Misleading The Marquis

Fourteen - Bane

He could hear her gulping air in the rapidly despite the quiet darkness. Bane sighed tiredly, he hadn't slept the night before and the same would be the case tonight if he did not get George to relax and go to sleep. He had been reciting the Saint's prayer for the last several minutes, trying to distract himself from the fact that he was stuck in a bed with Georgina Marie St. John. It had been working until she sat bolt upright and half screamed his name, he'd been nearly asleep until then. Now she sat stiffly, clutching the blanket to her like it would act as a parachute in the event of whatever horrific crash she was imagining at this moment.

"George, Sweetheart," he muttered without thinking, sitting up beside her in the darkness, "You have to sleep," he reasoned in exhaustion. Then realizing what he'd called her just now, he stood up and turned up the gas light, pulling at the bell for their steward. He didn't meet her eyes, wondering if She'd heard him at all, just waited in the impossibly small space for the bellhop to interrupt their awkwardness.

"You rang?" the maroon man spoke brightly, as if it was not the middle of the night. This would be the attendant for the first class compartments all night, the boy would stay at  his post in the corridor until morning.

"Bring us some tea," Bane half begged, rubbing a hand over his eyes tiredly once again, "And a sleeping drought if you would," he added, dropping his voice. The bell hop glanced over Bane's shoulder to see George sitting wide eyed and afraid, holding her blanket like a shield and seemed to understand immediately.

"Sleeping drought?" George repeated, questioningly as Bane turned back to the bed to wait for the bellhops return.

"You have to sleep, George," he repeated, closing his burning eyes and wishing he could sleep himself instead. But he Couldn't leave her alone and scared in the dark either.

"So you want tot drug me and force me to sleep in a bed with you?" she shrilled, sounding like an old maid in her horror at the impropriety of it all. Bane smiled, despite himself.

"Between the two of us, I am the most trustworthy," he chided, though his voice was too tired to carry much heat. She didn't respond for a long moment, but neither did she disagree.

"You should take your hair down at least," he suggested, resting his face in his hands and wondering if this would be the longest trip in his life.

"Why?!" she demanded, shrill and tensing again, the coverlet coming up even closer to her chin. Bane smiled to himself, then did at last turn to look at her.

"You get headaches when you sleep in those pins," he reminded her gently, and watched with amusement as her face went from disapproving horror to confusion.

"Oh," she shrugged, letting the blanket down ever so little, "I do... but how did you -"

"We wrote letters for a year and a half, George," he answered before She'd fully formed the question, "If your only lie in those letters was which Georgina Marie you were, then I know quite a bit about you by now, would not you say?" he asked, and he was fishing, just hoping she was too tired to notice his effort. She looked down at her lap, picking at a loose thread in the quilt.

"I do get headaches," she admitted, a heavy sigh finally forcing her shoulders to droop ever so slightly, "And I didn't lie to you in those letters... well except for - for  who I was," she added, wincing at the admission. Bane smirked and shook his head. He didn't understand her, not one thing. She was hiding something from him, he knew it, and he was determined to discover what it was before that cast came off and she left him forever.

Bane let her statement hang between them for another long moment, until the expected knock came at the door. Delivered on a small aluminum tray, a steaming cup of tea was laid beside a dish of honey and a vial of sleeping drought. He glanced at George, but she didn't object as he emptied the entirety of its content into her tea before handing it to her. She held it in both hands, studying it suspiciously then looked up at him over the rim.

"It'll help me sleep?" she asked, as if for reassurance. Bane smiled at her, distracted by her darling little mouth as it pertly frowned at him. She drank it down with another word of protest, surprising him, then set the cup back down on the tray and settled back against the pillows to wait for it to work. He moved to join her, sitting beside her, their stockinged feet in matching positions at one end of the bed. She took a deep breath and began tugging at her hair pins as he'd suggested.

"I promise never to put you on another airship," he said, glancing down at her, mesmerized by the her ritual.

"Fine by me," she answered tightly, her brows pulled together in concern.

"Do you always use so many pins?" he asked, reaching behind her ear for one that She'd missed. She froze when he touched her, glancing up at him, those eyes wide and worried.

"No, but Louisa was being a little overly vigilant," George answered, and Bane remembered the maid by name.

"I am sorry you had to leave her behind..." Bane said slowly, "If I had been thinking clearly, I would've suggested she come along, it would've made moving to a new place much easier for you," he explained, twirling the hairpin between his thumb and finger distractedly.

"I think your tea is working," George commented in a slow slur, her eyelids falling heavier. Bane, gathered the hairpins She'd been collecting between them and put them aside, then rose to turn off the gas lights once more. Glancing back he found George already sound asleep, her silky brown hair splayed out around her in disarray like a mermaid of the old pirate tales.

Feeling more like a nanny than anything, Bane collected the now empty cup and tray as George began to snore softly. At least now they would both be able to sleep, he thought to himself as he opened the door that connected their compartment to the corridor. Intending to leave the used dishes for the bellhop, Bane would've missed the single black rose that lay at his feet if he hadn't been bent to deposit the dishes.

Panic gripped him quickly, he felt frozen for several seconds, suspended in time, holding a tea cup and tray in midair as he stared down at the omen. It had been years since he'd seen... but then they were Cora's favorite flower after all. Coming back to his senses, Bane nearly threw down the dishes and glanced about the corridor for any sign of Malcolm - it had to be him who was doing all of this. No one else would've known where to look for the grail, no one else would know to taunt Bane with Cora's black roses on what most would assume was his wedding trip with his new wife.

His new wife.

Turning back to the room, Bane hurriedly shut the door and leaned against it, watching George as she slept with a new kind of concern coming over him. What if Malcolm's intent to punish Bane was through George? Another horrible thought came then - what if the sleeping drought hadnt' been a sleeping drought at all? Nearly leaping onto the makeshift bed, Bane scrambled for George's arm, in search of her pulse.

It was there, strong and steady... not the thready weak thing of someone who had been poisoned. He relaxed a little at the discovery, but then George stirred in her sleep, no doubt disturbed by his sudden examination. Sighing heavily, she rolled towards him in the small bed, as if seeking his warmth, and buried her face in the front of his shirt with a garbled statement he didn't understand.

"What am I to do with you Georgie girl?" he asked the sleeping figure as he pulled the cover up and over them both, adjusting so that she could sleep comfortabling against him. Bane curled an arm around her... to keep her from rolling he insisted to himself, then the other for his own balance, he reasoned. She was warm and soft and smelled like cinnamon, but fear still gripped him, causing a tightness in his chest that he hadn't felt in years. The guilt was always with him... but now he was afraid as well... afraid for George.

Settling back against his pillow, Bane interlocked his fingers as he held his sleeping wife. There was no bolt on the door, only a pitiful lock that anyone could pick... so with the smell of cinnamon and the slow rhythmic breathing of Georgina Marie St. John, Bane settled in for another long and sleepless night.