In The Arms of The Better Lover, The Better Brother

In The Arms Of The Better Lover, The Better Brother (12)

Now, for a pathetically short filler chapter I took to writing in history in place of notes. :)

Well, I was paying attention, no one worry.He was just lecturing on Diego Rivera and I am the shizzz at DG. Hella. Anyhow...

Chapter. Here goes :)

Complying with Aunnabelleiiyna's every prediction, fleeing the home of the castle for a safety in blood, death, and war made me burn hotly every night upon sleep fall. Energy thrusted through me, shooting my soul into an anytime belief state of anxious craving for a new future, a new beginning.

Making my three months pass more swiftly was only a matter of how many jobs I could take, revolts I could stop, foreign attacks I could cease. It didn't matter the hours I passed alone; those bled painful. It was those that I spent in fiery assault of those that penanced my chances to prove tactful, decisive, and mentally stable enough to run the kingdom. I'd be the best advisor this land had ever seen. I'd bring upon my country a legacy so strong that I'd never be forgotten. I'd rule as the brains behind my brother as always was mean to be. He'd be the face to the land; I'd be the backbone.

Reception when I returned to the castle was always a fan fare, countless lined up to service me in every way possible.

Celebrity-I did not want.

Influence-I craved.

I wanted, no, needed to have relevance. I didn't want to be the crown, the face of the land but I did want to be the one running it. I wanted to be the one who called the shots, painted the scene, ordered the act of war. I didn't care to have the world knowing it was I who was responsible but I wanted to be responsible.

Why not be the advisor to the king?

The first advisor, the right hand man.

Why not?

Surely not for the love a princess. Surely not for weakness of back, pull of ill will. Pain instillified.

Sometime after the fifth week of my internment, my second solid week on the road, I received letter from Benjamin reading simply in his naked, messy scrawl:

"Return home, Brother. Not for the hearts missing hurt but for the idle woo of the royal family. No, I don't mean to the say of the princess; I know your soul too well for that, but for the sake of the prince.

Young Colin lacks a male role model and I wish to grace him with a last breath of machisimo before he signs his celibacy, his pacivity, to the priesthood. I beg you return home so that yourself, the boy, and I may take a three day leave to the crested mountains. We will teach the boy a good hunt, a good brawl, and a good bond. I don't ask you enjoy just your presence.

For the sake of landing his support in this endeavour of ours.

Brother to you always,

Benjamin."

He had forgiven me then, I supposed. Returned home, taken in wing by the princess and wooed back into good grace. I hadn't scarred him too deeply as Aunnabelleiiyna had feared.

I feared her though. I feared her greatly. Not for the fear of losing dignity by her royal hand but more that she would do as she claimed she would and lock me into an impossible marriage to her. I could see her doing it, driving us both to insanity for the pure pleasure of making positive I was unhappy. Often I had nightmares about decision day, that three month marker where she would announce devilishly that it was I she desired to spend the rest of her life with. It was I who would make her happy for the next forty years or so.

I could also see the celebration supper afterwards, joined with the entire court, forced to look pleased with Aunnabelleiiyna on my shoulder, molesting my hands and feet, thighs and stomach beneath the table for the mere redemption in my reactions.

Maddening it was, the urge to scream, shout, fall into fits of laughter and the knowledge I must suppress it all for the love of not appearing entangled by her, for the love of appearing a good and responsible ruler. For the pain of knowing I lost everything.

Nightmares, I tell you. No pleasure fell from those sweating inducing and scream worthy dreams.

The point, of course, of all that being that merely I was fearful of her. she had the power to do that to me, in a second alone, one word to her father, "Benigno." I couldn't risk setting her off.

And she was right too; I hated admitting it but she was. By driving my brother out I was driving him to be me, regardless of whether I agreed with her that he did it for love or not.

So, only for my sake, on her direction and his word, I returned home, to the castle that is. It was one of those rare fall-feeling days in the middle of winter that came about so randomly when I rode into the castle gates. The sun, if you rested in it for a long enough time, beat down warmly. The trees, the evergreens, looked softly rich in colour, flow. What a day to go hunting and patch a broken and nonexistent relationship, no?

Ideally picked; Ideally perfect. Almost halfway through my sentence, early January, I rode back into the castle, apology to my brother in tongue, adventure on footstep. I'd prove I could be trustworthy enough to take care of the prince for a short spell and make merry of a disastrous mutual agreement of dislike between myself and Benjamin. And, if I was so unlucky, spend a moment or two giving a verbal lesson to Aunnabelleiiyna of who arms were that of the better lover, the better brother.

But as I said, unlucky.

I felt it was bit, prettier that usual. You think? No?

Well, tell me. And vote.  

:)