“I am well,” she said, then paused. “Actually, no. That is a lie, and I promised myself I would not lie to you, even to make things easier.”
Godric's expression flickered with something that looked like pain. “Nora –”
“I am not well,” she continued, needing to say it before her courage failed. “I am hurt and confused and angry. But I am also alive and unharmed, which is more than I had any right to expect a few days ago. So, I suppose the answer is complicated.”
He nodded slowly, accepting her words without argument. “I am glad you are safe,” he said. “That is... that is the most important thing.”
“Is it?” Nora asked, and she could not quite keep the edge out of her voice. “Because it seems to me that there are many important things we should discuss. The truth, for instance. I deserve that much, don’t you think?”
“You are right,” he said immediately. “You deserve that and so much more. I – may I sit? Or would you prefer I remain standing?”
The question was so absurdly formal given everything between them that Nora almost laughed. Instead, she gestured to the chair across from the sofa where she had been sitting.
“Please.”
They both settled into their respective seats, and for another moment, silence reigned. Godric's hands rested on his knees, his fingers flexing as though he wanted to reach for something but was restraining himself. Nora kept her own hands folded in her lap, fighting the urge to fidget.
“Where should I begin?” Godric asked finally.
“The beginning,” Nora said. “You said you only learned the truth recently. What did you mean by that?”
And so, he told her.
He spoke of growing up with Luther's lies, of being raised to believe that Gregory Wightman was responsible for his parents'deaths. He described the careful manipulation, the way his uncle had shaped him into a weapon aimed at an innocent man. His voice remained steady as he spoke, but Nora could see the tension in his jaw, the way his hands clenched slightly with each revelation.
Then he explained his discovery of the letters, his realization that Luther had been the true killer all along. And as he spoke of his mother's kindness, of the love letter she had written gently refusing Luther's affections, Nora felt tears slip down her cheeks.
“I am sorry,” she whispered when he paused. “For all of it. For what he did to you, to your family –”
“You have nothing to apologize for,” Godric said fiercely. “None of this was your fault, Nora. The blame lies solely with Luther and with me, for not questioning his version of events sooner.”
“But you were a child,” Nora protested. “How could you have known? He was the only family you had left, the only person who was supposed to care for you. Of course you believed him.”
Godric's expression crumpled slightly at that, and for a moment she saw past the composed exterior to the wounded boy beneath.
“I should have seen it,” he said quietly. “There were signs, inconsistencies in his story. But I was so consumed by grief and rage that I never stopped to question whether he might be lying.”
“And when you befriended Cecil?” Nora asked, needing to know but almost afraid of the answer.
Godric's gaze dropped to his hands. “At first, it had been purely innocent. He had been the first person who did not regard me as merely an orphan. But once Luther had got wind of our friendship, he decided to use it to his – our advantage. A means to an end, nothing more. Cecil was close to your father, and I thought... I thought if I could get close to Cecil, I could find opportunities to –” He broke off, shaking his head. “It does not matter what I thought. The point is, I was using him. Using your entire family.”
Hearing that hurt Nora all over again. But she could see Godric was also in pain himself.
“I convinced myself that I could maintain the lie,” Godric continued. “That I could be his friend while still pursuing my revenge. It was foolish and selfish, but I wanted both. I wanted justice for my parents, and I wanted to keep the one good thing in my life. But then you happened. You with your stubbornness and your fire and your refusal to let me hide behind my walls. Every time I thought I had you figured out, you surprised me. Every argument we had revealed something new and fascinating. And somewhere along the way, looking after you stopped being an obligation and became the most important thing in my world.”
He leaned forward, his eyes blazing with intensity. “I tried to fight it. God knows I tried. I told myself that I could not afford the distraction, that I needed to stay focused on my revenge.But then you would smile at me, or challenge me, or look at me with those eyes that saw straight through every defence I had erected, and I would forget why I was supposed to be keeping my distance.”
Nora's breath caught in her throat. “Godric –”
“I fell in love with you,” he said, his voice rough with emotion. “Completely and irrevocably. And it terrified me, because suddenly I had something to lose that mattered more than revenge, more than justice, more than anything else in the world. You became my weakness, Nora. The one thing that could destroy me utterly if I lost you.”
“That is why you pushed me away,” Nora said, understanding dawning.
“I thought if Luther believed you meant nothing to me, he would not use you as leverage,” Godric explained. “I thought I could protect you by making him think I did not care. But suppose I loved you far too much and my feelings were written all over my face. And I very nearly lost you because of it.”
He stood abruptly, unable to sit still any longer, and began to pace. “I never had any time for love or even believed in it. I never thought it was possible for me to find that sort of thing in life.”
He stopped pacing and turned to face her fully. “But then there was you. And I realized that everything I had been taught was wrong. Loving you makes me stronger. It gives me something worth living for. You make me want to be better than I am, to beworthy of the faith you place in me even when I do not deserve it.”
