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“You’re a freak, Thomas Barrow,” Billy Wiglet shouted as he and his bully boys cornered Thomas in the alley behind the grocery.
There was a time when Thomas would have let himself be afraid of them, but fear never got him anywhere. You had to fight back, even if you knew you were likely to loose. “Well, that’s original,” Thomas sneered. “Come up with that all by yourself, did you?”
Billy’s piggy eyes narrowed in anger and suspicion. “What’s that supposed to mean?” His pitbull daemon growled menacingly.
“It means,” said Simeon from where he sat perched on Thomas’s shoulder, “That we may be freaks, but you’re just a stupid bitch.”
Billy charged with a yell, slamming Thomas up against the wall. Simeon tumbled off his shoulder and was immediately pounced on by the other daemon. “You think you’re so clever, don’t you?” Billy’s elbow in his throat made it hard to answer, but Thomas supposed it was one of those, what ya call it, rhetorical questions. “You think you’re better ‘n us, but you’re-”
He broke off at his daemon’s pained yelp. She reeled back from Simeon, her face punctured and bleeding. “Cassie!” Billy half-turned to help her and Thomas took advantage of his distraction to knee the other boy in the groin. He followed it up with a solid punch to the nose. Something crunched under his fist and Billy’s nose exploded in blood as he sank, groaning, to his knees. It wasn’t exactly the Queensberry Rules, but what was that when the world was out to get you?
The heavier of the two bully boys started forward and Thomas raised his fists. He’d always fought back, but he’d never managed to bloody them before. He was shaking with the rush of it, quite ready to take on the whole rest of the world. “Well, come at me then!” He shouted.
But the other boys didn’t come at him. They helped pull Billy up while their daemon’s crowded around his Cassie. “I’ll get you for this, freak,” Billy swore, his voice muffled and garbled by his broken nose.
“You can try,” Thomas called after them as they fled. The moment they’d gone, he dashed to check on Simeon. The daemon lay curled in a ball, quills sticking out every which way. “You showed her,” Thomas congratulated him as he straightened out. “Now change to something I can actually pick up.”
The daemon tiny face screwed up in concentration. “I-I don’t think I can,” he said, sounding almost as shocked as Thomas felt at the idea. “I’m sorry.”
When he was small, Thomas had wished that Simeon would turn into a girl so that they could be normal. As he got older, he’d wished that his daemon would settle as something big and intimidating so everyone would just leave them alone. A hedgehog was neither large nor scary in the least, but Simeon could certainly hold his own. “Don’t be sorry,” Thomas told him, stroking his ears. “You’re perfect.”
“Be careful,” Simeon cautioned as Thomas went to pick him up. “Mind my spikes.”
“I will,” Thomas promised, scooping his daemon up. Simeon’s quills were sharp enough, but his belly was velvety soft.
Sarah had headed out into the kitchen yard for a cigarette when she found the new lad smoking, shoulder’s slumped, in her usual spot. “So, here’s where you’re hiding.”
At the sound of her voice, the boy straightened like a puppet on a string. He was certainly a handsome one. The maids had been all a flutter over him the whole week since he’d come. “I’m not hiding,” he said sharply.
Sarah smiled tightly. “Well, aren’t we prickly.”
“We’ve never heard that one before,” his hedgehog daemon said loudly as the boy himself rolled his eyes.
“Isn’t that interesting?” Lugh whispered from where he clung to her collar like a broach. Anyone else with a daemon like that might have tried to hide it. After all, it wasn’t as though you could tell just by looking with a hedgehog. If he just kept his mouth shut, no one would know he wasn’t female like a proper man’s daemon.
Sarah hadn’t seen much use for a too pretty footman aside from the entertainment value of watching the maids chase after his affections, but this changed things. “Thomas, isn’t it?”
He nodded, taking a drag off his cigarette. “That’s right,” he said. “And you’re Miss O’Brien.” He smoked, watching her with an unreadable expression. “Did you come out here lookin’ for me?”
Sarah snorted. He certainly thought very highly of himself. She wasn’t some silly maid swooning over his perfect hair and ridiculous cheekbones. Sarah had better things to do with her time than pant after some cheeky footman. “I came here for a smoke,” she said, pulling out a cigarette, “Only someone’s taken my spot. Now budge over and give us a light while you’re about it.”
Thomas met her eyes and took one last, long drag from his cigarette before flicking away the dog-end. He stood with rather deliberate slowness and presented her seat with a mocking bow. He lit her cigarette with a proper footman’s flourish, then spoiled the effect by using the match to light a new one of his own. Rather than take his daemon and surrender the field, he seemed determined to linger about.
Sarah considered him as she smoked. He held his cigarette casually enough but stood as upright and stiff as a soldier on parade. Did he suppose he was to be graded on it, even at his ease in a kitchen yard? He was as tightly wound as a spring without an inch of slack to him. “I suppose you’re settling in then.”
Thomas’s eyes narrowed just enough to let her know she’d struck a nerve. “Well enough, Miss O’Brien,” he lied with a brittle sort of smile.
Sarah nodded. “So, it wasn’t you I heard Mr. Carson yelling at this morning?”
His face tightened and Sarah congratulated herself on putting the uppity boy squarely in his place. “He thinks footmen aught to have dogs,” his hedgehog daemon groused.
That wasn’t even half the difficulty, Sarah was sure. Everyone knew what sort of man had a male daemon. She was rather surprised Carson had let him in the house let alone given him a job. Maybe the creature had managed to keep his mouth shut during the interview.
“He’s rather old fashioned, our Mr. Carson,” Lugh offered, much to Sarah’s surprise. He normally wasn’t much for talking to anyone aside from her or her Ladyship, but she supposed he had said the footman was interesting.
“I don’t see why he hired me at all then, if that’s the way he feels about it,” Thomas said, his shoulders slumping as the mask of arrogant confidence slipped away. He looked years younger without it. It was exhausting work, Sarah knew, keeping your face on with the whole house watching and waiting to pounce on your mistakes.
Sarah shuffled over on the upturned crate that served as her seat and patted the empty space next to her. The lad took the hint, sitting down and hauling his spiky little daemon into his lap with practiced ease. “There’s other ways to get ahead in this life that don’t require Mr. Carson’s love and approval,” Sarah offered.
“So it’s to be your love and approval then?” Thomas asked with the wry smile. He shook his head. “I’m not the sort to-”
“We know,” Lugh interrupted him. “And we wouldn’t have you if you were,” he said tartly and threw out a line of silk to make a smooth decent onto the other daemon’s back.
“Oy, oy!” Thomas made as if to pluck Lugh up but stopped short of actually touching him. “Mind his spikes,” he warned as the hedgehog twisted to get a look at his passenger.
Sarah watched her spider daemon climb amongst the quills like a monkey in a jungle. “Leave off your worrying. They can’t hurt him.” No, they didn’t trouble Lugh at all, they just made for convenient hand holds. This was certainly going to be an interesting sort of friendship.
Thomas Barrow was positively sinful. Everything about him, from his hooded bedroom eyes to the feel of his luscious lips on Philip’s cock brought more pleasure than one man could hold. “Oh, Lord,” Philip moan. “Lord, I lo-” He broke off with a groan. Philip had wanted this man ever since Lady Grantham’s ball when Thomas had offered him, as shamelessly as a house cat, a Yorkshire thrupence and a glass of Champagne. Just a few days left of the Season and he still wanted him more than he had ever wanted anyone. He simply could not say it, not to a footman. But Philip wanted, oh, he wanted.
“Let me touch you,” he demanded of Simeon. The little daemon sat perched atop Abraxas’s great head and was carefully, yet enthusiastically, rubbing up against one of his ears. “I need to touch you.”
Thomas made a noise of protest, his lips stilling in their work. His daemon trembled with something like fear, or possibly anticipation.
“Don’t stop,” Philip ordered, giving the other man’s hair a bit of a tug to remind him of his business.
Thomas resumed his task but Simeon shied away from Philip’s questing hand. “I-I can’t,” he whimpered. “I want to, but I just can’t.”
“Please,” Abraxas begged. Oh, the shame of it; a lion begging a hedgehog, a duke in love with a servant. “Please let him touch you.”
Philip reached out again, but this time Simeon stayed where he was, his whole body a quiver. Philip stroked his velvety soft muzzle and a tingle suffused his whole being. What he felt was nothing compared to what the touch did to Thomas. His eyes rolled back in his head as he moaned in ecstacy from what was clearly the most intense orgasm of his life.
“God,” Thomas’s exclamation was muffled by Philip’s cock as he resumed his sucking with renewed vigor. He gazed up at Philip, his face a picture desire, devotion and a frightening degree of trust. Philip might as well have hung the moon.
Philip gasped and shook as he neared completion. What must it be like, that most intimate of intimates? He imagined Thomas running his clever fingers through Abraxas’s rangy mane. If Philip closed his eyes he could feel the mind shattering pleasure as his lover stroked his very soul.
“Please,” Abraxas roared as Philip came. They both wanted, both needed, to be touched. Neither could ask for it though, not properly, and certainly not from a footman. Instead he reached out blindly for Simeon and yelped when the hedgehog’s quills drew blood.
“Mind my spikes!” Simeon exclaimed, trying to pull away.
Thomas swallowed hurriedly and seized Philip’s wrist “Careful, luv,” he said, turning Philip’s hand to inspect his wounds. “Shall I kiss it better?” He asked with a wicked sort of smile.
Philip shuddered as Thomas’s lips ghosted across his palm. He twisted his hand free and pulled the other man in for a kiss. Thomas tasted of blood, semen and something Philip suspected might be love. He’d never be able to give himself to Thomas, not completely. This had all been so much easier when it was just a bit of fun.
Edward let go of Nurse Crawley’s arm and took a cautious step forward, sweeping his cane out in front of him. Jocasta hopped along in his wake. There was a time when they had raced across the downs, bounding side by side with the whole world laid out before them. Edward cut a fine figure on a horse, but they were runners at heart, man and hare both. Now they would never run again.
“That’s right, Lieutenant,” Corporal Barrow called from some ways ahead of him. “Just keep walking towards my voice. You’re doing very well,” he added as Edward stumbled on.
He wasn’t doing well. Still, when Corporal Barrow talked like that Edward almost believed he could someday. He had never had to fight for anything in his life before the war, not really, but he was fighting now. Left to himself, he might not have, but Corporal Barrow and Nurse Crawley were in his corner and he wouldn’t let them down. No one had ever believed in him the way that Corporal Barrow did and not even his own mother encouraged him like Nurse Crawley.
“Where would I be without you two?” Edward mused quietly.
“In your bed,” Nurse Crawley said, suddenly just beside him instead of back where he had left her. “Enjoying your tea, I expect,” she continued.
This blindness was a damnable thing. It wasn’t just the helplessness or the way everyone seemed to sneak up on him. These were some the most important people in his life and he had no idea what any of them looked like. From her cultured accent and classically-named daemon he knew Nurse Crawley was of good breeding. He imagined her a true English Rose, fine, fare and lovely.
“Just a bit further, sir,” Corporal Barrow said encouragingly. “We’ll have you in for tea in no time.”
He hadn’t quite settled on his idea of the man. Barrow had been a footman, he said, so Edward supposed he must be tall and handsome, as all the best footmen were. Still, he couldn’t decide if he had red hair or dark. What was he like when he smiled? Edward knew the feel of the man’s hands as he shaved and dressed him each morning, but he didn’t know his daemon’s name nor the sound of her voice.
Edward’s cane lit upon a stone in his path and he deftly avoided it. It was such a simple thing, but he found himself grinning at his accomplishment. “Very good, sir.” Corporal Barrow sounded nearly as proud of Edward as he was of himself. He couldn’t have gotten anywhere without them.
Buoyed by his success with the stone, Edward rushed forward and ended up running headlong into Corporal Barrow. They stumbled back together like dancers, cheek to cheek with Barrow’s hands on Edward’s waist. He smelled of cigarettes and shaving soap. “Steady on, Lieutenant,” he laughed awkwardly.
Edward rocked into him again as Jocasta collided with the back of his legs and bounced off again. “Oh, be careful!” cried an unfamiliar voice. “Mind my spikes.” That must be Corporal Barrow’s daemon, Edward realized, except she sounded wrong. She sounded...male.
“Oh.” That’s what he’d meant before, about being different. Something must have shone on his face because Barrow began to pull away. Edward grabbed for his hand and held it pinned. After all this man had done for him he needed to make him understand. Edward just wished he could actually look him in the eyes.
“It’s alright,” Jocasta assured them.
Edward nodded his agreement, his hand tightening on Corporal Barrow’s. “There’s nothing to mind.”
There was something unsettling about Mr. Barrow, Jimmy felt. Sometimes they got on well enough. Sometimes they could just be two blokes enjoying their tea or a game of cards. But then Mr. Barrow would touch him or pay him some sort of compliment and ruin it all. It gave Jimmy a queer feeling in the pit of his stomach and he wished Mr. Barrow would stop.
Tonight was going well enough. They were sitting in the servants’ hall having a chat and a cuppa, mercifully seated across the table from each other with their daemons between them. Mr. Barrow was leafing through a film magazine in a desultory sort of way, smoke pouring from his nose like a dragon. “There’s a new Griffith film with Lillian Gish,” he remarked.
“I never liked that Lillian Gish,” Jimmy confessed. “Now, if it were Phyllis Dare I’d never leave the theater.”
Mr. Barrow shook his head. “Phyllis Dare? She hasn’t even been in a picture since the war.”
“Well, she should be,” Anthy insisted, going the sort of thundercloud grey that meant she was spoiling for a fight.
“She’s better on the stage where you can hear her sing,” Simeon countered. “Give us Douglas Fairbanks on the screen any day.”
Jimmy was willing to give him that point. Phyllis Dare had a beautiful voice. He’d seen her in The Kissing Time in London when he was working for Lady Anstruther and it had been one of the best nights of his life. Anthy was turning a sunny yellow at the memory of it.
Jimmy sighed. He’d spent all morning polishing silver and his hands still smelled of polish. “I wish I were an actor,” he said. He’d be famous, making faces at the camera all day and kissing pretty girls all night, and no one would ever call him James again. “That’d be the life.”
Mr. Barrow chuckled. “Well, you’re certainly handsome enough for it.” He smiled that special smile he only wore around Jimmy. “If you were in a picture I’d never leave the theater.”
Well, that’s done it, Jimmy thought, his own smile slipping from his face. Why did Mr. Barrow always have to spoil everything, complimenting Jimmy left and right like he was a soppy girl that needed buttering up before she’d let you under her skirt? What was he even supposed to say to that?
Of course, then Anthy had to go and make it worse. “Flatterers,” she giggled, blushing a rosy pink and leaning as close to Simeon as she could get without impaling herself.
“Well, isn’t this cozy,” said Miss O’Brien from the doorway. “Best to mind his spikes,” she advised as she sat down at the table with her mending.
“Yes, thank you, Miss O’Brien,” Jimmy said mechanically, feeling sick to his stomach. She’d told him to keep on Mr. Barrow’s good side but Anthy actually flirting with the other man’s daemon was well beyond the pale. “I’m quite tired now, so I’ll bid you good night.” He grab Anthy and fled from the room before the others could even begin to mouth the usual pleasantries.
“Goodness, I hope I didn’t interrupt anything,” Miss O’Brien’s voice followed him from the room and chased him up the stairs. He ran on, up and up, his grip on Anthy unconsciously growing tighter and tighter.
“Jimmy,” she gasped. “Jimmy, you’re hurting me. Jimmy! Stop!”
He fell back, panting, against the railing somewhere near the third floor landing and slid to the floor. Anthy wiggled her way out of his hand and turned to face him. “What’s the matter with you?”
“What’s the matter with me?” Jimmy cried. “Why did you have to flirt with him like that? Why do you always have to be so bloody difficult?”
She went positively blue at that, but Jimmy wasn’t the least bit sorry. Anthy had always been difficult. Jimmy spent years with people staring at him, wondering what was wrong with him, while she took her sweet time settling. And, when she finally did settle just after they turned 18, it was as a chameleon, a creature so changeable she hardly seemed to have settled at all. He didn’t know why she couldn’t just be normal. Why couldn’t she just pick one thing and stay that way?
“I like girls, Anthy,” he said. He loved girls. He loved looking at them and kissing them and imaging them when he touched himself at night. He liked girls, but sometimes, lately, when Mr. Barrow would smile his special smile he felt...unsettled. “I like girls.”
“I know you do, Jimmy. But why can’t we like both?”
Thomas sat huddled against the kitchen wall with Simeon perched on his upraised knees, their foreheads pressed together. The rain had quite soaked through his coat but he couldn’t bring himself to care. His whole world was falling apart. It seemed fitting that the very sky should weep with him.
“I liked them,” Simeon wailed. “I trusted them.”
“And now we’re ruined,” Thomas sobbed. Ten years good service and what did he have to show for it? A butler who thought he aught to be horsewhipped, an employer who barely noticed he was leaving, a best mate out to destroy him, and a love who hated him. He had nothing and no one. Ruined indeed.
Simeon shivered as Thomas carefully stroked back his quills. “When did we get so soft?” he asked, but that was the trouble, wasn’t it? Underneath all their barbs and sarcasm, they had never been anything but.