Cross Purposes (Chronicles of Ylandre, Book 5) (27 page)

“Tris!”

Keosqe caught him, pulled him back to the couch and forced him to sit down. He cradled Tristen, holding him tightly in his arms. The youth trembled almost violently and his tears quickly dampened Keosqe’s shoulder. And all the while, he sobbed like one forsaken and devoid of hope. Deity’s blood! Eiren had not exaggerated the extent of his remorse. He held Tristen until he ceased to shake.

“I didn’t say I don’t love you any longer,” he said when Tristen seemed calm enough to comprehend him. “But you almost accepted his challenge to… I shouldn’t have bedded you so soon. You were still quite inexperienced and indeed almost all you know, you learned from me alone. Small wonder you wanted to know what it might be like with someone else.” He reluctantly suggested, “Perhaps you should associate with your peers for now.”

Tristen shook his head quite vehemently. “I don’t want others.”

“How do you explain Mirdan?”

“A horrible mistake. It won’t happen again. He’s just a friend.”

“That’s easy to say now. Verily, I very much want to try again, but losing Veare to someone else was difficult enough. I can’t take another blow like that.”

“You haven’t lost me,” Tristen said in a low voice. “I love you,
Dyhar
.”

Keosqe stared at him. He let out a shaky breath. “I waited so long to hear that from you, but now … Holy saints, I wish I could believe you.”

He felt the slim body flinch in his arms. But Tristen did not break down anew. Instead he lifted his head and looked into Keosqe’s eyes. Searching. At length, he whispered, “It’s my fault you don’t. But it’s true. I love you, my lord. I have for a long time now, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell you … or admit it to myself. I feared you had turned to me only to ease your heartbreak over Veare.”

“Even after I professed my love for you over and again?” Keosqe countered.

“Even then,” Tristen admitted. “I didn’t believe you’d truly ceased to love him and that eventually, you would realize that. Verily it scared me more that when that day came you wouldn’t break with me, but continue our affair instead … out of obligation.”

“That’s absurd!”

“Is it? I see how it’s like with Veare and Narion. They can claim otherwise all they want but truth is, they don’t love each other. They only love what their union brings them.” Tristen shook his head. “They’re not even true friends—they have so very little in common. I wager were it not for their mutual ambition to better their lots in life, they’d have naught in common at all. For now it’s sufficient and they’re happy enough. But what will happen when they can no longer tolerate each other’s flaws? Without true affection between them, they won’t. They’ll just draw apart; live separate lives. Mayhap turn to others to see to their needs.” Tristen grimaced in distaste. “I know many marriages are like that, especially amongst our class. But my parents showed me another way. They learned to care for each other though they weren’t in love when they wed. They became close friends and devoted mates. I wanted that. Indeed, I want so much more, wishful as that may sound. I want a … a love match for myself.”

Keosqe stared hard at him. “And you were afraid I’d deluded myself that I no longer cared for Veare and had come to love you instead?”

“Yes,” Tristen said in very small voice.

“Saints above!” Keosqe rubbed his thumb against his forehead as if doing so would put his cluttered thoughts in order. “Confound it all, Tris, why didn’t you tell me?”

Tristen looked down at his hands. “To have done so would have forced me to acknowledge that I
did
have feelings for you. I told myself that once I admitted I loved you, I’d be unable to bear it if you ended our affair. I … I was stupid enough to think I could control how I felt about you so long as I didn’t let myself dwell on how much I’d come to need you.”

Keosqe sat back, exhaling audibly. “And when did you finally accept that you felt something for me?” he asked a little sarcastically.

Flinching, Tristen answered, “I missed you so after you cast me out. The emptiness was excruciating. I couldn’t sleep; couldn’t remember our time together without breaking into tears. Friends noticed. They told me to my face what I’d been denying.” He looked up and bravely met Keosqe’s stare. “I knew then I couldn’t pretend any longer. I knew then that I’d loved you all along.” Faced with Keosqe’s continued skepticism, he said. “I pray you’ll one day believe me—even if you don’t take me back.”

Silence fell between them. At length, Keosqe murmured, “I wish it was as simple as that.”

Tristen gazed at him, his sorrow and disappointment clear in his teary eyes and quivering mouth. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Keosqe’s lips, startling him. But he didn’t draw out the caress. With a sigh, he pulled back and smiled sadly.

Getting to his feet, Tristen reached out a hand. “I’m sorry I disturbed you. Thank you for being patient with me.”

Keosqe took his hand and squeezed it. Tristen’s smile turned heartbreakingly wistful. “Good night,
Dyhar
.”

“Good night, Tris.” Keosqe reluctantly released his hand.

He watched Tristen leave the chamber, breathing a little more easily when the door closed. Yet at the same time, he felt bereft just from the youth’s absence.

He got to his feet and made his way to the liquor cabinet. He needed something much stronger than wine.

* * * *

Tristen was gone the following morning. He left the house at daybreak, the butler informed Keosqe.

As he sat down to another solitary breakfast, Keosqe looked across the table at the chair Tristen had habitually occupied. He ran his hand through his hair and sighed a little wearily.

He’d thought it would be no difficulty to accustom himself to being alone again. After all, what were a few years to the decades he’d spent beforehand without a steady companion? But truth be told, he was not finding it easy at all. Not when he missed having someone to come home to. Someone to talk to and laugh with and even argue with. He closed his eyes. Someone to love and make love to.

But not just any “someone.” There was only one.

Unfortunately, Keosqe could not bring himself just yet to trust like that again. He’d taken a chance and given his love, verily his whole self to another only to reap disappointment, frustration, and pain once more. He did not know if he had it in him to risk his heart a third time.

Chapter 17

Indecision

In the days following Tristen’s visit, Keosqe did not know what to make of his feelings regarding the matter of the youth’s alleged infidelity. Alleged because Tristen had insisted he had not shared himself with Mirdan. Not that it hurt any less. Just the thought that his love and trust had been used against him to enable Tristen to deceive him so well grievously wounded him.

The youth’s actions were indicative of his willingness to go behind Keosqe’s back and even make a fool of him with someone else.

However, Tristen’s demeanor that night had spoken of someone deeply remorseful to the point of despair. And then there was his declaration of love. So quietly stated and all the more powerful in its conviction because of the understated yet earnest manner of its delivery. Keosqe could still feel the force of those words reverberate within him just by recalling how Tristen had said them.

He spotted the youth a few days later as the latter walked home from the University in the company of a few friends. He recognized Argil and Melande among them and noted Mirdan was missing. He briefly wondered where the Half Blood was but then dismissed him from his thoughts and observed Tristen instead.

Tristen was all smiles as he talked with his friends. The smiles did not seem forced.

He looks well enough
. There were no visible signs of dejection or desperation.
Not that he would show everyone how he really feels
, Keosqe told himself. And perhaps having been able to see Keosqe again and confess what he’d done, Tristen had unburdened himself enough to lessen his guilt and shame and thus throw off his crippling despondency.

For reasons he deemed most unworthy, it disheartened him that the youth appeared to have recovered sufficiently from their meeting. He certainly did not want Tristen to continue to wallow in sorrow and regret. But neither did he care to see how easily Tristen could put his disappointment behind him and get on with life.

With or without Keosqe.

Chiding himself severely for entertaining such thoughts, Keosqe turned his steed around and rode away. But he could not help looking back to catch one last glimpse of his erstwhile lover.

So beautiful
, he thought with a pang of regret and a welling of sheer lust.
How am I supposed to get over you, Tris? Deity’s blood, is it possible at all?

* * * *

Keosqe knew he had to confide the truth behind their parting to someone, as well as his confusion and lingering anger. Else the circumstances would wear him down to the point of rendering him incompetent at best and paralyzed at worst. But he was also proud enough to shy from exposing such tawdry business to anyone, even his closest kin. And he certainly could not reveal anything to Tristen’s own brother.

In the end, he decided to take counsel with Eiren.

Having struggled with his own romantic woes, Eiren would understand his doubts, as the others might not. Himself a victim of betrayal and disillusionment, Eiren was no stranger to wrecked relationships and painful entanglements. Most of all, after suffering the recent loss and loneliness of widowhood, the physician would not make light of Keosqe’s sense of bereavement.

True to form, Eiren immediately canceled his appointments and activities when Keosqe showed up at the Order of the Hospitallers’ Health Center and asked if they could talk.

The Hospitallers’ medical establishment was smaller than the Rikara Public Hospital but a lot cleaner, better staffed, and seldom overcrowded. Run by an order of warrior monks, it was also quieter and more secure despite its proximity to the scum-infested south district.

Likewise Eiren’s consultation room was more comfortable as well as spacious and well-appointed. Keosqe much preferred it to the physician’s rather spartan quarters at the public hospital whose saving grace was that its windows opened on the property’s garden. But Eiren’s office at the health center also had a good view of its garden and thankfully did not look out at the dingy buildings and noisome alleys of the slums.

Keosqe gave his cousin a concerned once-over after taking his seat on the reception couch. He looked tired and older than his years. Since the passing of his spouse just a month and a half back, Eiren had largely kept to himself, spending long hard days at work to keep grief at bay. The only one of their kin who kept constant company with him was Ashrian Mithani and this was largely due to his equanimity in the face of Eiren’s numerous outbursts of unreasonable anger and explosive sorrow. It was so uncharacteristic of the physician that none of the Essendris save Ashrian quite knew how to cope with it.

Yet Eiren had noticed Tristen’s misery and taken steps to address it. How he’d managed to set his own heartache aside to listen to Keosqe and perhaps give him comfort and counsel was nothing short of humbling. It bespoke not only his healer’s soul that compelled him to give aid where it was most needed, but also the strength of Eiren’s compassion and loyalty toward those dearest to him. Small wonder he was the most beloved of House Essendri’s scions.

Eiren unlocked the cabinet of his desk and took out two small glasses and a squat bottle filled with a burgundy-hued liquid. Keosqe regarded him with raised eyebrows. Liquor was the last thing he’d expected to find in a physician’s office.

“I wondered whether you would open up to anyone,” Eiren said as he poured Keosqe some brandy. “Why me, though?”

“Because you’ll know whereof I speak.”

Eiren snorted. “Now why does that worry me?”

He came around the desk and handed Keosqe his drink.

“Doesn’t this go against the physician’s code?” Keosqe asked as his cousin sat down beside him.

Eiren shook his head. “Liquor is prohibited only if one’s constitution can’t take it. Yours is as sound as swylboars in full rut battling it out for the right to boff every spread-legged sow in sight. So drink up, cousin, and then tell me all. I promise, nothing you say will reach other ears.”

“You sound just like my confessor,” Keosqe said, taking a sip.

“Oh, he also plies you with drink to loosen your tongue?”

Keosqe almost spit out the brandy at the preposterous notion. “Would that I had your spirit,” he commented, shaking his head in admiration of his indomitable cousin.

“Now that is so unlike you,” Eiren said in surprise. “Dispense with the stalling and tell me what’s happened.”

With a resigned sigh, Keosqe tossed back the remainder of his brandy and set the glass on the small side table. And then he began to talk.

It was almost three-quarters of an hour before he finished, thanks to Eiren’s penchant for interrupting ever so often to clarify a point or express dismay or disbelief. When he’d finished his account, Keosqe leaned back and looked at his cousin expectantly.

“So, Ren, what do I do? Indeed, should I believe him?”

“What do you mean? Believe that he’s sorry or that he didn’t cheat on you?”

“Either. Both.”

Eiren rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Tristen doesn’t strike me as a skillful liar,” he remarked.

“Yet he managed to fool me for a goodly while,” Keosqe scoffed.

“Because you trusted him so much, you couldn’t conceive of him deceiving you,” Eiren pointed out. “I warrant he gave many a sign of discomfort whenever he offered a falsehood or omitted something, but you didn’t see any of them.” He grimaced. “I remember I didn’t either for the longest time until the evidence smacked me right in the face. And even then I still made excuses. I just didn’t want to face the truth.”

Keosqe groaned and closed his eyes. “Neither did I apparently. Yet I was never certain about him precisely because of what I feared was the truth. That he stayed with me out of obligation—as payment for all I had done for him and his brother. Looking back, I realize now why I was so possessive with him; why I so feared to let him loose and tried to keep him to myself as much as possible.”