Page 11 of Antiletum (The Nocturne #1)
Read it yourself, your excellency
Val
“ T hey’re pissed, my Lord .”
Mallin tosses an opened letter with a distinct wax seal on my desk with an offensive plop . Doubled with his statement, I’m certain the letter is the beginning of my reprimand from Parliament.
Wonderful. Perhaps I will start correlating bad news with the appearance of my dearest friend.
Fingers pressed into my temples, I respond, “As we knew they would be.”
Beyond the rasp of my voice, footsteps and stern orders echo outside of my office. The ever-present happy sounds of summer birds chirping on the manor grounds doesn’t fit the overall energy today.
The manor has been a flurry of motion and straight pandemonium since I announced our early departure back to Omnitas. What’s the point in staying? Especially when there is no honeymoon period as I had assumed there would be.
No slow days lazing on the grounds, dropping fruit into Delaney’s smart little mouth, talking for hours while we bask in the sun.
No stolen moments amongst the trees with my wife’s skirts hiked around her waist, whispering words of adoration and pure filth in her ear while I’m pushed deep inside her.
Not caring if anyone happens upon us, too needy for one another to make it back to our marriage bed.
Our cold, lonely marriage bed.
An involuntary squeeze wraps around my weary heart. Delaney probably won’t want to move back here with me when we get settled after all.
“Did they mention Delaney?” I ask, not hiding my desire to rip the letter into shreds and pretend it doesn’t exist. That the ones who sent it do not exist. My exhaustion makes my already raspy voice somehow more gravelly.
Fuck. I should have already asked Nelda to have a tonic ready. I cannot stand these throat aches, coming along far more consistently lately than what I usually suffer.
Alas, the raw throat and unending indigestion is more than worth the indulgence.
Mallin stands at the edge of my desk, nudging the letter towards me. “Read it yourself, your excellency.”
I glare at him. He feigns a deep, mocking bow, his dark skin practically sparkling in the daylight. The gold hoop through his septum glints merrily.
“Are you quite finished?”
“Never.” He grins wide. Playful. Familiar.
I haven’t formed many deep attachments in my life, but my friendship with Mallin is certainly one of them.
And Alaric. Though he was indisposed and unable to join us at Greystone for my wedding.
Mallin was an easy choice as my Alter. And he very much enjoys making a show of our new titles within the faction.
Another painful heartache plagues me as I gather myself from my slouch, collect the letter, and read it myself just as Mallin suggested.
A bout of unwarranted memories of my departed father and brother.
All that they kept from me. The esteemed Llewellyn ven’Sol and his (legitimate) eldest son Heath.
The men who built me up to who I am today.
I’d be nothing without their guidance. Their tutelage.
Deos, but do I miss them.
A grief I should be able to share with my wife. Though Tabitha’s loss is not one I will ever grieve when we inevitably hear about it.
Reading the letter from Parliament takes only a moment. It doesn’t say anything outside of what I expected. And no mention of Delaney at all. A small but infinitely welcome mercy. Anyone with a functioning brain would know she wasn’t complicit. Innocent. Tucked away from Omnitas and The Citadel.
Away from me.
My father never shied away from my necromancy.
Instead, he made a point of showing his pride and trying to turn the tides of prejudice against the thought to be extinct gift when he rose to the position of Alter for the former Lord.
Something he made astounding progress in over the years he held the title.
Though, I suppose I helped. Making myself a respected member of the court, then gaining the favor of the cabinet, thanks to my ruthlessness and unfailing loyalty .
There’s a lot to be said about the level of torture that may be delivered by killing your captives and raising them over and over and over.
Makes for reliable extraction of information.
It all deeply helped my unsuspected rise to the role of Lord when my predecessor died at the same time as his heir.
And then his Alter . Oh, and then that heir as well—my very own father and brother.
Leaving only me.
But widespread famine and poverty and crime brings about many unexpected deaths in wealthy and noble families, as Parliament well knows. Quite out of hand these days. Almost like the masses are weary of being under a boot.
Hatefully, I inspect the parchment from Parliament while Mallin patiently waits for me to comment.
I blow out some of the hot frustration sitting in my lungs.
Doesn’t quite work, and it’s easily heard in my eventual response.
“I’m surprised it took this long to hear from them after my wedding.
” After my wife and I came together, our necromancy binding in a flare of intense power when we forged our souls together. Achieving the impossible.
“Poor oversight on Delaney’s parents’ end, ensuring no one—not even Parliament—was aware of her necromancy,” Mallin points out sarcastically. Everyone thought she had the more minor gift of a grower, thanks to her normally law-abiding parents and the documents they forged to record her showing.
“How wonderfully treasonous of them,” I agree.
Admittedly, I do feel marginally guilty for not warning Delaney before we wed. I had considered it. Quite a bit, actually. Pacing outside of her bridal chamber in the manor as she prepared for our wedding.
Part of me wanted to march in and tell her everything that our union was to truly mean.
Everything it took to get here. The other part simply wanted to walk in and be the one to place her headdress atop her head.
The one I designed and made myself, painstakingly collecting all the perfect pieces.
Just for her. Tell her that I could never have conjured a more beautiful bride than she, the literal epitome of my hopes and dreams.
That our wedding was everything I had prayed for.
My fear of rejection made me flee. Certain she wouldn’t want to accept all that I had to offer. Thanks to her current attitude towards me, I stand firm that my decision to act and ask forgiveness later was the best course of action .
Imagine my joy when our necromancy came together to breathe life into every single dead thing within range.
When we were officially bound through blood, sweat, tears, cum, and magic.
The way Delaney not only didn’t question the moment, she reveled in it, openly able to use her magic for the first time in her life, knowing that I accepted her for it because I am the same.
I made a point to tell her vehemently that night before we fell asleep in each other’s arms that she would never, ever have to hide who she is again.
It was true when I told her at breakfast that us finding each other was destiny.
With my body back in its unrefined slump in my leather chair, I toss the firmly worded summons from Parliament on my desk.
The gold wax seal stamped with a barn owl face is a fucking mockery.
I offer it my most sincere scowl and fight the urge to build a nice summertime fire in the hearth just to destroy it.
“You’re in a mood today,” Mallin notes. “Even for you.”
“I’m tired.” It’s well beyond the early light of dawn when I’m most likely to be able to sleep before jolting awake again.
“And you look it, friend. Exciting night?” He winks, rubbing a hand over his shorn head. “I would ask if you finally broke through Delaney’s defenses, but if that were the case, you’d be smiling, not brooding.”
“I am not brooding.”
I am absolutely brooding. The pout that comes over my mouth is involuntary. Like a fucking toddler. Deos , I need to pull it together. This is not at all becoming of me.
My hand covers my itching eyes. “She hates me.”
“I was only teasing, Val. Quit with the melodrama.” Mallin slaps the top of my shoulder, unable to reach my back.
My fingers spread to peer at him with skepticism .
I need a nap.
“Hate is a strong word. Delaney’s been distant. Not mean. This has been an immense amount of change for her. And you’ve allowed her to be distant!” He offers me a hopeful smile. “You can work with that. Ease into things.”
Time to lay the truth out there for him, then. Well, part of the truth, at least. “My wife and I had a riveting breakfast this morning.”
Riveting indeed.
“Oh?” Mallin asks, interested. “Did it go well?” Another glower from me. “Ah. Explains the extraordinarily bad mood. Though not why you look so sleep deprived one might wonder if you got punched in the face. Twice. Perhaps by your wife.”
“Funny.”
“Well. Don’t keep me waiting. What was this conversation?”
“It didn’t go quite as swimmingly as I’d hoped,” I admit. “In keeping with my delusions, I imagined that I’d be leaving that tower this morning with my wife on my arm, ready to take a romantic stroll through the manor grounds together.”
I rub my aching head again.
Mallin makes a soft tutting noise. “And yet, here you are, still sad and alone. What did you do?”
“Why do you always assume I did something?”
Truly, I am full of asinine questions these days.
“I don’t feel the need to go over your history.
But today, I will say it’s because in spite of your grand plans, apparently the only thing in tow when you exited Delaney’s tower was the rash decision to leave Greystone early.
” Mallin gives a soft chuckle, strolling over to a tall window to gaze at the grounds .
“I learned why she’s been distant. Beyond the change,” I tell my friend, meticulous in not saying that I learned of this distrust directly from Delaney. Or that it was at breakfast.