Cass and Byron stared at each other, both with their arms crossed, both with scrunched up facial expressions, and silence rang between them for a long, heavy moment. Neither spoke, the tension growing as Byron’s face continued to turn a deeper shade of red.
Finally, Byron broke the silence, a deep, ruddy shade across his cheeks.
"It was out of worry. I didn’t mean anything by it. I just thought that with Lucian gone you needed...someone to look out for you." Byron admitted. Cass huffed.
"Was the vampire and the holy knight not enough for you? What about Sam, the demon? Or hell, the army of fairies in war regalia? Come on Byron, were you so full of yourself that you thought you were better than even our family?" Byron looked sufficiently chastised. In fact, he looked incredibly embarrassed.
His shoulders hunched and the confidence he had coming into this conversation was gone. Replaced by a boy who had begged Cass for a chance when Cass had first found out he was a spy.
"I have no excuse." He mumbled, and Cass let out a laugh. The fool had truly thought that.
"You’re practically still a fledgling, Byron. Lucian is going to laugh at you for days if I tell him your behaviour." Byron’s gaze dipped, his throat working as he swallowed.
"...Please don’t tell him." Byron asked softly and Cass felt pure, dangerous joy fill him. The man was asking him not to rat him out to the bigger, badder dragon around. It was the perfect moment for a villain like him.
"I am going to withhold that judgement for how you behave going forward. No more of-" Cass took his hand and made a vague gesture in Byron’s general direction, "this." He finished. Byron flushed.
"Understood, my lord." He mumbled, clearly put in his place. Cass felt his eyes curl at the corners as he smiled.
"Relax, Byron. I’m not really that mad, I’m just having a harder time controlling mine and Cassian’s emotional reactions. If anything, I think this is fucking ridiculous and hilarious while also annoying. It’s humourous." Cass told him. Byron let out a low, relieved breath.
"Thank the gods." He muttered and Cass let out a laugh.
"Alright, let’s get back to the others. I know that you have all been working hard while I’ve been under. It’s time to hear everything in detail, I think, and plan out our next moves. I’m assuming you’ve been in contact with Aunt Alysora and your mom?" Cass asked, turning and opening the door.
Byron joined him at his side, more like a trained puppy now that Cass had put him in his place. He was still flushed, still embarrassed, but the light was still in his eyes as he spoke to Cass. Cass was glad for that. He didn’t want to take the light out of him, just warn him against overstepping.
Cass couldn’t even imagine what would have happened if Lucian had come back and any dragon, including Byron, had been looking over Cass the way that he was. The look held a tone of possessiveness to it, and while Byron was happily bonded, that might not have mattered to Lucian. He was...a little special. Even if Byron held a unique place in his heart, he had a feeling that Cass did too.
Cass and Byron chatted about their family, Cass’ heart tight and filled with positive emotions at the simple thought of that, until they got to Cass’ office here. When Cass opened the door, all three of the people inside froze like Cass had caught them doing something that they shouldn’t. Cass paused, as did Byron behind him.
Cass scanned the room a little confused. What in the world had they been doing that had them reacting like that? Edgar was sitting behind his desk, papers in hand, while Gideon was standing near his chair. Not quite behind Cass’ desk, but not quite near Edgar either. Sam was near the small area that had essentially been designated his own. It was a small trolley that had tea paraphernalia all over the three layers.
All three of them looked like they were deer caught in headlights, and Cass felt a strange smile cross his lips.
"What in the world is going on in here? Why are you looking like that? Are you up to no good?" Cass asked them and all three of them shook their heads quickly. That didn’t alleviate Cass’ suspicion.
"W-We were just waiting for you, my Lord." Sam said quickly, shuffling towards them. He glanced towards Byron before turning his gaze back towards Cass. "Did everything go smoothly?" He asked. He was clearly nervous, worried that something had happened between the two men.
Cass, for his part, didn’t rat Byron out. He wasn’t about to hurt Byron’s relationship with Sam, or more accurately, Sam’s relationship with Byron. Cass smiled.
"We figured it out. It wasn’t anything too serious in the first place." Cass told them. He admitted that there was a problem, but that it was small enough that it had been easily fixed with a simple conversation. Cass heard Byron exhale behind him slowly, with great relief. Cass didn’t look back at him. "Now, shall we discuss the mole situation?" Cass asked and watched as everyone perked up.
~
Cass had no problem discussing the mole with them, and it came as no shock to him that someone had tried to infiltrate his home. He was sure that there were several, and Cass explained his mentality that he’d had when he had been forced to hire more workers. No one was surprised that they had a few moles, Cass was just a little surprised that it was the Ridgewood family who had exposed themselves first. Cass realised after he explained why he had set the rates the way that he had, the conversation he’d had with everyone when he had first hired new people and everything that entailed, that he had left most of his team in the dark. Sam wasn’t surprised, but Sam wasn’t surprised by much of what Cass did.
He just supported him through everything.
Edgar was a bit surprised, but Gideon was the most shocked. He clearly didn’t think that Cass would keep people who would betray him around him at all times. Cass felt like a parent ripping a bandaid off as he explained that Cassian had been doing this for years, their previous home was full of them, and Cass was going to have to do a purge when they got back. He had, in fact, been planning to do a purge before the fairies had arrived in the capital and he had to delay his plans.
Gideon looked shaken, and upset. Cass couldn’t understand why he was upset until he spoke.
"You had no one to trust around you for that long? You thought everyone was ready to betray you at a moment’s notice? That’s no way to live, Cass. Even I had some faith that people would treat me well." Gideon told him, his green eyes full of an emotion so painful for Cass to look at that he had to turn his gaze away.
"I didn’t have no one. I just....was careful with who I trusted." Cass said carefully, speaking for himself, and for Cassian. "We were careful." Cass used the royal we when speaking, and realised that everyone was looking at him with that same, painful emotion in their eyes. Cass dropped his gaze. "That’s over now, anyways, so let’s not dwell on it. Now we just have to worry about the cleanup. Sometimes it benefits everyone to have a few moles around. You get to feed them information to confuse them, and I particularly enjoy doing it for my grandfather’s spies." Cass said, raising his head with a mischievous glimmer in his eyes.
That seemed to soothe everyone that was pretty upset over the truths that Cass kept telling them. He did think it was a bit ridiculous that they were getting upset now, but Cass felt that was more of Cassian’s emotions then his own. Cassian didn’t think anyone should have sympathy for him, while Cass was someone who had sympathy for him as well.
Cass just shrugged internally, taking it for what it was.
The others were a little surprised by how easily Cass could shrug everything off, but they didn’t pester Cass with their questions anymore, not regarding that at least. Instead, they asked Cass about what he wanted to do next.
Cass had a simple plan. Clean house.
He didn’t need to appease anyone anymore, and with even the nursery tree asking for bodies and blood, who was he to deny them? He didn’t have to hold back in fear of what Cassian would think because he was Cassian now.
It was a strange thing to sit with, but it was the truth. Cass and Cassian were now one, and the sooner Cass kept reminding himself of that, the sooner it wouldn’t feel so strange every time he thought of it.
So, they were going to clean house. Cass knew that he wasn’t going to stay here long term, but Ailia was, and so were the other fairies. Cass just knew that was going to happen, so he needed to make sure that those who were staying here and helping were going to benefit them in the long run.
Cass was not about to let anything befall the fairies. That would be the last thing he would want to happen, so, now was the time to get rid of any and all that could harm them. Cass had already quietly limited where people could go. Only those who were fairies, the originals who had been staying here forever outside of their guests, could go downstairs. Everyone else was forced to work upstairs.
He was sure that was something that bothered those who wanted to harm them, but that was just what was going to happen when you were up to no good. If they had taken Cass’ warning for what it was, they wouldn’t be doing this nonsense anyways.
Sam would be the one to start it. He was sure that the fairies who worked for them already knew who the problem employees were, and they would be happy to get rid of them. Cass would like to hire more fairies to work in the mansion but that was something he was going to have to speak to his Aunt and Byron’s mom about. He didn’t think it would be a hard sell. He had a feeling working in the home that housed a nursery tree would be a very honourable thing to do.
After that, it was simply sending a letter to Sir Forsythe and letting him know that he could do the same. Cass would ask for help there as well, and also see if Sir Sanders had anyone from the town that he thought would want to work for them. Cass would easily pay competitive wages, his other world’s mentality coming out to play.
It didn’t take much to get Ailia to come down to speak to him, and it surprisingly took even less to get a list of people that Sir Sanders thought would be a good fit. He had several people for multiple positions at the main house. Cass was impressed, and grateful. He thought that Sir Sanders wouldn’t take him seriously, but that wasn’t the case.
Sir Sanders said that he actually thought better of Cass because he had reached out, and Cass smiled at that.
Things were going smoothly, even as he felt a cloud forming over him. He knew it was the Ducal families and the King that were going to be a bigger issue. He wanted to deal with them, he did, but he’d also made a promise.
He told Lucian he would be at the main house, and he had left a bigger problem for Sir Forsythe to deal with all on his own. Cass needed to go put the issue with Ava’s real family to rest. Before it became a problem that grew two heads.