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“Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered I have fought my way here….
You have no power over me!” - Labyrinth
He puts off the conversation for as long as he can.
It’s inevitable, really. James doesn’t ignore his scars precisely, the first time they make love after he returns, but the look in his eyes says it all - the pain and the anger and the horror at what’s been done to his lover. He packs it away quickly - quicker than Thomas would have believed, and when he opens his eyes again, he looks over Thomas’ body again, this time without so much as a flicker of anything other than building desire, and Thomas feels his stomach unknot.
“You don’t - you don’t mind, then?” he asks, nervous, and James shakes his head.
“No. Of course I don’t. Jesus, Thomas - I thought I’d never -” He stops, and strips his shirt off, and Thomas stares at his chest, crossed by one large scar, and his bare arms, pitted and marked by more of the same and tattooed, of all things (and there’s an idea for another day. If James can be decorated, surely Thomas can match him?).
“I don’t mind yours if you can bear mine,” James says roughly, and Thomas surges forward and kisses him, wordless relief at the easy acceptance running through him. He knows that someday he will have to tell James the origins of the marks on his torso, but not today - not now, when everything is so right after so very long. James does not push, and Thomas is more grateful than he can properly express at his lover’s willingness to give him the space he needs.
It’s John that’s the real trouble. Adding him to the mix is - well, there’s so much that’s right about it. He balances both of them, as they balance him. He and Thomas work together well from the first, reading each other like books much to James’ wonder and amusement, since John has been a cipher to him until that point. He and James are a delight to watch together, exploring each other in a manner that is almost shy, learning to function together as lovers after spending so many months together as enemies, then wary allies and finally friends. He is, however, endlessly curious about absolutely everything. Thomas can see it in the blue eyes that are so striking (and he’s teased James about this already - this affinity for blue eyes and a curious streak that apparently attracts him to men). John doesn’t press, but he wants to know, and his occasional forays into assuring Thomas that he can talk - that John of all people will understand - are increasingly hard to avoid. It’s not that he wants to talk about it, exactly, but he’s tired of avoiding it - of pretending that nothing happened. Still, though, he’s not quite ready. He heals slowly, in bits and pieces - a bit of his trauma here, a piece of his pain there - until at last he starts to settle into his own skin again. It takes months, and a great deal of reassurance, but finally he starts to feel like he might just possibly belong to himself again - like his body is his own, and his mind as whole as it is ever likely to be having shattered once. The tattoo on his back helps - makes him feel as if he’s reclaimed his skin, as if there is some piece of him that those bastards in Bethlem have never touched or prodded or gawked at. And yet still the nightmares persist, worse the closer they get to the anniversary of the day he was dragged off to Bethlem. And when he is tired beyond measure from the nightmares - when he’s woken night after sleepless night, breathing hard, whimpering and flailing, and his poor, tired mind begins to make remembering difficult - it’s the last straw, the one he cannot take.
“Thomas - can you at least tell me why this upsets you so much?” James asks, and Thomas looks at him, eyes still wild, breathing still not quite back to normal, heart still pounding and he swallows hard.
“I -” he starts. “In Bethlem - I forgot.”
“Forgot?” James asks. “Forgot what?”
“Everything,” Thomas whispers, still shaking. “James, I -” He shakes his head, looking around him. “I - it was -” He weeps, and James holds him, helpless in the face of his incoherence. It takes several moments for him to exhaust his tears, and James simply rubs a hand up and down his back, soothing him as best he is able, allowing Thomas to hold onto him
“Thomas - I know you have no desire to discuss this, but -” John starts, and Thomas nods, wiping tears, watching surprise flash across John’s face.
“I know,” he says. “There’s no use in ignoring it. I - let’s move to the bed. I’ll tell you.”
***************************************************************
It happens in Bedlam.
He doesn’t mean to let it happen. He starts out determined that this will not change him - this will not break him. His father will not win. And yet, day by day, month by inexorable month, it seems to matter less what he has resolved. What did James’ eyes look like? He cannot remember, not next to the aching, burning sensation in his throat after he vomits for the third time that day (the sixth time since they’ve started the purges and dear God, his stomach feels as if it might actually come up his throat this time, it hurts, oh God it hurts). What did Miranda sound like when she laughed? Irrelevant when compared with the dizziness and the hunger and the sting from the wounds covering his arms where they’ve bled him just a bit too often, just a bit too much, just enough to make him break down weeping at the way his mind swims and grasps for order, for reason, and finds only chaos. Who is he? What is his name? He is cold and shivering and hurting and he can’t - can’t recall, hasn’t been able to in what seems like so long. At first it distresses him. He should remember. He should know his name. He has a name, surely? What did they call him - his lovers, when they called out his name? Thomas? Yes. It was Thomas. And they were -
James and Miranda are dead. He receives the news, and he can feel the moment that he stops caring - stops fumbling for memory, stops weeping, just - stops. The treatments increase in frequency, and he can’t bring himself to care, can’t bring himself to try anymore. Perhaps it doesn’t matter. Perhaps, if he forgets for long enough, it will stop hurting. Perhaps, if he forgets Thomas, they will let him go. They can’t hold him here if he’s no longer the person they dragged in kicking and screaming so long ago, can they? Eventually Miranda’s face fades from his memory. He forgets the way that James’ eyes crinkled around the edges when he smiled. He lets them go, but the pain remains, and he weeps one last time as he realizes that it’s all been for nothing - the forgetting, and now he can’t recall what it is he was supposed to forget. He bleeds, and he screams, and the days blur together until he no longer knows how long he’s been there or how he came to be there or -
He’s shaking, he realizes, tears running down his cheeks as he talks, remembering that time, and he reaches for James’ warmth, for John’s callused hand, for anything to anchor himself.
“We’re here,” one of them murmurs. “It’s alright.” It takes several moments to regain his composure, and they wait, patient, until he can speak again.
“I can’t -” he starts, and he shakes his head. He can’t keep talking about this - not this. What comes after, perhaps, but not this.
“You forgot your own name?” John asks, horrified but trying to help him, and Thomas nods.
“God,” James chokes on his left, and Thomas shudders. “You -” James looks horrified, and gathers Thomas closer to him, his arm around his lover’s shoulders, reassuring and alive and there. “Never again,” James says in a hoarse voice. “Not ever. I swear.”
“Any time you need a reminder -” John offers, and Thomas shoots him a look that’s half gratitude and half exasperation.
“I remember now!” he says, and John grins.
“If you want to stop there -” James offers, and he shakes his head.
“No. All at one go, or I’ll never tell you the rest,” he insists.
They move him. It’s been so long since he saw blue sky that he weeps at the sight of it as they hustle him to the waiting carriage. The man awaiting him inside sees his face and curses.
“Dear God,” the Earl says. (Earl of what? There was somewhere - somewhere far to the North. He thinks he remembers the man’s title, and the face that goes with it. He hasn’t forgotten everything - just the things that made him him - the things that made him dangerous). “What the blazes have they been doing to him?”
“The standard course of treatment -” The doctor starts, and he flinches. The Earl raises a hand for silence, and he cowers.
“God have mercy,” the older man mutters and stares at him. “Thomas - do you know who I am?”
“Wh- Who is Thomas?”
Silence reigns for a moment, and then someone mutters a prayer.
“He’s forgotten,” the doctor says. “His original malady -”
“Was grief, brought on by the treachery of his wife, not - this! This -” The Earl gestures to the prisoner’s emaciated form, “-this is a disgrace, nothing less. I had hoped for an end to the whole sorry mess, but -” The Earl shakes his head.
“Take him back to his cell. He cannot be released in this condition -.”
“Please -” It’s the first plea he’s uttered in such a very long time, and it startles him as much as it does the doctor.
“Was that -?”
He licks his lips, and repeats, softly -
“Please - don’t. Please -”
The Earl swears again, and he flinches, but the panic fluttering in his stomach is nothing next to the wonder that is this glimpse of the world outside the hospital.
“Please,” he repeats, and the Earl’s resolve wavers. He can see it in the other man’s eyes. “I can do it - whatever you like,” he pleads. “I can - just don’t - not the cell. I’ll never be a bother again. Wherever you like, I’ll go, just not back there. Please-” He is shaking so very hard, not from the cold now but from barely suppressed tears. He is so close - to what, he cannot quite recall, but he knows that it will come to him if he can only leave this place.
“That bastard,” James mutters. “Making you fucking beg to leave - to be allowed to leave that goddamn hell hole -” He trails off, still angry, and Thomas continues, in complete agreement with James.
The Earl stares at him for a moment, and then sighs.
“Get him in the carriage. We’ll see if he cannot be cleaned up and brought back to some kind of reason.”
“My lord - the patient has been deemed incurable. My methods -”
“Have driven him to this state to begin with,” the Earl snaps. “God help the rest of the patients in your care if they are treated similarly. My decision is made, and as the heir to the estate, it is my right to take him. Good day, Doctor.”
And just that simply, he is free. They load him into the carriage, where he sits across from the Earl, who looks visibly disturbed at the state of him, and he wonders what he must look like. He doesn’t remember what he looked like before - not truly, but he knows that he makes a pitiful sight now, unshaven and dressed in stained, torn clothing that has not been replaced in too long. He knows that his hair needs to be trimmed, that he desperately needs to shave, and that the Earl’s eyes do not leave the scars on his wrists and ankles from where they have chained him on several occasions (when all the restraints in the world could not keep him from bucking, could not keep him from lashing out against the lancets and burning brands). He tugs at his sleeves, trying to cover the marks, although he’s not sure why. He has no pride left, and certainly no vanity, or at least he does not think he does. He gets out of the carriage when they reach their destination, and stares up at the building they’ve brought him to. It’s - a house, he realizes. The Earl’s home, perhaps? In any case, it’s not Bethlem, and the thought is enough to bring him to his knees with the magnitude of it. It is not Bethlem - the hospital that is all he remembers, and suddenly he is terrified, aware all at once that he has left familiar routine behind. He is lifted to his feet and helped into the house surprisingly gently, and he wonders for the first time what he has gotten himself into - what he has agreed to do, but it does not matter, not when his new keepers ensure that he’s clean and warm and allowed to sleep in a real bed, showing more care for him in five hours than the staff at Bethlem had ever, ever done.
It takes months for him to regain his strength.
He is fed well here. At first, his stomach balks at the heavy foods, and they keep him on bread and broth until he begins to keep it down. Slowly, he gains weight - begins to see the sharp lines of his face fill out and sees his clothing (real clothing - tailored to fit him, and so many layers of it that he wonders how he ever stood the heat of it) stop hanging off of his increasingly less gaunt frame. He had dressed like this before, they tell him - he was not always a prisoner clad in hospital rags. He was a lord. He does not remember this, and they shake their heads, scandalized and pitying, and he feels the burn of shame. He should remember. He should know who he was - where he came from, but the knowledge remains out of his reach, and the servants continue about their routines, and he tries not to wonder who he is and why the Earl called him Thomas.
He can leave his room at will.
It’s a revelation the first time he tries his door two weeks after he arrives and finds it unlocked. He opens it slowly, expecting to be reprimanded, and instead finds an empty corridor. No locks. No guards. No punishment. He takes a few steps down the hall and then stops, breathing hard, the urge to return to his room strong - so very strong. He gives in after a moment, heading back to the safety of the (enormous, by his standards) room they have put him in, but the urge to try again stays with him, and the next day, he tries again, this time getting further. No one scolds. No privileges are retracted, and he grows bolder as the days go on, going further and further until the day that he descends the stairs, shaking both from the light exertion and from fright, and encounters a maid that looks almost as startled as he is frightened.
“My lord!” she squeaks and curtsies, and he flinches backward.
“I’m - I’m sorry,” he stammers, and she stares, clearly startled by the apology.
“My lord?”
“I didn’t mean to - I’m sorry -” He’s still stammering, mentally bracing himself for a blow when she frowns.
“Why would you be sorry?”
“I left the room -”
“My lord - did his lordship not tell you? This is your house. You’ve the run of the place, moreso than anyone.” He stares, and she darts a quick glance at him, looking longer when she realizes that he is utterly shocked.
“M-mine?” he asks, and she nods.
“Yes, my lord. The furnishings are different - nine years gone by since you were here last - but this is where - you truly don’t remember?” He shakes his head, and the girl clucks her tongue in sympathy.
“Must be awful. You were so happy here - you and Lady Mi-” She cuts herself off, and his breath catches in his chest.
“Your pardon, my lord,” the girl says, and curtsies again. “I shouldn’t have said - I’m sorry.”
“I don’t -” he starts, and then she’s bustling away, laundry clutched to her chest, and he’s standing in the hall, wondering what the rest of the sentence would have been. Lady whom? What was her name? Who in God’s name was he?
Beside him, James is crying silently, and John looks shaken.
“Christ,” he mutters, and Thomas nods.
“Yes,” he agrees.
“Did they ever tell you -?” James asks, and Thomas shakes his head.
“Nothing,” he says. “I spent a month and a half not knowing so much as my own favorite color, if you’ll believe it!”
“Green,” James chokes. “It was always green. Is it still -?”
Thomas nods, and kisses his brow.
“Yes, James,” he says, and James takes a shaking breath and nods at him to go on.
The house is huge. It takes him three full days to find all the nooks and crannies, now that he’s bold enough to venture out of his room, and he delights in it, even as the servants look at him strangely and awkwardly attempt to stay out of his way. Still, there is nothing here that reminds him of anything, to his great disappointment - no mementos that spark memory, no scents that send him reeling. It is as if someone has come through and very carefully scrubbed the house of anything personal - as if they do not want him to remember, but why? The thought gnaws at him, and he sits up at nights for several weeks, wondering. Why bring him back here if they did not want him to remember? Why show him the glimpses of what must have been his life before Bethlem? (There is a Before Bethlem. The thought alone is enough to set him on fire with curiosity, and he rolls the name the Earl had given him around on his tongue. Thomas. Thomas what?) Perhaps it is the curiosity that sets it off, or perhaps it is the slowly growing certainty that he is, in fact, safer here than he was in the hospital, but whatever it is, it is not long before the dreams start.
At first, they are of Bethlem - all pain and doctors and screaming, and he wakes, shaking and frightened, with the horrified servants peering in at him, having heard his cries. He spends weeks looking like grim death, purple shadows under his eyes, pale with the lack of sleep, eating only because he cannot bear not to do so, despite his lack of appetite. In the asylum, meals had been - unpredictable, and the idea of turning down food now makes him panic just a little. The servants express concern - unfamiliar, slightly frightening in its intensity, and he wonders how many of them knew him before. They do all they can, and gradually, while the nightmares do not cease, they do start to change. Faces and names flash across his mind as he sleeps, filling in gaps he did not know existed until they are gaps no longer. The bull terrier that his father had kept and that had hated him for some unfathomable reason. His father’s intolerable associates - men he had hated from the time he had been old enough to understand their hypocrisy - their lies. His father’s face the night he had been taken to Bethlem, terrible and condemning. Gradually, he starts to remember, and the nightmares become interspersed with other things - other memories. His mother’s face. His boyhood companions. His governess, who had called him -
He sits up in bed, gasping for air, and realizes that he knows his name. Thomas Nathaniel Hamilton. His name is Thomas Hamilton, son of Alfred and Lucille Hamilton. He is their eldest son - Alfred’s heir. He remembers it, and weeps from the relief of having that simple piece of himself back, his shoulders shaking, tears streaming from his eyes, hands reaching for the pillows to muffle his sobs. He has a name. He remembers, after forgetting for so long, and it comes as a blessed relief after so long wondering, hoping that something of his own identity will eventually come back to him. He leaves his room with an added spring in his step the next morning, and the servants watch with silent approval and something resembling relief as he starts to perambulate around the house with much greater confidence. He is recovering - slowly but surely coming back to himself. He rediscovers his favorite color, and the day that he requests a dish at supper, he thinks the cook might actually cry from happiness.
Still, though, there are blank spots. He recalls that place that he now refuses to name even in his head. He recalls his schooling and young adulthood, but the names and faces of the people he had shared those years with are lost. He recalls his younger brothers - or rather that he has younger brothers, but not their names, only their faces, and the lack drives him into a second depression worse than the first, because he should know. He should remember the two younger boys that he spent his childhood looking after, the two young men who withstood their father’s wrath at his side, until they all went their separate ways, He wonders with a sort of morbid curiosity what has happened to them- whether they have escaped Alfred’s poisonous scheming or been consumed by it as he was. There is a horrible joke to be made about Titans and Kronos here, he thinks, and he hopes silently that he has proven to be his father's Zeus.
The Earl returns after five months to find him much recovered. He stands straighter now, although his hands still shake from time to time and he still speaks little. Nine years in Bedlam have taught him many things, chief among them the ability to hold his tongue, and he hates it with every fiber of his being. He used to talk frequently, he recalls - used to babble, in fact, and he misses both the ability and the inclination to do so, particularly as he stands, waiting for the Earl to enter. (And why is he standing? It’s his damn parlor, not Selkirk’s! He stands anyway.)
He remembers him now - his own uncle, Charles Douglas-Hamilton, Second Earl of Selkirk, Gentleman of His Majesty’s Bedchamber, etc. and so on. He is Alfred’s younger brother - one of those whom Thomas has only rarely seen, and he seems to recall that the man was never overly fond of him. His imprisonment cannot have raised the Earl’s opinion of him, and he silently hopes that whatever Selkirk wants of him, it is something simple.
“Uncle,” he greets, and Selkirk stops in the doorway, his blue eyes narrowed.
“You've fished enough of your wits out of the gutter to remember me, then,” he grunts. “Good. I won't drag this out. I will not pretend that my brother was wrong in his decision to disown you or in committing you. You were quite obviously mad and from the look of you, you still are. The fact is-”
“The fact is that I’m going to find him and gut him,” James mutters, and Thomas swats his arm.
“Stop interrupting,” John scolds, and James scoffs.
“Oh, don’t pretend you’re not thinking the same,” he answers, and John grins.
“I want to know how hard I have to hit him,” he answers. “It’s important.”
“I’m not mad,” Thomas interrupts, and Selkirk glares at him.
“Don't be ridiculous, boy,” he snaps.
“And I'm not a boy,” Thomas says quietly. “Uncle-”
“You will be silent,” Selkirk snaps. “Unless you would like to be recommitted to a private asylum where they can finish beating the insolence out of you. If Alfred had had any sense he would have done so in the first place instead of leaving a mess behind him to be handled, but as it stands I am left with the decision of what to do with you, and I will not be -”
Thomas is shaking - trying his very best, in fact, not to give in to the urge to shrink away from his uncle. He sounds so much like Alfred - looks so much like Thomas’ father, and he hates - hates - this new version of himself that would very much like to disappear quietly back up to his (safe, secure, stifling, too-much-like-a-cell now that he’s free) room. He would never have backed down from Alfred like this. That other Thomas from his memories would never, never have allowed the man the satisfaction of seeing him run, and he silently wonders at that former version of himself - both his naivetë and bravery. Where had it come from? Who or what could possibly have convinced him of his own invincibility in such a fashion as to render him so utterly different from the Thomas who stands before his uncle, his hands shaking and something in his chest tightening with every word Selkirk speaks?
He wants that man back - his confidence and his stubborn optimism in the face of adversity. It is that man - his former self - that he needs now, and he takes a deep breath. He can’t be that man - not truly, not yet, maybe not ever again despite his hopes, but maybe he can pretend. He straightens, and when he opens his mouth again, it is Lord Thomas Hamilton speaking, or the best approximation of him he can manage, not the pathetic shadow of a few moments earlier.
“I’m sorry, but did you say that my father is dead?” Thomas questions, and Selkirk stops abruptly.
“Yes,” he answers. “That’s right. You won’t have been told.”
“When?” Thomas asks.
“Some six years ago, now,” Selkirk answers, his voice brusque. “I’ve done as he wished as far as was possible, but the bastard who murdered him -”
“Murdered?” Thomas asks, incredulous.
“Yes. By one of your beloved pirates - Captain Flint.”
Beside him, John snorts and James smirks. Thomas himself can’t resist a bit of a grin as he considers just how close his uncle had been to the truth quite unknowingly.
“I wonder what he’d say if I wrote to tell him,” he murmurs, and James starts laughing quietly, imagining the look on Selkirk’s face.
The name means nothing to Thomas, nor does his uncle’s attempt to sting him with his words. Someone has killed his father. It should be a terrible blow, and yet all he can find in himself is a sort of subdued sorrow, warring with what he is simultaneously frightened and disgusted to realize is elation. Alfred Hamilton is dead, and Thomas is still alive. He’s survived the man who made his life a living hell, and the knowledge shores up the facade, helping him square his shoulders and look his uncle in the eye instead of fleeing. He is a free man, he repeats to himself, not a prisoner, and he will not act like one any longer.
“Don’t start getting ideas, boy,” Selkirk snarls, seeing the look in his nephew’s eye. “He may be gone, but you’re no Lord, not anymore. You will do as you are told, or I -”
It’s strange, Thomas thinks. He has taken on the mantle of the other Thomas to be brave - the Thomas who had never been tortured, never been shown off like an animal in a zoo - never been locked away behind bars, and yet it is entirely he, himself, the Thomas who has experienced all those things, who laughs in Selkirk’s face.
“You’ll do what?” he asks. “Have you forgotten where you took me from, my Lord?” It is not him that puts the emphasis on the last two words - it is the shadow of his old self, the one who could bite with his words when he chose (although he never chose. He remembers that about himself - that in that previous life he had been kind. He resolves to be that man again, once this is done - once this conversation is over and Selkirk is on his way. Later.)
“I have been through Hell - through horrors you cannot imagine, and you would threaten me?” he continues, and Selkirk looks taken aback. “No,” he finishes, and the word warms him. It’s the first time he’s said it since he was released. The first time he’s denied anyone anything they asked for, and it feels good - liberating. Reaffirming. He can refuse, and he will refuse. “You cannot frighten me. I am inconvenient to you - I realize that, but I will not be shuffled around like - like -” He falters. Like an unwanted tea service, a voice whispers, and he stops utterly, breath stopped temporarily in his chest. Miranda. The name comes to his mind, and suddenly he cannot move - cannot even breathe, because he’s finally remembered. Miranda. His wife’s name was Miranda, and she -
God, she was brilliant. All light and life and charming smiles and a wicked sense of humor that used to set him laughing helplessly. Miranda, so named because her parents were hopeless Shakespeare devotees, and Thomas had always said that she lived up to the meaning of her name, although admirable did not begin to cover the wonder that was his wife. Miranda, who had taken such delight in embarrassing pompous asses like Selkirk. He looks at his uncle, and suddenly he’s smiling. Miranda had hated him - had, in fact, once made a fool of him in public. No wonder Selkirk had wiped the house of her presence! Miranda is - was -
“You are a lunatic,” Selkirk snaps, and Thomas’ swallows down against the urge to be sick, his uncle’s words only half registering. “Unfit for public life. I will not be disgraced by your actions any further. You will -”
Thomas stands.
“I’ll leave,” he interrupts. “I’ll go. Never darken your door again. Please, Uncle - just leave me in peace, and I will do the same for you.” He’s back to begging, he knows, but this time it’s not about fear. He wants this conversation over with - wants this life over with, because he’s just had the nauseating realization that Miranda is gone. Miranda is gone, dead, and this house - this house that he shared with her - is suddenly the site of a thousand memories, every single one bittersweet, and he can’t breathe, can’t stay here another day, another hour. He has to get out, and Selkirk stands between him and the door.
“Out of the question,” Selkirk snaps. “I know you, boy. You’re incapable of behaving appropriately. You would -”
“I don’t know myself!” Thomas snaps, his patience gone along with any semblance of the mask he’s been trying to wear. “How can you possibly know anything about me when I can’t even recall what the hell drove Father to have me committed in the first place? Do I even look like the same person that went into Bedlam? I ask, you understand, because I don’t actually recall!”
Selkirk is staring at him now, and he lowers himself into a chair, no longer able or willing to keep up the pretence of civility or obedience.
“Let me go,” he says wearily. “If you cannot find it in yourself to behave as though we are kin -”
“We are not. Alfred’s will made clear -”
The penny drops, and Thomas stares at his uncle, hands suddenly utterly steady, a sort of realization coming over him.
“If my father has disowned me - you don’t actually have any power here, do you?” he asks, and Selkirk flinches. Thomas stands again. “If we are no longer family - no longer uncle and nephew - then you have no right to order me anywhere, legal or otherwise. You came here, hoping to bully me into going, since you can’t actually make me do a thing.” He stops, and he can’t quite help the incredulous laughter that makes its way out of him - the first time he’s laughed about anything in - God, has it really been nine years? He can feel it bubbling up out of him, part hysteria mixed with genuine relief with the heavy taint of grief lying behind it, threatening to swallow him whole any moment. “You have no power over me,” he finishes.
“I have four guards waiting outside -”
“For me? What is it you think I’m going to do?” Thomas asks. “Bite? Am I a dangerous lunatic, then?”
“You’re a damned sodomite and an inconvenience,” Selkirk snaps. “An embarrassment that should have been drowned at birth rather than -”
“I’ll fucking kill him.” The growl comes from his right, to Thomas’ surprise, and he finds John sitting up in the bed, blue eyes on fire with anger, meeting James’ green on the other side. “I’ll kill the bastard for ever saying that to you, I promise you. Fucking hell!”
Thomas shakes his head.
“No. I won’t have more blood on your hands because of me. It’s over, John. James. Let it go.”
James shakes his head.
“No. Christ, Thomas -”
“I said no,” Thomas emphasizes, and James growls.
“I’ll have his tongue,” he mutters. “We’ll see if he can insult you then.”
“Vengeance solves nothing,” Thomas said quellingly.
“And rolling over and letting people like Selkirk have their way teaches them they can get away with it!” John snaps. “You want change in the world - bastards like that are exactly where it starts!”
“I’ve no desire for either of you to get yourselves injured or killed trying to teach a lesson to a man who will never learn,” Thomas says. “And I’ve no need to be feared by anyone, with the possible exception of the villain that keeps making off with my razor.”
John has the grace to look vaguely guilty, and Thomas gives him a Look.
“What can I say?” he asks. “You look good with a bit of stubble.”
“Remind me that you said that when you’ve got beard burn somewhere uncomfortable,” James growls. “You little shit!” John sticks his tongue out at him, and he turns back to Thomas. “Alright,” he agrees. “I’ll hold off on hunting the bastard. For now, but I swear, if I ever encounter him by chance -”
“You won’t,” Thomas tells him. “He never leaves the country.”
James huffs, and then lets it go.
“You remembered Miranda while negotiating with your uncle,” he says. “When did you remember me?”
At this, Thomas actually grins.
“When I threw him out,” he says, and James gapes.
“You -” he starts.
“Yes,” Thomas says. “And now, my lord, I think it’s time you left. It was the exact same words, and apparently they worked on my uncle quite as well as on my father. I left before he could remember I had no real right to make him go. You came back to me shortly thereafter.”
James stares, and then he lets out a startled laugh. “And you called me impulsive!” he manages to say in between chuckling. Thomas feels the redness creeping up his neck, and John looks between them, clearly confused.
“I’m missing something,” he says, and Thomas nods.
“The night that James and I became lovers - he didn’t so much ask my father to leave his own house as order him to do so. He’d insulted Miranda and I, you see, and - well, James has always been such a gentleman -”
John is staring at the pair of them, and James is still laughing.
“A gentleman?” John asks weakly. “That's what you're calling it? So - he’s always been like this?” He gestures toward James, and Thomas laughs.
“Oh yes,” he answers, and then yelps as James reaches over and pokes him in the ribs, fingers going unerringly for a spot that he knows is ticklish. John grins until James reaches around Thomas to pinch his arse, and he yelps, a surprisingly high-pitched sound coming from a grown man, and Thomas snorts. He takes a deep breath, watching James and John grin at each other, challenging and affectionate, as ridiculous as a pair of boys with each other, and realizes that the tightness in his chest has dissipated, taking with it the urge to weep. It feels - odd, after so long carrying the weight of it, to find the burden shared.
“Everything alright?” James asks, and Thomas nods.
“Yes,” he says. “I think - from here on in it might be.”
He sleeps like a baby that night.