It is very hard to ‘cheat’ when you have an understanding between two adults within a marriage. However, I do think that somehow the rest of the world thinks about these thing differently than most Americans tend to. In France, for example, extramarital affairs are de rigueur. In Japan, if a man does not have a mistress, his wife can very easily be led to believe that there is something wrong with him. Among the Sidhe, affairs are also not only permissible but expected of both husbands and wives. So, I can safely say that there is nothing wrong with my husband, myself or our marriage; no matter what culture we might find ourselves in, be it Human or Fae.
Yes, I know, there is a certain moral argument toward whether or not being with another person other than your spouse constitutes infidelity. I do not personally believe that it does. I have had other lovers, all of whom Sebastien has known about, and I know he has and has had mistresses as well. The only thing that would constitute cheating would to be to lie or to deny what is patently obvious. When one has a paramour or a Mistress, it does not make any party within that arrangement wrong or a whore – unless an untruth is introduced. I have not once ever seen the expenses for any of Sebastien’s mistresses. There is no need for me to. Their needs are provided for in whatever arrangement he has made with them, and the ladies do know what the expectation is. I do not hear him taking late night calls from any of them. His time away is his own, he has no need to explain. I do not spy on him, and he certainly does not spy on me when I am with whomever it is that I am seeing. There is no need.
There is only one man whom Sebastien has forbidden me ever to see intimately again, and that is the Comte de la Ferre, Oliver – otherwise known as Athos. That is not to say that discussion has not come up, nor that the temptation to defy that edict has not reared its head. Quite the contrary. It has. And I have and Athos has successfully (thus far) avoided such an ill-advised entanglement. I think if I were to trespass and go against my husband’s advisement, I would be crossing that line into deception. I am not willing to do that. And to be entirely truthful, after all that I have been through in re-establishing my marriage and the hardship and cost involved, it has definitely kept any such desires well in check.
Muse: Frances de Rochefort
Fandom: Original Character
Word Count: 445
crossposted to
Life Belongs to Sekhmet 