That, she thought, was so much worse.
And God, the way she had been in bed with him. The sounds she’d made, the way she had completely given into passion because she’d believed that they were both inflamed. He must have thought her completely wanton. Had he found it funny, the way that she had so fallen? The way that she had practically melted into his touch?
And to think, she’d once thought herself too intelligent to swoon. At the first temptation, she’d swooned all the way into a den of vipers. Now she was trapped; married, with no lawful reason to divorce and no one who cared about her future as she did.
She was the most stupid, wretched woman to ever live. Her patients deserved better judgment than she could provide. Dr. Pinkton deserved an apprentice with much greater discernment.
That was her final thought of woe before she reached their bedroom door. Luckily, without her husband in sight. Perhaps she would make it to their bed without having to run into-
She pushed the door open. Sebastian sat upon her bed.
Blast it all. She wanted to crawl beneath her duvet and disappear from the world, and instead she had to do this.
He stood as soon as she entered, his expression both shocked and nervous.
“Where were you? Are you alright?” True concern seemed to be etched into his voice. Then again, she’d thought he’d had true love as well all these weeks. She really did not know him at all, did she?
“I am fine. I’d like to go to bed now.” It was all she wanted in the whole bloody world.
Sebastian nodded, but did not move. “I’d like to talk. If you are able.”
He had the audacity to sound worried about her.
She swallowed, her throat dry. “I think we have said everything that ought to be said.”
He sighed, crestfallen. Or, seemingly crestfallen. Was he evenreally human? Did he even really feel?
“Not everything,” he said quietly. “I have…God, I have so much to say. Starting with the fact that I am absurdly sorry. For everything. For how we started. I want to tell you-”
“I would like to go to bed, my lord,” she said coldly. She could not hear another word of this, nor could she look at his lying face a moment longer.
He paused a while, as though hoping to wait out her resolve. But he couldn’t. She would get something out of tonight, even if it was only oblivion.
With a nod, he acquiesced. “Of course. We can speak tomorrow. Sleep well, love.”
She winced at ‘love,’ which earned her a sad, downcast expression from him. As though he had any right.
He stepped around her, hesitating at one point, during which she feared that he might attempt to offer her a kiss upon the forehead. Blessedly, he didn’t. He left the room, shutting the door so softly behind him that the little sound was its own kind of apology.
She stood still for some time. Perhaps a few minutes, perhaps an hour. Staring at the wall. When she finally got the gumption to undress herself and crawl into bed, she felt like a corpse crawling to its grave. It was only when she plopped down, weightless, that saw blissful darkness on the horizon.
The reality was dire. Unless a miracle occurred, her time as an alienist’s assistant would end, almost as quickly as it had begun. When she awoke tomorrow morning, she would be all the things she now feared the most: merely a wife, merely a woman, merely set dressing. But for now, she could run away from it all.
Just before sleep overtook her, she promised herself one thing: that no matter how weary and sad, how alone and miserable shefelt, none of this would lead her to a spell.
*****
A spell was on its way. Augusta could feel it.
The trappings had all been present since she’d awoken that morning: feeling like her breath was not her own, her limbs detached from her torso, and her tongue heavy and dry. Sounds seemed far away and garbled, especially speech. When her maid asked her if she might prefer butter on her toast or jam, Augusta had hardly heard her.
“Jam,” she’d said quietly. Even her own voice had sounded as though it were underwater.
Now, shortly after noon, she sat at the writing desk in her room with a blank piece of parchment in front of her, and she knew that the full grip of melancholy had finally sunk in its icy claws.
Was that such a bad thing? At the moment, the heaviness under her skin made sinking beneath the covers of her bed for days sound like an incredible prospect. A hibernation of sorts, and then when she awoke perhaps she would find that things were very different, and she could feel something different.
“...hear me?”
