August rose slowly from his chair, the hem of his coat brushing the polished floor, the last sip of warm milk still soft on his tongue. The silence of the chamber clung to him like breath held too long. He gave Elias one last glance—not a lingering one, not tender. A glance forged from something quieter. Something deeper. A sorrow too proud to speak.
Then he turned.
And left the room.
His footsteps echoed faintly down the corridor, swallowed by the hush of the manor. He walked without hurry, but with a heaviness beneath each stride, as if gravity itself had grown crueler. When he reached the door of his study, he paused briefly. A breath. A blink.
He entered.
The study welcomed him with stillness. Moonlight poured through the tall arched windows, casting long shadows over bookshelves and velvet drapery. The fireplace, now empty, remained only a frame of silence. August crossed the room, his boots muted against the thick rug, and lowered himself into the high-backed chair that faced the hearth.
A moment passed.
Then he called, low but clear:
"Giles."
The butler stepped into view without a sound, as if summoned by thought alone.
August did not look at him at first. He stared into nothing. Then his voice, when it came, was calm—but sharpened at the edges.
"I'm going to ask you something," he said. "And I want the truth. Not sympathy. Not excuses. I am not begging. I am asking."
He lifted his eyes then—smoke-grey and unreadable.
"Did my mother have any relatives?"
Giles's expression did not change. But his hands, clasped behind his back, tensed just slightly.
August's gaze didn't waver.
"Be serious about the matter, Giles.
There was a silence—long, thick, like molasses poured through memory. Then, softly, the butler spoke.
"My lord… I cannot say much."
"You mean you won't."
Giles bowed his head faintly. "I mean… I have sworn not to. But I know someone who might help you. Someone who knows everything about your mother. About the D'Rosaye line. About… what was kept from you."
August leaned forward slightly.
"Who?"
Giles's voice was barely a breath. "Your aunt. Katherine Virelle."
August blinked.
Giles continued, hesitant now. "She lives far from here. But if anyone knows the truth of your past—of your mother's legacy—it is her."
The room seemed to tilt around August for a moment. His breath slowed.
"And you?" he asked. " why You can't say anything?"
"I cannot," Giles said. "And for that, I am truly sorry."
August let the silence stretch, weighing the apology like a coin in his palm.
Then he looked away.
"You may go," he said softly.
Giles bowed low and left without another word.
August sat alone.
His gaze drifted across the room—past the shelves, past the quiet shadows, to the drawer where the half-faded letter still slept.
He opened it.
Carefully.
The paper was old now, fragile as pressed flower petals. Half the ink had bled into nothing. But one thing remained clear:
The surname.
D'Rosaye.
The sender had signed it with that name. Not his mother's name. Not her first name, not a nickname. Just that:
D'Rosaye.
It echoed like a ghost.
His thoughts turned, sharp and fast.
She wouldn't have written that. She wouldn't have signed her own name like a stranger. She wasn't careless. She was never careless.
He wasn't stupid.
August leaned back in his chair. The candlelight flickered over the hollows of his cheeks, the sharp lines of his collarbone. His hair fell loose down his back like moonlight spilling over silk.
Something had been hidden.
And he was no longer willing to accept silence.
Not from Giles.
Not from ghosts.
Not from the past.
In another wing of the manor, the chamber lay dim and quiet.
Elias reclined in bed now, the remnants of his feast pushed to the side. His stomach, once empty and aching, was full and warm.
He exhaled deeply, satisfied in the simplest of ways.
"That was delicious," he mumbled to no one, a sleepy grin brushing his lips. "I want to eat like that every day."
He turned his head to the ceiling, stared at the elaborate molding that blurred beneath the haze of comfort and sleep.
For a moment, his mind stirred.
A shape.
A sound.
A whisper of something not quite memory.
But it vanished before it formed.
He let his lashes lower.
And slipped beneath the current of sleep.
---
Meanwhile, August remained in his study, the silence pressing in like snow on ancient stone.
He hadn't moved in hours.
The papers he had tried to sort now lay scattered across the desk—ink drying mid-word, calculations half-finished. The oil lamp above him flickered faintly, casting shadows beneath his tired eyes. His skin, usually luminous and fair, was now pale with fatigue. Bruised crescents of sleepless nights bloomed beneath his lashes.
He hadn't noticed how long he'd been working.
He hadn't noticed that the sky outside had begun to bleed from violet into pale gold.
His fingers were cramped from writing, his mind swimming through the sludge of too many questions and too few answers.
At last, he gave in.
His head bowed slowly.
He rested it on the desk, cheek pressing against a half-finished page.
His eyes closed.
Just for a moment, he told himself.
Just a moment to still the ache.
But the weight on his chest didn't lift.
And before he could stop it—
He drifted.
Not into dream.
But into the kind of sleep born of grief.
Heavy. Soundless. Surrendering.
Like a candle giving itself to the dark.
The world bloomed in green and gold.
Elias stood amidst a dreamscape stitched together from half-remembered fragments—rolling meadows stretched wide beneath a sky painted in hues of dusk, with flowers nodding gently in the breeze and trees swaying like dancers mid-curtsy. It was beautiful, achingly so. Yet something in it unsettled him, like a melody he couldn't name.
And there—sitting on a pale stone, framed by the vivid color of wildflowers—was a boy.
August.
His white curls shimmered like fallen moonlight. His pale limbs curled inward, fragile, folded beneath the weight of invisible sorrow. He didn't move. Only looked down at the ground, where sunlight dared not touch.
Elias blinked.
The sight tugged at something in his chest. Something sharp and unfamiliar.
And when August lifted his gaze—eyes glassy, lips parted—Elias froze.
August rose from the stone.
Step by step, he approached.
Elias took a step backward.
And August stopped, expression faltering. He stood there, unsure, uncertain. His presence delicate, like porcelain warmed by tears.
Elias didn't know what he was doing here, or who this boy was meant to be. And yet, the pain in his chest deepened, as though his body knew what his mind refused to admit.
Before he could speak, another presence stirred behind him.
A woman.
Short and radiant, with honey-brown hair cascading in soft waves and eyes the color of autumn—warm and knowing.
She was too small to reach him, so instead she called gently, "Elias."
He turned.
She smiled, her voice sweet and grave all at once. "My precious boy," she said. "Why are you ignoring him?"
Elias turned back.
August was no longer simply sad—he was in pain now, the kind of pain that made breathing look like work. His hands trembled. His shoulders were shaking. Tears slipped down his cheeks in silence, painting pale trails down soft skin.
Something ached deep in Elias's chest.
He knew this feeling.
He didn't understand it—but he knew it.
He tried to speak the boy's name, but it sat on the tip of his tongue like fog.
The woman behind him whispered softly.
"His name is August."
The word shattered something.
But when Elias turned back to ask her who she was, the woman was gone.
Not vanished—dispersed, like a wind had taken her.
And in her place was only August.
Crying.
Elias stepped forward.
"August…" he murmured.
August lifted his head, eyes wide and wet, lashes heavy with sorrow. He stepped closer, slowly closing the distance between them, inch by inch, as though walking through water.
"Could you…" August whispered hoarsely. "Could you please… bow your head?"
Elias blinked.
Confused, but unable to deny the ache in those words, he obeyed.
He bowed his head.
And August leaned in—gently, softly—as though trying to bridge a gap that spanned a lifetime. His lips were close, nearly brushing Elias's—
But Elias pulled back.
The motion was small, instinctual, uncertain.
And August stilled.
His expression cracked.
"You don't…" he began. "You don't love me."
His voice trembled with something too fragile to name.
Elias's heart throbbed. He didn't understand. He didn't.
This was a boy.
He wasn't a woman. He wasn't—
And August turned.
He ran.
"Wait!" Elias called. "I didn't mean—I mean—stop!"
But August didn't look back.
He ran past the trees, past the flowers, past everything green and beautiful, until he reached the edge—
A cliff.
High above a swirling abyss.
Elias caught up just in time to see August standing at the edge, hair wild in the wind, face streaked in grief.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Elias shouted, voice torn from his lungs.
August didn't flinch.
"You don't love me," he whispered, eyes locked on the horizon. "So what's the point of living?"
"No—no, don't say that. August—!"
"It's fine."
August stepped forward.
And Elias lunged.
He caught him—arms wrapped around August's thin frame, pulling him back from the edge with a force he didn't know he had. The world blurred. The wind roared. Elias's heartbeat was thunder.
"I'm sorry," he gasped. "It was my fault. I shouldn't have—I didn't mean to hurt you."
August looked up at him, eyes wide and shimmering, a boy carved from heartbreak.
Elias pulled him close.
Held him there.
Wrapped his arms around him and whispered into his hair, "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry…"
And the meadow, the cliff, the wind—
It all blurred.
And faded.
As the dream slipped into silence.