Ready To Take A Chance Again

Title: Ready to Take A Chance Again 1/?
Fandom: Original
Pairing: N/A right now
Rating: PG-13 will be R in later chapters.
Disclaimers: This is a work of fiction. All characters situations and events unless otherwise noted are fictional. Any bearings on people and situations that are real are completely coincidental. All characters are the sole property of the author. (sounds nice to say that.)
Warnings: This work will contain references to certain situations and lifestyles that many would find objectionable. This story will also contain \'slash\', that is a relationship between two men. If you find this type of thing to be morally wrong or not your cup of tea, I would advise you to hit your back button right now and not to read any further.
The author will not be held responsible for anytype of distress your reading this work may cause, since you have been warned sufficiently to proceed at your own discretion.

A/N: This is a time-piece in that it takes place in Regency London quite a few years before the Victorian Era. The author will take liberties with certain aspects of the treatment of homosexuals by the upper crust of London during the time, but will try to stay as close as possible to actual truthful bearing. Remember this is Regency London, not Victorian and BEFORE Oscar Wilde.

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Somewhere in Devon, England.
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His wife was a bitch.

He didn\'t care what anyone would think of his less than charitable thoughboutbout the woman he pledged his life to and the mother of his child, about to become the mother of his children.

But the truth was, she was a bitch, spawned from the deepest abyss of Hell, forsaken by Satan himself. And that was saying something.

Sometimes he wondered if it would have just been better to have jumped off his castle\'s roof and leave the harridan with everything.

One of the only reasons that he didn\'t was because suicide was the ultimate sin, and he figured she made his life on Earth hell, there was no reason for him to allow her to make his afterlife hell too, as he had no doubt, that upon her death, that she would return to the Fires of Purgatory, from whence she came.

\"My Lord.\"

So deep in thought was he, that the servant had to repeat himself several times before he is aware of his presence and looks at him sharply.

\"Yes?\" he replies.

Smiling cautiously, \"You are delivered of two healthy bairns my lord. A laddie and a wee little lass.\"

\"And my wife,\" he asks sharply, \"how is the bi... how is she doing? I heard that this pregnancy was hard on her.\"

The servant could not figure out how the Lord was in possession of such information as he rarely visited his wife. In fact, this was just the second time he had seen his wife in the year, and the first was when he visited and got her with child.

\"She is fine my Lord, a little weak, but she should recover.\"

If it was possible, Jared was sure that his knees would buckle and he would start to cry. He wasn\'t a monster, and he believed that all life was precious, it was just that, damn, if there was an ounce of justice in this world, his wife would have died in childbirth and he would have raised his three children without the influence of the Spawn of Satan and Medusa within their midst.

Nodding his head, Jared moved to walk away.

\"Milord?\" the servant begins hesitantly.

Turning around and trying to get his face into some semblance of calm, least the servant think that he had offended him in some way, Jared uses some of his last reserves to get out a \'yes\' without shouting and venting some of the fury that is rolling around in his body desperate to escape.

\"Milord, she is asking for you.\"

Looking completely puzzled. \"Who?\"

The servant is a bit confused, but chalks it up to the way of the gentry, \"Milady milord, she is asking for you.\"

\"Why?\"

As soon as the words leave his mouth, Jared realizes just how ridiculous he must seem to the servant to ask him such a question.

Shrugging his shoulders, \"It doesn\'t matter, ask the midwife how soon the children and the wet nurse could travel and see to tending my belongings when they arrive.\"

Looking the servant straight in the eye, \"And place me as far away from that ... from my \'wife\' as possible.\"

The disgust and distaste that is on his face when he says the word \'wife\' is so real and compelling the servant is quite sure that had he not been there that his lord would have spit on the ground after saying such a thing, hoping the spit would wash the vile taste of the word \'wife\' out of his mouth.

As his Lord goes to turn away, the servant once again speaks up. Although he would rather muck out the stables after the horses had been stabled for two weeks than bother his lord with news of his wife, the servant grabs ahold of the crude cross that hangs around his neck by a bit of twine, rubbing it as though to ward off evil, but the fact that it was his lady he was thinking about did nothing to make him feel bad as he was sure that his lady was a demon from the pitts of hell with an angel\'s face.

A sentiment he and many at the castle shared, and it was no secret that her husband felt that way also, since in the entire course of their marriage this was only the fifth time he has come to see her and they have been married for over six years.

\"Milord, what about my lady?\"

Confused Jared looks at him.

\"She would like to see you.\" the servants prompts.

\"And I would like to see her gone,\" Jared mutters under his breath, unaware, or maybe not quite caring that the servant could hear him, \"but you don\'t see me getting what I want.\"

Trying hard not to smirk or let the laugh that is trying so valiantly to break out to be free, the servant remains as stonefaced at possible, but the glint in his eyes lets Jared know that the servant had heard if not all most of his muttered breath.

\"What was that my lord.\" the servant asks.

\"I said tell her I would be with her as soon as possible, I have a few tasks to take care off.\"
Muttering underneath his breath, \"Like trying to convince myself that I am one day closer to death, and being married to her and not strangling the w has has actually assured me my place in heaven.\"

Bowing slightly and moving past his lord, \"I will do that milord.\"

With that the servant disappears, Jared knows that the dutiful husband would be at his wife\'s side, praising her for giving him two more healthy children.

But the truth is, he would rather be in the company of rabid dogs than his wife.

Wait a minute he thinks. Two children, one of them a boy the other a girl. Smiling for the first time since he came to the Hall of Despair as he calls the castle that his wife resides in, he finds the good in his trip.

Already having a son, Jared Antone Charles V, and now this other boy, which he will name Gideon has assured him that he has done his duty by his title and provided his father with a heir and a spare. And the little girl, just lovely, that would keep his mother off his back, not that anyone would ever use his children for any type of monetary gain, but at least the parentals would leave him alone as he now has two, well actually three heirs and would never have to perform the soul destroying act of bedding the Succubus masquerading as his wife again.

Wanting to take a drink and toast to his good fortune Jared is halfway to his study before he remembers that he has got to be somewhere and to go to that place with alcohol on his breath would not do.

Turning and squaring his shoulders he makes his way to the rooms upstairs.

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A loud screeching can be heard all along the castle\'s corridor as Jared makes way to the nursery to check in on his children.

The smile that he has been wearing dies a swift death as a servant escapes from his wife\'s bedroom and scuttles down the hall as fast as her plump legs can carry her.

Stopping only for a minute to give a clumsy curtsy when she notices that it is him in the corridor, she quickly glances at the room she escaped from and gives him a pleading look.

While Jared has long ago hardened his heart against the helpless looks of females, something the female species of his class managed to accomplish while he was in his teens, he still on the rare occasion could show remarkable charitable goodness to the females of the lower class as he realized that many of them still possessed what many of his peers lacked or sold to devil. A Soul.

Lifting up his eyes and reminding God that this was it, this was his good deed for the decade. He gives the servant an encouraging smile, squares his shoulders, gives the nursery\'s door a wistful look and makes way to his wife\'s chamber.

Standing in front of the door, he gives it a courtesy knock before entering.

\"I did not tell you to..\" his wife\'s voice trails off as she sees who is standing before her.

\"So you came to see the spawns the you settled on me?\"

Careful not to show any type of emotion on the cold way his wife talks about the children she had just given birth too.

\"How are you my dear, no excessive tearing, bleeding?\" he asks.

Sitting up on the pillows, the late sun\'s rays catch her hair and turn it into a waterfall of molten gold. \'My god, she\'s beautiful\' he once again thinks to himself. If the beauty didn\'t hide an ugliness that rivaled La Belle Morte she would have been the most perfect specimen of the female species that he had ever seen. But being married to the monster for oveveneven years has made him immune to her charms and the only thing that he sees now when he looks at her is agony and grief and a reminder of the death to the love that he always wanted.

\ry try to disappoint you. The doctor\" she says this snidely, as she is still upset that he has to approve of every and any male that she meets, \"says that I should be able to travel in a two weeks.\"

Jared lifts an eyebrow, \"And this would concern me because?\"

Shooting him a hateful glare. \"Don\'t act the simpleton with me \'Red, we had a bargain and I have fulfilled my part, most splendidly if I do say so myself.\"

Understanding dawns, and Jared nods more to himself than to her. \"So I guess you are ready to leave this fair hamlet...\"

\"Prison is more like it,\" she interupts.

Continuing as though he did not hear a word she said. \"where exactly do you want to go?\"

Smiling evilly at him. \"Why my dear husband, with you of course.\"

Facing her stonily, \"Not while murder is still considered a crime.\"

Patting the sheets on the side of her and smoothing out nonexistent wrinkles on the bedspread. \"But what type of wife would I be if I am not with my husband and children so soon after giving birth?\"

\"A live one.\" comes his reply.

Shooting him an annoyed look, \"Look, the deal was to deliver to you two heirs that no one could question the paternity of, I have done that and more, I have also given you a squalling little bug of a girl. I have fulfilled my end, now you have to fulfill yours.\"

Walking over to the window and taking a look at the distant horizon, \"Actually I don\'t have to do a damn thing,\" turning around to face her, \"but a deal is a deal, you delivered your end, and I shall mine. As soon as the doctor says it is okay for the children to travel we will leave.\"

Walking over towards the bed and leaning towards his wife who is now huddling into her pillows, \"And if you do anything, or say anything that will harm my children in anyway, I will see you in hell, consequences be damned.\" the emotionless way he delivers has her knowing without a doubt that he is serious in this instance.

For a minute Jared is tempted to feel sorry by the brief flash of fear of him in his wife\'s eye, but memories from the past surface and disabuse him of that notion.

\"Good evening madam,\" and he walks towards the door.

\"Jared,\" a soft voice calls him back.

With a look of total innocence on her face and bewilderment in her voice. \"I know that you dislike me intensely, and the feeling is mutual, but when did you start to despise me?\"

Since she looks so lost wshe she asked the question and it was asked with all sincerity, Jared decides to enlighten her. \"It\'s simple my dear, it was when you caused the only person I ever loved to look at me as though I was a stranger in their eyes.\"

With that he closes the door and makes way to the nursery to look at two of the only three beings on Earth that gives him solace for the choices he made.




r/r to let me know if you want more.