Chapter 16 #2
Once again, the long tables are thrown over with tablecloths, this time in pure white. The centerpiece is a combination of frosted-looking branches and woven symbols made out of grass.
“Very nice,” Morgan says, brushing one with a fingertip as we pass. “St. Brigid’s Cross. You know, Brigid wasn’t even a saint until somebody appropriated her for their own purposes.” She throws a meaningful look at Lanz and Callahan.
“Hey, don’t look at me,” Lanz says.
“Yeah, we weren’t there,” adds Callahan.
I snicker in spite of myself. It’s strange. I can feel that the air is chilly around me, but it’s like it doesn’t bother me. Morgan’s perfume, I suppose. The music drifts overhead, weaving in with voices and clinking of glasses. And it’s almost enough to feel normal until I see the high table.
Once again, it’s for faculty and deans and trustees. But now with an addition: the white-robed figures we saw earlier. I shiver even though I’m not cold.
“So weird,” Morgan mutters.
“Right?” I glance back at them. Some of them are talking amongst themselves, but not to anyone else. A thought occurs to me. How do they even—I glance at Lanz and Callahan—you know, through those masks?
“What, eat?” Lanz says. He squints, shakes his head. “Uh, they probably won’t. Not here. In France, at mealtimes you had to keep your eyes on your plate in front of you. So, it’s not like we ever made eye contact.”
“You were there?” I ask. “At the monastery?”
“Well, yeah.” Lanz puts his hands in his pockets. “That’s where we had to train and be consecrated.” He glances at Callahan. “Except Callahan. We brought him on later.”
“It’s a whole deal,” Morgan confirms. “My mom and I just stayed in Paris while these guys were off, I don’t know, self-flagellating and praying or whatever.”
“It wasn’t exactly—” Lanz purses his lip. “Sure, fine, whatever.” He catches Callahan’s eye and nods up at the high table.
“We’ve got to go,” I say. “Please.” It almost sounds rude to add, but the two of them nod and take their leave.
Finally, I think. I hug my arms around myself, remembering now that I have no gloves on, but nobody seems to be staring, either because they already know I’m a freak or because they’re too soused on wine to care.
“How long does this all usually take?” I ask Morgan.
“Oof,” she exhales. “Dinner, the little ceremony thing, then they clear everything away for dancing.”
“Dancing?” I interrupt.
“Well, yes, that’s what a ball tends to mean,” she says. “Did you not think any of this through?”
“No,” I admit. “I kind of just have to go where I’m told.”
“I know. But hey,” she says, “at least this time there’s no assigned seating. We’re supposed to”—she waves a hand through the air—“mingle with the guests from the other schools.”
That’s right, I realize. The other two colleges are here for the tournament tomorrow, plus their cheering sections or fan bases, I suppose, because there are definitely some girls here I don’t recognize, too.
“I guess I’ll manage,” I say. “I’ll just get through this and then go home and curl up into a ball, which is where I want to be anyway. And at least this time I won’t be poisoned, probably.”
“We’ll try to make a night of it,” Morgan says, flicking her hair over her shoulder.
A clear bell rings out, a call for us to take our seats for dinner. I look around, thinking of the usual panic I’d have when trying to find a place to settle in the dining hall. This time, I just follow Morgan’s lead.
“Here,” she says, indicating a chair at a table a stone’s throw away. “This fellow looks intriguing.”
We settle on either side of a guy with broad shoulders and thick arms who barely reaches the tip of my nose.
“These seats taken?” Morgan asks.
“Uh, no,” he says, glancing at her and then at me, and then at me again when he notices my scars.
I pretend I don’t notice, pretend I don’t care, and I realize I actually don’t care. Some random guy from—I glance at his pocket square, which is embroidered with a school logo—Mount Stewart College. Not my problem.
“Wonderful.” She brushes a hand at me and I take the seat to his right while she takes his left. “This is all such a thing, huh?” she says to him.
“Yeah,” he murmurs, looking around. “Caliburn is quite, uh, eccentric.”
“Can say that again,” Morgan says, running a fingertip on the edge of her wine glass and scanning around. “Do you think they’re coming to the tables, or—?”
Another guy, this one dark-haired and lankier, but with the same Mount Stewart pocket square, puts a hand on the chair to my right.
“Oh, um, sure,” I say. “It’s a free country.”
He laughs softly and takes it.
“We were just talking,” Morgan said, leaning over the table to our new arrival, “about how extra this all is.”
“Oh,” the dark-haired guy says, nodding. “Yeah, for sure. It’s, uh, well, kind of what you get for being in this league.”
“Yeah?” Morgan tips her head. “I really don’t know that much about fencing.”
Something clicks in my brain. She’s playing a little game, I think. Well, so be it. It’s been ages since I’ve talked to anyone outside of the Caliburn universe, let alone a fencer who has no affiliation to the quest for the Holy Grail. I might as well get interested.
“Yeah, I mean, I guess you guys are Villa Loyola?” the dark-haired one starts.
Neither Morgan nor I correct him, but we do lock eyes.
“Caliburn’s kind of the oldest of the old school, except for the Russians,” mutters the stocky guy.
“Oh, well, yeah,” the dark-haired one admits. “But they’re, like, freaks, you know? All that Soviet training and shit. Oh, probably part of some government program.”
“Yeah, but they fly in from Finland,” he says. “I think they have some weird technicality. I just hope I never have to go out there to fence them. This is weird enough.” He glances up at the high table, at the masked faces.
His dark-haired companion follows his gaze. “Sheesh,” he says. “Are those guys, like, always here?”
Morgan blinks, looking attentive. “Yeah, I don’t know. I’ve heard weird stuff about the Caliburn guys.”
God, she could be a spy, I think, between what she pulled at Renfrew and this. And this doesn’t even involve any perfume magic. She’s like Mata Hari.
“Oh, they’re absolute weirdos,” the first guy confirms. “Like, all they do is fence and study. No parties, no girls.”
“What, like a No Nut November thing?” the second guy says. “Uh, sorry.” He ducks his head at me and Morgan.
“I’m familiar with the concept,” I deadpan. “You’re not offending me.”
“No,” says the first one. “I mean, like, all the time. Like, they are fully, uh, what’s the word? Chaste? I guess it’s to, like, save up their energy or something.” But he blushes a little bit. “Couldn’t be me.”
“Well, naturally,” Morgan says. She puts a hand on his shoulder and laughs. “I’m Morgan, by the way.”
“Brian,” he says. “Brian Shelton. This is Eric,” he says. “Childress. I’m fencing epee.”
“I see,” I say, surveying the first course as it’s set in front of me.
“You,” Morgan squints at Brian, “I’m going to guess saber.”
“Ha,” Brian laughs through a mouthful of salad. “No way, I’m foil.”
“Really?” I say. “Because I would have guessed carbon-based, looking at you.”
Brian frowns. Eric laughs. I laugh too. It’s a dumb joke, but it’s nice to be making dumb jokes. Doing something low-stakes, almost as if I’m a normal girl at a normal college formal.
Then my eyes drift up to the head table, and for some reason, they settle on Kai. He’s in a suit, too, of course, somehow managing to look uncomfortable, even though it fits him impeccably, from the dark red tie to the sleek lapels. And he’s giving me a murderous glance.
Kingston. He looks good. Of course he does.
He might have been born wearing a suit. His tie is a burnished gold color tucked into a waistcoat.
But when he sees me, sees me laughing with these two random guys, I guess, he pauses with his fork in midair, his mouth open a bit.
And then, like he notices that I’m noticing him, moves back into action.
I glance back at our table, not sure what to make of that. He’s never seen your scars, I think. Of course. I look down at my hands, at the rippling pink flesh that’s still so shiny it practically catches on the candlelight, and I swallow.
Morgan holds up the conversation like a caryatid on a Greek temple, speaking not just enough to cover my laconic interjections, but also the fact that Brian and Eric are two of the most boring people I’ve ever spoken with.
Once they’ve run out of comments on how weird Caliburn is, they start talking about fencing, but in the way that you might talk about fantasy football or something, not the way I’ve heard the other four talk about it.
I’m hyper-focused on scraping the last smudges of almond-chocolate torte from my plate when there’s another sound for attention.
“Students, guests, honored friends.” It’s Father Dennis, the dean of the divinity school.
He at least looks normal for a religious figure, just the clerical collar under a suit jacket as he signals for attention.
“We are grateful that you have joined us for another Candlemas Ball. As you know, this holiday is a testament to light in the darkness, to the promise of the return of warmth and life to the earth that is promised in the resurrection of our Lord.”
I’m tempted to roll my eyes, but I guess we’re all from religious schools, and that would be tacky. Besides, I’m not mad about the idea of winter being over. I shiver again, now genuinely from the cold. Morgan’s perfume must be wearing off.
“In recognition of this holiday, and to honor our guests all the way from Avignon, France, and the Monastery of St. Vincent,” he nods to the White Brothers, and the hooded heads bob back, “I have asked their prior to lead us in the lighting of the candles.”