Page 8 of Marked Out with Greater Brightness

They kissed each other, touched each other, in the aftermath: moving together, the way they fit.

Cam found lotion, salve, a cloth; and took care of the worst welts. Blake sighed with pleasure at being cared for, and Ash kissed him soundly, with tongue, and then looked up. “I think I see. I mean…that was like poetry. All of it. Like music.”

“Indeed it was.” Cam kissed him, this time: feeling that sweet scholar’s mouth open beneath his demand. “Lovely.”

“Very good,” Blake said, nestled between them, drowsy. “Thank you.”

That might be something they’d need to discuss, later; Cam wasn’t sure about the gratitude, there. Might be a fine line to walk, if their Blake wanted to say it; but he did this for the bracing clarity and the delight of shared desire, and he did not like the idea that Blake needed to thank them.

He caught Ash glancing at him, too. Ah, well, then; they would likely discuss it. Not just yet, though.

He said, to Ash, “So now you’ve done that; you’ll be good at it, I’d say,” and played with Ash’s hair, because it looked like starshine in the night.

“I have done that.” Ashley’s eyes glinted. “I enjoyed it. I think we all did. Though…I am yours, too, you know. And, oh, I love you. I love you both.”

“Yes,” Blake said, half asleep, safe and tucked into them.

An I love you, in this bed, in this home. So many tangles, so many truths. So many memories, and places he’d be leaving, so soon. A fortnight. Fourteen days.

Cam did want that. He did. Just at the moment he knew it more intellectually than emotionally: that same piece of his heart that cried out in dismay at the strange-familiar space of this bed, with those words in it.

He said, “Both of you get some rest. I’ll wake you in a bit, and we can have a late supper, and bathe, aye? We had a proper bathing-room put in; I’ll show you.” And the rain came back, drumming across pointed rooftops and cool windowpanes, behind his words.

Chapter 4

Over the next days, two weeks, one turning point, Cam showed his loves around Edinburgh, and met with a few long-standing clients and patients to explain his decision about the future and London, and began sorting and organizing his rooms, his equipment, his home. His life.

Some of his patients were happy to accept his referral to other physicians he knew—Robert Lewis was a fine doctor, and willing to take on more clients, and Cam spent a pleasant afternoon chatting with him, though an odd hollowness set in after, on his way home. One more loss, or change, or something given away. Robert had congratulated him on the move, on illustrious clientele, on securing a duke as a patron. Cam had smiled, and thanked him, and told him to pay attention to Mrs Bates’ legs and that recurrent swelling, in case it portended worse.

One or two of his patients—the wealthier, who could afford to—swore they’d come down to London to see him, wherever he set up that new private practice. Cam thanked them for the loyalty, and meant it.

The skies rained some days, and on other days hung misty and silver, scattered with light like pearls. The city shimmered in damp stone and iron and old legends. Cam made sure, at home, they always had hot tea, restorative and strong. His partners needed warmth.

Fourteen days left, before leaving. Then twelve days. Then ten. Time, moving forward. Filled up, occupied, like territory in danger.

Blake had previously done some exploring, some climbing, out in the hills; he was happy to let Cam take charge on this occasion, though, showing off the city and the streets, the old and the new. Cam kept an eye on him, and took them on the walk up Arthur’s Seat, cautiously, with a mind to weak lungs and the easiest path. Wind whipped around them, and the clouds raced, white over blue; the grass was green and gold, and the ancient stones sang under their feet.

Ashley, forgetting about the existence of illness in the face of mythology, practically combusted from historian’s excitement; Cam, amused, made a mental list of each monument, fountain, and antique point of interest he could think of, to share. He had not been to them all, preoccupied with work and not being on any sort of idle visiting tour; but he would, for Ash.

He took them to the University, with some faint stirring of pride in it; he took them to see the Royal Infirmary, where he’d done some consulting, though he did not want Ashley near anyone potentially contagious. He took them to the wood-beamed shaggy pub that’d been his and Hugh’s student haunt, to share that space and that piece of his heart; he saw Blake’s smile when he explained the location, and felt Ash’s leg press against his under the table.

He went back to the Infirmary, while his loves were occupied with some of their own work: Blake polishing volume two of the next adventurer’s tale, Ash answering various letters about contributions to a scholarly translation project, plans for establishing that library, the state of the Auburndale estate. Cam told them he wanted to speak to some of his old professors, which was true; he also wanted some advice. He did not like feeling uncertain.

Sitting in Professor Monro’s study—the senior, not the junior; Cam had always found the younger Monro to be careless with cleanliness, and disliked that fact with professional courteous dislike—he explained Blake’s fever, the symptoms, his own attempts with the drugs and tinctures he knew. Alex made contemplative noises, took notes—something new, something exotic, something to research—and called in the specialists in chemistry and botany, and asked to see Cam’s records of the symptoms and progression and attempts at desperate infusions.

He had fair copies; he handed them over. He left with the feeling that he’d not learned much, but perhaps he’d added something to the medical school’s awareness of diseases; he tried to take comfort in that.

He came home, through patchy sunshine like falling leaves, to Blake lounging on the rug by the fire like a wild jungle-cat with a pen in one hand, and Ashley using Hugh’s old distillation-equipment table as a writing-desk for a stack of letters. Cam stopped in the doorway, struck by the sight: so right, so home, so at home; and yet that wasn’t the point of that table, which he’d left bare for so long…

Blake put down the pen. Rolled to his feet, with panther grace. “Was it a frustrating meeting?”

“Was it—no. No, nothing so bad.” He let Blake strip off his greatcoat, with large skillful hands. “Just being reminded how much we don’t know, yet.”

“You know so much.” Ash signed the last letter, added it to the stack, got up. “You saved us both.”

“I did that.”

“I spent some time making an inventory,” Blake offered. “All your books. Titles. Which trunks they’ll go into.”

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