~1820~

After the first council meeting of 1820 had drawn to a close, Claire slowly made her way back upstairs. Even though it had been over a year since the attack at her tavern; she still had yet to feel very comfortable with the idea of reopening it, despite the fact that there had been no further sign of werewolf incursion in Sean’s territory. Added to her lack of desire to leave the home on a nightly basis was the fact that Nicolas had arrived at their doorstep only a few months after the attack; and making an attempt at dealing with his entire trauma had taken up much of her time since the incident at The Loft.

Now Nicolas had been in their home for only a week or two shy of a year and Claire had been left no choice but to give him that third sip of her blood just for the sheer purpose of saving him from the withdrawal; not to mention other side effects that would occur if she withheld the substance from him. Therefore Nicolas, now twenty-three, honestly felt as though he loved Claire more than even himself. And having forced that emotion onto a young man who had already been so badly broken by being forced to endure another’s desires; that did not give Claire the slightest bit of inner peace.

Plagued by this added guilt ever since giving Nicolas that third sip, Claire sighed heavily as she moved into the privy chamber where the servants already had filled a tub with warm water for her bath that night. After undressing and slipping into the water, Claire laid her head back in thought. Her usual inner debates did not go on for long though, before an interruption occurred. As the room sat between her and Sean’s chambers, and the bedroom Nicolas had been staying in for nearly a year, there was a door leading from the small room to each bedroom. She had entered from her and Sean’s room of course, but now the other door opened as Nicolas entered from his own room.

Of course the young man looked even more startled than Claire as his eyes fell on her there in the tub, her eyes immediately opening at the sound of his arrival. Nicolas found himself frozen a moment as his gaze traveled over her exposed flesh. Seeing his expression, Claire found her voice more quickly, “I can finish my bath later if you need the room” she offered with an attempt at a calming tone as she was sure this situation was a lot less disturbing to her than Nicolas.

“No… it’s fine” he stammered before quickly backing out of the room and tightly shutting the door once more, which only caused another worried sigh in Claire.

Back in his own chamber Nicolas was indeed a bit more than disturbed by the sight of so much of Claire’s pretty pale skin being exposed to his eyes. Though the disturbance did not affect him in the way in which he expected, and that caused him even further discomfort. Prior to this instance, the only time he had found himself in that close of a proximity to a naked woman was when it was part of Donatien’s twisted games. And during those he felt nothing but fear, pain, and crushing anxiety about what he was about to witness or endure, or even worse; what he was about to be forced to do.

However on this occasion, upon seeing Claire’s beautiful body exposed, there was still all the anxiety; but more than that, he felt his body reacting the way Donatien’s always reacted to their nightly games. He silently cursed himself for having a physical response and somehow becoming aroused, as he never wanted to ever think of himself as having anything in common at all with the man who had shattered him and his sister’s childhoods so irreparably.

Trying to dissect the reasons behind his body betraying his mind did inevitably lead to him envisioning the cause of such a physical reaction again. And letting himself think about what his eyes had just been allowed to see only caused his body to react further. And this of course only upset him further. His body was obviously aching to receive pleasure, and from what Nicolas knew of the way in which Donatien achieved pleasure when his own body became aroused; the thought that he would ever want such things made him physically ill.

Moments later, Nicolas still found himself seated on the floor beside the door to the privy chamber. His back was against the wall and his hands to his temple where he forcefully shut his eyes in some futile attempt to will away his own thoughts and desires. That was where he still was when Claire entered the room only a moment later, now covered by a thin robe that did still cling tightly to her wet flesh, making the outline of her body still quite apparent.

“Nicolas?” she asked worriedly as she saw his obvious stress and tension as he continued sitting there on the floor.

Forcing his eyes up to her, they immediately moved down over the outline of her wet, hardened nipples under the thin robe and he quickly forced his eyes away again as his body continued to have that same cursed response to the sight of her.

“Are you ok?” she asked in a worried whisper.

Forcing back more tears at the thought that he was becoming the same kind of monster as Donatien, he barely managed to force out a hoarse answer for her, “you should kill me.”

“What?” Claire asked, more than a bit shocked by his words.

“I’m just like him” he choked on the words, still refusing to let himself look up at her again.

“Him?” Claire asked, her own voice hoarse, “you can’t mean de Sade” she worried aloud.

“I see you and I…” he just shook his head, not able to admit to his own desires out loud just yet. Admitting them to himself had been terrible enough.

Claire looked down a moment as she deciphered what few words he had managed to share, “you mean you got aroused when you saw my body?” she whispered. The fact that he was now bound to her made the information the obvious conclusion, but it’s effect on him was something that she was not quite sure exactly how to explain to him just yet.

“I see you and I want to touch you. Force you to take me into you until I... He’s made me a monster too” he repeated with a stifled sob.

“Nicolas…” Claire began trying to find some way to make him understand that wanting pleasure did not make him a monster at all. “You can get pleasure from touching, and being inside a woman without it being something horrible. Without it being something you have to force on her” she sighed as she added, “for most of the world, people do give each other pleasure that is something they both want. It doesn’t involve any pain at all. It’s only pleasure that they each are willing to give each other. That’s honestly the way it is for almost everyone else in the world; Donatien is the one who made it into something horrible. The way he got pleasure was very different from the kind most everyone else gets from their partners.”

Nicolas sniffled as he finally forced his eyes back to her face where she was now kneeling next to him. “When Donatien got… like this” he said as he gestured to his pants, “it meant he was going to force himself into us, or force us to… do things. That was the only way he could… make this go away” he cast his eyes down again, “If I’m getting like this, then doesn’t that mean that I want to do those horrible things too?” he pleaded for her to tell him he was wrong.

“No Nicolas. It does not mean that” she assured him firmly, “Donatien was a very sick man. Hurting others is the only way he could…” she just shook her head before trying another piece of evidence, “you know that the place you grew up in was an asylum, right?”

“Of course” he answered as he sniffled again.

“Asylums are where they send very sick people. Donatien was a very sick person. When other men get aroused like that, they don’t hurt other people to satisfy their desires. They fill them in much less painful ways. Donatien was different. That’s why they locked him up there, to keep him from hurting people” she swallowed hard, “then they let him near you and your sister anyway. And then he had the ability to hurt people again” she shook her head. She then attempted one final reassurance, “just because you get aroused by the sight of a woman’s body, does not mean that you want or need to hurt her in order to get pleasure. There are other much better ways that give her pleasure too. And those are the right ways to be close.”

Nicolas was quiet another long moment before finally finding his voice again, “you really think it’s possible I’m not a monster too? Even after… the things I did… to her” he finished as his voice broke again.

“You were forced to do those things, Nicolas. Did you ever touch her after Donatien died?”

“What? Of course not!” he exclaimed.

“See that proves that it wasn’t something you ever wanted to do. If you had actually enjoyed it; you had four years after he was gone, and you never hurt her once after that did you?” Claire stated quietly.

“She still died” Nicolas whispered as he wiped away another tear.

“But it wasn’t because of you hurting her. You tried to save her” Claire assured as she forced back the urge to reach out to comfort him, all things considered.

“I failed though” he added in the same sad whisper.

“As terrible as it is that she died; she’s not the one who’s waking up screaming at night and trying to figure out if she’s a monster. That’s some small mercy at least” she whispered back sadly.

“I still don’t know what I am. I see you and I want…” he just shook his head, “I don’t know how, or understand how pleasure is supposed to be the way you say it actually is.”

“That’s because you’ve only ever seen the twisted, hurtful kind. You’ve never seen or experienced it the way it was actually meant…” that was when Claire’s voice trailed off as she had a thought. “Nicolas,” she began warily, “would you be willing to come stay in me and Sean’s room tonight?”

“What?” he asked, obviously more than a bit thrown by the question.

“I mean, you could watch us…”

“Watch?” he asked as that fear came into his brown eyes once more.

“I just want you to see the way it’s supposed to be. So you know that there is something other than what Donatien showed you. There is something so much gentler, and loving, and pleasurable, than the things he wanted” she attempted to further explain.

“You want me to watch you and your husband together?” he stammered, “the way Donatien liked to watch?”

“But what he liked to watch was pain and humiliation and force; that’s what he wanted to see. I want to show you something so much different. I want you to know that there is a way to be close, to feel pleasure, without there being any pain at all. I just want to teach you that the only thing you’ve ever known is not the way things were ever actually meant to be” Claire attempted to explain.

Nicolas still seemed quite afraid of her suggestion; however he did appear to at least be considering it for several long moments before speaking again, “I don’t know if I could ever be in the same room while…” he shook his head, “while a wealthy, powerful man used a woman for his pleasure. I don’t think I could be there in that room and feel safe at all.”

Claire thought on his words. She wanted to assure him that Sean would never ever do anything to hurt either she or Nicolas, but knew it was most likely a futile argument as he did not know or trust Sean the way she did. She then had a second thought, “what if you weren’t actually in the room?”

“Pardon?”

“What if you just stayed in the privy chamber with the door open a crack? And watched us from there?” Claire offered.

“But if he knew I was there…”

“He wouldn’t have to know” she offered with a bit of her own apprehension. She didn’t like the idea of misleading Sean, but she could think of no other method for ever even trying to help this young man recover from that entire trauma.

“I… I don’t know” Nicolas stammered, though he did still seem to be considering the thought. Perhaps it was simply the bond that made him want to trust her; but nonetheless, if it would help him understand what intimacy was supposed to be, then it would be worth it in Claire’s mind.

“I’ll leave the privy chamber door open a crack and you can decide if you want to look through it on your own tonight. How does that sound?”

“I decide?”

“Yes. Sean and I will be in the other room, doing the things that are supposed to give each other pleasure. It’ll all be up to you if you really want to know a different way; the right way” she finished in a soft whisper as she finally moved to leave him behind with that decision to make on his own. After all, it was long past the time when something was actually in his power to decide for himself at last.

Though she had told Nicolas that Sean would not even know of his presence had he decided to watch after all; Claire decided she still had to keep Sean somewhat aware of the plan. She mainly came to that conclusion as Sean’s senses and mind reading ability made it quite difficult for anyone to keep anything truly unknown to him. Plus, she feared that if Sean noted Nicolas’ voyeurism on his own he would have some sort of reaction to the fact, which would possibly scare Nicolas into never learning the lesson he needed to learn in the hopes of just undoing a fraction of the damage that had been done to him.

That was when she made her way downstairs to Sean’s office and lightly knocked at the door, “yes?” came Sean’s voice from inside as the hour struck eleven.

Claire then pushed the door slightly open as she peeked inside, “busy?”

Sean couldn’t help smirking at the question, “depends on if you have good news or bad news.”

Claire allowed a wry grin as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her before moving to take a seat in the chair in front of his desk, “I need a favor.”

Sean narrowed his eyes a bit at that as he set aside the papers in front of him, “good or bad favor?”

“You’ve become quite paranoid” Claire couldn’t help another wry smile.

“Says the woman who has refused to return to her business for over a year since that unfortunate event” he called her on her statement.

“I think that I have a lot more reason to be paranoid than you; prophecies and all” she reminded him.

Sean just shook his head sadly at yet another reminder that it had been thirteen years since he came into his throne, and those snakes were still threatening them from some terrible point in the unknown future. “So what kind of favor?” he asked, eager to push his mind from the reminder of that fate possibly still coming to pass.

“I need you to help me help Nicolas” she sighed softly.

“Nicolas? The same Nicolas who avoids me like the plague and won’t even speak English if he’s ever forced to be in my presence?” Sean replied with a sigh of his own.

“And you know most of the reasons behind his fear of you” she reminded softly.

“Misguided as they are” Sean returned in a slight mumble, “so how exactly am I supposed to help the young man who is afraid to be anywhere near me?”

“What I need you to do is come up to our bedroom with me and” a slight pause, “and make love to me as though it’s the first time we’ve ever touched one another.”