Rowan sat at the head of the long dinning table, fingers drumming impatiently against the polished wood.
His dark eyes swept over the assembled nobles — fat merchants dripping in jewels, stiff old lords with their powdered wigs — all blubbering anxiously about their political disaster, eyes darting away whenever he met their gaze.
Inside, Rowan was seething.
These greedy pigs. Wasting my time. My time that should be spent with Cael.
⸻
He leaned back, crossing one leg over the other in an elegant sprawl, face composed into that polite, icy smile he wore like a finely tailored cloak.
"Enough," he said at last, voice low and deceptively calm. The entire table flinched.
"You've all turned a minor border dispute into a quagmire because of your short-sighted greed. Here's what you will do—"
And then he laid it out for them.
With cruel, surgical precision, he dismantled each of their petty alliances, redirected the trade levies, promised select guarantees that bound them all tighter under his control — and offered one chilling threat, delivered with such a lovely smile that more than one noble paled visibly.
⸻
It was done in minutes.
A crisis that had been festering for weeks simply... resolved.
They sat there, stunned, muttering faint words of praise.
"Brilliant, Your Grace—"
"Only the Duke could manage it—"
"A truly wise solution..."
But Rowan didn't care for their trembling admiration.
He rose smoothly to his feet, adjusting his cuffs, smile still carved politely across his face — though the sharp edge in his eyes warned them how thin his patience ran.
"If there's nothing else," he said silkily, "I have more important matters awaiting me."
They nearly tripped over themselves in their haste to stand and bow, apologizing for taking up so much of his precious time.
Rowan merely inclined his head, already striding from the room.
His mind was leagues away, his heart racing with a raw urgency that had nothing to do with politics.
Enough of these fools. I've been away from him too long already.
_______
Rowan pushed through the heavy doors of his office, anticipation burning through his veins like wildfire.
Finally.
The world, the nobles, their endless groveling — all done.
Now he could return to the only thing that mattered.
To Cael.
⸻
But the sight that met him stopped him dead.
Cael sat on the floor amid a scattering of old letters, shoulders hunched, hands trembling. Tears clung to his lashes, his usually bright eyes wide and vacant as they stared down at some paper gripped tight in his shaking fingers.
Rowan's stomach lurched violently.
One look at the familiar seal and he understood.
No.
Not this. Not the one truth he had vowed to bury forever — even if it meant branding himself a monster.
Without thinking, Rowan crossed the room in two strides and dropped to his knees before Cael.
His heart was slamming painfully in his chest.
And when he saw the raw devastation on Cael's face — like all the light had been ripped out of him — something inside Rowan cracked beyond repair.
⸻
"Cael..." he rasped, voice almost unrecognizable.
But Cael didn't look at him. He was still staring at the letter in his hand, lips trembling, fresh tears spilling over.
"...as we discussed, I understand the delicate situation of your ward. That the child your wife carried was not of your blood, but born of her previous attachment..."
Cael's hands trembled so badly the paper shook. He scrambled through the next letter, then the next — each one worse, each one circling the same crushing truth.
So Rowan did the only thing he could think to do.
He reached up and gently covered Cael's eyes with one large, shaking hand.
"Stop," he whispered, his voice breaking. "Don't look at that anymore. Please,... don't keep hurting yourself."
⸻
Cael's breath hitched under his palm.
A small, wounded sound left his throat.
Then, so quietly it was almost lost:
"Why...? Why didn't you ever tell me, Rowan? Why let me believe he was truly my father...?Why did u hide this from me...."
Because he had always intended to take this secret to the grave — to let the world call him twisted, to bear the guilt of loving his own brother. All so that Cael could keep that pure, happy illusion.
⸻
Slowly, he pulled Cael forward, wrapping his arms around him and pressing Cael's tear-wet face into his shoulder. One hand cradled the back of his head protectively, fingers sinking into his hair as if to shield him from the entire world.
"I didn't want to see you cry like this," Rowan whispered hoarsely, voice unraveling.
"I wanted to carry this alone, even if you thought me vile — because your memories of him were happy. Because you loved him, Cael. I'd rather be your monstrous, perverted brother forever than steal that from you."
Let me be the villain, Rowan had always thought.
Let me bear every dark stain. Let me be sick with my love. As long as it means Cael keeps his precious memories. As long as he doesn't have to hurt the way I've hurt.
⸻
His hold tightened, breath shuddering against Cael's temple.
But now... he had failed.
And seeing Cael's tears — seeing that lost, devastated look — it felt like someone was carving out Rowan's heart with a dull blade.
"Please... don't cry anymore. Hate me if you must. Curse me. But don't break like this. Just seeing you hurt tears me apart."
⸻
I would've done anything to keep this from you. I would've let you hate me forever. I would've let the world call me a madman in love with his own blood related brother, just so you could keep your smile.
"I'm the worst. I couldn't even protect this one thing for you. I've ruined everything, haven't I?"
Cael didn't answer. Couldn't.
His body was shaking in Rowan's arms, tears soaking through Rowan's expensive coat.
Rowan who had carried this secret alone, branding himself the monster to protect Cael from a deeper pain.
And there, in that dim office littered with the ghosts of old letters, the mighty Duke D'Arvis — feared by kings, envied by peers, monstrous in every whispered rumor — broke down completely.
Because nothing in all his vast, ruthless power could stop the tears falling from Cael's eyes.
Rowan was, in the quietest ways, the most heartbreakingly caring man alive.
His every breath seemed to exist only to shelter Cael — to soothe him, feed him, hold him, worship him.He could be a monster to the world, ruthless and cold, but with Cael he was tender to the point of tragedy.
Rowan was just a desperate man, pathetically lost in his love for Cael.So pathethic...