Elf Defence (Adventures in Aguillon #2) - Lisa Henry Page 0,25

Benji agreed. “It’s interesting though, isn’t it, where the lines are? It’s really very arbitrary. Like drinking milk, fine. Sucking it straight from the cow, gross. And that’s even without considering that the poor cow is being completely oppressed and doesn’t actually have a say in whether or not she wants to give you milk. Does she? Who knows? Has anyone even asked?” And then, just to be a little shit, he added, “I’ll bet Lars sucks straight from the cow. He seems the type.”

Calarian’s eyes widened. “He does not! He loves his cows! And not like that!” he added hastily when Benji opened his mouth.

“Probably loves them just like that,” Benji said anyway, enjoying Calarian's dismay enormously. “He's still single. Who looks like that and is single unless they're into some weird stuff like cow-suckling?’

“We’re not discussing this, Ebenjilarian!” Calarian threw him a glare and stomped off, and then it wasn’t fun anymore, because Calarian was upset with him. Benji loved it when he and Calarian made fun of people together, but it wasn’t as hilarious when Calarian didn’t get the joke. And it definitely wasn’t hilarious when Calarian took the side of the person they were mocking.

“Fine, “Benji grumbled. “Your precious duke is an animal lover, but not in the ‘Grub and his horses’ kind of way, okay?”

“Okay,” Calarian said, and stomped with slightly less vigour, but Benji could tell from the tense set of his shoulders that he was still sulking a bit. Benji really didn’t want Calarian to sulk, if only because Calarian had the knapsack and the cups and, presumably, the food.

Fine. He’d make a token effort, Benji decided. “’m sorry,” he mumbled under his breath.

Calarian stopped dead, because of course he heard with those ears, and he whirled on his heel. “Benji, did you actually just apologise?”

“Shut up,” Benji scowled.

“You did!” Calarian crowed. “You said sorry!”

Benji kicked over a clump of daisies. “Whatever. I didn’t want you sulking, that’s all,” he muttered. “You won’t fuck me when you’re sulking.”

“I won’t fuck you anyway, because we’re in the middle of a meadow full of daisies on a mountainside.”

“Well,” Benji huffed, “that could be romantic!”

And then he froze.

Calarian blinked slowly. “It could be what?”

“Nothing,” Benji said. He fiddled with the hilt of his bollock dagger.

“No, you said–”

“I didn’t say anything,” Benji insisted. “And even if I did, it’s not what you’re thinking. I said athletic. Now shut up. Fuck off. Go and die in a ditch.”

Calarian stared at him, wide-eyed.

Benji did his best not to squirm under the weight of Calarian’s gaze. A part of him wanted Calarian to say something to break this sudden, strange silence between them, but another part of him—the smarter part—knew that no good could come of anything Calarian might say. Finally he scowled, jutted out his chin, and said, “Don’t you have a duke to find?’

Calarian raised his eyebrows, but then he turned away and started walking without a word, and Benji breathed a sigh of relief. He thought he’d covered that pretty well. Probably. What the hell had he been thinking anyway, calling things romantic? What he and Calarian had was a lot of things, but romantic wasn’t one of them.

Definitely not.

He drew a deep breath of cool mountain air, scowled, and followed Calarian’s leather-clad arse up the hill.

Chapter Seven

They were high up in the mountains above Tournel when Benji suddenly cried out and leapt forward, darting through the green field. It took Calarian a moment to spot what had caught his attention, and then he saw it: a tiny flash of colour in the grass.

“It’s his hat!” Benji exclaimed. “It’s his weird little felt hat with the ugly spotted feather in the band! I am the best at tracking!” He punched the air.

Calarian eyed him doubtfully. “Sure. Finding that hat, the hat that was just sitting there in the middle of the path, was genius, and definitely not something any idiot could do.”

“No, only a special idiot!” Benji crowed, before realizing what he’d said. He scowled. “Shut up!”

“I didn’t say anything.” Calarian grinned. “Idiot.” It wasn’t often he got one over on Benji, and he planned to exploit it thoroughly in retribution for Benji implying that Lars was some sort of zoophile with a nursing fetish.

Lars wasn’t some weirdo with a thing for cows. Lars was good and decent and brave and wonderful. Calarian didn’t believe for a second that Lars had run away, despite what Gunther was telling people. He had no doubt that after yesterday’s encounter