"You know, Alexander the Great wouldn't see his lover on the eve of the battle”, James says.
Silver rolls onto his side to face him. The swing bed creaks under his shifting weight.
"Why?" Silver asks, his fingers absentmindedly toying with tiny red hairs that grow on James’ chest.
"He thought it a distraction. ‘The pleasures of the body can erode the mind,’ ” he quotes,“a good king knows to keep a clear head before the battle.”
Silver smiles. His fingers still on James’ chest.
"You know, there are other, less subtle ways to let me know you don't want me in your bed tonight."
He sounds playful and James almost joins in on the joke.
But then he looks at Silver, really looks at him, past the facade of his charming smile, right at him and it’s like time travel because for a moment Silver looks like a boy - small, his eyes pleading.
Is this what he used to look like before? Before he came here? Before he came to me?
But Silver isn’t a boy anymore and his naked and sweaty form pressed against James is he proof of that. He’s just a man who is oblivious to his own power.
Does he still think so little of himself? Does he still think he doesn’t come first? Before gold? Before this war?
And then he remembers Thomas, in whose name all this - the war - is happening and feels guilty.
Ever since his death James has been taking and taking trying to fill the emptiness inside.
He feels disgusted with himself. And he is tired of feeling this way, being this way.
James swallows. He doesn’t know how to fix this.
He has spent the last ten years destroying things, never building. But for the first time he feels like he wants to try.
‘Have you watched the sun rise above Nassau? Have you smelled gunpowder mixed with excitement in it’s street? Or seen the waves bow down to its shores? It’s all because of you, not me,’ he thinks.
"I'm no king” is what he says.
He cups John’s face, runs his calloused thumb over his bearded cheek. Silver’s smile shoots up to his eyes and solidifies against James’ palm.
“In that case,” John swallows, not taking his eyes off James’, “know that I want you to stay”. He presses his lips to the inside of James’ palm.
“Besides, I never saw any point in being good. At anything,” he adds, his smile turning mischievous.
James laughs and leans in to kiss him properly.
____
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