Red Heir - Lisa Henry Page 0,28
top of his list when it came to his newfound companions. Calarian might have been stupidly attractive, but after last night Loth was pretty sure he didn’t have the stamina to keep up with him. Not that it wouldn’t be fun to try, he supposed.
He turned and watched as Calarian and Benji made their way back towards the cottage.
“Wow,” Grub said. “Just...”
“It’s like watching a pair of swinging pendulums, isn’t it?” Loth mused. “Oddly hypnotic.”
Grub surprised him with a laugh. “I’m not sure what’s more entertaining; those two, or Scott clutching his pearls about it.”
“Definitely Scott,” Loth said. He couldn’t help but add, “Disloyal little git. Trying to sell me off to Benji like that.”
“Lucky you’re not the prince then,” Grub said with a wry twist of his lips that Loth couldn’t quite interpret. Before he could overthink it, Grub, with a mischievous smile on his face, asked, “You know what git rhymes with, don’t you?”
“It does! You’re right!” Loth brightened at the reminder and turned and made his way into the cottage to tease Scott some more.
It took four miserable muddy days to make their way through the Swamp of Death. At least Benji kept them supplied with food, and seemed to know which paths were the safest to take, both to avoid the stinking, sucking mud and the worst of the swamp gas. Benji supplied them with powdered charcoal to wrap in a cloth and keep close to their face, meaning they all had smudged faces that looked like shadowy charcoal beards when the cloths were removed. (In Scott’s case, it was a vast improvement on his own facial hair, a fact Benji gleefully pointed out.) Although Loth found himself getting light-headed on a few occasions, it was nothing like when they’d first entered the swamp. The horses got stuck several times, sinking into the mud up to their knees, and only Dave was able to extract them.
Scott took the journey the worst. Not only was Dave still happily composing his Shit Ballad out loud, but Scott clearly objected to Benji having taken over his position as leader. Loth suspected it particularly rankled with Scott because Benji didn’t even want to be their leader—he just wanted them out of his hair. Possibly the only reason he didn’t let them all wander off into the swamp and die was because Calarian kept blowing him every chance they got. For all his snootiness, Calarian went weak at the knees for a bad boy—literally and figuratively. Not that Loth could begrudge him that. Elves really were stupidly attractive.
Scott was scandalised, naturally. Ada and Dave didn’t seem to care. Loth was highly appreciative of the free show, and Grub... poor Grub was red as a beet for most of the trip. Loth wasn’t sure if it was the way the elves were so open with their affections, the fact they were having such a good time, or their unfairly pretty cocks that were making Grub blush and stutter every time he glanced their way.
Possibly all three.
Whatever the case, Grub warmed to Loth a little during their journey through the Swamp of Death. Loth suspected a lot of that was because he knew he couldn’t hide his embarrassment and was grateful for Loth not teasing him about it. Grub was sharp-minded and quick-witted, and it seemed almost incongruous that he was innocent as well. However, to laugh at him for it wouldn’t be just teasing him over the fact he’d never slept with anyone, it would be teasing him over the fact that he’d spent around a quarter of his life in a cell. And some blows were too low even for Loth to consider.
Huh.
It turned out he had a conscience after all. Who knew? Certainly not Loth, or anybody who had ever known him. It had really never come up before, and Loth found it quite unsettling. His parents were going to laugh themselves silly if he ever made it back to Callier. Loth fully intended to make it back, but he couldn’t help worrying that they were playing right into the hands of Scott’s mysterious benefactor. Who was to say they could trust him? At first, ditching the party when they reached Callier had seemed like the smartest thing to do, but now Loth wasn’t sure he wanted to go to Callier at all.
Callier was home, in so much as any place could be home to the sort of man who often had to leave his lodgings in the middle of