Word Count: 820
Archive: DarkMagick.net, Apollymi’s Grimoire, and Archive of Our Own. Anyone else wanting it, please ask first. I’ll probably say yes, but ask first…[endsection]
The worst beating Goodnight took in the time between his thirteenth birthday and when he was forced by Monsieur Robicheaux into the Confederate army at eighteen was after the Mardi Gras party when he was fifteen. And while he wasn’t happy that it had happened, Goodnight was glad that he’d kept Letty and T-Jo’s part of the events leading up to it a secret.
Thank God he’d already changed out of the chartreuse monstrosity of a dress Letty had loaned him, or else she might have received a beating of her own. Although Goodnight still thought that the old bastard had known that the girl was keeping his attention away from where the eldest child was… entertaining one of their guests in a more private setting.
T-Jo’s role had been to give an early warning just in case Letty failed at keeping their parents—but especially Monsieur Robicheaux—distracted, and thankfully he hadn’t had to do so. And Goodnight had been able to enjoy the festivities, find a young man with similar leanings as his own—granted, said young man was a man of twenty-three who was just passing through town, the cousin of one of Letty’s town friends—and enjoy a few hours of being doted upon, pampered, and losing his virginity.
Again, thank God that T-Jo had been down the hall and not right outside his rooms. His brother was too young to go hearing that sort of thing.
But somehow, Monsieur Robicheaux had found out. Either Marcel had not been half as stealthy leaving the Robicheaux home as he’d been entering the upstairs during the party with Goodnight—and that had been very interesting, sneaking through the halls in a gown, corset, and heels—or one of the slaves had been ‘convinced’ to tell the old bastard what he or she had seen during the evening, but Goodnight had been finishing up in preparing for bed when the man burst into his room and grabbed him by the hair.
He was just glad the bastard had dragged him down the hall to the upstairs study rather than beating the shit out of him in his own bedroom; he never would have been able to sleep there again.
And it had been one hell of a beating, one that seemed to go on for hours even though no more than ten minutes could have passed during it or else someone—likely Maman—would have come looking for the bastard. Worse than the physical blows, worse than the cracked ribs that Nana Jolie had had to wrap for him, worse still than the dark bruises that took forever to fade from his arms and face, were the words Monsieur Robicheaux had spat at him. Every single derogatory word in his vocabulary regarding people with the same bent leanings as Goodnight, every insult growled in disgust, every accusing thought of Maman having an affair with Uncle Dempsey—his mother’s oldest friend and one of the few men in the world that the children felt safe being around—with Goodnight himself being the result, ending with a solemn vow that he would kill him if he ever caught him with a man, that he would be married off to some society belle when he was of age or that he would be cast out for good.
That, Goodnight couldn’t allow. If he was gone, who would keep T-Jo and Letty safe?
He had made a solemn promise to himself that he would do whatever it took to keep his younger siblings as safe and as happy as possible, even if that meant running away with the both of them.
Somehow he had managed to drag himself back down the hall to his room, where T-Jo was already waiting nervously inside. He had been the one to run for Nana Jolie, had been the one to hold his hand as he bit back whimpers of pain as the aging woman tended to his injuries as best she could. It had been T-Jo who carefully climbed into bed next to him, pressing a kiss to his unbruised cheek and offering a watery smile.
“S’okay, Goody,” he said quietly, ever aware that the bastard was always around. “It’s okay. You just sleep now. I’ll protect you.”
And that was how it was: the brothers protecting each other and Letty as best they could, every single day up until the horrible day he’d left to go to war. Which, in all honesty, was yet another way to keep the younger children—although not so much children any longer, with Letty a beauty at seventeen and T-Jo himself already eleven—safe from harm. After all, if Monsieur Robicheaux was distracted by the ‘glory’ of war, then he couldn’t do any damage to the two children still in St. Martinville.
And with any luck, the old bastard would die soon enough and Goodnight could go back home.
[section=Footer Notes]10 March 2017Again, I am so, so sorry.
I can honestly say that it’s my favorites that I tend to torment the most, so I must love Goodnight a hell of a lot, huh?
And for those who follow me and Adora on Tumblr? This chapter is one of those spots where we’ve created an AU of the AU. I was actually working on that a little bit before midnight while waiting for it to be time for posting this segment. It’ll be some time before that sees an appearance on here, however, even if we share a teaser at some point.
~Adora & Katsuko[endsection]