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The Highwayman	By : RiatheMai Category: +M to R > Ronin Warriors Views: 1146 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Ronin Warriors or the characters Sage/Seiji and Ryou/Ryo. They belong to Hajime Yatate/Sunrise. The poem 'The Highwayman' was created by Alfred Noyes. I make no money or profit from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-The Highwayman
- 1
A/N: I first discovered this tragic poem on Loreena McKennitt’s "The Book of Secrets" CD. As with all of her arrangements; I found myself as lost in the beauty of the story as I was in the music as she sang it. Later, I stumbled across a book called The Highwayman, which is a compilation of short stories based on Alfred Noyes’ poem of the same name. Naturally, I had to have that, too. Then, I came to discover and become enamoured of yaoi, and I found that, as I would listen to the song, I kept envisioning the same two male characters in the roles. And so, with no intended slight to Ms McKennitt whose talents and voice I admire greatly, or to Alfred Noyes who first penned this beautifully tragic account, I humbly submit my own version of the tale. The stanzas below are exactly as they appear in the CD jacket. I’ve not altered them in any way.: Riathe (11/2000)

A/N: This is a re-release of a story I wrote back in 2000. It contains sexually explicit content between two men in a loving relationship. It also depicts violence and death, though nothing graphic. If this offends you, please do not read. Constructive criticism is welcome, but flames will be ignored. Riathe (11/2012)

Disclaimer: I do not own Ronin Warriors or the characters Sage/Seiji and Ryou/Ryo. They belong to Hajime Yatate/Sunrise. Poem/Lyrics are showed in [brackets]. I make no money or profit from the writing of this story..

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The Highwayman By Riathe Mai

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[The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees.]

[The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon the cloudy seas.]

[The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple Moor.]

[And the Highwayman came riding…]

[Riding, riding.]

[The Highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.]

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The fog is thick and heavy, obscuring the ground over which it hovers like a gauzy shroud. The road is lost in its concealment, but I am not alarmed. I know this road well, would know it blinded or hooded in the blackest velvet. I’ve traveled it in the darkest of nights, when the moon was but a sliver of silver in the sky, or gone to that place where it hides whilst it renews itself for rebirth. I know it with the surety of one whom is no stranger to darkness, whose other senses: hearing, smell, or touch, have been honed by practice and by necessity to be sharper than sight, sharper than the rapier that rides my hip or the poniard hidden in my boot.

And so, the fog rolling steadily off the Moor is of no consequence to me. Neither still, are the cliffs, which trace the road, dropping off nigh vertical and as far down to the ocean below as the turrets and bastions of the King’s own castle reach up to the Heavens above. What concerns me is the hour.

‘Tis well past eventide; well past the time when honest and goodly folk bar their doors and windows and build their hearth fires high to stave the chill and the dark of night; when they read their Bibles aloud or in silence whilst their children sleep safely in their beds. ‘Tis the hour when no Godly man ventures out of doors, and those men who dare, do so for purposes sinister, reasons dark and illicit. ‘Tis the hour when hapless travelers draw close their swords and their muskets, and drive their mounts and their conveyances to greater and more reckless speeds, eager to be at their destinations with their fortunes and their virtues and their lives intact.

In that very order, I might add. But then, who am I to judge? ‘Tis me they fear. The Gentleman Bandit. The Bane of the Moor. The Highwayman.

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[He’d a French cocked hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin.]

[A coat of claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin;]

[They fitted with never a wrinkle; his boots were up to the thigh!]

[And he rode with a jeweled twinkle,]

[His pistol butts a-twinkle,]

[His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky.]

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I’d like to say that I’ve built my reputation well; culled and curried it like a fine horse or a finer wine; but I’ve done nothing. Well, perhaps, not exactly nothing. There will be no heavenly choirs and celestial bells to greet me at the end of my time. This I know. This I accept as I have accepted all else: the loss of my title and the loss of my goodly name. All these things were taken from me, as easily as the rings I slip from inattentive fingers or the folds I draw from unguarded pockets, but with not so much as half of the honor as I show to my prey. I am no saint and never have I, nor ever will I, claim to be, lest God strike me down where I stand.

But I digress. No, my reputation was not mine to write. Not entirely, by any account. To say that reports of my deeds have been greatly embellished at bower and drawing room alike would be a grave and inconceivable understatement. Never, to my knowledge, have I partaken of the flesh of naughty, disobedient children, nor dragged bowed-back, old men by the legs behind my steed, nor ridden them down as they’d fled into the night and crushed them beneath the iron-shod hooves of my Nightmare. I ride a gelding, black as midnight and strong of stride, and shod as any other horse that must travel the dirt and mud-bound roads. He is as true as any steed I’ve ever owned, but he would surer pitch me to the ground than trample another living creature beneath its feet.

And as for the virtue of fair, young maidens upon whom I have purportedly whet my fleshy sword, I can say only this. I do not need to take that which is so freely offered. Merchant, Lord, and farmer alike; their daughters’ innocence is safer at my hands than their silks and their jewels combined.

Do not misunderstand. I am a connoisseur of the pleasures of the flesh as much as is the next man. Perhaps more, for there is no greater stimulant for the blood than a good heist and a clean escape, the wind in your face as you charge off into the night with a purse full of gold and silver and jewels, knowing that you have escaped capture once more, knowing that you have avoided the gallows for one more night. To lose oneself in the sweet scent of soft flesh, the press of a yielding body beneath your own, and the soft song of joyous release in your ear; there is no better balm to quiet the beast that courses through your veins and rages within your chest.

Rape holds no appeal to me. How simple to take something so unguarded and so weak. How utterly meaningless and unnecessary when there are women aplenty with skill and desire with whom to sate the fire in your blood. When I bed a woman, I would have it be on a bed of silken sheets, with candles burning softly and the scent of perfume in the air, her body willing and supple and wet beneath and around mine. I’d not have her struggling and screaming and on the hard, cold ground, her body neither willing nor ready.

‘Tis their wealth that I want, their treasures and their baubles and those petty trinkets of monetary worth, which are so easily forgotten and laid aside for new ones when the fancy takes them, as is ever a woman’s wont. Their men and their escorts, I rob at the point of my sword, the sharp bite of steel at their throats as I cut their purses and purloin their golden rings and fobs. ‘Tis their fear that I want. ‘Tis their fear that I need; that I cultivate so they will not be foolish and challenge me. Not that I think they will defeat me, my skill with my sword is not embellished or exaggerated in the least—modesty aside, I am every bit as good as they say. I just do not want to have to prove it.

I am a thief, after all. This I do not deny. Well, I don’t exactly admit it either. There are laws against such things and I have grown rather fond of the length of my neck, thank you very much. I am a thief, but I am not a murderer; a cutthroat who enjoys the feel of my sword as it slides through the soft flesh of a man. The smell of blood and the color of it as it seeps into the dead ground are things that are not overly pleasing to me.

I need the men to fear me so I am not forced to prove the error of their ways in challenging me. Their treasures are not worth their lives and the lives of their women. The women fear me as well, but their fear is so akin to exhilaration and I would gladly play upon their wanton fantasies. I can be lethally charming when it suits me—and it suits me often—and my appearance lends itself well to the task, hair full and golden and eyes of icy violet. I am, of course, forced to disguise myself, with mask and queue and powder, but I have found the added mystery behind my true identity only serves to sweeten the allure.

I steal the kid gloves from their hands and plant improper kisses on their palms that leave them both flush and scandalized. After all, what woman--whether maiden or dame--does not fantasize about being ravaged by the handsome highwayman? What woman does not see herself as woman enough to change his wicked ways?

Think, you, that I am exaggerating? I can not begin to list the number of women whom I have had the fortune to meet on a dark, moonless night, who have by glance and gesture both sought to seduce me. ‘Twould seem a gallish boast, did I make such claims over brandy and pipe in the drawing room at court, but ‘tis indeed no such thing. A thief I may be, but a teller of lies, I am not.

The fog has grown thicker still, great grey waves rolling over the ground like the waves I can hear crashing against the rocks at the bottom of the cliff to my left, and I push my steed to greater speed. He is as eager as I to be at our destination, the promise of a warm stall and a good currying; oats and water, as much a prodding as any I might make with my heels. We crest the hill and the valley is a sea of foamy white mist and disembodied torches spearing through the darkness, and my mount surges forward with renewed energy.

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[Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard.]

[And he tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred.]

[He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there]

[But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,]

[Bess, the landlord’s daughter,]

[Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.]

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Oh, the very sight of him sends my blood to frenzied heat. Hair like a raven’s, long and wavy and as wild as any fey creature of lore, frames a face of sharp angles and sensual beauty. Even in the dim, mist-shrouded torchlight I can see the deep, sapphire blue of his eyes, and the petulant slant of his lips. He sits in the window, straddling the sill with his long, strong legs, and looks down at me in reproach.

"You, Sir, are late," he says.

His voice is hushed, but I can hear the rich timber it holds even from where I stand, a story below. Like brandy, is his voice when he speaks in that tone, warm and rough and such to chase the chill from a corpse. And I am no corpse. Neither am I one to seek forgiveness for my tardiness, and he well knows it.

"Well, seeing as how, ‘twould appear I’ve no welcome here, I shall be on my way. I hear the wenches in the next shire are rather comely."

He laughs, a rich, full sound like mulled wine. By God, I thirst for him! "If you have no fondness for teeth, they’d be comely enough, milord."

I shrug indifferently, and make to turn and leave. "There are some things for which such a trait would be an asset, sir."

"And for others, a disappointment," he says.

His voice has changed so slightly, but I hear it. Even over the sounds that seem to fill a quiet night: the lapping of the waves on the rocky shore and the wind snaking through the fields and the straw of the roof; I can hear it as clearly as though we are side by side and not another single sound exists but his voice. He is not courtly bred. A landlord’s son, pure and honest and real, as courtiers and gentry are not, he is not versed enough in the jousting of words and jests as he pretends.

I turn back, feigning boredom. His expression is cheerful enough, but his eyes betray him as surely as his voice. He has no talent for subterfuge. My tardiness has worried him, and yet he plays the game, though he has neither the skill nor the nature to play it well, matching my haughty, disinterested air with the closest facsimile as he can muster. And I, being the scoundrel that I am, let him, marveling at the play of torchlight in his eyes and against his midnight hair.

God, he is beautiful. No Highborn’s debutante or farmer’s daughter can compare to him. Soft, yielding curves and rosewater-scented skin are nice, but there is something about the feel of a body every bit as strong and hard as your own pressing against you, matching your strength and your desire in equal measure, that is beyond the mere pleasure found in genteel loveplay. Bedding a body that can submit to your will as easily as it can conquer it is exhilarating in the challenge alone.

And I am ever one for a challenge. But he is more than that. Guileless and open and noble, for all his simple breeding, he is a treasure in himself. I’d sought to steal him for but a night and found myself ensnared instead.

"Will you let me in the front, good sir?" I ask him, still playing the game, yet drawing it quickly to an end.

"I cannot, milord," he answers regretfully.

"Then I shall have to find another means to what I want."

For one of noble birth and genteel manner, I am as agile as a squirrel, and I scurry up the trellis with ease. He steps back from the window, though not in fright—no never that—as I steal into his room like a brigand. His blue eyes are like twin sapphires set ablaze from within, his chest rising and falling so the front of his unlaced tunic falls open with each breath. He wears only that—a tunic of rich burgundy, unlaced and unbelted—and breeches of a deep midnight blue that hug his strong, lean legs like a layer of paint.

"As you can see, Sir, there is nothing of value here." His voice and the lift in his head are defiant, yet how his eyes smolder. "You have dirtied your silks and velvets for nothing."

Nothing? What foolery is this? There is a treasure here worth all the gold in the King’s coffers, and he stands before me strong and virile and vibrant. I let my eyes grow cold, as I would during a heist when arrogance and an inflated sense of one’s own prowess would incite a lordling, fresh from his first arranged—and fixed—duel, to challenge my claim on his purse. The look was not for him, you realize, but for the benefit of the fair maiden he escorted, so she would see the danger who stood so close to her, who brushed her downy cheek with his glove as he removed the pearl drop earring from one earlobe and then from the other; who’s breath fanned the powdered column of her silken neck as he bent to unclasp the pearls from around her throat.

Such is the coldness in my eyes as I behold him, raking my covetous gaze down the length of him and letting it linger at the juncture of those strong legs before lifting it once again to his eyes. Such is the cruelty in the smile that pulls my lips as I draw my sword and raise its lethal tip to his tawny throat.

"Perhaps I shall be forced to take something else in compensation for my wasted effort," I say in that voice I use on the road, deep and whispered and so different from the soft, cultured tones I use in court.

Those blue eyes narrow, the fire building within them. How does he do that, my dark, landlord’s son? How does he house such heat, such devastating force within those marvelous blue eyes and not become consumed by it? I am consumed, and I merely look upon them.

"I have nothing of value for you to take, milord. All you see here is all I have."

"As I said, good sir," I say lowly, approaching him slowly, my sword hovering at his throat but my arm drawing closer to my body so I won’t nick him. "I shall then have to steal something else. Tell me, my dark beauty, what would you exchange for your life?"

‘Tis torture to be so close to him and not touch him, and I am in an agony of my own creation prolonging this foolish game. But herein lays the challenge I so crave. His will verses mine. Will he draw the game to an end or will I? Will he yield or will I? I am never sure with him, even after so many nights together, and I am not now. It seems his desire to punish me for my lateness, or at least for my lack of remorse, and as I had left him waiting then so would he leave me.

An amusing notion, but unlikely. I can see a tenseness in his body that mirrors my own and I wonder if this will be one of those rare nights when we both surrender, when our lovemaking will be fast and fierce and threaten to waken every soul in the inn with our racket. I hope not and not just for fear of discovery.

"What would you have?" he says then and he drops his gaze.

A surrender? Or a ruse? Or something else, entirely. I lower my sword and draw closer, stepping right up to him so I need but to lean forward the smallest bit to kiss him. I can smell his scent; clove and something sweet and hot, and I let my hand lift to touch his face.

"I would have you," I breathe into his lips. My fingers trace his cheekbone, not quite as prominent as mine, but still defined and smooth, and he leans into the touch. I chuckle in warm triumph and he pulls away, looking me in the eyes.

"You, Sir, are a knave and a scoundrel," he says, though not harshly. His voice is all but a purr.

"And you are a witch, to have me so ensnared."

He draws back, his eyes wide and shocked. "Such words," he says and I cannot tell if he is offended by the accusation, or frightened by it. "I—"

I lean forward and cover his lips with my own in a claiming kiss, my fingers threading

themselves through that raven nest of waves to hold him to me. He protests but an instant, too short a span of time to measure with any accuracy, and then he is crushing me to him. He kisses me hard, as hard as I kiss him, harder, and I revel in the strength of his arms around me, the firm, unyielding press of his body against mine. This is what I mean. Such strength. Such passion. This can not be found in the arms of a woman, with whom touches shared must be gentle and soft lest you bruise her tender flesh.

I know his body and he, mine; and what bruises we leave upon each other’s flesh in our haste and in our lust, will merely blend with those we already have; his from labor and mine from nightly pursuits. I hold him to me as I plunder his mouth and slide my free hand under his tunic. His skin is so warm, almost fevered, and so smooth. He is no child--he is but a few years younger than I and I have been a man for a while—but he is hairless, his chest and stomach as clean as any boy’s.

His is not a boy’s body, though. He stands as tall as I, but where my body is long lines and tight, sleek muscle, his is slightly more compact, his torso broader through the chest and his legs fuller through the thighs. His is the body of the laborer, bulkier from years of lifting and plowing, where mine has been honed to lethal grace through fencing and horsemanship. I trace those muscles, reveling in the way they bunch beneath my touch, counting every swell and dip in his defined abdomen and stomach, before stealing my hand into his breeches.

He tears his mouth away with a gasp and I dip my head to his neck and throat, tonguing the place where his heartbeat pulses frantically beneath his jaw. His hands go to the buttons of my coat, and with the agility of a master pickpocket, he has them undone and the heavy garment off my shoulders.

‘Tis with regret that I release him so I can remove my coat and shirt. He helps, his eager fingers pushing the layers of silk and velvet off my shoulders, letting them fall to the floor without a care for the expensive material. He has my scabbard beside them as quickly, but when he makes to kneel before me, I catch his arms and stop him.

"What—" he asks and the confusion and alarm in his eyes make me smile.

"Why hurry so?"

His forehead falls against my shoulder, his hands gripping my arms tightly. "When you didn’t come, I…"

"What’s this?" I push him back and gather his face in my hands.

He closes his eyes to avoid my gaze, whispering threadily, "Father suspects. When you were…" He opens his eyes and looks at me, his gaze pleading, yet determined. ‘Tis a curious combination, and yet he manages it convincingly. "I don’t want to talk about it now. After, maybe. I don’t know. Just not now. Please. I want…"

Once again he makes to kneel before me, and once again I hold him up, silencing his protest with a soft, slow kiss. I push him back a step. Another. Another still, forcing him against the edge of his bed. He goes with only moderate resistance, his mouth eager against mine, trying to force a more furious pace to our kissing. I won’t yield. I break the kiss and draw back with a smile.

"Let me," I say softly, not quite a plea, but then not quite a demand either. He nods, though I know he is not sure to what he is consenting, and his trust humbles me.

I kneel before him, falling to my knees as though to pray, and draw his dark breeches down. At my simple insistence, he steps out of them, then takes the hem of his tunic in hand and draws it off over his head. He drops it to the floor with my own discarded clothing.

He stands before me and I drink in the sight of him. Strange that I should keep thinking in such terms; of thirst and my need to quench mine. But I do; thirst for him, that is, as a man left to wander the desert might thirst for water to preserve his life. Such is my need for him at this moment, yet all I can do is marvel at the way the candle light plays off his skin, painting the swell of his firm muscle in shades of amber and copper.

He is sun-touched all over, his complexion naturally golden to begin with and now brushed by a flamey glow. My hands look powdered by compare where they rest at his hips. It never ceases to fascinate me.

"Milord?"

�I look up to see that his eyes are closed, a crease of torment between the slash of his raven brows. That magnificent chest rises and falls with each breath he takes, and I can tell by the very scent of him that he aches for my touch upon him. He will not ask for it, though. He knows he doesn’t have to.

"An impressive weapon, you have here, good sir," I say scandalously.

I let my breath blow across him where he juts out, thick and proud and hard, and he makes the smallest sound. Other than that, he says nothing. I knew that he wouldn’t rise—if you will pardon the expression—to the bait and ask if l was skilled enough to wield it. For all his simple, honest breeding, he is remarkably too well mannered for such bawdy talk. The faint blush of color in his cheeks, and the fire that burns in his eyes, when he opens them to gaze down upon me, are the only answer he gives.

Now, I’d once met a man versed and skilled in chemistry, some apothecary or some such, and he’d shown me to the place where he plied his craft. He’d had, on his table, a lamp within which had burned the most amazing blue flame. I’d never before seen its like. This gentleman told me that the strange flame burned hotter than a normal, amber one, but I’d had no comprehension of his words. What could possibly burn hotter than fire?

Those eyes above me are like that blue flame, and I now know such heat as is hotter than fire, just as I know what makes it ignite and what makes it burn. I dip my head and take him into me. I hear him gasp, those powerful legs becoming tense. I feel his fingers against my scalp as I work him. His grip is gentle, merely guiding me, setting a rhythm and bading me to follow it, though I need no such instruction. I am a master swordsman, after all.

Ah, his taste! ‘Tis so hard to describe it, when taste and smell are so finely intertwined, but his scent, as I said, is sharp and spicy, and so becomes his taste. Clove and cinnamon and all those flavors that burn the tongue and tantalize the palette: he is like an exotic opiate to my senses, intoxicating and addicting and delicious, and I would devour him whole if I could. Instead I content myself with making him shatter so that I may drink him down and abate this terrible thirst for a moment.

I release him and rise to my feet, wiping a hand across my mouth like a common man might after a hearty meal or a draught of ale. ‘Tis more for jest that I do this; and he is smiling as he watches me, those blue-fire eyes sweeping across my face as though committing it to memory. His gaze is that reverent.

"Is milord appeased?" he asks softly.

"Not quite."

He is reaching for me even as I answer, drawing me against the wall of his hard, strong body, and stealing the taste of his essence from my lips and my tongue. He has had his pleasure but his fires still smolder, waiting for the slightest spark or provocation to ignite again. I am a veritable tinderbox.

I push him down onto the bed and he makes to pull me with him as he falls. I resist as I am still dressed, and I would remedy this readily. I want to feel him against me and so I quickly divest my boots and breeches. My sword is on the floor where he dropped it, but I carry my poniard with me as I join him, tucking it safely beneath his pillow as I lower myself upon him.

He opens for me. ‘Tis so rare that he is insistent in what he wants, that he demands anything of anyone. He is gentle, for all his strength, yet there are nights when he seems to want that I should be coarse in my treatment of him; as though the pain is pleasure for him as well. Tonight seems to be one of those nights, and I don’t ask him for his reasons or question his desire, but accept the gift he gives me.

I capture his mouth with my own, and like the master thief that I am, I steal the cry from his throat as I take him. He arches and strains beneath me and I ride him for all he’s worth. Every breath he takes I give him, and every moan he makes, I take, kissing him fiercely to keep him silent, to keep us both from waking the whole inn. And as his body quickens once more, trapped between us as we move against each other, the threat of my own release building, drawing ever closer, I renew the cruelty of our kiss. He shudders violently and I shatter with him, falling down upon him in exhaustion so complete it feels like death has surely claimed me.

For once, I am content to let Him have me.

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["One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I’m after a prize tonight,]

[But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light;]

[Yet if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,]

[Then look for me by the moonlight,]

[Watch for me by the moonlight,]

[I’ll come for thee by the moonlight, though Hell should bar the way."]

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He is silent as I lay beside him. He is awake as I can feel the fan of his lashes where they brush my hair when he blinks, and his dark fingers lace and dance through mine. His heart is a slow, steady cadence in my ear, and I wish that I didn’t have to leave so soon. ‘Tis nigh midnight, now, and I have lingered far longer than I should have, am I to keep the appointment I’ve set for myself. Yet I am loath to move as yet.

"You will take care, tonight?" he says finally. ‘Tis as much a plea as a question and I draw up on to my elbow so I may look upon his face. He avoids my gaze until I lift his face to mine.

"As always," I answer. His concern touches me, and it unnerves me as well, yet I cannot let him see that he has shaken me. "I shall bring you back a token in gold."

He smiles. "I have no need for gold," he says and his fingers touch my hair, "so long as I have this."

"Then jewels. Sapphires to match your eyes, or diamonds, perhaps."

"Your eyes are all the diamonds I want."

Was he some gentrified fop, I’d parry his pretty flattery. Lord knows I am no stranger to such poetic jousting. But he is not and ‘tis his very heart which is on his tongue and in his eyes, and as such, ‘tis worthy of due honor. "Then you shall have them," I say and I kiss him soundly.

"The hour grows late," he says as we part. "If you don’t leave now I may be forced to hold you here."

"A sorry incentive, that, but aye."

I dress quickly and he helps me, straightening the lace at my throat as I see to the buttons on my coat. He then retrieves my sword from the floor, but when I reach to take it from him, he holds it back from my grasp. "Stay," he pleads.

"I cannot."

He knows this, but he had to try. He nods and doesn’t ask again, and for that, I am grateful. He hands me my sword and watches, silent as I belt it at my hip. As I straighten, he steps into me, taking me into his arms and gifting me with a farewell kiss.

Back to the window I go and throwing one leg over the sill, I pause and turn. "Say it," I tell him. "Aloud, so I might hear it."

"Say what, milord?" he asks confused.

"Those words you whisper behind the drape when I leave you. Those words you think I so loathe to hear. Say them aloud, now, I beg you."

He laughs. "You, milord? Beg?"

"Say them to me, now."

His smile fades. He steps back, his expression pained and…do I imagine this?…frightened. "’Twill surely curse us," he says and turns his back on me.

"Say them," I insist and when he looks at me over his shoulder I know that he will do as I ask.

"I love you."

His voice is a mere whisper as though he fears to speak aloud lest God should hear him and smite him for it. I hear him plainly. I read it on his lips and in his eyes and ‘tis as though he’s shouted it to the Heavens. He looks as though he has summoned Hell, but I cannot regret that I have forced this of him.

"I’ll return to you by the moonlight, my love, should Hell, itself, bar the way."

And I am gone.

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[He rose upright in the stirrups; He scarce could reach her hand.]

[But she loosened her hair i’ the casement! His face burnt like a brand.]

[As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast;]

[And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,]

[(Oh, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)]

[Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the west.]

[He did not come at the dawning; he did not come at noon,]

[And out o’ the tawny sunset, before the rise o’ the moon,]

[When the road was a gypsy’s ribbon, looping the purple moor,]

[A Red-coat troop came marching,]

[Marching, marching.]

[King George’s men came marching, up to the old inn-door.]

[They said no word to the landlord, they drank his wine instead,]

[But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed;]

[Two of them knelt at the casement, with muskets at their side!]

[There was death at every window,]

[And Hell at one dark window;]

[For Bess could see through the casement, the road that he would ride.]

[They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest;]

[They had bound a musket beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast!]

["Now keep good watch!" and they kissed her. She heard the dead man say-]

["Look for me by the moonlight.]

[Watch for me by the moonlight.]

[I’ll come for thee by the moonlight, though Hell should bar the way."]

[She twisted her hands behind her, but all the knots held good!]

[She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood!]

[They stretched and strained in the darkness and the hours crawled by like years!]

[Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,]

[Cold, on the stroke of midnight,]

[The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!]

[Tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hoofs were ringing clear.]

[Tlot-tlot, in the distance! Were they deaf that they did not hear?]

[Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,]

[The Highwayman came riding,]

[Riding, riding!]

[The Red-coats looked to their priming! She stood up straight and still!]

�

Damn the luck and damn that he’d been right to worry. For well over a day I’d been forced to lay low and wait, daring neither emergence nor missive to anyone lest I’d be discovered. How could things have gone so wrong? I’d planned everything to the letter. My sources had been my own intrigues. I’d told no one. So how was I betrayed?

I will not believe ‘twas he, my dusky lover, who unmasked me. Though he knew well who I was and what I was, he knew nothing of the foils and the heists. He’d never asked and I’d never offered, as I’d feared risking him. But someone had known, and a trap had been laid to snare me. ‘Twas by some unknown Fate’s intercession that I’d managed to elude capture and now my heart is dreading what price will be set for such a boon.

I drive my steed with abandon. I must warn him. They know who I am, can they know of him, as well? All the gold in the King’s coffers, land, title, name: they mean nothing to me and should he come to harm on account of our acquaintance…

I crest the hill and the inn is in sight, nestled in a low cradle of mist, torches burning brightly in their poles. His window is dark, and I long to see him silhouetted in its frame so I know that he is safe. I will take him with me. I’ve money enough to book passage for two. We can be gone by morning, across the sea where the King’s lawmen wouldn’t bother to pursue.

My charge lunges forward at my insistence and I make to leave the road, to approach the inn from the back where I can tether my horse in secret. I will steal across the inn-yard and make to the roof.

�

�

[Tlot, in the Frosty Silence! Tlot, in the echoing night!]

[Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!]

[Her eyes grew wide for a moment! She drew in one last breath,]

[Then her finger moved in the moonlight,]

[Her musket shattered the moonlight,]

[Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him with her death.]

�

�

I am midway down the hill when a resounding ~CRACK!~ rolls over the valley. I rein back hard. I know the sound of musket fire when I hear it. I cannot be certain ‘tis intended for me, and neither can I risk it. I will be no help to him am I killed. I pull aside on the rein and retreat. I will find a way to get a message to him on the morrow, to arrange for him to meet me where ‘tis safe.

�

�

[He turned; he spurred to the west; he did not know she stood]

[Bowed, with her head o’er the musket, drenched with her own red blood!]

[Not till the dawn he heard it; his face grew grey to hear]

[How Bess, the landlord’s daughter,]

[The landlord’s black-eyed daughter,]

[Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.]

�

�

I had heard men speak of the redness that seeps over the eyes, and the terrible calm that comes from a rage so great it consumes all else. I had never understood so much as now. Logic, reason, breeding, humanity; they are nothing to me. Nothing. All I know is this fire burning within my soul that needs to purge itself on those who have done this. Men of Law. The King’s own men. Soldiers and peace-keepers. Could I spit the foul taste of those words from my mouth, I would. Instead, I savor them, letting my hatred, this odd, numbing, blinding derision for these…these abhorrences, these devils in their Red coats, feed the fire coursing through me.

Dead! DEAD!!! I scream it in my mind and yet, I still cannot believe that I will not see him again, that he has been taken from me. Because of me. That is the worst of this. That I am to blame for this evil deed as surely as these lawmen, is a guilt, which will haunt me till the end of my days and beyond. Already I fear it has stolen my wit, for I can think of nothing but seeing their blood coat my sword.

I’d asked about. I knew where I was to find them. I’d avenge my innocent lover, did I have to trade my soul to the Devil, himself, to do it!

�

�

[Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky]

[With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high!]

[Blood-red were the spurs i’ the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat,]

[When they shot him down on the highway,]

[Down like a dog on the highway,]

[And he lay in his blood in the highway, with a bunch of lace at his throat.]

�

�

I hear the ~CRACK!~ of musket fire and pain sears my chest like a brand into my heart. For a moment, I am amazed that I can feel it, that I still have a heart to wound. I’d thought surely he’d stolen it at some point and so had taken it with him when he’d left. I had not felt it since his death. I feel it now and ‘tis a curse. I would rather fancy that he’d kept it.

~CRACK!~ The pain is irrelevant even as I feel another ball pierce my flesh. I am falling and I cannot bring myself to scream. I’ve failed you! The ground greets me cruelly. Wetness is on my hands and copper, in my mouth. It surges up my throat and steals my breath so I cannot even curse the men who’ve done this, who’ve twice thwarted and wronged me. They’ve stolen my love and stolen my revenge. And they call me a brigand.

Do you wait for me, still, my love? I would greet you free of guilt. I would look you in those blue-fire eyes and have you know that you were avenged. Wait for me, my bonny one. Wait.

�

�

[Still of a winter’s night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,]

[When the moon is a ghostly galleon, tossed upon the cloudy seas,]

[When the road is a ribbon of moon light over the purple moor,]

[A Highwayman comes riding,]

[Riding, riding,]

[A Highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.]

�

�

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~<@>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

�

Sage awoke with a start and found himself lost in a sea of blue. He blinked the haze from his vision and realized that the blue was Ryou’s eyes, wide and startled and hovering a foot above him.

"You fell asleep on the couch," Ryou said softly, as though that explained why he should be poised over Sage’s head in the dark. "I came in to watch the storm and saw you. I thought you might be cold." He stepped back looking guilty, and maybe a little disappointed, too. "I didn’t mean to wake you."

Sage looked and saw the blanket Ryou held in his hands. He’d been in the process of draping it over his sleeping form when Sage had awakened. Again Sage blinked, disoriented and off-balanced by the strange dream he’d had. Visions of him dressed in velvet frock coats with white, frilly lace at his wrists and throat, and of Ryo and then himself splattered in blood, came unbidden to his mind. He shuddered and ran a hand over his face.

"It’s okay," Sage told him forcing his voice to stay steady. "I was just reading. I didn’t realize I’d dozed off."

Pushing himself up, he looked out the window beside him. Rain pelted the windows and lightning licked the sky. Wind whipped the tree branches like lengths of rope, tearing the leaves from their roots and scattering them across the yard. Small sticks and branches littered the ground like soldiers on a battlefield.

~CRACK~

Sage jumped at the sound and he felt a strange sharp phantom pang in his chest. More disjointed images flashed in his mind: a blurry countryside out of some black and white gothic horror film, a stone and mortar inn set in a mist-covered valley, a spray of crimson and the rush of hard, packed earth.

"It’s been like this for the last half hour," Ryou said and Sage tore his gaze away from the fury outside to look at him.

He was dressed in faded, thread-worn jeans and a dark tee shirt. The actual color was indiscernible in the dark room, but it looked like it was red. Like blood. Sage shook that thought aside and focused on Ryou’s face instead, hoping the sight of something familiar would help shake the lingering pictures of his dream. The storm outside held Ryou’s attention for the moment, affording Sage with an opportunity to watch him without Ryou becoming embarrassed and turning away.

He was all bright eyes and cheerful countenance. He held himself back from the edge of the couch as though hesitant to impose on Sage’s precious personal space, but there was nothing awkward about his stance. Whatever slight discomfiture he’d felt at being caught showing Sage a kindness, he’d quickly set aside. His black hair was streaked with silver by the moonlight and every flash of lightning seemed to originate in his eyes. At that moment, he seemed more beautiful than Sage would have ever thought possible.

"I can’t believe you slept through all that racket," Ryou was saying. His voice was a whisper as though he didn’t want to disturb the quiet of the house. "You’re usually a real light sleeper."

Sage reached out and took Ryou’s hand, pulling him forward until Ryou was forced to brace his weight with a hand on the couch to keep from falling into Sage’s lap. "I must have felt safe," Sage whispered. His other hand came up and caressed Ryou’s cheek tenderly.

Ryou blinked, confused by the way Sage was gazing into his eyes. It was like he’d never really seen them before, or maybe like he was afraid that he’d never see them again. Ryou wasn’t sure. It was sweet in a way that Sage usually wasn’t; too awed to be calculating but too contemplative to be dreamy. Whatever it was it made Ryou feel nervous and shy.

Ryou’s skin was warm and soft under Sage’s cooler fingers. He was solid and real, and the ghostly shadows from his dream dissipated like mist burned off by the morning sun. That was all it had been; a dream, but the feeling of relief he felt to have Ryou within his reach was too strong to cast aside as a byproduct of a nightmare, no matter how realistic it had been.

He released Ryou’s hand and brought his hand up to Ryou’s other cheek. Cupping his face gently, he brought their lips together in a breath-stealing, soul-searing, kiss. It was sweet and deep, the kind of kiss that warmed you to the tips of your toes and to the depth of your soul, and they were breathing hard when they broke apart. His face flush and his eyes glazed, Ryo looked down at him bewildered.

"What was that for?" he asked with wonder.

"No reason, really," Sage answered caressing Ryou’s kiss swollen lower lip with his thumb. "I just wanted to."

Ryou smiled shyly. "Oh."

"Watch the storm with me." Sage requested, letting the hope color the tone of his voice.

Ryo nodded then pushed himself to his feet. Sage tossed aside the blanket—he wouldn’t be cold with Ryou pressed up against him—and patted the cushion between his legs. Another smile, this one less shy, more happy; and Ryou settled himself with his back against Sage’s chest.

Immediately, he shifted, reaching under his leg and pulling out the book he’d sat on. "What’s this?"

"A book," Sage answered with a sensual smirk. "You read them."

"Very funny." Ryou flipped through the pages with disinterest. "Looks like poetry."

He said it with amazement, unable to fathom why anyone would choose to read poetry. Sage said nothing, merely taking the book from Ryou’s hand and tossing it on the coffee table. He then grabbed Ryou by the shoulders and pulled him back against him. His arms went around Ryou’s chest and Ryou pinned them there with his own as another flash of light lit the sky like day. He could hear Ryou counting off the seconds; one one-hundred, two one-hundred, three one-hundred, four—until the sonic rumble rolled over the roof above them. The storm was moving away quickly.

And when the storm was nothing but a gentle patter of rain, and only the flash of far-off lightning remained, they stayed entwined. One storm weathered, yet many more to come, they held close the moment of silence, as the rarest, most valued treasure of all.

�

�

~~~~~~~~~~<@>~~~~~~~~~~
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The Highwayman