The Morning Room, usually a sanctuary of quiet erudition for Lysander, hummed with the languid aftermath of Lord Gareth’s night. Shadows clung to Gareth’s eyes, deepening the dissipated pallor of his skin. Without a word, Lysander approached the polished oak table where Gareth reclined, a half-emptied goblet of watered wine beside him. Lysander placed a small, dark glass phial before him.
“A restorative cordial, my Lord. Distilled with mountain rue and river mint. It should ease the humors.”
Gareth blinked, his gaze slow to focus. “Ah, Lysander. Ever the diligent keeper of my constitution.” He offered a weary smile, a flicker of his usual charm. “Did my father rage this morning?”
“Your absence was noted, my Lord. And discreetly accounted for.” Lysander’s tone was carefully neutral, his heart an insistent drum against his ribs. The lie, however subtle, chafed at his meticulously ordered soul. He always covered for Gareth, always. A cold compress for a swollen face, a fabricated alibi for a neglected duty.
Gareth merely shrugged, lifting the phial to inspect its dark contents. “Naturally. One relies upon competence.” He took a slow sip, a faint grimace touching his lips. Then, as Lysander turned to assume his own place among the estate’s lesser retainers, his eye caught on the other side of the long table. A stack of detailed proposals for the renovation of the northern watchtowers lay spread across the surface, meticulously annotated.
Sir Cassian Vance wasn’t Lysander’s immediate neighbor—a handspan shorter than Lord Gareth, Lysander always found himself seated further down the hierarchy. Cassian, however, possessed a more imposing stature than Gareth, placing him squarely beside the young Lord. Lysander, often cursed his own unassuming height, finding a small, solitary comfort in his position, close enough to observe, distant enough to remain overlooked.
Lysander pushed down a familiar tightening in his chest. “When did Sir Cassian arrive?” he asked, the words barely audible.
Gareth glanced over. “No notion. He was here already when I stumbled in.”
Cassian, head resting on his forearm, stirred. He stretched, a long, languid movement, before raising his heavy-lidded gaze to meet Lysander’s. A slow blink, then a wide yawn that revealed perfectly even teeth.
“I merely intended to review a few more figures before sleep claimed me,” Cassian murmured, his voice a low rumble. “Alas, the hour stretched.”
Gareth scoffed, a glint of amusement in his eye. “This one, so diligent. One would think him more committed to his duties than even the Baron’s most seasoned stewards.”
“Do try to endure it, my Lord.” Cassian’s reply was dry, entirely unoffended. He settled back, a faint, almost imperceptible smile playing on his lips. Lysander felt a strange prickle under his skin. His gaze flickered to the window, then back to Cassian, before he purposefully turned his attention to Gareth.
The Morning Room’s usual early cadence was beginning. Soon, other retainers, minor functionaries, and aspiring squires would gather, eager to catch a word with Gareth, to bask in his careless charm. Their chatter would fill the ancient space, a prelude to the day’s obligations.
For a Lord whose reputation was often stained by scandal, his mornings often began with surprising decorum. But even so, Lysander found himself performing a subtle pantomime, feigning amusement at Gareth’s casual recountings of the previous night’s exploits—tales that always left a bitter taste on Lysander’s tongue. He endured it, as he always did.
Then, a shift in the air. A sudden hush. The reason, Lysander knew, was entirely Alaric.
“Alaric is here,” someone whispered, barely audible.
“By the Mother,” another muttered, barely concealed disdain.
“Does that fool not understand discretion, after last night’s… incident?” a squire added, pointing with an exaggerated gesture. At the tip of his finger, Alaric Thorne, a distant, impoverished cousin and a ward of the Baron, shuffled into the Morning Room. His head was bowed, an untidy fall of dark hair obscuring his face. He placed his threadbare satchel on an unoccupied table near the wall and immediately slumped over it, a picture of defeat. Lysander let out a sigh, weighted with an irritation he couldn’t fully articulate.
Alaric was pathetic. His voice, when heard, was thin. His frame, small and easily overlooked. As a wave of murmurs swelled through the room, Gareth glared at Alaric’s hunched back, a low curse escaping his lips. Lysander hated it. That intensity, that venomous focus—it unsettled him profoundly.
Gareth snatched a crumpled missive from his own table. With a casual flick of his wrist, he sent it flying. *Thud*. The parchment struck Alaric’s head with a soft sound, and the smaller boy jolted, slumping further onto his arms.
“For the Mother’s sake, do not parade that dismal visage here first thing.”
Alaric, his face still buried, shifted, obeying. Yet Gareth watched him with profound distaste, then kicked his own table, rattling the crystal phial.
“Are you deaf, cousin? Answer me!”
When Gareth abruptly rose and snapped, Alaric, still hunched, stammered, his voice trembling.
“Y-yes, my Lord.”
“Lift your head. Look at me. Speak with respect.”
Did Gareth even realize the absurdity of his demands? Lysander felt a humorless laugh catch in his throat. Uncaring, Gareth advanced towards Alaric. With every step, the unpleasant sensation churning within Lysander grew more vivid, more raw. Gareth was closing the distance, and with each footfall, Lysander felt the careful control he exercised over his emotions begin to fray.
This was not the quiet, familiar ache of jealousy he felt when Gareth favored Cassian. Instinctively, Lysander knew this. Deep down, he harbored a darkness as potent, perhaps even more so, than Gareth’s own. That was why watching Gareth with Cassian had, over time, become tolerable. But his interactions with Alaric unsettled Lysander increasingly. His hands began to tremble, and he clasped them tightly to conceal the tremor.
Gareth kicked Alaric’s table hard. It shuddered, almost toppling. Alaric jolted upright, his voice still unsteady.
“Forgive me!”
Gareth stood there, silently looking down at Alaric’s face. Alaric’s eyes, wide and glistening, were on the verge of tears. Yet, in that moment, Lysander felt as though he himself might burst into an uncontrolled sob.
Gareth never made Alaric run errands, never commanded him to perform any service. Instead, he simply watched him. If Alaric excused himself to the latrine during a break, Gareth’s eyes would track his retreating figure, even as he conversed with others. Lysander knew, because he never stopped watching Gareth.
To be honest, Lysander’s first impression of Alaric Thorne had been unremarkable. His skin wasn’t particularly clear, but his youthful features made his face pleasant enough. When he smiled, it seemed genuinely unburdened, and even his neutral expression carried a certain quiet brightness.
Before Gareth’s torment began, no one truly disliked Alaric. He seemed a boy who had grown up in an environment of quiet affection. While he wasn’t overtly sociable, preferring the company of books, there was no trace of worry or unease in his demeanor.
Most considered Alaric a decent sort. He never flaunted the modest comforts he’d known, earning him even more subtle praise. Humble, quiet, studious, and inexplicably pleasant to be near—that had been Alaric Thorne. Lysander, however, hadn’t particularly warmed to him from the start. He didn’t hate him either—he simply didn’t care. To say Alaric hadn’t even registered on his meticulous internal ledgers would be more accurate. Yet, whenever he found himself in conversation with Gareth, or Cassian, or the other retainers, and Alaric’s name arose, Lysander would casually offer a lie: “Oh, cousin Alaric? He seems… quite earnest. Polite enough.”
Gareth, like Lysander, hadn’t paid much attention to Alaric at first. Gareth was never one to concern himself with the quiet affairs of the lesser household. When Alaric had been brought to Thorne’s care some months prior, he and Gareth hadn’t exchanged more than a perfunctory greeting for weeks. That was how things originally were.
But then, one day, something shifted. A small, sharp deviation in the mundane flow of events. It happened in the quiet aftermath of the midday meal, and looking back, Lysander didn’t think he had ever regretted an action as profoundly as he regretted what occurred that afternoon.
Alaric, true to his nature, had ensconced himself in a quiet alcove of the lesser library, deeply absorbed in a thick, leather-bound tome. Lysander, on the other hand, possessed a peculiar habit of being overly congenial towards those with an unblemished reputation.
That was why, when he chanced upon Alaric, he struck up a conversation about the book in the boy’s hands. Lysander wasn’t truly a scholar of obscure texts—feigning cultured knowledge was more his style.
“A fascinating volume you hold there, Alaric. Do you truly enjoy such weighty history?”
“Oh! Yes, I find the ancient lineages quite absorbing.” Alaric startled, his quiet voice a little breathless.
At the time, Alaric and Lysander were still distant acquaintances. Perhaps that distance made the approach easier.
“Have you concluded your reading of it?” Lysander inquired.
“I am nearing the final chapters, yes.”
“Then I must advise you to close it now. The ending, I recall, is a profound disappointment. One of those narratives where the conclusion utterly unravels the preceding scholarship.” Lysander’s tone was carefully modulated, a hint of sophisticated regret.
“You have read it before, cousin?” Alaric’s eyes widened slightly.
“Indeed, some years ago. A passing fancy.” To satisfy his intellectual vanity, Lysander meticulously noted reviews and critiques of any significant work, ensuring he always had an informed opinion. Drawing on those memories, he offered a critique—not a real one, merely enough to sound discerning—and Alaric smiled, a genuinely bright, guileless expression that caught Lysander by surprise.
“You are the first person I’ve met who has read this particular tome, besides myself.”
“Is that so…?” Lysander felt a strange, instinctive unease.
“Yet I shall still complete it. Discovering *why* the ending unfolds as it does, considering the author’s earlier promises, is part of the enjoyment for me.”
“A valid perspective. Each mind finds its own truth.”
“Hearing you say that only makes me anticipate it more.”
That smile still lingered in Lysander’s memory, an uncomfortable shard. Was it some subconscious premonition he’d felt then?
After that day, Alaric Thorne began to seek Lysander out more frequently. Though Lysander found it a trifle annoying, often wondering, *Why me?*, he didn’t outright reject him. Alaric, with his quiet nature and untroubled reputation, wasn’t the worst connection to maintain. After all, books—outside of ledgers and religious texts—were largely dismissed by those of their station. For Alaric, Lysander was likely the only one who might entertain such conversations.
That day was one of those routine encounters, but it also happened to be one of the most ill-fated days among them.
Sir Cassian Vance was to blame. To this day, Lysander couldn’t fathom why he acted as he did. Why he, a man who never meddled in others’ affairs, chose to insert himself where he didn’t belong. Why Cassian, of all people, had left a stack of preliminary logistical plans for the northern watchtowers wide open on his desk for any passerby to peruse.
Lysander, who meticulously guarded his own work, naturally assumed Cassian would want his protected as well. So, he reached out, intending to flip the topmost parchment to hide its contents. That was when he saw it: a series of precise calculations, annotations, and a beautifully rendered schematic that solved a long-standing structural dilemma. An 81-point efficiency gain, noted with elegant precision.
Lysander blinked in disbelief and checked again. It was definitely 81. Considering the complexity of the problem, this was an exceptionally high measure of competence. It was the first time one of his preconceptions was shattered. A small shock to realize Cassian wasn’t merely an austere figure, but startlingly astute. Naturally, that made Lysander think of Gareth’s own contributions to estate management—a litany of overlooked details and delegated tasks. Gareth was, in truth, an architectural ruin by comparison.
Perhaps that was why Lysander felt such a mix of emotions—like he had discovered a rare, finely wrought mechanism among common iron. A man he had once dismissed as merely rigid now revealed a surprising depth, while the man he cherished remained willfully shallow. That strange realization must have unsettled his careful composure, for he did something he normally never would have done.
It wasn’t anything grand. He simply selected a nearby quill and, in his finest, most delicate hand, scribbled a short note at the top of Cassian’s topmost plan.
*“Focus on the structural integrity calculations. Your proposed solutions for the northern bastion’s foundation are quite remarkable. A 3rd tier efficiency gain is within reach with further refinement. Well done. —Kael. P.S. Forgive my presumption in viewing your work unbidden. I merely sought to tidy the desk and chanced upon your excellent designs.”*
The arrogance of evaluating someone’s work and offering unsolicited advice, however well-intentioned, made Lysander feel a blush creep up his neck, so he rambled slightly to justify himself.
He couldn’t say why he even wrote it in the first place. At the time, he must have been utterly unmoored. Looking back, it was clear this was the first mistake in what would become a series of unforeseen entanglements. Every mess, Lysander knew, began with a poorly fastened first button, one that then dictated the skew of the entire garment.