"Therefore, good Brutus, listen now to hear."
She lay the note beside the text for perhaps the 200th time, staring at it.
Be prepared.
Those were the words they had changed- "Therefore, good Brutus, be prepared to hear." Be prepared. Prepared for what? What was she, if the note was even for her, supposed to prepare for? She still had to decode the rest, and she had no clue where to start. Frustrated, she ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it back. She had never been one for research; she liked untangling problems, taking them apart, but it seemed like there wasn't enough to even constitute a tangle.
Closing her eyes, she pulled her hair back with her ribbon. If there was enough for there to be a problem, there was enough for her to solve it.
Okay. What did she know? It was a code of omission, presumably. Presumably, all of the passages were from Shakespeare. And what else? What else did she know? The previous codes had to do with letter scrambling, but that didn't seem helpful here. He was an actor, and at least one of the sections was from a play. Was that useful? Shakespeare didn't just write plays, though, he wrote sonnets as well, didn't he? She lifted the note up again, reading it over. The first one rhymed; maybe that was a sonnet. It certainly sounded like the beginning of one; it had meter and plenty of poetic language. But that still left the middle one, the one about the English army. Unfortunately, if she knew anything about Shakespeare, it was that he loved writing about English armies. Groaning, she put her face back in her hands, fighting back despair. She could solve this. She had to solve this. The sonnets- she could at least start there. It was a next move, if nothing else.
It would be easier if she could just ask him, she thought, rubbing at her eyes with her hands. For once he was better versed than her. Checking the clock she was shocked to see what time it was. She jumped up, already behind on starting dinner. The last thing she wanted was a group of angry criminals on her hands.
He watched her as she served dinner, all innocence, as if she didn't belong amongst them. He tried to conjure up hatred, but all he could find was a fearful sense of betrayal. Was she working with them? Was she the reason they knew not to be there? She had panicked at the last moment, running in, but perhaps it had all been a ruse.
Had she really chosen them over him, even after everything? When had he even given her the opportunity to? Why was she insisting upon tearing him apart? She didn't even notice his wallowing destruction, too distracted by her own problems. She was such a clever girl; if she allowed him, he could build her an empire, but no, she was hellbent on creating her own.
Perhaps he was getting ahead of himself, though. Perhaps it was a misunderstanding. And perhaps she was a snake.
He'd wait, see what she did. The last thing he wanted to do was make her more clever in her deception. If she wanted to betray him, it was his job to keep her stoppable.
He was uncomfortably distraught that night. She wasn't sure what was happening with him, but she didn't like it. His anger never ended well for her. She doubted it was anything she had done, but still.
Honestly, she shouldn't care at all. She had more important things to do, more pressing matters to attend to. And yet, his disinterested glances were off-putting. She couldn't remember the last time she had felt so self-conscious, constantly checking and rechecking herself. She needed to stay in his good graces; it was absolutely vital. He was all that she had, all that she knew. If he had decided she was worthless, where else would she go?
Taking a deep breath, she tried to steady her nerves. There was no need for it to come to that. There was no reason to assume that he was upset with her. And yet, when she refilled his glass he hardly looked at her, didn't even acknowledge her. He didn't know, did he? Of course not, she reassured herself. She'd seen his acting skills; if he believed she'd been keeping things from him, he'd be livid.
Softly, he nudged the lip of the bottle up with his glass, "That's quite enough, Countess."
"Oh, sorry." In her internal chaos, she hadn't noticed how high she had been filling it.
"Quite alright." Softly, he slunk his arm around her waist, rubbing his thumb against her as if to ground himself, to reassure his mind that she was still there. He wouldn't lose her. She was too much to lose. "What has you so distracted?"
She leaned into his touch, still cradling the bottle of wine in both hands, "Oh, this and that. Routine things. The usual. Why?"
He shook his head casually, "No reason. Is it really so strange for me to care about my wife's interests?"
"Only when they're not pertaining to you."
"You're too harsh, Darling." He pressed his fingers tight into her side, into where he imagined the scar to be, as he took a sip of his drink. "Such cruelty is unbecoming."
..
...
..
AN-
Hello my darling Heathens!
Sorry I've been absolutely awful with updating, but I've got something in the works, and hopefully y'-"" will like it
Cheers!