10.
When the morning light came pale and wan through the window, Viona awoke with her back against a warm, solid presence. An arm was draped over her waist, Lucius's left arm. She studied his fingers. The nails were growing back nicely, as was the skin of his fingertips that had been scraped raw and bleeding when he'd arrived on her doorstep. His palms were still soft and tender skinned, though he had developed some early calluses from working in the pub.
Her eyes traveled up his arm and alighted on the faded tattoo on his forearm. She had often wondered what would have led a haughty man like Lucius to get such a gruesome mark. Perhaps he would tell her sometime. After last night, a new intimacy had been born between them. She gazed at the clock, suddenly aware of the hour, and grasped his hand, chafing it gently to awaken him.
He groaned, "What time is it?"
"Just past 7," she yawned. "How do you feel?"
He propped his head on his arm and kissed her shoulder, "Like I could spend the day here with you."
"Would that we could," she squeezed his hand. "Can I ask you something? You can ask me something in return - quid pro quo."
"Alright. You go first, I suppose."
"Of course," she shifted to her back, so that she could see his face. "I've been curious about your tattoo - what does it mean?"
He sighed, "It's complicated. I was part of a… political organization. This was our symbol. Only a few of us received the Mark. It was supposed to be an honor."
"Supposed to be?" She reached out, intending to touch the inked skin, but he pulled away.
"Don't touch it!"
She was taken aback, "I'm sorry."
"It's just, well, the Mark is tremendously dangerous. Or it was, before we were… defeated."
"Defeated. That's an odd way to put it. Disbanded?"
"Brought to justice. We did terrible things in the name of - of this organization, for our leader. We did whatever he asked of us. We almost overthrew an entire government."
"Almost?"
"We could never have succeeded. Perhaps the only positive thing I can say for myself is that I could read the writing on the wall. Our leader went mad and lost sight of the vision. All he wanted was power, and by the end, he didn't care about anything else. I'd lost my taste for his methods after we attacked a… a government building several years ago. People were hurt, some lost their lives."
"You said you did terrible things. I can see that it pains you, so I won't ask you about those things, yet," she gently touched his hand, which had clutched a handful of blanket in a deathgrip.
He sighed and unclenched the fist he hadn't realized he'd made.
"So it's my turn to ask the question?"
"Yes, be gentle," she smiled at him coyly.
"You sing so well, why didn't you do anything with your talents except run a pub and play in a local band?"
"I tried," she laughed grimly. "I left after secondary school and traveled, first to Belfast, then across to Britain. I worked in pubs and coffee shops all over Europe. I wrote music. Volumes of it, and played it wherever I could. On street corners, if I couldn't find a venue that would book me. I even recorded a single."
"And what happened? You could be anywhere in the world. Why did I find the best singer I've ever heard in a tiny Irish fishing village?"
"Oh," she waved a hand vaguely, "lots of things happened. I ran into hard times, so I made my music just a hobby and went to school to be a nurse. Then my da got sick, so I had to come home. And the pub was mine after that. Been in the family for generations, I can't be the one to sell it. At least not yet."
"Speaking of the pub, it's waiting for us, I suppose," he stretched.
Her mouth went dry just watching the movements of his body beneath the sheets. She turned to face him.
"Well, I am the boss. We could have a bit of a lie-in just once."
From that night onward, Lucius shared her bed. In between the sleeping and the lovemaking was the pillow talk, which forged a connection between them that neither had realized had been missing in their lives. They saw one another with new eyes, and it was only a matter of time before someone else noticed the change.
Unfortunately, Kev's suspicions were only growing with each passing day. He'd been watching his friend's interactions with her mysterious tenant with a weather eye since the man had first come downstairs, and so it became almost immediately clear to him when Viona and Lucius began to treat each other differently. At first, he thought maybe they were just experiencing the normal tensions that pop up between people who live together, but now he was sure there was something else going on.
He cornered Viona as she pulled a pint, "Something is off between you and the blond git. What happened?"
Viona glanced up, "Nothing, everything's fine."
Kev's eyes narrowed, "You look different. Relaxed, not like a couple of weeks ago, when you were drawn tighter than your guitar strings. Did you sleep with him?"
She nearly overfilled the pint, stopping at the last minute with a stifled oath. When she'd passed it down to the patron who ordered it, she stared at Kev for a long moment before responding.
"I don't see that it's any of your business."
"Oh my God. You did."
"Kev -"
At that moment, Lucius and Dennis returned from the cellars with fresh stock. Before they could do anything besides set it down, Kev had rounded the bar and grabbed Lucius by the collar. He hauled back and struck the other man solidly in the face 3 times, in rapid succession, reliving in that instant the kind of brawl he had engaged in as a teenager. Viona screamed and reached for her friend's arm while Dennis tried to step between them.
Lucius, having never really been in a fist fight before, could only hold his violently bleeding nose and blink the stars from his swelling and blackening eye. He held his other hand out in a gesture of surrender, but Kev ignored it and tried to hit him again, but Dennis managed to grab him by the elbow and lever him away from his unsuspecting victim.
Viona pushed forward and stood, shaking before her friend in the suddenly silent pub. She began smacking him about the head and shoulders with wild little blows that didn't really hurt him.
"Dammit Kev, I'm a grown woman in the 20th century, and I'll sleep with whomever I choose. You're not my keeper and I'll thank you to keep your nose out!"
"But I am, Vi!" He shouted. "Or do you not remember the event that made me your keeper?"
"That is so far from relevant here," she said in a low, dangerous voice, "and how dare you bring that up now. How dare you throw that in my face!"
"It is abso-fucking-lutely relevant. That was the moment you became my responsibility. You chose me. You didn't call your da or your aunt, you called me. You were still so high, you didn't even know what year it was and I only knew you were in Spain because I could hear Spanish on the PA system, but you remembered my phone number and you called me. I was terrified but I couldn't go find you because I'd just got a job. They woulda skinned me for taking off to Spain for some ex-girlfriend who hadn't so much as dropped a postcard since she left Ireland. When I got off the phone with you, I swore that if you came back alive, I'd never leave you out on your own like that ever again."
"Kev, I'm not nineteen anymore -"
"I know, but look - you still don't know who he is, where he came from, or even his bloody last name, Vi! He's living in your house, alone with you and now you're sleeping with him! How is that not recklessly irresponsible? He could be a murderer; some charismatic psychopath waiting for the perfect moment to chop you to bits and who could I blame but myself for not saying something when I had the chance."
"That's patronizingly sweet of you, but really unnecessary," Viona said tightly.
"Oh, but it is necessary. It's a shame that you don't see; or maybe you don't want to," Kev grabbed his coat and started to leave. He looked over his shoulder before he opened the door, "There's a laundry list of questions you probably haven't asked him because you're not sure you want to know the answers. He's not going to just volunteer that information to you, and you should want to know why."
On that parting thrust, he was gone.
Viona sighed and turned to Lucius, who was still holding his bleeding nose and snuffling uncomfortably. She steered him by his elbow up the stairs, instructing Dennis to keep an eye on the pub.
She propelled him to the bathroom, where she set to mopping away the blood and prodding his nose and eye gingerly. He hissed in pain, but allowed her to explore his injuries.
"Well, the good news is, your nose isn't broken," she said, "Your eye is going to be swollen shut if we don't get a cold compress on it, though."
"Would you care to explain why your friend decided to use my face for bludger practice?"
"He's an interfering little geebag is why," she growled. "He's meddling and tiresome, and stubborn when he gets an idea in his head."
Lucius cautiously touched his nose, "I haven't received a beating like that since - well, a long time ago," he winced, "I don't miss this feeling at all."
"I'll get you an ibuprofen, and then you're going to rest."
She left him laid out on the bed with a cold compress for his eye and gauze stuffed up his nose. When she returned late that night, she found him sitting at the kitchen table with a mug of tea and a grim expression on his battered face.
"I guess you know I have to ask you, now," she sighed, collapsing into a chair across from him.
"I wish you wouldn't," he replied softly.
"Easy ones first," she continued as though she hadn't heard him, "what's your last name?"
"Malfoy."
"Lucius Malfoy. Has a nice ring to it. 'Bad faith'? That's portentous."
"You have no idea," he said wryly.
"When you washed up on shore, I suspected that you'd escaped, but I don't know from where. Hospital or prison?"
"Prison."
She let out a shaky breath that she must have been holding, "Why were you in prison?"
He laughed mirthlessly, "Where do I begin? Participating in a terrorist attack, breaking into a government facility, attempted theft, assault, destruction of property," he paused and took a breath, "murder."
The kitchen was completely silent for an eternal moment. Lucius thought that perhaps, by some miracle, she hadn't heard him, and maybe everything might be alright in the end, maybe he would be allowed to forget his sordid past and start over, as he had been trying to do.
At last, Viona looked at him, "Were you ever going to tell me that?"
"How could I? What could I possibly say to mitigate that? It's impossible."
"You killed someone," she stated baldly, "No, you're right. There's no way to make it acceptable to me. Who was it?"
He stood and turned his back to her, "Does it matter?"
"Did you know them? How did you kill them? Was it only one person, or did you kill a room full of people? Did you kill your wife?"
He whirled around, his face a mask of fury, "No, I did not kill my wife! For all I know she's alive and well, no thanks to me. What does it matter if I answer any, or in fact, all of your very impertinent questions? Our relationship is forever changed because now you know a few more facts about my past. I'm still the same as I was yesterday, but you'll never look at me the way you did even 20 minutes ago."
"Don't you think I have a right to know who you are?"
"You know who I am! What if I didn't want to be the same Lucius Malfoy who did all those things?" He stared at her, wide-eyed and desperate, "The man who committed those acts is dead! I'm not him - I've changed!"
"How do I know that?" She slammed her palm on the table. "I don't really know you at all, do I?"
"But it didn't matter yesterday, did it?" He said bitterly.
"It should have, though. Kev's right about one thing; I should have asked you these questions ages ago."
"What would you have done if you knew? Throw me out? Leave me to die on the rocks like I had intended?"
"No, of course not!" She was almost yelling now. "I would have called the authorities. You should be back in prison."
He laughed, "The authorities. Naturally."
"You think this is funny? I could be jailed myself for letting you stay here. I should call them now," she rose.
Before she could even step away from the table, he had her by the wrist, "I don't think so. I'd rather die than go back there. I might as well have been dead the moment I walked through the gates."
"Let go of me!" she snarled. "If you hurt me now, they'll all know it was you as done it. You'll have nowhere to hide, there isn't another town for miles."
"I'm not going to hurt you," he sounded exasperated, "Just let me explain -"
"No! You can't explain this away, Lucius. You killed someone! And I've been - God, I started to think we -" she broke off with a strangled sob.
"Just listen to me," he tried again with exaggerated patience, "It was a war; we all killed people -"
"A war?! What war? When? You're not making any sense," she tried to tug her wrist free.
He sighed and released her, "No, I suppose you wouldn't understand."
"You're a dangerous political criminal, so no, I wouldn't. I knew you were different from the other men I'd known, but I had no idea how different," she gazed at him, her eyes filled with tears.
"Viona, I swear I won't hurt you."
He reached for her, this time intending to comfort her, but she held up a hand and stepped back.
"No, please don't. I'm too confused by this right now. Look, can you leave for a bit?"
"What?" He stared at her.
"Just for a bit. Take a walk, or something. I can't have you here right now. I need to think."
He clenched his jaw, but gave her a sharp nod. His eyes had gone utterly cold. He grabbed his coat from the hook by the door and was down the stairs and out the front door of the pub before she could say another word.