~ The second I asked I saw this heavy guilt weighing in through those deep dark marble green eyes. He went quiet for the moment and took a slurp of his drink and swallowed it down roughly. That the veins on his throat side bulge tightly. Until his veins eased up enough to disappear from the stiff tension.
He let out this heavy sigh through his nostrils and said putting his drink back on the coffee table. "Compared to other Societies, in the Kingdoms and Barons our teenagers are allowed to do shots at age fifty. This way it helps build up a tolerance since our shots are grown from the purest leaf. Other Kinds don't grow their shots from the finest grown leaf. Therefore, our garden stocks are more richly grown making them more potent. So when I reached fifty years old, I went overboard with drinking shots. And I ended up learning my lesson the hard way. With how shots can mess you up if you're not careful. Being within my million age marker, I am a lot more careful with what I do. I rarely do shots nor do I hardly smoke our finest leaf-rolled cigars."
I showed my empathy and asked more sincerely. "What kinda mistakes?" Since he didn't clarify what he did.
"I picked a few fights with my one cousin. It was stupidly over Rachel and I ended up making a regrettable mistake."
Yet, I was confused as to what he was meaning by this since he wasn't specifying what happened.
"Well, what happened?" I asked. "You're not clarifying what you did?"
He was quiet with me again as I noticed he put a shield over his building guilt. Now I couldn't fully tell what he was feeling since he blocked any emotion to peek through his memorizing eyes.
But he did however let out a light sigh and spoke. "That's because what did was awful." He stopped talking for a second, so I allowed him to gather his thoughts. "One time when Rachel turned fifty, she and I did some shots together and it lead us to physically sleeping together. Which is looked frowned upon, especially for a Royal. It was a great sin between us that we committed but I wasn't thinking clearly when I committed the act with her. Over her, I was severely punished for it and I got sent away to boot training for it. Which is like a cruel constant training isolation punishment. Shortly after I returned home from my punishment. I found out Rachel slept with my cousin Frankie twice over me. For whatever reason, I thought I owned Rachel over anybody else because she is under my dad's authority. So I got so caught up in my rage that I drink a few heavy shots and ended up picking a bad enough fight with Frankie. That I ended up killing him into the lifeless state."
I wasn't sure why but my heart was filled with a mixture of emotions that were festering beneath the core of my heart. But at the same time, I was shocked to hear him confess this to me.
"Did he ever wake up again?" I asked trying to remain sorrowful since I knew he felt horrible about what he did. Regardless, that I couldn't read his expressions, I could tell before he blanked out he expressed his guilt.
"Yeah, he's fine." Cory said. "Our Royal family are all immortal."
"Do you still talk to Frankie?" I asked more or less wondering.
"Yes, he and I are close. We both matured and had to learn to share the girls we counted. But he likes to mess with me. Frankie even tried teasing me about you. He edged me on trying to figure out if I felt something for you but he learned I did since knows me so well." Cory told me.
I nodded still feeling this strange weight on my heart about Rachel. "Did you both still court Rachel after the fight?"
Cory kinda nods. "We did but after that incident, I lost a lot of interest in Rachel and kinda drifted away. But even now Frankie and most of my cousins still court Rachel."
"But did you still court Rachel before we got engaged?" I could tell by his face, that I asked a tricky question. But I needed to be asked, I thought.
"I guess you could say I did," Cory softly admitted thinking he maybe shouldn't have answered her question honestly.
"Well, then who's to say she still isn't for you? Clearly you were territorial over her by thinking you owned her and you freshly counted her." I said bitterly when trying to point this out to him.
But he sorta coldly faced me and said in a chilling yet serious tone. "Understand this Sally, how I felt for Rachel was no different than how I felt for those other girls I crushed on then too. When you're old enough to do shots by age fifty. Adding that with the fact you're still learning control through your training. Nothing about any of that ever mixes well. I would have flipped even if it wasn't Rachel. I was over domineering with any Princess I courted. Rachel was just the one I favored the most at that time before she started to slut herself around. Just because I freshly courted her doesn't me I felt anything for her! Nor did give her much time to spend with me!"
"Okay, fine. I see your point with that. But you still laid with Rachel and not the other girls." I still tried pointing out to him that maybe Rachel meant something more to him. But his eyes only darken more and his jaw even flexed when he stared me down.