A Seditious Affair(34)

Absalom’s expression suggested he knew what thoughts were passing through Dominic’s mind. “Let us pray the House can be persuaded. I am worried things have gone too far, though. There’s a deal too much fear.”

They discussed the ins and outs of the situation for a while longer. Dominic had not spoken in depth to Absalom in some time and found the man to be rather more amenable than he remembered. That, or he was comparing him to Silas.

Silas, incandescent with rage, pacing up and down their room in Millay’s, hissing imprecations because he wanted to shout. Silas afraid.

Fourteen years’ transportation for seditious libel. Dominic knew what that meant. Silas would be chained into the hold of a rotting prison hulk for months, waiting for a berth in the stinking bowels of some merchant ship. Once that came he’d be shipped across the oceans and sold into indentured service. Slavery by another name.

There was every chance it would kill him. He would certainly never return. And it would happen if that law passed, and he was arrested again, which seemed all too probable because his response to the threat of the six bills was to fight. He was writing furiously as Jack Cade, bellowing his anger at injustice and repression. He’d released two pamphlets on the topic of Lord Sidmouth in the preceding week, either one enough to make a conviction for seditious libel a foregone conclusion.

I really ought not to be sharing his bed, Dominic thought, staring into the fire.

But, heaven help him, how they were fucking. They kissed now, all the time, and if he’d thought Silas had been brutal before…

I own you. Harsh words breathed into Dominic’s ear as he strained against the padded cuffs that chained his wrists and ankles to the bed. Harsh hands digging into his flesh. Every scrap of you. You’re mine.

Silas had fucked him to the point of tears the last time. Twice himself, not permitting Dominic to spend, and then again with a china consolateur while he’d lain tied and helpless, Silas whispering savage words into his skin along with kisses…

“I seem to have lost your attention,” Absalom remarked, rising. “I said, I must go.”

“I do beg your pardon. I have a certain amount on my mind.”

“So I imagine. I shall leave you to your reflections. Or not,” Absalom added as the door opened. “Good evening, Julius. What brings you back to London? No, don’t tell me, I must leave. Tell Dominic, if you can hold his wandering thoughts.”

Dominic waved a hand in greeting as Julius took the vacated chair. He was a very handsome man, if one liked cold good looks, with fair hair and light blue eyes, exquisite in dress and vicious of tongue. He and Dominic had clashed for years, mostly because Dominic’s sense of duty was offended by Julius’s relentless refusal to care about the world around him, but in part because Julius had had the good fortune to share a bed with Richard once and the sheer unmitigated gall to walk away the next morning. In recent weeks, though, as Julius’s successful love affair and Dominic’s disastrous one had progressed, they seemed to have found a quite unexpected mutual liking. It was the first shoots of what felt like friendship, and Dominic was grateful for it.

“Why are you back?” Dominic asked. “I thought you and Harry would be at Arrandene past Christmas.”

“Yes, so did I, but really, my dear fellow. Richard.”

“What about Richard?”

“He is as sociable as a bear, but without the charm. What on earth has happened between you two? I mentioned your name, and he was, frankly, explosive.”

“I don’t know.” Julius gave him a look. Dominic turned his hands up. “I don’t. Well, you know that I, uh…my Wednesdays.” Julius inclined his head. “I ran into Richard. He made some comments…” Not kind comments either. He’d seen the marks on Dominic’s wrists and launched into harsh words of shock and rebuke with a note of anger that Dominic couldn’t understand. “He demanded that I justify myself.”

Julius raised a brow. “How authoritative of him.”

“Well, you know Richard,” Dominic said, automatically defensive. “He has ever been our moral hub.” Julius snorted. “But no. I didn’t quite feel as though I had to. We exchanged a few words. I quoted a line of poetry, somewhat flippantly, I admit, and he turned on his heel and walked away. He has not spoken to me since.”

“That seems an extreme reaction. Unless it was Byron? Richard does loathe Byron.”

“So do I. No, it was a poet and illustrator of entire obscurity, a man named William Blake. He is a radical freethinker and eccentric to say the least, but produces work of quite remarkable beauty.”