23. Alexander
ALEXANDER
“So we’re leaving the Academy, then?” Alexander hears as he opens his door.
“We’re leaving.”
When Alexander steps all the way into the room, his friends spin toward him.
“You’re leaving,” Alexander says, not a question.
Zeno eyes him warily. “Wh—What do you mean?”
“He heard it,” Eudoxos says, shaking his head. “We should just tell him.”
Zeno looks at Alexander, then back to Eudoxos. “Xia, are you sure? It’s your call.”
It stings that Zeno doesn’t trust him. But to protect Eudoxos, Zeno would do anything.
Plus it’s clear that—
Wait a second.
Xia?
“We’re leaving,” Eudoxos confirms. “Kleitos is… blackmailing me, basically. I have no choice. I have to go.”
“And you’re going with him?” Alexander asks the other two.
“Yeah, they’re coming with me,” Eudoxos says, brushing it aside. “But, Alexander. You can’t tell anyone, okay? You have to promise me.”
“I—I don’t…” he starts.
“Don’t worry. You won’t get into trouble. No one will think that you heard anything.”
“What does Kleitos know?” Alexander blurts.
Eudoxos sighs like it physically pains him, then sticks his hand out for a shake. “Eudoxia.”
It takes an embarrassingly long moment for Alexander’s high school Latin to kick in. Eudoxia, the feminine ending. He takes Eudoxos—no—Eudoxia’s hand.
The weirdest part of it all is that this discovery isn’t weird. It makes enough sense that he can’t understand how he didn’t see it earlier.
“So this is why you’re leaving? He’ll report you for pretending to be… like, a boy?”
Zeno opens his mouth to add on, but Eudoxia stops him with a hand in the air. “The punishments are steeper here than you might think. So, yeah.”
“Right,” Alexander says, backing toward the door. He needs to talk to Kallias. “Okay, well, I have to go… But good luck with all this.”
It doesn’t dawn on him that his friends will find his immediate exit suspicious until he starts making it.
“Wait, Alex,” Zeno says in a placating tone, “you don’t have to go anywhere, okay? Just stay here, and we can talk it out.”
“I’m not going to tell on you, I swear. I just… I need to talk to someone. Stay here, all of you. I’ll be back.”
“Alexander, wait,” Zeno calls out behind him.
On his way out, he hears a shouted “Shit!” and the sound of someone kicking a wall hard. Eudoxia really is stronger than she looks.
Alexander sprints three doors down to Kallias’ room. He knocks once, and when he’s met with silence, he hits the door frantically. The rooms may be soundproof, but, somehow, noise always makes it through the door, so he knows Kallias can hear him.
After ten seconds of furious banging, the door swings open to show a very sleepy-looking Kallias. And also a very shirtless Kallias.
Shirtless Kallias is definitely a… good Kallias. His skin is pale but not too pale, and a flush paints his throat and cheeks.
And sleepy Kallias? With pillow creases and bed hair and squinting eyes? He doesn’t even have the words for that.
“Kallias,” he greets.
Why is he here again?
“Alexander,” Kallias replies.
Oh, right.
“Kallias,” Alexander repeats. “We need to talk.”
Alexander slips into the room through the gap between Kallias and the doorframe, and behind him he hears Kallias mumble, “Yeah, sure. Come right in. Thanks for asking.”
The room is neat, with a small bed in the corner, a balcony overlooking the sea, some food containers on the desk, and not much else. Like Kallias did everything he could to avoid giving it a personality.
Kallias sighs and leans against his door. It makes Alexander want to box him in and push him against the wall and—Christ!
Kallias really needs to put on a shirt.
“What is it?” Kallias asks, badly masking his curiosity.
“Zeno, Eudo…xos, and a friend of theirs. I heard them talking…” Alexander trails off. How can he best phrase this to get Kallias to say yes?
“And?” Kallias prompts.
“And they’re trying to leave. The Academy. They have to, or else something bad will happen, and I was thinking they could help us.”
Kallias rolls his eyes. “You mean we could help them. Eudoxos isn’t a complete idiot, but there’s no way he has a plan when we don’t even have half of one.”
“Fine, Kallias. However you want to look at it. But I think we should fill them in.”
Now that the possibility of bringing his friends along is being dangled in front of him, he can’t imagine leaving without them. He hadn’t even realized until now how much he would miss them.
Kallias zones out, calculating. “What does that do for us? It’s just more mouths to feed.”
“We’ll have more mouths, period. More hands.
Everything we’ve come up with so far would be easier with more people.
” Alexander closes the distance between them and grabs Kallias’ chin, turning it toward him so they’re making eye contact.
“I’m not selfless, Kallias. I’m not saying we should recruit them because it’s ‘the right thing to do.’ It’s strategy. It’s all strategy.”
He doesn’t feel guilty for the lie. In fact, it’s not even really a lie—it is a good move to get more people on their side. But also, he knows this argument will appeal most to Kallias. Telling him he’d be sad without his friends wouldn’t get him anywhere.
He must be hallucinating, because he thinks he sees Kallias’ eyes briefly dropping to his mouth before flicking back up.
Kallias glares, and Alexander has to force himself to let go of his chin instead of pulling him into a kiss and letting a hand drift to his perfect waist and—
“Fine,” Kallias says. “Tell them. But know that I have a priority, and that priority is you and me.”
You and me.
Alexander nods with an involuntary grin, and Kallias’ eyes widen, head tilting to the side.
“Yay,” Alexander exclaims. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” He kisses Kallias on the cheek repeatedly until Kallias yanks his hair back so they’re nose to nose. Kallias’ cheeks are bright pink.
“I’m not your keeper, dumbass. You can do whatever you want.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s just your luck that what I want is whatever you want.”
Kallias glares again, and then his eyes drop, and Alexander is definitely not hallucinating. Alexander lets his eyes do the same, dropping to Kallias’ lips.
Are they about to—
“Okay, get out, you dunce,” Kallias says, pulling on his hair harder.
One day he’ll work up the courage to make this boy his. But today, Alexander just laughs and backs up to let Kallias open the door.
“See ya, gorgeous.” Alexander beams from the hallway.
“Goodnight, dolt,” Kallias says, glare melting into something softer that Alexander doesn’t really have a name for yet.
“You’re back,” Zeno says, staring up at him from the floor like he’s not sure if he should be relieved or terrified.
“I’m back.” At the sound of his voice, Ophelia and Eudoxia shoot upright from where they were curled up in Zeno’s bed. “I didn’t tell anyone,” Alexander starts, before amending, “Well, I did, but not how you think.”
“What does that mean?” Eudoxia asks.
“I had to talk to Kallias.”
“Kallias?!” Eudoxia and Zeno yell at the same time.
“Why, dude?” Zeno begs. “Why?”
“Because we’re leaving too,” Alexander yells, cutting off their complaints. “He and I. We’ve been planning for weeks.”
Everything in the room goes silent and still.
“You’re running away?” Zeno asks hesitantly.
“Technically, I’m running back.” He takes a deep breath to brace himself. They won’t trust him if he doesn’t tell them the truth; he just hopes they’ll forgive him. “I don’t… I don’t belong here, Zee. I’m from somewhere else.”
“Yeah, I know. The countryside.”
Alexander can’t help a laugh. “A little further.”
When it’s clear that no one understands what he’s saying, Alexander addresses the ceiling and continues, “I washed up on shore in a shipwreck. I’m not from the Republic. There’s more out there, beyond the walls. And I need to go home. Or, at least, get out of here.”
He doesn’t have to glance down at them to know they’re shocked silent.
“I talked to Kallias, and we decided that… Well, we needed more hands anyway. And if you guys don’t already have a plan, which I presume you don’t, you could leave with us.”
“I have money,” Ophelia says. “Lots. It’ll be helpful. So, you know, we have something to offer, too.”
Alexander smiles at her. “Nice.” Then he looks back to his two best friends. “So, what do you guys say?”
Zeno gives Alexander a you better explain this all soon look but nods tightly.
Then Eudoxia glances at Zeno, and her face breaks into a grin. “Yes.”