| Dragonfruit by Bianca The first time Justin saw one, he was thirteen. His mother had just died. He'd been in the garden, picking dried and withered pea pods. It would be peas for lunch, and pea soup for breakfast. "Don't you complain," his father would say, shaking his cane at Justin, "because there's folks that got even less than us." And because it was true, Justin merely pressed his lips into a thin line and ate up. Still, it would have been nice to have something other than water and peas, bread and peas, everyday of his life. He wasn't sure why, but they tasted a heck of a lot better when it was his mother cooking them, simmering them in vegetable oil or peppering them with a handful of the secret spice she kept in the first crock pot on the counter. Justin did most of the cooking now. He had been angrily tearing the sallow-skinned vegetables from the vines, the tentative wood stakes rocking with every pull, when a large shadow passed over him. His head jerked up, his eyes going wide as his eyes caught the backend of some large creature soaring through the skies. He stood there dumbly, his mouth open, until his father rapped sharply on the windowpane facing the garden, his face disapproving. Wiping the sweat from his brow, Justin went back to picking peas, his fingers working faster, his mind racing. He had seen a dragon, a mythical creature. He tried to tell his father over dinner, but he would hear none of it. "You're a fool, Justin," he said, not unkindly. "Dragons don't exist. They never did. They're just some fairytale your mother made up so you'd go to sleep at night." Justin clenched his jaw and nodded, but inside he knew the truth. It burned him even worse than the too hot soup burned his mouth, scalding parts of him into believing. Dragons weren't make believe; they were real, too real to even begin to convince his father. That was the first time. After that, he would see them everywhere, a baby dragon peeking out at him from beyond the stone wall, his curved nose like a beak, little tail switching nervously. Sometimes he would begin to walk towards them, but they would disappear as miraculously as they had come. Other times, it would be a loping, languid one bathing in the pond between the giant oaks. That was in the beginning of the drought. Even the pond dried up eventually, and then the dragons stopped coming to bathe there. But that was okay; there were still others, ones that nibbled at his soft curls and tugged at his pantlegs, medium sized ones that he would have liked very much for a pet. Justin was fourteen the first time he met a dragon hunter. His name was Joseph, and he had bright eyes and a funny mouth that twitched and rode up and down while he laughed. "Dragon hunter?" Justin had asked skeptically. No one but Justin saw dragons. Joseph looked around the town square to make sure Justin's father wasn't around to hear, and smiled, motioning for Justin to lean in closer. "Heck yeah," he said, "a dragon hunter. I'd do it for a living, but I'm no good. The good ones, they can catch up to four dragons a year. The hardest part's finding them; they hide well and they can blend in like nobody's business." Then Justin's father had come hurrying by, his brow furrowed, and Joseph had simply melted into the crowd. "Dragon hunter," said Justin's father over another helping of pea soup that night, "right, Justin. You just keep thinking that." But Justin had lain awake the entire night, unable to sleep. He couldn't help but think that maybe Joseph would like a dragon hunter's assistant. After all, he saw them everywhere, mothers and their broods of blood-red hatchlings crossing the road, great big black ones that ate what remained of the leaves off the trees. When the trees too fell to drought, the black ones disappeared and little green ones started coming by to nibble on the dying wood. Even though he never saw Joseph again, he promised himself that if he ever met another dragon hunter, he would make them take him on their journeys. He didn't tell this to his father, of course. He kept those thoughts inside him, on a high shelf in his dreams. Sometimes, he would take them down and examine them, turn them over in his hands, careful not to drop them onto the hard floor. "Son," he liked to say, usually when Justin began to entertain thoughts of leaving their little cottage on the outskirts of town, "when I die, you'll live here and you'll marry and have children, strapping young sons. You'll work the land, as I have, and your hands will grow tough with work and pride. And your children will inherit the land when you die. There's no escaping it, so you put away those ideas, put them out of your head. I'm counting on you to keep the Timberlake name alive." Justin wasn't sure what good the Timberlake name was. He knew that once his family had been rich; he knew his father owned a copy of the Book of Gold that he kept in a lockbox in the cellar, and that their name was in it. Other than that, they had only what they could scrape together day to day, and even that was getting smaller and smaller. They were calling it the worst drought the land had seen in a century when Justin turned fifteen. The small saplings of lorken, and even the great oaks by the pond, had fallen and shriveled to death on the ground. The river running through the town had almost bottomed out. There was barely an inch of water struggling over the sandy floor. And Justin still saw dragons. He still dreamed. Justin was almost sixteen when his father introduced him to Britney, the daughter of the town mayor. "Daughter of the mayor," his father had said, spitting the words out bitterly. "Once, she wouldn't have been good enough for a Timberlake." In the fields, the dirt, once as black as the darkest night, had thinned and sifted into dust. Justin had refused to speak to his father for a month when he had sold Justin's mother's horse to buy bread. "Times have changed," Justin said. "Times are hard," agreed his father, closing sun-wrinkled eyes. Justin and Britney were betrothed within weeks. It wasn't that Justin didn't like Britney, per se. She was a pretty girl, a nice girl, and she had a kind smile and a serene way about her that put others at ease. She had set up a clinic in the Spears' backyard for patients stricken with sun-sickness. And she did care for him; that much was obvious to him the first time they met. "Hello," she said, peering at him from under the white shade of a parasol, imported from another land, a place with rain and water, glorious storms of it pouring down into the streets. Or so Justin imagined, as they walked side by side down the streets. He blinked as she continued to stare at him with that little smile. "Justin," she said, batting large blue eyes, "do you care for me?" He swallowed uncomfortably, the midday sun heating his skin until he felt as if he were actually on fire. He looked around frantically, but there were no reassuring dragons, no suspicious shadows shaped as wings cast onto the ground. "Yes," he lied. That was all she needed to announce their engagement. They would be married upon his eighteenth birthday. Justin was seventeen when a young man fell from the sky, it seemed, and into his life. He had been attempting to pump water from the well; according to Britney, the river's depth had increased to two inches the last time she checked. It was a good time for drawing precious water. He blistered his hands in the attempt, but managed to secure a bucket of water, a bucket enough for soup for a week. He paused to look at his home. The house's roof was slowly falling apart, the tar that consisted of the shingles melted and cracking under the constant beating of the sun, the door's violet paint chipped. There were no animals grazing in the once lush fields. Even with all the doors and windows closed, dust still managed to coat everything, from the floors inside the house to the food that always crackled in his mouth. What he wouldn't give for a glass of clean, cold water, to drink and wet his throat... What he wouldn't give to walk away from it all. "I wish I were a dragon hunter," he whispered. He had gone no further than another step when something large and bulky knocked into him. The bucket went flying, skidding across the yard and cracking against a wood post in the fence. "What the--" he sputtered, his heart pounding. "Dragon?" he asked, shocked by the contact of another body against his. His father never touched him, never even patted his back. "Not a dragon," said a deep bass voice. "I'm a person, as much as you are." A strong hand gripped his arm, pulling him to his feet. "Thanks for breaking my fall," said the mysterious boy, letting go as Justin steadied himself. He was a few inches taller than Justin, his frame bulkier. He wore strange clothing, a tunic that fell to the knees, dark brown pants that had seen better days. "I'm Lance." He extended a hand that had seen labor, the calluses proud and rough. "I'm Justin." He looked at the bucket with some irritation, but it faded as he looked back at Lance. Lance had a leather bag slung over his shoulder, one hand holding the strap, protecting its contents. "Would you like to come inside?" he asked impulsively. His father was still sleeping; he would sleep through the day, waking for dinner, and then sleeping again, always dead to the world. "That'd be wonderful," said Lance, smiling. He had a nice smile, decided Justin, the kind of silly grin that seemed sincere without even trying. Justin's mother had smiled like that. "Is the rest of the town this dry?" he asked sympathetically, moving quickly to retrieve the errant bucket. "Yeah," said Justin, his eyes surveying the sky. Lance had just fallen from nowhere... He's a murderer, part of him hissed. A vagabond. But another part of him loved the idea of a handsome young man borne from the clouds above. It was mysterious; it was like his dragons. No one would believe him if he tried to explain. Lance was a natural part of Justin's world. "I can't even remember the last time we had rain," said Justin as he opened the door for Lance. Lance nodded, saying nothing, as if he knew Justin were lying. The last time it had rained, there had been three Timberlakes, and Justin's father had been able to walk smoothly, the powerful muscles in his thighs supporting his weight. "Do you want something to drink?" asked Justin, wondering if there was anything in the icebox that could serve as a drink. Lance shook his head 'no.' "I've got water," he said, pulling a flask from his bag. He took a long swig, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down, so slowly. Justin had never seen one so large; his hand flew to his own throat of its own volition. Lance noticed him staring and smiled, again. "Do you want some?" Justin found himself nodding, accepting the worn leather flask. He put his lips to the opening and tilted the container up, fighting a flush as Lance watched him. "It's good," he said, feeling stupid. "I think so too," said Lance, corking the flask and tucking it into his bag. Latching onto a topic of conversation, Justin pointed to Lance's bag. "What do you have stowed away in there?" Lance closed his eyes, lashes fluttering in the silence. His eyes were a deep green when he opened them, pinning Justin against the counter. His mouth, moist from his drink, opened minutely. "Nothing," he said, grinning. "Can I guess?" asked Justin. "You'd never be able to," said Lance. "I don't know if you have things like this here." "Here?" asked Justin, eyes widening. "What do you mean? Where are you from?" That would explain the strange clothing, thought Justin, but he has no accent to speak of. "I'm from Astoria," said Lance, naming some far off country that Britney, with her imported parasols and peaches and chairs might have recognized, but he did not. "It's a place where it rains almost every day. The only thing you can do is either study or hunt for dragons." Justin felt his mouth go dry. "You hunt dragons?" 'The good ones, they can catch up to four dragons a year. The hardest part's finding them; they hide well and they can blend in like nobody's business.' He saw Joseph's face in his mind, the laughing curve of his jaw, and then he saw Lance, his eyes serious and glittering. Lance must be one of these 'good ones', he thought, picking at the sawed off edge of the table. "Well, no," admitted Lance. Justin exhaled loudly, blushing as Lance gave him a look. Disappointment warred with embarrassment; what a fool Lance must think him to be. It was obviously a joke, and he had taken it seriously. Lance was just like the others in town. Justin couldn't bring himself to meet the other boy's intense gaze, instead preferring to stare out the window where two blue baby dragons were twirling circles around each other, wings flapping furiously. "I breed them," said Lance. "You what?" Justin couldn't stop the words from coming out. "I'm sorry," he said, "I just thought--" "Yeah," said Lance, tapping long fingers against the rough wood, "that's would everyone says at first. I take it you don't have dragons in this part of the land?" "Of course we do!" said Justin. "We've got dragons all over the place. In the backyard, and there used to be some in the pond--" "Hey," said Lance, his eyes narrowing, "I don't take kindly to people making fun of my profession. Breeding is hard work. Dragons are rare, more so than ever before, what with all these blasted dragon hunters going out and killing all of them for trophies. You have to keep the bloodlines pure; if you don't, the hatchlings will be an ugly brown color. That's the last thing you want as a breeder." "Damn," said Justin, leaning forward on his elbows. "How did you start?" "My father was a breeder," said Lance, looking a bit more relaxed now that he seemed to realize that Justin wasn't poking fun at his job. "We've got a hundred acre plot that's just for grazing." He laughed, as if sharing an in-joke. Justin laughed too. "If you'll let them, dragons will sit around all day and do nothing but eat, sleep, and..." He shrugged. "You know." "Yeah," said Justin. "I'm probably boring you," said Lance, moving as if to stand. "No!" Justin let his hand rest on Lance's forearm, feeling the soft, blonde hairs roll beneath his palm. "Not at all. I want to hear more." Lance smiled. "Well, there's a skirmish in Astoria," he said, choosing his words carefully. "I had to leave my farm, leave my dragons behind..." "Who's taking care of them?" "My uncle," said Lance, smiling. "He's a fool, but he loves dragons, and they respect him. The king in my home passed away a half-year ago, and his two sons are tearing the countryside apart trying to steal the crown from the other. It's no longer safe for people to live there. Perhaps when order is re-established..." He shrugged. "I can only hope. There is a green-skinned female carrying twins, and I would love to be at the birth. Her skin glints in the sun like she's made of emeralds." His voice seemed far away, his attention on a creature Justin had never met. He was suddenly jealous of the green dragon that Lance doted on so much. "You can stay here while you wait," said Justin firmly. "I couldn't impose--" "No," said Justin, swallowing, "you're not imposing at all. I mean, it's just me and my father on this huge farm that we can't even do anything with anyway, so..." He smiled. "Maybe you could show us how to set up a breeding farm or something." "Maybe." Lance looked unconvinced. "I mean, if you're sure I wouldn't be imposing... Times must be hard, with the drought, and the seers say no rain all summer long." The seers, thought Justin, always said no rain. Sometimes he didn't wonder if they tried to keep the clouds away on purpose, for the people only turned to sage advisors when times were hard. "The harvests are non-existent," said Justin, frowning sourly. "We make our way. Everyone does." Lance leaned back in the chair abruptly, tapping his booted foot against the packed earth floor. "Nothing can be helped, Lance." "What's a good looking kid like you doing at home? Shouldn't you be out chasing girls?" he said, changing the subject. Justin knew his own face was twisted into a grimace of distaste, and did nothing to alter it. Meeting Lance's eyes boldly, he shrugged. "Oh." "So," said Justin, clearing his throat, "if you're staying for supper, I need to go pick some more peas. Want to help?" Lance laughed easily. "There are worse things." They worked in the garden until dinner, picking mountains of the shriveled things. Justin brought them into the house in his shirt, his face heating as he caught Lance's eyes straying to his exposed stomach. As he slowly dug his hands into the pile of peas, felt the toughness of the shells surrounding his fingers, up to his elbow, he felt rich. "Huh," said Justin's father as he made his way down the crooked stairs, clutching the banister. "You picked some of the young ones. You should have left them on the vines; they weren't ready." "It'll make the soup stronger," said Justin, stirring the pot on the stove, watching Lance out of the corner of his eye. "Father, this is Lance from Astoria. Lance, this is my father." Justin's father examined the blonde carefully with one eye, making a rude noise when he was finished. "He'll be staying with us for a while." Justin hoped his father wouldn't contradict him in front of their guest. "Hello," said Lance. He blinked as the older man continued to say nothing, merely sitting down at the table across from him, glaring. "Let's eat," said Justin, passing out bowls. The conversation consisted mostly of Justin trying to draw his father out of his self-imposed shell, and Lance making a helpful comment here and there. The tide changed when Lance began to reminisce on the things he had left behind. Justin's father always had lived in the past. "God, what I miss the most, though," said Lance, "is the orchard. I mean, an orchard the size of a grazing field, with apple trees, cherry trees, peaches, grapes everywhere you look, just bright color and wax skin clouding your sight until you can't think straight." "We haven't had enough rain for fruit in fifteen years," said Justin's father, staring out the window at their little garden. "The drought's changed everything." "I've never eaten an apple," said Justin suddenly. He felt his father's reproachful glare on his back. You weren't supposed to bemoan your own fate; you were better off than most folk. Justin put down his spoon and stood. "I'm not hungry any longer," he announced, and stalked from the kitchen, not caring what Lance thought or what his father thought. He sat on the steps of the back door and watched the stars in their milky clouds. Everywhere he looked, there was life. Even the heavens could arrange themselves into some semblance of natural order, but here, where the mortals ate and slept and died, the skies were too good for them. He felt spited. "Want to tell me what that was about?" Lance was there, without warning, and in the blackness of night, a comet streaked across the sky. "Justin?" He took a deep breath, drinking in dust and the sorrow. He was drowning it in. "I'm to live here the rest of my life." He heard a soft skittering under the boards of the stairs, and sighed. A small dragon, perhaps, its tail upright and scraping against the wood. "Is that a bad thing?" He turned, about to give this stranger a piece of his mind, this stranger who bred dragons and lived in a far away place, Astoria, Astoria that Justin couldn't even conceive of, nor touch. He had no right, not with everything that he had that Justin didn't, to come and judge. Lance's eyes were solemn, two polished stones embedded in a body of human flesh. It seemed that the body paled in comparison to those refractions, that he was a golem and the runes were his eyes, not any scratched symbols. She had looked the same way when she died. "Come back inside?" Lance held out a hand, his palm callused like Justin's. He had known that before, of course, but not to the extent of seeing his mother in his face. "Okay." Lance's fingers curled around his, and warmth spread through his belly. "Is my father done eating yet?" He nodded. "He's retired for the night. Poor man," he murmured. "You got a place for these old bones to rest?" Justin poked his side, feeling a shiver run through him as he connected with solid muscle. "You're not that old yet," said Justin, rolling his eyes. "Follow me." He gave the spare bedroom to Lance. "We would have rented it out," said Justin, fumbling with a candle he'd stolen from the kitchen as he tried to lift the latch with the same hand, "but you know... No work, no tenants." Lance nodded. "I understand. It's much better than what I had before," said Lance, chuckling a bit. He turned to Justin, and he felt his breath catch in his throat. Lance's eyes shone brightly over the pallid light thrown by the candle flame. He felt a fleeting touch on his back, running over his spine, and started forward, nearly burning Lance in the process. "Careful." The older boy rested one hand on Justin's hip, steadying him, shocking him into stillness. "Good night," he said, moving to close the door. "Good night." Justin made his way back to his room, snuffing out the candle after he lay in bed. The moon slid one leg in through the window, teasing him with glimpses of dragons, flying across its full face. -- The next morning, he found himself roused by a hand shaking his shoulder, the scent of strange sweetness invading his senses. "Huh?" he muttered, batting the hand away, and turned over in his bed. God, it was too early... "Justin, get up," said a deep voice that boomed through him, as if forging his body. "I'm going to watch the clouds. Want to come?" Recognizing Lance's presence, Justin lifted his head from his pillow, squinting his eyes. Sleep won out over curiosity. "Come back later." Lance hesitated, then said, "Your father says that clouds like this are rare. We might get some rain this afternoon, since his arthritis is acting up." Justin shot out of bed, wiping his streaming eyes on the back of his hand. Rain! The word meant everything Lance had that Justin didn't. "Holy crap," he said, throwing the covers aside. "Holy crap." Lance grinned, the corners around his green eyes crinkling like the cloth he had seen his mother folding one day, just bolts of plain cotton, the fabric creasing and peaking in insubstantial mountains. "A good breeder," he said, "can see things in the clouds." "Really?" Justin hunted around for his shoes, finally going to his knees and sticking his hand under his bed. There were all sorts of creepy things under his bed, and he only looked there as a last resort. Shaking off the feeling that a spider had just crawled over his fingers, he pulled out his boots and stuffed his feet into them. "I'll show you, if you want," said Lance. They went through the kitchen and into the dirt fields. No grass had grown there for years, but as he lay on his back, staring into the endless blue of the sky, he could imagine that the fields grew up all around them, shielding them from the rest of the world. "Look!" Lance pointed to a small clump of white, like a burst of cotton hanging from a plant. "It's a dagger-nosed one. They're dangerous, hard to tame. You have to find them when they're really young, or else they'll peck your eyes out. That's just their instinctive way." "Damn," breathed Justin. "Have you ever...caught one?" "No," said Lance, folding his arms behind his head. "Their skin is almost as hard as diamonds; the only way you can get close to the young is if the mother's dead, and dagger-nosed dragons only die from old age." "How long do dragons live?" "Longer than humans, that's for sure," laughed Lance. "They'll be here when we're just dust in the wind. I sometimes wonder if they don't know that. Sometimes, when I'm feeding them or rubbing oil into their scales, they look at me and I just *know* they're thinking, 'Insignificant human!' But oh well." Justin laughed with Lance, unconsciously curling his body around the sound. "What do you feed them?" All his attempts to bribe the baby dragons into the open with food had failed. "Blood," said Lance. "Blood!" Justin sat up, eyes wide. "What kind of blood?!" Lance pressed a hand to Justin's stomach, pushing him back to the ground. "Chicken blood, mostly. I guess it's just another reminder that they're still animals," he said after a moment. "As we are." He looked at Justin through his lashes, and the curly-haired boy's stomach did flips. "No matter how sweet they seem, they're primitive creatures in the end, and they can kill you quicker than anything." "Whoa." Justin shook his head. "I never thought that." "Look!" Lance smiled. "See? That cloud's a dragon, a female one. She looks like she's carrying one of her young in her claws. That's how they do things, you know. Mother dragons are very protective of their young. Dragons love easily and for forever; they mate for life." He sighed. "I'm going to take it as a sign that the green one's doing fine." "I don't believe in such signs," said Justin, then regretted it as Lance frowned. "I'm sure she's all right anyway," he added quickly. "You've had a hard life, haven't you?" Justin blushed under his intense scrutiny. "No, don't be modest. You're far too old for your own good." Hoping to take attention away from his burning face, Justin punched his arm affectionately. "Yeah, well, how old are you?" he retorted. "I'll be nineteen in a Goddess's plowshare," he said. Justin laughed at the colloquialism. "And you look twenty six, but I'd bet you're not a day over eighteen." "Seventeen," he said, tentatively resting his head on Lance's shoulder. "I'm seventeen. I'll be married when I'm eighteen..." To Britney. She was a good girl. Lance started, and Justin felt like kicking himself. Why'd you go and say that? he thought, wanting to look at Lance's expression, but afraid to. You might as well already be married for all he cares. "You love her?" asked Lance, his voice blank. "No," said Justin. It felt good to finally say it aloud. "I've never loved anyone." Lance raised a single, perfectly arched eyebrow. It reminded him of the old bridge over the river that had been taken down when the water level dropped to a foot. "Never loved anyone, or *loved* anyone?" Justin shook his head. "I'll be damned." Lance traced absent designs on the big muscle in his arm. Justin prayed that he didn't notice the shivers that wracked his body. "Maybe you're just like a dragon. Waiting for the right person." Justin smiled. Lance helped him with his chores, carrying the bucket to and from the river. It had gotten, despite his father's forecast of rain, significantly lower. Justin groaned as he saw Britney crossing the road to him, magnificent in her white taffeta gown and parasol. "There's Britney," he said, pasting a polite smile on his face. Somehow, having Lance next to him made him feel less intimidated by her money and her smile. "Justin," she said, turning her face to him. "I haven't seen you around town in a while." He shrugged, offering no explanation. "And who's your friend, here?" "I'm Lance." She shook his hand gingerly, as if afraid his tanned skin and commoner demeanor--imagine, introducing *oneself* instead of waiting for one's companion to do it--would rub off on her. "We were just going, right, Justin?" "Right," said Justin, grinning at Lance, "we were." -- It hadn't come out the way Justin had secretly hoped. In his mind, he revealed, in a flash of thunder and lightning, that he saw dragons. Lance, in a fit of insuppressible desire and longing, would sweep him into his arms and-- He blushed, turning his face into his pillow. If he kept that kind of thinking up, he'd never be able to face Lance. He was dreaming on borrowed time. Britney had already sent invitations out to the townspeople, on white-bordered paper, in black calligraphy. He felt like a fool spending her money on their wedding when there were people starving in the streets, weathered by sun sickness, diseased by despair. He learned something new from Lance every day. He learned how to take care of a dragon sick with separation sickness, a disease that plagued the young, those newly separated from their mother. "You have to bathe them in warm water," said Lance as they walked along the border of the Timberlake's lands, balancing on the old stone wall. "Then, you feed them dragonfruit." Dragonfruit. The word was ominous, and beautiful. Justin had an image of red juice, slowly leaking from a thick pulp... "Who taught you all this stuff?" asked Justin, amazed. A red dragon skittered across his foot; he resisted the urge to blurt out his secret. "And how do you remember it all?" "My da," said Lance, "loved dragons. Maybe more than he loved my mother." Justin wanted to comfort him, but he wasn't sure how, or if it was even appropriate. At least, he thought, my father always loved her. "As for remembering it..." He tapped his finger against Justin's temple, the pressure of his skin against Justin's intolerable. "You remember your mother, right?" Justin stiffened. "My mother--" he began, but Lance cut him off with a kiss, his mouth soft and moist. He floundered at first, his arms plastered to his sides, but as the kiss deepened, Lance's tongue gently stroked his, and he forgot everything: his name, the stubborn trees that had refused to die that shaded their kiss, his father, Britney, the wedding, the farm. It dripped away, and all that was left was sweet. Then Lance pulled away, unwinding his arms, and Justin relearned quickly in the first harsh breath of air. "You remember what you love. I love dragons. You loved your mother." Lance tweaked his nose like a parent would do to an amusing child, and Justin felt like a fool for kissing back. He felt like an even larger fool when at dinner, his father, drunk on a bottle of wine Lance had produced from his magic shoulder bag, declared, "Justin thinks he sees dragons! Dragons, everywhere!" his father ranted, laughing brokenly. "If only he'd see something useful. Rain, maybe, but no, he's got his fool dreams. Probably thinks you're a dragon hunter. Probably thinks you're...I don't know, here to take him away, ride him off into the sunset." He snorted. "Can you imagine riding a little two-bit thing like him? Ha!" He took a deep drink from the bottle, his lips stained purple. "Dragons!" "Father," said Justin, struggling to pull the pieces of his dignity together, "I think you'd best go to bed." "You're probably right, son." His father wiped away a tear that had leaked from his eye. "But then, you're always right now, aren't you? Good night, Justin." He stumbled up the stairs, his hollow laughter trailing down to them on a summer's breeze. "Justin--" He stood abruptly, shoving the dishes into the sink. He'd do them in the morning; at that moment, he couldn't bare to look Lance in the eye. His father was right; Justin was just a foolish little boy. He took a deep breath, and looked around the kitchen, at the bare walls, the cobwebs in the uppermost corners of the ceiling. This was his home. 'I'm going to die here.' "I'm going to bed," he said, turning his back on Lance. "Good night." Even as he rounded the corner, shutting the door firmly, he hoped that the dragon breeder would come after him, ready to ply his affection with more of those sugar-flavored kisses and more of his tales of dragons. When it became obvious that Lance was not coming, he closed his eyes. He didn't want to see the dragons flying over the moon. They reminded him of painful things. Did she ever wish to die? Justin turned on his side, remembering a conversation he had heard between Britney and her full-bellied father. He would never have stooped to listening, except he heard his name. "It's a shame about Justin's mother, though," Britney was saying. For a moment, anger and relief warred in him. How callously she spoke of his mother's death, as if she were nothing but a sand flea and he were a boy permanently crippled by the lack of a mother. How kind of her to deign to pity him. "I heard," said her father, using that dinner table whispery voice that all rich men use when speaking of other's misfortunes, "that she just couldn't stand living in the country any longer." "Father!" The clatter of silverware against a table built on the taxes of the town. "What are you saying?" "I'm just saying," he said, his voice muffled, his mouth stuffed with the fifth plate of a seven course meal, "sometimes death is the only way out. I heard she went to the old healer the day before she passed away and bought ground apple seed powder and snake venom." "Apples, Father?" "You know, those things we had for your birthday last year, straight out of Imperia." There was a prideful not in that voice, proud of the fact that they could afford apples and others could not. Justin knew, then, that Mayor Spears would never do anything to help the poor, not if it meant raising them up out of poverty. Aid from that family came with a heavy debt. Justin wondered what his debt would be. Then the conversation turned to other things, and Justin's father came out of his meeting with Britney's mother about their wedding. He had been sixteen. For supper on his birthday, they had a loaf of bread the baker had given them for free. Justin wondered what was so special about apple seeds powder, if they killed quickly. He concentrated on his feet, putting them to bed, numbing them. He wondered if death began at the very tips of one's feet, spreading upward, merging together at the crush of the thighs, or if it was very sudden. He wondered if snake venom hastened the process along. He was almost disappointed when he woke in the morning. It had been a half-sickle since they had been to the baths. Justin's father's arthritis was again acting up, and he hoped the soak in the hot springs would help. He wanted to ask Lance if he thought it was because rain was coming, or because Justin's father was dying. But Justin was still technically angry at Lance, so he said nothing. They took the old cart, hitching up the old pony. She was generally only good for pulling the Timberlake family into town, and even then, she required a half-day's rest before she was able to take them home. Justin's father fell asleep, lulled by the feel of the cart rising and falling with the pony's wide steps. "Justin," said Lance, "are you angry at me?" He held his shoulder bag in his lap, the leather grown thin with the heat and the dust. If Justin looked hard enough, he could see lumpy shapes in the bottom of it. More bottles of wine? he thought bitterly. "No," he lied, and stared off into space. The bathhouses were empty; it was a Timberlake peculiarity, Justin suspected, that inclination towards bathing. "The devil to washing," Mayor Spears had been quoted as saying on more than one occasion. "Spreads disease." The bathhouses had been a place of decadence, of marble tiling and gold trim. When hard times came about, Justin remembered his father telling him how robbers had stolen the copper piping, scraped off the gold paint, and stolen the small statues by the doors that traditionally held bars of soap. "Once," his father said, "there were showers rigged in there. Bastards had to go and ruin it." Now, the bathing houses were merely holes in the ground, built over a large spring of hot salt water. Justin often wondered why Mayor Spears didn't have the women boil the salt out of the water for drinking, but the one time he had proposed the idea to his father, he had been shushed harshly. "I'll wait," said Justin, unable to stand the thought of sitting naked in a pool of warm water, knowing that Lance was only feet away from him. "I'm going to go look at the teapots in Grimm's store, okay?" Without waiting for an answer, he ran out of the bath houses, his heart thudding in his chest, his pants growing tighter with every passing moment. "Stupid," he told himself, untucking his shirt so it hung over his arousal. "So stupid, Justin." Grimm's store wasn't open; he was at lunch. Rolling his eyes, he settled down beneath the Great Oak, one of the last trees left standing in the town, beneath the skeleton branches with no leaves, and slept. He felt a boot against his spine and jerked away. "Huh?" His father, his thin hair a bit damp, jerked his head toward the bathhouse. "Oh," he said, wobbling as he got to his feet. The town square was mostly deserted, the dirt and grime forcing people inside. He felt the heat sticking to his skin as he stood in front of the two stalls. Which one was vacant, and which one held Lance, patches of knee and thigh peeking out of the bubbling water? Justin was about to pull the door of the bathhouse open when it opened on its own. Lance stood in the doorway, steam rolling off his heated body, long swathes of pale skin above and below his waist, where his clothing was strategically held. "Lance," breathed Justin, running a hand through his curls, "I..." He couldn't take his eyes from the older boy, from the droplets of water than trickled seamlessly down his collarbone and shoulder, forking over one pink nipple. "Shh," said Lance as he pulled Justin inside the bathhouse, and shut the door. -- It was that night, lying sated against Lance's chest in Justin's bed, his hand kneading the smooth flesh, that he posed the question. It wasn't really a question, but a quiet request that Lance could turn down. If he were lucky, Lance would not feel obliged to take him there. That would be as bad as Justin living on the farm for his father. "Lance," said Justin speculatively, "are you going to show me your breeding farm? I'd love to see it. I mean, I could help you out and stuff." Lance's head came off the pillow suddenly, his eyes panicky. "What's wrong?" asked Justin, gripping his lover's wrist tightly. "Lance..." The blonde slid from his bed, his naked body pale in the milky light. "Justin..." "You see dragons?" Lance made the question sound as if it had life and death implications. "Justin? Do you really?" His voice was hoarse, as if he were weeping for some death, as yet unnamed. "Yes," said Justin. Lance froze as if struck, then turned round. His eyes were wild, his hair disheveled from all the times Justin had run his lazy fingers through the thickness of it. Justin too sat up, wincing as his slightly sore body reminded him that it wasn't only his hair that was thick. "Justin," said Lance, his name a plea. "Whatever you want me to do," said Justin, his nipple pebbling as Lance kneeled beside him, his lips barely brushing the tip of it. "I'll do anything." I will, he told himself, his eyes, magnetized and polarized by the sudden movement from child to adult in a single night, moving to the moon. For the first time, he understood its laughing face, the grinning like a bleached skull. His hands held Justin's waist as if he were a delicate straw stalk about to bend double and break into little tube pieces. "Justin," he said, his kisses dotting the eyes and crossing his chest with a tease tongue. "God..." And when Lance moved inside him again, his hips giving an exploratory thrust, Justin closed his eyes and saw *them* painted on his eyelids, Britney with her parasol, twirling in a little girl circle, Mayor Spears and his fat job, his mother, drinking poison from a bowl like brandy from a glass, the trees swaying and falling over, their roots wilted, the dragons that permeated and surrounded his life, their webbed wings stretching, Lance, who whirled into his life with a gasp and a broken bucket, his father who could not bend from the waist down without crying out in pain, and they all built up around him like walls of glass, all breaking into tiny pieces. He breathed in slowly. He breathed out shards of glass. "Justin," said Lance, kissing him once more, "I love you." He swallowed, and tasted blood. -- Justin asked him again a few days later, but Lance simple shot out of bed like a man on fire, searching for a basin of water. "You don't understand," said Lance, kissing him deeply, plunging into the chasm between his lips, keeping the chasm between his two lives permanently separate. -- Britney and her mother invited Lance and his father for tea. It sounded nice and round, except that there were things covered up in the endless plates of thin mints and green tea. Britney and her mother were really just the painted surface; Justin could see that he was really marrying Mayor Spears and his money, Mayor Spears and his influence. And even with the Timberlakes, it was Justin and his father and Lance, because Lance was one of them, wasn't he? Justin was pretty sure his father knew, and he was pretty sure that he couldn't care less, as long as Justin was still getting married. The union of souls was really a meeting of minds, a collision between two things that could not co-exist. That was what Justin thought, at least, as Britney shot him a coy look and bit into her cookie voraciously. "We think Justin and Britney should both be married in white," said Britney's mom, flipping her blonde hair over her shoulder. "It's only fitting. A fairy tale wedding!" Beneath the table, Britney's hand sought out Justin's. "Ah," said Justin's father. "Sounds good!" said Justin, jumping up, accidentally kneeing her hand as he stood. "You ladies are very good at planning weddings. Anything you choose will be fine by me." Britney and her mother stared at him, eyes wide. Looking at her mother, he could see what Britney would easily become given twenty years. The picture wasn't pretty. "Maybe we'd better leave," said Justin's father, giving him what amounted to an appraising look. Justin, in earlier years, had seen him turn that scrutinizing eye on livestock and fields of hay, calculating and pinching numbers in his head. Justin's father said nothing to time the entire ride home. After helping him into the house and putting supper on the stove, he ran upstairs, eager to hold Lance in his arms. Being with him was like sinking into his bed with all the covers folded down after a long day of chores. That was the closest thing to it that he knew, anyway. He'd never been drunk, or gone out with the boys in town to smoke poppy petals, but Lance called him 'intoxicating'. "Can't keep my hands off you," he had said on more than one occasion. "Lance?" And then he was there, pulling him into his arms, his hands tugging off Justin's shirt before the door had even closed, rubbing away the dust from his cheeks. "It was hell," he said, licking his lips. "I ate so many thin mints, I never want to see them again." "I'd never make you eat them," said Lance, already naked from the waist up. "You know that, right?" Justin blinked. "Of course I know," he said, and he was surprised to find thick tears springing from some deep well inside him, long after they'd all thought the ground completely parched. "Even if I marry her, I don't love her." "And you love me." "Yes." Lance pulled Justin in close, his hardness pressing against his lower belly. "Justin, I haven't been completely truthful with you." 'That's okay," said Justin, leaning his head against Lance's chest. He could feel every breath rise and expire, like the moisture of the land flying into the sky, collecting there. Now, he was convinced, they were just waiting for some perfect moment when they would dump out all the rain on their heads. He had a sudden vision of himself, dancing in a flood of tears in the streets. "Justin..." Lance tilted his chin up. "You aren't mad?" "No," said Justin, grinding his hips in tiny circles, "I'm not. I think I should be, but..." Lance's eyes were earnest, clear for the first time. He could almost see through them, straight to the man he had thought he loved, only to discover that he had always loved him. "I've been waiting for someone like you." "I'm not who I say I am," warned Lance. Justin laughed. "I'm serious, Justin." "Well then," said the curly-headed boy, pulling on his lover's hands, leading him to his bed, "tell me what's got you so nervous." "I...I didn't leave Astoria of my own choice. I was exiled. There was a revolution, and my brother lied to the King and told him I was a rebel. I can't go back until he's dead." Justin inhaled sharply, all the blood rushing to his hands. He laid them against Lance's chest, as if he could infuse him with some of the strength he wanted to give him. "I'm a rootless man, Justin. I have nothing to give you." "But your uncle is still watching over the dragons," he said, smiling. "They're still there." Lance nodded after a long moment. "He is." Justin shrugged. "Then what else does it matter?" Lifting a hand to brush the stray mats of hair from his forehead, he pressed a light kiss to his ear, teething the soft lobe. "Nothing matters." Lance surrendered to Justin's demanding hands, moaning as he sought and found his erection. He pinched the tip, studying his lover's expression. "Nothing matters." Shedding his pants, Lance lunged over him, kissing him fiercely, silencing him. His hands went to stripping Justin's pants off, tossing them in a ball beside the bed. The roughness of the straw pallet bit into his back, leaving pockmarks, but Justin was too impatient to move to another room. "Justin," said Lance, holding his face in both hands, his fingers pressing against the curve of his cheekbone, "I love you." Justin nodded. -- The next day, Justin rose from Lance's bed to find his father gone into town. The day seemed lazy with possibility, the hours that could be spent in bed until his father's return. "Lance," he called, "come downstairs. I'm making breakfast." He heard a soft groan, then, "Not more peas?" "No," he laughed, taking out a rare tin of flour. It was supposed to be used only for special occasions, but something hummed inside him, a kind of knowing that today would be important. "Pancakes. My father's not here." Lance bounded down the stairs, wrapping his arms around his narrow waist. "While the cat's away, the mice will play?" he teased, dipping a finger into the flour. Justin slapped his hand away, moving to open the container of oil still left from the days when his mother would stand by the stove like she was handcuffed to it, cooking peas for Justin because he couldn't eat them any other way. "And play we will," he said, snapping his teeth at Lance's finger as it tried to insert itself into his mouth. "Beastly animal," said Lance. "I know." Lance sat down at the table, in Justin's father's chair, and for a moment, he couldn't tell the difference between the two. "Don't do that," he said, motioning to a different chair. It was like...it was like Justin's father was dead and they were happy because of it. Guilt assuaged him with hungry eyes and a rabid mouth. Lance held up his hands, defenseless, and sat in a different chair, still smiling. The sun had almost gone down when the cart pulled into the yard. Justin never heard the clip-clop of the pony's familiar hooves; he didn't know that Mayor Spears had promised and delivered on a new horse, a new home in the center of town. He didn't hear the door opening, crack by crack, pushed by old bones. He was bent over the kitchen table, his clothing once donned and then again discarded, Lance's tongue working inside him with unnerving slowness. "Oh," he choked out, his arms hugging the sides of the table like a life raft. "Oh God." Lance's hands stroked the points of his hips briskly, playing against the nerves that ran over the bone. He came hard into Lance's hand and slumped against his lover, giving the room a satisfied once over. Then, almost missing it the first time, his eyes locked on his father, standing in the doorway, his eyes unreadable in the shadows of afternoon. "Father..." He grabbed his pants and nearly ripped the seams as he jerked them up over his softening cock. "Oh my God..." Behind him, Lance rubbed his back, trying to soothe him with a familiar touch. "Lance, you should go to your room," he said, his voice wrinkled. "Put on your clothes, Justin." Swallowing, he pulled his shirt over his head, relacing the front quickly, looping the string through the eyelets. With one last caress, Lance headed for his room upstairs, his eyes never leaving Justin's. "Justin," said his father. "Yes?" He bowed his head. "The seers predict rain." Justin nodded, stiffening as his father tripped walking up the stairs. "It's over, Justin." He nearly sobbed aloud. -- Lance crept into Justin's room like a thief later that night, and as they lay together, breathless, biting shoulders and necks to muffle their cries, he felt the inevitability of the rain inside him, the wetness between his thighs like a multiplying disease. "Lance," he said, wrapping his arms around his waist, laying half-on him, "tell me about your breeding farm. Even if--" He swallowed, hard. "Even if my father never lets me go with you, I'll disobey him, I'll cancel the wedding. Just tell me about the dragons." Lance began in a low voice. Justin wondered if he was crying like him. "There are four hundred sixty five different known species of dragons. They are organized by color, shape, weight, and wing span." "Tell me something wonderful," said Justin, crying unashamedly. "The baby dragons, when they are sad, they bury their faces into their mother's stomach pouches like this--" He nuzzled his neck. "And where their tears fall, trees bearing fruit spring up. The fruit is like nothing you've ever tasted; sweet as thinned honey, but it hurts the sides of your mouth, too. Dragonfruit." He stopped, and the quiet, the sound of Justin's tears falling, was too much. "Tell me more. Tell me something happy." "When the rains come, the dragons all huddle in a little cave just outside the mountains. It would be useless to keep them from flying there; it is their nature, to roam, to seek other places. They curl up into little balls and keep each other warm." "Something else." "You can heal a dragon with your own saliva, but it burns the tongue..." Again and again, until Justin had begun to drift off, and then he heard, so quietly he thought he might have dreamt it, "I love you, Justin Timberlake. And someday, when your father gives up his hold on you, I will take you to Astoria and we will spend our days raising dragons and feeding each other grapes, grapes that crush and explode in your mouth, straight from the vine. I promise you." He fell into a light sleep, and when he woke, his father was at the foot of their bed. He motioned for him to come downstairs, the wood steps creaking beneath the squeaky hinges of the old man's knees. "I love him," said Justin. The man, so old, no longer his father, sagged into the chair. It was hard to believe that he had once loved his mother. "The Mayor has given me a house in town," said the broken man. There had been a time where charity would have been below a Timberlake. "You would undo everything with your foolishness." "It is not foolishness," said Justin. "He's a dragon breeder. He's going to take me to Astoria, and we're going to live on his farm. There are dragons there, father, as there are dragons here. There have always been dragons around us, but you--" He spat out the words, his eyes blazing with a hate that burned his father to the core, "You never wanted to see. You hate my dragons, and I don't know why." "If you want to go," he said, ignoring the unspoken question, "then go." He lifted a hand, thinned by age and death, his eyes drifting to the stairs that led to Lance's room. Every fiber of Justin's being thrummed and vibrated with joy, making his hands tremble. He looked back at his father, and Justin's blue eyes met his. "Thank you, father," he said, his throat swelling. "Go. I could never have stopped you," said his father, slumping in his chair, as if he had been drained of all his strength. Justin, gingerly, leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his papery forehead, inhaling the scent of grime and too many years working on a farm. Then Justin sprinted up the stairs, using his weight to propel him quickly around the corners. We're going to live in Astoria, he thought, his fingers clenched into fists. We're going to live there someday, but for now, we can just travel around, and I'll find the dragons and he can raise them. He thought about Britney, and her hand beneath the table, and a pang of guilt struck him like an arrow through the chest. But even that was swept away with the memory of his father's face. "Lance, you'll never believe it," he breathed. "It's too perfect. I can barely believe it." He would still be sleeping; Justin would have to wake him, perhaps with the press of his body against Lance's, a kiss dropped just above his navel. They could leave that afternoon. 'I'd do it for a living, but I'm no good. The hardest part's finding them; they hide well and they can blend in like nobody's business.' "Lance, you'll never believe what--" He was shocked into stillness by the emptiness of the small room. The pallet had been neatly made, the quilt folded over a sheetless bed. The window was open, letting in a chill wind that brushed the pale yellow curtains. There was the pallet they had made love in, the promise he had made fragrant in the air. It was all there, but no Lance. "Oh God," he said, his hand flying to his throat, as if some invisible spirit were choking the life from him. '...his Adam's apple bobbing up and down, so slowly...' On the windowsill, tilted at a precarious angle, sat a glossy red fruit, an apple, he knew with overwhelming certainty. Justin lifted the hard fruit gingerly, as if afraid it would sprout wings and fly off into the high skies. The weight of it was unnatural. Outside, the winds stirred up a cloud of dust, covering Lance's footsteps, erasing them as if the young man had never been there to press them. Justin bit into the apple. As he felt the first of the sweet juices flow into his mouth, the tartness teasing his tongue, tears pricked at his eyes. He stood by the window and looked up at the clouds, clouds he was sure he was truly seeing for the first time. 'The seers predict rain.' 'See? That one's a dragon, a female one. She looks like she's carrying one of her young in her claws. That's how they do things, you know. Mother dragons are very protective of their young. Dragons love easily and for forever; they mate for life.' Justin closed his eyes and took another bite. He didn't open his eyes until he had eaten everything, even the seeds. Those tiny black diamonds took root inside him, binding him to the ground, dragging him back down to the earth. The sweetness, in the end, was a poison. back send feedback |