Helios stood at the window of his study, a letter crumpled in his fist. Behind him Georgios lounged against the door frame with the casual grace of a man who had never faced consequences for anything in his life. His green eyes sparkled with barely contained amusement. 

“Helios, you’re going to pop a blood vessel if you keep glaring like that,” Georgios said cheerfully. 

“It’s just a letter, cousin, from a very lonely, very persistent young lady who—” 

“Get out!” 

“—who, I might add, has been writing you for months now and you’ve ignored every single—”

“Georgios.”

“I’m just saying.” Georgios raised his hand and mocked surrender. “Lady Calista was Lucia’s friend, and it’s not unreasonable for her to want to visit the children. Pay her respects. All very proper and above board.”

Helios turned slowly. The light from the window caught the scarred side of his face, throwing half of it into shadow. His silver eye gleamed like a blade. “She was not Lucia’s friend,” he said, his voice dangerously quiet. “She was a vulture circling my wife. She watched my wife suffer through her pregnancy, just waiting for her to die so she can take her place.” 

Georgios’ smile faltered. “That’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?” Helios looked down at the letter in his hand. The handwriting was elegant, looping every stroke designed to project grace and refinement. He could practically smell the perfume she’d dabbed on the paper.

‘My dearest Duke,’ it began. 

He hadn’t read past those three words.

“She’ll expect an answer,” Georgios said, softer now. “If you reuse her outright, it will cause talk. Her family has powerful connections, Helios. You know that her family–”

“I don’t care about her family.”

“You should.”

“You know her aunt is the Empress. A direct insult—”

“Let them come.” Helios placed a letter on his desk as if it were repulsive. 

“Let them all come. I’ve buried better enemies than the House Marin.”

 Georgio’s sighed, “You can’t kill a fight as everyone’s cousin.”

“Are you sure about that?”

A long silence stretched between them. 

Finally, Georgios pushed off the doorframe and crossed to the desk. Karma picked up the discarded letter with two fingers. 

“What if she’s genuine?” he asked quietly. “What if she really does want to see the children?” 

“Bullshit. Lucia didn’t trust her. Near the last months of her pregnancy, she warned me about Calista. He turned back to the window. I should have listened. 

“You couldn’t have known—”

“I should have listened to her, I should have listened to everything Lucia told me. If I had been there when she gave birth—” The words hung in the air, heavy with old grief. 

“You couldn’t stop her death, Helios.”

“I…I know, I just…I always think about her begging me to stay and having to leave her because o the emperor’s orders.”

Georgios thought for a moment before he said: “So, what will you do?” 

Helios stared out at the grounds below. From there, he could see the pathway that led to the garden. If he looked carefully, he could almost imagine he saw movement behind the windows. Nico’s dark head, perhaps the flash of a servant’s apron. 

Enid. 

Her name rose in his mind, unbidden. A kitchen maid who has somehow become the center of his children’s world. Who looked at him with those brown eyes and saw... what? Not the serpent. Not the monster of the empire had made him. Something else. Something that made him want to be worthy of that gaze. 

“I’ll let her come,” he said finally. 

Georgios blinked. 

“You will?”

“I’ll let her come, and I’ll watch her every move. And if she so much as looks at my children wrong,” he turned, and the wintry smile on his face made even Georgios take a step back. 

“I’ll remind the Empire why I’m called the Serpent.”

Georgios smiled, swallowed. “Right. Well. I’ll draft a response then, something appropriately cordial.”

“Do what you want.”

Georgios hesitated as he reached the door. 

“Cousin?”

“What?”

“The maid. Enid.” Georgios’ voice probed with ease. “She’s done well with the children. The whole house is noticed. Perhaps... a reward of some kind? To show your appreciation?”

Helios said nothing for a long time. Then, slowly, the corners of his mouth curved. 

“Yes,” he murmured, “a reward.” 

Georgios frowned.

What kind of reward his cousin had in mind? 

The look on Helios’s face was answer enough.

“I’ll leave you to it then,” Georgios said before he fled.

Now alone in his study, Helios let the smile linger. 

A reward for Enid. 

For her diligence. 

For her care. 

For the way she brought warmth back into a house that had forgotten what warmth felt like. 

He thought of her laughing at something Niko said as she told him how much of a special boy he was. He thought of her hands, work calloused, capable, and quite gentle when cuddling Anastasia against her chest. 

Something nice for her—but as Helios thought of this, he also thought of something else. 

He thought of her on the nursery floor, curls escaping a bonnet, her backside tutted out and her back curved. 

Then his cock got hard. 

He thought of the way she trembled when he stood too close. The flush that crept up her neck when he spoke her name. 

Yes. 

He would reward her. 

His mouse had been so very, very good, and Helios was a man who paid his debts.