AN: Hope y'all have a lovely Easter :)

CLOSE QUARTERS

Aro pushed open the door to his chambers and slunk inside. "Good morning, my queen," he said quietly.

Everything hurt. His head had developed a thumping ache from the dungeon blood and every solitary step was pure pain thanks to Atia's handiwork.

"Good morning? Where the hell have you been?" Sulpicia called back shrilly, stopping suddenly when she saw the state of her mate. "Aro, what's happened to you?" she asked, voice full of concern.

Don't pity me, Sully, I don't deserve your pity, he said to himself. "Nothing, I'm fine," he lied.

"You're limping," she pointed out, as though he didn't know. "And, you're filthy!"

Aro looked down at his clothes. He looked like he'd been rolling around the dungeon half the night ... because he had!

"Are the children still asleep?" he asked before moving any further into the room. If they were already up he wanted to send them back to their room so they wouldn't see the state he was in.

"I believe so," Sulpicia replied, closing the door for him.

Aro limply made his way to their bed chamber and collapsed face first onto the bed. "I went to see Caius. Atia found me ... we got into an argument and she, well ... she ... "

He didn't know what to say. He felt embarrassed and he really wanted to apologise to Carlisle for making him relive his shame the day before.

"I won't be arguing with her again," he said, laughing humourlessly to his own cowardice.

Sulpicia helped Aro out of his clothes, stopping when she saw the bruising to his ass, which seemed to be pulling all the venom from his legs and his back to heal his battered skin.

"Oh my god, Aro!" she exclaimed, covering him over with a sheet. "Who the hell does she think she is?"

"My mother, Sully," Aro said flatly, ending Sulpicia's ideas for retribution before they could begin. "And we both know, this has been a long time coming."

Sulpicia threw a blanket over her mate and lay out next to him. "Are you saying that you deserved it?" she asked in surprise … that was almost as much of a shock as the state of Aro's behind.

Aro looked into Sulpicia's eyes and his heart ached. I love you so much, what was I thinking?

"Definitely," he confirmed.

"Does Basileus know about this?" she asked, still full of concern for her mate without even thinking to question his crimes.

"He will soon, I expect," Aro said with a shiver that traversed the entire length of his body. "Sully, I am sorry about all of this with Demetri ... we need to come up with a plan for how we are going to deal with him if he falls for someone else. If any of our children do, for that matter."

"We?" Sulpicia asked, eying her mate for his response.

"You and me," he said. Obviously.

"And your parents?" she asked, not ready to give-up her authority over her children as easily as Aro might be.

"If we are better prepared, they will have no reason to intervene," Aro answered ... without really answering. "But Sully, we both know that Basileus only acts out of love for us, all of us," he pushed gently.

Sulpicia stroked his face. "I know that, my love."

"Then we could cut him some slack? Perhaps?" he asked, knowing he would very soon be asking for Basileus to cut him a lot of slack.

"I'm not apologising to him, or Atia, Aro."

Sulpicia tried to leave their bed but Aro pulled her back, hissing with the pain it created. "I don't expect you to. Let's just forget about it. What's done is done. We need to get through the next few months and then work out a way to never be in this situation again."

"How do you mean?" Sulpicia asked.

"It's just something Atia said."

That was the last thing she wanted to hear. "What unsolicited opinion did she have to offer this time?" she asked spitefully.

Aro pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. "I solicited it, kind of. An objective view," he said softly. "She pointed out that we have been turning a blind eye to Demetri, and Felix too, having sex with whomever they like but we made no plans on what to do if they actually mated with someone."

He felt his mate soften in his arms. "Okay, she has a point," she admitted. "So we need a plan."

Aro nodded into her hair as he kissed the back of her head. He didn't want to ever let her go again. "I don't know what that plan should be, and frankly we have too much going on at the moment to come up with one."

Aro sounded so tired and Sulpicia felt for her poor mate.

"It can wait, my love." she told him. "It's waited this long, after all." They fell into quiet conversation for a while before Sulpicia finally asked, "so, Atia ... "

Aro pulled her in closer.

"Worse than your father?"

Aro snorted. Worse? I don't know about that. But I am not going there again! "Different. I'll give her that," he admitted.

"I think I will stop winding her up." Sulpicia turned in his arms to face him.

Aro still looked stricken. "Basileus is going to ..."

"ARO!" Basileus bellowed from their living chamber and by the sounds of it the door would be lucky to have its hinges still intact with the thud of it rebounding off the wall.

"Oh shit!" Aro squeaked.

Sulpicia was so startled by his fear that she felt compelled to help him. "Stay here, I'll send him in," she said resolutely.

Aro wondered if his father would tell her what he had done. "Sully ... " he called before she reached the door.

Turning to look at him only solidified her resolve. "Trust me, my love," she said sweetly before leaving and closing the door.

Basileus was disappointed that Aro had sent his mate out to see him. Weak, he thought of his boy.

"Ah, Sulpicia, I just need a word with my son."

"May I speak with you first?" she asked, blocking her bed chamber door.

"Of course, my lady." Basileus ran through his daughter-in-law's thoughts before she could voice them.

"I shouldn't have spoken to you the way I did, I apologise, unreservedly."

"Oh!" Basileus exclaimed. That's not true, though, is it my dear one, he thought. You are trying to soften me up for Aro. He doesn't deserve your love.

"Mothers protect their children, whether they need it or deserve it, it's what we do," she pushed, taking his free hand in her own.

His other held a black cane ... not that Sulpicia recognised any relevance to him carrying it.

Basileus softened his stance. "It certainly is," he said, thinking on Atia's protective position of their son. "It's a wonderful quality and I know I made it sound lesser when we spoke yesterday."

"I know you only have our best interests at heart, Basileus, and I shouldn't have thrown what happened with Carlisle in your face." Sulpicia was working her way around the creator in such a way, that even though he had read her mind and knew to expect it, it still worked.

"You spoke the truth. I have reconciled with Carlisle because you were right, I was hurting him for my own mistake."

Sulpicia was glad to hear that, but she pushed on anyway. "I would never want to hurt you and I am sorry if I did."

As she looked up to him with those big eyes and soft curls dancing around her face, he broke. "My sweet, Sulpicia, nor I, you," he told her, wrapping her into his arms.

Knowing she had done all she could for Aro, she stepped back. "Aro is in our bed chamber, my lord. I am going to make peace with Atia."

"Thank you," he called after her before she shut the door to the stairs.

He waited for the door to close before he went in to Aro. When he opened the door, Aro jumped out of his skin.

"Dad, I ... "

"Shut up!" Basileus ground out hatefully. "Do you realise what your mate has just done on your behalf?" he questioned, closing the door behind him. "She has apologised to me, and will be to Atia, too, just to soften me up so I am not so harsh with you." Aro closed his eyes. I can't believe you did that, Sully, he thought, knowing how resolute she had been about apologising to his parents.

"I could read it in her thoughts," Basileus confirmed. "There has never been a woman more loyal to walk this earth and you chose to demonstrate your loyalty to her by fucking, fucking Heidi!"

Aro's head shot up - the last thing he wanted now was for his children to hear.

"Keep it down, will you!" he dared to say.

That's when he spotted it, Basileus brandishing the same cane Atia had used on him in the early hours of that morning. His stomach flipped over and he felt the tar-like dungeon blood come up into his mouth. He swallowed it back down bitterly.

"So you do feel some shame then?" Basileus asked, stalking around his son's bedroom like a predator taunting its prey.

"Shame, guilt, stress ... pain." Aro admitted.

Basileus stopped. "Pain! Ha!"

"Show me," Basileus ordered.

"You must be kidding?" Aro scoffed as he attempted to get up from the very vulnerable position in which he lay. Basileus shoved him back down to lie on the bed.

"Do I look like the damn jester?" he ground out through gritted teeth.

Basileus ripped the blanket away, it was all Aro wore.

"Hmm."

He appraised the damage Atia had done and to be fair to his mate, he thought she'd done a damn good job.

"Still, it's nothing compared with what I promised you if I caught you on that dirty dungeon blood again, is it?"

Basileus threw the blanket back to Aro and he quickly wrapped it around his waist before standing in front of his formidable father.

"No, my lord," he said quietly.

"We are disgusted in you, absolutely disgusted!" Basileus bellowed his boy out only inches from his face.

Aro was genuinely scared, which didn't happen often. Even when he was facing his father he could usually hold it together, bar the odd bit of begging for a reprieve. Right now he wanted to cry! He put the emotional reaction down to the blood rather than the crushing guilt in his heart.

Basileus scrubbed a hand through his hair wondering just what the hell he should do with the supposed coven king.

"What were you thinking?" he asked, expecting a response.

Aro's breath caught in his throat. "Caius suggested it ... " he tried.

Bad move.

CRACK

Basileus cut him off by wrapping the cane across his son's thigh with so much force that Aro was sure he had broken his bone, let alone his skin.

"LIAR!"

Aro flopped down onto the bed holding his leg as though it would help.

"I know the blood was your suggestion," Basileus said venomously. "And Caius never would have fetched Heidi had you not already agreed."

Aro was shaking on his bed, leaning away from Basileus as best he could. It was no good. Basileus kneeled on the bed next to Aro and wrapped his hand around his throat.

"She's a siren I am powerless ... " Basileus repeated Aro's own words back to him.

Aro felt awful.

"SCUM!" Basileus spat.

Aro couldn't disagree. He couldn't breathe for a start, but he agreed with the sentiment anyway.

"I have been to Caius already, so I know it all," Basileus confirmed.

Aro had worked that out already.

Releasing his hold on Aro, Basileus sat next to him instead. Aro daren't try to move away no matter how desperately he wanted to create some space between them.

"Why do you have that?" Aro asked, rubbing his sore thigh and gesturing to the cane in his father's grasp.

"Caius has gifted it to me, at my request," Basileus told him as he pulled Aro's hand away from the blackening stripe of fire on his leg.

Aro knew what was coming. "My lord, please, it was a mistake ... " he tried, knowing it was futile.

"One you have made before, repeatedly!"

CRACK

Aro bit into his free hand, drawing blood from his knuckles in an effort to distract himself. Not that it worked.

"Do you need more?" Basileus asked, holding the cane up high above his head.

Aro felt like a child as he begged for all he was worth. He couldn't even protect himself, as Basileus kept a firm grip on his wrist giving himself an easy target.

"Atia has requested that I leave you able to walk, at least."

"Will you?" Aro asked. As things stood, he genuinely thought he wouldn't make it out with the ability.

When Basileus simply smiled, Aro felt the blood rising in his throat again. The whole lot of dungeon blood he'd drank so happily came up and over the bed.

Basileus moved from the bed in disgust. "How many shots of that shit did you have?" There looks enough to be a full feed, he thought.

"I'm not sure," Aro lied.

Basileus easily picked through his son's memories and counted eight before he had to remove himself from his son's head - seeing what Aro, Caius and Heidi had been getting up to was a sight no father should see.

"I'll make it eight ... at least," he told Aro, who was scooping the bloodied sheets from the bed.

His heart sank. Six more! he thought, knowing how Basileus worked.

Aro dumped the ruined cloth on the floor before turning to face his father. If he hadn't been limping before he certainly was now.

"Not with that," he pleaded, looking at the cane.

"With whatever I like," Basileus told him flatly.

"But Atia said ... " Aro said quietly as he limped backwards, using the bedpost to steady himself.

He can hardly walk now, Basileus realised, and thought on his promise to his mate. Fine. He removed the rings from his right hand, never once breaking eye contact with his son.

Aro gulped. He knew what was coming.

Basileus whipped the back of his hand across Aro's face with such force that he felt his boy's eye socket crack.

Aro gasped in pain, but he took it. He could feel the trickle of blood running down his cheek, but the wound soon healed to leave only a red stain to show it ever existed.

"See. I am loyal to my mate, son," Basileus told him as he stalked towards the door. "Between Atia's request and Sulpicia's efforts ... you really have no idea how lucky you are to have those women in your life," Basileus ground out before opening the door and checking for the young ones.

Happy they weren't in hearing distance he turned back to Aro. "You don't want me interfering and for Sulpicia's sake I will pull back where the children are concerned, but I will be watching YOU very closely. Understood?"

Aro nodded. "Yes, my lord."

Though he was in considerable pain, he knew his father had been lenient.

Basileus swung the cane around and tested it out to walk with. "I think I will be keeping hold of this." With that he left and Aro collapsed, once again, into a heap on his bed.

His peace was soon disturbed with Felix barrelling into his room to complain about Demetri.

"Can you do something about Romeo?! He's doing my head in!"

Felix stopped in his tracks seeing Aro's bruised and battered body. "Did mom do that?" he asked, slightly amused.

"No, of course not," Aro scoffed as he pulled his blanket to cover more of his body, or at least his modesty.

Demetri was hot on his brother's tail. "Where is she? What have you done to her?" he demanded.

"Excuse me?" Aro asked with a raised eyebrow, getting to his feet.

"What have you done to our mother?" Demetri ordered when he saw the bloodied sheets on the floor.

"Who the hell do you think you are talking to?" Aro asked threateningly.

He didn't look too threatening right now, barely able to stand and wincing as he tried. His face was swollen from Basileus' back-hander and Demetri must have realised Aro was in no fit state to chase him down.

"You!" he replied with a cocky grin.

Aro stood to his full height and hid his pain. "Demetri, I ... "

"Are we really arguing already?" Sulpicia's voice floated through from the living chamber.

"I thought he hurt you," Demetri said, sounding relieved to see she was still alive. Both Felix and Aro rolled their eyes to his dramatic display.

"Now that you can see I am perfectly fine, you can apologise," his mother commanded him easily.

"Sorry," Demetri said quietly, with little conviction.

"Hmm, saved by the skin of your teeth there, boy," Aro told him, jabbing a finger in his direction. He really did look a sorry state.

Sulpicia shooed her boys from her bedroom so she could check on Aro.

"How did it go?" he asked, before she could question his mounting number of injuries.

"With Atia? Perfectly fine. She understands why I was upset and appreciates it's something we all need to work through."

Aro breathed a sigh of relief. So, Atia hasn't grassed me up, thank the heavens.

"Are you okay?" she asked her mate sadly, wiping the crusting blood from his cheek.

Aro winced and pulled her hand away. "Better than I deserve to be, I can assure you."

Before Sulpicia could ask him any uncomfortable questions, like how he had managed to piss off both of his parents during the middle of the night, and to such an extreme extent, he decided to deflect. It's what I do best, apparently, he thought, reminding himself what Atia had told him.

"Felix, get dressed. I will take you down to Eleazar's," he called through to his boys, who were still bickering over which one of them was being a jerk.

Sulpicia pulled some clothes out for Aro to dress. He had no intentions of going any further than the tower today so she only fetched him his very lightest of clothing.

"I think I can find my way down one whole flight of stairs, Dad," Felix replied happily, still sat on his ass.

Aro made short work of dressing. It was going to hurt however long the task took, so going at vampire speed and taking a moment to catch his breath afterwards seemed to be the best option he had.

"I'm sure you can, but you are not allowed to try it unattended." Aro wanted to give absolutely no opportunity to test out that cane again for a good long while. "Now!" he added as he limped through to the living room where Felix still sat.

Felix splayed out on the sofa dramatically. "I've only just got up. I don't want to start yet," he whined.

"Felix, this isn't optional. If you want to be able to attend the ball in March you need to have finished all of Marcus' books before then and Carlisle is already writing around the clock - you are getting off lightly!" Aro called back, having no interest in listening to Felix's 'woe is me' bullshit – he was busy with his own!

"Lightly!" Felix scoffed. "Carlisle is enjoying it, it's not fair."

"Not this again." Aro ran a hand through his hair and gestured for Felix to stand.

"Well it isn't!" he said, this time directing his hopes towards his mother.

"Felix, I suggest you get on with the task at hand," she told him firmly.

"Before you end up with my hand across your ass!" Aro added.

Felix looked between his parents with an incredulous expression, thoroughly pissed off that neither one would help end his torture.

"For fuck sake!" he boomed before turning to leave. He didn't get past Aro without a sharp slap to his backside.

"OW!"

…

"Demetri, will you please settle down," Aro begged. He didn't have the strength to clobber the little brat but he was tempted to throw him out the window if he didn't stop flitting about the room, annoying everyone.

"I have too much energy, I can't sit still." Demetri replied, flashing from one side of the room to the other. He was driving Aro crazy and he was loving it.

"Force yourself," Aro ground out.

He stood over the table going through Sulpicia and Carmen's administration. Sulpicia was already annoyed with him for asking to see their work - it didn't need to be checked as far as she was concerned but Aro had to oversee everything, it was his way.

"Can I go out?" Demetri asked, flashing to his father's side.

"Is it March?" Aro asked without looking up from his work.

"No."

"Then no."

Demetri huffed. "Not even to the guard hall?" he asked, reaching out to take Aro's paperwork.

Aro slapped his hand away, hard. "No."

Demetri backed up, deciding to go for Alec instead. "What are you reading?" he asked, flashing to his little brother and snatching his book from his hands.

"Give me that back!" Alec whined as Demetri held it out of his reach.

Sulpicia admonished Alec, rather than Demetri. Alec felt incensed at the injustice. "But he's winding me up!" he complained.

"He's winding everyone up!" Aro added.

"Aro ... " Sulpicia turned on her mate.

Aro held up his hands defensively, he couldn't take an argument today. "I know, it's not his fault. However, I am running out of tether, and when I reach the end I will be beating him with it."

Sulpicia caught his smile and appreciated that he was at least trying not to murder their son for his agitated state.

"Perhaps you should go to your room for a while, Demetri," she suggested gently.

Demetri ran to his mother's side and dropped to his knees dramatically. "No, no, no, I can't be in there on my own, mom! Please don't send me away, please. I love you so much, I can't be on my own."

"Sulpicia, he is playing you," Aro sang out. He knew what his boy was doing. Anything to get a rise out of me, eh? No such luck today, kid.

Sulpicia hugged Demetri. "Aro, let us not argue about this again," she willed as she took Demetri out onto the terrace.

Aro offered a tight smile to the twins before returning to his paperwork.

Eleazar strolled into the living chamber, unannounced, with a sullen looking Felix coming behind him.

"Why are you back already?" Aro asked. Felix had only been gone two hours.

Though it was clear Eleazar had noticed the beat-up state Aro was in, he didn't raise it, for which Aro was grateful.

"He needs a break," Eleazar answered for the pair of them.

"Ha!" Aro scoffed. "He won't get one in here."

"Demetri?" Eleazar guessed, with Aro confirming through his nod.

"You have only been writing for a couple of hours," Aro said, turning to his eldest son.

Eleazar clapped the boy's shoulder before doing his best impression of his nephew. "No one understands, my life is so unfair, rah, rah, rah."

Aro and the twins all began laughing at Eleazar's impression, he was bang on.

"I just don't know how the poor prince puts up with it all," Aro responded, winding up his boy.

When he took a look at Felix, however, his amusement turned to concern. "Hey, what's wrong with you?" he asked, seeing Felix looking murderous.

"Where's Demetri?" Felix ground out in reply.

Demetri clearly heard the call, though he mustn't have sensed the danger in Felix's tone because he foolishly came running with his doting mother trailing behind.

"You called, brother?" the younger boy sang out happily.

BANG!

One punch and Felix put Demetri flat on the floor.

"Felix, what the hell?!" Aro bellowed out in shock as he flashed to his side.

Sulpicia went straight to the floor to drag Demetri back. It took the combined efforts of Eleazar and Aro to stop Felix.

"What was that for?" Demetri asked, holding his bleeding nose.

"Grass!" Felix spat, ducking around Aro so he could continue to glare at his brother.

Demetri was giving some mouth back, but sensibly he stayed on the floor with Sulpicia.

"The second you let me go I'm taking him down!" Felix ground out, looking Aro dead in the eyes. Well, one eye ... the other was swollen half shut.

"I'm not scared of him! He couldn't take me down!" Demetri called out from the floor.

Aro laughed as he struggled to hold onto Felix. "Demetri, he just put you on your ass and he could take down any of us, with the possible exception of Jane."

Eleazar nodded along as he held onto his nephew's arms behind his back.

"You grassed on me! I would never do that to you!" Felix roared.

"I only did it because I was worried about you - and I was right to be worried," Demetri replied.

Aro looked around the room. Although Felix and Demetri appeared to know what this was all about, no one else did. Aro grabbed hold of Felix's face and forced his boy to look at him and not his brother.

"I will ask you again, what the hell is going on?"

"He grassed on me and Carlisle leaving the castle!" Felix spat, furious.

Hearing that, so was Aro. "When did you leave the castle? You have been on restriction ... "

"Last year, when Atia followed us," Felix answered before Aro could finish.

Sensing that Felix wasn't going to try and attack again, at least not now Demetri was pinned to the wall behind their mother, Aro lightened his hold.

"And you are bringing that up now?" he asked.

"Carlisle has only just told me," Felix replied.

Suddenly it made sense to Aro. Carlisle, you brat, he thought. His little brother said he was going to get Felix back for holding him down on Aro's orders. There's no way you slipped Felix that little piece of information for nothing, brother. You did it to send him into an angry ball of stupid so he would attack Demetri and I would have to belt Felix. Not gonna happen, he thought.

"This is ridiculous," Sulpicia called out, dragging Aro from his thoughts.

"You know what's ridiculous, mom?" Felix asked, "Demetri is lying to you about being unable to control himself. He knows you are worried about him and he's using it to play you off against each other."

"He's lying!" Demetri replied - the boy was a terrible liar and it was plain as day that Felix was being truthful.

"Excuse me?" Sulpicia asked, spinning to see Demetri.

"He told me so last night," Felix confirmed.

"Felix, if you are lying to me ... " Sulpicia began, only to be cut off by Jane.

"Felix isn't lying, I heard Demetri, too," she said plainly, without looking up from her book.

"You witch!" Demetri bawled from behind Sulpicia. She wasn't taking anymore from her deceitful boy - she slapped him so hard and so fast that Demetri heard it before he felt it!

"You are driving everyone crazy, it isn't funny anymore!" Jane said, hearing him curse at her some more.

"It isn't funny anymore? So, it WAS funny?" Aro questioned his girl, wondering why she hadn't backed him up - she usually would have.

Sulpicia joined in with her husband's questioning. "You both knew and you didn't say anything?"

Alec shrugged. "It was kind of funny," he said with a smirk.

He had enjoyed the odd tensions in their home, it was a break from the norm, but he didn't fancy serving out the rest of Demetri's restriction under the same stress.

"You didn't believe Aro, why would you have believed us?" Jane added, thinking her reasoning for keeping schtum was obvious and understandable, which it was really.

"She has a point, my queen," Aro pointed out. I must have a death wish, he cursed seeing Sully turn her angry eyes on him before leaving their chambers entirely and heading out of the south tower to get a break from her family.

When Aro turned back to his big brother, he realised Eleazar was still wearing the same shocked, and stressed expression as he had when they first tackled Felix. Aro laughed.

"Get married, Aro! Have kids, Aro! It's great," he said, mocking their fathers voice. "I will never trust that bastard again!"

Eleazar's face cracked and he broke into chuckles at his little brother's predicament.