. “I should have seen it would slide off.” Seregil wiped his eyes, grinning. “Maybe so, but these things happen. I don’t know how many times I’ve pulled a blunder like that. It’s the recovery that counts and you did just fine. “Learn and live,” I always say.”
    Relieved, Alec fell into step beside him as they headed for home. Before they’d gone another block, however, Seregil let out another snort of laughter. Leaning heavily on Alec’s shoulder, he moaned in a lilting falsetto, “Kiss me, my brave lover. I’ll warm you up!” then staggered away, cackling into the wind.
    Perhaps, Alec thought in exasperation, he hadn’t heard the last of the matter after all.
    Back at Cockerel Inn, they nicked a late snack from Thryis’ pantry and crept up the hidden staircase on the second floor. Warding glyphs glowed briefly as Seregil whispered the passwords.
    At the top of the stairs, they crossed the chilly attic storeroom to their own door.
    The cluttered sitting room was still warm from the evening fire. Tossing his wet cloak over the mermaid statue by the door, Alec shucked off soaked clothing as he crossed to his bed in the corner by the hearth.
    Seregil watched with a faint smile. The boy’s considerable and, to his way of thinking, unnatural degree of modesty had lessened somewhat over the months of their acquaintance, but Alec still turned away as he stripped off his leather breeches and pulled on a long shirt. At sixteen he was very like Seregil in build: slim, lean, and fair-skinned. Seregil quickly busied himself sorting a pile of correspondence on the table as the boy turned around again.
    “We don’t have anything in particular planned for tomorrow, do we?” Alec asked, taking a bite from one of the meat pies they’d purloined.
    “Nothing pressing,” said Seregil, yawning hugely as he went to his chamber door. “And I don’t intend to be up before noon. Good night.”
    With the aid of a lightstone, he navigated past the stacks of books and boxes and other oddments to the broad, velvet-hung bed that dominated the back of the tiny room. Peeling off his wet garments, he slipped between the immaculate sheets with a groan of contentment. Ruetha appeared from some cluttered corner and leapt up with a throaty trill, demanding to be let under the covers.
    It had been a busy year overall, he thought, stroking the cat absently. Especially the past few months. Just realizing how long it had been since