#( lordedmund - thread 08 )

[ernestpembroke]

@lordedmund​

Ernest was dreading the end of the season. He wasn’t eager to return home, although it would be nice to see his cousin it still meant he wouldn’t get to see many of the friends he had made, too. Particularly, it meant he wouldn’t see much of Edmund. He grew used to spending so much time with him, seeking him out as often as was reasonable, never feeling that he was becoming a nuisance. He didn’t want to go home and trade all of that in for writing letters.

And yet he already wrote Teddy a letter. He battled with himself over not saying any of it in person but the idea terrified him. It may not have been as romantic but . . . Well, Edmund was the one good at that, as far as Ernest was concerned. The heart of an artist instead of the heart of a coward.

The note had gone through multiple rewritings before he decided he couldn’t improve upon it. It read:

Dearest Teddy,

I hope you will forgive me for approaching this question in a letter, the alternative seems to me quite impossible. I cannot remember the poem it is from but Villon (I believe in his exile) once wrote, translated “I am dying of thirst beside a fountain” & soon, I do not think I will be by the fountain. So this must be written.

I am a viscount & future earl, you will be a viscount, & neither of us by my understanding are in need of money but even if we were, surely, our union would still be suitable to the other. Without regard to money, titles, or property, I have come to understand that my feelings for you surpass the limit of what I imagine most feel towards temporary lovers. What I mean to say is that given my passion for you, a union between us seems to not only be smart but promising of a bright future. I do not wish to die of thirst beside the fountain anymore but even less so to perish away from it. Away from you, my own one.

I will be returning to Salisbury in a fortnight but am more than willing & indeed find it preferable to instead go with you to Scotland. I do not wish to wait nor to put our fate in the hands of anyone else.

With love,

---

Rather than do as planned, have the letter mailed off, Ernest found himself with a burst of unexpected courage. He thought it over too many times, would Edmund say no because he sent it off so coldly? Would it seem like an afterthought? And didn’t he want to see his face if he said yes? The possibility of him saying no weighed heavily, too but . . . Edmund, as much of a rake as Ernest knew him to be in the past, always seemed like a romantic to him. A letter proposal was unacceptable to be sent away like that to someone like Edmund.

But he couldn’t say the words, either. He knew they would die in his throat, that Edmund would smile or kiss him or look at him like he was art and that he would find it impossible to say anything worth the air he used for it. He pocketed the letter and went to Edmund’s so that he could call on him, sending the butler off to notify Edmund of his presence. As he waited, he twisted the sealed letter between his hands, just barely gentle enough that it did not tear.