Yield Under Great Persuasion

by Alexandra Rowland

Tam Becket did not care for Lord Lyford. On the other hand, gods, the man had a cock on him.

On one hand, the prick: Obnoxious, entitled, smug, thoughtless, impractical, excessive, irresponsible, unreliable, and lazy. On the other hand, the prick’s prick: Long, incredibly girthy, deliciously curved, hard as a rock, ravenous, and roped with veins that made it look ferocious enough that Tam’s mouth started watering at the very thought of it and his traitorous legs somehow kept falling open on their own, despite all efforts to convince himself that he definitely did not need Lyford’s cock to live and that he certainly would not die without it.

Lyford rolled onto his back and put his hands behind his head, which as far as Tam was concerned was some kind of war crime.

Lyford’s cock, still fat and delectable, lay wet and shiny with oil across his hip and thigh. Rake.

The last time, he’d very firmly told the carving on her standing stone that he did not want to be obsessed with the prick’s prick anymore, thank you, so could she please give him leprosy or some kind of other flesh-eating disease so that it’d fall right off and Tam would be forced to move on with his life?

“Anyway, he assured me that you’d told him in no uncertain terms that you were volunteering, so I asked around and nobody else had heard from you, and so his lordship said that maybe you were shy and just hadn’t spoken up yet.

Tam would be forced—forced—to stick his tongue down Lyford’s stupid throat and climb him like a tree.

He hadn’t been in love with anyone for a long, long, long time, and any hurt in his heart about the lack of it had long since scabbed over.

He didn’t think of himself as a prickly sort of person—except when it came to Lyford, who deserved it—

Tam could not risk being alone in a tent with Lyford, or he’d make some very Bad Decisions, such as ripping Lyford’s trousers open and sucking his dick.

He might as well have been Angarat’s favorite—maybe he was, actually, with that beautiful godsdamned cock that was unfortunately attached to the rest of him.

Tam instantly boiled into pointless rage and would have shoved Lyford onto the table and climbed on top of him if the sides of the tent hadn’t been wide open.

“Have you told him to stop?” “...I can’t remember,” said Tam, who knew very fucking well that he hadn’t.

Second, Lyford might be so offended that he wouldn’t fuck Tam the next time that Tam was making poor life choices. This was the more serious consideration.

He does dreadful things to me, Tam did not say. He spreads his legs so I can see the bulge of his cock in his trousers and just sits there making innocent conversation on purpose and being intentionally handsome until I can’t stand it anymore and I throw myself at his crotch. He’s a rake, that is rake behavior, he is Idunet’s own scion—

“I have never liked him. I was born disliking him. He is the worst person alive.”

It would have been more honest if Lyford just stuck his cock in and came quick and didn’t bother with Tam’s pleasure, but noooo. No, Lyford always had to make a fucking production out of it and waste Tam’s time whispering to him and kissing him and fingering him for ages and—and Tam was sick of it, that’s what! The dishonesty of it all!

Lyford laughed and did the same to him, sliding his hands up Tam’s back and spreading his fingers against Tam’s bare skin with a stupid sigh as he kissed Tam’s neck and nibbled Tam’s collarbone like a complete prick who had no regard for the steadiness of Tam’s knees.

“I don’t believe you.” Lyford smiled the saddest smile Tam had ever seen on anyone’s face. “I know.”

No. It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t. Even with his perfect, breathtaking cock, it couldn’t be true.

It was just like Lyford, anyway. Obstinate, entitled, unreliable, an absolute prick.

“Well, no, I do. Angarat told me I should work on this.” “What, matchmaking?” “Something like that.”

He found a nice-looking young man who had the air of a traveler. He was not as tall as Lyford, and not as broad in the shoulders, and his hair was reddish and curly and only the length of a finger, rather than blond and wavy and long enough to tie back in a ponytail as Lyford did.

“You don’t. You come and complain to me that he’s saying shocking things to you. He’s trying to get your attention, Mr Becket, trust me, I’ve heard all about it—we all have—” “We? We all? Who is we all, pray tell?”

He didn’t know whether to rage or cry or run away and never show his face in the village again.

Before he knew what he was doing, he’d flung his clothes into a bag and gathered a few treasured possessions into a box. The rest could stay behind. He’d sell the tea shop, he’d go to a big city, maybe Brassing-on-Abona, and he’d start a new life, and—and he wouldn’t cry to be leaving it all behind, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t—and there would be someone else, eventually.

I don’t expect you to do something so absurd as to appear and give me permission, so I’m just going to take it.” “Go right ahead,” said a woman’s voice on the footbridge behind him. Tam spun around so fast he dropped his bag. He froze. “Bitch,” he said before he could think better of it.

“I’m so tired,” he said, almost a sob, and pressed his cuffs to his eyes again. “I’m so tired,

“Fuck’s sake, Tam, work with me. Kittens and puppies and lambs and calves can be babies, if you can’t figure out how to source a human one or don’t want to. Plants can be babies. It was figurative.”

“Think about the things you want. Go home. Tell people what those things are. Flourish and prosper.”

“I,” he said, just as carefully as before, “am too tired to discuss it at the moment. I am ten seconds away from bursting into tears. I’m starving, and I’m thirsty, and my whole body hurts. I am going to lie flat on the floor and weep because I do not have the energy to feed myself or draw a bath, so I certainly do not have the fortitude to discuss my doings at the moment.” “Should

“I’m sore and mad and I’ve earned the right to behave like a toddler about it!”

“That I should think about not being quite so much of an awful little goblin. Not in those words,” he added as Lyford snorted. “But that was the gist of it.”

“I have no claim on you,” Lyford said quietly—too quietly. “You haven’t given me permission to care about who you choose to pass the time with. You would rebuke me in the most strident tones if I tried.”

“Because it doesn’t cost me anything to be kind, and because you’re an awful little goblin that I...” He fell silent for a long moment. Tam didn’t dare to move or breathe. “An awful little goblin that I like very much,” Lyford finished softly.

“Yes, goblin, I thought you were cute. Why else would I go to such elaborate lengths to lure you into my father’s hayloft and practically beg to kiss you?”

Lyford brought him more tea and a book, and then, in one of the most alluring and arousing moves Tam had ever witnessed, left him alone for several hours to nap.

“I didn’t think it was a day to try to civilize the goblin by inviting him to the table. There’s silverware, but you needn’t use them if you’d prefer to shovel food into your mouth with your hands.”

“I’m the worst person anyone knows and an awful, intractable goblin,”

“Mmm. And a quest is just a dare with a bit more direction.”

He could see the shape of the task he had been set—he understood what was being asked of him, and why. He could have wept with gratitude for it. It was healing. It was a second chance. It was the kindest fucking thing that anyone had ever done for him.

Bitch, he thought at Angarat mostly out of habit, but it was exhausted and defeated.

She looked like a happy little raisin.

He supposed he appreciated (ew) Lyford setting Mrs Hatter and the others straight so that Tam didn’t have to.

“Listen, seedlings,” he said, leaning down to hiss at the plants, since he couldn’t be sure Angarat was listening. “I’m fucking counting on you. I need you to really concentrate and make a giant marrow, giant enough that Lyford gets all breathless and fluttery in his favored-of-Angarat parts and swoons off his feet and changes his mind about not fucking me. Okay? This is a team effort and I’m going to need you to put your backs into it.”

“Tamerlin Becket, do you know what you are?” Tam felt the reflexive urge to hurl himself out of the nearest window to escape whatever this was. “Uh. Good at growing marrows?” He swallowed. “A goblin?” “Favored of Angarat?”

“Pervert,” Tam said flatly. “You’re horny for the marrow. Do you want to fuck the marrow?” That seemed to drag Lyford out of it. He took a deep breath and shook himself. “I do not want to fuck the marrow, thank you, goblin.” “It’d probably still be in Angarat’s domain, marrow-fucking. Plenty of ladies around here could tell you about, uh, vegetables.” “Goblin.”

“That’s not my problem.” Lyford was grinning now. Fucker. Villain. Tam had always known this about him. Cad. Rake. Entitled, obnoxious, evil prick. What a good show he put up, being that sweet Angarat’s boy and going to the morning rites at her henge nearly every day, and having her favor shining from his eyes, and being so generous with pleasure—

Tam felt like everyone ought to be proud of him for not lashing out or escalating the debate into an argument or throwing himself out a window.

Who was he becoming? Maybe it was just that he’d removed himself from the context of his home village and Lyford, and it was now easy to... try on a new hat. See what happened if he was nice instead of an awful goblin. Or still an awful goblin, but with manners.