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[ For once in his life, Cardan doesn't quibble with an order. He stops slightly behind Liem again, though his eyes are on the assassin's shaking form, blood and singed feathers and cast-off skin. She, too, seems frozen, one arm still raised to defend against attack, but her breaths are shallow, whistling. Whatever broke in her chest appears to be making itself known. ]

It would tether you to her master.

[ She hisses, and he feels a small dose of satisfaction somewhere along the panic. She had not expected to be understood.

...still, there is no real time to take pleasure in it. He speaks quickly. ]

She spoke a geas, though she should not have the power to bind you. [ If she did, surely she wouldn't have attacked with knives and flesh. ] Not unless she bought it. With her life, for example.

[ At this, the wings flutter, agitated; the assassin opens her mouth, and Cardan barks out a harsh laugh. ]

Oh-- you didn't know. Did you think your master gave you a boon?

[ He can see it all too clearly: Use the geas only when in great peril, and you will have the power to carry it through. Clever, if convoluted: even if she failed in her stated mission, she would succeed in another. ]

Edited (words) 2022-12-09 15:25 (UTC)

[Cardan’s answer makes Liem’s eyes narrow. It is not his custom to start fights that he doesn’t intend to finish. This faerie has attempted to kill him and his husband both; he is willing to tolerate much, but this goes beyond even his capacity for forbearance. After a certain point, being permissive only invites others to take advantage.

Also, right now he feels ready to jitter right out of his skin. His wounds sting, the stab wound especially, and every movement the assassin makes threatens to turn into a reason to take her down. The prospect of letting her leave goes against every instinct he has.]

If she dies? [He speaks the question evenly, resisting the urge to snarl it.] Or if she dies by my hand?

[Or by his teeth, presumably. That’s always an option where vampires are concerned.

He doesn’t like the idea of this living bomb slinking away with her finger on the trigger of magic he doesn’t understand. He doesn’t like the idea of her going back to her master to tell him what she’s learned about Cardan’s husband. He doesn’t like the idea of her succumbing to her wounds and bewitching him from afar. He especially doesn’t like the idea of this somehow coming back to bite him if she gets killed by someone else. That would be especially irritating.]

[ Cardan's eyebrows twitch up. It's a difficult question to answer conclusively -- magic is hardly an exact science. Beyond that, the fact that Liem doesn't appear fully convinced is worrisome. The trembling in the bird woman's wings is concerning, too; he doesn't know what Liem will do if she tries to escape. He doesn't know what his husband's wounds are doing to him, whether he's about to end up in a room full of corpses anyway--

He aborts the thought. ]

Perhaps not if it was by mine.

[ He doesn't intend on killing her; he has never killed anyone, and this seems like a fraught place to start. But the threat is cheap enough, and he's sure his reputation for cruelty makes it credible--

She appears to seize this moment to make the decision for them. The mass of stick-like limbs and feathers lurches back, scrabbling towards the back door in a mess of unnatural movement. The pause seems to have given her back some strength and coordination; though she is plainly hurt, she still moves with unnatural speed. If she can only reach it-- ]

[Although his eyes are still trained on the woman before him, Liem has split his attention more than he should. At the sound of Cardan’s reply, a frown tightens his expression for the first time since the assassin had thrown her first blade. When he had asked that question, he had not meant that he thought his husband should get involved—

She bolts.

She bolts, and Liem is just a heartbeat too slow to register whether that movement is aggression or escape, to decide whether he should really let her go, to note the door she’d come through, to move to intercept. He darts after, reaches the door just an instant after she flings it open and hurls herself through — and he’s ready to hurl himself right after her, to run her down until her wounds slow her just enough to land her in his grasp for a final time.

He isn’t thinking about what he’ll do once he catches her; he can figure that out later, probably. If he gets his hands on her again. His only thought is that she’s bought her own death and he intends to deliver what she’s owed, one way or another.

Except.

Except he stops, instead. He catches himself on the doorframe, dragging himself to a halt with a lurch that makes the solid wood creak. And he grips it, white-knuckled, as he stands on the threshold and watches her scrabble through another door and out of sight.]

[ For a few breathless seconds, Cardan thinks it's all for naught. They both move too damnably fast-- by the time he's lifted his hand and gasped Liem's name, she's out the door and Liem is at it. He feels like he's watching a cat pounce after its prey, unable to stop its killing instinct even if it had wanted to.

But Liem does stop. Inexplicably, he stops, though it seems to take him a great deal of effort; or maybe it's going after her that has exhausted him in the first place. Cardan doesn't know and doesn't want to stop to think about it. The tight knot in his stomach isn't resolving either way.

He makes himself step across the room, even though his legs feel suddenly leaden. ]

Please-- [ And even though it's unwise, and he's, frankly, a little terrified, he's going to reach for Liem's shoulder with somewhat tremulous fingers. ] --tell me you're not dying.

[ There is not a hint of irony in the question. ]

[At first, Liem’s grip on the wooden doorframe is all he has to ground his buzzing nerves and his twitching muscles. The stink of burnt flesh and the foreign, enigmatic scent of spilled faerie blood still hang heavy in the air, and he visibly quivers with the desire to stalk through the door and disappear into the labyrinthine dark of the mansion. The fact that the faerie has escaped his sight hasn’t made this desire any less potent; in a way, it has only teased it to higher excitement, added the thrill of a stalk, a real hunt, to the promise of a kill.

It would be best if he could sink his fangs into someone — for his wounds as well as for his nerves. Though the only other person here has shed enough blood tonight already, at least by his reckoning.

The hand on his shoulder doesn’t come as a surprise, nor even do the jitters that Cardan also seems to be afflicted with. Liem’s grip on the doorframe eases from its brutal intensity. He turns his head to look back at his husband, trying to shove the escaped assassin out of his mind for the moment.

He is not, however, expecting the question that accompanies Cardan’s touch. He blinks, and — before he can think to stop it — a broad, amused grin flashes over his expression.]

From a knife wound? No.

[He shouldn’t be so cavalier about it, but he’s just too wound up. What vampire had ever died from being stabbed in the gut? Only the woefully uninformed would expect to be able to kill a vampire with nothing more than some silver daggers.

But he does finally let go of the doorframe, and the smile vanishes just as quickly as it appeared, replaced with an intent look that he rakes over his husband as he touches careful fingertips to his jaw.]

You’ve lost some blood though, haven’t you. Where are you hurt?

Edited (grammar) 2022-12-09 22:06 (UTC)

[ The grin earns Liem a glare, though there is no real rancour in it; regardless of how silly Liem might have thought he's being, Cardan is only-- relieved. So much so that it makes him feel slightly weak-kneed now that the immediate danger is over. Later he's going to have questions, like where were you hiding all this violence and since when is a knife wound a minor inconvenience, but for now, it seems pointless to question good news.

He'll pull his hand away to close it into a fist, alarmed at its trembling. Worried that he may not be able to control it as well as he should. They aren't out of the woods yet, and the thought of dealing with... everything else... is exhausting. But what recourse is there?

Cool fingers touch his face, and he blinks, focusing with some effort back on his spouse's face. ]

I will be fine.

[ The gash at his shoulder is deeper than he's used to, but it's at least familiar enough -- and though his jacket is sticky with blood, it can probably wait. It hurts, but-- he's used to that too.

They have more urgent things to worry about. ]

We should leave.

[ He doesn't fancy explaining a room full of feathers and blood to whoever decides to fuck here next. ]

Edited 2022-12-10 01:27 (UTC)

[It would be astonishingly hypocritical of Liem to cast doubt on Cardan after so roundly waving off the idea that a dagger injury might threaten his life, particularly as he knows Cardan cannot lie, so — although his fingers linger for another hungry moment against Cardan's cheek — his expression becomes slightly less urgent.]

Then we will.

[He does finally drop his arm, sighing and glancing back at the room and then down at his ruined suit with the same expression he'd often worn in the last week, while planning events around the visiting Duchess. He'd come here hoping for a quiet place to have an unhurried fuck, and he has, once again, instead been handed a problem to solve.

He'd rather not be caught here in the midst of the room's mess, of course, but just as pressingly, he does not want to reappear in front of the host or his guests looking and smelling like he's just been in a fight. The state of his clothes is dire enough that he wouldn't be able to explain it away even if Cardan wasn't bleeding all over his jacket right next to him; if they're seen by pretty much anyone, everybody will want to find out what happened.]

Hopefully most of the others will still be occupied, but I suppose we'd best leave through the side door. I don't care to be the subject of the next bit of hot parlour room gossip.

[He frowns as he looks at the door they came through. They might avoid running into any other guests if they slip out through the servants' door, but avoiding the staff will be close to impossible. And it is very bad manners to be caught mesmerizing another house's servants, even if it's just to make them forget they saw something strange. He mutters,]

What a mess.

[ Cardan will concede on all points except one: after the night he's had, he could not give a single care to the affront of bewitching servants. Besides, the glamour he throws up around them will not make the staff forget: it simply directs the servant gazes away from where they are walking -- the difference between a deflection and a lie, given shape. Even so, there are some close calls and some hasty, strategic retreats. It's funny: any other time, ducking around corners and hiding in shadows would have sounded like great fun, particularly with his oh-so-serious husband in tow.

Tonight, it only forces him to admit that he may have oversold his resilience. By the time they arrive at Iago's estate, the anxiety keeping him distracted has worn off enough that he's hurting, and in a way that's more keen than he's used to. Keeping the strain out of his gait becomes difficult; eventually, he will give up. What's the point, anyway, if no one is to see him?

Liem seems to be doing just fine, which is particularly irritating.

The shimmer of glamour drops immediately once the heavy doors close behind them. Cardan himself waits a little longer -- first, he will stalk over to the liquor cabinet and, not bothering with a glass, lay waste to half a bottle of wine.

Then he will sink into a chair and take what feels like his first full breath in a couple of hours. That hurts too. ]

[Their painstaking journey out of the manor, back home and to Liem’s rooms (their rooms) affords Liem the time to settle somewhat from the nervous excitement that had seized him back in that disused parlour. Gradually the list of concerns made inaccessible by the immediacy of a life-or-death fight filter back into his awareness: the provenance of the assassin, for instance, and the consequences of her escape.

As they near the safety of home and the pain of the stab wound in his gut dulls to a lingering ache, he adds worry about his husband to that list as well. The scent of blood on him has gone from fresh to stale, but he considers the surrender of Cardan’s poise to the strain in his movements to be a bad sign.

His beeline for the liquor cabinet is a bit more ambiguous after the night they’ve had, but he certainly doesn’t view it as a good thing.]

I’m going to send for the doctor.

[By the time Cardan has sat down, the silk at Liem’s neck and the remains of his shredded waistcoat are both undone, and he’s most of the way done with his shirt buttons as well. God knows he could probably just rip the whole tattered, blood-spotted mess open in the state it’s in, but at this point the motions are simply automatic.

As his hands work, he disappears through the bedroom door, leaving it open behind him. His voice floats back out.]

And then, we need to talk.

[ Cardan doesn't protest the call for a doctor; he only watches, expression carefully blank, as Liem's hands work to open his clothing. Despite everything that's happened, it's a welcome enough distraction -- until Liem deprives him of it by walking away.

Liem will get no response to his second statement, either.

He's right, of course. They do need to talk. That doesn't mean Cardan has to look forward to it, and it certainly doesn't mean he's not going to spend the time until the doctor's arrival drinking in morose silence. It takes the edge off, but not sufficiently; he would need something stronger after tonight, or a lot more of what he currently has. His thoughts drift longingly to the little vial of golden powder he had brought from Elfhame and tucked into a bedside drawer. Nevermore would certainly work -- would probably render him insensate and warmly happy all too soon -- but he cannot afford to be that, either.

So he will wait and drink. Once the doctor arrives, he peels out of his blood-stained jacket and shirt, then straddles the chair backwards so his back can be worked on. He tolerates the wound cleaning with stoicism, though his tail is twitchy.

The suturing needles give him more pause. ]

Is this really necessary?

[ At least he has clawed his way back to his usual arrogant tone. ]

[Liem reappears after barely more than a minute, dressed only in slim black trousers and a matching shirt, open at the throat. Tension is nakedly visible in the set of his shoulders and the shape of his mouth; he has to take a moment to force some ease into his countenance before he can send a servant to fetch the house doctor.

While he waits for her to arrive, he sits on the very edge of the couch near Cardan’s seat, with a glass of wine he mostly stares at rather than drinking from.

The woman who answers his summons is small, dark, and human. She strides into the room, absorbs Liem’s brief explanation with just a small click of her tongue, and sets up her things while Liem perches on the couch arm next to Cardan’s chair. He watches unabashedly while she cleans the blood from the wound in his back.

“It is if you want it to heal up quick and clean,” the doctor says briskly as she fits a length of surgical thread to the needle, holding it steady with what seems to be a cross between long-handled tweezers and small-jawed pliers. “Otherwise it’s liable to just tear right back open.”

Liem is eyeing the surgical equipment with a thinning of his mouth. The smell of sizzling, bleeding flesh and burnt feathers comes unbidden to his mind, and his fingers reach automatically in search of Cardan’s hand.]

[ Cardan eyes her with something very close to hatred, but he doesn't protest further. Only: ]

Work quickly, then.

[ He takes one last swig from the bottle, then puts it on the floor and picks a spot on the wallpaper to stare at. He will relax a moment and a deep breath later, if only a little. His expression goes a little slack, his eyes flat.

He does let Liem take his hand.

And then there's nothing to do but breathe through it. Luckily for Cardan, as the needles are steel instead of pure iron, there will be no outright sizzling. Still, it burns; the needle and the forceps leave angry red marks where they touch his skin. His grip on Liem goes from tight to bruising relatively quickly, and he cannot say he remains silent.

But eventually, that, too, will be over.

After some steadying breaths, he'll uncouple his fingers from Liem's and waggle them for his wine glass. ]

If you're not going to drink that, give it to me.

[Liem doesn't make a sound, doesn't even take a breath as the doctor stitches a tidy, efficient row of sutures over Cardan's shoulder. He sits next to them and he watches the work get done, flicking his eyes from Cardan's neck down to his tail, listening to the steady sound of his breaths and the racing of his heart; trying not to listen to anything else.

By this point, the grip on his hand hurts more than the half-healed stab wound beneath his hasty change of clothes.

Eventually, the doctor finishes her work and begins rooting around in her bag. Although he can't imagine how they wouldn't be done at this point, Liem is too distracted to be mystified by this. He surrenders his wine glass soberly, without comment; there's little else he can contribute at this juncture. All he can do is wait until her business is finished — presently she does emerge from her bag, wanting to apply some sort of pungent paste to the wound and bandage it up — and ensure she retains no true memories of her visit when it's time for her to leave.

When the door has closed behind her, Liem leans against it for a moment, seemingly at a loss for what to do next. He feels fried and restless and exhausted all at once, and for that moment it shows starkly in the aimless direction of his gaze and the lean of his head against the wood.

But he takes a breath, rallies enough to find his way back to the liquor cabinet for a glass of wine he does, finally, intend to drink. And he turns back to look at Cardan again.]

I'm glad you're not dead, [he says. He means to follow up with something else, but his mind seems to get stuck on this point. The thought is loud in his head. His hands, cupping his glass, are quiet and still.] I wasn't expecting to need to worry about such things tonight.

[ Cardan doesn't know where to start with that. Usually, he would have spent some time workshopping this conversation in his head, but-- his focus had been taken elsewhere, and now that they're here, he feels at a disadvantage. Or he ought to be, anyway, except that the scattered way Liem looks suggests otherwise.

Cardan both can and cannot fathom why.

He will unfold himself from the chair and consider his options. He would like to keep drinking, and he would also like to be comfortable for the no doubt exhausting discussion they are about to have. Irresponsibly, what he wants most is to commandeer Liem's lap as a pillow again, which would be manageable as long as he favoured the other shoulder in lying down.

Unfortunately, that's not going to work for this particular discussion. But he will collect another bottle, then lean one hip against the cabinet as he goes about uncorking it. ]

She could have picked a more opportune time. Any day last week, perhaps. [ Instead of while he was trying to suck Liem's dick. Perversely, the desire to do so hasn't receded significantly; his gaze strays, lingering, to the exposed slant of Liem's pale collarbones. ]

...how do you feel?

[ And that's not what he'd planned to say first. But he might as well ask; for all that Liem may be physically fine, Cardan imagines this wasn't a pleasant experience for him, either.

Plus, there is the small matter of the geas. ]

[Liem smiles slightly at Cardan's observation, following the dip of his gaze as it slides down from his face to linger about his open collar. He can think of any number of reasons why the Count's party would have made for a more convenient opportunity for an assassination than at some point during the drudgery of last week, but if their assailant was especially well informed and had a particularly nasty sense of humour, he supposes she could have chosen that moment just to add insult to injury.

It really does feel like fate is just conspiring against them at this point.]

I should be asking you that.

[He drains some of his glass, regarding his husband sidelong. He looks steadier than he had earlier, in the count's manor, but that's hardly a high bar to clear.]

I feel as well as can be expected: Disturbed. Tired. A little paranoid. A little sore.

[Thirsty, also, but he will make do for now. He takes another sip of his wine, glances at Cardan over the rim.]

Still bound only to my father, as far as I know.

[Oh, how terribly jealous Iago would be if some other lord sunk his claws into his son. But, much as Liem enjoys the thought of causing his father frustration, he devoutly hopes never to inflict this particular one on him.]

Good.

[ He's going to ignore the fact that it's unlikely such a contract would be felt. There is no point in disquieting Liem more than he already should be, especially since: ]

If our lady visitor is still alive, then the time for enchantment should have long passed. [ This, at least, he's confident about, even with his limited expertise in powerful spells. ] Even if she were to die now, I do not think it would bind you.

[ It's a relief. Cardan has had time to narrow down his guesses of who might have sent an assassin after him -- after them -- and the thought of them taking control of his husband terrifies him. He's surprised by how vividly he feels it: an immediate, visceral rejection of the idea. It appears that at some point over the last few weeks, he has come to think of Liem as his, which is ridiculous -- because aside from physical attraction, what they appear to share most is a near-infinite capacity for misunderstanding each other. And yet. And yet.

Well, he has always been possessive.

Unfortunately, he is also fairly clear on the solution to the problem. His jaw clenches with it, unhappy, but the answers to these kinds of problems are rarely palatable. ]

...if I were her only target, there would have been no need for a geas. I am hardly difficult to kill.

[ Embarrassing to admit, maybe, but the past few hours have hardly left room for pretense. ]

I suspect it was meant for you all along.

[It’s for the best if Liem doesn’t have to consider the possibility that he could have become subject to the geas at some point without his knowledge. It won’t serve him any to have his paranoia increased any further, particularly since even the news that he should no longer be at the spell’s mercy does nothing to grant him any sense of relief.

The fact remains that someone motivated enough to send an assassin and canny enough to bait a trap with her life has designs on both him and his husband, and he still doesn’t know the first thing about them.

This is both completely expected and entirely new territory for him. Compared to his venerable father, Liem is an appealingly easy target, and this wouldn’t be the first time someone has tried to use him to — he assumes — access Iago. But usually those attempts come his way from amidst tangled sheets or over pleasantries and sips of wine. This is the first time someone has been ambitious enough to grab for him with magic. That is deeply unsettling; it makes him want to drain his glass and follow Cardan’s example with a bottle of his own, though he resists the urge to do so.

The fact that the attempt led with a try for Cardan’s life is not unsettling so much as wildly, woundingly unfair. That he would struggle so tirelessly to win some shred of Cardan’s regard only to see him killed in front of him is a joke too cruel to even consider; his eyes go flinty as he slams the door on that particular thought.

Carefully, he sets his glass down on the cabinet.]

Cardan. Who do you know who has both the means and the motivation to have sent that assassin?

[ Cardan huffs out a mirthless laugh. He has plenty of enemies in the High Court, but none of his childish quarrels would warrant such effort. No, this is plainly about higher stakes. Which has to mean: ]

Only my relation.

[ He doesn't actually need to run down the list. It's not like he thinks Liem has grounds to question his judgment, and he is relatively sure of whom he suspects.

He'll do it anyway because the answer unsettles him, and he wishes to stall. ]

My father is too busy neglecting his duties. Caelia hardly has the brains for such a scheme, and Rhiya is uninterested in politics.

[ Which leaves only his three oldest siblings, who have been vying for the throne for all of Cardan's young life. ]

Balekin is more like to think me a useful pawn than a problem to remove. [ Besides, his brother isn't clever enough for such a plan, either; for all of his menace, Eldred's first-born leads with brutality first and foremost. ] I suppose that leaves Elowyn, whom you have met, and Dain, who is poised to be my father's heir.

[ It could be Elowyn. She would certainly have the means, and he's not fool enough to believe she's above murder. But--

Cardan sighs and closes his eyes. ]

But this reads like Dain's plan. I have not known Elowyn to be so cavalier in sacrificing her people.

[Liem listens quietly to the list of immediate relations that Cardan runs down. It's a predictable enough collection of names; who else but his own family would be invested enough in his death to seek it even after he's been married off to some vampire lord beyond Elfhame's borders?

But he is disturbed by how unsurprised Cardan seems at the attempt. He had not previously imagined that the youngest prince of Elfhame would be a compelling target for assassination, especially since nothing about his behaviour thus far has led Liem to suspect he harbours any designs on his father's throne. He is about as far from relevant to Elfhame's court politics as a prince could possibly be, and Iago's retribution is nothing to be courted lightly; his reputation hinges on it.

And yet, here they are, discussing tonight's attempted assassination.]

And why, [he says slowly,] would your elder siblings consider you to be a problem worth making an enemy of my house to remove?

[ They are getting into the portion of this family explainer for which Cardan desperately needs another drink, which is notable because he still has an unfinished bottle. Well, it will have to do, and his spouse will have to wait a few seconds while he imbibes.

Afterwards, he'll examine the dregs in the bottle instead of looking at Liem. ]

All royal children have the stars read at their birth. Mine foretold that I would destroy the crown.

[ Just that little thing. A twitchy little smile plays around his mouth; it pairs with the restless loops made by his tail. He finds cause to regret not putting on a robe. Having to explain the prophecy is oddly embarrassing. He's never had reason to tell anyone about it -- either they already knew or didn't need to. ] Among other things.

[ Now he'll glance up, though only briefly, as if trying to gauge Liem's reaction. ]

I suppose no one saw fit to share this part of my dowry with your house.

[As Cardan pauses to drain his bottle further, Liem watches, and he waits. There is some puzzle piece that he's missing here: something that Cardan has avoided speaking of before now. He's a little afraid to find out what that missing piece might be.

But whatever he might have been expecting, what Cardan shares with him is worse. Liem stares at him, as aghast as if he'd confessed that he'd smuggled a bomb into Liem's home amongst his trunks of clothes and books.

For one dreadful moment, he wonders if his father did know about this and had just never deigned to mention it to him — if he had somehow been the only one kept unaware for the past month and a half. Then his sense catches up with his shock, and he realizes his father would never be so uninvolved in Cardan's time here if that were the case.

But if he doesn't know yet, he absolutely cannot be permitted to find out.]

They must not have, [he says, with an attempt at even-keeled interest, like people tell him about their personal prophecies on a regular basis.] I did not know there was such a tradition. Is that… the sole reason?

[He's really hoping "among other things" just covers mundanities like whose hearts he's meant to break, or his drinking victory against that troll he mentioned the other week.]

[ This time, Cardan does look at Liem, and if he was avoidant before, he is the opposite now: his black, intent glare bores into Liem's face, and there is something hard and searching in it. Whatever the first admission may have cost him, this costs far more. And though his husband has proven steadfast and stalwart in defending him, though Liem has been unerringly patient with Cardan's caprices and compliant with most if not all of his demands, though they are bound to each other by oaths and duty--

Though all these things are true, Cardan cannot say he wants to trust Liem with his more difficult secrets, even now.

But there is also the question of debt. Liem took a knife for him and, worse -- had almost gotten ensnared because of him. So, eventually, Cardan will sigh, and he will put the bottle down, and he will say it: ]

The prophecy intimated some things about the benefits of spilling my blood. But I do not know if my siblings know this portion of it. It is more likely they are seeking to preserve their inheritance.

[ Already he regrets sharing this. It feels rather like being exposed in the middle of an ice storm.

He's eager to leave the feeling behind.]

...regardless, I see no need for you to be involved in this. The treaties are long signed; our union need not remain. You should not have to field further attacks once I am gone.

[ That doesn't feel much better, but it is at least a little less vulnerable. ]

Edited (wording) 2022-12-12 02:11 (UTC)

[Liem meets Cardan's stare warily, feeling like he's wading blind into a mire with no knowledge of what might lie at the bottom. He's liable to get dragged into something he'd rather stay out of, and that ultimately doesn't need to concern him — but whatever intrigue his husband is at the heart of, if he's involved, then by default Liem cannot avoid being so also. He has no choice but to walk in deeper, to try to find his way through.

Except, Cardan insists on giving him a choice. It is the choice to turn around and head back the way he came, to forget what he knows and cover up the night's troubles, to bury his memories of Cardan somewhere out of the way so he can go back to his tidy, predictable life without needing to work around a husband he never wanted in the first place. It is a perfectly reasonable choice, and he should probably take it.

Liem stares levelly at him, standing very still, without a shred of emotion on his face.]

Where then will you go, once you have released me from my vows?

[The words, like the expression, are quiet, unweighted by either relief or anger. Even though he might well be relieved to not add "sons and daughters of Elfhame" to his list of enemies. Even though he might well be angry that his husband hid this knowledge from him for almost two months while he tried to build their marriage into something that they might both be willing to tolerate.]

What do you intend to do?

[ Putting aside the fact that the one who would have to dissolve their marriage would be Liem, this is not quite the response Cardan was imagining. He had expected Liem to take the offer or else to protest for the sake of something stupid, like honour or the integrity of his entirely non-binding vows. The lack of appreciable reaction puts Cardan on edge. He is reminded, uncomfortably, of his little prank in the bath, of the way Liem had shuttered his expression then.

Which makes no sense since Cardan thinks he's being uncharacteristically selfless in his offer. He raises an eyebrow. ]

I suppose I would go back to being Balekin's pet menace.

[ A fine enough answer, and probably indeed his best choice. For all of Balekin's many cruelties, being back under his wing would provide a measure of safety, and it is familiar enough a gauntlet.

He just didn't think he'd feel so much dread at the thought. It seems that he is at a disadvantage: where Liem is still as a statue, Cardan is unable to quite keep the nervous twitch from his tail nor the tension out of his jaw. It makes him angry to be faced with that impossibly level, bright stare. Why should he be explaining his post-wedlock plans of all things? It is asking a little too much. ]

Why does it matter?

[ He doesn't care for the answer, and he won't wait for it. Instead, he will turn and stalk towards their bedroom, presumably in search of that robe.

That it turns his back to Liem is just a bonus. ]

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