They arrived at Brighton in the early afternoon, and Harry led the way to their hotel, which was near to the beachfront. He was not pleased, upon arriving, to be given a room on the third floor, and for the lift to be out of order. It took him a few minutes to convince him to swap their rooms over, arguing with the young man that Mr Fox was hardly capable of traipsing up and down the stairs.

Initially, he could see that the gentleman assumed he was a veteran – there was something in his tone and the twist of his lips as he began offering rooms farther back from the main reception, at a longer distance, that made it clear he was assuming Alexos was like as not visibly scarred, or otherwise an eyesore, unpleasant to look at.

Harry showed only as much of his anger at the concept as was necessary to frighten the other man into quicker acquiescence, and when he came back to Larry and Alexos, it was to find that Larry was chattering happily away to some nearby friend about one of his most recent books.

“What were you arguing with the receptionist about?” Alexos asked, not standing yet to his feet, his hands loosely clasped about the top of his cane and his chin rested on top of them.

“An unsatisfactory room, although I’ve repaired matters.”

“The lift is out-of-order, I notice.”

“We have a ground floor room.”

“We?”

“The rooms on the upper floors have separate servants’ quarters – these ground floor ones have small adjoining bunks for attending servants.”

“Bunks scarcely big enough to accommodate a grown man, let alone one grown to your proportions,” Alexos said coolly, standing to his feet, and Harry’s lips twitched, watching the other man’s face as he looked toward the desk. He studied Alexos’ posture as he rolled his shoulders slightly, adjusting the set of his hips. “Are you going to be comfortable?”

“Your concern is flattering, sir, but I’ll make do,” Harry murmured. “Here is your key – I’ll go and unpack our things. Would you like for me to run you a bath?”

“Not particularly, though regretfully I would concede I ought to have one before this awful dinner imposes,” Alexos said in an undertone, and he looked down to Larry. “This dinner is at a restaurant, I take it?”

“Felicitus, a few streets over, we ought be able to walk it,” Larry said, and then looked down at Alexos’ legs. “Or, erm—”

“We can walk it, Larry, don’t be precious,” Alexos broke in impatiently. “Felicitas, surely?”

“What?”

“Felicitas?”

“Felicitus. -TUS.”

“But that doesn’t mean anything, that’s nonsense.”

“No, it means, ah, happiness, or good luck, or. Something.”

Alexos made no attempt to hide his disdain as he limped across the hall and began to follow the line down the corridor, and Larry stared after him with an abruptly miserable expression on his face. Bidding the man he’d been speaking with a pleasant farewell, he stood to his feet and walked alongside Harry down the corridor, adjusting his hat.

Ahead of them, Alexos cut rather a figure – Harry had never seen him have cause yet to wear a travelling suit, and its dark maroon wool suited him rather well, paired with a grey hat. Harry was hoping that given more time – not to mention exposure to the young ingenues of England he was about to make contact with tonight – that he might feel more up to experimenting with his wardrobe.

“Something I said?” Larry asked.

“Mr Fox is an academic, Mr Kidd, not a socialite,” Harry said mildly. “I recall warning you time and time again he would not be an easy friend. In any case, he’s not angry at you – he’s angry at someone making a Latin mistake.”

“Oh.” Larry put his hands in his pockets as he watched Alexos ahead, opening the door to their room and going inside – Riggs had already gone with Kidd’s possessions up the flights of stairs to set things away. “Do you think he’s going to have a terrible time this evening?”

“Not as terrible as he’ll make it out.”

“He’s being very, ah…” Larry trailed off as their room door closed shut, and he looked nervously at Harry, pressing his lips together. “I’m not making too much of it, am I, that he’s being rather coarser of late than he was? Or— or cooler, sort of… nastier?”

“Mr Kidd,” Harry said quietly, and when Larry looked at him pleadingly and he had ascertained the coast was clear in the corridor, he reached out to adjust his collar. He wasn’t even making an excuse to touch the other man, either – it needed adjusting. “Larry,” he amended. “That Alexos is being so harsh with you is an indication of his trust and his relaxation in your presence.”

“… Really?” Larry asked, but Harry could see the shift of his expression, the part of his lips and the frankly ridiculous smile as he cast another look down the corridor. “Oh, it is, isn’t it? He’s a sort of grumpy sailor by his basest nature. It’s hardly his fault he lives his life crippled and chained to a typewriter instead of hanging from a mainsail on the stormy high seas.”

“Phrase it like that to Mr Fox, Larry, and you’ll find in short order that he can throw quite the punch, when it suits him.”

Larry cringed, and Harry smoothed down the front of his suit for him.

“Will you tell him, um,” Larry started, and then hesitated. “This lot, these actors, they’re all… I mean, bright young things, the most of them, sort of young partyfolk, quite free, quite liberal, if you take my meaning.”

“I do.”

“Liberal with everything.”

“Yes.”

“You know, the drink and the powder and the body and all the rest.”

“I follow you implicitly, Mr Kidd.”

“Free with the words, too. Catty, they are, with each other and without – I sort of go through it in the affable and stupid manner I do all else,” Harry’s lips twitched, and he glanced down between them, “but I certainly can’t keep up with it – he’ll be able to, though. Say to him that he should, that’s all. He’ll drive these boys and girls wild for him, if he’s mean in the right way.”

Harry considered the idea of Alexos being in a room of young people wild for him – Harry really wasn’t certain if he’d love or hate that, but in either case, he wouldn’t expect it. “I’ll pass the advice along. You’re going to change and dress?”

“Mm, and I might sit and write a bit. Should I hire a car to take us over? It’s a walk of fifteen minutes, maybe twenty.”

“I’ll send word with Riggs once Mr Fox is out of his bath. Larry, if I might advise you?”

Larry exhaled. “I wish you would.”

“You really piss the man off when you ask these hundred questions about if he’s certain and if he wants it. What he needs, he’ll ask for – and you’ve seen by now he’s quite confident in asking for what he wants, when he wants it.”

Larry sighs. “I just want him to like me,” he muttered.

“He’s come to Brighton at your invitation, Larry,” Harry said. “He wouldn’t do that for a man he didn’t.”

“Only because you engineered it.”

“Only because he let me,” Harry pointed out, letting a little mild fatigue come through in his voice, and Larry looked pensive at this, even before Harry went on, “If Alexos truly didn’t want to be on that train this morning, Mr Kidd, no power on Earth would have compelled him to board it.”

He squeezed Larry’s shoulder before heading down the corridor, following Alexos inside – he was sitting on a stool in the bathroom, placidly watching hot water fill the tub. Harry pulled the latch across and said as he slipped off his coat, “People will think I’m a terrible valet, letting you draw your own bath and undress yourself whilst I chat with your friends in the corridor.”

“He’s your friend, not mine,” said Alexos pleasantly, and Harry gave him a flat look that made the other man laugh as Harry took up Alexos’ suit from the bed and hung it up on the outside of the wardrobe to be washed, drawing off his own suit jacket and hanging that up on the handle of the door that led into the servants’ bedding area. “Is he alright? Was I too foul with him on the train?”

“I advised him that your cold demeanour is a sign of your burgeoning affection for him.”

“You’re an adept deceiver.”

“And an honest man, when it suits me,” Harry retorted, and as he set Alexos’ folded clothes away into the chest of drawers waiting for them, he rolled his shoulders. Alexos was watching him sidelong through the open door to the bathroom – this one a good deal smaller than the ones upstairs, Harry expected, as well.

“Stiff from the train?”

“Why, eager to do something about it for me, Mr Fox?”

“Depends entirely on where you’re stiff, Mr Sutton.”

Harry’s lips twitched at the tone in his flirtation, at the up-and-down look and smirk that accompanied it, and he slowly strode into the bathroom, nudging the door shut with his hip. The bath was made of an astonishingly ugly blue ceramic, contrasting with the minted green of the bathroom tile, and the terrible décor did little to make the bathroom feel any larger.

As he unbuttoned his braces and Alexos leaned his cane against the wall, reaching to unfasten the front of his trousers, he said, “Larry wanted me to pass on that you should let loose a little with his actor friends.”

“Larry thinks everyone should let loose with all and sundry,” Alexos muttered, sliding Harry’s trousers down to his thighs, but he certainly seemed intrigued by the prospect, looking thoughtful. “Do you know any of them?”

“I know Cherry Flintman, one of the supporting cast.”

“What sort of name is Cherry?”

“A pickled fruit’s,” Harry said, sighing as Alexos pulled his boxers down and wrapped a hand around his already hardening cock, his eyes closing shut as he leaned forward and into the grip of Alexos’ hand. “He’s a very vibrant man, often drunk, frequently imbibing other substances as well.”

“Well, I can’t begrudge a man his substances,” Alexos said. “I was about to ask you for some aspirin to go with my bathwater. Some whiskey wouldn’t go amiss, either.”

Harry considered telling him that aspirin and whiskey weren’t considered advisable bedfellows – as though he didn’t know – but his focus was spirited away by the slide of Alexos’ tongue on the underside of his cock, and he groaned quietly, gripping at Alexos’ hair.

“You won’t be the only addict or drunkard at the table tonight, no,” Harry said softly, and Alexos’ laugh was low and almost entirely muffled by the cock stuffing his handsome little mouth open. “You’ll be surrounded by actors – I can’t make promises, but I would expect at least a few of them will know their Aristophanes from their Euripedes, even in subpar translation.” He groaned at the sweep of Alexos’ tongue into his slit, the gentle part of his lips around the skin of Harry’s foreskin whilst at the same time he twisted his grip and squeezed the base of his cock. “You’re becoming quite the admirable cocksucker, I hope you know.”

Alexos responded by opening his mouth wider and attempting to invite Harry further into his mouth, and he choked with the head of Harry’s cock at the back of his tongue, but he didn’t stop. He’d been practising, Harry thought, or maybe just focusing the power of his keen and dangerous mind on his gag reflex, battering its protests into submission in a way he couldn’t the traitorous nerves and muscles that made up the rest of him.

He choked again, and Harry gripped tighter at his hair as he felt the flutter of Alexos’ throat, and Alexos let out a soft whimper as Harry adjusted his stance, enabling him to lean and turn off the tap before the bath made to overflow.

“Don’t get too good at this, mind you,” Harry murmured, and he sank forward – Alexos’ gag this time was harsher, came with a soft but spluttering keen, and his eyes opened wide as he stared up at Harry, Harry’s cock forced to the root inside his mouth. “I enjoy rendering you somewhat desperate – enjoy seeing the water in your eyes, those quivering lips, that shaking body.”

Alexos’ eyebrows shifted slightly, his eyes showing a bit of defiance in them, and Harry thrilled with it, the way that he had Harry’s prick buried in him, gagging him, and yet still did not want to concede that Harry was the authority in this moment, the authority between them.

Harry shoved forward with his hips, pushing his knee between Alexos’ thighs at the same time he gripped even tighter at his hair, and Alexos whimpered with the weight of Harry’s belly pressed into his face – it had been a long day, he was a picture like this, a picture… Harry didn’t take long to reach his peak, and Alexos grabbed helplessly at him as he swallowed it down, pulling at his thighs, touching his belly.

When Harry drew back, he was left gasping like a beached fish, one palm rested on Harry’s belly, and Harry stroked through his hair, scratching gently at the other man’s scalp.

“So,” Alexos said, only slightly hoarsely as he tried to look casual, reaching across and testing the bathwater with his fingers, “be nasty to the actors, get drunk, have fun?”

“Don’t be too nasty or have too much fun,” Harry murmured. “But effectively, yes. You’re someone different, interesting – a friend of Larry’s they haven’t met before. A handsome, intelligent, well-educated man with no small amount of inheritance awaiting him.”

“A cripple,” Alexos added, lips flattening, although he’d made a face at being referred to as handsome. “A drunk cripple. With no friends to speak of.”

“With at least one friend,” Harry corrected him, “and a mutual one at that. In any case, a gentleman who stands to inherit significant wealth is far more exciting than one with lots of friends to compete with.”

“Oh, so they’ll want me for my insignificant wealth?”

“Teach them cursewords in dead languages, if you don’t know what else to do.”

“I’ve never liked the phrase “dead language”,” Alexos mused out loud, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand before standing to his feet with a quiet noise of pain, and once Harry had refastened his braces, he went to help him off with his shirt and underclothes, supporting him as he stepped out of them. “There’s a profound grief in something like that. Lost civilisation, dead language, extinct people.”

“There’s little an actor loves like profound grief,” Harry pointed out, and Alexos huffed out a laugh, leaning his face against Harry’s shoulder for a moment before he pulled back. “Are you sure you only want aspirin, not codeine?”

“Oh, you and your desire to give me codeine, Harry,” Alexos said, but it was undercut by the mask of pain on his face. Alexos could see Harry’s own expression once the pain receded, and he exhaled as he braced his palms on the side of the bath – now naked, Harry could see the way he was favouring his better side, how much he was favouring it.

“Alexos…”

“I’ll consider it, but the bath will help,” Alexos muttered. “I want to be able to drink, to excess, even. Not to mention to be able to take any other hospitality I’m offered.”

“Have you had cocaine before?”

“No, why, don’t you recommend it?”

“You’ll probably like it better than me,” Harry said honestly, supporting him under his arm and easing him down into the hot bath, and Alexos’ sound of pleasure was much louder now – he took in a breath through his teeth, but the heat of the water didn’t deter him enough to stop him from relaxing back into the water. Once the initial shock of the heat had passed, Harry could see the bliss on his features, the slackness of his jaw as his head tipped back against the wall of the bath. “I… have nightmares. Tendencies to panic at times. Cocaine is no real aid to such things.”

Alexos’ eyes opened, and his gaze was keen as it settled on Harry, studying him intently.

“Shell shock?”

“Not so extreme as that,” Harry demurred, but he kept his tone serious as he took the stool Alexos had vacated, reaching across and running a warmed cloth over his back. Alexos moaned quietly as water trickled wet own his back, and he leaned into Harry’s touch, shifting his position in the water. “But yes. Sometimes I hear the rain at night and I still think I hear gunfire.”

“I’m sorry,” Alexos murmured, idly rubbing his bad knee in the hot water, squeezing at the tired muscle around it. When Harry cupped his cheek, he leaned his face into the warmth of his palm, his eyes fluttering closed as Harry stroked his thumb against Alexos’ cheek. “You’ve mentioned having poor nights of sleep, nightmares. You hallucinate, as well?”

It felt odd, speaking about it so explicitly – and yet sleeping so close to each other, with barely a wall between them, he felt he needed to express it. The both of them had their own issues with sleeping, he knew that, but his could be more… volatile. “Less discrete hallucination, per se, and more a continuation of vivid dreams. You’d know all about that, of course.”

“Your uncle really matched us well, didn’t he?” Alexos asked, raising his eyebrows, and then he gently pulled away from Harry’s touch, beginning to scrub himself clean. “Speaking of sleeping—”

“You want me to tie you down tonight?”

“You could,” Alexos said, pausing a moment. “Or you could simply share the bed with me. I wasn’t joking about not particularly wanting to cram you into a cupboard, Harry – for your comfort alone, I would rather you sleep in bed with me than in that little closet that amounts for a servant’s sleeping quarters… but of course, it isn’t about your comfort alone. I’m sure I’ll be quite comforted by your presence beside me.”

Harry was quiet, and Alexos glanced at him sidelong, his lips parted.

“You needn’t, if you wouldn’t like to—”

“I would,” Harry interrupted him. “I would like to.”

“I’ve never slept with anyone before,” Alexos said. “Shared a bed with someone, I mean. You might have to tie me to the bedpost.”

“To keep you from sleepwalking, sir, or just for fun?”

Alexos laughed, and dunked his head under the water, pushing his fingers back through his hair.

“I’ll prepare your suit for you,” Harry murmured, but before leaving him to stew in his waters, he set the aspirin and some whiskey in a tray on the side of the bath.