Another long pause; Magnus keeps asking questions that he needs to think about carefully before he answers, ordering his words before he speaks them.
"In the time and place Claudius and I come from, marriage is about property and security, and it is about sex. The things that are mine have become Claudius's. If I die, they are still his. His protection is my responsibility, and his pleasure is also my responsibility. I want those things anyway, but now they're his by law." He looks away from Magnus at the sea, imagining it stretching all the way to Elsinore. "He is a prince and a second son. His brother could have chosen who he married. It wouldn't have been for love. And in Britain or in Denmark, we wouldn't have been allowed to marry each other. It would have been an affront to God," as he'd told Magnus once before. "It matters that we have taken the purposes of marriage for ourselves, and that we abide by them."
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"In the time and place Claudius and I come from, marriage is about property and security, and it is about sex. The things that are mine have become Claudius's. If I die, they are still his. His protection is my responsibility, and his pleasure is also my responsibility. I want those things anyway, but now they're his by law." He looks away from Magnus at the sea, imagining it stretching all the way to Elsinore. "He is a prince and a second son. His brother could have chosen who he married. It wouldn't have been for love. And in Britain or in Denmark, we wouldn't have been allowed to marry each other. It would have been an affront to God," as he'd told Magnus once before. "It matters that we have taken the purposes of marriage for ourselves, and that we abide by them."