The Art of Persuasion

Chapter 10

Asher managed to avoid Farren for four days.

He forced his mother to give Farren her continuing lessons on Vampirism, and essentially kept to himself feigning business with the wedding and his investments. He tried using Dansby as a crutch but he too had joined the dark side, siding with his mother and sister in the matter of Aurelia vs. Farren.

Oh, how many taunts he had been forced endure as Cecily and Dansby teamed up against him for the first time ever. They were disastrously good together, bad for him of course, but it was nice to see his best friend working together with his little sister. Even if it was working against him.

But those four days were torture for a completely different reason. He had tasked the two with keeping Farren safe from the bullying nature of his wife-to-be and his future mother-in-law. And every day one of the two came up with some different story of Farren.

They told him of how Farren had been forced into hand writing all the place cards as she had the best calligraphy.

How she had been guilted into agreeing to do all decorating for the actual wedding.

How Aurelia had come into Asher's library during one of Cecily's art lessons and despised the canvas that Farren had been working on. If it hadn't been for Cecily's quick thinking, she might have destroyed it.

Granted she also covered her in paint but Cecily hadn't seem perturbed and Aurelia had been quick to apologize once Asher had shown up at her door with that angry scowl on his face.

Dansby and Cecily were quick to ride to Farren's rescue, both amazed that she could be so wilful and quick to witty comebacks with them, but the second her family came around she turned into the pathetically silent scapegoat. It frustrated them to no end, just like it frustrated Asher, but they had a lot of fun protecting her.

They enjoyed going toe to toe with Aurelia and Candice because Aurelia and Candice couldn't handle them. When they lost fights, they would go bright red and start going on about the indignation and disrespect of it all.

It made for terrible arguments with him and Aurelia, about how his family was purposely picking fights with her. But he didn't know how to tell her that if she stopped picking on her sister, his family would leave her alone.

But that morning Asher had been made aware that at breakfast that Aurelia had made it known that Farren was not in the bridal party. The reason, he found out, was because Farren was not considered pretty enough.

This was something that was announced in front of his whole family.

He heard that first from Cecily, and found out from Dansby that Cecily had been booted out of the bridal party as well. He was unaware of the reason but it made for a terrible argument.

He had showed up in the rooms that had been given to Aurelia and actually got properly mad at her for the first time. She admitted that with all the arguing that Cecily had been causing, that she didn't want someone as negative as Farren as her bride's maid. And if Cecily continued that way, it wouldn't matter what Asher said, Aurelia wouldn't change her mind.

Asher had never been so angry in his life. Usually he could control himself, he prided himself on his self control, but he had finally lost it. In those few short minutes yelling at his wife-to-be he had managed to say all he had thought about her. Which might have included he didn't want someone as cruelly selfish as Aurelia as a part of his family.

He didn't even care when she had been reduced to tears. He simply walked away.

Asher's plan had been farfetched from the get go. He always assumed that, to avoid wasting away, to avoid succumbing to his worst fears, was to find someone he could never love and marry them. Someone that he could get along with, was attractive, and would be easy to control. A pretty little 1950's house wife. Beautiful woman completely subservient, and in return she got to be queen in title only, for he'd never let her make decisions about his coven, and he would shower her with all she ever wanted.