The Cost

Chapter 5: 

Cassian's POV 

The door stood open.

Cool air from the corridor spilled into the private quarters, carrying the faint smell of incense and old stone. 

Father Corbin stood just inside the threshold, one hand still on the latch. 

His eyes moved slowly from the tangled cassock on the floor to the bed, to Elias half-hidden behind me, to the clear evidence of everything that had happened here.

 For a moment the only sound was the thin chorus of crickets outside. And his face contouring into different shades of expression.

I shifted further in front of Elias, instinct pulling my body between him and the doorway. My hand was already close to the gun still tangled in the black fabric.

Corbin’s mouth curved first with surprise, then with something that looked like a smug smile.

“Well well,” he said softly. “This is unexpected.”

I kept my voice low. “Close the door.”

He did not move. His gaze lingered on Elias with open contempt before returning to me.

 There was something almost bright in his expression—satisfaction, sharp and immediate. 

 “Had he waited for a crack in me for years?”. “Was this a set up by him?” “Was he sent by my enemies?”. I couldn't help but question myself.

Now he was watching the crack split wide open.

“I’ve wanted senior priesthood longer than you’ve been in this parish,” he said.

 “I watched them praise your restraint, your discipline, your quiet example.”

“ I watched every preference go to you while I remained useful and overlooked. And here you are. The perfect Father Riven, undone by the deacon’s son.” “ha ha ha ha ha. He laughed disdainfully."

I rose carefully from the bed, keeping myself between them, and reached for my discarded shirt. My hands were steady only through long habit.

“We can discuss this,” I said. “There are options, you just name it. Money. A transfer recommendation. Silence can be arranged.”

Corbin laughed again, short and pleased. He was enjoying it—the sight of me negotiating, the rare sound of something close to pleading in my voice. He let the moment stretch, savoring the reversal.

“Listen to yourself,” he said. “All that control, and it only took one night to bring you here. Begging.”

“I am asking you to be reasonable.”

“And I am telling you I have no interest in being reasonable.” His eyes flicked again to Elias. “I think I prefer the version where I walk to the diocese before dawn and end both of you. The scandal alone will finish whatever reputation you have left.”

I tried again. Measured. Controlled. The same voice I had used for years to keep dangerous situations from exploding. “Corbin. There is still a way through this that does not destroy everyone in the room.”

He smiled wider, clearly deciding he had heard enough.

“No,” he said. “There isn’t.” turning to leave.

The last of the careful restraint I had left snapped.

I moved.

The gun was in my hand before the thought fully formed. Corbin’s expression shifted—surprise, then anger, then the beginning of fear. He opened his mouth. I did not give him time to use it. The shot was loud in the small room, flat and final. He staggered back against the doorframe, eyes wide, then slid down to the floor.

Silence rushed in after the sound.

My ears rang. The smell of cordite mixed with the older scents of the room. Corbin lay still, one hand half-raised as if he had still been reaching for an argument. Blood darkened the front of his cassock.

I stood over him and felt the full weight of what I had just done settle across my shoulders.

Years of discipline. Years of restraint. Years of sweat and prayer and deliberate distance from the man I used to be.

 I had built a life out of silence and self-denial, brick by careful brick, telling myself that if I was strict enough the past would stay buried.

 In one moment of panic and rage I had destroyed all of it. 

The collar, the quiet reputation, the fragile peace I had carved out in Saint-Mireille—none of it would survive the night. I had become again the thing I left the syndicate to escape.

Behind me I heard Elias make a broken, disbelieving sound.

I turned.

He was sitting up on the bed, sheet clutched against him, face bloodless.

 His eyes were fixed on the body by the door. 

Horror moved across his expression first, raw and unfiltered. Then something else rose beside it—something soft—love. Still present, still stubborn, tangled tightly with fear.

 The combination landed harder than the gunshot. 

I had always been afraid that if he ever saw the version of me I kept locked away, he would look at me exactly like this. I had been right.

His hands were shaking.

“Cassian…” My name came out thin, almost lost.

I set the gun down on the reading table with deliberate care and crossed to him. 

When I reached out, he flinched—only slightly, but enough. The movement cut deeper than I was prepared for.

 Still, after a second, he surged forward and wrapped his arms around me, clutching hard, as if the contact itself might keep the world from finishing its collapse.

 His body was trembling against mine. I could feel the rapid hammer of his heart.

“We have to go,” he said against my shoulder, voice cracking.

 “Both of us. Take me with you. We can leave tonight. Please. Don’t send me away. Don’t do this alone.”

The plea was raw. Desperate. Full of the same stubborn devotion that had followed me for four years, now mixed with real terror of what I was capable of.

I closed my eyes for a brief second, one hand resting against the back of his head, and felt the full cost of the night settle into place.

I had wanted him.  

I had taken him.  

And in protecting what we had done, I had become the exact man I once swore I would never be again.

When I opened my eyes, my voice came out quieter than before, emptied of everything except necessity and sacrifice for his safety.

“You need to leave, Elias.”

He pulled back just far enough to look at me. Fear and love were still fighting openly across his face. He shook his head once, hard.

“No. Come with me. We run together—”

“No.”

I saw the refusal hit him. His expression cracked further. For a moment I thought he might argue again. Instead he only stared at me, shaken, as if trying to hold on to the version of me that had existed an hour earlier.

I forced myself to step back.

“Go home. Get into bed. If anyone asks, you were never here. Do you understand?”

He dressed with trembling hands, edged past the body on the floor without looking at it, and stopped once at the doorway. Then came rushing back, this time, I could only see the softness in his eyes. 

He hugged me. Please, don't leave me. 

Stunned, at the intensity of his love, I kissed him, hard and hugged him back for a long time. Almost breaking my resolve.

But reminded by the laws of Vespera and what they'll do to him, I strengthened the last of my will and pulled away.

Go now Elias, you're better without me here, I'll be gone by morning.

 The look he gave me afterwards—love maybe still burning underneath the fear—hurt more than anything Corbin had said.

He left.

I stood alone in the private quarters with the smell of blood and sex still in the air, the crickets continuing outside as if nothing in the world had changed, and the clear knowledge that the life I had tried to build with years of discipline and restraint was already finished.

There would be no quiet resolution.  

No careful return to the man I had pretended to be.  

I had chosen.  

And I had chosen the version of myself I had spent years trying to bury.