Chapter 3: Laws and Liquids
The thick scent of roasting mutton and stale ale hit Kiran like a wall as he pushed open the heavy oak door of The Rusty Tankard. Noise washed over him – boisterous laughter, the clatter of tankards, a bard’s badly tuned lute battling against the din. It felt like stepping into a furnace after the tense quiet of the castle corridors. He scanned the crowded room, the flickering torchlight carving deep shadows on faces flushed with drink and the day’s oppressive heat. He spotted Barnaby already ensconced at a corner table tucked beneath a faded tapestry depicting a dubious-looking battle scene. Two overflowing tankards sat before him.
Kiran weaved his way through the press of bodies, the roughspun tunics of merchants brushing against his gardener’s smock, the occasional glint of a knight’s mail sleeve catching the light. He felt the lingering tension of the proclamation coiled in his gut, tighter here amidst the forced merriment. He slid onto the rough wooden bench opposite Barnaby without a word, the coolness of the ale-wet wood seeping through his thin trousers a minor, fleeting relief.
"Took your time," Barnaby remarked, pushing one tankard towards him. His eyes, bright with an unsettling energy Kiran couldn’t fathom, swept the room. "Place is buzzing. More than usual. Everyone’s talking." He took a long, deliberate pull from his own mug, foam clinging to his upper lip. "About it."
Kiran grunted, wrapping his hands around the cool ceramic. He didn’t want to talk. He wanted the earthy silence of the greenhouse, the simple problem of aphids or blight. Not this. Never this. He took a cautious sip. The ale was cheap, sharp, and slightly sour. It did little to ease the knot in his stomach. He could feel eyes on him, speculative glances darting his way. Whispers seemed to coil around the shouts and laughter. Gardener. Nineteen. Like the King...
"See that lot?" Barnaby nodded towards a group of young knights near the hearth, their faces flushed, voices loud but brittle. Sir Gareth was among them, his usual proud bearing replaced by a rigid stiffness, his hand constantly adjusting the fit of his tunic over his abdomen. "Been nursing that same ale for an hour. Bet they’re bursting." A smirk played on Barnaby’s lips. "Sir High-and-Mighty looks like he’s about to crack."
Kiran followed his gaze. Gareth’s jaw was clenched, a bead of sweat trickling down his temple despite the tavern’s relative coolness. Another knight nudged him, saying something that made Gareth flinch violently, his hand darting down to press hard against his groin for a fleeting second before snatching back. A ripple of stifled laughter went through their group. Humiliation, sharp and raw, hung thick in the air around them, a counterpoint to the tavern’s forced jollity. Kiran looked away, focusing on the dark grain of the tabletop. He felt a sympathetic, unwelcome pressure building low in his own belly. The ale.
"Ridiculous," Kiran muttered, more to himself than to Barnaby. "All of it. Over a... a stumble." He couldn’t bring himself to say accident, not after the proclamation.
"Stumble?" Barnaby chuckled, low and dark. He leaned forward conspiratorially, his voice dropping. "More like a royal fountain display, from what I saw on the balcony." He winked. "Course, he’s got silks to hide it. We get wool and linen." He took another deep swig, draining half his tankard in one go. Kiran watched the muscles in Barnaby’s throat work, the flush spreading up his neck. He saw Barnaby shift slightly on the bench, a minute tensing of his thighs beneath the rough fabric of his kitchen boy’s trousers. Was it just the ale, or...?
Suddenly, a commotion erupted near the back of the tavern. Raised voices, the scrape of a bench being shoved violently aside. Two burly men in the King’s livery – Enforcers, a new designation born that morning – stood blocking the narrow hallway leading to the privies. One held a rolled parchment. His voice, trained for the drill yard, cut through the noise.
"ATTENTION! By decree of King Ewan Rex! Privy access restricted! Verification of age required!" He unrolled the parchment with a snap. "Men aged eighteen to five-and-twenty years! Present yourselves for registration only when necessity is demonstrably urgent! Others, state your business clearly!"
A wave of outrage crashed through the tavern. Shouts of "Outrageous!" and "You can't be serious!" mingled with groans of despair. A young merchant’s apprentice near the back whimpered audibly, doubling over slightly, hands pressed firmly between his legs. The Enforcers stood impassive, stone-faced, blocking the hallway like grim sentinels.
Kiran froze. The pressure in his bladder, previously a dull ache, flared into a sharp, demanding pulse. The cool dampness he’d felt from the bench seemed to vanish, replaced by a sudden, internal heat. His fingers tightened around his mug. Eighteen to five-and-twenty. It included him. It included Barnaby. It included every young man in the room not lucky enough to be born a year earlier or later. He felt trapped. The gardens, his sanctuary, felt continents away. There was no escape, not even here, in the supposed freedom of the tavern. The earthy scent of soil was replaced by the cloying smell of roasting fat and fear-sweat.
Beside him, Barnaby let out a soft sigh. Not of despair, but something else. Satisfaction? Anticipation? Kiran risked a glance. Barnaby’s eyes were fixed on the panicking apprentice, a predatory light in them. He placed his half-full tankard down deliberately. Then, slowly, deliberately, he stretched his legs out under the table, crossing them at the ankle. His posture relaxed, a languid slump against the tapestry behind him.
A strange tension radiated from him. Kiran saw the subtle shift in the fabric of Barnaby’s trousers, high on the inner thigh. A faint darkening bloomed, spreading slowly downwards, tracing a path towards his knee. It wasn't a gush, but a deliberate, controlled seepage. Kiran stared, transfixed by the horrifying intimacy of it. The damp patch grew, the rough wool darkening to a deep, wet grey, clinging obscenely to the shape of Barnaby’s leg. The sharp, unmistakable tang of urine cut through the tavern smells, pungent and immediate.
Barnaby met Kiran’s shocked gaze. His lips curved into a slow, knowing smile. He uncrossed his legs, the movement languorous, deliberately showcasing the spreading stain. He leaned forward again, his voice a low murmur meant only for Kiran, thick with a perverse intimacy and a hint of something else – a dark thrill, a challenge.
"See?" he breathed, the scent of ale and piss mingling on his breath. His eyes held Kiran’s, unblinking. "Takes the edge off the waiting. And honestly?" A slight, almost imperceptible shiver ran through him, his pupils dilating slightly in the dim light. "Kinda... feels freeing. Lets you focus on other things." His gaze lingered on Kiran’s own clenched hands, on the rigid line of his shoulders, on the tense set of his jaw. "What’s really holding you back, gardener?" The damp patch on Barnaby’s thigh seemed to shimmer in the torchlight, a flag of defiance and humiliation proudly flown. The noisy tavern receded for Kiran, narrowed down to that spreading stain, the provocative gleam in Barnaby’s eyes, and the insistent, painful pressure building relentlessly within his own body. The garden walls felt impossibly distant. There was no sanctuary left.
The damp patch on Barnaby’s thigh seemed to pulse in the flickering torchlight, a dark, intimate stain spreading through the rough wool. Kiran tore his gaze away, nausea warring with the sharp, insistent pang in his own bladder. The tavern’s roar – the clatter, the shouts, the bard’s off-key wailing – pressed in, suffocating. "You... you enjoy this?" Kiran hissed, his voice tight, knuckles bone-white around his untouched tankard. He couldn't look at Barnaby’s face, focusing instead on the grain of the scarred wood table, the sticky rings left by countless mugs. "This degradation? This...law?"
Barnaby shifted, a languid ripple of muscle beneath his stained trousers, deliberately pressing the wet fabric against the bench. A fresh, pungent wave of ammonia cut through the greasy air. "Degradation?" He chuckled, low and dark, leaning closer. His breath, sour with ale, washed over Kiran’s cheek. "Or liberation? No more sneaking off, hoping no one notices you squirm. No more pretending." His eyes, bright with a reckless, unsettling light, locked onto Kiran’s averted profile. "Everyone’s in the same piss-soaked boat now, gardener. Even the King. Especially the King."
"It’s wrong," Kiran insisted, the words scraping his throat. He finally met Barnaby’s gaze, seeing only defiant amusement. "Forcing humiliation. Making a spectacle of a private...function." He gestured vaguely towards the privy hallway, where the Enforcers stood like grim statues, a young merchant now pleading desperately with them, hands clutched low. "It strips dignity. Turns men into... into animals waiting for permission." The injustice burned hotter than the ale in his gut, hotter than the pressure building relentlessly inside him. He saw Sir Gareth stumble slightly near the hearth, face contorted, a knight beside him stifling a laugh. Kiran flinched. "It’s cruel. Pointless."
Barnaby snorted, a sharp, dismissive sound. He drained the last of his tankard, slammed it down, and stretched, arching his back like a cat. The dark stain on his thigh stretched wider, glistening. "Cruel? Pointless?" His grin widened, predatory. "It’s the funniest damn thing this castle’s seen in years! Watching stuffed shirts like Gareth dance? Seeing the King’s own decree bite him right in the arse?" He leaned in again, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper that vibrated with dark glee. "The chaos, Kiran! The beautiful, messy chaos!" He waved a hand dismissively towards the frantic crowd, the stink of fear-sweat now mingling with his own scent. "What’s the harm, eh? Except maybe to the washerwomen?" He barked a laugh, loud enough to draw a few startled glances their way. "Let ‘em earn their coin!"
Kiran stared at him, the gardener’s quiet soul recoiling from the raw, ugly delight radiating off the kitchen boy. The ethical argument felt like shouting into a storm. Barnaby saw only the spectacle, the rebellion, the twisted freedom in shared shame. Kiran saw trampled dignity, unnecessary suffering, the violation of something fundamental. He saw the stain on Barnaby’s trousers, a flag of surrender to absurdity. He saw the rigid Enforcers, the panicked faces, the impossible pressure within himself, a physical echo of the societal vise tightening around them all.
The fight drained out of him, replaced by a cold, heavy weight. His grip on the mug loosened slightly, the knuckles fading from white to a bruised pink. He looked down at his own lap, at the worn fabric of his gardener’s trousers stretched taut over his thighs. Barnaby’s words, "What’s the harm?", echoed mockingly in his skull, drowned out by the tavern’s din and the insistent, throbbing demand of his own body. He took a shallow, shaky breath. The earthy solace of his plants felt like a dream remembered upon waking into a nightmare. There was no reasoning here, only endurance. His jaw clenched, teeth grinding silently. He let go of the argument, letting it dissipate like steam in the fetid air. He didn’t look up. He didn’t speak. He simply sat, rigid, trapped within his own skin and the King’s impossible decree, the warm dampness beneath Barnaby a grotesque counterpoint to the cold dread solidifying within his own core. The pressure intensified, a silent scream building behind his ribs, demanding release he couldn't, wouldn't yet grant. Not like this. Not yet.
The damp patch on Barnaby’s thigh seemed to pulse in the flickering torchlight, a dark, intimate stain spreading through the rough wool. Kiran tore his gaze away, nausea warring with the sharp, insistent pang in his own bladder. The tavern’s roar – the clatter, the shouts, the bard’s off-key wailing – pressed in, suffocating.
"Enjoying the show?" Barnaby murmured, his voice thick with a knowing amusement that scraped Kiran’s nerves raw. He deliberately shifted his leg, pressing the wet fabric against the bench, releasing another faint, pungent tang into the already thick air. Kiran flinched, his own body clenching tighter, a traitorous warmth blooming low in his belly alongside the sharp ache. "Or just admiring the view?"
"Shut up," Kiran ground out, the words barely audible. He pressed his thighs together under the table, a futile attempt at control. Every laugh, every clatter, every shouted order felt like a hammer blow against his resolve. He stared at the sticky rings on the table, the grain of the scarred wood blurring. The earthy scent of loam and blooming jasmine from the castle gardens felt like a memory from another life. Here, it was sweat, roasting fat, spilled ale, fear, and now, underneath it all, the sharp, undeniable ammoniac scent radiating from Barnaby. His sanctuary was gone. The decree, the guards, Barnaby’s… demonstration… it felt like walls closing in.
A fresh wave of panic surged as a young blacksmith near the bar doubled over with a strangled groan, hands clamped between his legs. "Please!" he gasped towards the impassive Enforcers blocking the privy hall. "I can't...!" One Enforcer glanced at his list, then shook his head curtly, pointing towards a growing cluster of tense, shifting young men near the kitchen door – the designated ‘holding area’. The blacksmith stumbled towards them, face crimson, a dark patch already blooming rapidly on his leather apron. A ripple of tense laughter, laced with schadenfreude and shared dread, followed him. Kiran squeezed his eyes shut.
"See?" Barnaby whispered, leaning so close Kiran felt the warmth of his breath, smelled the ale and something else, something primal clinging to him. "Fighting it just makes it worse. Hurts more." His hand brushed Kiran’s clenched fist resting on the tabletop, a fleeting, deliberate contact that sent a jolt through Kiran’s rigid frame. "Just… let it happen. Like breathing out." Barnaby’s eyes were dark pools in the low light, fixed on Kiran’s face, waiting. "What’s dignity worth here? Right now? In this?" He gestured vaguely at the fraught tableau around them. "Just… let go."
The words hit Kiran like a physical blow. Let go. It wasn't an invitation; it felt like a command from the absurdity itself, echoed by the agonized faces around him, by the relentless pressure building to an unbearable crescendo inside him. He felt a tremor start deep in his core, a shudder he couldn't suppress. He tried to clamp down, muscles straining, tendons standing out in his neck. A bead of sweat traced a cold path down his temple. The tavern noise seemed to warp, stretching and thinning into a high-pitched whine inside his skull. He saw Barnaby’s smirk, the damp stain on the bench, the Enforcer’s stony face, the blacksmith’s humiliated slump.
Let go.
The tremor intensified, becoming a violent, involuntary spasm. A gasp escaped Kiran’s lips, choked and desperate. He felt the first hot, treacherous trickle escape, a searing betrayal against his inner thigh. Heat. Impossible, undeniable wetness. He tried to lock his muscles, to dam the flood, but the spasm broke his control like rotten wood. It wasn't a gush, but a sudden, hot rush, unstoppable and terrifying. A low moan escaped him, lost in the tavern's din, as warmth flooded the front of his thin trousers, soaking instantly through to the skin. The fabric clung, heavy and scalding, to his groin, his thighs.
He froze, utterly paralyzed. The world narrowed to the shocking, spreading heat, the immediate weight of the sodden wool, the sharp, acrid smell rising distinctly now – his smell, joining Barnaby’s, joining the blacksmith’s, joining the King’s imagined scent from the courtyard. Humiliation washed over him, hotter than the piss soaking his clothes, a wave so intense it stole his breath. He stared blindly at the table, unable to look down, unable to look at Barnaby, unable to look anywhere. The pressure was gone, replaced by a vast, hollow emptiness and the scalding reality of what he’d done. He’d yielded. He’d obeyed the absurd decree in the most fundamental, degrading way possible.
Barnaby let out a soft, satisfied sigh beside him. "There," he murmured, his voice thick with something Kiran couldn't name – triumph? Perverse sympathy? He didn't dare look. He felt the warmth pooling beneath him on the bench, a spreading puddle mirroring the dark stain already left by Barnaby. The smell was unmistakable, a raw, biological signature hanging in the air between them. Kiran remained rigid, eyes wide and unseeing, feeling the damp fabric plastered to his skin, the heat radiating outwards. He didn’t move. He couldn’t. The noise of the tavern rushed back in, suddenly shockingly loud, and he knew, with a sickening certainty, that everyone nearby knew. The gardener had joined the King’s solidarity. He had let go.
The warmth beneath Kiran was a sickening brand, the rough wool of his trousers clinging heavy and wet, radiating the sharp, undeniable tang of his own humiliation. He couldn't move. Couldn’t breathe. The tavern’s noise crashed over him – laughter, shouts, the lute’s discordant twang – but it felt distant, muffled, separated by the roaring shame flooding his senses. He stared fixedly at the whorls in the scarred oak table, the sticky rings of old ale, anything but the spreading dampness on his lap or the knowing presence beside him. His knuckles, pressed hard against the wood, were white islands in a sea of numbness.
Barnaby shifted, the bench scraping slightly. Kiran flinched at the sound, bracing for mockery, for the kitchen boy’s triumphant sneer. Instead, he heard Barnaby clear his throat, his voice projecting loud and clear over the din, utterly devoid of self-consciousness. "Oi! Landlord! Two more ales here! The good stuff this time, none of yesterday’s swill!" He rapped his knuckles sharply on the tabletop, the sound cracking through Kiran’s daze.
Kiran’s head snapped up, disbelief warring with horror. Barnaby wasn’t curled in shame; he was leaning back, arms braced casually on the bench behind him, legs stretched out under the table. The dark, soaked patch on his inner thigh was fully on display, glistening wetly in the uneven torchlight. He met Kiran’s stunned gaze, not with pity, but with a languid, challenging smirk. Then, deliberately, he turned his head, scanning the crowded room.
His eyes, bright and predatory, landed on a cluster of stunned squires huddled near the bar, their faces pale ovals in the gloom, staring openly at the spectacle of the two young men clearly soaked. Barnaby’s smirk widened. He uncrossed his legs slowly, letting the full, dark stain on his breeches catch the light as he shifted, the wet wool clinging obscenely, outlining the muscular line of his thigh. He held the squires’ horrified gaze for a long, insolent beat. Then, slowly, deliberately, he winked. A single, slow-motion lowering of one eyelid, charged with a brazen, unsettling sexuality that cut through the tavern’s boisterous indifference.
The squires flinched as one, looking away hastily, cheeks flaming. Barnaby chuckled, a low, dark rumble in his chest, as he turned his attention to a group of older male servants gaping near the kitchen door. He repeated the motion, another slow, deliberate wink, his posture radiating a perverse pride in his own degradation. He wasn't hiding; he was flaunting. Flaunting the piss-darkened wool, the damp sheen on the bench beneath him, the raw intimacy of what they’d both done. His gaze swept the room, daring anyone to meet it, a defiant, almost seductive challenge issued from the depths of shared, imposed humiliation. He seemed to relish the discomfort he caused, the way eyes skittered away from his stained crotch only to be drawn helplessly back.
Kiran stared, utterly paralyzed. Not just by his own sodden shame, but by Barnaby’s terrifying audacity. The kitchen boy wasn't enduring the King’s ridiculous "solidarity law"; he was weaponizing it, twisting the humiliation into a performance, a dark carnival act. The smell – Barnaby’s sharp tang mingling nauseatingly with his own – filled Kiran’s nostrils. The damp bench beneath him felt like a shared secret, intimate and vile. Barnaby leaned back again, picking up his fresh tankard the landlord had slammed down, seemingly oblivious to the dark streaks his wet hand left on the ceramic. He took a long, slow pull, his throat working, eyes never leaving Kiran’s horrified expression. That challenging smirk never faded.
"See?" Barnaby murmured, his voice a low thrum that vibrated through the shared bench, thick with ale and something dangerous. He gestured subtly with his tankard towards the squires still trying to look anywhere else, towards the servants nervously shifting their weight. "They can’t handle it. The truth of it." He took another sip, his gaze locking onto Kiran’s, intense and unsettling. "Makes ‘em squirm worse than needing to piss." He let his free hand rest lightly on his own soaked thigh, fingers tracing the damp edge of the stain almost possessively. "Might as well enjoy the view while they’re looking, eh, gardener? Or..." His eyes dropped meaningfully, lingering for a fraction too long on the unmistakable dark patch spreading across Kiran’s lap, the wool plastered to the shape beneath. "...are you just going to sit there looking like a landed fish?" The implied dare hung in the reeking air between them, heavier than the smell of ale and urine: Join me. Fight back with defiance. Or drown in your shame. Kiran’s breath hitched, the heat in his face clashing violently with the cold dread solidifying in his gut. The wet wool itched. Barnaby’s gaze, predatory and expectant, didn’t waver. The tavern pressed in, a blur of noise and judgment. The choice, as impossible as the King’s decree itself, felt like a physical weight crushing his chest.