As he reached out to her, Evras had flinched. Her sore scalp, the bruises on her shoulder, they were all too soon for her to forget what he had done just a half an hour ago belowstairs in the foyer of their home. But in light of their recent agreement to forgive, she pushed to not react further, and took a deep breathe before offering a watery smile as he brushed his fingers back into her hair, reaching the knots of her black locks.

His apology served to further mollify the woman, whose heart had always been soft to her husband, gave in further. She let her blue-green eyes meet his, and a knot of anxiety loosened at her husband's clear gaze. Making a mental note to tell him to stay away from alcohol as much as he could, it was as if Evras could remember just why she had fell in love for the handsome, almost twelve years ago.

Evras closed her eyes when he leaned down, savoring the feel of his lips on her forehead. She had let her hand slip down, and her palm was now splayed on his chest. Allowing him to wrap his arms around her, she steped in closer, into the space that had once been easily hers, but which she had forgotten from not being there in years. It was odd, this feeling of something being foreign yet familiar, and Evras looked up at him.

"I'm sorry too." she murmured, tilting her head to look up at him. For causing him pain? For making him mistrust her? For standing by and doing nothing as he mistrusted her? Like he said, no point in dredging up the past. "For any hurt I may have caused you." Standing on her tip toes, Evras pressed a quick, chaste kiss on his lips, careful to not hurt his split lip, before words tumbled out in a choked sob past her lips. "I love you, Zanon."

One kiss did not an apology make, and neither did it wipe away years of hurt and anger. But what it did, was give one hope and a wish for the future that perhaps, for now, they were both on the same path and could work something out that could bring them back to how they used to be.

Evras couldn't say she was surprised when Zanon tilted her head back and deepened their kiss, and she willingly went with him. It was familiar, a whiff of nostalgia that made her heart swell again with longing. She had missed her husband's gentle treatment of her. The woman nipped at his lips when he caught her own, a hint of the teasing wife she had once been showing itself as well.

Lowering herself down again, a small smile curled Evras's lips upwards when he brushed her hair away, and her fingers instinctively curled around his, a trail of warmth behind where he slid his hand down her arm. Her heart raced, a flush slightly tinging her pale cheeks. The girl nodded, letting him catch her hand and following as he led them to their room - well his room, really. She had not shared it since the Taengean visitor had left.

Her gaze fell to their joined hands, and then an amused gaze flickered up to her husband, a wry brow raised. "You seem to be asking me to just sleep next to you very often, husband of mine." A lilt in her tone hinted at the light tease Evras included in her words. "If that's what you prefer, well... alright. Whatever you want then." Her blue-green eyes sparked with the unspoken laughter, as she tugged at him along the hallway. Evras paused just enough to hail a passing slave to prepare a warm bath to be sent to their chambers, before continuing on their way up.

Upon reaching, she was quick to release Zanon's hands and dart to the mirrors, intent on working out the kinks and knots in her hair. Her dark locks had always been thick and luxurious, a point of pride for Evras, and she disliked the birds nest it now resembled. Wincing as it tugged at her scalp, she turned as the door opened again and a couple of servants came in with a steaming wooden bath, which they set at the other end of the room. Filled with water and scented oils, the perfume was quick to diffuse through the room. "Get in, husband. I'll wash off the grime for you. Your clothes are ruined so we can toss that." she murmured in her usual gentle tone, turning to allow Zanon to enter the bath as she finished up the loosening of her locks.

The eldest Kotas brother, entirely ignored Athanasia's protests as he encouraged her down the halls of their manor and away from his own wing so as to give Zanon and his wife some privacy. He had no idea whether their discussions would go well, whether they would end in catastrophe or whether they would be, once again, returned to the stony silence of the in-between that they had been depressively mooching through for the last few years. But, at this point, it was up to them to decide the results of the night.

Vangelis had told Zanon their father's story - providing evidence that Zanon was not the only man to be distracted on the battlefield by the ones he loves; that there was no such curse to spell that had created the near-tragedy. He had made his own opinions on the Thanasi sisters and their rumoured roles as witches very clear and tried to knock sense into the mythos that had taken control of Zanon's mind for so long.

He understood. He knew how such a notion had entered Zanon's mind. And one only had to spend an hour in a Court that held one of the Thanasi's to understand how such a concept could become embossed and imprinted into fact.

He had said all he could to correct the lies, rumours and gossip that had tainted Zanon's feelings towards his wife but, if his brother chose not to listen - if he continued to allow rumour to over-throw his own heart - then there was nothing Vangelis was about (or inclined) to do further. This was not his marriage. It was Zanon's. And he needed to be the one to fix it.

Upon reaching Athanasia's rooms, Vangelis heard her compassion and kindness in her insistence of looking after Evras and nodded as they came to a stop. His words, however, were that of the Head of House - not of Evras' brother-in-law.

"I knew the blood was not hears, Asia, as I saw the events outside from my room. Otherwise, of course, I would have sent someone to check on her..." He paused as his eyes grew harder in the dimly lit corridor. "But Evras is a Kotas now. And to be a Kotas means to be strong and defiant in the face of adversity... We are not coddled and we do not bleed for others. We stand for strength... If Evras cannot handle this situation, she does not deserve to be one of us."

He then turned his assessment to his sister - not unkindly, but in a tone that instructed in fact over emotion. "While it is kindness that sent you to Evras, Asia, please remember that we Kotas are 'Blood Above All' and that your following of her to my rooms could be taken by Zanon as a betrayal by his sister. They were at odds and you chose a side that was not of your blood." His eyes narrowed. "While interruption was needed this night in order to protect Dion, this is their marriage and it is there's to fix. You should be careful in when and how you show your compassion, so as not to be seen as meddling."

Placing a hand on her head and ruffling her hair a little in affection; perhaps in the hopes of making his words less harsh, he then released her in order to point inside the open door of her rooms.

"Now... to bed." He told her. "I see you up and around again tonight and the marital state of our brother will be the least of your concerns..."

And with her dismissed, Vangelis headed away into the darkness of the manor, not bothering to light torches or instruct a passing slave for a candle. Instead, he knew the halls and corners like he knew his own skin and he made his way quickly down through several servants’ steps and out into the main foyer through a hidden door beneath the grand staircase.

Heading out to one side and finding his way quickly to the kitchens, Vangelis selected a cloth and a large bucket which he filled with scolding hot water from the cauldron kept above the fire pit.

As he carried the weighty barrel back up to the foyer, Vangelis had already dismissed the notion of summoning a servant for such work. The Courts talked and it wasn't just the courtier's tongue that did the wagging.

While his servants would already have heard the rumbling noises and raised voices from the foyer, they did not need additional evidence to their stories.

The foyer, at least, was quick and easy to clean. Vangelis simply picked up the blade from the floor - the one that Zanon had used to run through a slave that Vangelis knew to be innocent, and then wiped it off with the wetted cloth. Securing the blade under his belt, Vangelis then crouched to wipe away the black spattering pattern on the floor, where droplets of blood had been flung from the metal and dried hard to the marble tile.

As he wiped, the black turned damp and smeared crimson, but he had it all off quickly enough and the few drops that had been washed away hadn't even been enough to taint the water of the bucket pink.

Now, for the tricky bit... Vangelis thought as he moved back to standing, his thigh painful but ignored and took the bucket back up, allowing it to swing in line with his knee.

Outside, the courtyard was dark and dismal. It was now the deep of the morning and the sun would be rising in perhaps only three hours or so. There was no wind that night - no breeze to tug at the plants, leaves and grass and no swift changes in air flow that might have sent the yells and cries of the Kotas mansion down to the citizens below. This was good news as their matters should more or less remain private. The entire front courtyard appeared almost spooky with how still everything was in the tepid air, however, and Vangelis frowned into the inky darkness.

Settling aside the bucket and his cloth, Vangelis stepped forward to assess the damage of the dead body now lounging on the cobblestones.

The man was dead, there was no doubting it, for he had watched his brother run the man straight through. The slaves had slumped against the blade, lifeless, before he had even hit the ground.

The way he had crumpled in a single spot, however, at least stemmed the flow of his lifeblood.

There was a large puddle beneath the body, a long, flecked line of black against the floor, streaking out to the right - where Zanon had removed his blade and then pointed and swung the thing in gestures, but beyond that, there was little to even make the man's passing, besides his body itself and the black smudge across his front where Zanon had mostly cleaned off his blade.

Sighing, Vangelis was careful to inspect and check that the body was no longer leaking, before he threw its arm over his shoulder and lifted the dead weight as he rose to his feet. His leg protested and his shoulder screamed before he readjusted the cargo and then he quickly headed around the back of the Kotas manor and out across the grounds.

Towards the back of their fields lay forestry that ran the length and hugged the side of the mountains. It was within a glen of that forest that Vangelis finally set the corpse to the side and breathed a steadying moment before he turned around and walked the fifteen minutes back to the Kotas manor.

The body, he would deal with later. For now, the front of their house needed to look less like the site of an execution...

Within ten minutes, Vangelis had scrubbed away the worst of the blood and then thrown the bucket of water over the cobbles, turning the bubbling, frothing red to a pale cleaned away pink.

This would be perfectly acceptable as the Kotas manor's entry courtyard had numerous stains of the same kind that washed away with the rain and were then replaced again when the next hunting kill was brought into their home. Blood, after all was not a sign of violence, but a sign of life. A spot that had clearly witnessed the execution of a man? That was far less subtle.

Leaving the pretty pink smear over the ground and heading back towards the forest, Vangelis was careful to pick up a shovel on his way from the stables.

Now, for the real work.

The glen he had chosen for the funeral grounds of the Valaoritis slave had been carefully picked. With trees on all sides it was hidden from public view, but the space was large enough that he would be able to burn the body without setting alight to the entirety of the Kotas property.

Taking up the shovel, Vangelis began to create the second contingency that would help with that; a hole.

It took him near an hour - an embarrassing length of time if he were in his fittest state, but alas he had had to stop on numerous occasions to give his aching muscles a rest - but by the time he set assign the shovel, there was a hole in the centre of the clean, six foot long and five foot deep. That would be enough to hold back the sparking embers. He had also lined the bottom of the hole with the dried branches of the trees around the glen, intent on making sure the fire burned hot and fast.

Setting the body into place, on top of the kindling, his feet braced either side of the hole as he lowered the man down, Vangelis then removed a few obols from the pouch he always had attached to his belt, reached over to drop the man's eyelids, and then placed the coins appropriately.

Stepping back and going in search of more firewood, it was another half hour before Vangelis was able to kneel at the edge of the hole start a flame beneath the victim of his brother's rage.

Standing up and taking a step back, Vangelis waited the duration of the burning for two reasons. One, was to be assured that no evidence was left before he buried the remains within the hole he had created and two was to show at least a modicum of respect to the burning man.

He had lived as an innocent and died as a traitor. The least Vangelis could offer him was safe passage across the Styx and a mortal gaze to witness his final moments as part of the mortal realm...


By the time the slave had gone from this world and Vangelis had buried all evidence and was returning to the mansion - bucket, cloth and shovel in hand - he was dirty, sweaty and smelt like burnt wood and flesh. He was also tired as hell, in a lot of pain and thoroughly pissed off at the whole situation.

Not that he would ever show any of that on his face.

Dumping the equipment he had stolen from various places in the manor up against the stable building, Vangelis stopped for a moment to pet at Phobos. The horse seemed happy to stay far away from him, as he lent over the stable doorway, the sun's first rays warming his back.

"You're going to have to be used to this smell, Phobos." Vangelis said... The creature who get a lot of it on the battlefield. Death and flame were often synonymous with those taken by Hades.

As if the sound of Vangelis' low, gravel of a voice saying his name caught his attention, the creature finally turned towards his new owner and allowed himself to be petted across the nose and down the neck.

Vangelis waited for a while, tending to the horse and watching the sun rise, permitting his equilibrium to fall back into place.

Today was a new day.

With a final scratch to Phobos' nose, Vangelis left the stables and headed back inside his family home, intent on seeing his nephew. For he knew his mother would have obeyed his instructions and the two of them would have seen no-one else for the night.

She had looked at Zanon with a surprised gaze when he offered to help - in truth, Evras had gotten so used to hardwiring her brain in not accepting help from anyone else since Zanon had began to push her away, the nod of her head to allow him to help seemed almost forced, as if one was learning a foreign language.

But she did it anyway, staring as if her husband had grown a second head, before gingerly picking up her hair brush.

Pushing the rumpled and askewed chiton off her shoulders, and standing straight to let the silken material fall off her body, for the first time in awhile, Evras actually flushed when she stood naked whilst walking to the bath tub Zanon was now in. The other time she had stripped in front of her husband in recent months had been fuelled by more anger and dignity then appropriate embarassment, but now that they were actually beginning to mend matters, she... well, considering she had yet to bed anyone in years, it just felt entirely new all over again.

Stepping into the water with one feet and then the other, she handed her brush to her husband and presented her back to him, a small smile appearing on her face as he began combing the tangles and knots out of her locks. The steam from the hot bath and the heat began loosening all the tense muscles which had coiled from the adrenaline of the evening. Evras slowly used her palms to cup the water, pouring it over her shoulders. The calm silence between them had been rare, but it was funny how even in silence, Evras found the peace and mutual understanding they now had do its work in making her battered heart heal less, and enjoyed the solitude with only the slight sounds of water interjecting the night's peace.

She was halfway through washing her face when she suddenly felt a pair of warm lips pressed tenderly on her neck. The heat and feeling of it brought shivers down her spine. The way his forehead was against her shoulder brought Zanon infinitely closer to her, and despite the heat of teh water, Evras could almost feel her husband's whole length behind her back.

The woman instinctively turned to where his head was, and pressed a kiss into his scalp, leaning backwards so her back was now pressed against his chest. Reaching behind, she pulled at his hand gently, bringing them to wrap around her waist. Her lips slipped lower to kiss the lobe of his ear, before Evras leaned back, a small smile on her lips, something she had not worn in front of Zanon for a long time - at least, not a genuine one. "How are you?" she murmured. It may be an odd question, but in truth Evras has not known how her husband fared other then hearsay from other people in a long time. Ironic, since they were supposed to be married, but that's what estrangement in marriage did to people.

It has been so long since Evras had last felt Zanon wrapped around her that she had almost forgotten just how warm and at peace she would always feel with him surrounding her and taking over every one of her senses. Tilting her head so he could tuck himself nicely in the crook of her neck, chin on her collarbone, lay her own arms over his crossed ones under her breasts, tracing mindless patterns on his arm in the water.

His soft tone that replied her question made her chest ache. Zanon had always been a confident man in her eyes, so sure of himself and never flinching away from danger or troubles. To hear him so quiet in the dark of the night, made her wonder just how much had went on his mind to act the way he had been over the past few years.

Leaning her head on his which rested on her shoulder, she squirmed, a light laugh escaping her when he ran his fingers on her stomach. The woman was slightly ticklish, and caught his fingers to still their movement. Her other hand lay on his bare thigh next to her legs, more mindless patterns being drawn as the hand which had caught his now laced their fingers together.

His admission made her turn forlorn eyes to his direction, guilt suffusing her chest. Evras knew she shouldn't have done it - she had had ample time to push Silanos away. But she had been caught off guard all night, added on to the hurt that had simply been intensifying over her husband's ignorance of her over the past few years, had made her act in a very insensible manner. A manner in which Evras now thoroughly regretted.

Picking up her hand, she used it to tilt Zanon's head up so she looked at him in the eye, leaning her forehead on his. "No more, Zanon. I'll always be by your side. If you want me there." with a breathy whisper, his lips only a hairsbreadth apart from hers. The last part was an added thought. Because Evras had always promised to stand by him, as long as he did not push her away. She did not think she would survive a second instance of her husband's denial of her again.

A peal of laughter escaped when he continued his efforts to find all her ticklish spots, and Evras further squirmed and shifted in his lap as she struggled and failed to catch his hands. The water sloshed over the edges of the tub, but despite how breathless she made him in trying to keep his hands away from her ticklish areas, it was an old game that made Evras's heart ache even more for him, pine for all the year's they've lost.

When he finally stopped, she cautiously looked at him, the laughter that she had had making her clear gaze look even brighter now as she settled back into Zanon's embrace, the silence bringing back the solemnity that was between then instead of the lighthearted cheer from Zanon's teasing. Now that he was back by her side, Evras was reminded again of how acutely lonely it had been without him.... and reminded of how much she had missed the smile he had been wearing as he made her laugh just minutes earlier. She had spent years thinking that he found company in the arms of others, that she was the only one who suffered at being alone. Now, for the first time Evras thought that perhaps he too, was just as lonely as she had been.

His words echoing hers had the dark haired maiden's eyes glimmering again, but this time she managed to hold the tears at bay. Instead, she gave him a smile that spoke of her longing for him, allowing him to gently hold her chin, his touch now so different from the rough way he had manhandled her earlier in the evening. Evras allowed his touch now to wash the earlier ones away. Instead, she focused on remembering the many, soft ways he had treated her, brought her to experience a new way of joy that only he could bring her each time... all of which she had almost forgotten.

His lips on hers was gentle, soft, and as if drawn by a magnetic pull she could never explain when it came to Zanon, she went with him, allowing his hands to trail across her thighs as she returned his kiss. Eager to acquaint every part of her body with his again, as they broke apart for him to speak, Evras smiled, and nodded. Deciding to eschew words, instead the woman merely pressed nearer to him, letting both her legs slide to either side of his waist, so she could draw nearer to him. Her arms did the same around his neck, as she pressed her lips to his again, eagerly searching for his warmth, his kiss, every part of him that Evras has so desperately missed.