Epilogue I #2
He’d debated leaving the body somewhere to be found in the hopes someone might recognize the girl and let her family know what happened, but the body had been in a bad state, decomposed and feasted on by rats.
Instead, he’d used his transfiguration power to transform the girl into several yards of beautiful silk, adorned with an intricate design, that he’d then buried in the cemetery and marked with a large rock.
It was all he could think to do, to give the girl a proper burial at least. Maziren had helped him dig the grave. It wasn’t the first body she’d helped him bury, but he hoped it might be the last. Either way, he knew she’d take the secret to her own grave.
Maziren was the only one he’d told about the girl.
He hadn’t even told Jasper. He couldn’t bear to see the look on Jasper’s face if he admitted what he’d done…
what his body and hands had done. He could tell it was hard enough for his husband to reconcile the incident with Evory, let alone what he’d… what Morland had done to the girl.
No, he would never, ever tell Jasper about the girl.
Aidan walked on. His bedroom wasn’t much farther, and he was desperate to get there, to be able to lock himself in the solitude of his room. Finally, they reached it, and Maziren stepped in front of him to open the door and look inside.
“My lord, the lord consort is here,” she said softly.
Aidan’s chest tightened, partially in joy and partially with anxiety. He was glad Jasper was there, but Morland had damaged that relationship as well, and – despite his and Jasper’s best efforts – rebuilding had been slow.
“Take your leave,” he said to Maziren as he moved past her into the room. She’d stand outside the door all night if he didn’t make her go. He wasn’t sure what he’d done to deserve such fierce loyalty from her, but he’d long ago resolved to deserve it.
“My lord-”
“I’ll call if I need you,” he assured her.
She hesitated, then nodded and strode back down the hall.
Aidan steeled himself and went into his bedchamber to face Jasper.
Interactions with his husband had been hit-or-miss lately.
Aidan knew Jasper was trying his best to get their relationship back to where it had been before Morland, but Jasper occasionally had bad days where he could barely stand to look at Aidan, and Aidan didn’t blame him.
He was at least grateful Jasper remained in their quarters, that they still slept in the same bed together, even if Jasper slept as far on the other side as he could.
“Jasper?” Aidan said as he walked carefully to where his consort sat in a window alcove staring out over the city.
Jasper jumped but forced a small smile as he saw Aidan.
“Done with Loreleigh so soon?” Jasper asked, rising from the seat and coming to stand in front of Aidan. “I didn’t expect you for another hour.”
Aidan tried not to read into that, tried not to decide if there was disappointment in Jasper’s voice that he was back so soon.
“We made it through some of the more important business,” he said, “but Loreleigh had pity on me and let me go early. I have a full schedule of important meetings tomorrow with Bressen and Samhail, so I think she was giving me time to rest up and prepare.”
Part of Aidan wished he could just tell people what had happened, that it hadn’t really been him terrorizing them the last few weeks, but Bressen had advised against that, and Aidan understood why.
Letting news get out that one of the Lords of the Triumvirate had been compromised by their enemies – his body literally taken over – would send panic through the country and would call into question everything Aidan had done in the past and would do in the future.
Unfortunately, their best option was to stick with the story that Aidan had contracted some kind of rare illness that had warped his mind for a few weeks.
“What are you doing in here?” Aidan asked. Jasper had a host of projects and causes he was involved in throughout Seatherny, so it was rare to find him in their room in the middle of the day.
The smile Jasper tried to pull onto his face failed after two attempts. “I just needed some peace and quiet for a little while,” he said.
Aidan reached out instinctively, perhaps to take Jasper’s hand or touch his face, but he froze as the lord consort flinched back from him. Pain stabbed through Aidan, even as Jasper’s eyes widened in horror.
“Aidan, I’m sorry,” Jasper assured him quickly. “I’d didn’t mean-”
Aidan held up his hands to stop his husband’s apology, then swore inwardly as Jasper’s eyes flew straight to them.
He pulled them back but didn’t lower them as he too looked at them.
An image flashed in his mind of his hand on the back of Jasper’s neck as he pushed Jasper’s face hard into a pillow while he – while Morland – fucked him.
Bile rose in Aidan’s throat, and it was all he could do to swallow it back down as he turned and hurried toward the bathing chamber, praying he didn’t vomit before he got to the toilet.