Chapter One #2
“One more time,” he said. “Say what you said again, the bit you think is fine as long as it isn’t overheard. Because it seems to me we have quite a consensus that, overheard or not, the rules are the same.”
“This is—”
“Repeat it.” Aldric moved closer still. “You were inarguably proud of what you said. You even said it multiple times. Do so again now.” He motioned around the courtyard at the growing number of spectators.
“Repeat it, without identifying her, so all these people can hear what you consider conduct to be proud of. Let them all decide what kind of person you are.”
“You’re tossing your lot in with the Gents, then?
” Baker sneered a little, but it fell flat.
Everyone watching, including his cronies, could easily see that he knew he’d been caught out and was in the wrong.
Blustering was often the approach taken by those who hadn’t the humility to acknowledge their errors.
“You could, of course, scamper off,” Aldric said. “No one would blame you. But that would also give us a clear demonstration of who you are.”
With a show of pride that didn’t quite hit its mark, Baker rushed away. His hangers-on followed, as they were wont to do, but with less enthusiasm than they had a moment earlier.
“Typical,” Aldric muttered to himself.
“You didn’t answer the question,” Stanley said, still standing next to him.
“What question?”
“Are you throwing your lot in with the Gents?”
Aldric clasped his hands behind his back, a posture he’d adopted from early childhood and couldn’t seem to shake despite knowing it gave him an air of arrogance and disapproval. “One does not throw one’s lot in with the Gents. You pick your members; everyone knows that.”
The three gentlemen watched him ever more closely.
“Would you like to?” Stanley asked. “It would mean Digby here would be the only one of us at Cambridge without a title to look forward to, but I think he can manage to endure the humiliation.”
Digby offered Stanley a look of dry annoyance that held more humor than anything. He spoke to Aldric though. “The intelligent one in the group arrives from Eton next year.”
“You all have roles to play, it seems.”
Lord Jonquil nodded. “Stanley’s job is to make certain we have adventures. I ensure we laugh a great deal while undertaking them. Digby attempts to make us look dashing through it all.”
“Emphasis on attempts,” Digby added.
“And Kes, our brain, as it were, tries to keep us from looking like idiots in the process.”
“Emphasis on tries?” Aldric asked.
They laughed. He didn’t generally make people laugh. It wasn’t a bad experience; it was simply unfamiliar.
“What would I do in this brotherhood of yours?”
“Based on what we’ve just watched,” Stanley said, “you’d likely be charged with keeping us from doing anything too unwise. I was ready to simply break Baker’s nose, but your approach proved far more effective.”
“And Digby likely would have objected to the blood ruining your ensemble.” Aldric shrugged.
“I like him, Stanley,” Digby said firmly.
I like him. Something he had never heard from his own brother.
“Care to be the strategist among us?” Lord Jonquil asked. “Keep us from going on foolhardy and ultimately doomed adventures?”
Aldric shrugged. He wasn’t sure what he thought. It would be nice to have some friends, but these three were more like family to one another. Family wasn’t something Aldric was particularly good at.
Silent looks passed between them, and before Aldric knew what was happening, Digby and Lord Jonquil had taken themselves off, and Stanley alone remained with him.
“We won’t force you into anything,” Stanley said. “I doubt we could anyway.”
“You couldn’t.” If Aldric’s tendency toward bluntness sat wrong with Stanley, it didn’t show.
“We also don’t make the offer lightly,” Stanley said.
“You singled me out suddenly after a bit of verbal jousting with Baker and offered membership in what is considered a rather exclusive friendship.” Aldric eyed him doubtfully. “That feels quite lightly made.”
Stanley smiled broadly. His were the sort of features that settled naturally into an expression of happiness and amusement. It was actually a rather nice thing. Mother had been the same way, but her smiles had come less frequently toward the end.
“You think this has been the impulse of a moment.” Stanley shook his head.
“At the risk of sounding uncomfortably awkward, I’ve been watching you, Lord Aldric Benick.
I know perfectly well that you have been watching us too.
You observe, evaluate, and formulate approaches for everyone and everything that you encounter. ”
It was an entirely accurate assessment.
“The Gents don’t often add to our numbers. But the three of us have been wanting to ask you for weeks. We weren’t certain you would be interested or consider us important enough to indulge.”
“Because I am the son of a duke?” If only they understood how little value that actually gave him. Even in his own family, it meant almost nothing.
“Because you give the distinct impression of not being particularly interested in forging these kinds of connections.”
Aldric had a tendency to keep himself, which meant few people understood much about him. Only Mother ever had. Yet Stanley Cummings had neatly dissected Aldric and accurately described what he had found.
“I do not have connections like yours,” Aldric said. “It is a brotherhood; anyone can see that. I don’t even have a brotherhood with my actual brother.”
“Anyone who has met Lord Mowbary understands why you wouldn’t be interested in that.”
Aldric shrugged. “Benicks ruin families. It is the one thing we are actually good at.”
“Would you be willing to try being part of the Gents’ family?” Stanley asked.
“You don’t want me in your family.”
“We do though.”
“You’ve met Mowbary. Is that the sort of brother you’re looking for?”
Stanley laughed. “You’ll notice we didn’t ask him.”
Aldric studied the man. He was in earnest. Odd.
“Ours is a family that’s not easily ruined,” Stanley said.
“Are you issuing a challenge?”
A contemplative look crossed his features. “Actually, I think I am. You say that Benicks ruin families. I am saying you can’t ruin this one. Let’s find out who is right.”
It was tempting, but accepting would be foolish. He’d not managed to save his own family. Destroying theirs would be unforgivable.
“At least try being one of us,” Stanley said. “You might discover that you like it.”
“If I decide, after a time, that I don’t, you won’t quarrel with me about it? I can just walk away?”
“We’ll cry a great deal, but after writing a few odes to what might have been, we’ll stop pining under your window day and night.”
Aldric nearly smiled. “I have sufficiently warned you about the dangers of accepting me?”
“Benicks ruin families,” Stanley repeated. “I’ve been warned.”
These brothers-by-choice were offering him a chance to have family. He wanted that. He’d wished for it ever since Mother died. But family never went well for him. For any Benick.
“I suppose I could try for a time,” he said. “But don’t expect miracles.”
Stanley slapped a hand on his shoulder. “That’s something you’ll soon enough learn about me: I always expect miracles.”