Unraveled (Turner #3)(92)

He pressed it flat.

Stop fussing over yourself.

“Are you well?” Dalrymple asked. “You couldn’t even bring yourself to swim at Eton, not without becoming ill. And now we’re surrounded by water. It’s all around us. I think—are you shaking?”

“Shut up, Winnie.” Smite drew a deep breath. The pain in his side was receding, but it still hurt. “If you don’t mention it, I don’t have to think of it.” If he didn’t think of it, he might be able to keep his old memories from devouring him alive.

“Oh. Sorry.” A pause. “It’s been ages since anyone called me ‘Winnie.’”

“A deplorable lapse on my part,” Smite said.

Dalrymple had been the Marquess of Winchester, back when they’d been boys—back when almost everyone had believed him to be the heir to a dukedom. The title had been shortened to just Winnie amongst his intimates.

“You’re right,” Dalrymple said presently. “I am a coward. They simply pointed a pistol at me and told me not to make a fuss. That was all that was needed. I didn’t fight. I didn’t scream.” He made a disgusted sound. “Even girls can scream. Ash would have punched them.”

“At least they didn’t shoot you,” Smite said. “I count that a positive. As I told you before, I’d rather you didn’t die.”

“Ha.”

Despite himself, Smite smiled. “How long have we been here?”

“An hour? Maybe two.”

“If we’ve been here an hour, you’ve used up the sentimentality quota.” Smite rubbed his forehead. “So stop telling me what you should have done, and start thinking about what we will do instead.”

That comment brought only silence. And with the silence came that sound again, the noise at the edge of hearing that made him think of water rushing in.

He was outright grateful when Dalrymple spoke again. “It’s like Eton all over,” the man muttered. “I whine to you; you tell me to keep quiet and do something instead. Every day I was convinced you’d discover what a little sniveler I was. Every day for two bloody years.”

“Still too much sentiment,” Smite said. But at least Dalrymple’s voice drowned out the sound of water.

“When you finally did discover it, I hated you for it.”

“My head is splitting.” Smite moved, and winced again. “We’re in captivity. I believe I can weather your hatred for a few hours longer.”

Dalrymple gave a shaking laugh in response. “I know what these early friendships mean. There was no reason our friendship should have survived adolescence.” A heavy sigh followed. “But unlike you, I didn’t have a brother who worshipped me. I didn’t have a family that stood behind me no matter what. For me, there was only you. And you were cold and brilliant and fascinating. You could always set the other boys aback with an insult so exact that it cut precisely to the bone and no further.”

There was no way to answer that.

“In return, I was just…me. I could never figure out why you chose me as your friend, other than the fact that we shared a birthday. You were brilliant and perfect, and I was me.”

“I wasn’t perfect,” Smite said slowly. “I was…harsh.” He blew his breath out. “I still am.”

He heard Dalrymple struggle to his feet, and take a few steps away. “You were indifferent. To you, it was just the kind of friendship that boys have at Eton. It was a passing thing. For me, it was everything.”

Smite looked up into the darkness. His head throbbed. His side twinged. If he thought of where he was for too long—enclosed in darkness, with that quiet sloshing of water all around him—he might lose his mind.

“I need something to do,” he commented. “Soon would be good. Now would be better.”

“It makes it worse, you know,” Dalrymple was saying. “Carrying a grudge when the other man doesn’t even give a damn. When he scarcely even knows you exist.”

“I knew you existed,” Smite said simply. He set his hand gingerly to his head and probed the sore area.

“You scarcely noticed when I stopped talking to you.”

“Mmm. When I fall to pieces, I tend to do so by myself. After you walked away, nobody needed me for anything. It was a bad few years.”

“Really?” Dalrymple snorted. “How bad?”

Smite paused. “There was laudanum,” he finally answered. He didn’t like to think of those years much. “The details aren’t relevant. It took me years to find my feet properly.”

There was a longer pause. “Does it make me a bad person that I rejoice in your suffering?” Dalrymple asked.

Smite laughed. It hurt, but he laughed. “No,” he finally managed, “but it leaves us both still in captivity. I need something to do.”

“About that,” Dalrymple said, a touch too casually. “If we do what they say, they won’t kill us. Right?”

The Patron had already committed hanging offenses. At this point, Smite would call in the dragoons rather than allow the man to walk free. The man might sometimes take action that was close kin to justice, but he was too cavalier with assault and imprisonment for Smite to overlook his crimes.

“They haven’t killed us yet,” he said carefully. “Maybe the Patron hasn’t the stomach for outright murder.”