“Did you know I have lived my life by one rule? Never let desire dictate my actions,” he said, following the dark currents of hisown thoughts. “It does no one any good. I have seen people destroyed by following the whims of their flesh.”
Was he regretting kissing her? Touching her? Were all those considered whims of his flesh?
“But you… you did not destroy anyone,” she reassured him, even as her throat felt raw, reaching for his hand. Her hands were warm against his skin, cold as the memories he was unearthing.
“Are you certain, Juliana?” He chuckled, but there was no humor in it. “Listen to this story. I was fifteen, and it was Christmas. You may know me as an arrogant brute, and you may be right. I was certainly one then. I did not want to travel with my parents to visit relatives, which was dull enough on its own, but the truth of it is rather worse than simple reluctance.” He paused, and something that was not quite shame but was in the near vicinity of it crossed his face.
“There was… a kitchen maid I was very keen on impressing. I feigned a vague illness. My parents loved me too much to question it, or perhaps they simply knew how much I despised those particular relatives and took pity on me.” A humorless smile.
“But then I caught a real fever, bad enough that the servants panicked and sent word to my parents. And my parents, being the people they were, turned the carriage around immediately and came back through a blizzard because their fifteen-year-old son, who had lied to them, who had stayed behind to pursue a kitchen maid, needed them.”
“What could be so wrong about that?” she asked. “Yes, it sounds… spoiled and improper, but you were young. Adolescents can be selfish.”
Juliana thought of her own brother as a child and of their fights. Yes, adolescents could be especially selfish. Even she had her own weaknesses, and she felt she was still atoning for them.
“The thing is… They did not get to see me. The carriage slid off a cliff’s edge. Father and Mother died instantly, according to reports, but Marta survived. She was never the same since, and I vowed to take good care of her and be her fortress. It took some time for her to recover from the trauma, but not long after, she endured yet another… difficulty.”
Juliana suspected it was more than just a difficulty. She rose from her seat and took his hand. “You were young, Cassian. All but fifteen. You did not wish for that to happen. You could not have known.”
“But I should have! I let desire cloud my judgment. Over the years, I could not help but think that things would have been different had I not. I enlisted in the war seven years ago because I needed something to make me forget the painful reality of their loss. I needed to bleed. During that time, I met your brother, Kit. Your father had him sent to the front to make a man of him, or so he had told me. He was kind to me, and we became fast friends. At the time, I thought I could trust him.”
Juliana let out a small whimper. She had not expected the story to veer this way. Her heart raced. She did not know if she would be ready to hear what Cassian had to say, but she had to know. It was better than the agony of silence, at least that was what she told herself.
“What happened?” she asked in a small voice.
“I was hit at Salamanca. A French cavalryman caught me from the left. I did not see him until it was too late. The ball shatteredthe bone just below the hip. They told me I was fortunate not to lose the leg entirely, which I found hard to appreciate at the time, lying in a field hospital, listening to the surgeons debate the matter.” A pause. “Then, while I was stuck in the hospital for weeks, I was in so much pain and did not know when orifI would be released. I was rotting and unable to protect my sister. And so, I thought it was only right to ask your brother to care for the person I valued most: Marta. I sent him to Stonevale as her companion and protector.”
His jaw was clenched, the memory clearly causing him more pain than his leg ever had. Dread coursed through Juliana. She was too young to remember much from Kit’s time at the front, but he had never mentioned any of it to their family.
“When I was discharged, I returned home to find out that Kit did not just take care of her. In fact, he had ruined her!”
Juliana gasped.
“He left her with child and did not even try to do the honorable thing. He abandoned her when he discovered she was pregnant and fled like the coward he was.”
“A baby? Kit left her with a baby?” Juliana asked, reeling.
How could her brother—the one she had always defended—do something like that? Would that mean she was defending a monster?
A shudder ran through her.
Kit, what have you done?
Chapter 21
“Inever… What happened?”
“I took her away to the country to avoid the scandal, but she… lost the baby. We cannot be sure why, but the midwife said it could have been the stress. Marta would not stop crying, would not eat properly,” Cassian explained, bowing his head. For a moment, a strand of light caught in his hair, making him look older than his thirty years. “The deaths of my mother and father had many consequences. And Marta had always been frail since. But after that… she could only find solace in the West Tower, where she can forget the pain of what she lost.”
“I… I made her leave her safe place,” Juliana whispered, the weight of her mistake pressing down on her.
“As you understand, none of it is your fault. Everything is my fault. It began a long time ago, Juliana. I brought Kit into our lives and married you for revenge. I acknowledge my mistakes. If I do not, I will remain stuck forever. As I have been all these years, and you have every right to hate me for it.”
Juliana pondered those words. She was part of his mistakes, and it stung, even though the truth in his revelation could not be denied.
Yet we do not have to let those mistakes linger until they ruin us. No.
“No matter what, please remember this. Nothing that happened was your fault. I do not think you are a bad person, Cassian. If you were, none of this would have bothered you. And I do not hate you. I could never hate you.”
