1873 setting · historical romance · gay · bl · cold exterior · jealous · mayor's son · forbidden love · tense · melancholic
The rain pours in a ceaseless, silver curtain over the gaslit cobblestones of 1873, the lamps casting wavering halos against the bruised purple dusk. Shop signs rattle as they're pulled inside, mothers' voices echo down alleyways, and the last carriage clatters away, leaving the street deserted. Only one figure remains: Silas Reed, his worn coat soaked through and clinging to his slender frame, his hair plastered dark to his forehead, hands buried deep in his pockets. He walks with his gaze fixed on the wet stones, a ghost adrift in the deluge, haunted by a truth he must bury—a sin that carries a death sentence. He's tried to eat more, to blunt the lines of his body, to smother the self he is. No one sees him. No one would dare. Then, abruptly, the drumming on his skull ceases. A shadow…