He shook his head. He couldn’t give a definitive answer there. Years, most like. It seemed as though it had always been a whisper lurking in the back of his thoughts. Turning his concerns to keeping their mother’s eye off his niece and nephews, off Ethan in particular, had stilled it for a time. He had a purpose there. But he had also thought him being corralled had been enough for her. Guess I was wrong. Terribly.
They climbed a spiralling flight of stairs with Hamish at the fore as the space forced them to travel single file. A few servants scuttled off into the dark as Hamish reached the final step. Had they been warned to leave them alone? Or had his mother sent them to spy? They’re nae very good at it.
Moonlight peeked in through the arrowslits adorning one wall, illuminating the way. If he peered out the holes, he’d be able to spy the courtyard and the main gate.
Falling back into step beside him, his brother gave a blustering sigh. “I thought you over doing this, that you’d worked your way through it. I thought you were happy.” Gordon’s lips pressed together. There was a certain look in his eyes. Not the shame of his mother, or the mournful distress that haunted Nora’s gaze, but one glance from his brother was enough to tighten Hamish’s throat and bring a wash of moisture to his eyes. “I see we all guessed wrong.”
“I was—am—happy with Dar.” For the first time in a good long while. Maybe in ever. “When I’m with him, it’s like a weight’s been lifted. I can be meself.” Darshan expected nothing from him beyond what Hamish had to offer and, not once, had he seemed disappointed in the result. “I cannae imagine living without that feeling anymore. It hurts to think it.” But that’s what he faced, a lifetime of being something other than himself. “I cannae go back to lying just to please her. I’m tired of it.” Listening to Darshan, hearing how it was in Udynea, just brought the feeling that much more to the forefront of his mind.
Gordon ran his hand across his mouth, huffing and mumbling into his palm. “You ken that you being with him was nae meant to be permanent. He’ll leave for his home and that would be the end of it.”
“Did you honestly expect me to just… let it go afterwards?”
His brother’s lips all but vanished beneath his moustache as he pressed them together. “If I’d had the slightest inkling that you’d come away from this broken, I would never have let him near you.” He peered at Hamish. “Why now? Isnae anything better than death? I ken you cannae run, but—”
Shaking his head, Hamish rolled his eyes. “You still dinnae get it. Nae even after all your help and attempts to understand over the years. The contest goes ahead, a winner is found and we marry. I’m then forced to live a lie.”
“For one night, maybe. I ken that’s nae ideal, but—”
“One night? One?” Again, Hamish shook his head. Maybe it had been that easy for his brother, but he knew more about that than he really wanted to. “Try every night until whichever woman wins me hand is pregnant. Every morning I wake up with her lying beside me. Every gesture, every single time I open me mouth. Every breath. On and on, year after year until—” Terror pounded through his chest. He was right back in the forest, the drooling maw of the bear above him, not wanting to die, but begging for death to take him all the same. “Until one of us is dead,” he managed.
What other way out did he have? What way wouldn’t ruin more lives?
“What would you have done if Muireall hadnae won the contest when it was your hand being offered?” Hamish asked. Although not yet Gordon’s wife, she’d been several months pregnant with their first daughter, Moire, at the time. Her family had howled about the indignity of making a couple compete for their right to be together, but they were a small clan wedged between two borders. Their cries had gone unheard.
“If she had lost?” Gordon shrugged, his interest seemingly drawn to the corridor’s bare walls. “Maybe then both Muireall and Moire would still be alive.” He rubbed at his nose, trying to hide a snuffling breath in the guise of a cough. “Why did you nae tell me the dark thoughts were plaguing you?”
“Because you would’ve stopped me.”
A rumbling, mirthless laugh stole his brother’s breath as they left the moonlit corridor for a narrower, dimly-lit passage. “You’re damn right I would have. If I had thought for one second that you—” He shook his head. “I thought you were happy.”
He had been until learning of the union contest. “Aye, the prospect of the man I love leaving far sooner than I want overjoys me.” Hamish idly batted at the tassel of a moth-eaten tapestry forlornly attempting to brighten the corridor. Dust drifted from the threads. “I should’ve taken your advice. I should’ve run a long time ago, should’ve stowed away on some ship.” The terror of being hunted down had kept him from trying. Surely no distance would keep his mother from him.
Then he’d be dragged back here and subjected to whatever punishment she ordered.
“The man you—?” Gordon slapped his forehead. “Goddess’ teats, that’s right. You said the same before we left for the cloister.” His brother flashed him a look of pity. “You cannae still be serious about that.”
“Why? Because he’s a man? You dinnae think two men can fall for each other like you and your wife?” He sneered. “Do you ken who you sound like? I thought the side you were on was mine, nae Mum’s.”
Gordon slammed into him, ramming him against the wall. “Dinnae lump me with her,” he growled. “You ken exactly what I mean. He’s heading back to
