No matter how much Dorian tried - how much he could try if he wanted to - it was impossible to keep little Alean away.
The girl came back only a few days later - as soon as the meddlesome priest and anyone else he might have told lowered his guard, Dorian supposed - and threw herself into his arms.
"I missed you so much! Did you miss me? Or...?"
Dorian couldn't help himself but grin at the puppy-like desperation shining from her face. "Of course I did, my sweet lady. I love you, remember?" He didn't even think about the words, not after countless repetitions.

"Do you want me to show you how much I love you?" Dorian smiled at the girl brightly, but inside he was already growing tired of her whining. When he kissed her, it was to shut her up just as much as to "prove" his devotion to her.
Not that he didn't enjoy the kiss as well. For all her innocence, the girl was learning fast. And the innocence itself was refreshing when it was paired with excitement.

"They treat me like a child, but I'm not one anymore. I can tell when I am in love and you must always follow true love, don't you?" As soon as she caught her breath, she starting whining again, but this time there was something underneath as well. Dorian wasn't really listening to the words, but he did notice her shining eyes when she pulled him outside to kiss him again.
"It's nicer here. More romantic." She said in response to his raised eyebrows and then her confidence vanished again. "Or so I thought, do you...?"
Dorian thought something about getting caught, but he didn't say anything. The meddlesome priest's speech had really made him think and gradually he came to realise using the girl to marry into nobility won't be as easy as he had thought. No matter how much the girl thought she was in love, her father would overrule anything she might say. But what if - as the priest said - her marital prospects were ruined..?
He kissed her again and then pulled her down into the flowers.

Someone must have seen them. Or at the very least someone noticed that the girl almost floated on her way home, beaming with pure joy, and filled in the blanks, because the next day Dorian got a rather unexpected visit, the young lord Lorimer himself.
"Is this supposed to be a house? It looks like a goat shed, is this where you take my sister? You don't even have a castle and you presume to speak to her?"

"Are you speaking about Alean? I'm not..." Dorian started but the young brat didn't even let him finish he sentence.
"You forgot 'my lord', don't you know how to address your betters? Even if I was looking for a husband for her, you certainly wouldn't be on the list of possible candidates, you dirty peasant. Stop bothering her, or I will have you arrested! I am a lord and you must respect me!"

Nobody spoke like that to Dorian. Call him a peasant, what did the brat think he was? As if he had a castle himself! Dorian looked at Liam and instead of a young lord he saw just a wimpy kid trying to look tough in his armour. He was trying to hide his cowardice with strong words, but the weakness in his face was clear to Dorian.
"You listen!" He exploded at the brat, who instinctively recoiled, just like Dorian expected. "I don't see any lord, just a silly boy playing pretend in his father's clothes. And the only person bothering anyone is you. Your sister has made her choice and she has much more will and courage than you do. How dare you speak to me like this! You come to my house and insult my honour... you call me a peasant again and I will..."

Just at that moment Dorian saw from the corner of his eye someone approaching. He turned for a second from the brat cowering in helpless anger... and stopped in mid sentence, before the meddlesome priest could overhear his outburst.
The priest passed without stopping, but Dorian was worried he couldn't have missed the dynamic of the situation. Even without hearing any of the words, the actors and their body language spoke clearly enough and the meddlesome priest had already shown himself as quite observant.

This would probably be the perfect time to pay a visit to the local church, to try and win the priest's favour back by appearing pious. This always worked on priests.
The first thing Dorian saw there, just outside the entrance, was a donation bowl with a badly carved figure of the Watcher behind it. The idea was that anyone who put a coin in could ask humbly for the Watcher's blessing and protection, while the money would then be given to the poor to help feed and clothe them.
Dorian though it was mostly nonsense. In his opinion most of the poor were just lazy bums who didn't deserve the help and he knew better than to ask favours from an unpredictable outside force. But this would be the perfect gesture to show his true character, his caring and his great trust in the Almighty.
He approached the bowl, his coin held high for everyone to see.

He threw the coin into the bowl, wondering whether he could secretly retrieve it later. Then his fingers begun to itch, then his palm and the whole hand. It started subtly, but the sensation was growing, spreading into thousand places. He scratched and scratched, trying to ignore the look in the carved Watcher's wooden face.
He was surely just imagining it. Whatever it was.

Still, he cursed under his breath when the itching refused to go away. Now it felt like his whole body was burning, including the areas Dorian hadn't even known it had.
He hated the stupid bowl and the whole stupid church.

Finally the terrible feeling stopped and Dorian was free to do what he came here for - approach the meddlesome priest and try to appease him.
"Have you come to pray for the Watcher to give you some common sense and decency, before you end up on the punishment platform in the market square?" The meddlesome priest asked immediately after the required greeting.
Dorian groaned inwardly, but forced a penitent smile. "Yes. I want to turn my life around, with the Watcher's aid, of course." He almost added "And yours, if you would be willing to give it," but it was better not to give the priest more encouragement to stay in his life than was strictly necessary.

The uncomfortable introduction over, Dorian did his best to turn the dialogue to other topics, encouraging the priest to tell funny stories from village life. This time he outdid himself in being the perfect listener and conversation companion in general and if the priest noticed he was laughing at all the jokes too quickly and too much, he never showed it.
Everything was going well and it was turning into a successful day, when Liam the stupid brat walked past them, with that self-righteous smile on his face.

Maybe it was the smile that did it, or the fake manly walk. Or maybe it were the words "cowardly peasant", the words the priest simply had to hear but chose to ignore. Either way, something broke in Dorian and suddenly he didn't care about the priest anymore. All he cared about at that moment was wiping that smug grin off the brat's face.
He followed him inside and something in his face must gave betrayed his intentions even from a distance, because the brat stepped back, on his face a look of surprise and - yes - fear.

"I warned you, didn't I?" Dorian growled and slapped the brat so hard his head hit the cold stonewall behind him. The brat didn't even have time to react. The wannabe knight was probably too frozen in fear to do anything.
It felt good. So good, in fact, that Dorian didn't at first realise what he had done.

Then something must have snapped in the brat as well, because for the first time that Dorian saw he actually fought back.
"How... how dare you?" He stammered and then repeated it louder: "HOW DARE YOU?!"
Dorian flinched instinctively, shocked by the sudden change in Liam's expression. Now it was truly fierce, with fury replacing the usual weakness and fear.

Liam was enraged. A peasant - a dirty peasant - had actually dared to touch him. Him, a knight, a future lord! What an impudence!
For a while he was too shocked to do anything, but then he took a step forward and returned the slap, hard, in his iron glove. And then again. And again.
When the peasant was staggering before him, dizzy with his head ringing, he stood back to admire his work. There, that that should teach him.
Now Liam was feeling better, but there was still the unbelievable impudence to take care of. But that was a matter for someone else, this was time for justice to have its way.
"Arrest this man!" He called and then simply turned his back. The peasant wasn't worthy any more of his breath. Not until he saw him chained and whipped at least.

Only now did Dorian begin to realise what was happening. His cheeks were still burning and his ears ringing, but a sense of reality was slowly creeping in when he saw an armour-clad man he recognised as Illyan the village guard approach him.
Now he had enough sense that when the guard came to lead him away, he didn't fight him. He just growled helplessly.

"Enjoying the view? We have came to realise long ago that the whipping post is one of the best cures for criminal behaviour there might be."
Dorian didn't bother replying. If that was supposed to be an attempt at smalltalk, the guard was even more hopeless than he had expected. And if it was meant to scare him, it wasn't succeeding.

Just... why had the whole village be there to see the show? After all the hard work Dorian had put into getting on their good side, all the sacrifices he had to make...
There were the two elves, little Alean was standing at the side with her father towering above her, the meddlesome priest naturally had to be in the first row... and everybody else was there as well, expectant.
Dorian just turned his head away from them.

And then the trice-damned brat, the one who had caused all of this, walked onto the platform to mock him one more time.
"How do you feel now? Do you see a lord now? Are you learning some proper respect now? Take your time, the lesson can be repeated as many times as your feeble peasant mind needs."
Dorian just glared at him. At that moment he hated the brat too much to speak. He wasn't worth the wasted breath.

"As you wish." The damned brat shrugged with a smirk. "Long lesson it is. You'll be more than glad to bow after. Commence the punishment."
Then he calmly stepped off the platform to watch.
Dorian just continued glaring, intent to do so for the whole time. Then the first stroke bit into his naked back and after that all he could do was not howl in agony.

Alean desperately wanted to turn away or at least close her eyes, but her father ordered her to watch and remember. She bit her lip until she tasted blood, flinching at every stroke of the terrible whip. She almost felt the pain herself.
How could her brother be so cruel?

When after countless lashes the dreadful ordeal was finally over and Dorian was released from the pillar, Alean ran to him. There was a very real possibility of her getting a punishment of her own, but she ignored that. Her true love was hurt and she desperately wanted to console him.
"Are you...? Was it...?" She reached to caress him gently, but Dorian just slapped her hand away.

"Why... what... have I...?" Aleam stammered incoherently, frozen in confusion, but Dorian didn't bother saying anything to her. His back was still on fire because of the girl's brother and nothing she could say would make it any better. She was supposed to be his shield. Why hadn't she protected him from this?
At that moment he hated the girl, almost as much as he hated the meddlesome priest with his righteous smile and the guard with his idiotic small talk. And everyone else, just for watching.
He just turned and walked away, escaping the square and all the people, his head high and his face stony despite the pain. He would get the brat who had caused this, he promised himself. Somehow he would get back at him.

Only at home he allowed himself to show the pain.
He was so exhausted that he just washed his back carefully and then went straight to bed and slept for the rest of the day and for the whole night.