Page 13 of The Elves and the Shoemaker
“Like I’ve never loved anyone.” Henrik swallowed the lump in his throat.
“Such an imbecile,” Elias muttered again, only this time, he pressed his lips to Henrik’s for a gentle kiss.
The gesture was as familiar to Henrik as breathing. He adored the feel of those soft lips that so often stretched to blind him with his favourite smile in the world. The smile he couldn’t live without and that would have haunted him forever if he’d really destroyed what they had. He loved the little puff of air that Elias let out after they kissed and treasured it now, breathing it in and keeping it safe in his heart.
He hadn’t ruined everything after all, and the relief almost brought him to his knees. They still had each other, and they would be okay.
Elias lifted the blanket he was wrapped in, inviting Henrik to join him. Henrik didn’t hesitate, snuggling in as close as he could get and kissing Elias on his neck where he smelled divine, the perfect combination of masculine and feminine that was so perfectly him.
Exhaustion weighed heavily on Henrik now that the turbulent events of the evening were resolved, and keeping his eyes open was a struggle, but he needed to look into Elias’ eyes once more to be reassured that his affection remained there. Glittering amber eyes gazed softly back at him.
“I love you, too, Rik,” Elias whispered, pecking another kiss to the tip of Henrik’s nose.
Eight
Johan
J
ohan wasn’t sure what to do. Sitting on a wooden chair at his dining table, he waited until Elias and Henrik finished resolving their quarrel and the sound of soft snores drifted across the room. The only problem was they were snoring softly inhisbed. And he had no desire to sleep downstairs on a mattress that was too short for him to lie out on.
In the end, Johan deliberated on it for almost an hour before he struggled to keep his eyelids open. He grabbed the other blanket Henrik had discarded when he joined Elias and slept on the far end of his mattress. The elves were wrapped so tightly around one another that they took up very little room anyway.
Johan would like to think he was a better man than to go to sleep with the image of Henrik’s naked body behind his eyelids, and that he wasdefinitelyabove replaying the soft moaning sounds that had floated up the stairs earlier that evening, but he wasn’t in the business of lying to himself.
After Elias had lain down to rest, something had tugged at Johan’s gut, telling him to go and check on Henrik. He’d seen how Henrik was around Elias, and it left him with no doubt whatsoever that the elf loved him. Johan had observed enough people interacting to have quickly deduced that there had been a drastic misunderstanding.
He hadn’t, however, expected to find Henrik having some kind of fear attack. They had happened to Johan quite frequently when he was younger. There were more occasions than he could bear to think about where his determined parents would try to force him to speak to strangers in an unsuccessful attempt at having him overcome his “curse,” as they called it. The endeavour almost always ended with Johan in tears and struggling to breathe. The feeling was so familiar to him that seeing Henrik experience it had hurt his heart and ripped open old wounds.
He was grateful in some ways that the two of them were sleeping up here where he could see them. Johan would have worried about Henrik otherwise. Despite Elias being the physically weaker of the two, Johan didn’t worry about him in the same way. There was a resilience and fight to Elias that Johan imagined would burn eternally; it was something not even the cruelty of slavery had snuffed out.
Johan tossed and turned for a while, unable to get himself to sleep as he usually would, with his fist wrapped around himself. In the end, he settled for lying on his side and listening to the soft, even breathing of Henrik and Elias as they slept. It was dangerous how much Johan could get used to this. How something so foreign could feel so comfortingly familiar only he knew it wouldn’t become so. He knew that this was an exception, and they hadn’t intended to spend the night in his bed, so he promised himself he would appreciate it for the rare gift that it was.
J
ohan scrubbed at his eyes with his knuckles when he woke. Only, when his sight came back into focus, there were two sets of amber eyes staring back.
The two elves lay on their sides facing him. Elias was in front, Henrik tucked behind him with his head resting in the crook of Elias’ neck, peering at Johan with wide eyes.
“We’re sorry we took over your bed,” Elias whispered, but the way his lips quirked up in the corners indicated he wasn’t all that sorry, and Johan couldn’t help but smile, his heart feeling full at not waking up alone for the first time in over six winters.
“Can we make you breakfast to thank you?” Henrik asked.
Johan almost said no, because he didn’t need them to thank him. But then it occurred to him that maybe it would make them feel less indebted, and it would be nice to have a meal he hadn’t had to make for himself, so he smiled and nodded.
Henrik looked relieved. “We’ll go wash up quickly and then come and make something to eat.”
Elias blushed, and that made Johan recall why they probably wanted to wash up right away, which in turn madehimblush. Only his reaction seemed to give away to the elves that he knew they’d been intimate last night, and now they were all as red as tomatoes and avoiding eye contact.
Thankfully, Henrik quickly grabbed Elias’ hand and tugged him out the door, which gave Johan the opportunity to get himself together before they returned.
Johan kept himself occupied by tearing up some newspaper and building up the kindling and logs inside the fireplace. By thetime Henrik and Elias came back, there was a roaring fire, and Johan was less at risk of standing to attention in his breeches by recalling the soft moans of the two—entirely too handsome for his health—elves he lived with.
Johan pointed to the cupboards and gestured for them to help themselves while he left to use the outhouse.
As he walked back up the stairs afterwards, he could hear light giggles and gentle ribbing between the two elves, and it made him smile. Inside, he found them side by side in front of the fire, keeping an eye on a small pot they’d placed on the flames.
Johan poured the three of them each a drink of water and placed three forks on the table. A lump formed in his throat at the image of three place settings before him. In recent years, he’d even begun avoiding eating at his table altogether, finding it a painful reminder of how alone he was—but not that morning.
