The only sound she heard was a low groan, but it was certainly Cassian’s voice. Pressing her ear as close as she could, she heard a low shuffle and scuffle. He was alive— but was he injured?
Panicked, she turned and sprinted back to the main house, shouting for Andrews or for any footman around. When he came running, she blurted, “Cassian is trapped in the outbuilding! There is so much rubble and rocks, and I heard him groan, and—and—”
The butler held her shoulders and, to his credit, held his calm, “We’ll get him out, Your Grace.”
She nodded jerkily and followed after Andrews and the five footmen who rushed out to aid Cassian. She stayed behind as the men worked to remove the rubble, wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow.
Cecilia’s worry and fear heightened with every passing moment, and she would call out to Cassian every few minutes, hoping to get an answer—but none came.
Little by little, Cassian’s body was revealed, and while more than half the rubble was yet to be moved, she wanted to climb over it and rush to his side. It was too dangerous, though, and she could only pace and try to see if Cassian was uninjured.
He was seated across the far wall, a sledgehammer by his side, away from the rubble—but what concerned her most was that his head was pressed on the wall, and he looked… distanced anddefeated.
“Are you injured, Your Grace?” Andrews asked the moment the rubble was largely cleared, “I can send for Dr. Hamilton to arrive in under an hour and—”
“No,” Cassian stopped him, his voice void of emotion. “I’m—I’m not hurt. But thank you for saving me.” His eyes landed on a quiet Cecilia. “Cecilia, please sit with me for a moment. Andrews, you can rest easy. We’ll be in soon.”
With an uncertain nod, the butler and his men headed back to the manor, their dark jackets soon melding in the nighttime air. Cecilia went to him, folded her skirts under her, and sat at his side amid the rubble, surprised when his arm did not curl around her or bring her into him.
He didn’t speak for a while, but she allowed him time to process his thoughts; the most important thing to her was that he was alive and those seven wheelbarrows of debris had not fallen on him.
Cassian drew his legs up and rested his arms on them. After a long moment, he finally spoke. “When I was nine, not long after my mother passed, my father and brother had left Hertfordshire on a business trip. I was supposed to go with them, but the morning before they’d set off, I had come here to sleep the night.”
She frowned. “You weresupposedto go with them?”
He smirked blankly into the air. “I had overslept and they’d left without me.”
Cecilia furrowed her brows at his answer. “When they didn’t see you, they didn’t come looking?” she asked.
“No,” he said, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world. “I… I can only assume they had thought I’d chosen to stay back. But the house staff presumed I’d gone with them.
“I woke up closer to noon to the racket of an early summer storm. The winds had slammed the heavy oak door in and locked the latch from the outside. Cecilia, I had been trapped here for almost four days.”
Horror cloaked Cecilia’s heart in a grim shroud. How couldanyonehave survived that, let alone a child?
“To my good fortune, I suppose, the summer storm lasted the rest of the week, and I drank rainwater that dripped in from a crack in the roof,” he continued hollowly. “There was a kind messenger boy—no older than ten-and-eight—Noah, who heard me early on the fourth day while posting some letters, and who eventually alerted Mrs. Joan, the housekeeper.
“You can imagine the scandal that rippled throughout Hertfordshire at the time. It forced Father’s hand into sending me to a boarding school, so I could be properly watched over.”
“You mean controlled,” she muttered.
He grunted. “The moment I left Oxford, I left England entirely. Truthfully, after my mother passed, there was nothing for me here anymore. I only returned when I had learned of my father and my brother’s passing.”
Only to leave again.
“That… that must have left some mark on you,” she said at last.
“Not as much as you’d think,” he murmured, picking at some debris on his sleeve.
Secretly, Cecilia doubted that. From the hollow echo in his voice, she knew it still haunted him and had struck him deeply. And eventually made him the man he is today—evasive, lonely, and constantly on the move. She felt a pang of sympathy for that lonely boy and began to realize why he was the way he was—still, he refused to let any weakness show.
She realized his self-reliance had come from self-preservation. He had learned from an early age that no one was going to come and save him, no one was going to protect him, or care for him. He had to control the narrative so others could not control it for him.
“I’ve been making my own way in the world since I can recall,” he finished quietly.
Her heart ached for all the hardship he must have endured, and from such a young age. “Was it difficult? Being so alone?”
“I was never afraid of being alone,” he answered. “It is a meaningful connection I cannot seem to manage. Earlier, I received a letter from a woman I once loved, or I thought I had. I’d made some promises to her that I always intended to default on, and to my shame, I had tried to put her out of my mind for years.”
