I’d almost forgotten what he looked like. Tall, stately, dark-eyed, handsome, ropes of his hair folded over in that way that made it look like handsomeness came as easy to him as pulling on an ornate robe, and only now with a scowl slashed across his face. Kept some distance from me as he took his chair. I looked over. Didn’t know what to say, nor if I should even try. I missed his face and I missed his smell and my heart strained at my ribs, yearning to hop into Kaspar’s hands again. Even if I was scared to death he’d crush it. “Where’ve you been?” I mouthed silently as Field started today’s spiel. He saw me. Didn’t answer. I tried to give up, but my heart wouldn’t let go.

  Field waved at a heap of hinged boxes atop her desk, piled next to the little potted cactus I’d rushed out for yesterday evening. Made it to class before anyone else and she’d taken it along with my best attempt at an apology, and I knew I had more to make up to her, but I was trying. And then she laid a deft finger on the topmost box and the lid flung open with a rippling pop. “Sound and vision, my esteemed learners, sound and vision indeed. All noise is organised shockwaves, and today you become the maestros of your own symphonies – or for the time being, cacophonies will suffice.”

  She marched down the aisle handing out the boxes to either side, took a look at me and Kaspar, and left the final two in front of me. I grumbled and slid one down to him, and he muttered a thanks. “No problem,” I said, and that was the end of it. Shame. I had a nice line cued up about what Field normally offered out to us being a lot more un-hinged than these but I wasn’t letting Kaspar have that, not today.

  I’d resolved not to care about Stack and the others, and I found I just couldn’t stretch it to Kaspar too. Still I knew I had to focus on myself. Stop fighting everything. Pick what was worth my efforts. Ignore the barking of the dogs. I closed my eyes amid the vague mumble of uncertain chatter in the room and drew my attention inwards. There. Right there. The buzz in my muscles, distant, growing familiar, the leaden weight of the thing growing with it. Growing as I did. Steady, measured breaths in my lungs. Pressure in my chest. A buzzing rising, writhing, flickering and itching, clawing, scratching, begging to be used. I channelled it, chained it, choked it – a conduit for the power flowing through me. One hand on the box, I impelled it forth, and the lid shot open with a pop.

  Everyone looked at me. We were barely ten minutes in. I didn’t care, and I sat back, and allowed myself a little smile.

  “Good work,” said Field as she approached in a tone like she’d expected the whole thing. “How about something more? Specific sounds, repetitions, perhaps something more complex?”

  “I’m happy with this,” I said, “if that’s okay.”

  “We’ve got plenty of time. Why not challenge yourself?”

  “I’m happy with this,” I repeated. A hundred Dreadfall voices yelled in my mind to fight stronger, hit it harder, and I refused to listen. “If the class is on track for the exam everyone keeps on about then I don’t wanna push ahead.”

  She tilted her head. “In that case, I’m sure your renowned peer would be grateful for your insight on how you –”

  “I’m fine,” Kaspar said.

  Field gazed at him. “Indeed, Rudd.” She straightened the collar of her robe and made to leave, then turned back. “I was short for time before class, Oakley. Your gesture was appreciated and your efforts to return to the right path will bear many fruits if you persist. Others would do well to learn from you, indeed.”

  So it was tense now it was just the two of us again. Yes, the rest of the class were still there, still figuring the new arcany, but when I was near Kaspar, it was only really the two of us there. For better or worse. I splayed a hand and pressed my fingers into the table. Let it drift ever so carefully a few shades in his direction. “Do you –”

  “No.”

  “Okay,” I said. Sighed. Considered repeating the conjury I’d done but it drained you like your blood was made of treacle, and I knew I should conserve myself where I could. “Where do you keep going?”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Away.”

  “Where?”

  He grumbled and turned his box over with more force than it needed. “What is this transfixion you have with my private life?”

  “Because I care about you,” I hissed. "The stuff we’ve been, the stuff we’ve done. Don’t you care for me back?”

  “Of course I do but your incessant prying is quite a drag. I’d really rather our relationship was about who we are here and now, with each other, not where we’ve come from. I don’t poke around in your prior circumstances,” he said, and turned over the box again. “Perchance I should.”

  “That’s different!” I insisted. “I had to escape where I came from. But you’re clearly from somewhere far better because you make that very obvious in every room you enter.”

  “So insightful of you to presume I didn’t also have to escape.”

  “Yeah! Cos whatever problem you face, you either pay to fix it or skip past it. Normal people don’t have that luxury.”

  “Normal people don’t have the luxury of effortlessly transforming their learning into instant praxis, yet here you are, the fabled golden hero.”

  I gritted my teeth and planted my hand on the desk, right by his own. "Must suck to have finally found something your endless money can’t solve for you, huh?”

  The stool scraped as he shot to his feet and I braced for the retort but none came. He chewed snidely on his lip, then left the room without a word, just a billowing of the robe. And I knew everyone must be looking but at least they had the barest decency not to toss a comment over. I didn’t have enough rocks to be dealing with that right now.

  *

  I returned to my cold room immediately after class and I’d barely hit my bed when the door swung open. Like he’d been waiting for me. I bristled where I sat and he shut the door behind him. “To answer your question from before, Forester, sometimes I leave and take time to myself instead because unlike you, I was raised properly and know how to excuse myself when my presence is no longer wanted.”

  “That wasn’t my question,” I said.

  “Learn to cope with disappointment."

  I stuck my head in my case study book but he didn’t go anywhere. Not towards me nor away. “I thought you said you knew how to leave.”

  “Am I wanted here?”

  “Of course you’re wanted!” I said. “I care for you – or I try to, anyway. Gets harder every week that goes by. I just don’t know what’s going on with you! Stuff seemed great for a while and then, well, this happened. Whatever this is.”

  “Because you keep upstaging me. That’s what it is.” He took a couple steps closer. “Everything you do, it’s like you have to be better than me. You get the privilege of some freakish natural aptitude, but don’t you see how it affects me? Being second to you the whole time? Or do you see it and just not care.”

  I sat up straight. “Oh, so this is about your weird little rich family and your inferiority complex to your older brother again, huh? Cos he’s gonna be, what, the king of your little family merchant company you can’t tell me anything about?”

  He speared me with his gaze. “No, it’s because he’s going to be the Duke of Avernorria and because he gets everything he ever wants, right where he wants it, how he wants it, and I have to work my fucking ass off to get second place at everything – a second place which ultimately isn’t worth a single damned copper shard.” He stood like he was missing a crown atop his head. “Does that satisfy you now? Your fantastical, fanatical demand for answers – does it make you feel better?”

  “He’s the… what, sorry?”

  Kaspar looked at me in a way that reduced me to a street wretch, below his dignity. “My brother, the heir. My mother, the Duchess Avernas. Act as smart as you think you are and work it out.” My guts churned like a whirlpool. “My best hope in life is that I’m never needed, because if I am, something has gone so badly wrong that the entire country will never forget it. If I never get what he has, that’s good for everyone. If I do get what he has, that’s a national tragedy. Do you fucking see now? I’ve lived my entire life as a shadow, an understudy, hoping I never get what I’ve worked myself to the bone to be, if ever needed. So come on, golden student – are you surprised there’s a hint of resentment when I finally wrest myself free enough to create my own path, to live a life of my own for the very first time, and what I get from it is –” He gestured at me like you would the stinking trash that someone else was meant to take out a week ago.

  “I didn’t mean to make you feel bad,” was all I could choke out. I pulled my robe tight. Not that it was really mine anyway. "I’m sorry you’re hurting, Kaspar.”

  “Since you’re so good at all your classes, here’s a fun lesson for you: keep your multicoloured nose out of other people’s business and keep your weird, scratchy hands out of other people’s pockets.”

  I looked down at my knees, my eyes watering. Heard the door open and close. Pressed my palms to my face and when the door clicked open again a moment later I rose with a fury, ready to make him properly hurt, ready to see his royal blood on the walls, but it was Holly and Grove. Just Holly and Grove.

  “Storm and thunder, what happened there?” she asked, drawing close. Grove messed with the Ooh, whirring it into an orange warmth.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Sorry if you heard any of that.” Forced myself to breathe. “Hey, I guess now I’ve got a clear answer to whether we’re actually together or not.”