Aimeric

Voice mail & text messages for Aimeric go here.

After everything, Aimeric still retained his youthful beauty, and part of him loathed it.

He was thinner than he'd been, having lost most of the slender muscle he'd built during his time in the Prince's Guard. There were shadows smudged beneath his eyes from lack of sleep. But once he'd started venturing back out into the city the various servants of the shops he entered were eager once again to rush to his aid, offering phone numbers as they'd done before in case he had further questions or just wanted to 'hang out.' None of them knew how toxic he was.

When he first arrived back at his rooms after being released, he'd stared in the mirror for a long time, a pair of scissors in hand. He'd thought about taking the scissors and dragging them across his cheek, doing something to permanently mar what drew such attention...what had drawn the Regent's attention, and Jord's, and now the various citizens of Darrow who deemed him attractive. Then he'd laughed, and his laughter had turned to hysterical tears, and he did not understand how talking to someone who knew neither him nor the complexities of Vere could possibly repair the ways he'd been shattered.

He would not injure himself again. Not because of some newfound zeal for life, but because it was pointless. He began his mandated therapy, deciding from the start that he would conceal nothing, for the kind woman who was to be his therapist assured him that anything he said would remain between them, and Aimeric decided that if he was to undergo this exercise in futility there was no harm in not committing himself fully to his part in its execution. He could then not be blamed for not trying when it proved useless.

This had been the second week of Aimeric's therapy, twice weekly sessions. The first week had been primarily occupied with him telling his therapist of his life in Vere, up until the night at Ravenel that led to his arrival in Darrow. He'd told her everything, and her reaction to much of what he had to say had been...unexpected. The second week they'd continued with their sessions, and though Aimeric was no more confident in this than he'd been at the start, he'd felt something start to loosen ever so slightly in his chest, just from the act of unburdening himself to someone who did not immediately deem him weak or horrid.

His therapist had encouraged him to reconnect with those he knew, to try and develop friendships. So today he was in Petros Park, carefully pecking out a text message with an index finger. If you are not busy would you perhaps like to meet for a cup of coffee? He pressed send, then slipped his phone back into his pocket, knowing it would make that strange sound if there was a reply. In the meantime, he continued his walk through the park, not knowing how his message would be received.

Aimeric’s imprisonment was not unpleasant, the rooms he was kept in well-furnished and comfortable, but he could not find any gratitude within him for such niceties. The Prince’s words echoed in his head, cruel and viciously accurate. Loves you? You paltry little upstart. I doubt he even preferred you. How long did you hold his attention? A few fucks while he was bored in the country? It was a truth Aimeric didn’t want to examine, not when it was the destruction of everything he had believed to be real. And yet all that he had known the past few weeks – it made him question that which he’d thought was unshakeable, and he felt himself tearing apart from the inside. He felt flayed open, laid bare, and there was nothing that seemed real enough to grasp, to anchor himself to the world. Nothing made sense anymore.

He paced his rooms, unsettled and utterly alone. He’d bathed, dressed himself in clothing more suitable for his station. A dull ache throbbed in his cheek where the Prince had hit him with the goblet, and he knew there was a bruise, his eye slightly swollen. He didn’t want to close his eyes and rest, but even avoiding that could not prevent the image in his head – Jord’s face, his devastated expression. The one Aimeric had pretended to ignore as he rigidly sat his horse beside his father and betrayed them all - the Prince, and Aimeric’s fellow soldiers, the Prince’s Guard. He didn’t want to remember, but his thoughts could not be contained, flowing like water through soft memories tainted with deception: their first kiss, standing by the map; afterward in Jord’s tent, sweet passion interrupted by the Prince’s Akielon dog; their night at Acquitart, Aimeric insisting on being fucked in a proper bed. Every kiss Jord had so freely given, more tenderness than Aimeric had ever known in his life, was imprinted on his lips. He didn’t deserve the loyalty Jord had shown, not after what he’d done. He didn’t deserve the way Jord had defended him against the viciousness of Laurent’s attack, not when the Prince was merely revealing the truth. Even now, Aimeric searched for cracks, trying to find a way he could still be right, that the Regent could still love him. He’d wanted so badly to make him proud, to make his father proud, to stand out from under the shadow of three older brothers for once in his life. After all, the Regent had chosen him despite being the youngest, hadn’t he? No, Aimeric supposed. Because he was the youngest. Because he had been only thirteen.

For six years he had held on to those three weeks like a lifeline: The Regent loved him and one day, they would be together again. He only needed to infiltrate the Prince’s Guard and seduce a soldier to acquire intelligence, be the eyes on the inside. And yet now, when he tried to think of what he knew of love, the visions that were called up in his mind’s eye were of Jord, kissing Aimeric without reservation, giving more than he received, unhurried in his passion. It was nothing like what he had experienced of love before. It was beautiful and unconditional, and Aimeric couldn’t bear it. He couldn’t reconcile it with what the Regent had taught him, and worst of all, he couldn’t face the agony of knowing that if he had to make a choice now, his sense of loyalty would steer him toward the Regent even as his heart cried out for Jord.

It didn’t make sense. Nothing made sense anymore. He was broken beyond repair.

Aimeric sat at the table, intending to write a note, but the words would not come. What words could possibly be sufficient to convey what he was feeling? He could barely sort out the emotions that assailed him. He raked a hand through his hair, damp curls in disarray, clenching his jaw against the tears that threatened to overwhelm him. There was no explanation that would suffice.

He stood abruptly, going to the window. It wasn’t difficult to break one of the panes in the corner, and he carefully removed a large enough shard of glass to fulfill his purpose. Sitting back at the table, he wondered if the Regent would mourn, or if he would even spare a passing thought. He wrote, then, three simple words: I’m sorry, Jord. He placed the note carefully aside, to be found later. Then Aimeric took up the piece of glass from the window, and with careful precision, sliced down the inside of his wrist, biting back the whimper of pain as he made certain the cut would be deep enough.

It wouldn’t be long now. The second wrist proved markedly more difficult, the fingers of his hand unable to grasp, the cut shallow. One would be enough. He was too weak. He’d always been too weak, even though he’d tried so hard to prove otherwise. He’d been so proud to hear that Jord had noticed his hard work, in spite of his determination to not care what the Captain of the traitor Prince’s Guard thought. He’d grown to crave the taste of Jord’s kiss, in spite of his purpose in seducing him in the first place. He couldn’t muster the energy to laugh as his mind summoned that familiar face, a final memory as consciousness left him.

I’m sorry, Jord.

He was found bleeding and unconscious in an alley, a passing witness whose identity Aimeric would never know calling for emergency services. At the hospital, saved by the doctors, he was placed in a recovery room and spoken to in a strange language he had never heard and yet somehow knew, flickers of calm voices during bouts of consciousness saying things he couldn't comprehend - a place called Darrow, they had called his emergency contact, who would be there soon. Laurent would be coming soon, they told him, horribly butchering the pronunciation of the Prince's name, but Aimeric was too confused and hazy to care. He was supposed to be dead. All he could do was lie uncomprehending in this strange bed, hooked to strange machines that beeped, and wait for the arrival of the last person he wanted to see.