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Jemel reaches up and wraps his hand around the flask. He pulls the stopper out and drinks. He is thirsty. He drinks perhaps more than he meant to.

Then he looks at Xan. Xan is staring at him. “Well, Baraboo?”

“I think it takes a moment.”

“How should we fill that moment?” Xan says, dropping slowly onto one knee and then the other, bringing their faces level.

Xan’s lips meet Jemel’s. This time Jemel does not pull back. Xan’s lips are soft and warm. A gentle, persistent pressure against his own. The feel of it is so welcome he wants to weep. Instead, he gasps. He can feel his flesh heating. His heart beats harder. The desire he feels for Xan — has felt for so long — growing stronger and stronger. Xan’s lips part. His tongue flickers out, nudging at the closed seam of Jemel’s mouth.

Jemel parts his lips, greedily. Xan’s hand is on the back of Jemel’s head, fingers splayed, holding Jemel’s skull steady as Xan’s tongue slips into his mouth. Jemel groans, pushing his mouth back against Xan’s as if trying to consume him. He wants this. He has never wanted anything the way he wants this.

His cock is iron hard beneath his robes. He is aflame with desire. All his senses feel enhanced. Is this the foribunda or simply all his life of ignoring his desires for so long?

Xan pulls back from the kiss and smiles, “Jemel?” he says.

Jemel’s voice comes out breathy. “That is the first time anyone has ever kissed me. Kissed my mouth I mean.”

Xan raises an eyebrow in slight surprise. “Really?”

“You think I kiss men all the time?” Jemel means to sound terse, but it comes out as another gasp. After that all he can manage to say is, “Please. Please do it again.”

“Whatever you wish, Baraboo,” Xan says. His voice is breathy too, spiced with his own desire. Hearing that, being able to detect Xan’s own lust in his words, makes Jemel squirm, his want, his need, overwhelming.

Xan kisses Jemel again deeply. Jemel groans. He can feel Xan’s kiss between his legs, as if his tongue is there. On his cock, on his hole. Xan pulls back and kisses Jemel on the cheek, then on the neck. With each kiss Xan is moaning with pleasure as if Jemel is truly delicious.

Jemel shakes as Xan, coaxing him with touches and kisses, lies him back on the blankets and pushes up his robes. Xan lowers his head and kisses Jemel on the belly, just above his hip cloth.

Jemel gasps, arching his whole body into the kiss. The mere thought of Xan’s mouth so close to his aching, straining cock, is intoxicating. The thought that Xan could put his mouth anywhere. He cannot wait another moment. He cannot. His hips jolt up and Xan grunts as Jemel’s loins bump into his chin.

Jemel gasps, “Sorry.”

“Do not apologise, Baraboo,” Xan says, dark and sweet, as he kisses Jemel’s belly again.

He still cannot tell how much of this is his own desire — finally roaring free — and how much is the love draught. But it does not matter.

All he knows is that he wants this. He has wanted for so long.

When Doroth Zain spoke against the use of foribunda in sacred rites, he claimed it did not cause desire, only made desire that was already there impossible to resist, meaning that acts committed after taking it were still sins of the heart.

But Jemel has always known his heart was sinful.

Zai touched his face to mark him as a babe and then as a final twist, made him beautiful. Gelen had presented him to Emperor Selim in his private shrine once, removed Jemel’s veil and declared his face a sign of Zai’s wrath; that Jemel should have been left to die as many babes born with such a broken face did.

Zai had been angry that Doroth Zain had commanded Pershel to save him. And had decided to curse Jemel with a beauty that would drive any man to sin.

Gelen had also demanded Jemel confess that he had sinful desires. That Zai had made him a luxorite.

Selim had agreed with Gelen that Jemel should be veiled and confined to the palace.

Xan pulls away Jemel’s hip cloth, baring him. Jemel can only lie there, panting, half-lost to his desire. His body feels like nothing but an object. A thing spread on the floor before Xan like an offering. A thing that needs to be touched. He whines for it.

Xan does touch him. He reaches out and strokes Jemel’s cock with the back of his hand. “Are you sure?”

Jemel keens at the touch. It is feather light, almost deferent. The only other hand he has ever felt on his cock has been Gelen’s, and those ministrations had caused him nothing but revulsion.

“Yes,” Jemel manages, only finding his voice to speak when Xan draws his hand back. “Xan, I have never been more sure.” He speaks the raw truth. His blood is roaring through him, demanding this, this and more.

Xan looks down at him.