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The air around the dinner table wasn’t tense. Alois is far too good at this kind of thing for that, weaving the right strings and details and feelings into his own behaviors that his guests have no choice but to fall in love with him.
Well, the Viscount for certain had. Blood relation or not, how he spoke so openly about being attracted to his far younger cousin—
Alois was good at working men like that. They were the easiest.
The reverend wasn’t too difficult to sway either. The right tears gathering in his eyes, the right innocent smiles? The Father was hanging on his every word. The innocent picture of a child.
Innocent.
Alois could laugh but he’d be afraid he’d choke.
Two fools ensnared in the spiders web of lies. Pitiful. He knew he was good at this, but not flawless. Yet they questioned nothing. Naïve, no, stupid of them. Called here to bring him into question no doubt, and yet they believe every word he says?
Because dear old Uncle Arnold can’t say a word.
His eyes were cold, his shoulders stiff as he picked at his food. Just another wretched old man with those same eyes, the same face, the same family name.
No, those eyes were different.
The old man looked at him like he was a meal. Like he was hungry, starving to get a taste. Like an addict who couldn’t wait to get his fill of young boys bodies to use as playthings. Like a prized doll.
But Uncle Arnold? They may share the same shape, the same hideous blue color, but those eyes were full of nothing but disgust.
He had been around the manor over the years. He knew of his brothers habits. He saw the “dolls,” nothing indecent, but enough to know what their purpose was. A toy to play with until it broke.
That’s when Alois first met him. He was allowed to have tea with them, a rare treat. Dressed up in basically nothing, covered in red, the filthy red he so adored. The old man was only just taking a liking to him then. Having him there seemed to be more of entertainment to him than anything else; it wasn’t as though Alois was encouraged to speak.
No, but he watched. He watched him eat the fine foods he’d never even seen before, swing his legs back and forth unable to reach the floor, fiddle at the edge of his napkin with nervous fingers. He watched like the tea and cakes were just an appetizer.
No, he was still building his appetite.
It made Alois feel sick. Much the same way the viscount stared at him now, at his thighs when he walked, at his every movement. He took after his uncle it seemed; if not in looks than in tastes for certain.
But Uncle Arnold still wore the same contempt.
“Must you drag your… hobbies, into everything?” He had grumbled, gesturing at Alois with his cigar. “It’s vulgar and repulsive. Keep them hidden at the very least.”
The old man had laughed at that and gave some disgusting answer that he had purged from his mind. Whatever it was, his presence was ignored for the rest of their meeting but clearly not forgotten.
No, Uncle Arnold still stared at him like some… thing. A horrid, pathetic, awful little creature. Something that should never see the light of day. A terrible secret.
He knew what he was on the inside.
Alois laughed at a pathetic excuse of a joke the viscount made, sure to be childish and loud. Bubbly. They liked his spark of life, his exuberance.
Innocent.
Uncle Arnold sneered.
The old man had undressed him with his eyes like unwrapping a package, a present that he couldn’t wait any longer to see. It was as if whenever he looked at him he saw what could be, what he wanted.
How idealistic. Foolish.
Seeing the innocence he so wanted to defile.
But Uncle Arnold? When he looked at Alois it was clear he saw the same naked, pathetic plaything shrouded in darkness alone. Covered in bruises and loveless love bites and substances that wouldn’t be named.
Disgusting. A creature of perversion. Defiled. Unclean. Ruined. Broken.
It made Alois’s skin itch. The look on his face as he attempted to keep his cool with the minister and the viscount was laughable, yes, but the look in his eyes…
It was all just a game.
Uncle Arnold couldn’t say he knew out of social pressure. If the reverend knew what was going on, what he knew about this entire time, surely he would be removed from polite society. The viscount would double down on this decision in extreme hypocrisy to protect himself.
He had to stay silent.
Alois made eye contact with him across the table, met with that menacing gaze. There was nothing to be afraid of; he had wrapped his threads ever so carefully around this horrid fly, and now he removed its wings. There was no way he could hurt him anymore— not without damaging his own ever precious social standing.
Alois smiled, sticking out the tip of his tongue. To the others it would look playful, but the deliberate taunt had Uncle Arnold’s face turning blood red with anger.
All he had to do was pull the right strings and it was all okay. He was safe. Nothing they could do would threaten him.
But still he stared with that disgust. Like a maggot-filled corpse sat in front of him instead of his “dear nephew.”
Like he was nothing more than a dead body. Lifeless. Filthy. Used up and thrown out.
And no amount of strings could change that.