Chapter 227: Aldric says
ALDRIC
The estate breathed differently when empty.
I’d given the Ogas the afternoon and night off. I even sent the sentinels to patrol the outer periter. The guards could stand at the gates for all I cared. I wanted the house to myself. I wanted the silence that ca with solitude.
No footsteps in distant hallways.
No murmured conversations bleeding through walls.
Here and now, it had to be just
and the vast emptiness of the estate.
Elara’s absence made it better. The girl had been a constant buzz of need and questions. Daddy this, Daddy that. I loved her in the way one loves a prized possession, but her presence demanded energy I didn’t always want to expend. With her gone, the house settled into sothing peaceful.
Sothing truly mine.
I moved through the kitchen with practiced ease. Cooking had always been ditative for . The precision of it. The control. Every ingredient asured, every temperature monitored, every step executed exactly as intended. There was no room for chaos in a well-made dish. No space for error or weakness.
I’d decided on boeuf bourguignon. Not the simplified version most people attempted. The real thing. The kind that took hours and demanded attention at every stage.
He loved it and considering how mad he was going to be when I showed up, I needed to make an effort.
The beef had been seared earlier, each cube caralized to develop that deep, almost sweet crust that would dissolve into the sauce later. I’d deglazed the pan with cognac, watching the alcohol ignite in a brief flash of blue fla before settling into sothing richer. The wine had been added next. A proper Burgundy, not so cheap substitute. The liquid bubbled and reduced, concentrating flavors until the sll alone could make a person’s mouth water.
Pearl onions sat in a separate pan, glazed with butter and sugar until they turned golden and tender. I’d peeled each one by hand. Dropped them in boiling water for thirty seconds, then shocked them in ice. The skins had slipped off like silk. Most people used frozen. Most people were lazy.
The mushrooms had been cleaned with a damp cloth, never washed. Water ruined mushrooms, turned them soggy and flavorless. I’d quartered them and sautéed them in butter until they released their moisture and then reabsorbed it, concentrating everything they had to offer.
The at had been braising for three hours now. Low and slow in the oven, covered, the liquid barely bubbling. I checked it periodically, turning the pieces, skimming fat from the surface. The sauce had thickened to sothing glossy and dark. Rich enough to coat the back of a spoon.
I added the onions and mushrooms in the final thirty minutes. Let them heat through and marry with the sauce. Added a bouquet garni I’d tied myself: fresh thy, parsley, bay leaf. The aromatics filled the kitchen with sothing that slled like comfort, though I wasn’t sure I’d ever actually felt that emotion.
When I pulled it from the oven, the at was fork-tender. It fell apart at the slightest pressure. The sauce clung to everything, thick and luxurious. I plated it carefully. Spooned the vegetables around the at. Made sure the presentation was clean. Professional.
I poured a glass of water and then filled another glass with fresh-squeezed orange juice before I set both on the tray beside the plate.
Then I took a bite.
It was fucking divine.
The at dissolved on my tongue. The sauce was perfectly balanced: rich but not heavy, complex but not muddled. The wine had reduced just enough to lose its harsh edges while keeping its depth. The onions were sweet. The mushrooms earthy. Everything worked together the way it should. The way I’d designed it to.
I allowed myself a mont of satisfaction. Most people couldn’t cook like this. Most people didn’t have the patience or the precision or the understanding of how flavors built on one another. But I wasn’t most people. I’d never been most people.
My phone buzzed on the counter.
I set down my fork and picked it up. Pauline’s na flashed across the screen.
Right on schedule.
I answered. "I assu you succeeded."
Her voice ca through tight and clipped. "Did I have a choice?"
"Co on." I leaned against the counter, watching steam rise from the plate. "That was your granddaughter. Did you really want her to die?"
Silence stretched between us. I could picture her face: pinched with anger, lined with resentnt. She hated . The feeling was entirely mutual.
"What do you even want with the girl?" she finally asked.
I smiled even though she couldn’t see it. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."
"That’s cryptic."
"I hate the guts of her half-sister who happens to be my nephew’s bride." The words ca out smooth, almost conversational. "If I have to keep her thorns to get her off my own back, then why would I not seize the opportunity?"
Pauline said nothing.
"I also need to know more about Fia," I continued. "Your granddaughter Hazel might not know much. But she’s about to."
Another pause followed. Then Pauline’s voice slowly ca through: "The girl, Fia..."
"Yes?" I straightened slightly. "What about her?"
"Forget it." Her voice went flat. "I always seem to forget you’re no ally of mine when we speak."
"I’m not your enemy." I kept my tone pleasant and reasonable. "I just had to threaten you to make you fall in line."
"How long will you hold it over my neck?"
"Until I can no longer use it."
She drew in a sharp breath. "The girl reminds
of soone from my past. I hate her guts too. That’s all."
The line then imdiately went dead. That wasn’t all. But I would let it go for now.
I set the phone back on the counter. Pauline’s grudges were her own problem. I had what I needed from her. Everything else was just noise.
I picked up the tray and headed for the door.
The estate was large enough that most people never explored all of it. Surface level rooms for guests and daily life. Upper floors for private quarters. But beneath everything, carved into the earth itself, there were spaces most people didn’t know existed.
I took the stairs down. Past the main floor. Past the cellar where we kept wine and storage. Past the old servant quarters that hadn’t been used in decades. Down and down until the temperature dropped and the air grew stale.
The lights flickered here because of wiring that hadn’t been updated in years. It was the only imperfection in these walls that I allowed.
The bulbs buzzed, dimd and brightened in irregular patterns. It gave everything a sickly, uncertain quality. Like the basent itself was breathing.
I didn’t mind. It kept people away.
The hallway stretched ahead of , concrete walls painted institutional white that had yellowed with age. My footsteps echoed. The tray didn’t shake in my hands. I had perfect balance... perfect control.
I stopped at a door at the very end. It was made from heavy steel and there was no window or decoration in sight. All that sas present was a lock that required a key I kept on a chain around my neck, hidden beneath my shirt.
I balanced the tray on one hand and pulled out the key. The lock turned smoothly because how well-oiled it was. This room was the only one I maintained with the sa precision I used to maintain everything else.
The door swung inward and I stepped through, locking it behind
with a decisive click.
The room inside was nothing like the hallway. It had bright overhead lights, white walls that were actually white because they were cleaned regularly by . The floor was equally spotless and sterile.
And in the center of the room sat a cage.
Large enough to stand in. But not large enough to be comfortable. The bars were thick steel, spaced close enough that nothing bigger than a hand could fit through.
Inside the cage was a man.
He lurched forward the mont he saw . His hands gripped the bars and his face pressed between them. He had wild eyes and an unkempt beard that had grown long and scraggly. His hair hung in greasy strings around his face.
"You fucking monster!" His voice cracked. Raw from disuse and probably thirst. "Four days without food or water?!"
I walked closer, my steps asured and calm. The tray didn’t waver.
"I apologize, big brother." I let the words hang in the air for a mont. "I was busy."
Gabriel’s face twisted. Rage, desperation and sothing that might have been despair all fought for dominance in his expression. He looked terrible. Slled even worse.
"But I made your favorite," I added, sliding the tray across the floor toward the cage.
It stopped just within his reach. The boeuf bourguignon sat there, still steaming slightly. The glasses of water and orange juice beside it. All of it perfect. All of it exactly what it should be.
Gabriel stared at the food. Then at . His hands were shaking.
"Eat up, Gabriel." I smiled. The sa smile I used at dinner parties and business etings and family gatherings. Pleasant, unthreatening and completely hollow.
He didn’t move toward the food. Not yet. He just kept staring at
with those wild, broken eyes.
I wondered if he rembered what it felt like to be the one with power. To be the older brother, the heir, the one everyone respected and feared. Did he still dream about it? Did those mories torture him more than the hunger?
I hoped so.
"It really is your favorite," I said, turning toward the door. "You should eat before it gets cold. You know how butter-based sauces congeal."
My hand was on the door handle when he finally spoke again.
"You can’t keep
down here forever."
I paused and looked back over my shoulder at him kneeling in his cage, ribs showing through his shirt, beard matted with who knew what.
"Can’t I?"
The question hung in the air, rhetorical and heavy. We both knew the answer.
I left him there in his pristine white room with his gourt al and his desperation. The lock clicked into place behind . The sound echoed down the empty hallway, swallowed by darkness and flickering lights.
The walk back up felt lighter sohow. Easier. There was sothing deeply satisfying about having complete control over soone’s existence. About being the god of soone’s tiny, terrible world.
I whistled as I climbed the stairs, so half-rembered tune from childhood. The sound bounced off the concrete walls and followed
up toward the light.
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