Elf Defence (Adventures in Aguillon #2) - Lisa Henry Page 0,66
and he smiled, his cheeks dimpling. He knocked their shoulders together as they walked. “Come on. Let’s keep helping Lars.”
Benji wasn’t sure how they were actually helping Lars, who seemed to have a handle on things, but he supposed there was a certain strength in solidarity.
Lars was bringing the herd to a lower pasture for the night. The late afternoon sunlight slanted across the mountainsides, painting the world gold. Below them, the red roofs of Tournel gleamed. Cowbells clanged pleasantly, and the breeze carried the faint sounds of carefully harmonized singing from somewhere in the distance. Benji thought of the nun and her weird curtain-clad children, and suppressed a shudder. Still creepy as fuck.
A familiar green figure lumbered over the hillside, carrying his lute in one hand and a knapsack over his shoulder. He was no longer wearing his rose-cabbage kilt.
“Dave!” Benji exclaimed.
Dave waded through the stream of dairy cows to meet them. His tooth-tusks shone gold in the sunlight, and his hair tufts waved in the breeze.
“Where are you off to?” Calarian asked curiously, nodding at his knapsack.
“Back to Callier,” Dave said. He scratched his green nose. “I quit the band.” He lowered his voice ominously. “Creative differences.”
“Oh?” That was surprising. The last time they’d seen Dave, he’d been strumming his lute and bellowing along enthusiastically as the nun and her children held an impromptu concert in the town square while Gunther’s body was carried away. The music had effectively cleared the square of onlookers, and sent the last straggling cows scattering as well, but Dave had looked like he was having the time of his life.
“Yeah. I thought I should sing. They thought I shouldn’t.” Dave sighed unhappily. “So I’m going back to my dragons.”
“Also, don’t you have Simon to get back to?” Benji asked, just to see Dave’s incredible purple blush.
“Yeah. I got him an egg,” Dave said, patting his knapsack carefully, his aubergine flush deepening. “S’wot I was here for in the first place. It’s not a big one like I thought the monster’s might be, just a littley, but he’s never seen a miniature alpine ice dragon before.”
“All the boys love a little egg,” Benji said. Calarian stared at him like he was trying to figure out if he was being sarcastic or not. Benji wasn’t totally sure either.
“We’re jus’ fronds,” Dave said.
“Friends?” Benji asked.
“S’wot I said,” Dave said. “I’ll see you later.”
And off he strode, heading across the hillside with Pie trilling happily and flitting around his shoulders.
Benji and Calarian rejoined the cows. Lars walked at the front of the cows, his hulking, muscular figure silhouetted by the setting sun. His leather shorts accentuated his glorious arse perfectly, and Benji wanted to use his suspenders to climb him like a tree.
“He really was an okay duke,” Calarian said.
“Yeah.” Benji shrugged. “But he’s happier as a cowherd.”
Calarian nodded, and they followed Lars and the cows down the hillside towards the town.
When the cows were in a meadow that Lars deemed the right one, he patted them all and kissed Maisy on the head, and then came back to Benji and Calarian. He smiled at the sight of their joined hands, and carefully separated their linked fingers so he got to slot himself in the middle. Which gave Benji a lot of good ideas for how to spend the rest of the evening. And by Calarian’s sly smile, he wasn’t the only one.
Lars whistled happily as they walked back to town.
They arrived back at the castle, and headed for Lars’s room. Well, Lars’s room until Gretchen was installed as the Duchess of Tournel—Benji had an idea that the election was mostly a formality and that Gretchen would win in a landslide. In the meantime, the big bed was theirs to fully enjoy.
“So,” Benji said, clapping his hands together. “Reverse double paladin or dirty alchemist with a twist?”
Lars blinked at him.
“Or,” Benji said, “we could just start with kissing and see where it goes?”
Lars gave him a brilliant smile, and reached out and grabbed him by the shirt and reeled him in. “I like that idea.”
“I have lots of good ideas,” Benji said breathlessly, his gaze transfixed on Lars’s mouth.
“You do,” Lars allowed, and bent down and kissed him.
Who put bubbles in Benji’s bloodstream like that? He giggled and sagged against Lars. And then, when Calarian joined in, he giggled and sagged against him as well.
“There’s something we need to tell you, Benji,” Lars said, his blue eyes wide.