Chapter Text
Shawn stares out the window, slumped in his chair as he pouts. Across from him, Hunter is setting down his tea and watching his friend with pity. Shawn's melancholy had gone on for weeks now, ever since his father gave him the news that they had 'finally found someone suitable for their son,' a backhanded way of saying that they arranged a marriage for their hapless son that would benefit the family's already-considerable wealth.
Both men knew this day would come eventually. Shawn couldn't be a carefree bachelor his whole life, and someday his partying, flirtatious ways would have to come to an end if his family wanted to mitigate the damage he'd done to their name. Shawn, the youngest son of the Michaels family, had proven his desirability amongst every man and women in the neighboring towns. Not one party was thrown that didn't involve him being found splayed out in a bed with any number of company.
Part of Hunter was glad for it. He, too, wanted to see his friend settle down. The partying and wine Shawn consumed was not meant for anyone who wanted to live a long life - he was a man racing towards the end, filling every moment of his life with hedonism until his gut was full of it. And Hunter wanted Shawn to stay around longer. His best friend, someone he would have married himself had his hand not been given to the woman whose proposal couldn't possibly be turned down.
It wasn't that Hunter thought he and Shawn would be soulmates. Rather, he knew he could take care of Shawn, and the man they'd instead matched him up with was mysterious, unknown. His name was strange, a moniker, and no good man goes by an alias.
"God, I think that's him," Shawn says, sitting up in his chair and peering through the curtains. Hunter moves the tea away and looks out the front window to see a black carriage being pulled up the front walkway, led by a velvety black mare and a rather gaunt-looking stagecoach in a low black hat.
"Where did your parents find a man like him?" Hunter asks, incredulous. Shawn frowns, watching as the last of his freedom is stomped away under the hooves of what looked like a steed from hell. There was the boat of Charon, his final passage, and in it carried some sort of man who was going to take the rest of Shawn's life and douse it in something worse than pain - boredom.
"Shoot me," Shawn pouts to Hunter.
"Something tells me that won't help," Hunter quips back, then stands. "Okay, come on now. Your father trusted me to send you off...to wish you...good luck," Hunter says quietly. His voice trails off as the rattling sound of the carriage pulls up towards the front door of the palacial mansion that was the Michaels Villa.
Shawn stands, reluctant, defeated. Hunter steps forward and straightens his suit, brushing his hands down his friend's wrinkles pants and adjusting his frock coat. Shawn's hair is pulled back into a similar style as Hunters, with the top half slicked back into a hairtie, his face cleanly shaven for the first time in his life. He looks dashing.
He looks miserable.
"Hunter," Shawn says quietly as a knock reverberates loudly through the home. Hunter looks up into Shawn's eyes, a sadness deep in his heart. He had seen so many friends go through this. So many families. The lucky ones were married off to local royalty and aristocrats, the unlucky ones were whisked away to other countries or far away lands. Never to be seen again.
Shawn was the unlucky one.
The two men who had known each other their entire lives, born in neighboring homes, aided into life by the same midwife. Brothers, almost closer than that. Shawn was with Hunter through all his struggles in life, Hunter helped Shawn with his demons. And now they were looking at the other man, knowing how this world worked, knowing the indifference with which it tore people apart.
"I will write," Hunter promises softly. "I will visit. I swear."
"I don't want to do this. I can't."
"You can," Hunter promises softly, wrapping Shawn in an embrace. "I know you can. You're going to be okay."
Shawn wraps his arms tight around Hunter, as if he could make the embrace tight enough to keep them together. The butler walks across the front hall and Shawn hears the front door open, he hears the greetings. One voice is deep, deeper than any he's heard before, with an accent from those in the south.
Great. He will be going south.
He will be kidnapped, forcefully taken, his life ended with something as swift as a hand in hand. What hurts the most is when Hunter steps away from him, and what could be their final embrace ends. Bitterness turns sour in Shawn's throat, festering into a cold expression as the doors to the parlor are opened.
"Young Lord Michaels," the butler says, stepping back and opening the double doors wide, "The Duke of the Valley."
A man steps into the room and an icy chill sweeps through the air. Something has entered the home, and Shawn cannot quite bring himself to believe it is benevolent. He swears he is looking at something that is adjacent to a man - human in appearance, but beneath the skin there is something otherworldly.
He was taller than any man Shawn had ever known. His skin was pale, his face sharp and masculine. A black beard frames his lips and chin, black hair falls over his back like a dark river. His broad shoulders fill out a long black overcoat, his entire frame fitting into an outfit more fit for mourning than meeting one's spouse. He removes a wide-brimmed hat from his head, revealing two cold, green eyes.
Shawn is stuck in place. Something moves inside him, some kind of...fear? No, it isn't quite fear. It's as if something familiar rings inside him and he feels drawn towards this man, some all-knowing part of him reaching out for the man. But Shawn has more control over himself than that.
"Hello," he says coldly. The Duke nods, stepping forward to offer his hand. Shawn stares at it sourly for a moment, until Hunter gives him a nudge. Hurt, aching, Shawn lifts his hand and places it in the other man's. His palm is icy cold, inhumanly so. When the Duke leans down and kisses the top of Shawn's fingers, his lips are just as cold.
Eventually, Shawn will have to kiss those lips.
"It is an honor to meet you," the man says in that deep timber. "Shawn Michaels."
Shawn's heart thumps in his chest when he hears his name from those lips. The man is...interesting. But Shawn's heart is wrapped in too many bitter layers to say anything back, to even pretend he is happy that this marriage has been arranged.
In what seems a cruelly short amount of time, Shawn's things are packed up into the carriage, with the rest being in storage until he returns. If he returns.
He and Hunter can only share one last embrace, holding back tears. For the last time, Shawn is sure, he steps away from his best friend. The face of his childhood, his heart, his support in the darkness of his world. But that is not the worst of it. The worst is sitting beside the silent Duke, the man who says not a word, who seems calm despite the agony his future spouse is in.
The worst is looking out the back window of the carriage and seeing Hunter standing alone on the front steps, growing smaller and smaller, until there is nothing left but the rising trees that close in as if shutting the door on all that was Shawn's happiness.