A Mage Born Ch. 02

Dina reached the place she lived with her husband after a long, but uneventful walk. She didn't call it a home anymore, as it had stopped being that a while ago, but the walk was pleasant enough in that it let her reprieve last a bit longer. She was increasingly angry with herself as she made her way through the streets... She should have done more to dissuade Hanah from whatever her plan was and wondered why she didn't.

Because you want to believe, you idiot. You want to believe that somehow this can all be made right and that the two of you can live happily ever after. That's why you didn't set her straight at the inn. That's why you don't break it off. You hope.

The manor wasn't particularly imposing to anyone but her. It was large and impeccably maintained of course, but the privilege of reaching for the sky was gifted to the High Houses and the palace. To Dina though, it was a reminder of oppression. You'll be able to get away again. Just smile, breathe, and wait.

The door opened almost as if it were automatic at the moment she reached so she could walk in and not break her stride.

"Good evening, Mrs. Stranix, Kav, the elder House Master said with practiced cheerfulness. "I trust your day was a good one."

The question brought thoughts of Hanah and that brought with it a wide, genuine smile. "It was a lovely one, Kav," she said as she walked into the ornately furnished home. She found it slightly ostentatious now even as it impressed her to speechlessness in the early days. She did grant though that it was just slightly overdone, not ridiculously so like some of their acquaintances who tried to overcompensate for the fact that, as powerful as they were, they were never going to reach par with the High Houses.

"Did you find anything of note in the markets?"

Another smile came almost unbidden. "Nothing to bring home today."

But someday. Perhaps. I hope.

"Very good Mrs. Stranix." He began to lead her down the hall. "Your timing is impeccable. Dinner is just about to be served and Mr. Stranix awaits."

Dina decided that it was too much to expect that his meetings today would turn into an unexpected trip as some of them had previously. She used her time on the way to perfect the facade as much as she could. She'd thought she'd gotten pretty good at keeping it up over years. It was becoming like putting on a well-worn leather coat, though she was somewhat troubled by whatever truth there was to that. Part of her worried that one day it might not come off.

She entered the dining room to find the first course already laid out, though the servants were just departing in almost drone-like fashion. Etan Stranix liked things done a certain way, and the closer you were to him the more he required that you conform to his expectations. He ran his life like he ran his businesses and he liked to tell her that that was part of why their lives were the envy of others. "They see perfection and know that there is perfection."

He rose as soon as he saw her, his smile as disarming as it had always been. It was the thing that had first captivated her about him. That smile. That charm. That feeling that when he was focused on you, you were all that mattered. They all combined to make her swoon those few years ago that seemed forever ago now. "Dina, my darling, you look ravishing as usual. He kissed her gently on the lips and stepped back to look at her. "So many women spend half the day primping and all my Dina needs is a day in the fresh air, basking in the energy of the markets, and she comes back looking so beautiful and content that she could be mistaken for the queen."

A reminder of the day brought with it a reflexive grin that she decided couldn't have been taken as anything but a blush at a compliment, "Thank you, Husband. It's lovely to see you home at such an early hour."

His dark eyes conveyed contrition, "I know. I work entirely too much. Believe me, dear, I know I have so many wonderful reasons to stay home, but I have so many irons in the fire, so to speak, and while it may be a personal failing, I just have the sense that no one can handle matters as well as I can."

"That being so, certain other things important to me can get...lost in the shuffle...so to speak, and I'm very sorry for that, my love. I give you my word that I'm going to do the best I can to get everything back as it should be, including the two of us, starting tonight." He pulled her chair away from the table as an invitation. "Please."

By rote, she took the offer, smoothing out the bottom of her dress with both hands as she sat. It seemed odd to her only because it was such a rarity. She felt like an afterthought for the most part, which wasn't a bad thing once she had an inkling of what he was. Once Hanah entered her life, she was happy to be virtually ignored as she basically built her life around one rendezvous, the next, and the times between. She focused on the appetizer, "Looks lovely." And it did, the artistry in presentation alone was always such that it was always nearly a shame to eat it.

Etan gave a small nod in agreement as he took his place at the other end of the table, "Chef has truly outdone himself tonight, which is as it should be of we are going to begin a new chapter."

Over the course of dinner, he again reminded her of what drew her to him before the reality of him revealed itself. He was charming and disarming, asking her about her days and her life, and following up on things that he seemed to find interesting. She remained careful in her responses at times, of course, but the conversation was easy and casual.

She asked him about his day, letting him tell her what he chose to. It all seemed quite mundane, really, and she couldn't help but wonder what he wasn't telling her. As much as she was thankful for not having to hear about him cheating this one out out of his life's work or blackmailing that one, there was a part of her that held onto a morbid curiosity about it all the same. It was like being in the middle of one of those horror tales where one knows the monster is inside the cave and you can feel its gaze on your skin. One one hand you are terrified, yet there is a small voice inside that urges one forward to see if they can look upon the source of their terror just to do it.

You know enough.

He'd just finished talking about a first meeting with a spice trader that he'd hoped would yield a steady supply of rare goods for sale at a better than premium price when his tone turned slightly more somber, though still matter-of-fact, "It certainly wasn't pleasant, after such an otherwise fine day, to have to come home and dismiss Trina, but that's only served to make this evening between us even more important to me."

Dina paused having not yet touched the dessert before her, her hand resting on the fork, pressing against it gently for fear it might start trembling otherwise. There was a pause as she not only worked up the courage to speak, but thought about her words tone in an attempt to sound as nonchalant as possible, but she wasn't nearly as effective at masking her true feelings as her husband. "T-that's a shame. Why would you have to do such a thing?"

He leaned back slightly in his chair, the sound of it creaking at the shift in weight the only sound to be heard just then. "She was playing messenger to help you arrange your little trysts, and that's not something I can tolerate, but I shouldn't have to tell you that."

Dina could feel the color drain from her face and her hands shook anyway and she shivered, suddenly cold. She opened her mouth to speak, but he did before she could get a word out. "Don't waste your time asking me what I'm talking about. We both know, so it's just insulting and would do nothing but make me more...annoyed with the whole situation and with you. I don't think that would help either of us as we start over, do you?"

He rose smoothly from his seat and took slow, measured steps towards her. "And, to be completely honest, I'm already offended as it is. After all, you swore before the Goddess that you would be faithful to me, and here I find out that you have chosen to abandon your vows and betray me."

"And, as if that weren't insult enough, you can't even betray me with another man. You skulk away to be with that little jewelry maker that can barely make a living while I offer you nothing but a life of luxury. Anything you could want is here. If it is not here, I am happy to go to the ends of the world to provide it for you and you still go from one dark little room to another to writhe naked with that little nothing."

"The only positive aspect of that that I can reason is that a woman can offer things that I cannot, so it's at least a small comfort that I don't have to look at a man and compare, looking for all the ways that I would come up short, so I suppose I can be grateful for that bit at least."

He stopped before her and leaned his body against the corner of the table. Clasping his hands before him, he looked down at her in such a way that Dina felt as though she were shrinking under the gaze. He shook his head as though he were about to scold a child. "Honestly, Dina, the worst part of this business is the fact that you clearly took me for a fool and I cannot tell you how angry that makes me."

"If you wanted to have a tryst now and then, that's something I could at least tolerate. But it's the...insult...to my intelligence inherent in smiling at me as we dine, making conversation with our friends, as if you were the honest, respectful wife you should be, all the while just waiting to see me off, just so you could go be with that woman. You wave me off, expecting me to smile and wave back like a fool."

"For you to treat me with such dishonesty and disrespect. For you to treat me like I am so far beneath you to think that behavior is in any way justified? That's what my real problem is here; it's the fundamental dishonesty. Can you understand, Dearest?"

"That's quite something," she whispered.

"Pardon?"

There was a flash of anxiety as she realized that she confused her thinking voice and her speaking voice, but that anxiety fed the beginnings of a fire in her belly. There was a pause before she said more loudly this time, "That's something. Honesty? From you? What do you know of that? Do you tell business partners that you cheat wherever you can? You try to ingratiate yourself to Court, but did you announce to them what I'm fairly certain of; that you burned your competition out of business? When we were courting, I don't ever remember you telling my father that you run gambling and prostitution dens from here to the Larian Coast."

She stood, feeling a rush as the flood of years of emotion would no longer be denied. "Yes. I lied to you, Etan. I lied to you because, in this house, what's one more lie? I couldn't stand it, Etan." Her skin suddenly crawled thinking of it all. "I look at you and I compare what I thought you were and what you actually are and it stuns me. I spent years wondering if you were good at hiding or I was just that stupid, and maybe it was a little bit of each."

"I did not plan to break my vows, dear husband, but when you are crushed by truths you cannot bear and you feel as though there is no escape, someone who shows you love and you know will be there for you because they have been is like the breath of life. What else was I to do, suffer in silence until I die so that you don't feel like a disrespected victim of my dishonesty? I didn't believe you would let me go, so I did not ask you to. I figured that you had your secrets, so I had mine and, as long as I practiced some discretion, there would be balance."

"So that's what I did, even as I did what my heart demanded. And, while we're on these subjects, can we please dispense with the idea that I wounded your ego by breaking my vows, no matter who I chose to be with. That doesn't really matter to you, does it? Your ego is in the brothels and gambling houses, in with the secrets you keep and lord over others and the people you hurt to get your way. It's all in the money and power you can acquire, not me. So can we please not pretend things are something different than what they are?"

Her own anger of the moment spent, she began to rethink the wisdom of every word she uttered as he scrutinized her carefully, as if seeing her for the first time. Dina focused on the light from the fireplace reflecting in his eyes because it helped her not look away. She couldn't look away anymore. This is who he was and she wouldn't look away. The hiding and pretending had to stop and it might as well be here and now. That said, she would be lying to herself if she didn't admit that her heart wasn't still threatening to burst from her chest and not because of her spent rage. She had no idea how he would react.

But, whatever it was she'd imagined, it wasn't what he actually did.

A smirk grew into a grin and a grin turned into a full-fledged smile as he clasped his hands together. Wonderful, Dina, my dear. Thank you. Honesty. Pure honesty. We each know where the other stands and, as I see it, there is no better way to get this new chapter of our lives off to the best possible start."

"You're quite right. I had a role to play in your transgressions. I thought it best to try to protect you from some of the more unsavory characters that being a successful businessman in Erette forces one to deal with. That left us apart far too much, so, of course, you were drawn to someone else to help you fill your needs and your time. But I have the solution to that."

He waited a few moments for her to respond, then took her silence as his cue to continue. "I think that, form this time forward, I should involve you in the business as much as I can. It is, after all, your business now, as the two of us are our own family. You should see everything, know everything, and we should look for opportunities for you to be helpful."

Ebon placed his hand smoothly on her shoulder, gripping it just enough to be felt. "It's my way of strengthening our union. After all, neither of us wants to end this union." The ache in his voice was actually believable if Dina didn't know better. "That would leave me without a wife I adore and your family in a much more difficult position than they are used to being in after all this time."

Dina could already feel herself collapse under the weight of her future. Her husband would kill her a bit at a time. Having her worst fears confirmed and more would just be the first step. She had no idea what he would actually have her doing in the end, but it hardly mattered. That sort of thing poisoned your soul. How long would it be before she just didn't care. What frightened her more was in contemplating the path of her husband. He wasn't raised in the kind of life he lived now. He chose it at some point. Even if he'd been forced to start down the path, at some point, he chose to follow it on his own.

She could see herself reaching a point where she didn't care anymore, but could she ever end up so corrupt in her soul that she liked it in any way that he did?

"We'll be together, Dearest," he began, coming in behind her, the warmth of his breath tickling her ear and giving her goosebumps that chilled her. "There is nothing we can't do together." A pause before, "You might find it pleasant. Power is a wonderful thing. Queen and Court does what it does but it is people like me...us...that makes the world spin."

Both hands were on her shoulders now, and the feeling was like she were being ground into the floor. "It's probably for the best for you to use this opportunity to distance yourself from Hanah."

He watched her head dip briefly towards the floor as she processed the words and he heard the puzzlement in her response, "What do you mean 'for the best?' What are you talking about?" She turned quickly to face him, staring into him almost as if trying to read his mind right there in the moment.

He exhaled and closed his eyes. "You're quite right about me, Dina, as much as it pains me to admit. I've done things that I regret in order to gain our position in the world and maintain it. Not because I truly wanted to, of course. I detest violence. But in some circles it's simply how things are done. Those are the means that those people employ in their daily business, so, to get to where we are and to maintain our place I have responded in kind as necessary, but so do they."

He took his hands gently in hers, "I promise you that no harm will ever come to you. I protect my family, I am proud of that and, in spite of the circumstances, I make no apologies for it." His voice suddenly carried weight. "But even my reach only extends so far. I'm not sure I'd be able to protect her. If the more unsavory characters I must deal with were to find her...something could happen that I couldn't prevent, and that would break my heart for the simple fact that it would break yours."

It was no one thing that she could point to, not just his voice where the pained tone just sounded a little too put on even when compared to the rest of the false veneer of concern, or the look on his face that looked to her like an actor's mask, as though he were waiting for the director to call for the end of the scene. Nor was it the nearly imperceptible tightening of his grip on her hands. It was all of it together. All of it combined to chill her to the bone and later when she thought back on it she'd find it remarkable that almost the only thing that happened in response was that her jaw quivered. "Husband," she said, clearing her throat after the word came out gravelly and with virtually no sound . "You have given me much to think about. Would you please excuse me?"

He gave a small nod and a loving smile, "Certainly, Dearest. It is a lot to contemplate. We'll speak again in the morning."

Dina pulled her hands away as though they were near a flame and walked out as quickly as she could without running. She saved that for when she was clear of the manor.

Etan watched her go, the satisfaction he felt shaping his face more and more the longer he stared at the empty doorway. He knew her well enough to know that this whole mess was probably over. She may have been his wife, but that didn't make her any different from any competitor or business partner he dealt with. Sometimes you had to apply pressure, so you found what they valued and you squeezed, and, if you had to, you crushed.

That wouldn't be necessary with Dina, of that he was certain. Dina loved that woman and would do anything to protect her. Stranix wasn't a complete monster. He never contemplated killing the girl. It would have been counterproductive anyway. Alive, Hanah would always be a reminder to Dina of what could happen to those she cared about if she strayed, so she wouldn't, probably ever again and that was the ultimate end. She was his and she would behave so. If she didn't, another lesson would be necessary.

The clicking of boot heels against the floor snapped him from his contemplation and he looked up to see a tall, lean man in a black, woolen overcoat approach. He looked as Etan always thought he looked; almost blank, so singularly focused on the job that he'd never bothered even to feel much less express emotions. He never could read the man, but he didn't have to. He knew enough to know the job was already done. Even so, "I assume all went as expected."

He sounded indifferent. "There was someone with her."

His brow knotted, "And you didn't wait?"

He shrugged with the slightest twitch of his head. "What would be the point? You had your little bit of theatrics planned for tonight, so today it had to be. If I had come to you and told you it hadn't gone to plan you would have thrown your usual cool and measured fits and, for as well as you pay me, it's not worth it to me to endure."