Lord Aubrey's Secret

Even at the risk of persecution and losing a really nice wedding, she challenges him to accept what she is. But Lord Aubrey Lyons has a secret of his own...

 

Even in the dimmest alleyways and deadends, very official-looking flyers posted, emblazened with very official-looking silver and golden lettering.

Leilu hurried along under a cloak. She'd seen the posts for weeks and not bothered to read them. She wasn't particularly motivated now either, considering that the city was under curfew and it happened to be past the hour.

The creeping, shadowy night cast over the labyrinth of dew-gleaming cobblestone corridors and back alleys that led to the centre. Ever now and again, she ducked behind a stretch of archway in the darkness to avoid the marching guards and their shiny eyes.

"Are you certain that this is a good idea? Can't it wait until morning?"

A bright blue orb of light zipped in front of Leilu's face and hovered there. It had taken years of adjusting to Leilon doing this in order for Leilu not to become bespelled by her aura. "No"and keep your voice down and stay out of view!" she hissed, glancing around furiously. "You're like a dang-on beacon hovering there in the dark! Are you trying to get us caught and cast into the Next!"

"Don't be so dramatic." Leilon bobbed in typical eye-roll fashion. It was always odd to witness this, seeing as how she was supposed to be the sensible one.

The blue light vanished, but a quiet, disembodied voice continued, "This is potentially a very bad idea, Leilu. Tell me again why this can't wait."

"I have to see him. Before tomorrow morning it can't wait. And if you'll remember correctly, it was his idea."

"And you're just going to listen to him?"

"For what reason would he deceive me?"

"That, as it has again and again, begs that nagging question of why he would choose a pauper girl to be his bride in the first place, don't you think?"

Leilu frowned hard in the darkness of her hood. It really doesn't make any sense, she thought, pushing back waves of suppressed anxiety. The most well-known name in the city had somehow found her miles away from his estate in the gutter of the underbelly and asked for her hand. He only said, "You'll never want for anything. I will not pressure you for anything you do not desire. And what is more, your family and those dear to you will be taken care of for the rest of their lives. Accept my hand, please. The choice is yours."

And I never exactly said yes. She wanted to see where this is going. Leilu hurried along the alleyways again, deeper towards the usually bustling center of the city, toward the aristocrat's avenue on Victorian Row.

"It all seems too good to be true, doesn't it," Leilon said from the front of Leilu's cloak.

"What's that?"

Something pleasant and familiar passed over her skin, something alive and charge, something more than air. Something bright and glowing fluttered by the archway adjacent them. Leilu started towards it. A pull on the inside of her cloak, like something bigger than what was in there, halted her.

"Shouldn't you be moving along? This isn't the time to go investing."

Leilu frowned but turned around. "You'd think after all this time, I'd have seen something, some flare of life on the streets, but there's nothing… I guess you're right." She started back in the direction of the Row. She couldn't let curiosity over a fluke ruin her chance. Worse things could happen if she was caught out of home and out of bound out of district at this hour.

"And there's some question as to why that is?"

"What do you mean?"

"You never have learned to mind your surroundings. Look, the postings all around the city."

Leilu didn't have to look very far to find one, though the closer they got to the row the more the flyering seemed to thin out.

Council Against Magic Users

"And here," Leilon risked a dart out to another poster nearby plastered to the nearby wall.

Leilu squinted in the dimness and found that the two posters were not exactly identical, the similar lettering and design was deceiving. This on read"

Anti-Magic Union

The posting aired the convention meetings of both organizations and the successful bills that had been passed under their wings. Leilu stared, unsure of how to react, a low panicked throbbing in her chest.

"I've said it before and I'll say it again: What do you think he'll do, knowing this, if he finds out about you?" Leilon fluttered around one of the posters on the wall.

"I don't know." She set a determined gaze on the Row. "But the wedding is tomorrow and I intend to find out."

There was a ball going on in the manor at the moment she set foot on the doorstep. The silhouettes of the women in their expensive balloon-bottomed gowns and straight-backed men of means paraded before the windows. The sounds of glasses and chatter spilled beyond the walls to a hum outside.

She realized she'd only ever been to his house under the supervision of Nana Sarabi, and at that only a few times to discuss the civil union contract and the details of the wedding. It was unnerving to show up, out of bounds, out of district, after curfew, and with a fay concealed under her cloak.

The door opened and the high, stately-looking butler with the eagle's crown stared down his nose at her.

"Yes?"

Leilu flinched but said, "It is I, Leilu of Seemsway, the…his lord's betrothed. I wish to see him. Now."

"I have ventured far and at much risk to do so." The voice that said so sounded exactly like her but did not come from her lips.

Leilu pinched at the loose fabric around her head.

A quiet, hastily muffled, "Ow!" was drowned out at the butler bowed and opened the door wider to admit her, brow raised. "Of course. His lordship is in the library for a brief respite from his guests."

He led her inside, discreetly past the doorways crowded with music and the voices and shadows of the guests and the elegant staircase. Everything in the house was elegant and well-crafted, like its master. There was something about everything in its place, polished, perfect, something that wasn't as proper and prim as it appeared. It was his house and she'd sensed the same thing about him. Lord Aubrey Lyons. The butler opened the door to the library and stepped aside to admit her through this final door.

"Er, thank you," Leilu said and went inside.

"If you require anything else, please, inquire to his lordship for the bell to summon me." Then he left.

Leilu closed the door behind herself and crossed the carpeting in the spacious library lined in windows as large as the doors and stone balconies beyond, footsteps muffled, cloak and hem whispering as they trailed.

Leilon stilled, a warm glow against her neck dimming. "I sense something! Go forth with caution."

A short stone hall, cloistered in neatly overflowing bookshelves crafted into a gothic archway, led off the comfy main library. The windowed doors of this balcony lay open to the plum-clouded, starry night.

The cool night air wafted over as she approached. Somehow Leilu knew he was here, sensing someone there, but knowing how who and what she felt could really be the chosen son of the Lyons, the most wealthy and influential family in the city.

At first, she didn't see anyone there though someone was there. He wasn't what she expected. And the invisible glamour before her eyes fooled her because of it.

Dressed in his finery, Aubrey stood there on the balcony in the night sky, surround by red, blue, green, and yellow birds, vibrantly glowing an otherworldly glow, fluttering gracefully and in good fun. A blue bird rested on the length of his paled, tapered finger. And when he turned his head and looked at her, she knew that he knew what she was as she now knew what he was.

"Please don't tell anyone," Aubrey said softly.