Title – Empire
Pairing – House/Chase, Chase/Cameron
Rating – M
Disclaimer – Not mine
Summary – Total AU. In a time of social status, of battles for power, of 'turf wars' in the most gentlemanly of ways, Lord Gregory House and his brother James rule supreme over their little corner of stately England. Second only to the great Lord Rowan Chase, could the outcast bastard son of their great rival hold the key to their own domination?
Warning – mention of past cruelty this will indeed be slash, unlike my other story which will forever remain friend to friend…
I understand AU is not most people's cup of tea but I felt if I posted it I'd at least free up some space on my desktop…
One can never replicate one's father...
Lord House is not a man of honour as one might expect living beneath his family name. Whilst his paternal grandfather built this family up from the ground and his own father, indeed, polished it from sand into diamonds, the third generation is no more noble that the commoner that tends it's land; that keeps it in the manner it had grown accustomed.
Gregory House is a man of great charisma, his brother James a man of great kindness - but they cannot hold a flame to those that went before.
(*)
This is their kingdom and within these walls and fields they are as powerful as the almighty God that governs over them from above.
They inherited the land and the title from their late father who died but months ago. His parting words to his sons were not words of love but words of responsibility.
To Gregory he spoke at great length.
"It is down to you and your brother to carry on the family name. It is up to you both to ensure the respect this family has garnered remains intact. The house is mine to give, as is the land. The respect is yours to earn."
That was not his father's to give. In life, neither was his affection.
The house, his pride and joy and the centre of his very possessive-orientated world, sits on acres of land owned by the House family, one of many such estates that dot around this country and other empires as far away as Spain and Italy, Belgium, Austria. Its elegant and luxuriant, though its eldest Lord is known for his distinct lack of both qualities.
House does not personify this place…
The other families see Lord House as an indulgent man prone to erratic behaviour and souring addictions. Some say he sniffs the ether, others that he awakens to a glass of wine that never falls dry.
Some say he takes lovers of both male and female; that he indulges his servants in ways he should not. The man himself prides himself on these rumours, feels they make him brighter, more interesting than the next.
His servants would describe him as an odd employer, his brother James a kindly one. None of them could ever claim to 'know' the man, forever a bachelor, a strange collector of waifs and strays that he pulls along on strings until he tires of them.
It's Thursday December 13th and, through snowy fields, he arrives home with more than just a felled Fir tree with which to decorate the grand hall for festivities. The carriage approaches from the North entrance, a route lined with tall iron lanterns and ornate sculptures. The horses, black and beautiful, grind to a halt beside the intricate fountain, a gift from an uncle as a way of expressing his 'love' and to commemorate the passing of his beloved elder brother.
The path is crystalline. Beautiful. It's painted by the enchantment of Winter.
Lord James watches from the upstairs window as his brother's latest 'toy' is taken from the carriage and wrapped in a blanket to ward off the chill. The figure stumbles, falls to his knees yet his brother makes no move to assist.
James sighs, grateful only that Gregory is not a man of cruelty who would kick a servant when he was down.
Far be it for him to judge, however.
He steps away from the window and sits in the large leather seat from which he writes his manuscripts, tales of medical mischief and darkness and plague.
James would've liked to have been a doctor if he hadn't been drafted to be a House.
(*)
Curiosity is peaked whenever a new acquisition is brought to work within these foundations. Those that last longest bond tightly, a family away from family, of sorts. They each room together, breathing each other's air, living within each other's pockets.
When one of them leaves, either for 'the other side' or for places elsewhere, they each feel the loss as a physical ache like the loss of a limb, the amputation of a thought or emotion.
"Take your shoes off," Lord Gregory demands. "I don't want your muddy paw prints all over the floor."
Silently, the young man complies.
Allison watches from her place on the stairs. Her eyes are red, hidden beneath long lashes. Her soul is dark, tempered only by obedience and servitude. She remains saddened and broken by the death of her loved one, her Joseph, angered that he be replaced just days after his passing. Her lips are still warm from his, her mind still enveloped in the memory of his last breaths, taken with her arms wrapped around him.
Poor Joseph, her 'husband' in all but the law.
Still, her tears clean these stairs as readily as the polish does. Lord House has not even waited for Joseph's bed to turn cold, for the ground he lies beneath to settle with ice and snow.
She scrubs the wood so hard the brush becomes flat and distorted, so hard that she can no longer see her face in the stairs but her very soul. It bleeds with love for Joseph, with hatred towards the man that sought so carelessly to replace him.
She looks down through the bannister rails, looks at the fresh young man with his velvet coat and his ribboned golden hair. Spoiled, she assumes, a fallen aristocrat that deserves no better than a life of servitude. She heard he was disowned by his illegitimate father, forced into work to avoid the family shame of an extra-marital affair.
Rowan Chase could never explain why his boy-servant was the very image of him; why the boy was nursed by a woman in his household who never had relations or even had contact with a man other than her 'master'.
Allison looks him carefully through her veiled eyes. His hands look too clean to have ever known true work, his face too handsome and she wonders if the Lord has taken a lover rather than a servant. His behaviour is oft strange and this would not surprise her after all. So many pretty men have entered and exited his life together with so many pretty women.
No pattern is in place, no rule set in stone.
"Remember this hallway; that staircase. The servants wing is up there," she hears House call out, confirming at least that this young man will not be bedding with him. "I'm sure they will permit you to rest your pretty head on the floor if there's room."
He teases. His words, though false, do not move the boy to disappointment.
Allison thinks he looks way too calm, bordering on arrogance. She doesn't like it one bit, not one, and as the new servant's eyes look up to meet hers she makes a visible, obvious effort to look away.
His face, she sees, is a vision.
In the periphery of her own vision, however, she notes only the marks that ruin it.
(*)
The boy is a strange one, James thinks, an odd choice even for his brother.
As a settling in ploy he has been given the ultimate honour of dining at the masters' table. He eats slowly, indifferently, his blue eyes looking only at the table before him. He has learned to play the game, has learned that sustenance can be taken from him as readily as it is given.
"Is the soup to your taste?" the younger man asks, his warm brown eyes casting watchful glances over Gregory's new charge.
The boy, Robert, has learned that to express desire is not within his rights, what little of them he has, and so he eats, drinks yet holds his silence.
House watches intently, takes in the physical form of his cast-off. He finds it difficult to believe this young creature was banished from his former court and home for bad behaviour yet there is something 'off' about him. He wonders if the bruises on his wrists have something to do with his perceived 'wrong', the ones he fights to
hide; whether the healing cut beneath his eye is remnant of being backhanded by a strong and powerful man wearing the ring of his family.
There is a lot to read. It seems, however, that the boy does not want to be read.
House leans forward. He places a hand on Robert's arm. He watches the jaw clench as he struggles not to react.
"I offer you food and fine wine, Robert, and yet you say nothing. Did Lord Rowan maim you or did he simply steal your wits? Has he bottled your voice or your tongue?"
The servant lets his spoon drop into the bowl of broth he has been afforded. When permitted, he places his hands slowly in his lap as if waiting for something.
"Open your mouth."
James clears his throat. Under his breath, he speaks his brother's name.
Don't push him, he is saying. Leave him be.
The young man hesitates, jaw clamped, eyes fixed to the ground. His hair, tied back in a navy ribbon, falls loose from it's bindings just as he becomes entangled in his own. The other servants are ruddy and urchin, dark haired, dark skinned. James thinks this one looks as if he should have been born to privilege yet here he is, owned and exchanged for money and favour.
Lord House grasps his jaw without force yet those blue eyes close tightly.
Still, he makes no sound.
"Open your mouth," House repeats. "I'll have to be rid of you if he's maimed you. You are of no use if you cannot answer me back. There is no amusement in permanent silence."
The servant looks up, resistant, defiant, and he parts those full lips with such contempt it can almost be tasted.
There, in that space between his jaws, is a fully intact tongue.
"So, you're a mute. Is this a birth state or a chosen one? Do you not speak because you cannot or because you will not?"
There is no forthcoming answer to his question. There is only the joy of the puzzle.
"Leave him be, Gregory," James insists and this time his brother complies.
(*)
"So, you are the man to replace our fallen brother?"
The man, Eric, has skin as dark as soot and midnight. Robert Chase has never looked upon a man of colour before, his life as sheltered as it was monotonous.
He stands in the doorway waiting to be invited inside.
"You don't have to stand there like a frightened cat. Come inside. We don't bite."
The voice is far from welcoming but the eyes hold no malice. Robert slowly crosses the threshold into what will be his sleeping quarters for as long as he is forced to remain.
He knows not to run in the winter, his fragile human body ill equipped to deal with the harshness of snow and ice and for now, at least, there is a warm log on the fire and a warm bed in which to sleep.
He recognises the woman from the staircase and she is as mute toward him as he is toward all else. He doesn't smile in her direction, nor does he smile for the black man.
He places his small bag of possessions on the bed beside him and claims this space as his own.
The woman looks agitated, the man something else entirely. Robert remains as he always remains. Neutral. Silent. Cold as stone.
"Do you speak to the spirits?" the black man asks. "It seems you don't speak to the living."
Robert says nothing, but when the man speaks again it leaves him feeling chilled to the bone, as if he walks the outdoors with his feet bare and his body stripped to nothing.
"You'd do well to speak to the Holy Ghost tonight, dear boy. A man died in that very spot barely days ago."
If the newcomer is moved by these words then Eric does not see it.
Allison sees nothing but her own grief, her own pain at the fact that a newcomer need be here at all.
(*)
"He's coltish, Gregory. Even by your impure standards, a banished servant with a history of absconding is a little extreme."
Gregory washes his hands in the warm water of the basin, reaching for a towel warmed by the wood-burning fire.
"Has he any skills?"
"I hear he's very good with his hands."
"Eric is good with his hands. Joseph was good in the fields as well as in the hunt. Can he fell a deer? Can he plough land?"
Gregory smiles.
"Doubtful."
"Then, what?"
"What? What, you ask? What are you doing with Miss Amber when all the world and its sister knows she is a menace? What are you doing here with me when our father left you properties abroad in which to excel? You always did say you wanted to travel, James, to see the world with your beautiful lady friend."
"This is about you. This is about you bringing yet another man in disrepute into our household. You're garnering yourself a reputation as being flippant as to whom you allow past the threshold."
Young James, always the worrier, always too preoccupied by the gossip mongering; by the naming and shaming of those that do not conform.
"I chose him because he's beautiful. I chose him because he pleases my eyes."
"Oh, dear Lord…"
"Oh hush, dear brother. I chose him because the great Rowan Chase sought to cast him from his whimsical, exclusive, perfect little Kingdom when everybody whose anybody knows he's his son."
He smiles.
"You of all people should know, Wilson, that a young man's hatred toward his father can grow into something substantial."
He uses his brother's middle name so as to draw him to attention.
"I'm sure all of Rowan's infidelities, his crimes and his passions, could serve us well in the future. Whoever could put his faith in a man that beds another behind the back of his ailing wife? What of a man who will submit his own flesh and blood to a lifetime of obligation and cruelty when he's heir to his very estate? I'm sure those that favour him might think otherwise if we could expose some of his lies and falsities and who better to do that than his banished, beautiful child?"
Who better to bring down an Empire than the scorned son of its 'Emperor'?
"It's cruelty, Gregory. It's absurd."
Gregory's hand curls behind his brother's neck and he pushes together, forehead to forehead.
"Father never could overturn that man and his people. Our family was forever second best. Maybe you and I can take the step he never could."
James sighs. His brother's schemes are never victim-less and this young man is victim enough, denied his right, demoralised and dejected from the moment of his birth.
"You want to use this angry, downtrodden boy against his father?"
Gregory shrugs, forever careless, forever one-track minded.
"What other use for a silent miscreant?"