Page 24 of Duke of the Sun (Regency Sky #1)

CHAPTER 23

T he private boxing ring in which Michael had practiced all his life did not hold the same comfort as it used to. Perhaps he was imagining things, but the room echoed darkness all around him. He merely stood within the middle, already dressed in his loose clothes to box, already wearing his thin gloves and padding. A part of him felt as though he had been there for days, maybe even weeks, just standing there. Every once and a while, there would be a voice in the back of his mind, one that desperately called out to him.

“ Michael, ” the familiar voice said into his ear. “ Why did you leave me ?”

He flinched and shuttered.

For the last four days, Michael found himself in a pit of unavoidable despair. The life he left behind in Solshire haunted him still, keeping him from sleeping or behaving like a regular person. He saw Cordelia everywhere he looked. She was in the swaying trees outside of his townhouse, she was in the geese that flew overhead. She was the gentle breeze that coaxed his hair, the very grass beneath his feet. She was in everything the light touched. Michael felt as though he was haunted by her, despite death never touching her.

He waited impatiently for Rhys to arrive, pacing throughout the ring. He sent a rushed letter late in the evening a few days ago, imploring him to meet him for a boxing match as soon as he could. Though he had said in the letter that he needed some form of social interaction after parting ways from Cordelia, Michael was well aware of how it was an unmistakable lie. He needed the rush of adrenaline that came with a fight, he needed the feeling of pain to rock through him, he needed the bruises and the scars. And the only person in all of London willing to do such a thing without a single drop of fear, was Rhys.

Behind him, the door to the boxing ring opened.

Rhys stepped inside the room, his regular bag thrown over his shoulder. “You’re early,” he commented nonchalantly as he passed him by, lowering his bag onto a chair and retrieving his things.

“You’re late.”

“No humor in you today?”

Michael glared. “Get your gloves on.”

As he pulled on his protective padding, Rhys straightened up, moving to stand in front of his friend. Rhys had one brow raised quizzically as his eyes looked all over him, the frown growing with each passing second.

“What’s the matter with you?” Rhys asked. “You hardly look like yourself at all.”

Michael pressed his lips together. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“That’s it?”

He rolled his eyes, turning around to step into the ring. “Don’t push me, Rhys,” he called out over his shoulder, “And you might find me to not be the best sparring partner.”

Following behind him, Rhys kept the look of concern on his face. “Did you forget that you invited me, Michael?”

“Of course not.”

Rhys shook his head and chuckled humorlessly. “Not that you aren’t regularly a grouch,” he muttered, “But what happened? Your anger is… It’s practically tangible.”

Michael raised his fists instead. “You seem to think I asked you here to talk.”

“Didn’t you?”

“What does it look like, Rhys?”

Leaning against the ring’s ropes, Rhys shook his head again. “I can’t box with someone who can hardly stand on their own two feet.”

Michael frowned. He didn’t think he looked that bad, but once he swiveled his head towards one of the mirrors along the wall across from him, he slowly realized what Rhys referred to. There was an echoing dark shadow beneath his eyes, his hair disheveled and entirely unlike himself. He hadn’t shaved in a few days, allowing the short hair to grow along his jawline and chin. He looked gaunt and hollow.

“You can take it back, you know.”

Michael met his friend’s gaze. “What?”

“Whatever you did to Cordelia.” Rhys stepped closer to him. “Your reason for leaving. You can take it back, and return to Solshire.”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Look,” Rhys started, sounding rather exasperated, “I think you -”

Michael let out a frustrated grunt and shoved his friend backwards a few steps. “I am in no mood for talking.”

Rhys glared at him. “I won’t fight a man who can hardly stand,” he snarled again.

“Look at me standing, Rhys!” Michael held his arms out. “I wouldn’t have insisted on sparring if I did not believe I could do it.”

Rhys watched him suspiciously for a few moments before letting out a heavy sigh, and raising his fists to his face. Relief flooded through Michael as his friend stepped closer, the determination clear in his eyes. Their fight began rather timidly at first, with Rhys holding back. Michael didn’t realize how little energy he had within him when he failed to dodge the third and fourth punch, hardly able to sustain himself as Rhys’s knuckles made contact with his ribs, then his right side.

By the fifth hit, Michael stumbled backwards, his vision growing foggy and blurred for longer than he expected. He shook his head a few times, desperate to regain himself but still unable to regain his balance. Michael fell against the ropes around the ring, leaning heavily against them.

“It’s no fun winning when you can’t fight back,” Rhys grumbled.

“Who said you won?”

Rhys rolled his eyes. “Come on, Michael,” he snapped. “Do you take me for a blind man? Perhaps a foolish one, is that it?”

Michael remained silent, determined to stop the room from spinning all around him. He breathed in deeply before pushing himself off the ropes, his fists desperately launching forward without entirely seeing where he was going. Rhys merely needed to side step out of the way, letting Michael tumble till he landed on the opposite side of the ring, leaning against the ropes once more. Rhys paced behind him.

“Michael -”

Letting out a pained grunt, Michael pulled himself off again, the world beginning to take shape around him once more. He threw punches towards Rhys, though his depth perception was wildly off. Rhys kept blocking and parrying, obviously making sure not to deliver another hit to Michael. The frustration grew louder and louder in the back of his head as Rhys continuously avoided landing a punch, merely tapping him on the chest every now and then.

“ Rhys ,” Michael growled. “Are you a coward?”

“What?”

Michael threw another punch but drastically missed. “You refuse to hit me! You are a coward! I wanted a fight, and you give me a pandering game!” He shouted, dipping forward again and launching his fists forward as fast as he could. “I demanded a fight! I demanded -”

Rhys suddenly lurched forward, ducking beneath Michael’s onslaught and delivering a rough shove. Michael crashed down back into the ropes another time, his head swirling. He swayed and rocked, unable to carry himself on his feet as the exhaustion crept into his vision. He shook his head once and another time, but it was to no avail.

Rhys slowly walked towards him, barely even breaking a sweat. “I know what you want,” he muttered, “And I refuse to give it to you.”

“How can you possibly know a thing?” Michael angrily grunted, desperately trying to hold himself up on the ropes. He could taste the venom in his mouth when he spoke, but he hardly cared. Despite Rhys being his closest friend, the one person he had leaned on throughout his entire life, Michael found himself desperate to hurt him, desperate to poke his buttons till he could unleash some sort of pain upon him. He was beyond desperate for it.

Rhys sighed. “You want me to punish you in a way that you cannot punish yourself.”

Silence answered him, only the sound of Michael’s heavy pants filling the air.

“Do you want to know how I know that?”

Michael pressed his lips together. He already knew what Rhys was going to say, and it was nothing he wished to hear.

“I lost a cousin to the very heartache you wish to succumb to right now,” Rhys continued, not waiting for an answer, his voice rising in anger. “The poor sod went to war for it. Eager to punish himself for the things he had done, but only managing to be lost to everyone who ever loved him. To this very day, Michael, we know not what became of him.” Rhys stepped closer, trying to meet Michael’s eyes. “Is that the same fate you wish for yourself?”

Michael kept his gaze down, his teeth clenched together so hard it rattled his head.

“Answer me!”

“You know nothing,” Michael finally hissed. It was a lie, he knew, but he wished to convince himself of the opposite. Deep down, Michael was very much aware of how it all seemed, of how it looked to Rhys, and he was entirely right to believe it. Michael sought a punishment for what he had done to Cordelia. He never should have returned in the first place, and that needed to be hammered into his head.

Just like how his father used to crack the whip against his back.

“I look at you now,” Rhys continued, “And do you know who it is I see?”

Michael looked up at him.

“Your father.”

The anger rushed through his arms like adrenaline, pulling him off the ropes almost instantly. He let a yell out, the sound slamming against the walls and echoing throughout the private practice room. The newfound energy in his arms riled Michael forward, allowing him to land punch after punch against Rhys’s chest. His friend stumbled backwards in surprise, his teeth gritted with every hit. Michael was seething as he delivered a hit to his friend's cheek, stunning him further.

Despite the injury delivered to Rhys’s face, he merely spit on the floor, and returned to his stance. “You’re pushing Cordelia away,” he shouted, “In the same way the old Duke pushed your mother, pushed her all the way to -”

“ Shut up! ” Michael growled. “Say another word, Rhys, and you’ll regret it!”

“Why? Because you know I am right?”

Michael surged forward, shoving Rhys against the ropes. He continued forward still, clutching his friend's collar in his hands, raising a fist over his head. Despite this, Rhys remained still beneath his hold, meeting his clenched fist straight on.

“You are taking away the best thing that has happened to you,” Rhys said through gritted teeth, a bruise already forming on his cheek, “And for what? To prove a point to yourself? To become more like the beastly Duke that all of London already believes you to be?”

“You are wrong!”

“Am I?” Rhys shook his head. “They said the same about your father, and you know that. You grow more like him with each passing day, and you are too afraid to admit it!”

“This is not the same !” Michael’s hands shook as he held onto Rhys’s collar. The scars his father once gave him peered out from beneath his clothes, taunting him in a dreadfully poignant way. “Leaving was the best thing I could do for her! Without me, she has a chance! She has a real chance!”

“For what?” Rhys snapped. “A sorrow as long as life itself?”

Michael was breathing heavily, the truth of his pain beginning to reveal itself. “Do you really believe I do not look in the mirror, and see that cursed man staring back at me?”

Rhys faltered slightly.

“My mother was trapped,” he whispered. “My mother was forced to endure a darkness she was incapable of surviving on her own. I am doing the honorable thing, the one option my father refused to do. The honorable thing.”

“What is honorable about this?”

Michael’s hold over Rhys’s collar loosened. “Everything, Rhys.”

“But -”

“I cannot divorce her,” he said. “The least I can do - the only thing - is to grant her freedom. The one thing I am capable of.”

Rhys’s lips tugged into a frown. “Michael -”

“I am through with this.”

Releasing his hold on his friend, Michael slipped out from beneath the ropes, and stumbled towards the chairs. Words he never wished to expel now hung in the air all around him. He wished to be free of the pain that haunted him, to feel something other than Cordelia’s phantom touch across his lips. He felt as though she was within him still, holding onto his very soul without any intention of ever letting go.

Michael reached his bag, already undoing the wraps around his hands and removing the gloves. There were aches all across his chest and sides, Rhys’s sharp punches sure to leave bruises along his skin.

“I believe you hold yourself in a regard much lower than what you deserve,” Rhys said from behind him.

Michael shook his head. “You said it yourself. I become more like my father with every passing day.”

“Continue on this path,” Rhys replied, “And there won’t be any chance of bringing you back. You understand that, don’t you?” He walked till he stood in front of Michael, his gaze hard and persistent. “The only one stopping you from becoming like the old Duke is yourself.”

Michael wished for it to be as easy as that. “I cannot return, Rhys. Cordelia deserves far more than a marriage like what my parents had.”

“Then don’t let it come to that!”

“Can’t you see?” Michael snapped desperately, stunted by the own weakness in his voice, something he hadn’t heard in quite a long time. “It is far too late to turn back! I have abandoned her already, I have already left her behind. In what life do you see her letting me back into her heart?”

Rhys reached and rested his hand over Michael’s shoulder, giving him a reassuring squeeze. “You will never know until you dare to try.”

Michael watched his friend’s face fill with a hope he could not match. Perhaps if he was stronger or more resilient, he could nod his head and make his way back to Solshire. He could try to imagine a future where he was a kind husband, a man who would one day raise a family and leave behind a legacy. But now, when he thought it over, Michael only saw the same despair that once plagued his mother. He saw a life ended at his hands. He saw Cordelia’s future ripped away from her. At least, in solitude, Cordelia could do as she pleased. She might build another orangery, if that was what she wished for.

He would see it through, no matter what.

Michael’s lips parted to speak, right when the door to their private room snapped open. Shrouded by the afternoon light, all Michael saw at first was a tall silhouette storming towards him. The closer the figure came, the more his vision sharpened, and he recognized the man as Duncan Celeston, Cordelia’s older brother.

Immediately, Michael was put on edge at the sight of him, questions blaring through the back of his mind. What could have brought the man to him in such a rush, with such a flurry of anger behind him?

“Michael Rayson,” Duncan exclaimed, his voice shrouded by a growl, his cheeks burning a brilliant red. “I call you to a duel of honor!”

Michael’s brow shot up in surprise. Rhys was moments away from stepping in front of him, but he shot his arm out, stopping him from doing so. “Duncan,” he said, walking towards him, “What is the meaning of this? In what vein have I insulted your honor to force you to make such a drastic measure?”

“Do not act as if you are unaware of the things you have done!” Duncan stormed closer, thrusting his hand forward accusingly. “Your selfish actions for solitude have left my dear sister to the wolves, an innocent girl who has done nothing more than follow the things our father demanded her to do!”

Michael shook his head, the words swimming around his head. “To the wolves?” he repeated. “What do you speak of? Is Cordelia -”

“You have no right to even speak her name!” Duncan surged forward, violence obvious in his eyes. It was not until Rhys slipped around, stopping him from doing something he might’ve regretted later. Rhys held him by the shoulders, planting his feet on the ground to fight against Duncan’s obvious strength.

Michael almost had a mind to tell Rhys to let him go, to take every hit Duncan was willing to give. But before he could even think to do such a thing, the Celeston sibling continued shouting, his voice bouncing off the walls and hitting Michael like a punch to each cheek.

“My sister has been harmed because of you ,” Duncan spat. “My sister fell into that damned lake because of you. She lies in a bed like a dying bird because of you !”

Michael’s eyes went wide. That damned lake.

A flash of a memory he wished to keep trapped and buried deep within him rose to the surface, threatening to bring Michael to his knees right then and there. Instead, he shoved it aside, the world around him growing red with a hot and unavoidable rage. No longer did he care of Duncan’s presence or even Rhys’s. Where he was did not matter. None of it meant a single thing. There was only Cordelia, and she was wounded. Hurt, all because of him.

Michael stormed forward, his shoulder shoving past Duncan. Snatching his coat from beside the door, he surged out of the private boxing ring, racing towards where he had left his horse. In the distance, a thunderstorm crept closer and closer to London’s city streets. Michael ignored the threat of rain, throwing himself onto the back of his horse and gripping onto the reins as though they were tethered to his life. He pressed his heel into the horse’s side, and snapped the reins.

Within an instant, he was racing forward, shooting through the city streets and towards the countryside, where Solshire stood. All throughout the ride, even when the rain began to pelt down over him, Michael imagined seeing Cordelia within the inky dark lake, her pale body standing out like a bolt of lightning within the darkened sky.

Michael pushed himself faster, her name already on his lips.

Cordelia.