It was odd to feel Villon’s length sliding from his arms, though René had threatened to do just that since James had first had to lift him from the ground back on the island. The alarming groan as the other man had finally succumbed to his weakness was stuck firmly in James’ mind, and James reached out as he had done then, feeling the stiffness of the body before him.

“I am taking you to her ship,” James had addressed the top of René’s head, his voice stiff and formal, but calm, for he was not willing to make a scene with Sir Marvell so near. He had expected arguments, a struggle, not the blank stare and still figure of a man who had not even seemed to notice that he was there.

The growing heat of the day would weaken him quickly, James had thought with a rush of unexplained anger, and had gritted his teeth together and resolutely turned his eyes away. Without a word they had stood there, René perhaps disbelieving that James would do what he had claimed. But when Gabriel had returned with another wicked smile to see René, René had abruptly ended his doll-like stillness and had spit out a stream of furious French and tried to stalk off.

Now, James limited his touch to grasping softly at René’s hips and put his other hand back, hearing the sounds of Ben scrambling on to the deck behind him.

“Be still,” he warned in a hiss, looking around at the hard, dirty faces that surrounded them, watching Gabriel melt away into the group. There would be no help there it seemed. “I will…”

“You will do nothing!” René shoved the words out without turning his head, not wasting the effort to look at him as he looked instead to the pirate approaching them. James squinted upward into the sun to follow him as well, aware that only he seemed to have the freedom to move, the rest of the world, even René, as frozen as himself.

“René Villon,” the pirate spoke in a voice that seemed both surprised and amused, and James blinked, realizing at last that he was staring at the person that they come here to find. L’Aranha, whom René had called Mirena, stopped some distance from them; her hair was held behind her head and the wisps that the wind had set free did not soften the lines of her face as she studied them.

The same breeze toyed with the fabric of her shirt, giving them all a momentary glimpse of the rise of her breasts, well browned from the sun, before she moved and James found himself staring directly into her watchful gaze. She frowned, and James stretched out the fingers at René’s waist, pulling the man closer as he reached for a sword that was not there, a sword to match the one hanging easily from the woman’s hip.

“I did not think to see you here,” she went on, continuing her hard stare, and James pushed out an unsteady breath. She did not appear soft now, not as she had when whispering in Villon’s ear, costumed in flowing gold.

“René,” James whispered urgently, glancing away from L’Aranha to the faces of the men. He caught of a glimpse of Gabriel’s tall, thin form, and recalled the man’s words about L’Aranha choosing whether they would live or die.

“I did not want to be here,” René answered her while ignoring James, and stepped from his hand, leaving James clutching at the air. Ben pressed himself against his open palm behind him and James tried not to let the fear take him, fighting the urge to push the child back down the ropes to the boat below.

“You would rather be twice the dead man?” L’Aranha spoke calmly enough, but her words made James quake and gasp out a protest and dart his eyes to the many men observing silently. “They were careless to leave you alive.”

“Foolish,” René spat, as though her words held no import of life or death, but his flesh seemed to burn through the air with sudden heat. “…To cross you.”

“Sim.” The first grin cracked the woman’s flinty face as she gestured around her though it disappeared before her arm had even fallen back to her side. “We have already decided they will die.”

James could not even think to beg for compassion, opening his mouth to find breath when he thought of Pym, and others on René’s ship, who surely had not been part of such a thing. A select few had probably committed the heinous act, perhaps Marechal, or even the cold murderer, Deniau.

“Lady,” James tried to begin but stopped when her gaze flicked to him and she put the tip of her tongue to her lips and stroked a taste across first her upper lip, and then her lower, her manner bringing to mind a street whore so much that James knew his eyes grew as large as a child’s.

“And what will I do with you, and the pretty you have brought me?” She switched to her fractured French with an abruptness that left James struggling to translate, and she laughed as she said such strange things, confusing him more. But René’s answer he understood, and flung his head up at the blow of it.

“I do not care,” the Frenchman answered simply, shrugging as though he truly did not care a whit, unconcerned with James and Ben behind him, trapped here.

But the woman’s brows rose, and she grinned once more, a quick little smile.

“I will like to have René Villon as my prisoner,” she announced, not quite as a question though she leaned her head to one side and tapped her cutlass hilt thoughtfully. “The other two as well, unless you do not agree, René.” It was nearly another question, but she turned away as she said it, lacking even the respect to wait for an answer.

“You w…will not mock,” James blurted it with a shameful stutter, furious enough to place one hand on René’s shoulder in his effort to push himself forward. The sun reflecting off a bared sword from one nearby pirate recalled him to his senses for one brief moment, but L’Aranha took advantage of the moment to look back over her shoulder.

“You and your mouth will follow me to my cabin, English man.”

James shot a wide-eyed glance to the dark hair covering the back of René’s head, and saw him to be still, when James knew himself to be twitching like an aged drunkard in need of a drink.

“Villon also, but he knows the way,” the woman declared as boldly as René had stated his desires on his own ship all those months ago, and James knew he gaped, his anger flaring into an embarrassed fury.

No doubt he did, but James had no desire to visit the same path. His feet longed only to leave this place and find another, though he feared that there would be no place safe for him now, save Heaven should he be fortunate enough to see its beauty after his many sins. This day alone he had acted in violence and wrath, and lied, and lusted, and though he might blame the black-hearted devil before him, he knew it was his own weakness that had lead him so easily into temptation, and he feared he would do it again at the least invitation, and he wondered sickly if he would dare to call it sin if he knew that another felt as helpless as he.

“Two at once?” shouted a man with the sound of strange shores on his tongue, with a bawdy laugh following that soon created more in the men around them. Another man answered the first, calling out that it would take two to feed her appetite, and though James saw René curve his shoulders into his body, the other man seemed untroubled as he began to follow the woman toward the small door leading to a cabin, though his gait was still stiff.

With a glance to amused figures around them, James swallowed and stepped after the two pirates, ensuring that Ben kept pace with him. The men slowly dropped away once René disappeared through the cabin door, apparently not interested in James, or used to the sight of the woman who led them taking two men to her room.

James stopped before the door for one moment, swallowing as he studied it and the dim figures further inside. The door was smaller than the one to René’s cabin, or at least seemed so to his tired eyes, and he wished he could close them as he ducked his head to walk through.

Three people filled in the small room, and James took in the sight of a plump, well-tanned figure sitting on the mattress of a heavy-looking bed, gnawing at an equally plump orange and losing most of the juicy fruit to the blankets beneath him.

“We would like to be alone, Agostinho.” Why the woman would be so polite to the man soiling her bedding with his gluttony, James did not know, but she did tolerate René, who ate with no concern at all for the stomachs of those around him. Her pleasant tone, so different from how she had greeted them moments ago, seemed to work on the man. He scowled but rose from the bed, winking at them before slipping out the door and closing it behind him.

“You ass!” L’Aranha turned upon René at the same instant, smacking his shoulder hard with the back of her hand. René’s slighter figure rocked as he steadied his feet, and James knew the man was close to falling to the floor, though he would never admit to it.

“He is not well,” James said, quietly he was sure, though the lady Mirena blinked as she studied him as though he had been more forceful.

“What happened?” Her hiss did not even reach James’ ears until her face was inches from his own and her brows were lowered with menace.

“Shut your mouth, Mirena,” René spoke lowly, but it brought Mirena away from James and back to his side, something undoubtedly profane in her own language bursting from her. Her thick fingers brushed aside the tangled waves of dark hair without hesitation and smoothed away a patch of dried blood and René did not move, or shout for her to leave him alone.

Now James did close his eyes, but felt a small measure of comfort in the warm child’s hand curled into his.

“I will need to clean this.” The woman spoke softly, with no apologies for striking René moments ago, and James nearly laughed to himself to think of their likenesses. Fitting then that she should take René to her bed, as she had implied. “Your hair is filthy, René. It…sticks…and you must wash it,” she spoke again before James could, and James caught a glimpse of René’s eyes before the older man looked away.

Sugar syrup, James wanted to tell her, but held his words back, imagining instead René in a bath, naked and flushed from the steam, with this woman running her hands through the heavy, wet strands of his black hair. No doubt they would not linger long there, but move down to the rest of René’s body, and he would lie before the embrace like an eager lover.

“Am I your prisoner on this ship, lady?” James asked in the silence that followed her mutterings, in a far shorter tone than he ought to have used had he been addressing a real Lady.

“You must leave soon, if you care to go, English man. It is not a long swim back to the shore.” She half-turned to him and cracked a smile as though this was funny, but James glanced around them with sudden alarm.

“You mean to keep us here?” James squeezed the small hand in his own and glanced down at the top of Ben’s head before allowing his eyes to drift back up. He knew where they would end, and let out a small breath to find René at last looking at him as he had stared down at Ben, as directly as he had not since his moments of madness that morning.

“Leave, James.” René pronounced slowly, and the words burned, as they had not earlier, when there had been a lunatic gleam in the man’s gaze. Indeed, they seemed to demand why James already had not. James knew his face grew hot, could feel it, from a distance, in the same way he could feel the pinch of his shoes and the constraints of his clothing, but it was nothing to the tumult of feeling in his mind.

He swallowed, and did not move, and felt Ben’s hand leave his own.

“This is my ship, Villon,” Mirena’s suddenly icy voice broke into his thoughts, and cut through the air between them like a dagger. “The pretty may stay if he wishes. I am sure others would enjoy him.” She paused just as James opened his mouth in stammering protest. “Is that the right word, René?” Without any answer from the still figure trapped by her hands, she pursed her lips and yanked back slightly as if hoping to elicit some sound of pain from him.

Instead, though it must have pained him greatly, René just tilted forward, pulling her grip even tighter until there would have been tears in James’ eyes from the hurt.

“And when we take my ship?” There was only the barest hesitation as he referred his treacherous crew, but his black eyes went to the opposite wall and stayed there, and James imagined that he dreamed of murder. His voice grew quiet, almost too quiet for James to hear him. “It will go to Tortue, to vanish.”

“Then the Englishman will fight with us or die.” L’Aranha shrugged and reached for a bottle on the desk, mumbling to herself when she found it empty. Stretching, she found another and sipped at its contents thoughtfully. Neither of them even glanced in or Ben’s direction as their lives was tossed about between them. “And Tortuga is a short distance in my ship.”

“He is no killer.” Contempt for his weakness was what made René raise his voice, scorn for James’ cowardice in not taking vengeance or wielding a sword when he had been given one. He was not even to be addressed by name it seemed, a courtesy even Lord Cavendish had granted him.

“Nay, I am not.” Fiercely, James addressed René, who seemed to regard him as just the sound of wind blowing for all the attention he paid to his heated words. The Lady Mirena just rolled her shoulders and splashed a few droplets of what she drank onto the back of René’s skull.

“Then I will find some other use for you,” she remarked indifferently, though flinching at the bitter stream of harsh language directed at her by René, not in Parisian, and from this James deduced that it must her native tongue. The liquor undoubtedly stung as it poured over the wound René had been dealt, and James could imagine that it hurt a great deal. He still did not direct even a passing glance in James’ way, and James realized that the man had already imagined him gone. Doubtless, months ago, he would have went, afraid of a figure that had only an hour ago been too weak to stand on his own.

Nonetheless, James shivered to recall the following look of madness, and the bloody thoughts the man was even now entertaining. His head throbbed as he considered, narrowing his eyes to the sight of the woman bent over René’s slighter form, pulling back his hair to expose the pale neck.

“And the child?” He asked carefully at last, and Ben choked on some word that James did not understand. Again, the lady captain shrugged as though it hardly mattered. James paused anew to think on that, and finally took his eyes from René to study Ben.

Ben was regarding him warily as if he had been already for some time and James had not noticed. His green eyes were wide, watchful, and expectant all at once. Trusting in him, James realized, and questioned faintly as the fear took his stomach if Ben remembered their argument of that morning.

“There will be a battle,” James murmured, wondering at himself, amazed that he should be calm as he asked such things of a child. But Ben was no thrall of his, and had the will to stay or go. Nearly a man if James admitted the truth to himself, even if there was yet no hair on his face. “We will be beyond the law,” he added, to make the danger more clear. And they would have to trust in God to guide their way until they reached some safer shore. Neither shore of the New World had proved a welcoming harbour, and he could feel the desire to laugh at how their only welcome now was with a ship full of cutthroats.

Pawns indeed. A harsh barking laugh burst from him despite his closed lips, and he could feel the pressure of eyes on him as he contained his mirth and focused back on Ben, not daring to look toward the tight displeasure radiating from the other man.

“I’ll go where you go, Master James,” Ben answered with a simple duck of his head, and James exhaled heavily, the sound louder than any of the other restless sounds of movement in the small room.

Behind them both, the door was torn open and a tall figure stooped to get in, ignoring all of those already inside as he marched to the desk and rifled through the papers on top. He nodded once, vaguely, at L’Aranha, and then continued to search until he found whatever it was he was looking for. Knowing that, any other day, he might have felt some amazement at this display, James just watched. Then the stranger took a long swig from Mirena’s bottle, belched, and slipped back out the door. Neither L’Aranha nor René commented, ignoring him in much the same way they had disregarded James and Ben, and James could feel himself nodding shakily.

“Then we will take our leave…” Uncertainly, James paused and then inclined his head respectfully, “…Madam.”

Apparently amused, the lady chuckled softly and then waved a free hand toward the door. “Go…Fitzroy. I may seek you later.”

“Aye, Lady.” Uncertain of how to address this new master, James chose politeness, knowing that despite her threatening manner of before, she was even now caring for René Villon’s wounds. And it seemed to please her, another odd smile curving her lips that made James drop his shoulders and flick his eyes to the René’s bent head.

But he did not stop and wait and invite more cold scorn, stumbling backwards out into the bright light, losing Ben’s hand as he fell back and nearly landed on his arse. Blinking, he straightened and turned, looking about at the faces of those watching them emerge. A few leers, some curiosity, he had expected no less, and felt the weight of all of their assumptions.

“René…” he heard the woman beginning in a low, determined voice, and the force of the glare at his back made James move, feeling René’s eyes on him the way he had always been able to.

Lifting his head, James stepped forward, clearing his throat as he did and letting his face fall into a frown. Hearing Ben fall into step behind him, he walked forward to keep himself from collapsing to the deck, and tried to find the rolling gait of a sailor that he had once been so proud of.

A voice hailed him, and James turned, his vague surprise fading when he beheld Gabriel nodding at him. A little smile acknowledged that James was out of danger, and would live, and then the man was slipping away once more, settling his arm around the shoulders of another man and frowning in earnest conversation as others went about tightening ropes and preparing to sail.

So he had one friend on this alien vessel, if he did not include Ben, and about that James was still unclear. But Ben would meet others and become bosom friends with them quickly despite his age, and find some use for himself aboard ship.

“Are you happy, Ben?” James asked quietly, meeting another man’s curious gaze as he stopped at the entrance to below the deck. So many new faces he had seen in the past months, but few that had stayed with him.

“What?” Ben stomped loudly to a halt in front of him and tossed his head. His scowl said clearly that he did not understand what James had asked, and James was not even sure why he had asked it when it did not matter to anyone in the world whether or not one boy was content. Nonetheless, he stared down at Ben and spoke again.

“Will this ship do, Ben? Or shall I find us another? We are thieves now, mayhap I shall take another one, if it please you?” He was too harsh, too accusing, and he knew he had yelled the last few words from the way Ben stepped back and his small mouth fell open in obvious shock. “I…” James tried to speak now and the words were gone, for he had no explanation to give the boy.

“Master James?” With the obvious deference that one gave a lord or a captain of a vessel, Ben questioned him, caution in the angle of his head though his voice rang rich with hurt.

“I am sorry.” James shook his head to clear it, then swallowed, his throat dusty and sore as though he had been screaming for hours. “I need…” That he did not know, or perhaps he did and simply denied it. “Grant me some time alone, Ben.”

Ben frowned, not pleased, but aside from putting out one hand he did nothing as James walked into the darkness below deck and found his way about the strange ship. Where he went hardly mattered, it seemed to be the same as any other ship. The same tiny rooms filled with the same people, none of them where he wanted to be or belonged.

Doubtless the same options would greet him when they overtook le Diable Noir, if he and Ben survived the bloodletting. He knew it would be bloody and horrible, Villon’s eyes had promised that, and James was surprised to find that he little pity for those guilty of the mutiny. They must be punished, but this vengeance would be an ugly thing, worse perhaps than the fate of Captain Carter.

James shuddered, but it was weak, his body feeling the lack of sleep now, the constant, tense excitement of the day sapping his strength all at once now that he had no eyes upon him. Finding a small room filled with a few barrels and little else, James slipped inside of it and fell against the side, sliding to the floor. He let his eyes close and propped his arms upon his bent knees, lowering his head until his chin was nearly on his chest. Then he exhaled slowly.

His body ached in places that had not ached in months, but he ignored it, pushing aside as well the rapid pulse of his heart.

“Go to Mirena’s cabin.” The harshly voiced order did not even lift his chin from his chest, though in another age, James could easily imagine himself rising to his feet for the walk back to the small room. Not hurriedly, but his stumbling feet would have followed the command without question even as his body and mind struggled to hold them back. That the rough whisper did nothing to him now made him crack his lips apart and wet their dryness with his tongue.

He must have been sleeping. How strange. But he did not let his mind dwell on it for long. Already the wisps of dreams were leaving him; slicing through the clouds like a thin rapier.

“No.” A simple word indeed, and like a great bird flying from his chest, allowing him to breathe for a moment before it returned. But he laughed silently, shaking like a crying woman for some time without making a sound, knowing well the look of surprise his single word would produce on the face of the man who had followed him here.

No, that was wrong, for it was he who had done the following, to end up back on a ship with Jamaica behind him and unknown dangers before him.

James cast his aching eyes over the filthy walls of the cramped section of the hold where he sat crouched, where he had been sent, and did not turn to look at the man filling the doorway.

“It is not good here, James.” René decided to speak again, in a lower voice as if attempting to seem a rational man. A few words only would not banish this day from James’ mind, and he did not acknowledge René by so much as a glance. It was foolishness to keep his eyes from a madman, but had not the events of the day proved them both lunatics? He licked his lips once more as René continued to talk, rare speech from René Villon with a rarer quietness was not something to be missed. “Come to the cabin, James.”

The ancient invitation to René’s cabin had held no low note of softness; there had been just Marechal and strange leers that only now brought him to blushes to realize their meaning.

“No, René.” He doubted very much that René realized his order had descended to a request, certain it was only an affect of the blow to the head the other man had taken that it had happened at all. It changed many men, it was said, left them nothing more than hollowed out figures with babbling speech, or turned others into frenzied patients of Bethlehem Hospital. Though he was not screaming with lunacy, James could still recall the hard push of his cold body against his lap, the outrageous claim of ownership as icy hands had gripped and hurt him. Whenever he had let his mind and body remember their first joining, he had not thought to be grateful for the probe of fingers and the warm feel of a man’s hand between his legs, offering him pleasure that he had not realized could be so easily denied.

René’s gait might have steadied in the hours since they had set out from Port Royal, and he might seem as poor as the poorest of Mirena’s crew in his borrowed clothing, but he could have been the same man who had begged James to accompany him while still wrapped around his body in Sir Marvell’s house, as though the acts of today had never occurred. Watching James now that he had recovered, perhaps even stepping inside from the doorway, hiding his black humour and seeking to cozen him as though he were a gullible maid.

“Do not speak to me, Villon.”  James realized his shoulders were curved tightly over his body but would not ease the ache in his back or arse, as the hard wood grew harder with his stillness. But he would not have his thoughts aired and brushed aside now, when he had been claimed and touched like nothing but a whore, and then told to leave and called a fool, only L’Aranha seeming to see him at all once aboard this ship. And now he was trapped here, feeling the tightness of the walls closing in on him and the rolling of the sea.

“You…blame me for your being here.” So sudden and so close that James was tricked into looking up, blinking to see some colour had returned to René’s white skin. So much of it open to his sight now that he studied it, aware that he had never been allowed such liberties before. Hints of bruises still sickened him and he could not hide it, and knew René saw it for his slender brows drew together, and one hand reached for his chest, to where his chain had been before it had been taken from him. His hand fell limply to his side a moment later, and then René tossed his head, his hair sinking back behind him. “I told you to leave.”

“I know it well,” James narrowed his eyes as he said it, uncaring of the anger in his voice or the fact that he had spoken so quickly as to almost silence René. “And I did not heed you.” That fact no longer startled him, though the confusion still made his mind spin. He had challenged and his challenge had gone unanswered or unnoticed, for he yet breathed. But he had not liked Jamaica, or his employer, and neither had Ben. Mayhap this had only been the escape offered for the moment, he told himself painfully, and he would have taken another if he had been offered it.

René’s eyes widened, and James thought that this challenge at least had not gone unmarked, but René did not reach for the knife tucked into the side of his belt that the lady had no doubt given him, or leap onto him as he had done that morning.

“You wish to be at sea?” The other man was astonished, and James coughed a laugh, but René was not finished, approaching him slowly with whispered steps. “Why?”

“I find it freeing,” James lied and was ashamed that over this his lips and tongue did not stumble. His legs cramped and pained him and he shifted them at last, moving so that his arms no longer rested atop his knees and his legs were nearly flat upon the ground for one moment before he bent them again. Then he leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, cursing softly. “Far away from the laws of King and Church, is that not where you would be?”

“You should not be here.” The hard voice broke through his dark thoughts, making shapes move behind his eyes, memories, or Villon moving nearer to him, and he quivered at the knot in his belly at the thought. René was forever telling him where he did not belong, and James stiffened, recognizing the truth of his awkwardness that even Villon should see it. He belonged nowhere, had no country now, at least none that would claim him should they know him.

“I know.” He bared his teeth and then lifted his eyes Heavenward in surprise at the barest touch of a hand across the crown of his head.

Villon was already withdrawing his hand, though too late to keep James from flinching from it and meeting his black gaze with wide eyes, twisting his head around until it was painful.

He could not breathe and saw the same panic filling René’s face before he turned away from it and pressed his back hard into the wall, wishing it were harder, sucking breaths between his teeth so hard that they whistled.

“Might it be that I will die when you attack your ship, and then I will be here no longer.” It was the weariness the day had left in him that had made him speak so, and he trembled, wanting to hide his hands beneath his body like a frightened child.

“Non!” James only continued to shake at the forceful word from René, unable to control himself, and he did not lift his hands when slender fingers curved around his throat and urged him to turn back his head. The fingers squeezed, losing their gentleness for one moment and creating specks of light in James’ mind and a throbbing in the rest of his body, and then James opened his eyes, surprised to see fury in the face he had expected to be either pleased or calm and cold.

The pressure at his throat eased, though René’s hand remained for a bit longer, two fingers lingering at the frantic beating of his veins before he slid them down to James’ collarbone and then away.

James did not move, barely blinking even to wet his eyes as René’s fingers caressed the skin over the hard line of bone for the smallest moment. They were warm now, not frozen as they had been earlier, but James shivered, never once looking away from René’s black eyes. Vaguely, he could see the bright lips fall open, and hear René’s shuddering sigh, but the skin of his chest burned already from the sight of René watching his hand as it touched him and that sense alone controlled him.

His shirt ought to have been a hindrance, but he could feel a dry, shaking palm sliding underneath the cloth, curving awkwardly across his breast and finding his heart. And René sighed once more, as though the strong beat were music.

He wanted him again then, and James wondered which it was to be, a hand reaching around his body to tease him, or a cold thrust of fingers, as there had been that morning.

The back of his head bumped softly on the wooden wall behind him, and James realized that he must have leaned backward. He swallowed, but did not shift to his former position, wondering if his heart’s beating felt like thunder only to himself, or if René heard it as well. The organ skipped a beat suddenly, thudding madly against his ribs as René glanced a touch to his nipple, peaking the skin with the memory of other touches, of René’s mouth, bare and wet and hot, and his teeth, so sweetly sharp. That too, had hurt, but the memory did not make James tremble, and he savored it as the sweat dotted across his upper lip, making it taste of rough salt.

To his distress, René’s hand did not pause there, and James expelled what would have been a cry if he had not held most of it back. He did not think that he had moved, but it seemed that he had, for René tore his eyes from the sight of his softly wandering hand to look into his face, the lashes of his eyes suddenly seeming longer than a pretty, flirting housemaid’s as he peered through them.

“Do not move,” he murmured simply, as though it was nothing what he asked, and James wondered if perhaps he was flirting as though he were a maid, and James were some cook he thought had a well shaped leg.

But his strange resistance of earlier must already been leaving him, for James obeyed the order, staring without break into gleaming eyes as René withdrew his hand and moved to stand in front of him, only to fall to his knees with a grace that a sick man ought not to have possessed. If James had not seen with his own eyes the proof that he was a man, he might have believed him to be a spectre.

Between his legs, Villon’s heat was a too familiar thing, but still James would not move to allow the man more room, grunting softly as his inner thighs pressed against the man’s body. He remembered last night as he felt the stroke of René between his legs, remembered being squeezed and crushed between those thighs, and longing to press himself into them so far that he would never have to leave them. He had strained to do just that in his heat, squeezing the flesh of René’s arse in return and handling him with a roughness that would have shamed a doxy.

But René had not been shamed. James knew his lips parted, a silent whisper of amazement that René had tore at him to pull him closer and the blood had surged beneath his skin so fiercely that he had stamped René’s mouth with his own and tasted his groans as he had come off, jerking at the hot flood between them, twitching in exquisite pain.

His body jerked once more at the memory, startling him into the present, but he had no chance to pull away and deny the motion, René shifted nearer to him, insinuating himself further into his lap, never once even breaking his intent watch.

James recalled his opened mouth at last and firmed his lips, running his tongue along his closed teeth as he stared back, searching for any tastes that might remain though his teeth and tongue were dry.

Swallowing wet them both, but offered him only the salt of spittle, and black eyes focused on his throat for the tiny moment, circling back up to his face like a bird in the air. René slid an eager touch up the outside of one leg to his hip, teasing at the edge of his shirt, and James half-jumped, twitching up from the floor. The other hand rubbed across his stomach, pushing slowly but firmly with the heel over the tight muscles, up and down until the knots wanted to loosen, in his eyes no doubt an order for James to stay where he was, as though James were not already trying to keep himself still.

James sought Villon’s gaze quickly and found him frowning just as he had feared, and he could feel his belly knot even tighter and the sickness there rise to his throat, preventing him from speaking. René took the hand from his hip only to place it next to the other at his stomach, spreading his fingers out wide and clutching briefly at the flat surface as if testing James’ response to his touch. Then tips of fingers stroked upward, raising the small thatch of hair, bringing bumps to James’ skin and tightening the muscles beneath the flesh in a thousand shivers.

When James said nothing, only allowed those fingers to play with his skin, René pushed out with both hands, sliding his palms up from James’ stomach to the lines of his ribs, taking his shirt up with them, and James felt the tickling glide of the material as his stomach and part of his chest were bared for René to view. Surely that was René’s intent, for he paused and slid each hand back down to the bones of James’ hips and bent his head, ending his peering study of his face only to study his body.

His silence left James there, still partially arched from the floor and needing to move, but it did not last, granting James a surprised reprieve when René expelled a hot breath and curved over him to press his mouth to the small spot of smooth skin between his ribs. James moaned shakily, then heard it change into a gasp as René’s lips opened and his skin was licked with a rasping tongue.

The echoing little sound brought René’s dark head up, and his eyes narrowed to the sight of James panting for breath, not seeming to notice how his own lips were parted for air. He raised one arm, and James lifted his head to draw it away just as a hand slid up his neck. He froze, startled, swallowing carefully as it pressed briefly over the throbbing veins at the side and continued up to caress his face. And it was that, a caress like the touch of velvet, nothing cold in it as a palm cupped his chin and then slid up his jaw toward his ear. James knew his face should have been shadowed and raw by now, for he had not shaved, but René seemed not to notice, running his thumb back and forth across his cheek in time to some rhythm James could not hear.

Back and forth, just that, and slowly, rasping as René’s tongue had on his chest, and James blinked as neither hand seemed to ready to do more than stroke soft circles over his skin. He parted his lips anew, still half-expectant, and froze as René’s eyes locked to his mouth, and his pale cheeks grew fiery with colour.

René fanned his fingers out over James’ mouth, holding there for a long moment, letting James’ breath rush over each until James could feel the hot moisture gather on his lips. He wanted to move, but forgot the notion quickly, for René leaned further over him and his body twitched as René’s cock pressed hard up between his legs and his mouth edged into his vision.

“Wha…?” He could not stop himself from trying to ask, not even finishing the one word as René slid two fingers across his lips and into his mouth. They found his tongue, and James tasted salt and dirt before he pulled his tongue away, swallowing each flavour as it trickled down his throat. There was only that moment of resistance, and then he felt his tongue darting back to surround the invading fingers, moaning to himself when René pushed his fingers in far as they would go and choked on a word that almost had almost the sound of his name.

Tension gathered knife-sharp in his middle, and James shifted, pressing up the slightest bit against the hand still rubbing over his tense muscles, surprised to realize that it was still there, that it still stroked him firmly over the very spot where the feeling seemed to tear at him the strongest. Lifting himself from the floor pushed him against that hand, and he could feel the warmth of it through to his spine, heating the flesh of his belly and down to where the hand had not yet gone.

Shivering, he closed his lips to suckle curiously on the tips of René’s fingers, wondering if the sight or the feel of him was what made René’s eyes so hot they seemed to melt James where they touched him. Rewarding him, even more than the gentle pressure of his other hand at his middle, creeping upward now toward his heart.

“I told you to leave,” René reminded him quietly, as though James had forgotten, and James drew hard on the fingers in his mouth, enveloping them with his ready tongue, making René swallow a moan. There was no purpose in acknowledging such a remark, and yet James did, nodding once with care as he savoured every last measure of taste from René’s skin. His response did not please René, James sensed it moments before the scowl marred René’s features and then he was left with only the taste of tears on his tongue as René withdrew his fingers.

James blinked, his body growing stiff once more as René leaned closer, and fierce eyes held him to the spot. René parted his lips as though to speak, and then shook his head and let fall his eyelids, and James gasped his surprise at the sudden touch of those lips to his own.

They were as soft as he had remembered and more so, sweet and salted as René pressed the kiss to him at a strangely crooked angle, only just keeping their noses from smashing against one another.

He could feel René’s breath, just barely taste him at the edges of his mouth, and felt his own eyes fall closed as the fire raged gently through him. René’s lips were closed, but his own were still parted, and he waited, extending his tongue to seek the taste of René’s passions, inhaling the scent of the ocean and wine and, faintly, the lingering traces of blood. His hands came up from his sides to wrap around the tangles of René’s dark hair and angle his head to bring him nearer.

His hands had only just reached the thin set of shoulders when René yanked himself away, sitting back on his legs with furious eyes and a bright face. James let his hands fall in confusion and licked his lips, shivering with what he knew was cold now.

“You should not have come for me!” René told him in a thick voice, pitched so low that James nearly could not hear the rich huskiness of arousal. But it was there and James almost reached out, holding himself back only from confusion. “You should not be here,” René added harshly, and James knew that he flinched for the back of his head pounded as it hit the wall.

Fingers still wet for having been inside of his mouth trailed knowingly through the fine hairs at his waist, and James watched silently as René used them to pop free the large buttons holding closed his breeches and then worked them under the fabric to smooth over his hips. His pantaloons followed them down, so far as to reveal curled, blond hairs, only shades darker from the sun-whitened hair atop his head, barely concealing his pulsing cock from both of their eyes, and he shuddered when he knew baring it to be René’s intent.

“I must punish you, James.” René’s murmur startled him, the deadly seriousness of the man who hands were achingly close to his cock making James remember his thoughts of insanity. But he knew him to be in earnest, and stared with wide eyes as René twisted his hands under the edge of his pantaloons and grasped his prick. James jerked his hips upward with the same startled pleasure, and felt the familiar glide of René’s hands up the length of him as he leaned back.

The touch was dry, but firm, carefully wrapping around every bit of him in turn as though René had never held a cock before, something James knew to be false. But with nearly the same slowness that James had taken with René’s prick months ago, his prick was explored and squeezed, drawing a liquid sigh from him before René seemed satisfied that it was the same cock it had been before, that it hardened and burned and wept for him just as it always had. Only then did he relax his grip to stroke leisurely up to the heavy crown, where he rubbed one thumb across the very tip, pushing into the slickness, and then he squeezed again, and James’ teeth found his lip.

“René,” James croaked, seeking for reason though still held to his spot on the floor, spread out beneath the other man’s gaze. René’s only answer was the removal of one hand from his cock, slipping further down to stroke across the small circle of puckered flesh between his legs. And James arched up, breathing so heavily it seemed to fill the room with the animal sounds. They did not press in and hurt as they had before, but James swallowed gulps of air, knowing he lay there with eyes as round the moon while René played with him.

“Do you understand?” Where his breath was loud, René’s air seemed to have been pulled from his chest, for his words were rough and hushed and slow, as though each one left him empty. James did not understand, and so he struggled to make his head move, shaking it from one side to another without ever losing sight of the slender man kneeling between his thighs.

A finger darted across the sensitive skin of his arse once again, and James clutched at the flat ground beneath him, and then the bare flesh of his own thighs, knowing he had been expected to give a different answer yet again. Anger firmed the grip on his prick, and René tugged once, hard enough to drag a moan from him. Then the torturous stroking of his cock resumed as though nothing had been said, and James leaned his head to the side, arching his neck to keep René’s gaze even as his body tried to pull away from the little stabs of lust.

Slowly, as if they had the world to themselves, as if that morning had never happened, and he had never declared James to be his, René squeezed up and down his shaft, and James twitched with each pass, wanting to push up into his hand but some part of him keeping still. If René were going to study him without shame then let him strip his breeches away and expose of all him to his sight and his hands, he thought with a surprising burst of anger, and then shuddered at the image of his blood-flushed cock in René’s white hands, another sight that had been denied him on occasions past.

His cheeks heated, then his throat, his whole body filled with arousal and embarrassment that René would not take his gaze away as he was toyed with, and he tried to frown, or find words that would come out clearly. Only dry groans emerged when he opened his mouth to speak and gathered the courage to dart his eyes lower, to the shifting bulge in his pantaloons, the hint of skin and hair, and the sweat shining on his stomach as surely as the clear drops were glistening on the head of his prick. He wondered faintly if René’s cock were the same, thick and throbbing with need for him, and sought an answer by moving, wanting to feel the burning brand of it against his body as some proof that René felt this too.

For the barest second he was claimed by it, scorched by the pulse of another’s man arousal between his legs, and then René swore in fevered French and shifted his body. Punishing as he had promised, René touched his hand back to James as if reading his thoughts in his eyes, pushing hard into the head of his cock with his thumb and bringing James up from the floor with a loud, hoarse cry, only able to pant as he fell back to the ground. René’s lovely mouth opened, and James caught a glance of the sweet tongue he had sucked the night before, and remembered how it had lain still for that but had sucked and danced around his cock like the very devil when René had taken him into his mouth. Like René’s thumb now, darting around and under the swollen tip to coax his seed from him

Each lance of delight as René’s palm smoothed over the wet head brought forth another twitching, desperate murmur, and then there was a steamy palm to stroke him, slow and easy, with none of the quick, demanding jerks that made him spill his seed in time to the pushing of René’s cock within him before. But his mind recalled those, and his body the incredible tightness and raw, stinging pleasure of each time that René had filled him to bursting, and he murmured something his ears did not hear, and shifted, turning to the side as much he could, only to turn back a moment later to lay himself before that heavy gaze. It pricked along his chest, made his lips part and his own eyes grow heavy, and he was only distantly shocked to find himself stretching back, wetting his mouth to wait what came next.

“James…” His own name was something foreign as James watched it come from René’s lush mouth, left partly opened, lips the same red that coloured René’s fair skin. Boldly, James lifted his hips, and sighed at the firm grip sliding down to the base of his prick, brushing his balls, the surprised tightening of René’s fingers. His slender body shook, trembling and rocking against his thighs for one moment, and James felt the sweet twist in his belly at the heat of René’s cock as it pressed against leg once more.

Someone’s breathing hitched noisily in their throat, and then they seemed to cease breathing altogether as hands pulled away from his manhood to yank down his pantaloons and lay him open to the air.

James lifted his hips in agreement and was rewarded with the tension in the muscles brushing against his thighs, the shifting as René bent over him, and the same someone as before murmuring his name above the skin of his chest, something pleading in his voice even as his fingers worked between the flesh of his arse toward the tight hole he had teased moments ago.

James went still as his mind registered where René sought him now, and the tearing burn of that morning flared in his memory though he did not move. Not even when René’s fingers found him and pressed gently into the muscle. And James gasped, not at the touch of his hand but at the abrupt, amazing feel of René’s mouth on his chest, open-mouthed caresses of lips and teeth and tongue on his skin amid the soft litany of his name, and the swift, sudden urgings of a hard stomach rubbing against his cock as René twitched into motion. So unexpected was it that James threw his body up, letting the softness of René’s hair fall over his chest and the heated little body stroke all over him.

“Yes, René,” he answered the calling of his name, though for all his intent posture René seemed not to notice that he had spoken, and James realized that as the other man moved, he had squeezed his eyes closed, leaning further into James’ body as if denying the light. “In me, please.” He repeated it hoarsely, only now realizing that he had demanded it before, somewhere amid his gasps of pleasure, and feeling how René jerked at his words and groaned into his chest, suckling on his skin desperately.

The torturous rocking of René’s form lasted but a moment, though René’s mouth did not stop its wet possession of his flesh, and James mourned it even as fingers continued to torment him by merely pressing on the flesh again and again until he jerked his hips up. He remembered being filled, ages ago, something painful and full and raw that had made him cry and whimper with a desire that he had wished had been shame.

“No, James,” René begged now with every intimate touch to his empty flesh, as though the words were to make sense to him when he was so empty and being denied once more, and James knew himself to be nodding in disagreement though René did not see it. “No,” René said again and slid against his prick, curving up to suck on James’ shoulder and leaving James with no thought in his mind but to push back toward René, to make René fill him with those fingers, and so he did, just as René pressed into him and he groaned even as René went still, shifting at the stretching feel of even that small part of René inside of him. It was of his choosing now, and he closed his eyes briefly at the discomfort, ready for the pleasure to follow.

René slapped one hand down onto the ground to support himself, raising himself up enough to meet James’ eyes, and James had to frown to see him so wide eyed and breathless, his hair thrown about carelessly. For one moment, he was as James had imagined him being last night against the table in the near dark, but even then he had known that René Villon had never been one to be plundered like a woman.

“Yes, you will,” James whispered in a voice far from his own, his body protesting their stillness. He bent his knees further, sliding his prick across René’s smooth, wet stomach, and drawing in streams of air as he jerked at the throbbing pleasure, the burst of heat twisting in his balls. And René jerked in turn, and James nearly moaned at the rigid feel of René’s cock at the top of his inner thigh, wondering if René would ask him to roll over onto his stomach so that he might be fucked, and gasped at the thought, his blood raging. “Fuck me, René,” he whispered greedily, and raised his head awkwardly, smashing his opened lips onto René’s neck, inhaling René’s flesh, longing to draw in all of him.

René’s gasp echoed through the room, but he shook his head forcefully, as though denying that he his body was pushing back against James’, that they were thrusting gently in time with one another and that James had open his legs wide for him. James sucked on the soft skin hard enough to bruise, his anger making him press his teeth into the salty flesh, René gasped again, yanking himself away.

“I will not take that also.” René seemed to curse him, growling each word with narrowed eyes.

For one moment, they started at one another as René sank his teeth into his pretty bottom lip, and then he was opening his mouth as though prepared to name James the fool that he was. Something hotter than even the lust in his loins made James push against the ground with his hands for one moment, lifting them both.

“Be quiet, René,” James heard himself ordering when he had wanted to hear more words from Villon before, dropping them both easily back to the floor and bringing up his hands to grasp René’s slender body about the ribs. His fingers instantly slid down and over the unknown flesh, ignoring the utter stillness of the body on top of him. “It is my punishment,” he demanded heatedly, and ran his thumbs across the shivering, sweet skin of René Villon.

René’s skin was soft, almost like a woman’s but for the trembling, hard muscles playing under his touch, and James slid his hands nearly to the sweet curve of arse before releasing him, letting out a sigh as he did. Black eyes were narrowed, and they both breathed and let their breaths join together in the air before René turned his eyes away, his head turned into James’ shoulder. James spent one breath into the depths of the inked hair that Mirena had so lovingly cleaned, and then René swung his head insistently back to face him, inhaling deeply as he spread apart the fingers inside of James and pushed them in further.

Stinging liquid fell into his eyes, and James threw back his head to banish the sweat, heaving his hips upward at the sudden pressure inside of him, and the slow burn of stretching skin, and then he was moaning unabashedly as René’s fingers pressed toward that place of ecstasy. René’s cheeks were like blood on the snow, brighter than roses as he caught his breath and strained his muscles to stay upright, and James stared back as he strained his own body to meet René’s still one, shaking to hold himself from doing more.

“This,” René’s voice was saying roughly, struggling for something, and James imagined the arrogance in the pale face, the tilt to the head as he watched James reveling in carnal pleasures, “…I give to you.”

James rolled his body underneath René’s, unable to not to, driving René’s fingers hard against that spot inside of him, rubbing himself into his stomach until they would both be sore with the force of his eagerness. He wanted to spill his seed onto René’s skin, and wondered if René wanted that as well, if he would close his eyes and moan as James itched to do. He had never seen René in moments of absolute pleasure before, but surely it could not be more beautiful than the fierce light shining from his slender, rose-coloured face at this moment, with part of him inside of James, captured between his legs.

Would René beg for a hard fuck if James were to plunge his fingers inside of him, squeeze apart the firm flesh of his arse as he had done last night through his clothes and caress him so intimately? The blood raced and burst into his already stiff cock at the notion, and René’s name burst from James at the daring image. He reached up, digging his hands into the other man’s waist and holding them together with a sudden strength.

“You will be still,” René ordered frantically with his jaw clenched, and a single sweep of the fingers inside of him had James slamming back into the wall for pain to distract from the intense spiraling burn streaming from where René had touched him.

“No, René,” James disagreed mindlessly, and pushed up, grunting at the heat of René’s body, yanking them tightly together. René’s cock was so hard, and he wanted it inside of him, René farther in him, now.

Teeth scraped his neck as René choked on a startled word, and then there was a quick tongue, lapping at his sweaty, stinging skin with soft little sounds of hunger, turning pleased when James arched his throat to allow more.

He could hear his own breathing as well as René’s; the other man’s had a shallow, desperate-edged sound that surprised him, though not enough for him to risk questioning it and having René pull himself away. It filled his ears as he recalled the taste of his breath, and it seemed a thing of his mind to suddenly feel it as well, blowing down his shoulder faster than even the rapid beating of his heart. James jerked his chin up expectantly, tingling across his shoulders and down to his nipples and belly, tingles becoming an urgent tearing as they neared his balls and arse and cock.

René stroked harder inside of him, pushed hard against him, squeezing his prick firmly between them at the same moment, drawing strangled cries from James’ dry throat, loud enough for the world to hear. And because he had no shame he uttered more, gasping and groaning as René sought to tear him apart with the harsh pleasure that he had demanded from his strange new lover, flinging himself up and opening wide his eyes.

Dark it was in the small space between them, but light enough for him to see the agony flashing across René’s face as he pulled partly back, the opened mouth and spent breath as he pushed his head up and moaned through swollen lips, staring at James with glittering eyes.

So impossibly good to have this, that James could not understand the agony even as his body strained with it, and he gasped a question that he forgot as soon as it slipped past his lips. It did not matter, could not at that moment with René thrusting inside of him and repeating his name like a tortured priest at prayer. James’ body clenched around those questing fingers, and his name slipped into a pleading whisper, as though the waiting were a torment to him.

Punishment, he had promised, and James nodded rapidly, moving his thick tongue to find more words, moaning instead as René twitched his fingers in a new direction before renewing his hot little strokes, circling back and back again to the flesh that was swollen and hot and begging for him.

“You have me,” James explained as the pleasure spiraled higher and his limbs would not be still. The bitterness would be not be denied, the burning truth as he pleaded to be taken. But René said nothing as his fingers did what his cock would not, and James lifted one hand from the ground to squeeze the flesh of René’s shoulder, knowing as he did it that it would fall away to find the strands of dark hair. “Please.”

Cool, tangled silk against his palm before his hand curved gently around the bones of René’s skull, fragile as René seemed to push himself into his hand, letting his body fall against him, his breath coming so fast that his chest seemed scarcely able to contain it.

“No,” René murmured savagely, drawing his body up and grasping James’ cock with sudden ferocity, heavy on the head. It twitched and pulsed, hardening as his body strained for more.

James could only gasp, and then another fierce wave of lust burned out his insides and left him hollow except for René inside of him, and he thrust up to meet it, feeling the shaken stillness of René’s body for one small moment, the grasping hands and heated breaths, and then knowing nothing but being filled with an ache so intense that he was deaf and dumb to all else.

The pressure inside of him burst him into nothing but pleasure, and he lay shaking and soft upon the floor as the last of it drained from him, feeling hardness beneath him and heat above and distantly, ropes of silk, wet against his middle.

There was shivering skin under his palm, and so James stroked it, up and down with his weighted hand until the shivers were gone and there was just still, soft warmth. Tickling hair across his face and shoulder made him sigh softly, and open his eyes, staring in curious exhaustion at René’s small body spread out on top of him, hands clutching at his hips and chest.

A most strange sight indeed, but James swore softly to see the marks of his roughness the previous night. He had forgotten, and had been equally rough now, even if René had not complained. In the heat of his lust he had even forgotten that they were in an open room, that anyone might have walked in, or have seen them.

He lifted a hand from René’s skin, tugging gently on the shirt bunched up about his waist, and felt the first stirrings of the body above him. Just a faint trembling, like the ground of Port Royal was sometimes said to stir, and then René was still once more, heavy upon him. His weakness had taken him at last then, doubtless the events of the night leaving him drained of spirit.

Almost fearfully, James reached up again, smoothing out the gathered lines of cloth to cover the abused skin and then leaving his palm in the small of René’s back. Still, the heart beating against his chest remained steady and slow, and James blinked as he realized that the other man had fallen into sleep in his lap.

His skin itched, heated and naked yet sticky with drying sweat and his own jelly. Below the waist there was only René to hide him from the eyes of strangers, and his back and neck ached as well. But mostly there was the different ache of his vacated body that made James frown, longing to roll René to the side to straighten his clothing and leave the room.

It was the pirate after all, who had left him this way. Denying him what he had wanted and yet ensuring his pleasure so that his mind would remain empty.

Frowning harder, James clutched at the flesh under his fingers and tensed his muscles, pushing slightly in order to shift the other man’s weight and be freed. Easily enough, René’s limp body slid to one side, a quiet cry coming from him as he moved, though he did not wake.

Soft strands of hair slipped down across James’ bared neck, falling to the floor as weakly as one of René’s hands. The other remained curled tightly in James’ shirt, but it would be nothing to pry it loose.

James slid his hand from René’s side, up his arm to the pale hand buried against his chest, between them. His other hand he brought from the floor, cautiously smoothing over the silky hair covering René’s skull. He found the lump in an instant, hard not miss the misshapen, hot bump of soft flesh, even harder to ignore the cracked, broken skin, crusted now with blood.

The length of René’s body shook violently until James moved his fingers, and then it subsided to shivers, a sure sign of fever in this heat, or mayhap just the troubled dreams that came with fever. Mayhap he dreamed of the battle to come, perhaps a day away, perhaps only hours if the lady’s boast were true.

Frightened, James expelled a long breath and let his head fall back to the wall. He tangled his fingers in long, black curls, and closed his eyes as his own heart slowed and steadied. There would be blood spilled in moments, and even the ocean would not wash him clean.

Copyright R. Cooper with all rights reserved

Please use your browser's "back" button to return to index