Chapter 557: The Story She Could Not Ignore

Chapter 556: The Story She Could Not Ignore

The wind moved between them, cold and quiet.

Brynhild didn’t rush into it. She sat with Sam in the snow a little longer, letting the silence settle before she began.

"Caspian and Madam Tyler were the ones who told me this story—well, not just me, but me and my group of friends," she said. "They told us when we were younger, around the time when Lysander and I were having some issues in our relationship. And honestly, for two people who gossip a lot, it was quite surprising to hear this tale from them."

Sam said nothing. But she hadn’t looked away either.

Brynhild took that as enough.

"There were two men," she said. "This was a long time ago, mind you. Long before either of us were born."

"The men, they grew up together, they fought together, and even bled together. And somewhere in all of that, they fell in love." She paused. "It was obvious to everyone around them. They belonged to each other. Most people around them knew it just from their interactions."

The snow fell lightly around them.

"But the men fought it," Brynhild continued. "Both of them. They pushed each other away, and they were good at it. But one of them, he had a particular reason. He kept saying that they were of the same gender, that people would talk. That the eyes on them would never stop. That the gossip would follow them everywhere they went." She exhaled. "And he wasn’t lying, neither was he paranoid, because there was gossip. There were eyes. He wasn’t wrong about that part."

Sam shifted slightly beside her. Just barely.

"So the one who feared it most chose to get married," Brynhild said. "To a woman he didn’t love. A kind woman, from what the story goes, but he didn’t love her, and everyone with eyes could see that too. And the other man stayed single. He kept his distance and let the years pass." She was quiet for a moment. "The way they told it, they were both miserable. Just in different ways. One was miserable with company, and the other was miserable alone."

There was a gust of wind. Sam’s hair shifted across her face, and she didn’t push it away.

"Then the single one fell ill," Brynhild said. "It was quite serious, no healers could help him recover. Everything they did was like feeding into a bottomless well."

"The one who got married..." Brynhild continued, "felt it before anyone told him."

"He couldn’t breathe properly. He couldn’t think straight. Everything felt... wrong. There was this constant pain in his chest."

"But—he was a fool if you ask me—he ignored it. He told himself it wasn’t his place anymore. That he had already made his choice," she told Sam. "He kept telling himself that right up until he broke down completely."

"His wife was the one who found him," Brynhild said. "Sitting on the floor of their home. He was not crying. He just held his chest as he wheezed. And she looked at him for a long time, and then she told him to stop being a fool, to stop listening to everyone else for once in his life, and to do what his heart wants. That he should stop being a coward."

Something shifted in Sam’s face. Just slightly.

"He argued, of course," Brynhild said, and there was something faintly dry in her voice. "He said people would talk. She told him to go. He said they would be judged. She told him to go. He asked what would become of their marriage, what people would say about her, about them. And even at that, she still told him to go."

Brynhild shook her head slowly.

"He went to the healer’s house, and by the time he got there, they told him the man only had a few hours left." Her voice softened. "He was beside himself again. Standing in that doorway, completely undone. And his wife, who had followed him because she already knew him better than he knew himself, she stood behind him and once more, she told him to stop sulking and stop dragging his feet."

Sam’s hands had gone very still in her lap.

"And the man said," Brynhild continued, and now the dry note in her voice was unmistakable, "people will talk."

"Madam Tyler said his wife slapped him," Brynhild said. "Flat across the face. Right there in the healer’s doorway." She paused. "Well, I like to think that’s how she slapped him. And I also like to think it was a painful one."

Despite everything, something moved across Sam’s face. Not quite a smile. But close to one, briefly, before it faded.

"Because according to the story, that slap was what reset his brain. It was like something finally shook loose. His wife told him that he was a free man, that he should spend the rest of the hours with the one he loved, that he no longer had an obligation to her as a husband." Brynhild paused. "In simple terms, she was divorcing him." 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

"That was enough, apparently. He went inside. And he spent the last hours he had with the man he had loved his entire life." She was quiet for a moment. "And when it was over, when the man died, the only regret he carried was that he hadn’t spent more time. That he had wasted so much of it being afraid."

The silence that followed was heavy.

Brynhild reached out and took Sam’s hand in hers. Sam’s fingers were frozen, the cold having long since worked its way through. Brynhild held them anyway, warming them with both of her own.

"I’ve wanted to tell you that story for a while," she said.

Sam swallowed.

"It’s not a consolation," Brynhild told her plainly. "I’m not telling it to make you feel better. I don’t think it will make you feel better right now, and I wouldn’t insult you by pretending otherwise."