2. The Separation Decrees
The Separation Decrees
Miles
T he velvet box in Miles’s pocket felt heavier than the laws of physics should allow, as if the small white gold ring inside possessed its own gravitational field.
A sapphire. Not the deep, bruised blue of the ocean at night, but a pale, shifting gray-blue that caught the light exactly the way Gabriel’s eyes did when he was about to make a biting remark.
It had taken three months to commission. Three months of sneaking off to a jeweler in the next valley over, pretending he was consulting on a warding schema for a miller.
He patted the pocket of his caster’s coat for the tenth time since leaving the village proper. Still there.
Briarleigh was dozing behind him, the air thick with the scent of late-blooming jasmine and the earthy promise of the coming harvest. The Harvest Festival was two weeks away.
He had a plan: simple, romantic, and logistically sound.
He would propose under the lanterns in the village square, surrounded by the noise of the joyful life they had fought so hard to be part of.
Miles turned up the walkway to the Cottage on the Wend where Gabriel would be waiting and opened the door.
Or tried.
The thumb latch of the front door refused to depress.
Miles frowned, jiggling the handle. Locked. Had Gabriel gone someplace and locked the door after himself?
They never locked the door. He didn’t even carry the key. Briarleigh wasn’t that kind of place .
“Gabriel?” Miles called out. His hand went to the pockets of his casting coat by reflex. Had someone found them? A remnant of Madaze’s circle?
The bolt slid back with a hurried clack .
The door swung inward. Gabriel stood there, breathless, his chest heaving beneath a linen shirt that was sweaty at the collar. He looked like he’d just run a sprint or fought a duel. His hair was loose, a chaotic halo of ash-blonde waves, and his blue-gray eyes were wide, the pupils blown.
“Miles!” Gabriel exclaimed, his voice pitched high. He blocked the entryway, one hand gripping the doorframe white-knuckled. “You’re back. Early. You’re early.”
“I’m on time,” Miles said, stepping closer, scanning Gabriel for injuries. There was no blood, no scent of ozone indicating a magical struggle. Just Gabriel, vibrating with frantic energy. “Why was the door locked? Is everything all right?”
“The wind,” Gabriel said. It was a flimsy lie. There wasn’t a breath of wind today. “It kept banging open. Terribly distracting. I was... meditating. Trying that breathing thing you recommended.”
Gabriel forced a smile. He looked terrified.
“Gabriel, you’re shaking.” Miles reached out, resting a hand on Gabriel’s shoulder. The muscle beneath his palm was a knot of unyielding tension.
Gabriel flinched, then melted into the touch with a desperate sort of neediness, like a cat seeking heat.
“Just startled me. Didn’t hear you coming.
You have the tread of a haunt, Miles, really.
” He grabbed Miles’s hand and pulled him inside, practically dragging him away from the door.
“Tea! No, wine. We need wine. The red from the vintner down the hill. I’ll get it. ”
He was moving too fast, spinning away toward the kitchen, his movements jerky rather than his usual slink.
“I just need to put my things away,” Miles said, turning toward the entry wardrobe. He’d hide the ring in the back until the festival.
Gabriel pirouetted, abandoning the kitchen trajectory. “No!”
Miles froze. “No?”
“I mean... why bother?” Gabriel placed himself squarely in front of the wardrobe, striking a pose that was meant to be casual but looked more like a guard dog standing its ground. “Just... drape it. On the chair. The chair is fine. The chair is excellent.”
Miles blinked. He could feel the ring box pressing against his hip. If he left his coat on the chair, Gabriel might pick it up to move it. Gabriel had opinions about clutter. He might feel the box.
“I’d rather brush it out and hang it up, love,” Miles said reasonably, taking a step forward. “It’s picked up dust from the road. I don’t want to get grit on the upholstery.”
“The upholstery is resilient!” Gabriel countered, sidestepping to mirror Miles’s movement. “It yearns for grit! It’s rustic!”
“Gabriel.” Miles stopped, adjusting his glasses. “You are acting incredibly strange. Is there... is there something wrong?”
“Don’t be absurd, darling, I’m just in a hurry to get to that wine. Just toss that coat down, and we’ll deal with it later.”
Miles moved to bypass him.
Gabriel lunged, grabbing Miles’s lapels. For a second, their faces were inches apart. Gabriel’s eyes were frantic, searching Miles’s face with a desperate intensity.
“Miles, please,” Gabriel whispered, and the banter vanished. “Just... let’s go to the kitchen.”
“Darling, you’re scaring me,” Miles said softly. He covered Gabriel’s hands with his own. “Whatever it is, we can fix it.”
He unpeeled Gabriel’s grip and stepped past him. Gabriel made a strangled noise, reaching out, but dropping his hand at the last second.
Miles pulled the wardrobe doors open.
He expected skeletons. He expected a mess.
He did not expect an avalanche.
A cascade of charcoal wool, silver interfacing, and scraps of heavy blue silk brocade tumbled out, burying Miles’s boots. A sleeve, pin-marked and half-sewn, flopped sadly over his left foot.
Miles stared down at the fabric.
The tension in his chest unspooled so rapidly it left him dizzy.
“Oh,” Miles breathed. He turned back to Gabriel, who was standing with his face buried in his hands.
“It was supposed to be a surprise,” Gabriel mumbled into his palms. “A new coat. For the festival. It’s not finished.”
Miles looked from the (obviously stolen) silks to his brilliant, chaotic, wonderful lover. This was it. This was why the door was locked. This was the panic. Gabriel had been frantically sewing, trying to make something beautiful for Miles, and was panicked at having his surprise spoiled.
“Gabriel,” Miles said, his voice thick.
Gabriel peeked through his fingers. “It’s ruined. The surprise is dead. We should burn it.”
“It’s magnificent,” Miles said, and he meant it. He stepped over the pile of fabric and pulled Gabriel into a hug, burying his face in the crook of Gabriel’s neck. He smelled of anxiety and sweat beneath his herb and citrus cologne. “You were making it for me?”
“Well, I wasn’t making it for Widow Miller,” Gabriel grumbled against Miles’s chest, though his arms wound tightly around Miles’s waist. “You wear that dreadful Guild coat everywhere instead of the nice ones because the nice ones don’t have all the damned pockets.
I thought... something more lovely but with the pockets. ”
“I love it,” Miles murmured into Gabriel’s sweat-damp hair. “And I love you.”
“Yes, well,” Gabriel sniffed, pulling back but staying within the circle of Miles’s arms. He wouldn’t meet Miles’s eyes.
“We can fix it,” Miles said. He released Gabriel and knelt, beginning to gather the silks. “Here. Help me fold it. I’ll hang my coat, and I promise not to look at the construction details until you present it to me.”
“You’d better not.” Gabriel dropped to his knees to start gathering up the piles of fabric into a bundle. Miles took off his coat.
“I’ll just...” Miles turned his back to Gabriel, effectively creating a blind spot.
With the dexterity of a Guild-certified level four caster, Miles slipped the velvet ring box from his pocket. He reached deep into the wardrobe and tucked the box into the back corner.
Safely stowed.
“There,” Miles said, hanging his coat up. He turned back to help Gabriel.
They corralled the sprawling yardage together, snapping the heavy fabric taut between them before folding it down into manageable squares.
Gabriel swept up the cut pattern pieces and arranged them on his sewing table, leaving Miles to heave the remaining bolts onto the wardrobe’s top shelf.
Gabriel hadn’t relaxed. If anything, now that the “secret” was out, he seemed more brittle, his eyes darting through the door to the sewing table, then back to Miles.
“Wine,” Gabriel said, slamming the wardrobe doors shut. “Now. A lot of it. ”
“Gabriel?” Miles asked, pausing. “It’s really okay. I’m not looking.”
“I know,” Gabriel said, his voice tight. “I just... I hate surprises being spoiled. You know how I get.”
Miles nodded, though a small frown lingered on his face.
He knew Gabriel was dramatic, but this..
. this felt like he was still waiting for the other shoe to drop.
But the ring was safe, and the coat was a beautiful gesture.
He would simply have to ply his fiancé— almost fiancé —with that red wine and massage the tension out of his shoulders.
Whatever it was, he needed to let it breathe a little.
“Wine it is,” Miles agreed.
Dinner passed in a blur of fragmented conversation as the sun set.
Gabriel attacked his food—a simple rustic loaf and the stew Miles had left to finish cooking earlier—with the same erratic energy he’d directed at the wardrobe.
One moment, he was dissecting the Widow Miller’s questionable taste in bonnets with vicious, sparkling wit; the next, he would go dark, staring into the dregs of his wine glass.
It wasn’t the behavior of a man upset about wrinkled silk. It was the behavior of a man waiting for a blow to land.
Miles ate, watching the candlelight flicker over Gabriel’s pale features.
He cataloged every twitch of Gabriel’s jaw, every tremor in the hand that lifted the glass.
He knew the signs. He’d seen them in the soldiers he’d served with in Lyonnor, in himself for the first few years after he’d returned from his Crown Years in the war.
He’d seen them in Gabriel during those first few months after they’d fled Averdon, when a slamming door could send him under the table.