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The man who killed Laurent’s brother offered him a peach.
“Sweetheart?”
He blinked, and the image changed; nothing changed at all, but it was Damen, who was trying not to frown but frowned anyway, in his hand a round little peach. It was disconcerting, how normal it all was. Sometimes—Laurent still, sometimes. Reeled.
“Life is rarely ever what you expect it to be,” he told his horse once, on a summer stroll through the forest. The world glinted golden all around them and Laurent’s chest was ever-tight. No-one really listened to him, then, but for his horse; no-one… well. Can’t say he made much of an effort.
Her name was Eleanor, and she was a gift from Auguste. The horse. She was young then, a foal, and so was Laurent, and Auguste will always be. He’ll never change. Laurent told himself there was comfort hidden deep, deep within the thought.
“Sweetheart,” again, from his left, oh, from the present. Blinking, blinking:
“Yes?”
“You seem very far away.”
Was he? Far. How far could he run before being wrenched back, torn and dragged till he was right where he started. Laurent sometimes thought… no, no-one was this good at planning. The gods didn’t care enough to punish him, specifically, the matter of merit aside, and his uncle was dead.
Uncle? Something gleaming in the corner of his—
Laurent stood, brushed invisible crumbs from his sleeve, where none had the chance to fall: he never touched his food. Oops. “My head,” he said, to someone. Probably.
“Laurent.”
Would humming be enough for a response, or had he missed the chance to salvage this? Laurent’s mind wasn’t working in its neat straight lines. Everything was running around in circles: run, run, could he still, run? But he would return. He always returned.
“I,” he said, “think I will go for a ride.”
Damen’s frown deepened. “What about your head?”
“I’ll be sure to take it with me.”
A pout. “You said it ached.”
Did he now. Laurent couldn’t remember saying anything, ever, in his life. He was not the wordy type, was he? Surely not. “It’ll pass.”
“You haven’t eaten a thing.”
Very observant, this husband of his, this brother-killer slave-freer beast-tamer king of a man. Laurent said, “Yes.” It was pointless to argue.
“Are you feeling unwell? Perhaps we should have a physician—”
“I’m fine.” He was, after all, one of the beasts the great Damianos had tamed. Admittedly, he didn’t feel very tamed right now, but the proof was in his actions, and he always returned. He might stick out his claws and sometimes even cause damage, but he was, over all, quite domesticated.
Suddenly, Laurent hated everything.
Everything: from the morning light falling gently through the curtains, to the brilliant day rolling hilly-green outside, to the tasteful and horribly bare décor of the dining chamber, to the peach, set carefully on a napkin, bright. He did not allow himself a single glimpse of Damen, wary, knowing himself. He couldn’t bear hating Damen right now, and he hated him, hated him, with viciousness that stole his breath away.
“Sweetheart—”
“Don’t,” frantic, skidding three steps down the stone floor, panting already, “don’t. I need to be—anywhere else. We have the day, still, before they arrive?”
This delegation from Patras, an ambassador Laurent couldn’t name for the life of him. He knew his name, all of their names. Simply not right now.
“We… yes. Not before tomorrow morning, the messenger said.”
“Good.” Had to force himself to take a deep breath, still his hands. Damen didn’t deserve this lashing out. He didn’t deserve anything Laurent inflicted upon him. Still, words would not come. A peach outlined in gold behind tightly-shut eyelids; a trickle starting in the crown of his head, pouring downwards, irreversible. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“Laurent,” Damen said. Pleaded. It all clawed inside his throat, venomous, I’m sorry and you are not to blame and I wish I knew how to. Laurent couldn’t say any of that.
“Tonight,” he promised instead. And left.
As soon as he was out of the room, as always, the earth shifted course, the knife thrown, struck, right under his breastbone: rage finally aimed at the real culprit. Himself, of course. Himself-himself-himself. There was no-one and nothing Laurent hated more, who deserved to be hated more, who needed punished worse. To the never-ending list of his affronts against Damen in particular, now add this. Another instance of his trademark casual cruelty that would jab into Damen’s too-big heart. Another fault in Laurent.
He could not stand a moment longer under this skin. But to tear at it had proven non-helpful one time too many, and his head truly was splitting at the seams, because every lie had to come back to bite him tenfold. Just deserts, he was getting his—where on earth was the door out of this infernal place. Every corridor was too long. Every window taunted. He needed to be outside (out, gods, let him out of his head). He needed—
Click-click, jibed his shoes as he marched, fled, always the scared little boy running, like Uncle said—
Every occasion in which Uncle was right should give Laurent pause, and he paused, literal hand on his chest like a tittering maiden in a play. Not to be intimidated by a ghost, he stood his ground. Spite would always work fastest. Stood his ground, and thought, enough, and thought, please, and thought, out.
Outside was a courtyard, privately kept, which Damen found pleasing and Laurent found strategic enough a place to ambush him in on occasion. Today he would rip through it without reservation had he the time, but he didn’t, the time, didn’t have any time. Already the sun was moving, and he promised Damen tonight. He needed to not-fall-apart by tonight. To have glued-himself-together with Paschal’s special scar paste and to be—whoever he normally was. Someone level-headed, presumably. Someone who remembered words and cared about… matters. Someone real. By tonight he had to be someone real.
And so he allowed his legs (wobbly?) to take him to the stables, and his face must have been frightening enough to secure him this silent reprieve, as no-one dared approach. Good. That they learned. It would be terrible, if he went back to his right mind and found out he’d made a stable-boy cry, or—scared a serving girl. He had enough entries on the list of his crimes, and no time, no time.
Find the reins: whoever organised this hellhole ought to be beheaded—
On his horse (the only one at which he couldn’t snipe), and oh, how the sunlight irritated his eyelids, how it burst and crashed through his cluttered thoughts, how it blocked his airways with seething, burning fury and… the air was cool. He closed his eyes. Eleanor knew where to go.
The air was cool: Laurent clung to it like the scared little child he never ceased to be, and rode on.
“It isn’t…” he found himself muttering as Eleanor trotted through the forest, slowed down by age and much more interested in following hares than in philosophical conversation. “Rarely,” Laurent said, stupid. “What you expect.”
She was a gift from Auguste, all those many, many years ago. He worried, sometimes. That the wound would close. Life had never really been what Laurent expected, but he could be certain there’d be some melancholy tonight, some resolve. A concession. He would beg, as always, and bear the humiliation of—Eleanor took a sharp turn, showering Laurent with leaves from a too-low branch.
He shuddered with sudden, unexpected peals of—bubbling up his throat—laughter, maybe, wet down his cheeks; stroked a marvelling hand down her mane, and remembered to breathe.
Before him was a fork in the road. The path to the right would lead deeper into the forest, where the lake he favoured hid, curled between the hills. To the left would be towards the township, golden fields and unfailing skies. Neither seemed like the right choice, a strangely soothing concept.
He was hungry: silly, not to eat anything, and his cheeks flushed high-pink, and his muscles finally consented to unclench, then re-clench to fit the current objective. It was maddening, how much prompting his body needed for every single action. Amusing, sometimes, his desperate exercises at control. He taught himself. Perhaps he could be taught again.
Back where he came from a conversation awaited, an explanation, and a peach. Laurent knew he didn’t have what was considered a ‘normal’ approach regarding punishments, and yet… well. Something was already forming. Damen would forgive him.
Damen always did, which was most of the problem, and not why he kept returning.
Perhaps Laurent just wasn’t good at running? He looked down at Eleanor’s fussy braids he did not remember tying. Golden under his fingers. Auguste would like this day tremendously.
The familiar ache finally provided some relief; there will be no closing this. With a nod, Laurent kept riding.