Rufus Albarea (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ruinatings) wrote2018-06-24 08:52 am
ruinatings) wrote2018-06-24 08:52 amPSL masterpost
there's sibling incest and other gross shit in here watch your step
ruinatings) wrote2018-06-24 08:52 am
YAN AU
Rufus tried to get rid of him, as a teenager. But it wasn't that he felt strongly about doing so. He didn't really care about the tensions between the royal family, the commoners in the government, and his father's aristocracy. He didn't, and doesn't, give a particular shit who's in charge. So long as they deserve it, anyway. In his opinion being strong, being noble, confident, proud, smart -- that's what matters. And the Chancellor fits the bill. When he failed to take him out, he could have been killed, but Osborne saw the flicker of interest in Rufus' eyes, and ever since he's been following.
He's thinking about killing him still. Maybe if he does he'll take over the world himself? It might be engaging. But for now he's absolutely disgustingly enamoured with the man, and at the same time fantasizing about cutting his throat. It's fun. So for now he's helping the world be conquered and destroyed by a man arrogant in his righteousness, who believes the best way to fix the ills in humanity is to destroy it til there's nowhere to go but up, under his iron leadership.
The problem is, that's going to involve liquidating the aristocracy both here and abroad. And there is one person Rufus doesn't want to see killed: his darling, beloved, naive little brother. The one person he loves fervently, truly, though with a twisted and feverish selfishness.
It's that selfishness that allows him to slaughter Jusis' friends, calmly and with satisfaction. They're people Jusis has hung around since high school, for a few years now, and they're strong. He knows that if Jusis stays with them he'll become an obstacle to the Plan, and that's not allowed. So before that can happen, before the Plan itself becomes apparent to those outside of it, he travels here and there and efficiently, ruthlessly, murders every single one. Some he kills directly, arranging it so someone else will take the fault. Some he arranges a political trap for, and lets them be executed under the suddenly rapidly tightening control of the Chancellor's government.
Jusis doesn't have to watch it happen, because before it does, he's arrested. Accused of embezzling tax funds, with damning evidence that can't be real, he's put under house arrest "for his own safety, until the truth of the matter is sorted out". He's put under tight guard, not allowed any television or internet or newspaper that might tell him what's going on outside. He gets only the maids' whispers of political turmoil, and their pitying gazes as they speak out of earshot about things that'd break his heart if he knew.
He's been there for three months, with only maids, guards, and himself to talk to. But Rufus is done with his isolating campaign so here he is now, sweeping in the kind and concerned brother fully intending to shatter Jusis' world.]
Good evening, little brother. I hear you're holding up well enough.
no subject
He's not desperate to leave, but he kind of is, too. He wants to contact his friends, he wants to know what in the world is going on, but he trusts Rufus, ultimately, and so none of his chafing at the confinement has been too much.
It's a relief when he sees Rufus, but also he feels an uncertainty in his stomach. It's been three months and he's still under arrest for false charges, and the isolation, the gag order on information from the outside world--no matter how much he trusts his brother that sits very badly with him. He's concerned. He's anxious. And yet he's also still, happy to see the person who's always been a focal point of his life. He even gets up from his seat to greet him, smiling shyly because he can be upset but still happy. It's conflicting.]
Brother. You're finally back.
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[He smiles gently, the same charming, impossibly endearing smile he's always had. It's warm, genuine, and full of love, as is the way he lifts a hand to pat Jusis on the head, like he hasn't grown out of that yet.]
I should be able to stay at home for a few weeks though, now, provided nothing unexpected happens.
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I'm happy to hear that. Can I assume this ridiculous situation is soon to be resolved?
[No one tells him anything, so he can only assume, trust, that Rufus has been working to help him out of this stupid confinement and stupid isolation order.]
no subject
[He's still smiling, still patting Jusis' head, but what he's about to say is anything but warm and nice. There's no reason to lie to him, anymore. And there's always something satisfying about the reveal, when a plan's fallen into place.]
You won't be leaving here for a long time.
no subject
[He isn't a dumb person, but his trust for his brother is rather blinding. He simply isn't considering anything sinister from that statement--at least, not sinister with Rufus. The statement itself is alarming.]
no subject
[That's not actually true either but it may as well have been, so Rufus felt 0 regret in twisting the lies and falsified paperwork to get their father on the same chopping block as Jusis' friends.]
Chancellor Osborne is no long tolerating corruption, so he's been seen to. Considering that, I'm placing you under guard for your own protection, indefinitely.
no subject
Rufus is just being protective and oddly unreasonable, it's nothing that they can't work through.]
Indefinitely? I can't remain here forever brother, if my name's been cleared I would like to continue with my life. I'm happy to see you, I would love to spend the week with you, but I really think I should contact my friends and let them know how I'm doing.
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and now it's siscon
The nobles fight like cats and dogs. One misstep and a lineage can be wiped out, dead or stripped of titles and wealth and thrown on the street. One house that has recently faced this fate is the Albareas -- once a powerful pillar of the nobility, its last head ran it into the ground with rash decisions and the cultivating of enemies. Eventually he lost all position, his assets were seized, and he was left to fend for himself. There was one option to line his pockets, however: two daughters, ages 6 and 16, whose mouths he didn't want to feed.
So he sold them. An eccentric pair of brothers were happy to take them, and to pay a pretty penny too -- the elder daughter was stunningly beautiful, and the younger looked likely to follow suit. And so Rufus & Jusis ended up "adopted". Calling it an adoption was an easy way to erase their surname and make it socially acceptable to dress them up nice and bring them out in public, but everyone in high society knew the truth. They also knew the brothers were breaking at least one law -- 16 was plenty old enough to excuse it, though.
The only person who never found out was Jusis. Rufus bargained for her sister's safety with her own, giving up her pride and performing on command for twelve years, all while putting on a face in front of Jusis. It wasn't a pleasant life. It was rife with torture, with horrible pain and pleasure, but Rufus endured it all because of the promise that their masters wouldn't touch Jusis until she was an adult.
The plan was to figure out how to extract themselves by then. But it's Jusis' eighteenth birthday now, and she's soon going to learn that the distant but benevolent "family" she's been raised by is something else entirely. All the fancy parties, the nice clothes, the opulent house, are a lie -- but in this moment it all seems fine, as she's called to one of her "brothers'" rooms. There he can be found sitting at the edge of the bed with a bright smile, while Rufus sits stiffly in an armchair, fingers digging into the arms of it like she's about to get up and throw it.]
no subject
Which is why, over the last twelve years, she's never found out. It's not intentional blindness, she knows things are wrong in this household and that often her sister looks ill or tired.
It's never occurred to her, in her relatively sheltered life, that their adoption was not so much an adoption at all.
And yet when she walks into her "brother's" room, with Rufus sitting in that chair looking highly stressed, she feels a foreign wave of true apprehension, as if he she should turn and run. It doesn't stop her from walking forward and offering her so-called brother a curtsy.]
What is is?
[She tries not to be too rude with her brothers and sister, but curtness is something of her natural way of speaking, when society is less than kind about her and her sister in many interchanges over the years.]
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[Their "brothers" are attractive in their own right -- Conrad's a tall, broad, dark-haired man in his early 30s, a charmer in high society who enjoys teasing his peers and lounging all over his older brother. That much Jusis knows. What she doesn't know is that he's also an enthusiastic sadist, and that Rufus has been bearing the brunt of that the entire time they've been here.
He's smiling as placidly as usual, as he gestures to Rufus. She's sitting quite still, as if unable to relax even a muscle, and she shoots him a poisonous glare before turning to Jusis and speaking in a dull, forced tone.]
They're not our brothers, Jusis. They're our owners. They always have been. You've been protected, all this time, but I'm no longer allowed to lie to you. ...I'm sorry.
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[Jusis stares at Rufus, waiting for the laugh. But it's not coming, this isn't a joke Rufus would make.
She feels... She doesn't know what, horrified and scared. This has to be a nightmare. At lot goes through her mind in an instant. If this family isn't real, if she's been lied to, what's been happening to Rufus? What's going to happen to herself?
Memories of a lot of things just click, and she feels something between sick panic and searing, horrible rage,
She looks away from Rufus, back to Conrad, backs away from him like he's a poisonous snake, not towards the door, but Rufus.]
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...Don't come to me for help.
[It sounds cold, but it's what she's been told to say. She can't help. Nothing can. All Rufus can do is read the script. Which she is doing perfectly, but there's no emotion in it. It's just fed lines.]
It's the truth. It's time you quit pretending.
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[She's supposes that's what this must all have been. Pretense... For her benefit, until now. Her fists clench and she turns her back on her sister, holding her hand out to Rufus while keeping a wary eye on Conrad.]
I'm not coming to you for help. You're coming with me.
[They can fight, run, steal a motorcycle, escape, go live in the woods, get far away to start new lives. She doesn't care, as long as she has Rufus she'll be okay anywhere.]
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[She'd sure like to. But if it was that easy, they'd have left years ago.]
We can't go anywhere, Jusis.
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[And this guy's all too pleased about it, sitting with his legs crossed and just watching.]
Right now, your dear sister can't even get out of that chair without permission. You can try to make her move, but you won't like what happens.
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[She turns to Conrad fully, glaring, cornered. The flight part of her instincts are being denied and the fight is riling up. She doesn't understand at all what's going on, but she also understands too well. She's too smart not to follow, but it's too shocking to really process.]
What did you do to her?
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1/2
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JUSIS IS AWKWARD AND ITS CUTE
Rufus was eleven when he was delegitimized in favor of Jusis, and fourteen when the political hemming and hawwing over it reached a breaking point. Although his "stepmother" was endlessly kind, and although Rufus adored his "brother", things with his father had become so tense that Rufus, genius that he is, became absolutely sure he'd be disposed of soon. He got increasingly paranoid, but at the same time he found himself more and more isolated, separated from the friends and connections he'd made and pushed further and further into the dark. Genius aside he was still a child, and that disadvantage led to him being forced out of sight and, after a year or so, gotten rid of just as he'd anticipated.
It was a staged accident. Rufus went out hunting with his father, and he didn't come back. The official story was that his horse had bolted and fallen from a cliffside, but in reality he'd been bought and sold, handed over to strangers in the woods and abandoned.
It took some time for him to end up in The Red Peony. It was a whole nation (and several months of horrific experiences) away from home. But by the time he got there he had already begun to shut down all the soft parts of himself, thinking only of revenge. For his parents. For himself. He didn't know if his stepmother had approved the plan but he couldn't afford to care, so he's spent the entire last thirteen years planning his coup.
He's the most sought-after courtesan in the city, now. He has more power and influence than most people with no control chip in their brains. And tonight, he'd flexed that power to get out of working a very, very fancy party. Because Jusis is here. He saw the guest list. So Rufus is staying far away from the banquet hall, leaving Gaius and a couple of other co-workers to manage while he sits in the garden and grooms his nails, pretending he's not stressed out at all.]
Rude
These days he works hard as the heir to the household. But not in ways his father approves of. He takes after his mother, in most aspects, and his father and he butt heads constantly, especially about the treatment of non-nobles and the slave trade. Jusis is a rising star in a reform faction of their government, but his father favors tradition.
It's as a representative of his father that he's here this month. Much as he loathes it he still has duties to his father's business associates, and this is the place they wish to party.
He's escaped the entertainment. Deeply uncomfortable and even embarrassed, he's claimed a need for air and run to the gardens, which he assumes would be empty at the prime time for night entertainment in a house with what seems like a hundred rooms just for that.
He doesn't see Rufus immediately, dropping onto a little bench behind where Rufus sits and letting out an aggravated noise. They aren't facing each other, and the lighting is soft, with a decorative bush between.]
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Is something wrong?
[He's got to come around this line of hedges to be seen, so for now he'll just talk through them. Enjoy the mystery.]
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It's probably an employee on a break which just makes him kind of feel bad for interrupting.]
No, nothing is wrong. Don't mind me, I'm not good with places like this.
[It's an insult he didn't mean and he makes a frustrated noise, pinching the bridge of his nose and breathing out.]
My apologies, that came out wrong. Feel free to ignore that I'm even here.
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Is this your first time? I can keep you company if you like.
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[He's speaking more carefully now, not actually wishing to be a jerk to whoever this is. Undoubtedly they get enough of bad behavior on the job.]
But it wasn't my intention to come out here and harass anyone. I didn't even realize you were there until you said something.
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[Wow what a cute person. There aren't a lot of those here, so Rufus is interested.]
I like company. Consider it a friendly meeting. No charge.
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[This place must have somewhere else he can hide if the man wants to be left alone.]
Not that I mean to say... I'm not above company. I just don't wish to impose on your time.
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