2. Chapter Two
Chapter Two
Rafi was grateful for Briene’s impeccable manners and clear embarrassment about the entire matter, and assumed the subject was going to be politely ignored from now on.
He did as he had promised and had a pained and mostly useless talk with one of the assistant healers that very day, making arrangements for an isolation room and scheduling an appointment in a week for the assistant to check on him.
That was all Rafi really could do and he accepted it even if he wasn't content with it.
Then, because he had no other real option, he firmly pushed his aedis from his mind like all his worries about coin and his future placement, and why, aside from that one incident, he showed no other signs of an approaching heat.
He’d thrown himself into his studies with renewed dedication though he had little to show for it.
Concentrating had become difficult over the past few days with every trace of a new scent on the breeze distracting him.
The scents were wrong in indefinable ways, although Rafi suspected that if he allowed himself to dwell on them, he would be able to articulate exactly what his senses disliked so much.
Though that would likely be something that would make no sense to him outside of aedis; Katoh said she became obsessed with the smell of bread before her heats, she assumed because it reminded her of home but it could have been for any reason.
Rafi could not begin to imagine what scent he would find that soothing, and avoided that question out of necessity too.
He spent more time in the dining hall off the kitchen where students and instructors ate; if all he could smell were the layers of various foods cooked through the last century and beyond, then he could return his energies to his control problem.
Or at least, to advancing in his studies so that his aedis—and possible worsening of control—would not hinder him too much.
His friends had so far been nice enough to accommodate this.
Katoh, possibly because she felt guilty about not loaning out Laure—which Rafi had never actually asked her to do and which wouldn’t have worked now anyway with Laure’s recent slip.
Cambray, Rafi’s roommate, was there because he had a bottomless appetite and enjoyed being near the kitchen.
Cambray was no help at all with aedis matters; he was a miné but two years younger than Rafi and nowhere near able to control his own aer, much less anyone else’s.
They were studying. The mornings were for physical lessons, the afternoons for classes with instructors on protocol or languages or breakdowns of the noble factions; anything that might aid a swersoldi’s career and help keep them alive.
But evenings were free. Most students used that time to study, flirt, or go into the capital proper where they would drink, flirt some more, and get into petty squabbles with students from other schools or even bored young nobles.
Sometimes, those fights led to duels but since getting caught dueling might mean expulsion or arrest, stories of those were kept quiet.
Rafi, without much coin to begin with and liable to fall into aedis any day now, kept to academy grounds.
He suspected Katoh was staying near him in case that happened, because despite the open book in front of her she claimed to be reading, she had been mostly trying to get Rafi to talk in real terms about his plan for his heat.
Rafi ignored all the poking, attempting to determine if learning poetry would aid him in his eventual career or make him look ridiculous.
Cambray was pretending he didn’t know either of them as Katoh started talking loudly about aedis problems, including things like wet and cleanup.
Rafi kept his gaze on his book of odes from a different time.
Cambray was turned away from the two of them, and so must have seen Preteau approach first, since he stiffened and then kicked Rafi beneath the table.
By the time Rafi raised his head to ask what in Caia’s name Cambray thought he was doing, Instructor Preteau had dropped a folded piece of paper onto Rafi’s poetry book and stepped away.
“Rafeli.” She acknowledged Rafi only with his name, and that without looking at him, leaving Rafi to distantly wonder if she meant it to be discreet. Foolish, with both Katoh and Cambray speechlessly staring after her.
Rafi probably shouldn’t think of an instructor as foolish.
But several of the professors were only a decade or so older than him, and even the gray-haired ones could sometimes make questionable choices.
Maybe all swersoldi had some nonsense in their blood.
Rafi liked to think he was being sensible, not foolish, but Katoh clearly disagreed.
He looked down at the note Preteau had left for him, keenly aware of his friends’ interest as he picked it up.
The paper was finer than what they used when practicing flower-lettering—the handwriting used by educated nobles that swersoldi might be expected to read or write.
It could have been from such a noble, or at least one of a better rank than Rafi.
The black flower-letters on the front spelled out Rafeli Tizzan.
The paper was not sealed with wax and unfolded easily, filling the air with the scent of orange blossoms and clover. Rafi’s cheeks went hot. Then his neck. Then the rest of him. The writing inside was script, not flower-letters, but neat and pretty, as if the writer was skilled in all things.
I accept your invitation and suggest we meet before necessity demands it. –Viau di Ruzé.
That was all.
Rafi stared until his eyes were dry. The scent of Viau on the paper made him quiver and locked his throat tight.
He willed the words to make sense, for he had issued no invitation, would never have dared.
His entire self was afire, humiliation and arousal burning in equal measure as he considered what Briene would have said to such a figure to make him take pity like this, for this had to be pity.
Viau did not know him, as the letter indicated. Yet he had accepted.
Accepted the invitation to help Rafi through his aedis. Viau. Viau had accepted.
The air in the dining hall was stifling, heavy with the smells of countless meals.
But the hall was full of people, each of them brimming with life that Rafi wanted to take and then bury himself in.
That seemed reasonable, like hiding beneath blankets, or digging a hole in the gardens to live inside of from now on, like a desperate, embarrassed mole.
He did not reach for that aer. He took a breath and reinforced the wall between himself and all the others.
Katoh was beginning to worry, tugging at Rafi’s sleeve and patting his forehead as if she expected to find a fever.
Perhaps she did find one, because she turned to Cambray. “Must be bad news. Maybe it’s his family.”
Rafi tilted the note toward her so she wouldn’t start thinking he had to journey home to help a dying relation and he wouldn’t have to explain to her how that would never happen.
She read the note, snatched the paper from him to read it again, then gave it back before Rafi could do more than unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth.
“Viau?” she asked, pronouncing it with more of an uh at the end instead of the oh that Viau himself used with the accent from around the capital, Veeuh instead of Veeoh.
“Viau?” she demanded again, worryingly loud.
She flicked the tail of her long, straw-colored, straight hair back over her shoulder and focused on Rafi with far too much interest.
“What?” Cambray was nearly as bad. He’d never been one to gossip before. “How did you manage that?”
“Ooh, yes.” Katoh scooted in and finally lowered her voice. “Tell me everything. Was he swept off his feet by your—wait, you haven’t met? Oh, maybe he’s seen you.”
Rafi flushed hotter at her tone, which implied some sort of romantic notion.
“Across the courtyard, he catches a glimpse of a serious, yet sweet nex and turns to the person with him to ask who it is?” Cambray’s tone was doubtful but Rafi wasn’t offended. Cambray’s realism was grounding. “And happened to know that nex was in need of a partner for his first aedis?”
“The instructors arranged it,” Rafi informed them both, striving not to be visibly uncomfortable beyond his blush.
“There’s no one else who can. It’s not personal.
” He glanced at Katoh, offering a faint smile.
“I doubt he has glimpsed me, and if he did, I left no impression. Which I would not expect to. Not on someone like Viau, at least.” Rafi pronounced the name as Viau did; he had abandoned his country accent when he’d first arrived, not wanting to stand out.
“Well, he’s not going to be discouraged there once he does see you,” Cambray offered, apparently seeking to be helpful. Cambray was something of a pretty miné, with cool blue eyes, and short, but artfully messy, hair. Not at all like Laure, but he got plenty of interest too.
“Viau.” Katoh breathed the name, then narrowed her eyes thoughtfully.
She looked like a beautiful, scheming courtesan, which her mother had been.
Beautiful and scheming enough that Katoh’s father, while not officially claiming her, paid for Katoh’s education at Trianon.
“I bet he fucks like a… no, maybe he’s gentle.
Ooh, maybe both. He has to be skilled. You are going to have such a good time, Rafi. ”
“It’s pity,” Rafi reminded her, pushing down the excited, burbling aer in his chest. He refolded the note but then held it, letting a trace of Viau’s scent linger since he seemed to be the only one affected by it.
He swallowed, throat still tight, his tongue still clumsy.
His aedis was growing closer. “I should consider it medicine.”