>>5225109>>5225130>>5225497>>5226196The dinner proceeds pleasantly, and with only a little awkwardness. Your Mother and Eleyse speak more to Alys than you about your shared travels, and she good naturedly describes what is appropriate to them with little fanfare or exaggeration. You try to keep your younger sisters entertained, but they seem unable to tell you from a stranger. Sad, but not surprising. You can tell Moira knows there is more to the stories but Eleyse seems enraptured. She insistently asks Alys about how she was involved, what she did for the journey. Alys for once seems bashful describing what has been her profession for years, to a young girl of barely twenty. You begin to suspect your sister has an alternative motive on this line of questioning and you therefore discard it. Perhaps it's not only Moira she kept correspondence with all these months. No good to suspect family and friend. Until you have to.
Two hours pass before the last course is cleared. Your Mother announces her intent, “The hold, as I said, is yours, dear son, but do get some rest.” With that admonishment and a respectful tilt of her head, she retires, your younger two sisters at her heels as is proper. But Eleyse remains, as is her right as a legal adult. This seems, well, deliberate. The only people left at the table are you, her, and an increasingly uncomfortable looking Alys. You had made the opportunity to inform your companion of the nature of the lie beforehand, something which will hopefully provide dividends now. You take another gulp of the wine before you address your sister.
Of course, she's there before you. Damned clever girl. “Who's the kid, Uilliam?”
You gulp audibly. “I had him with some woman in the capital. I-I had too much to drink. It's nothing to be worried about.”
Eleyse makes a laugh, not unkind, but sharper than you would expect from her. She seems to accept that, but without some little condemnation. Though you do notice the four wine glasses empty before her.
“Oh bugger brother, that's such a social faux paux. Couldn't you have just fucked Alys? At this point no one would have said anything” Alys almost falls out of her chair and you yourself only do marginally better, a small drop of liquid leaving your lips.
“Eleyse! You know better than that!” You cry in legitimate outrage.
“Do I? Oh, fuck it, I believe you. It's Mother who always thought you were an angel with no wings. It was me who found you in the hay with village girls. No shock you would just do it again.” Eleyse is right, you once had a great deal of fun with girls in the village at the foot of the river. But that was almost fifteen years ago, that was before Father died, and now your love is duty. As you say this to yourself, Alys looks at you with a more vile expression than you have seen. Interrogated in your own home, how shameful.
