He was a rough and harsh man who cared only for himself the entire night. I had learned to wait through it when it came to people like him with a smile.
He mumbled countless things to inflate himself as many others did, and I just responded with confirmation and an accepting face as I always did, but then he randomly came to a stop and asked me one question, "Am I better than my brother?"
The face he gave me as he said this wasn't one of arrogance or pride, it wasn't one of a man looking for some sick pleasure in taking the woman who his brother sees as property, it was that of a man who was one moment away from breaking down.
Seeing his expression I was shocked to silence and didn't answer his question which caused him to tear up and say, "I knew it, even in this moment I can still never beat him at anything."
He collapsed in on me and started crying. I don't know if it was the shock of the situation or an instinct buried deep within me, but when I saw this man cry like he had just reached his limit with life I felt my body move and I simply put my arms around him, then said, "Everything will be alright."
I rubbed his back as he cried into my arms dampening my bedsheets, and soon he pulled his body back and began to talk. He told me all about himself, his family, his friends, his village, I think by the end of his rant I knew more about him than I knew about myself, and at the end of it all I held him and said, "It is ok."
And he hugged me back, then said, "Thank you."
The men who come here want to fulfil some sort of fantasy, some wish for power, some wish for love, some wish for connections, and very few solely wish for pleasure.
And as people who aren't allowed to exist, we answer those fantasies by allowing them to become something they aren't during the day. But in that moment, I was the one in a fantasy, one of an object who was reminded she is a person.
He came back to our establishment the next day, and the next, and the day after that, and every single time he came we talked and talked. He had no guard around me, no shield, all of his fears, thoughts, insecurities, and weakness were all open and freely handed to me.
I learned how horrible his brother was. Despite many people seeing him as a charming man he engaged in far more depraved things than Cambell but was far better at hiding them.
I learned that Cambell was a bastard and his father resented him for it, so he made great efforts to try to skip over the laws of Gorias where all children must get an inheritance and give it only to the younger of his two children by constantly attacking Cambell's character.
Even his bringing Cambell to our establishment was merely a way to taunt him over the fact he could get away with things that Cambell could never dream of.
I felt warm and fuzzy inside as if someone lit a fire in my soul. So, I spoke back telling him all about myself even what happened to my mother, and my life so far.
"I am sorry if my simple life was as boring compared to yours, but I can tell you some of the stories of the other people her-."
My words come to an end as I notice the tears that fall from his eyes, and I say, "Huh why are you crying?"
"It just sucks so much that people could hurt someone like you."
"I have half human blood it is only natural."
"NO! Unlike everyone else you were compassionate and kind to me, you listened to me instead of writing me off as a crazy person, for that I am sure you are far more aligned with the ideal Danu had for her children than any member of the red branch."
Sentences like that are easy to make up and throw out, I have been given countless compliments by men who simply want to pretend we have a connection before they toss me away, but the words he said to me right now I know for a fact that he meant them, and right now I know that I love him.
Grabbing his face, I planted a kiss on his lips then I pushed him down and said, "You never finished."
That night was the first time I ever truly wanted to be with someone out of my own free will. Not because of money, and not because of obligation, and what truly fulfilled me was that he wanted to be with me.
And as he kept coming to be with me each night, I had become intoxicated by the feelings that he gave me, and didn't want to let them go, so I did a bad thing.
I knew him insane and out far better than anyone else and I knew how he would react if he became a father, so I intentionally didn't take preventative measures, and soon I told him, "I am pregnant."
"Is it mine?"
"You come so often that I don't even have customers outside of you."
He grabs me and says, "I promise you I won't allow you to be harmed again, and I promise I won't allow this child to experience the hell our parents put us through."
He held me that day, and I cried as I felt that the fantasy I had been living had finally become reality.
He bought me from the establishment using portions of his land as collateral, and then he brought me home to stay as his wife.
Cambell decided from that point on to work harder and harder so he could overcome his brother. He did whatever was necessary to fix his reputation. He spent hours working with the rest of his community and found ways from those around him to cultivate the land he was given, so he could catch up to his brother.
He spent nights awake beside me studying, and when I asked, "Why are you pushing yourself so hard?"
He responded, "Because you have saved this life from turning into nothing, and I will use it for you from now on."
Soon Ferdiad was born, and our family grew even bigger bringing more happiness and motivation to both our lives, and for some time it looked like things would be turned around and our situation would change.
But that year as the harvest came from the land Cambell was tasked with carrying for, we were created with a blood bath. The soil had been infected with maneater parasites and the plants became maneaters around the time of harvest.
They attacked the families on the land we looked after, and we had to ask his father for help to destroy them, which eventually led to us having to burn the soil and dig up most of our land to remove their roots under it.
It was a critical setback that we didn't recover from, and later that day Cian came to visit us.
"To think your failure would not only hurt the livelihood of your people but also bring an end to their lives. I have never felt more embarrassment than I have today."
With a desperate look in his eyes, Cambell says, "Father I don't know how this happened I had taken proper precautions."
Niall says, "Well Maneaters could easily sneak into one's soil and remain dormant for years, so even if the maneaters didn't appear this year they could have appeared during your era of incompetence."
My husband dropped his head to the ground as he understood the validity of the words spoken to him and said, "Sorry."
"A mere sorry won't bring all of the dead back to life, and if you think it would you are even dumber than I thought you were. Cambell from this moment I strip you of your inheritance."
I still remember the look on his face that day. It made the sadness and despair he had when we first met seem like a simple mood swing. He felt like a man who had died endless times and had lost hope in life.
So, I held him and the baby Ferdiad in my arms did as well while saying, "Daddy."
He snapped out of it and held us back, and if it wasn't for Ferdiad at that moment I would have lost everything again.
We had lost our rights to the land we lived in, and my husband's reputation had become significantly worse making finding a job harder than ever in the land.
And during a moment when we were mere days away from thinking of leaving Tir na n-iontas, his brother came up to us and said, "Regardless of your failures you're still blood to me, and I believe both you and your future children should be allowed to stay on this land, and I will make sure to give you enough where you and your children could live however you want."
Cambell gritted his teeth and held his fist tight as if he was about to punch his brother, but stared at me and Ferdiad then said, "It would be my pleasure."
I loved him more than anything as he did to me, so I made sure that even after the hell he had suffered each day I would stand beside him, that I would be his safe haven.
But each day he worked there I knew his brother was using it as an opportunity to mock him and abuse him. Still, the money was too good for him to risk moving elsewhere when he had us to look after.
So, I fought for him.
I went up to his brother and slapped him in the dead of the night saying, "You are nothing but a monster who doesn't even deserve all he had been given."
Rubbing his cheek, Niall says, "It was my brother's foolishness of the years he was without you that caused him to fail, not me and you better remember that."
"So, what!? He has changed and is trying better, yet you use this as an opportunity to mock him?"
"What of it? Does changing now change that past? You will never have control of how your past mistakes affect your future now, and even a child knows that."
Putting his hand in my hair, Niall says, "But others will always have the ability to mitigate those mistakes."
"Let go of me."
Bringing me closer he says, "You do realize I had you long before my brother did, never forget you were on loan, and repaying that loan might decrease your husband's suffering."
I hated Niall, much more than anything else in this world, but I loved the smile my husband had coming home from work recently than even that hatred.
What I did was a disservice to myself, Niall's wife, Ferdiad, my husband and worst of all to you Minagrain.
Cambell started to ack stranger and stranger by the day. The looks he gave to Minagrain were one of investigation, and the looks he gave to me had a lack of emotion behind them.
Minagrain looks like me more than anyone else, so he can't know, he couldn't know. But no matter how much I told myself this I knew Cambell wasn't stupid.
He started drinking, more and more and despite his reputation improving, it took a clear hit on his health and mind, so I asked him, "Cambell please you need to stop this."
He ignored me, so I tried to grab the bottle out of his hands, but he knocked me away and onto the floor causing a loud thud to move through the house.
I stared up a my husband on the floor as the kids rushed towards me, and he looked at himself with horror and then ran out of the house, and later I found out he had run all the way to Niall's house.