A/N: My thanks to floraposte (fromlaughter) for thoughtfully beta-ing this piece.

Ease is my plague; ease makes thee void.

He had asked but they hadn't heard. He already knew his name, that he was from Manchester, that his father had died the year he left for college. They said his mother was in France doing charity work and hard to track. It didn't mean anything to him; Mother was always helping out with hospitals, ever since he could remember. "Medicine's in my blood, Matthew," she had said, when talking about her father and her brother, "My calling is to help the sick and the needy." She had met his father while working as a nurse.

It was Lord Grantham who had furnished the details: that he was a Captain in the North Riding regiment, had been posted in France, had been wounded during the battle of the Somme. He had flung the sheets and looked, the pins cutting him as he pulled, the fresh-red of delirium marking the spool of gauze.

"I need to know!" He had shouted, when Lord Grantham had stopped him and rung for the male nurses to tie him down. But it was futile. It was too late and his throat was dry. Lord Grantham had waited until he had calmed, when he had finally allowed the covers to rest. He had sat, watching him with the same sad, tired eyes as Mary. When Lord Grantham said he was the heir, that all of Downton would be his, he wanted to laugh. Downton belonging to a madman, a cripple! Little did he know. But he only winced, a stab coursing through him down to his legs that still felt like molten lead, the price of spoils.

"Just get well, Matthew. Don't let this trouble you."

By the time Lord Grantham left, it was already dusk outside. A nurse was nowhere in sight and the walls began to darken, the shadows pressing on him, the forms hewed in smoke, the voices mired. It wasn't that he didn't know how he could be the heir or assume responsibilities. As the minutes elapsed, as the room spun with the unseen, he wondered whether he could ever go back. Dr. Clarkson had assured him he would recover, he could leave. He thought of the sound of the church bells as he rode home after work, knowing it was time, the scones still warm in his father's library, where his sure-past was framed, the glass reflecting his idealism as his mother agreed he could change lives. In his dream he saw her there, air-blue gown out of place, though he missed her in the morning.

So when she told him he would have a visitor, he had expected to hear yet another summons, his fate smothered in old scrolls. He hadn't immediately asked who it was.

"Now?"

"No, tomorrow."

He had been the one to start it, even though he knew there was no stopping the inevitable. She had been sitting, as she normally did, on the chair on his right. He waited for her to pick up the book she was reading but she didn't. Instead, she adjusted her skirt, sweeping it slowly to free it of the crumbs of the cake she had been eating—the one she had brought and shared with him, although most of it lay half-eaten on the table next to her, like his. Outside, the light dimmed as the clouds barred. The clock chimed, past noon. Her face was still bent slightly, but he caught the faint throb of her eyebrows, the echoes of her lips.

"Who is it?"

When she mentioned he was engaged to a woman, he had felt the room suddenly grow large, the air between them heavy, the thrum of the fan overhead drowning out her voice. What he had carefully constructed only the other night, his start, mocked him, his carelessness a farce even in dreams. He felt parched, his body hollow with anger. Why the hesitation? Why this restraint? Why not tell him early on? Why had they led him, especially her? A wave of revulsion passed over him when he remembered collapsing in her arms, trusting her in strange ways, anchored by the strength in her eyes. He saw now that she had been contrary, acting one way when she meant the reverse. He seethed, his flaw robbing him of truth as the Crawleys hid in their legacy of secrets. But even they were no match for Lavinia Swire, his fiancée who had insisted on her place.

He had sent her way.

—

In the light, her red hair scorched. It reminded him of something underground, like midnight's call, a fevered curse. He craned his neck to get a better view, though her reflection obliterated him. From the corner of his eyes, he observed the soft curves of her face. Her clouded green eyes looked a little swollen, and her hand shook when she slipped it into his, her fingers threading his own, her touch stamping him with claims to make up for her delay. Was she afraid?

"I am here, Matthew. And I won't leave you."

Her voice was husky, edged with anguish, her throat exhausted. When she bent over to him and laid her face on his shoulder, he smelled her London cologne, the notes conspicuous like hothouse flowers. It seeped into his clothes, his hair the only armor against the raid. He felt his skin growing cold, the ethers rising, the fury of the fan overhead as it thrashed against the unjust heat of the summer. Then he shifted, the motion displacing his legs so the fracture pulled him back with the pain still-raw amidst the imposing air, its reverberations a distraction. Or was it a clue? The dark-blank was yet unforgiving and the moments remained stolen, but the agony was unmasked.

It must have roused her, for she stepped back, whispering "I am sorry, I am sorry." She pulled a white, gold-lined handkerchief—where had he seen it?— from the black purse that slung over the edge of the chair, and wiped her eyes. That was when he had seen the narrow band on her finger, its cut sharp, its glow a reminder. He had felt the fire from that distance, though he saw the embers buoyed in smoke.

He searched her, half afraid, half hope. She hadn't stopped crying, and her tears had dotted her open rust cotton coat. Inside, he glimpsed a pale pink dress, a slender ribbon tying the cascades of the flowing collar. Tendrils of her red hair, which had been set in swirls when she had arrived, had come loose and framed her temple, concealing the lines he had caught earlier. Her green eyes were larger and her lips were pale on her flushed face. Her freckles were buried but he knew he couldn't remember the pattern, only that it was incomplete. And there was that same note of sadness he couldn't explain, this time accusing, as if it was his fault.

"I would have come earlier but Papa was ill and Lord Grantham said I had better remain with him, that he'd look after you here. Papa is better now and I came as soon as I could. I am here for you. And I won't let you go."

The daylight was persistent, wearing his gratitude. As the sun retaliated against the showers the previous night, he didn't feel indebted, only annoyed at its wake. The workers having escaped for meals, it was unusually quiet outside. But he heard the nurses wheeling food trays, the starved slurps of Tuesday's beef barley soup. It wafted past his screens, collecting in his corner like parachutes. He felt it closing in, his body mined. He gasped, wheezing as his throat was stuffed, the wrongs robbing him of speech, his veins meting in return.

Lavinia panicked, asked him if she should call a nurse, but he only shook his head, pointing to the window. As soon as she opened it, the air had rushed in like an avalanche, melted on his skin, filling the gaps as it freed. He closed his eyes, breathed in. It was on his tongue, he could taste it, air-blue, like her touch.

When he had opened his eyes, it had vanished. The room dimmed and the curtains beat as the wind cooled. He pulled the sheets closer, the spectres hidden, their footprints trailing doubts, her absence palpable. But he must know.

"Tell me."

—

When he saw her entering through the darkened doorway, a figure in white, he at first looked away. There had been letters and dates, promises and goodbyes. Before she left, Lavinia had told him his story and he had watched it unfold in three acts, the curtains closing as she paved his future, his fate steered by her duty, his joy heightened by her sacrifice. Now was not the time for dreams.

And yet, he felt the stillness pervading the length of the room, the hospital sounds muted once again in another's presence. He heard the clicking of her heels, the sway of her gown, the count of her pulse, as if they beat to an olden tune. And then the walls hung with scenes, the stories dusted with print. He was waiting.

It struck him, when he saw that she only looked smaller and younger, and caught the slip in her step, how much he already knew, how much he still needed to know.

"I hope I didn't wake you, Cousin Matthew", Sybil said as she neared, her off-duty white-grey dress muting the anticipation, her dark features shadows of her sister's. She had brought with her a book that Mary had asked her to bring to him. He quickened.

As if reading his mind, Sybil mentioned Mary was in London, "taking care of some things." He wasn't sure what prompted him to ask then and there, or why he hadn't asked before.

"Were your sister and I close?"

Sybil hesitated. He noticed the marks of perspiration on her young face, her eyes darkening like Mary's.

"You were once lovers."

It should have shaken him. It should have brought him crashing, but it did not. It only left him stoned in time, storied in make-believe. The past was painted, but the pattern eluded him. He saw her on the rails, the stairs swirling around her, the centuries weighing her down as the skies opened, gravity hung aloft, the law stayed unbent among a new order of things.

Sybil wouldn't say anything more and he couldn't bring himself to ask. He opened the book of Hardy's poems, thumbing the pages, searching for her voice.

A/N: Thanks for reading. I'd love to hear what you think about the turn of events.