Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/11987628.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      Multi
  Fandom:
      Supernatural_RPF
  Relationship:
      Jensen_Ackles/Jared_Padalecki, Jensen_Ackles/Other(s), Jared_Padalecki/
      Other(s)
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe, Alternate_Universe_-_Kushiel's_Legacy_Fusion,
      Prostitution, Indentured_Servitude, Consensual_Underage_Sex
  Stats:
      Published: 2017-09-03 Updated: 2018-03-16 Chapters: 2/? Words: 69305
****** Nightblooming Flowers ******
by deadlybride
Summary
     In Terre d'Ange, to be trained as a courtesan in the Court of
     Nightblooming Flowers is a life to be envied. Jared was born for the
     life; Jensen was not.
Notes
     The series of books by Jacqueline Carey set in Terre d'Ange depict a
     fictional world only a step to the left of our own. As will quickly
     become clear, it's a setting which corresponds to the 1700s, roughly,
     complete with candlelight and coaches and, unfortunately, indentured
     servitude. The characters within the universe don't regard indenture
     as slavery, and so I tagged appropriately, but be aware that there is
     some talk of buying and selling people's bonds.
See the end of the work for more notes
***** Balm *****
It's summer, with sun poured like thick honey over the garden of Balm House.
Jared, Thomas, and Sandra are playing hide and seek under the indulgent eye of
Marina, one of the younger adepts. Sophia sits at Marina's feet while the adept
combs out her long dark hair, and Jared would try to get her to join them but
he knows it's no use. The adepts say Sophia, with her poise and dignity
apparent even at eight years old, is bound for Dahlia House, and Jared can see
why. He thinks no one must have any fun at Dahlia, so Sophia will fit right in.
It's Sandra's turn to count, and Jared has hidden himself behind one of the low
stone benches. He doesn't trust Sandra not to peek, though—she's naughty, no
matter how prettily she acts with the adepts—and so he's watching from just
over the top of the bench when Honore appears in the doorway to the house.
"Come along," she says, in her kindest voice. Jared pops his head up a little
further and sees that there's a boy behind her, standing in the shadows of the
corridor that leads down into the garden. He's pale-skinned and covered with
bruises. Big purple splotches over his eye and cheek and jaw. He's wearing only
a too-large shirt that falls down to just above his knees, and there are
bruises there, too, and scratches on his shins like Jared gets when he falls
down. Sandra has pulled her hands away from her eyes, but Jared doesn't yell
for Marina that she's cheating, because he has forgotten the game, too. The boy
looks like he's maybe a few years older than Jared—maybe older than Thomas,
even—but Honore is touching his shoulder very gently and even so he looks like
he's just seconds away from crying.
Jared exchanges a look with Thomas, who has stood up from his hiding spot
behind one of the big ferns. Thomas is a little nervous-looking, but that's to
be expected. Everyone knows that when he comes of age Thomas will stay in Balm
House, with his calm and gentle nature, but he's so sympathetic that he can't
stand to see anyone crying. Marina is still sitting on the edge of the
fountain, her hands quiet on Sophia's shoulders, and Honore is just waiting for
the boy to come down into the garden. Jared bites his lip, then sucks in a deep
breath and stands, walks right over to Honore's side.
"Hello," he says. "Do you want to come out and play with us?"
This close, he can see that the boy has very pretty eyes—green, with flecks of
gold, and the places on his skin that aren't bruised or scratched are dusted
with fine, cinnamon-colored freckles. Jared thinks he might be prettier even
than Sophia, and hopes she won't be jealous. 
The boy doesn't say anything, though he looks a little less like he's going to
cry. Thank goodness. Jared can handle Sandra's weeping fits, but she's easily
distracted with a joke or a game and Jared's good at those. This boy looks like
he has more reason for crying and Jared doesn't know how to comfort him yet.
"Maybe Jensen can just watch for now," Honore suggests, in her gentle way, and
Jared nods.
"You can help make sure Sandra doesn't cheat," he says.
"I don't cheat!" comes a little, indignant shriek from behind Jared, and he
grins. It startles a small smile out of the boy (Jensen, Jared thinks), too,
and that only makes Jared smile wider.
"Come," he says, holding out his hand, and after a second Jensen takes it.
Honore gives Jared a smile and ruffles his hair before he tugs at Jensen's
hand, leading down the steps to the fountain where Marina and Sophia are
seated.
"This is my new friend, Jensen," he announces.
Marina smiles. She's eighteen, having been dedicated to Naamah's service for
two years, and may be even kinder than Honore. "I'm very pleased to meet you,
Jensen," she says. Jared can see the way her eyes flick over Jensen, taking in
his battered appearance, but there's no change to her mild expression. He
squeezes Jensen's hand and looks up at him, trying to see if he noticed, but it
doesn't look like he's any more upset. Just a little lost.
"This is Marina," Jared says, nodding at her. "She's nice. And this is Sophia,
and that's Sandra, and there's Thomas," he continues, pointing at each. "We all
live here."
Honore beckons to the other children, and they come closer, gathering around
Marina in a curious cluster. "Jensen will be living with us here at Balm
House," she says, her fingertips settling gently on his shoulder. "The Dowayne
owns his marque now, just like she owns all of yours."
Jensen's hand spasms in Jared's grip, fingers squeezing so tightly that it
hurts. Jared bites his tongue rather than make a sound and, luckily, the grip
relaxes after a few seconds.
Marina exchanges a look with Honore, then gives Jensen another smile as she
stands. "Come and sit by the fountain," she says, gesturing with a graceful
hand. "It's about time for luncheon. Shall we have it outside today?"
There's a chorus of assent from the children and Marina nods, then kisses
Jared's cheek. She takes Honore's arm and they head back into the house, heads
together as they whisper about something. Jared assumes they're going to summon
one of the servants.
Once the adepts are gone, there's a minute of silence while the other children
examine Jensen. He keeps his eyes on the ground and doesn't let go of Jared's
hand. "How old are you?" Sandra says, at last, bold as she always is.
Jensen startles. "I'm eleven," he says, finally, in a scratchy voice.
"I'm seven," Sandra announces. The rest of them echo her—Jared's also seven,
Sophia eight, and Thomas nine. 
"Which house did you live in before you came to Balm?" Thomas says. 
Jensen's hand clenches around Jared's fingers again, and this time Jared
squeezes back. Jensen doesn't look up. "I don't—I didn't live in the Night
Court."
Jared blinks, confused. Thomas frowns, delicately, then his expression clears
up. "So this is your first time here?" he says. Jensen nods, and Sandra looks
like she's going to ask another question, but Thomas speaks again first. "Do
you know which house you'll end up in?"
Jensen shakes his head. His eyes are shiny, like he wants to cry but isn't
letting himself.
"I don't know anything about the Court," he says, and his voice is even
scratchier. "I grew up outside the City of Elua, we didn't really..." He shakes
his head again and doesn't finish, but a few tears roll down his cheeks anyway.
Sandra and Thomas look like they're going to cry, too, and Jared's stomach
hurts. Sophia looks up at Jensen from her perch on the edge of the fountain and
says, calmly, "You have a lot to learn before you can be dedicated into
Naamah's service."
Jensen nods, but he looks miserable. Jared doesn't know what to say, but he
does know what he's good at. He tugs a little at Jensen's hand, enough to make
Jensen look down at him, and then stands on his tiptoes to wrap his arms around
Jensen's neck in a hug. There are bruises here, too, on his neck and on his
shoulder where his too-big shirt has gaped open. It's only a second before
Jensen's squeezing back, hard, even though it must hurt.
There's a delicate sound of a throat being cleared, and Jared opens his eyes to
find Marina returned, accompanied by two servants laden with baskets and a
steaming tureen—the good fish stew Cook makes, by the smell. Jared lets go of
Jensen, a little reluctantly, and then there's a flurry of activity: the maid
lays down a blanket, and the children all accept a bowl and a hunk of fresh,
crusty bread, then settle themselves in a haphazard circle in the sunshine. The
flagstone under them is warm enough to send heat up through the blanket and a
breeze picks up, surrounding them with the scent of honeysuckle and lavender
that's planted in the garden. Jared shuffles over a little, making a space, and
Jensen carefully sinks to his backside, flinching a little before he's
settled. 
Sandra begins to whine artfully to Marina that she would like her hair combed,
too, and how she doesn't think it's fair that Sophia always gets special
treatment. Sophia tosses her head and says something about Sandra being too
ill-behaved to merit such things, and under the ensuing argument Jensen leans
in close to Jared.
"What's your name?" he whispers, so quietly Jared can hardly hear it.
"Oh!" he says, but lowers his voice to a whisper, too. "I'm Jared."
Jensen gives him a smile—tiny, but there. He looks over to where Sandra is
pouting and Sophia is pretending not to, and whispers, "Are they always like
that?"
"Usually," Jared says. "We all grew up here, but probably only Thomas is going
to stay in Balm. The adepts say he'll be just right in the bedchamber, once he
can take patrons. See how nice he is?" He nods to where Thomas is listening
politely to whatever Marina is saying, genteelly ignoring the two girls and
eating his lunch with grace.
Jensen bites his lip. His mouth is full, a pale pink, and Jared wonders if
maybe he'll end up in Cereus for how delicate he seems. "You're nice, too," he
says, after a second, and Jared feels himself flush all over with pleasure at
the compliment. Jensen blushes, too, over the top of his bruises, and he's such
a mess of colors that Jared almost laughs. When Jensen shifts, though, to pick
up his bowl, and flinches with his whole body, Jared remembers himself. He
wants to ask so many questions. But Jensen is looking sad again, carefully
rubbing at his arm under his shirt, and so Jared just settles down to his own
stew and lets Jensen lean on him a little, even if Jared is smaller, and tries
to tell Jensen everything there is to know about Balm House. It's the most
soothing of the Court of Nightblooming Flowers, where patrons come to the
adepts for healing as much as they come for the pleasures of the bedchamber.
The Dowayne is kind, Jared tells Jensen, and has a habit of taking in unwanted
children from the other houses when the adepts are made pregnant by their
patrons and the child doesn't throw true to the house's canon.
"Is that where you came from?" Jensen asks. He's blushing again, for some
reason.
"My mother was in Camellia," he says, nodding. "Their canon is perfection," he
explains, when Jensen looks confused. "The patron who got me on her wasn't a
good match and their Dowayne didn't want to keep me, so they sold me to Balm."
Jensen takes a bite of stew and chews it slowly. "Do you miss her?" he says,
very quietly. "Your mother, I mean."
Jared puts his empty bowl down and hugs his knees against his chest, watching a
hummingbird flirt with a spray of honeysuckle above their heads. "I don't
remember her. I came to Balm when I was two and the adepts here take care of
us. I don't know who she is, just what the adepts told me."
It's a fact of his life and he isn't sad about it. The nature of their service
to Naamah makes unwanted children an inevitability, but the Court always finds
a place for them, one way or another. Jensen, though, looks sad enough for both
of them. He's quiet for the rest of the meal, and when Marina leads them in a
cheerful rhyming song after, he only watches.
That night while the children bathe Jensen gets special help from Honore.
Thomas is turned away, thoughtful as ever, but Jared can't help but watch while
she pulls the shirt carefully over Jensen's head, revealing a pale, slender
body, which would be pretty if it weren't for the bruising. More of that awful
dark purple mars his hip and side, spreading up to hide under the big white
bandage wrapped around his middle. When Honore starts to dab a fragrant
ointment onto Jensen's face he flinches, hard, and Jared wants to leap up from
his own bath and hold his hand again. Honore catches his eye, though, and gives
him a look full of enough chiding that his face heats and he turns away,
splashing through his bathing as fast as he can. The girls are already done,
toweling off while Sandra chatters away to Sophia, and Thomas and Jared soon
join them in changing into their sleep clothes.
"Wait," he hears, and turns to see Jensen flushed, skin damp and shining. He
gestures at the bundle of cloth Honore is holding, red-faced and seemingly
embarrassed, one hand hovering over his groin. "Can I—please, may I—"
"We'll give you new clothes, Jensen," Honore says, and Jared can tell she's
confused.
Jensen hesitates, but it's clear what he wants, and Honore pauses only for a
second before she shakes the shirt out again. "It's fine," she says, soothing,
and helps him to lift it over his head, settling the old linen down over his
hips again. She touches his jaw, gently. "I'm sure my brother will be pleased
enough to let you keep it."
Jared frowns, not understanding, but then Honore turns and catches him
watching. Jensen follows her gaze and startles at seeing Jared still there in
the doorway to the sleeping chambers. "Jared," Honore says, and it's as close
as she ever gets to scolding.
"I'm sorry," he says, stomach twisting, and he really means it.
Honore sighs, but shakes her head and reaches down for Jensen's hand. "You'll
be sharing with Jared, for tonight at least, so perhaps it's just as well."
Jared bites down on a smile, upset forgotten, and Jensen smiles back—if a
little more cautiously. Honore leads the way down the short corridor to the
room all the children share. Sophia and Sandra are already under the covers,
Sandra looking seconds away from sleep, and Thomas stands next to the bed he
and Jared usually share. "I wasn't sure," he says, glancing at Jensen, and
Honore cups her hand around his black curls, presses a kiss to his forehead.
While Honore lets Sandra and Jared argue about which bedtime story they would
like, a manservant appears with a low cot, which he spreads with blankets and
cushions before departing with a short bow. Thomas takes the cot without being
asked, and Jared helps steady Jensen as he sinks to their bed's mattress, body
stiff with pain. With Jared distracted, Sandra successfully sues for the story
of Blessed Elua's birth. Honore blows out all the candles but the taper next to
her chair and Jared whispers, "It's okay if you fall asleep, don't worry," in
Jensen's ear, earning him another startled look but also another little smile.
Honore has a sweet voice. She isn't as good of a storyteller as Brother Olivier
who came to instruct them in the history of Elua and his angels, but she's good
enough, and Jared settles carefully into Jensen's side as she begins. She
speaks simply of the death of the One God's son by the soldiers of Tiberium,
frightened and made cruel by it. Then, how the Magdalene wept over the body of
Yeshua, and how her tears melded with his blood upon the earth and up sprang a
new life, that of Blessed Elua, best and brightest of angels. Jared's favorite
part is how the Followers of Elua rebelled against Heaven for love of him, and
when Honore speaks of Naamah he can't help looking to Jensen to see if he's
smiling, too—but he isn't, for he's asleep. His features are softened even
further in rest, lashes dark on his cheeks, and he has turned away from the
candlelight, his face tilted toward Jared's on the pillow. Jared settles down,
too, and closes his eyes while Honore speaks more quietly of Elua coming to
Terre d'Ange, of he and the angels making the land beautiful and threading the
mortals with their heavenly blood. It isn't long before Honore stops telling
the story. The soft breath of the other children fills the nursery. She comes
over to their bed and presses a kiss to Jared's tousled hair, and he smiles at
her, slipping inevitably down towards sleep. She drops a kiss onto Jensen's
head, too, and it's to her murmur of, "Sleep well, darling," that Jared finally
closes his eyes, and is gone.
                                       *
Over the time the follows, life slips into routine once again. Jensen sleeps a
little more than the rest of the children, but Marina explains quietly to Jared
that it's because he's trying to heal and that they should let him rest. He
does join them in their lessons, but he's missed so much that Jared and the
others end up helping to teach him in their free time, while they're at play or
during meals. Jensen already knows how to read and write, and quite well if the
adepts' surprise is anything to go by, and so while Jared and the rest are
studying at poetry or their letters, he's free to attend the adepts in their
rooms, to see how a bedchamber ought to be prepared for a patron, or how to
serve prettily at table. He's quiet, even quieter than Thomas, but Jared can
tell he's clever for how quickly he understands everything that the adepts can
show him. He even practices kneeling abeyante with Jared, though it pulls at
his bruises and Jared can tell it hurts. "I have to learn," is all he says, in
his low murmur, and Jared can't disagree.
His eyes are still shadowed, though, and even as his bruises slowly fade and
Honore finally removes the bandages from his ribs—broken, Jared learned, and
why Jensen rarely plays with them—he stays quiet, sleeps hard but troubled.
Gradually, Jared and the others gather the gossip from the adepts. How it was
Honore's brother, the soldier, who'd brought Jensen to Balm House, battered and
ill-used as he was. How his parents were dead, and the soldier had seen how
beautiful the boy was, and how in need of healing, and how he and his sister
had pleaded his case to the Dowayne, to take in a too-old fosterling and let
him recover in this most gentle of houses.
"Why not give him to the Sanctuary of Elua?" one of the girls says, leading the
children in the practice of arranging flowers. She says it quietly enough that
Jensen can't hear, on the other side of the chamber, but Jared can.
The male adept with them shushes her, but glances Jensen's way nevertheless.
"Look at him," he says, voice low but fervent. "That shouldn't be wasted on the
priesthood."
Jared flushes a little, to hear them talk of Jensen that way, but he can't help
but look, too. With his skin unmarred and back to the smooth pale gold of
health, Jensen is beautiful. His lack of training almost makes him more
appealing, for his embarrassment at mistakes is sweet. The adepts are kinder
about his mistakes than they are with Jared's, that's certain.
When Jensen has been with them for a few months and summer has slipped away
into autumn, a visitor comes to the house. In the nursery, Sophia and Thomas
are practicing their singing, and Sandra and Jared are helping Jensen to
memorize the royal family tree, when Honore comes into the room, trailed by a
strange man. Jared has enough time to see that the man shares Honore's honey-
colored hair and her fair skin before Jensen scrambles up to his feet, with no
poise at all.
"Hello, Jensen," the man says, and his voice is gentle, his face pleased.
Jensen looks back and forth between the man and Honore, and she smiles at him.
"Luc wanted to see you, to see how well you're doing," she says, and beckons
for Jensen to come closer. He does, after a brief pause, and Luc smiles
broadly, no artifice in it. Now that Jared is looking more closely, he can
recognize the doublet the man is wearing, embroidered with a silver swan. A
soldier, Jared thinks, and then realizes that this is Honore's brother, the man
who brought Jensen to Balm.
"I'm glad to see you," Luc says, easing down onto one knee. It puts him a
little below Jensen's height, but he's still taller than Jared. His features
aren't as fine as Honore's, but there's a certain charm to him. "I was worried
about you, but Honore says that you're doing well here."
The other children have pulled a little away, urged by Thomas, but Jared makes
no attempt to hide his interest. Jensen's hands are clutched together behind
his back, but he doesn't look scared exactly.
"She is very kind," Jensen says, after a moment, and it's at least relatively
smooth. "Everyone has been very generous with me."
"Jensen is a very good student," Honore puts in. "He will be a credit to the
house."
"I'm sure he will," Luc says, eyes tracking over Jensen's face. He seems
content to look for a moment, but then says, "Are you happy?"
Jared bites his tongue and can see Honore's expression flicker. Anyone who's
been with Jensen for more than a few hours knows that, no, he isn't happy, but
there's no way for Luc to know that. To draw attention to such things goes
directly against the credo of Balm House and so Jared has been doing his best
not to, wishing to avoid upsetting Jensen any further.
He's surprised when, after another little pause, Jensen smiles at Luc and his
hands relax behind his back. "Of course," he says. "And it's all thanks to
you." Luc blinks, but his smile goes shy and pleased, and Jensen steps forward,
presses a lingering kiss to either of Luc's cheeks. When he pulls back Jared
can see that Luc is enchanted. Jared would be, too, if he didn't think Jensen
was fooling.
"I still have your shirt," Jensen says, quietly, ducking his head.
Luc stares for a second. He's a few years older than Honore, perhaps twenty-
five, but at that moment he seems barely older than Jensen himself, surprised
and pink-cheeked. He clears his throat. "Keep it," he says, and his voice is a
little rough.
While Jared's still frowning, Honore puts a hand to Luc's shoulder. "Come," she
says, firmer than usual. "Perhaps we can see the Dowayne before you go. I'm
sure she'd like to speak with you."
He nods, abstracted, but stands at her urging. At his full height, Jensen comes
only to mid-chest on him. Luc reaches out a hand and cups Jensen's smooth cheek
in one palm. "I'll see you again," he says, a queer note in his voice, and then
Honore tugs on his arm and they're leaving, Luc glancing over his shoulder for
one last look.
The meeting unsettles them for the rest of the day. They return only with
difficulty to their studies, and Jared tries to catch Jensen's eye but he's
focused on the memorization of noble houses he and Sandra had been working on
and it's no use. It's only later, when they've eaten and bathed and been tucked
into bed, that the strange attitude Jensen has been carrying fades. He turns
into Jared's side in the dark, breath coming strange and heavy, and Jared
realizes only after he's already embraced Jensen's shoulders that he's crying,
quietly but hard. The others are sleeping, and Jared can't see a thing, but he
holds Jensen close anyway, mumbles soothing noises into the soft waves of his
hair.
It takes a few minutes for it to subside. When the shudders stop, Jensen takes
in a deep, cleansing breath, then lets it out on a humorless little laugh. "I'm
sorry," he says, in the humid warmth between their bodies.
"It's alright," Jared says. He can feel Jensen's breath coming thickly against
his forehead, and snuggles down so that his head rests on Jensen's chest, over
his heart. "I don't mind."
Another minute passes, quiet enough that Jared can hear the thud of the
heartbeat under his ear, getting gradually slower. The room's chilly, as the
servants haven't yet started lighting the braziers at night. Jensen's warm,
though, and Jared pulls the blanket up around his shoulders, creating a little
cocoon for them both. 
"When the soldiers came," Jensen starts, his voice caught around a whisper,
"Luc was the one who pulled me out, looked after me while we rode into the
City."
Jared stays quiet. Haltingly, Jensen tells a story, but it's a true one, truer
than the stories about Blessed Elua or Naamah or any of the other angels,
because it happened to someone Jared knows, to his friend. Once, there was a
man born in Camlach, in the cold mountains, to a d'Angeline woman who'd fallen
in love with one of the Skaldi. He was a soldier, for a while, but had a
distaste for violence, and didn't fit with the Camaelines because he didn't
want to fight and because they distrusted his Skaldi blood. He left the
mountains and came down to Azzalle, by the sea, to learn a different trade. He
worked on ships, and in the fields, and one day when he came to the market he
met a beautiful Azzallese woman. She was alone, too, but proud, and she admired
how he didn't hide his Skaldi heritage, liked his rougher features and gentle
ways. They soon married, and had a son.
The man bought a wagon with his hard-earned wages, and with his wife and baby
began a traveler's life, selling small goods and repair work to people along
the roads and making a decent living. The wife sang, and could recite poetry
like a Mendicant, and she'd grown up in a Sanctuary and so could read and
write. She taught her skills to her little boy, and the man taught him to ride
and help with the horses, and for years they lived just like that, skipping
from town to town. They weren't rich, but they were independent, and very
happy.
One day, in the middle of spring, a group of bandits and mercenaries rode upon
the little family's encampment. They tried to buy the woman and the little boy
from the man, but he refused, because he loved them. The bandit leader saw how
beautiful the woman was, and offered to fight the man for them, but again the
man refused because he had sworn off fighting. The bandit then said that he
would simply take what he wanted, and when the man protested a third time, the
bandit had his men hold him down and ran him through, leaving him to bleed to
death on the dusty road.
The chest under Jared's cheek shudders when Jensen takes in a long breath.
Jared has started to cry, but he tries to stay quiet while Jensen continues the
story. The bandits waited for the man to die and took the woman into the wagon
where the family had lived, taking it in turns to lie with her. The boy they
chained up to the wheel so he couldn't run away. After a few hours, they pulled
the woman out of the wagon and with it all the valuable things the family had
owned, and their horses, and then burned the wagon with the man's body inside
and rode off, into the night.
The bandits roved even further than the family had. To Skaldia over the
Camaeline mountains in the summer, and down to Caerdicca Unitas in the winter.
The woman wanted to run, and so did the boy, but the bandits never let them be
alone together and neither would leave without the other. The woman they used
as a cook and as a bedwarmer, and the boy they made look after the horses and
do the chores around the camp. Sometimes, the woman's pride would rear up its
head, and she would protest being made to go to bed with one of the men, and
when that happened they would beat the boy to force her compliance. Sometimes
they would hurt the boy just because, and then she would plead for them to stop
and offer herself up willingly, and the bandits liked that best of all.
On their way back from Aragonia, coming back to Terre d'Ange along roads that
they made dangerous with their presence, the bandits spent one evening taunting
and then beating the boy and then, when the woman made an offering of herself
to distract them, took her there on the side of the road, in the dusty heather.
They whooped and laughed, drunk with the success of sacking a merchant's
caravan, and left themselves unaware enough that when a column of d'Angeline
soldiers came upon them they were unprepared for the fight. They were
mercenaries, though, not unused to battle, and killed the woman and two men
before they were overcome. It was Luc, one of the younger soldiers, who noticed
the battered boy, covered in blood and lashed to the saddle of one of the
horses, and he pulled the boy into his chest so he wouldn't have to look at the
bodies anymore, and promised to get him home. He didn't know that the boy
didn't have one.
"He gave me his shirt so I wouldn't have to wear the bloody clothes," Jensen
mumbles. Jared's nearly dizzy with crying, the shirt in question sopping wet
and salty under his cheek. "When the soldiers came back to the City, the
lieutenant wanted to send me to a Sanctuary or to foster with the army, but Luc
convinced him to let him try to give me to the Night Court. The Dowayne almost
wouldn't take me because I'm too old, but Luc and Honore persuaded her." He
sniffs, wetly. "I didn't expect to see him again."
Jared feels wrung out, like an old cloth. He hurts from listening. How much
more Jensen must hurt from the telling, he thinks, and years of watching the
Balm House adepts gentle their patrons helps him. He doesn't wrap Jensen up in
another hug, doesn't ask him to talk more. Instead, he finds Jensen's hand, in
the dark, laces their fingers together. "You'll be all right," Jared whispers.
It makes Jensen hitch in a breath and he buries his face in Jared's hair, hauls
him in a little closer. He falls asleep after only a few minutes. Jared keeps
his eyes closed against the dark, listening to the slow thud of Jensen's heart.
He stays awake for a long time.
                                       *
A sleety rain is falling the day Thomas turns ten. Winter has settled gently
onto the City of Elua, this year, and inside Balm House the warm air smells of
cinnamon, of roasting nuts. Thomas's birthday falls only two weeks before the
Longest Night, but even so the House pauses its urgent preparations. In the
nursery, Marina and Florent, one of the male adepts, help all of the children
get ready with a solemn air. Even Sandra behaves while they're dressed in
simple white tunics, while Marina weaves cerise-colored ribbons through their
hair. Florent draws Thomas to stand between his spread knees, a delicate moue
of concentration on his handsome face while he dabs oil fragrant with bergamot
behind Thomas's ears, at the hollow of his throat and his wrists. "Ready,
darling?" he says, and Thomas nods, serious but calm.
In the Dowayne's hall, they find a feast laid, all of the adepts waiting for
them. Jared hears Jensen gasp, behind him. The adepts are dressed simply, but
they have adorned themselves with flowers and they all smile radiantly upon
seeing Thomas with his hand in Florent's, and it's so much beauty at once that
Jared's eyes tear up. The younger children and Jensen wait quietly by the door
while Florent leads Thomas over to the Dowayne's chair. She is dressed more
grandly, in a dark violet robe with the chain of her office gleaming gold on
her bosom, her silver-shot sable hair caught in a caul studded with tiny golden
leaves and flowers. Her Second, Maxime, stands just beside her, and he looks
solemn as Thomas sinks abeyante to the cushion before the Dowayne.
"When Blessed Elua came to Persis, he was captured by the King and chained in a
cell," Maxime begins. His voice is deep and pleasant, his hands clasped quietly
before him. "There were angels who heard of this and descended from the One
God's heaven to the earth to save him and to walk with him in his wandering. It
was Naamah, eldest sister, who came to the King and offered her body in
exchange for Elua's freedom."
Beside Jared, Jensen takes in a deep breath, but when Jared glances at him his
expression is still. The other adepts are listening intently, eyes on Maxime
and on Thomas before him, though of course they have all heard it before.
"The King was cruel, but he accepted Naamah's offer and took her to his
bedchamber." Maxime bends and touches Thomas's chin with a gentle hand, drawing
his head up to meet his gaze. "Naamah looked into the King's heart and saw
something there to be pitied, and so it was with compassion that she lay down
with him, and with her touch tried to ease his pain. In this house we strive to
do the same in our service to Naamah, to find what ails our patrons and soothe
them, to be a balm to their hearts. Do you understand?"
Thomas nods, and Maxime smiles down at him before he steps back and gestures to
a servant.
"Stand, child," the Dowayne says. Thomas rises in a smooth movement, while the
servant draws close and proffers a silver tray. From this, the Dowayne takes a
delicate wreath of twined pink and violet flowers and, when Maxime leads Thomas
closer, she places it on his dark hair and presses a simple kiss to his
forehead and then to both cheeks. "Be welcome to Balm House," she says,
formally, and then smiles at him, her face kind. "You will be a credit to
Naamah's service, my dear."
The solemnity eases, then, and Thomas is drawn into the crowd of adepts,
embraced and kissed until he's flushed pink with pleasure. During the feast, he
sits at the long table with the adepts, and he's still mild, sweet Thomas but
also radiates happiness. Jared can't stop grinning, even though he and Jensen
and the girls are relegated to the small children's table, dining on simpler
food with well-watered wine. The conversation at the adepts' table isn't
precisely lively, because this is still Balm House and those who serve Naamah
here are predisposed to calm, but this is an occasion for joy. It's not long
before one of the as yet undedicated apprentices moves to the harp in the
corner, and a trio of pretty female adepts rise to sing, drawing Thomas with
them. His lips are darkened with wine and he's flushed, gone the same color as
the crown of pink flowers in his hair, but his sweet boy-soprano rises clearly
above the women's voices and Jared feels like he could just expire with the
sheer happiness filling the hall, tangible as the bergamot-scented smoke
hanging in the air.
That night they return to the nursery late, accompanied by a yawning servant
who lights the brazier in the corner and turns down the covers hastily before
disappearing off to his own bed. Sophia and Sandra tumble into their cot with
ribbons still tangled in their hair. Jensen helps Jared with his plait, then
turns around so he can have his own hair unbound. Jared keeps having to
suppress his giggles and his skin feels warm, but he's careful as he pulls the
ribbon from Jensen's hair, only just long enough now to be restrained. When
he's finished he collapses down to the bed on his back and watches lazily while
Jensen changes from the soft tunic and breeches into Luc's baggy shirt.
Jensen's skin is very white now, Jared thinks muzzily.
Jensen blows out the candle the servant left and finds his way to the bed in
the dark, and Jared winds himself around the heat of him as soon as he lays
down. Jensen huffs when Jared's curls end up in his nose, but holds him close
anyway. The nursery is far enough away from the public areas of the house that
they can't hear the festivities anymore, but Jared still carries his last
glimpse of Thomas behind his eyes, and he buries a smile in Jensen's shoulder.
"I wish I could turn ten," he says, after a minute. Jensen makes a questioning
hum against his hair, and Jared snuggles down a little more. "You know. Move
into the grown-up quarters, and start to learn about how to serve Naamah, and
all that."
Jensen's quiet. Jared listens to the steady in-and-out of his breath, the same
sound that's been lulling him to his rest for months now. He's halfway to sleep
when Jensen says, quietly, "I ought to be doing that, now."
Jared blinks his eyes open. He can't see anything, but he drums his fingers on
Jensen's breast anyway in a slow easy rhythm. Jensen's not wrong. By rights and
tradition of the Court, he should be with the adepts now just as Thomas is,
working his way toward his dedication into Naamah's service rather than staying
behind in the nursery. "It's not your fault that you started late," Jared
tries. "Your turn will come."
Jensen shifts, against him, and a long sigh puffs against Jared's ear. He
thinks for a second that Jensen's going to say something else. But no—there's
only another shift as the blankets get pulled up to Jared's shoulders, and
under his fingertips Jensen's chest rises in a long, slow breath. "We should
sleep," he murmurs, at last, and Jared obediently closes his eyes, the dark all
around him warm and comfortable. He hopes it's that way for Jensen, too.
                                       *
Thomas isn't lost to them, of course. He no longer stays in the nursery, but
there are still many arts of the salon that must be learned, and he's weak in
his letters and so attends lessons with them. And, too, he's the youngest of
the apprentices in Balm House—the next in age is a girl of fourteen, Elodie,
who has already been dedicated to Naamah—and so he's still their playmate, and
is with them in the early evening of the Longest Night, when the rest of the
house is preparing for the journey to Cereus, the first and oldest House, for
the Midwinter Masque.
Jared loves the Longest Night. Most of the servants leave the house, and so
while the adepts attend the Masque at Cereus as tradition demands, the children
are left with just a few chaperones, the servants with no families to go to and
the apprentices who haven't yet reached sixteen and who may not yet appear in
public as adepts of Balm House. Last year, he and Sandra coaxed Sophia and
Thomas into playing a game of hide and go seek and he managed to stay hidden
the longest. He wants to see if he can convince Jensen to join them, this year.
For now, though, they have to stay out of the way. The sun has just set and the
Dowayne and Maxime are supervising the costuming of the adepts in the Dowayne's
hall, the largest open space they have. The children, Thomas included, have
gathered on a large couch in one of the salons just off the entrance, and the
adepts bustle back and forth, most of them half-clad and half-painted, urgent
calls for more pins and ribbons sounding through the open doors of the hall.
The houses of the Night Court contract no patrons on the Longest Night except
in very special circumstances, and Thomas whispered to Jared earlier that some
of the adepts refused contracts even the night before, wanting longer to
prepare for the Masque. This year, the Dowayne selected the theme of a flower
garden, showing off the simple wealth of Balm to be found in her large
greenhouse: every kind of bloom Jared has ever heard of, kept carefully
cultivated by the adepts to put patrons at ease in nature's bounty even in the
depths of winter. Sophia thinks it will be a coup to have live flowers for the
costumes.
Sandra scoffs, clever fingers constantly braiding and untangling a sheaf of
ribbon one of the adepts has tossed aside. "Flowers are dull," she says. "Even
in the middle of winter. I'd bet Eglantine has the best costumes again, just
you wait."
Sophia's ready to retort when a cleared throat interrupts, and Jared twists
around on the couch to find Florent standing just behind them, a chiding
expression aimed at Sandra. "Eglantine is the cleverest and most inventive, and
I am sure they will be a delight to all who attend the Masque," he says, as
Sandra flushes. "But don't forget, there is beauty to be found in simple
things."
Sandra nods, her face deeply pink. Thomas pulls her into his side for a hug,
and Florent's expression goes a little softer. He is fully costumed: face and
bare torso painted with delicate notes of white and deep purple, sheer green
silk wound around his wrists and arms, modesty only just covered by low-slung
dark velvet breeches. His amber hair has been left unbound, tumbling over his
pale shoulders, and he wears a crown of moonflower vine, the white blossoms
pinned with seeming randomness through the glossy waves of his hair. It is a
simple costume—hardly a costume at all, Jared thinks—but it brings out
Florent's beauty and his softness, both.
"Each house has its place in the Court," Thomas says, but it's with a
questioning lilt.
Florent nods. "Just so," he says, and drops a kiss on his head. There's a
sparkle to his eye, though, when he says, "And I'd wager even you, little
Sandra, would be intrigued by some of our night-blooming flowers."
He nods at the open doorway and Jared looks over in time to see Maxime step
through, barefooted and only barely clad in artfully arranged strips of white
silk, golden hair bound and studded with narcissus. Jared can't stop himself
from laughing, because he knows Sandra thinks Maxime is the most beautiful
adept in the house, and he laughs harder when he sees that Jensen is blushing
just as deeply as Sandra is. Maxime gives Florent a puzzled look, and Florent
shrugs, and when Jared just keeps laughing Sandra hits him.
It's not long before the adepts are ready, and though they've now been scolded
the children are all allowed to see them off to the carriages. Seeing them all
together, receiving last-second touch-ups from Maxime and the Dowayne, Jared
knows that Florent was right. The costumes aren't complex, but they are
beautiful, selected with obvious care to bring out the coloring and traits of
each adept. Jared catches Honore's eye just before she dons her domino (purple
silk, to match the lilac trailing from her wrists and twined in her honey-
colored hair) and, though the smile she gives him is gentle as ever, he catches
his breath. They will hold their own, he thinks proudly, even if Bryony attends
wearing actual gold or if Jasmine comes adorned with all the treasures of
Persis.
That night the children and the apprentices and the servants all dine together,
on simple stew and bread and sharp cheese, spiced cider warming their bellies.
Jensen and Jared sit by one of the footmen and a maid, and the footman tells a
bawdy story about a nobleman who lost a wager to Bryony's Dowayne, and instead
of two Bryony adepts got two Mandrake adepts instead. Jared doesn't really
understand the story, but the maid's laughter is infectious and he finds
himself giggling along, too. Jensen only blushes, of course.
With his limited experience, Jared doesn't realize that the footman and the
maid are courting until they rise together and the footman winks at Jared, hand
low on the maid's back as he says, "Ask Blessed Elua for an extra-long night
for me, sweet thing." The rest of the servants laugh and cat-call, and the
apprentices smile and blow kisses, and Jared remembers all over again just how
much he loves the Longest Night. Brother Olivier told them that, long ago, the
people who had lived here before Elua and the angels came held the tradition on
their own, to make merry and celebrate life on the darkest, coldest night of
the year, and Elua loved it so much that he embraced it himself.
"Do you think Blessed Elua ever played hide and go seek?" he says later, when
they've gathered again in the nursery. It's almost midnight, but he's not
tired.
Sophia gives him a haughty look. "Of course not," she says, braiding her hair
into a neat plait.
Sandra, for once, agrees. "The angels would all have been able to find him,
anyway," she says, reasonably. "Can you imagine anyone being able to hide from
Cassiel or Camael?"
Thomas blinks tiredly from his spot on the rug, where he's splayed in front of
the fireplace like a sweet, sleepy cat. "Cassiel wouldn't let Blessed Elua go
alone, in the first place."
The conversation turns, then, to a discussion about which of the angels was
most devoted to Elua (Sandra says that of course it was Naamah, and Sophia says
that, no, it must have been Cassiel, to give up the One God's love but to
partake of none of Earth's delights). Jared isn't sure, himself, and turns to
ask Jensen's opinion before he notices that Jensen isn't with them at all. He's
over at the table where they practice their letters on the far side of the
room, all alone, and Jared pops up from the circle they've made around the fire
and goes over.
"What are you doing?" he says, when he gets close, and Jensen startles. He's
only got one candle lit, there on the table by his elbow, and in the little
pool of light Jared can see that he's writing something, in that smooth flowing
script that Jared can't manage yet. "What's that?"
Jensen's got ink smeared on his jaw, on his fingertips where he's been
clutching the quill. As Jared settles down onto the stool beside him, he's once
again pink with embarrassment, but he doesn't hide the parchment away.
"It's..." He bites his lip, then turns a hesitant look down at Jared. "It's
something I've been thinking about, that's all. A secret, kind of."
"Oh." Jared swings his legs back and forth, drumming his heels against the
solid mahogany legs of the stool. "I can go away if you want."
"No, that's alright," Jensen says, quickly, and a smile finds its way to
Jared's mouth. Jensen smiles back, a little, but there's something serious
about his eyes. "It's just—it's not ready for anyone to read yet, not even
ready to talk about."
"Oh," Jared says again. He doesn't understand, really.
Jensen seems to sense that, because he bites his lip again and looks back down
at the parchment. By the fire, the other children are giggling about something,
and Jared kind of wants to go over and see what fun they're having, but he also
likes it right here, quiet at Jensen's side.
"I'll tell you," Jensen says, finally. "As soon as I can, when it's ready.
You're the first one I'll tell. Okay?"
Warmth curls in Jared's belly and he knows a huge grin breaks out on his face,
and he throws his arms around Jensen's neck, hauling him into a hug. Jensen
lets out a little oof but it's only a second before he's hugging back. Jared
presses his face into Jensen's neck, love for his best friend lighting him up
on the inside, and it's then that the bells in the city start to toll out for
midnight. The other children let out a little cheer, and Sandra calls for them
to come and join in singing the hymn of the Longest Night. Jared pulls back to
see that Jensen's smiling, too, and as he leads the way back to the fire with
Jensen's hand caught firmly in his, he sends up a prayer to Blessed Elua in
pure, joyous thanks.
                                       *
Years pass. Two new girl-children come to the nursery, aged two and three, and
Marina falls pregnant, gives birth to a sweet-tempered boy and looks after him
and the girls full-time during her recovery. Jensen is afraid to hold the new
baby, but Jared adores little Stephane, plays with him every chance he gets.
At the beginning of the spring Jensen turns twelve, Balm hosts a small
gathering for the other Dowaynes of the Night Court and the older children are
all called to attend, kneeling abeyante for hours while the masters and
mistresses of the Houses drink mulled wine, while they mingle and murmur
amongst themselves. It's only once they're released to go to bed that Marina
explains that it was the four children who were the real point of the whole
ordeal—made clearer when, soon after, Sophia's marque is bought by Dahlia and
Sandra's by Jasmine, to be held in trust until each of them turn ten. Sophia is
reserved, of course, but nothing can subdue Sandra's ecstatic pleasure at the
idea of serving Naamah in exotic Jasmine House. No matter how Jared wheedles,
neither girl will tell him the prices their new Houses paid to Balm for their
marques. "Don't be vulgar," Sophia says, but Sandra only giggles. She does
whisper to him later, when they're training to hold serving trays full of wine
with graceful strength, that after the negotiations the Second for Jasmine
named her a perfect blossom and kissed her mouth. For a moment, Jared is
intensely jealous, but then Honore is instructing them to begin serving the
wine to their imaginary guests and he has to concentrate on other things.
Sophia turns ten in midsummer of that year. It's an unusually warm day when the
haughty-looking adept from Dahlia arrives to escort her away. Unexpectedly,
Sandra bursts into tears, and though he tries to smile gracefully Jared's eyes
fill, too. For once in her life Sophia unbends: she bites her lip and throws
her arms around Sandra, and then embraces Jared, and Thomas, and even Jensen,
who startles but then hugs her back, tightly. She sniffles against Jensen's
shoulder and then takes a deep breath, and when she picks up her head she is
unruffled but for the dampness around her eyes. Maxime kisses Sophia lightly on
both cheeks, says, "You will be a credit to Balm, child," and then the Dahlia
adept takes Sophia's hand and they're gone. It's the last Jared will see of her
for a long, long time.
                                       *
Jared and Sandra are almost nine and Jensen is newly thirteen when they're
called to attend another gathering, serving properly this time in Balm's dark
violet livery, with strict instructions from Maxime to be barely seen, and
certainly not heard. It's a fete hosted by one of the Dowayne's favored
patrons, the Comte de Rocaille, and he has rented out the entire house for he
and his friends. The children kneel through dinner, and Jared is glad they were
fed beforehand because his mouth waters at the scents of roast duck, sweet plum
and candied almonds. Jensen quirks a small smile at him when his stomach
rumbles. Once dinner is cleared the guests move to the largest salon, and
Jensen and Thomas pull open the great glass doors to the gardens, let the sweet
scents of late spring flow among the patrons.
The servants withdraw and the adepts take over, moving with calming grace
through the gathering. Sandra, on her best docile behavior, fills goblets with
wine, smiles with reserve when one of the patrons catches her eye. Thomas,
Jared, and Jensen kneel near the entrance to the living quarters, observing
quietly as they have been instructed.
Balm House gatherings are always quiet—not as reserved as those in Dahlia
House, Jared has heard, but the adepts put the patrons at ease rather than
goading them into merriment or provoking debauchery. Outside of the Dowayne's
circle near where the children kneel, the other guests murmur quietly under the
babble of the fountain and the simple songs Elodie plays from the harp in the
corner. Jared watches with interest as Marina sinks into the lap of a blond man
sitting by the hyacinth, murmuring into his ear so that he smiles a little,
presses a kiss against the white skin of her throat.
"Off to Jasmine, then, little one?" he hears, and his attention drags away from
Marina and her patron to find de Rocaille smiling pleasantly at Sandra. She
curtsies, perfectly graceful, and de Rocaille's attention moves to the line of
boys. Jared immediately lets his eyes go hooded, hopes that the comte didn't
notice him staring. "Your nursery will soon exceed that of Cereus, Emmeline."
"I would never hope to exceed the First House, my dear comte," the Dowayne
says, and Jared can't tell if she's fooling. "I only hope that Balm's little
flowers grow to be a credit to Naamah."
De Rocaille kisses her hand, laughs a little, and a thrill lights up Jared's
belly. The comte is a pleasant-looking man, his grey hair bound back with a
sky-blue ribbon to match his silk doublet, his body still slim despite his
years. It's exciting to see the Dowayne's words work on him, just as any adept
would sway a patron with a beckoning smile.
"And what of these lovely boys?" de Rocaille is saying.
"The dark-haired one is ours," the Dowayne says, and Jared flushes, knowing
what's coming. "We haven't yet decided on the other two. The smallest is likely
headed for Orchis, or perhaps Heliotrope—" and Jared bites his cheek, because
he hadn't known that, and his heart starts to race, Heliotrope, or Orchis!—"but
the older one there is as yet a mystery."
Jared daren't move, not with the Dowayne's attention upon them, but he can feel
how Jensen goes tense at his side. Jensen's birthday came at the start of
spring, and by rights he should have already been dedicated to Naamah, but he's
still in the nursery with Jared, still sharing the same bed.
"A mystery? Come here, child," says de Rocaille. Jared sucks in a quiet breath,
but watches covertly as Jensen rises and crosses the flagstone to sink
abeyantenext to the settee the comte shares with the Dowayne, eyes downcast. In
the candlelight, Jared can hardly see his freckles and his skin is a smooth,
pale gold. "Hmm. Almost of age, I see. Will you keep him?"
The Dowayne twirls her silver goblet between her fingers, eyes appraising
Jensen's form. It's perfect, at least, after all the long hours Jared has spent
practicing with him. "What do you think?" she says, in the low, sweet voice she
uses around all the patrons.
De Rocaille raises his eyebrows at her, but returns his attention to Jensen.
"Well. What's your name, boy?" 
"Jensen," Jared hears, so quiet as to almost be a whisper. 
One of the comte's friends, a Kusheline noble from his coloring and clothes,
smiles. It's broad and knowing, and makes Jared shiver a little, though he
makes sure to keep abeyante and not draw any attention to himself. The nobleman
leans forward and touches one finger to Jensen's chin, tilts his face up for
inspection. "A shy one, I see," he says, but it doesn't sound kind like it does
when Marina says it. "Perhaps to Alyssum?"
De Rocaille purses his lips, examining Jensen's face. "His eyes are certainly
averted," he says, and a soft ripple of amusement passes through the group.
"One cannot tell how deep such modesty goes."
The nobleman shifts, his finger sliding down the column of Jensen's throat
until his hand can wrap around the fragile circumference. "Perhaps Valerian,"
he says, and his voice is mild but Jensen flinches, ever so slightly. "What do
you think, little boy? Will you yield?"
Jared clenches his hands together in his lap, fighting the sudden urge to go
over and slap the man's hand off of Jensen's skin, but luckily de Rocaille
speaks first. "Baptiste," he says, disapproving, and the man laughs lightly but
lets go of Jensen's neck, leaving behind white finger-marks that take a moment
to fade. Now Jared can place him: Baptiste de Morhban, one of the Duc's younger
cousins.
One of the adepts from Alyssum who came along with the group sinks to the couch
next to de Morhban, offering a goblet of something, and de Morhban curls his
arm around her, smiling and whispering into her ear. Jared sees the Dowayne's
shoulders relax, if only slightly. She settles one hand on de Rocaille's
shoulder, fingertips playing through the steel-grey fall of his hair. He eases
into her touch, forgetting his irritation, and returns his attention to Jensen.
"Well. He cannot be Jasmine, not with that coloring." He strokes his fingers
through Jensen's sandy-colored hair, that dark blond that the adepts assure
them will end up a light, golden brown. "Nor Cereus, though he looks fragile
enough. Not bold enough for Bryony, nor steely enough for Dahlia—though I'm
sure you have hidden depths, my dear." He bends a little smile down at Jensen,
then takes the smooth line of his jaw between careful fingers, tilting his face
more toward the candlelight. Jensen keeps his eyes downcast (maybe he will go
to Alyssum, Jared thinks, unbidden), his expression still and mild. "He can't
go to Camellia, I see—not pure d'Angeline, no matter how pretty. Skaldi blood
here, unless I miss my guess."
The Dowayne twirls her fingers through de Rocaille's hair, smiling, but Jared
can tell she's surprised. "Well spotted," she says, voice placid. "From a
grandsire, on his father's side. Hence the name, too, we think."
De Rocaille hums thoughtfully. "Look at me, boy," he says, after a few seconds,
and Jensen obediently turns up his eyes. The green is a little darker in the
candlelight, but still gold-flecked and so pretty surrounded by his sooty
lashes. De Rocaille strokes his thumb along Jensen's cheekbone, only lately
gaining its definition, and then releases his face, settling into the inviting
curve of the Dowayne's side. "Well. If you don't keep him here, he'll fetch you
a pretty price when you sell his marque."
There's a chuckle and Jared's attention snaps over to de Morhban, now laughing
into the curve of the Alyssum adept's neck. "Not just the marque," he says,
sliding one hand from the girl's hip down into her lap. She squirms, and Jared
can feel his face heat. "Give him some training to go with that sweet face and
present him at the right fete, and just imagine what you could fetch for his
virgin price."
Jensen flushes, pink rising up his neck, and Jared bites his tongue at how
clearly de Morhban enjoys discomfiting him, even with his hand between the legs
of another adept. De Rocaille sends de Morhban a look that Jared can't
interpret, but then shrugs, beckoning to Sandra for more wine. "Well,
Emmeline?" he says to the Dowayne. "Will you give us a hint?"
The Dowayne rises smoothly to her feet, graceful as a new adept even at her
age. "I'm afraid you'll need to wait and see, Charles," she says, lightly
teasing, and gestures at Jensen. He stands almost as gracefully, his training
not yet settled into his bones, and she kisses his cheek. "Time for bed,
sweeting," she murmurs, and Jared's glad that she turned Jensen's back to the
guests when his expression collapses in relief.
He keeps his head enough that he doesn't run over to the children's cushions,
but his eyes are a little wide as he waits for Jared and Thomas to stand so
they can all leave together. Sandra places the ewer of wine on the table at the
Dowayne's nod and curtsies to the guests before Jensen starts to lead them
behind the screens to the living quarters. Jared lets Sandra go before him, and
pauses at the screen for one last look. De Rocaille and the Dowayne are moving
away, towards her own chambers with her hand tucked into his elbow, and several
of the other guests have paired off, either together or with adepts. Elodie is
still playing at the harp in the corner, the music liquid and soothing even
with one of the noble ladies laying kisses over her upturned face. From the
doorway behind the screen, Sandra whispers, "Jared?" and he's about to follow
when he catches de Morhban's eye. He has urged the Alyssum adept to her knees
between his legs, and Jared can't see what she's doing, but de Morhban isn't
paying her any attention—his mouth turns up at one corner, and his eyes flick
from Jared to the shadowed corridor down which Jensen has already disappeared.
His hand settles onto the back of the adept's head, fingers curling into her
hair, and Jared can see her little flinch when he tugs at the dark brown
waves. 
"Time for bed," de Morhban says, turning his eyes back to Jared. He shivers and
goes before he can see anything else.
                                       *
Summer's first blush has fallen upon the City of Elua and the gardens at Balm
are so thick with flowers that the patrons nearly get drunk off their scent
alone, but in the inner chambers Jared, Jensen, and Sandra cannot smell them.
Instead, they're watching Josephine demonstrate the best methods of massaging
tension away on a languid, sleepy Florent. An unfamiliar man is in the
bedchamber, as well—he hasn't introduced himself, nor have Josephine or Florent
acknowledged his presence, but Jared can't help but sneak glances at the
stranger because he's just... startlingly beautiful. Josephine's thumbs drag up
the column of Florent's spine, moving slippery through the sweet oil and
obscuring the twined leaves of his unfinished marque. She's saying something
about finding knots, how to insinuate relaxation through groups of muscles.
Jared can pay her no attention.
The stranger is dressed well, as well as any lordly patron of the House would
be, but a patron has never interrupted their lessons from what Jared can
remember. Long dark hair spills over one shoulder and his eyes are a sharp,
pale blue, as Jared learns when he inadvertently meets his stare. The stranger
raises an eyebrow and Jared bows his head, knows his face is flushing scarlet
at being caught looking. He lets his weight rest a little heavier on Jensen's
shoulder and turns his eyes determinedly to how Josephine is sliding her hands
over Florent's buttocks, tries to memorize the caress. It's only when the
stranger leaves, and the tension in the body he's leaning against dissipates
with a blown-out sigh, that he even notices that Jensen was nervous at all.
It's raining by the time the lesson is over. Sandra throws herself onto the
divan in the nursery and declares that she'll be taking a nap and that, no, she
shall not be pleased if they make any noise while she's sleeping. Jared makes a
face at her, once her eyes have closed. He's not sure where the smaller
children have got to, but he doesn't particularly want to play with them,
either.
He drops to the floor at Jensen's feet with a sigh. "I'm bored."
Jensen doesn't look up from the book of poetry he's been reading, but does at
least pet a hand through Jared's hair. "I never would have guessed," he says,
dry.
Fingernails scritch at the base of Jared's skull and he almost purrs, resting
his chin on Jensen's knee. He wants to ask for a story, but Jensen says it's
hard to come up with new stories when he's trying to read someone else's. The
house isn't open to patrons tonight and they won't be called upon to serve, so
dinner at least will be early. He nuzzles a little closer into the curve of
Jensen's knee. The rain spatters against the window and he watches it with
half-slitted eyes, humming idly. 
"Who was that who came to our lesson, d'you think?" he says, eventually. The
rain is falling harder.
Jensen's hand stills in his hair for a moment, then resumes, carding through
the length of it in slow, soothing pulls. "Not sure." There's a small rustle as
he lets his book fall closed. "Maybe—"
"Boys," Jared hears, and he twists around to find Maxime standing in the open
doorway, looking at them strangely.
He surges up to standing as smoothly as he can, Jensen following his lead just
behind him. Jared bows his head respectfully, but in truth he has no idea what
to do. The Second never comes to the nursery and rarely interacts with them at
all, certainly not without sending an apprentice or at least a servant to make
them ready first. In the silence, he's acutely aware of their simple house-
tunics, his ruffled hair, and of Sandra, sleeping soundly in the corner.
"You'll attend me in the east salon," Maxime says, finally.
Jared lifts his head. "Yes, Maxime," he murmurs, with Jensen echoing just after
him. He touches his hair, wondering how much time they have. "How shall we—"
Maxime waves a hand. "As you are," he says, that strange look still on his
face. "Exactly as you are. Jensen, bring your book, it may be dull. Come along,
right now."
He turns on his heel and disappears, soft footfalls receding down the corridor.
Jared looks over his shoulder to find Jensen just as bewildered as he is, but
there's nothing for it—their Second has given them a command, and even in
gentle Balm that's not an order ignored lightly.
They follow Maxime's straight, slender back through the back corridors of the
house. Giggles and light, unaffected conversations spill out of the private
bedrooms of the adepts and apprentices, a snatch of music as someone practices
their harp. When they finally reach the east salon, Jared sucks in a gasp
between his teeth and has to fight not to step directly back into Jensen's
chest. A light repast is laid on the sideboard and the air smells of summer
cordial and wine, but more important are the five exquisite faces that turn to
greet them. Three women and two men; they hail Maxime with warmth, paying the
two boys no attention, but Jared's stomach squirms with mortification at his
unpolished appearance, at his and Jensen's bare legs and feet below their
tunics. The kneeling cushions he's accustomed to are missing and for a moment
he thinks Maxime means for them to wait abeyante on the bare floor. It's no
less disconcerting when they get a quick glance and flick of fingers which
leads them to sit on the divan closest to the sideboard, like they're guests of
all things.
His confusion is made no better when they're promptly ignored. Jensen is a
rigid line of tension pressed up against his side and when Jared checks—yes,
his cheeks are flaming, nearly hiding the freckles. Jared tucks his legs up
beneath him and pushes his hair behind his ears, then does his best to follow
Maxime's orders and just... attend.
Somehow, it's not a surprise that the stranger from their lesson is here. As
the group converses about the recent great fete held at the palace to celebrate
the birth of the queen's third child, Jared sees that the man is a little
distant, cool as he sips at his wine and listens to the conversation. He sits
beside a sweet-faced woman with hair the color of wheat, her gown a simple
delicate pink, who listens to the conversation with eyes downcast and rarely
contributes.
"Do you think the dashing Consort will get another boy on Anielle, or will it
be girls forevermore?" The words are tactless but the tone is cheerful—this
from the redheaded woman lounging nearly atop Maxime, her skirt spilling over
his lap in a froth of silk the color of new leaves.
"My lord de Somerville tells me this last pregnancy was a hard one," says the
dark-eyed woman occupying the window seat. She combs nimble fingers through the
thick weight of her hair, shrugs elegant shoulders. "Perhaps little Jeanne-
Marie will be the end of it."
While the guests throw out suggestions, Jared curls into Jensen's side, gives
up on sitting still and perfect as a statue. They really are paying he and
Jensen no mind, and anyway, this is fascinating. Maxime lets the redheaded
woman shift around until her slippered feet are in his lap and he pats them
absently, but he isn't acting like he would with a patron, isn't massaging her
calves or soothing her. Jared's almost proud that they're being allowed to see
this, even if he has no idea why. Jensen has opened his book of poetry and is
resting it against his knee, but he's still tense and Jared doubts he's really
reading it. He shifts a little, undecided, then slings his legs over Jensen's,
leans his head against Jensen's shoulder and settles in with a tiny sigh. It's
comfortable, and no one has protested. After a moment, the book gets propped on
Jared's knee, instead, and Jared smiles, not bothering to hide it.
The conversation has been going in circles by the time the milk-pale man in the
group stands, stretching languidly. "The Dauphin is healthy, Princess Adélaide
is healthy, and by all accounts our newest princess is already a beauty," he
says, in a slow, dreamy voice. He moves to the sideboard, crossing past Jared
and Jensen without glancing at them. "What more could we want?"
Jared watches as he pours himself a draught of the white wine, fighting the
urge to leap to his feat and help. It's only when the man draws the long fall
of his ash-blonde hair over one shoulder that Jared sees that his shirt dips
low—low enough to reveal the curve of a full moon inked onto his back, the deep
blue of gentian blossoms scrolling over it and up his spine to end in a
graceful finial at the nape of his neck. Jensen sucks in a breath beside him,
obviously seeing it at the same time—this is an adept, from Gentian House by
his marque, and suddenly Jared's mind is racing.
He keeps his place, draped over Jensen's lap, but his eyes now dart from face
to face, drawing conclusions with what he knows of the Court. The blonde woman
in the pink gown, whose voice never rises above a bare murmur: she must be of
Alyssum House, where modesty is trained into the adepts from birth. The redhead
with the dancing eyes, laughing brightly now, is clearly of Orchis—and with how
casual she is with Maxime, Jared realizes at last that these beautiful men and
women are Seconds of the Night Court, here speaking with Maxime as equals, and
his heart is suddenly pounding in his ears.
Disregarding his revelation, the adults' conversation continues. As the light
starts slowly to fade, the rain slackens a little in its pounding against the
window, eases to a spattering drizzle. A servant comes in to light additional
candles, another to come in and pour more wine for the Seconds. The woman in
the window seat is called upon to play the lyre, and she produces a song of
such cheerful bawdy whimsy that Jared wants to laugh aloud. The Second from
Orchis does, in bright peals that make even the cool-eyed man's lips curve up,
and it's only once the song is over that Maxime says, "Well, then, are we
ready?"
The guests and Maxime turn as one to face Jared and Jensen on their shared
divan, and Jensen stiffens immediately in the face of all that beautiful
attention. Jared swings his legs off of Jensen's lap but stays close, pressed
in to his warm side. He drops his eyes, going on instinct, but he really
doesn't have any idea what's going on.
"Well, perhaps a candidate for you after all, Chloe," says the cool-eyed man,
and there's another peal of laughter from the cheery woman.
"I think not," says the quiet woman—Chloe, Jared thinks, trying to get his
bearings. "Not that one. He was watching the whole time, did you notice?"
"Jared isn't meant for Alyssum, no," Maxime says, and his voice has a wry edge
to it. Jared can feel a flush creeping up his cheeks and he clasps his hands
together between his bare knees, tries to look modest and calm. If he's been a
discredit to the house—oh, Marina will be so disappointed. "The other,
perhaps."
Chloe makes a little hmm noise. Jensen's practically vibrating next to him and
Jared tries to press his knee into Jensen's, but it doesn't seem to help. It's
certainly no help when Maxime says, "Jensen," in his deep, kind voice, and
Jensen has to rise, and stand where Maxime gestures, and Jared's left alone on
the divan, watching covertly. Well—he thought it was covertly, but apparently
not.
The very pale man, the Gentian second, is draped at ease into the velvet
armchair, slowly swirling his goblet of wine in a languid hand. "My name is
Antony nó Gentian," he says, and Jensen effects a smooth bow—it looks silly in
just the tunic, but his form is perfect. Antony smiles and lifts his goblet to
Jensen in a little toast. "Very pleased to make your acquaintance," he says,
and he might be making fun, but there's no trace of it in his expression.
"And yours, sir," Jensen says, voice soft. Chloe and the other two women are
watching him closely, though they're still at ease in their seats. When Jared
looks at the blue-eyed man, the man is looking directly back at him, and he
drops his eyes again immediately. His face must be bright red, now.
"Jensen," Antony says. He shapes the name slowly, soft in his lovely mouth.
"You're a little older than usual, are you not."
"Yes, sir," Jensen murmurs. Jared risks a glance up—he can't see Jensen's face,
but his hands are clenched tight around the book of poetry he's holding behind
his back.
Antony asks a few questions, then, simple things—how old is Jensen exactly, how
long has he lived in the Night Court. Does he like Balm—of course, sir, Jensen
says, sounding honest, and Maxime smiles at him for it—and does he enjoy his
studies, and then the questions get a little stranger—what is your favorite
bloom in the Dowayne's garden,he's asked, and there's a long pause before
Jensen says he doesn't have a favorite, he likes so many, and then Antony says,
"And what do you dream about, Jensen?"
There's a silence. "Sir?" Jensen says, and now his shoulders are rigid under
the thin tunic. Jared bites at his lip. He knows part of what Jensen dreams
about, and it's nothing that he would ever share with a stranger. Jared doesn't
understand everything, but he knows that.
Antony lifts his chin—he'd looked barely interested up to that point, but now
his eyes narrow, his mouth parting just a fraction. "Ah," he says, but not like
he meant anyone to hear.
"Antony?" Maxime says.
He looks at Jensen for another moment, then sinks back into his chair. "My
apologies," he says, and he says it to the other adults but his eyes flick back
to Jensen. "It was a possibility, but—no. Not without causing harm where none
need be caused."
The red-headed woman claps her hands together, suddenly, and Jared starts.
"None of your mystic nonsense, Anty," she says, propping her elbow on the arm
of the settee. "Roxane, dearest, lead us away from all this silly solemnity."
"Félicie," says the dark-eyed woman, standing up with a swirl of silk skirt. "I
believe Quintus was your dearest when we started the evening."
"My dearest shifts according to the needs of the moment," Félicie says, with a
sunny grin at Roxane, and the last man—Quintus, apparently—rolls his eyes.
Roxane takes a few steps closer to Jensen and tips his chin up with two slender
fingers, and examines his face. She's tall, much taller than Jensen, and her
smooth olive skin is a pretty contrast against his pale gold. She hums, and
then shakes her head. "I'm not sure," she says, and unlike Antony she doesn't
seem to be addressing Jensen at all. She drops her fingers and moves past him,
to the sideboard where the wine is waiting. "Chloe, he might be for you after
all."
Félicie groans, a delicate little noise. "That was dull, I was hoping she was
going to make him sing," she says, to Maxime, who tweaks one of her red curls.
"Well, it's a waste of time for me," Quintus says, and joins Roxane in pouring
himself some wine.
"Now, Quintus," says Maxime, and Quintus makes an undignified snort, something
Jared has never heard from an adept.
He leans back against the sideboard. "Nightblooming Heliotrope turns toward
whatever sun is paying for its attention," he says, gesturing with his goblet
from Jared to Jensen. "It's a sorry sun who must drag his worshiper's love away
from a rival who has already caught it. The patron is ill-served—and it's bad
for business, to boot."
Jared frowns, because he doesn't really know what that means, but—he remembers:
Heliotrope, or Orchis. His belly squirms unpleasantly. He wishes he and Jensen
could just go back to the nursery.
"Oh, yes, I see what you mean," Antony says, but his voice is softer than
Quintus's was.
"That's delightful," Félicie says, and sounds like she means it. "Jared, is
that right?"
Jared jerks his head up to find her sitting upright, smiling his way, and he
finds his feet immediately, bows as Jensen did. "Yes, my lady," he says, mouth
dry.
She laughs, a brief bright sound. "Sweet manners you give your boys," she says,
to Maxime, and then beckons so that Jared crosses the room to where she sits
upon the settee. "Pretty boy, too," she says, approving, when Jared's in front
of her. She runs a hand through his hair, smooths it down behind his ear. She's
young, Jared sees—older than most of the adepts he knows, of course, but the
youngest in the salon by far. She tweaks his nose, startling him, and then
smiles broadly, and he can't help but smile back.
"Oh, precious," she says, tapping one of his dimples with a soft finger. "Did
you like Roxane's song, sweet thing?"
"Yes, my lady," Jared says, flushing all over again. She raises her fine arched
eyebrows, clearly inviting him to continue, but all he can think to say is: "It
made me laugh."
"The best thing you can say for a song," Félicie says, like she's telling him a
secret. Quintus groans, over by the sideboard, and Félicie shakes her head at
him—and then refocuses her attention on Jared, all deep green eyes and pretty
smile. Jared is half in love with her, already. "How would you like to come and
live in Orchis House, dearest?"
Dearest, Jared thinks, in a daze, and then when she raises her eyebrows again
he blurts out, "Oh! Yes! Yes, please, my lady."
Maxime sighs, and Roxane lets out a rich laugh. Félicie pats Jared's cheek and
then nods at the settee, and he scrambles back to sitting with his heart
thumping high in his throat. Orchis. "My way is easy, you must admit," Félicie
is saying, and Jared bites hard into the inside of his cheek so he won't wear
the silliest face ever. He could shout aloud for happiness, only—Jensen's still
standing, left in the center of the room with his eyes cast down to the floor,
and he doesn't have a place to go, yet.
"Well, then—not Heliotrope, nor Gentian," Quintus says, with cool eyes on
Jensen, and it's cruel, Jared wants to hate him, but the way he says it is
matter-of-fact. "Nor Orchis, unless Félicie's test can uncover some deeply
hidden depths."
"Hush," Félicie says, and Jared loves her a little more for it. It's not
that—Jensen can be happy, Jared's seen it. He thinks so, anyway.
"Well, then." Maxime stands, hands clasped loosely before him. "Chloe?"
Chloe has been silent, watching, and she tips her head, looking at Jensen's
downturned face.
Roxane puts down her wine and takes swift steps across the parquet. "What's
that," she says, and before Chloe can speak Roxane has tweaked the volume of
poetry out of Jensen's hands.
"Jensen enjoys reading, he's very skilled in his letters," Maxime says, but
Roxane is shaking her head, impatient, flicking through the little book.
Jensen's empty hands are clenched into fists at his sides, and he's tense—Jared
can tell even from here that he wants to take the book out of Roxane's hands,
but he daren't. Surely, he wouldn't, Jared hopes, because that would certainly
lead to rather more than a scolding.
A piece of foolscap comes away from the book—folded a few times to fit inside
its soft leather cover and hidden, like a marker. Roxane pulls it open while
Antony asks, "What is it?" and she reads it swiftly, with a lightly furrowed
brow. Her eyes flick back up to Jensen with sudden interest.
"This is yours?" she says, but Jensen is silent. She looks at his face for a
moment, and then nods, though Jared couldn't see that his expression changed,
at all. "Accepted, but when you're asked a question you'll answer it, Jensen."
Her voice isn't sharp or cruel, but it is firm, and Jensen says, "Yes, my
lady," and turns his eyes to the floor.
"No," she says. "Look up. At me, now." He follows her command, confused, but
Jared sees his fists unclench. "You read, yes? Recite a line of verse for me."
Sometimes, when Jared isn't ready for sleep and when Marina has left to put the
smaller children to bed, Jensen will read aloud for them. Even Sandra stays
quiet and listens, when he does. Most of the poems in the books the house keeps
are love poetry, sometimes bawdy rhyme, intended for the patrons' entertainment
more than the adepts, but Jensen reads it all. What he recites, though, is
something Jared doesn't recognize. He blinks at Roxane, and takes a deep
breath, and then in his light sweet voice says, "The bee is in the lavender,
the honey fills the comb; but here a rain falls never-ending, and I am far from
home."
Antony tips his head, and Maxime frowns, but after a brief pause Roxane nods
once more. She hands the book and the piece of foolscap back to Jensen. "Yes,"
she says, looking up at Maxime.
"I can't imagine the boy as a mummer," Quintus says, cradling his wine against
his chest.
"There is a reason you are Heliotrope's Second, and not Eglantine's," Roxane
says, with some asperity. She turns from Jensen and retrieves her own goblet
from the table, the matter apparently concluded. Jensen stands alone where he's
been left, and he looks from her amber-silk back to Maxime, but they're no
longer paying him any attention.
"If you're sure?" Maxime says, and Roxane nods, as does Félicie when he looks
her way. Félicie smiles again at Jared, at least. "Very well. I shall let
Emmeline know she can expect your House's offers soon, then."
Jared feels as though his world has tilted on its edge. So long without
knowing, and now—Orchis!he thinks again, a fizz in his chest, and Jensen will
go to Eglantine, and they will both become adepts and take patrons and serve
Naamah and everything will be perfect, he knows it. Maxime stands and puts a
hand on Jensen's shoulder, leads him over to the divan. "You may go, boys," he
says, and he gives them a smile, if only a very small one. "Go and find your
supper, and then sleep well."
"Yes, Maxime," Jared says, Jensen echoing him a half-second later.
It's a struggle to be dignified, and quiet, as they walk through the back
corridors to the nursery. When they come through the door Sandra is playing
with the little girls, while Marina feeds Stephane. "Where have you been?"
Marina says, and Jared races across the floor and embraces her about the neck,
only barely remembering to be careful of the baby.
"They chose us!" he says, giddy. Marina pats his shoulder, but when he pulls
back she's confused, and looks to Jensen for an explanation.
"Our marques," Jensen says. He's holding his book against his chest, his arms
folded tight over it. "The Seconds, they agreed. Jared to Orchis, and mine—I'm
going to Eglantine." He sits down, then, folds right down onto the rug next to
little Lillian where she's babbling at her dolly.
"Isn't it wonderful?" Jared says, and Sandra claps, comes to hug him, too. Only
a year, he thinks, squeezing her tight—a year until he gets to go to his new
home. He can hardly wait.
"I'm happy for you, Jared," Marina says, smiling at him. She pulls Stephane
sleepily away from her breast and transfers him to her shoulder to pat his
back. Her smile goes smaller when she looks at Jensen. "We'll have to practice
your singing," she says. Jensen blinks at her, his face pale. "You'll do the
House proud, Jensen."
He looks down at his lap, holding his book loosely between his hands. "Yes,
Marina," he says, after a moment. "I'll do my best."
                                       *
The negotiations begin swiftly, and couriers go back and forth between the
houses for a few weeks after that day. Orchis seems to finish first, because
one day Jared is summoned alone to Maxime's chambers, and dressed carefully in
white with a deep violet ribbon binding his hair, with another tied in a simple
bow over his right wrist. It's a warm day, light streaming in through the
windows and the doors to the greenhouse flung wide so that the flower-scent
seeps through the whole house. He follows Maxime to the Dowayne's office, on
his best behavior, but it's hard to maintain poise when they come through the
door and Félicie is there, waiting, this time in a gown of sky blue with her
fiery hair done in an elaborate braid down her back. She gives him another
smile, but she and the Dowayne are conversing pleasantly, and he finds the
kneeling cushion and sinks to it, abeyante, watching the adults talk through
his eyelashes as best he can.
Maxime gives Félicie the kiss of greeting and a maidservant pours wine, and
after a brief toast to each others' health they settle to business.
"Madame," Félicie says, formally. Her face is still pleasant, but much of her
laughing glow is muted. "Will you accept my Dowayne's offer for the bond-price
of this child?"
"Martin drives a hard bargain," the Dowayne says, lacing her hands atop her
desk. "Surely, with a laugh so sweet, young Jared would be a perfect jewel in
Orchis's crown."
Jared feels his face go hot, but Félicie only smiles. The Chancellor of the
house, an older man Jared has seen only once or twice, waits to the side with
Maxime while the women speak—except, Jared sees, he is already holding a scroll
of fine vellum, and pen and ink sit ready on the desk for the contract to be
signed. His stomach turns, slowly, but he isn't exactly nervous. This is a
thing already done and his future is set—all that remains are the finer
details.
When they finish, the Dowayne smiles, truly, the fine lines beside her eyes
crinkling. "Well, then. I think we are agreed?"
"Eighteen hundred ducats," Félicie says, with a nod. "Plus any unwanted
offspring for five years to be placed with Balm House for fostering."
Jared kneels, mouth dry, while the Chancellor presents the contract for their
approval. Félicie signs first, and the Dowayne after, and then Maxime appears
beside Jared, and pulls him to his feet. "Your hand, sweetling," he murmurs,
and after a confused second Jared holds out his wrist, and the violet ribbon is
pulled away, leaving his skin bare. The Chancellor has already sanded and dried
the signatures, so all that is left is to roll the contract so that Maxime can
tie it closed with the ribbon from Jared's wrist. It is sealed to the vellum
with wax, and the Dowayne affixes her seal.
"It will be held in trust until he reaches ten years," the Dowayne says. The
Chancellor bows and then disappears with Jared's contract tight between his
hands.
"We will send word for the gold to be transferred to Balm within the week,"
Félicie responds, and then she clicks her fingers. A footman appears in
Orchis's rose-and-gold livery, bearing a small velvet lady's bag. "With your
permission?" she says, and the Dowayne nods. "Come here, then, Jared."
He walks the few steps to her chair, and watches while from the bag she
produces a length of ribbon in softest blush pink. This she twines around his
wrist, once and then twice and then tied with a simple knot so the ends trail
past his fingertips. "You'll be home soon," she says, smiling at him, and
kisses his forehead, and then his mouth. He presses his fingers to his lips and
Félicie laughs, merry, while his face grows hot. Honore appears, then, and
takes him by the hand to lead him out of the office. He looks over his shoulder
as he's led away, the silk ribbon brushing his skin, and hears the adults toast
to Naamah before the doors swing closed.
He can hardly sleep that night, laying beside Jensen in the warmth of their
nursery bed. Marina helps him to tie the pink ribbon into a lover's knot and he
tucks it under the mattress for safe-keeping, just one trailing end slipping
out so he can rub it between his fingers, now and then. He's idly toying with
the soft end one evening while Jensen reads fairy-stories aloud, and Sandra and
the little children are long asleep when Jensen halts midsentence in the middle
of the tale of the mermaid who found a wife.
There's a long pause, and Jared turns over to see Jensen sitting up in bed with
the book open in his lap. "I thought you were asleep," Jensen says, but
it's—distant, like he's thinking of something else.
The candles are just bright enough that Jared can see the unhappy expression on
Jensen's face. "What is it?" he says, rolling a little closer.
"When they finish haggling, I'll go directly to Eglantine." Jensen rubs his
thumb over the drawing on the page, the mermaid half out of the water, touching
the wife's face. "I'm too old already, they'll have to start my training right
away."
Jared sits up. He—hadn't thought of that. Next summer, he'd thought, because
that was how long he had to wait—but, of course, Jensen is thirteen, and so
will be taken away and dedicated immediately. "But—that will leave me here just
with Sandra," Jared says, and feels stupid as soon as he does. Jensen puts the
book aside and draws his knees up, circling his arms around them loosely. He's
staring away into the dark outside the pool of candlelight and feels
suddenly—distant, from Jared, in a way he has never been. Jared has never felt
the difference in their ages, or in their circumstances, but suddenly it's
rushing in. Things are going to change, and soon.
He puts a hand on Jensen's arm, feels the warmth through the soft of the sleep-
shirt he still wears. "I know you'll be busy, learning. And we'll be in
separate houses. But—" He falters, and swallows. It takes a moment before he
can continue. "We will see each other. Won't we?"
Jensen looks at him, at last, and for the first time in a very long while Jared
feels almost like he might cry. But Jensen takes his hand, where it rests still
on his arm, and squeezes it tight. He doesn't smile, but he's—there, looking
right at Jared, and the tears recede as fast as they came. Jensen takes a deep
breath. "We will," he says, firm. He shifts around so that they're sitting
crosslegged facing each other, their knees touching, and he clasps both of his
hands around Jared's one, his face suddenly full of a fierce determination.
Jared's made aware, all at once, that Jensen's bigger than him. "We will,"
Jensen says again, looking into his eyes. "I'll find a way. I'll sneak out, if
I need to, or you can, and I'll write to you. Every day, I swear it."
Jared squeezes his hands, feels himself smiling. "We can run away and play all
day in the City until the footmen catch us," he says, imagining. What a game it
would be—he and Jensen out beyond the walls, running through the streets below
the slope of Mont Nuit, places Jared has never seen.
"Say it, and we will," Jensen says, serious. "Jared, if you ask, I'll go with
you."
It's a feeling like his heart is swelling, like it's growing too large for the
slender cage of his ribs. A feeling like he's going to weep, only somehow it's
through his whole body. He presses a kiss to Jensen's knuckles, and then rides
the surge of feeling to lean in and kiss Jensen's mouth, once. It's clumsy,
nothing like when Félicie's lips met his own, but Jensen sucks in a breath,
anyway. Jared pulls back to see that Jensen's eyes are wide, his mouth parted,
and Jared—there's nothing he can say to match what he feels, and that's not his
skill, anyway. He disentangles their hands and surges forward and throws his
arms around Jensen's neck, instead. Jensen lets out a small oof, but catches
him, and hugs him back hard, so hard that it's difficult for Jared to breathe.
He puts his face right alongside Jensen's, their cheeks pressing together, and
doesn't say a thing.
                                       *
It's just a week later, a warm and golden afternoon, when Josephine enters the
nursery, interrupting their singing practice. "Jensen," she says, beckoning,
and Jared's belly twists.
Jensen takes a deep breath and gets to his feet, but pauses. "Will I—" he says,
and swallows. "Will I get to come back here, first?"
Josephine, always kind, comes and embraces him gently around the shoulders.
"Yes, I promise, darling," she says. "Maxime would hear of nothing else."
Jensen nods, against her breast, and when she releases him he glances back at
Jared only once before he squares his shoulders and follows her out of the
nursery.
"I wonder what they'll pay for his marque," Sandra says, all eager gossip, but
Jared can't join in it. The queer feeling in the pit of his stomach is back.
Jensen is gone for what feels like ages longer than Jared's own turn took.
Marina has luncheon with them, and Jared tries to distract himself by playing
peek-a-boo with little Stephane, but his heart's not in it. While they wait,
Marina helps to comb his hair and Sandra's, and they dress in Balm's livery. It
isn't precisely a formal occasion, but to see their playmate off in front of
the Seconds of two houses—it has the feel of ceremony to it.
It's dusk by the time Jensen comes back, followed by a maidservant. Jared
scrambles to his feet from the cushion where he'd been nervously waiting.
Jensen is pale, but lovely, with his hair bound back from his face with a green
ribbon, in a cream-colored shirt and soft fawn leggings. "I'm to pack," he
says, blinking at them, and Marina goes immediately to the maidservant and
leads her along to the bedroom, murmuring in her ear. Sophia had taken nothing
with her when she left, and Jared's confused—but, perhaps this is another
difference between the houses.
"How much?" Sandra says, when they're alone, her eyes gleaming. Jared thinks
sometimes that Bryony should have bought her marque, not Jasmine, so obsessed
is she with gold.
"Twelve hundred ducats," Jensen says, and he wavers for a moment there in the
doorway. Jared blinks, surprised that the price is so low, and Sandra leans
back in her seat with a trace of a smile on her face. She's never said how much
Jasmine paid, but clearly it was higher than that.
Jensen looks down at his hands. "When we were traveling," Jensen says then,
very slowly, and Jared stiffens because Jensen never, ever speaks of his life
before, not since that one terrible night. "If we had ten ducats we celebrated,
because that was food for a week."
Sandra frowns, confused, but before anything else can be said Marina and the
maid come back into the room, the maid bearing a cloth-wrapped bundle. "The
Dowayne gave permission for you to take a book if you wanted, Jensen," Marina
says, and Jensen hesitates only for a moment before he names the fairy-stories
they'd been reading for the past week. Marina goes to retrieve it from the
bedroom, as the maid doesn't have her letters and could not, and then the
bundle is tied up—the sleep-shirt, and Jensen's no longer secret writings, and
his favored book, and everything that would have tied him to Balm. "The
courtyard, then," Marina says, gently, and Jared's belly wrenches, and then he
thinks—
"I'll be there in a moment," he says, and darts away, down the corridor. In the
kitchen one of the maids is always mending something—and yes, there's Ada,
embroidering in the heat of the kitchen and laughing with Cook, and he darts in
and steals her scissors with a breathless, "Sorry!" Then the dash back down the
corridor, ignoring the shout of surprise and anger, and into the dim empty
bedroom, and he yanks his silk ribbon out from under the bed—their bed—and
undoes the lover's knot with a quick tug. One snip—and then he's running again,
through the familiar rear hallways of the house, dodging a surprised couple of
adepts, and then he reaches the exit into the courtyard he tries to move more
sedately.
Marina is there, Stephane held close against her chest, and the little girls,
and Sandra. Honore has come, too, and Florent, and when Jared emerges from the
house Maxime is kissing Jensen's cheeks in soft farewell. "My dear boy," he
says, smiling, but sad, too. "May Elua grant that you find happiness in
Eglantine House."
Jensen nods, against where Maxime's palm cups his cheek, but he doesn't
respond.
"Jensen," Jared says, almost breathless.
The footmen have lit the torches and braziers in the courtyard, so despite the
dusklight it's still easy to see Jensen's eyes—deep green in the shadows, now,
but the whites reddened as though with tears. Jared steps forward, aware of
Maxime and also of Roxane, standing near to the coach in a striking emerald
gown, her eyes watchful.
"For you," Jared whispers, when he's close, and Jensen holds out his hands to
receive the length of soft silk ribbon, half of Jared's gift from Félicie. It's
only a bit crumpled from where Jared had held it too tight, but Jensen clutches
it close anyway, crumples it further against his breast. "For you to remember."
Jensen nods, wordless, and then grabs Jared by the shoulders and hauls him in,
hugs him hard with his face pressing down into Jared's shoulder. His breath
comes hot through the velvet of Jared's thin doublet, but he doesn't cry.
"It's time, Jensen," Roxane says.
There's another nod, down against Jared's shoulder, and then he pulls away, the
length of pink ribbon caught up in his clenched fist. He doesn't say
goodbye—only steps quietly across the flagstone to where Roxane waits with the
coach, and climbs into its dark interior. Roxane nods to Maxime and follows,
and then the Eglantine footmen close the door and cluck to the horses, and then
they're moving away—the horses hooves clacking against the stone, the green-
and-white livery of the footmen receding as they move further from the
torchlight.
Florent puts his hand on Jared's shoulder. "Do not weep, sweetling," he says,
softly, and Jared realizes only then that his cheeks are wet, his face hot and
his chest aching.
                                       *
At first Jared cannot sleep and feels as though his heart is broken, but time
passes, as it does, and life begins to seem normal. Notes arrive from
Jensen—not every day, of course, because the couriers have better things to do
than to carry letters from child to child—but they do come, sporadically. Jared
reads with avarice, even the simple common things that Jensen sends him in his
fine hand—that he has met the other apprentices, that his singing is respected
but his harp and lute needs improvement, that he will be paired with an adept
to mentor him in his writing. Two months away and a very brief note, which
Honore brings down to the nursery out of her own correspondence—I have been
dedicated to Naamah, Jensen writes, and now the training begins in earnest.
The letters slow, then, as Marina warned they would. "He will be very busy,"
she said, when Jared whined. "You'll see soon enough, little orchid."
The Longest Night is very long without Jensen, though he and Sandra still play
as best they can when it's only the two of them. Thomas spends more and more
time with the apprentices, approaching his own dedication. In the early spring
a new girl comes to the nursery, fostered from Cereus, with bright copper hair
and a gentle manner that's even softer than Thomas's, and she's kind but Jared
doesn't play with her as much as he would have, before. Everything feels like
it's holding its breath, his whole world waiting.
After midsummer, when the days go hot and bright and the Court hardly wakes,
waiting for the cool of evening—that is when Jared turns ten. He wakes that day
with a knot of nervousness in his belly, but he's excited, too. He bathes,
alone, and afterward Josephine and Florent dress him in a cream shirt and
breeches, the same sort of clothes that Jensen wore on his last day in the
house. The halved pink ribbon Florent uses to tie the loose plait of his hair,
since it's now too short to knot around his wrist. Florent kisses his temple
when he's done, and Jared hugs him impulsively around the waist. "How could
there ever have been doubt," Florent says, smiling down at him. "Joyous down to
your bones, you are."
What follows blurs, a little. Orchis sends another adept in Félicie's place, a
man of average height with shoulder-length auburn hair. He meets Jared with the
kiss of greeting, as though he were an adult, and gives him a wide smile.
"Ready, little flower?" he says, and Jared nods, grinning back. He embraces
Sandra, and all of the adepts who have been so kind to him—Florent and
Josephine and Honore and Marina—and accepts his kiss from Maxime with a thrill.
"Be well, Jared," Maxime says, simply, and then—into the coach with the adept,
and for the first time Jared sees Mont Nuit, outside of the walls of Balm
House.
The thirteen Houses of the Court of Nightblooming Flowers vary in size, and
prestige, but Mont Nuit has been theirs for nigh six hundred years. Jensen told
Jared that, from a book he read, and it's still hard for Jared to fathom.
Balm's grounds sit halfway up the slope, and Orchis is higher still, so Jared
watches out the window as the coach climbs the winding cobbled street. The
estates adjoin each other, Jared sees—there, the opulent gates with footmen in
gold, that must be Bryony House, and only a little further up the hill are the
green-and-white footmen of Eglantine. His belly thrills and for a moment he
wants to lean out of the coach and wave to Jensen, but—well, it's not as though
Jensen would be able to see it. The adept with him, who introduces himself as
Antoine, smiles at Jared's excitement, and when Jared catches a glimpse of a
coach with the royal Courcel swans on its door and gasps, actually laughs.
"Who do you think visits our Court, dear thing?" Antoine says, his eyes
dancing. "I promise you, your patrons will be wealthy merchants and young
lordlings, but there will be princes, too." Jared gives him full attention—he
has seen some little of what happens between an adept and a patron, but no
detail, and it fascinates him in a way little else does. Antoine waves a hand,
though. "Never mind, never mind. Just you enjoy the summer day. There will be
time enough for patrons later. Today is more important, no?"
The coach approaches Orchis, then, and the footmen swing open the gates to
admit them. The courtyard is larger than Balm's, Jared sees—but then Antoine is
stepping down from the coach and holding out his hand for Jared to take, and a
footman bows and opens the great door for them, and then Jared steps into the
hall of his new home. It is airy, the hall wide enough for a fete of at least a
hundred, and the great high windows make it brighter than Balm, but it is not
so different, really. Before Jared can work out whether he's disappointed or
relieved, Antoine hands him over to two female adepts, both sunny but
businesslike, and he's swept away into the back corridors of the house to be
prepared.
An hour later, and he's dressed in a pale gold tunic, a softer version of
Orchis's bold livery, and his hair has been re-bound into a more elaborate
braid, though the girls still tied it with the pink ribbon Félicie gave him.
Perfume is dabbed at his throat and wrists, a thin line of kohl applied to his
eyes, and then the girls lead him through the house, whispering to each other
and giggling as they move along through the unfamiliar corridors. A footman
opens a new set of doors, bows them through it, and then Jared is left blinking
in the sunlight. There is no greenhouse as Balm has, but there is a decorative
garden and a wide green lawn, and on it are laden tables draped with colorful
fabric under a white canopy, and the House is waiting for him.
It is a crowd, adepts he's never met in a rainbow of colors, fine velvets and
bright silk, flowers and jewels alike. They're chattering, when the doors open,
but they soon go quiet—but there is no solemnity here, only bright smiles,
whispers and laughter. The girls urge him forward and so he walks, barelegged
and barefooted, over the lush thick grass, to where Félicie waits in her green
silk gown, her eyes sparkling as she holds out her hand to Jared. An older man
sits on a wide stone bench a few feet beyond her—his new Dowayne, Jared
immediately realizes. The man is handsome, still, perhaps a few years older
than the Dowayne of Balm—his hair is steel gray all over, but thick and
shining, in a long braid that rests over his shoulder. He watches Jared's
approach with a small smile, the lines deep beside his eyes and near his mouth.
When Jared reaches Félicie he kneels abeyante, in the grass, feels it thick and
warm against his skin, and the Dowayne's smile widens, just for a moment.
The adepts spread out, murmuring as they form a loose semi-circle around the
Dowayne's seat, and then Félicie claps her hands, twice, and they fall quiet.
"When Blessed Elua came to Persis, he was captured by the King and chained in a
cell," Félicie says. Her voice is high and bright, the words well-practiced.
"There were angels who heard of this and descended from the One God's heaven to
the earth to save him and to walk with him in his wandering. It was Naamah,
eldest sister, who came to the King and offered her body in exchange for Elua's
freedom."
The sacred tale, passed down and down, welcoming each apprentice into their new
home. Six hundred years on Mont Nuit, comes Jensen's voice in his head, and yet
the Houses themselves went back further still. Jared feels an instant snap of
connection, there in the grass with the sun warm on his face—all of the long
generations, and it is at last his turn to serve.
"The King was cruel, but he accepted Naamah's offer and took her to his
bedchamber." Félicie bends, then, and tilts up Jared's face to her own, her
beautiful eyes on his. "Naamah came to him smiling, and though he had only ever
before laid with another to prove his power, she showed him the great joy to be
found in it, and brought happiness to his bed. When we serve Naamah in this
house we strive to do the same: to find joy in laughter, to bring our patrons
light." She smiles at him, then. "Do you understand?"
He nods, tears pricking behind his eyes, and she cups his cheek in her hand
before she steps back, and a maidservant steps forward with a finely carved
wooden bowl.
"Stand, child," the Dowayne says, and his voice is musical, light. Jared's
knees wobble, but Félicie takes his elbow and leads him the few steps closer.
The Dowayne plucks from the bowl a single orchid, white petaled with a deep
magenta heart, and pins the blossom to Jared's breast. Then he draws Jared even
closer, between his knees, and kisses both of his cheeks and then the smooth
spot between his brows. Jared closes his eyes, breathes in. "Be welcome to our
House," the Dowayne says, then, "Jared nó Orchis."
A cheer goes up among the adepts and somewhere, a lute immediately begins
playing. Jared opens his eyes to find the Dowayne still smiling at him, holding
his face between his hands. "You will have a bright future, Jared," he says,
under the noise. "You will do Naamah proud."
"Thank you, my lord," Jared whispers—and then Félicie spins him around and
kisses his cheek, and draws him into the crowd of adepts to be embraced and
kissed and feted. It would be better if Jensen were there—if Jared could hold
his hand, and see the smile enter his eyes—but there, among the flowers of his
new home with the sun shining, Jared feels no sadness, and no solitude, and his
heart fills to the brim with bright, simple joy.
***** Orchis *****
With autumn drawing close over the City of Elua, the linden trees lining the
boulevards of Mont Nuit are threaded through with gold. The chill of morning
takes longer to dissipate and the servants bustle through the rear corridors of
the house, preparing for the cold season, while grey rainy days cover the city
in fog—but the evening steals over the City sooner, too, and that is when the
Night Court comes to life.
Jared is careful as he lights the little candle under the silver censer, and
more careful as he places the lump of thick amber wax in the warming dish
inside. He chose the canella for this evening, and already it smells… warm,
inviting, the spice of it starting to fill the air. He closes the censer and
places it on the credenza under the window, set between the bouquet of white
chrysanthemum and the sculpture of Naamah’s hands. The hands are held open,
inviting, their delicate spread suggesting an offering being made. Jared
touches the left thumb, the white marble cool under his finger, and wonders how
full those hands will be left this evening.
"Canella?" he hears, and spins around to find Richard leaning in the doorway in
his dressing gown, smiling at him. "Why that one?"
Jared clasps his hands together. "An autumn scent," he says. "Comforting, but
exotic, too. To make the patron feel both at home, and as though they are
somewhere special."
Richard laughs and comes fully into the room. "Always such clever reasoning,
darling," he says, and cups Jared’s cheeks in both hands. Jared feels a flush
rising up, already, as always happens. Richard pinches the pink of it, just
softly. "And always so sweet," he murmurs, his smile warm. He runs his thumb
over Jared’s cheek, shaking his head just a little, and then lets him go and
nods toward the side chamber, off of the bedroom. "Come along, it’s nearly
time."
Jared follows, obedient, though he hardly needs to be encouraged. This is his
favorite part of his day, most days. Behind the thick velvet curtain hides the
bathing room, where the patrons and adepts may refresh themselves before or
after an assignation, but it also holds the elegantly appointed vanity where
Richard prepares for his evenings. The suit for the evening has already been
delivered to the bedchamber by the maid, pressed and cleaned, and Jared busies
himself with hanging it up, carefully brushing the silk doublet and breeches,
while Richard disappears behind the screen. Jared isn’t yet allowed to aid with
what might happen behind it, though he knows a bit of what does from the
adepts’ gossip. He makes sure that the jasmine-scented oil is always available,
since he knows it’s Richard’s favorite scent.
Richard emerges after only a few minutes, his dressing gown loosely tied so
that Jared can see his white chest, the perfectly groomed traces of hair under
his navel that dip down below the rich fall of plum-colored silk. "I think a
braid tonight, darling," he says, sitting at the vanity before the mirror, and
so Jared moves behind him, gathering the silky weight of his long hair. He’s
done this so many times now that he hardly has to watch the movement of his own
hands, and so he watches Richard in the mirror, instead. White skin, yes, but
the faintest peach flush at cheeks and chest, and a pouty pink bow of mouth.
He’s slight, barely a foot taller than Jared, and his muscles are slim and
subtle on his frame, and as Jared finishes the complex weave of his braid and
lays it in a thick black rope over Richard’s shoulder—he opens his eyes, smiles
his thanks, and Jared feels himself flush all over again.
"Do you have a particular assignation tonight?" he asks, to cover his
embarrassment.
Luckily, Richard is as tactful as he is lovely, and he turns his attention to
the drawer of cosmetics. "No, not this evening. Tomorrow, my lady Desmarais
will return from summering in Siovale, and she has sent word ahead that she
will see me at my earliest convenience—but tonight, who knows?"
Jared takes the pot of kohl and the fine brush when they’re handed to him, and
takes a deep breath to ensure a steady hand when Richard tilts up his perfect
face, eyes closed. His lashes are dark and long already and so Jared needs only
draw the thinnest line to accentuate the tip-tilt of his lids. "Nothing else
tonight?" he asks, quiet.
"No—in the red silk, more would be vulgar." Richard opens his eyes, and so
close Jared can see the clear, deep brown of them, so dark they seem black in
the candlelight. Richard bats his lids, coquettish, and Jared can’t help but
laugh. A glance in the mirror makes Richard smile, too. He’s always smiling.
"Well done, sweet. Help me dress, now."
The silk suit for the evening isn’t quite red—it’s the color of currants, the
fabric rich and deeply dyed, glinting beautifully in the candlelight. It’s
Jared’s second-favorite, after the mahogany. He runs careful fingers around the
hems, over the delicate embroidered detailing on the sleeves, checking for
loose threads the maids might have missed, while Richard sheds the dressing
gown and loops it casually over the screen. He dabs jasmine perfume behind his
ears, in the crooks of his elbows and on the waxed bare skin under his arms, on
the soft skin of his inner thighs—all those places the blood will heat it and
make the scent rise intoxicatingly from his flesh. Jared has already laid out
the hose and he watches while Richard rolls them up just above the knee, tying
them into place with ribbons at the back of each thigh, the creamy white of the
silk not contrasting with his skin at all. The corset, next, and Jared helps to
lace it in place where it will show off the slight rise of Richard’s pectoral
muscle to best effect. He’d been confused at the addition, when first he
started to assist, and Richard had laughed delightedly—such delicate flowers
from Balm,he’d said, and when Jared had been embarrassed, gently explained:
sometimes my patrons like something to hold onto, dear one. Jared ties the
laces in the back with a careful knot, the bow sitting flat and centered under
the spray of orchids rising up Richard’s spine toward the finial of his almost-
finished marque.
The white shirt, next, and while Richard adjusts the laces at the throat to
show off his smooth chest, Jared licks his lips, thinking. "Do you wonder about
who your patron for the evening might be?" he says.
Richard finishes with the laces and smooths the shirt over his narrow hips,
turning back and forth to admire the effect. "Of course," he says, abstracted.
Jared kneels to help him into the tight breeches, and Richard easily uses his
shoulder as a balance as he steps into them. "Without an appointed assignation,
it’s always a surprise. But I am not of Gentian, trying to divine the future
with—what, incense and dreaming and opium. Thanks to Elua."
Jared grins, can’t help it. Richard has very little use for the mystics’ house.
He waits, kneeling, while Richard adjusts himself, tucking his soft bare cock
into the breeches and lacing them easily, quickly. The ruffled hem of the shirt
floats just over the bulge, showing it off to great effect, and then Richard
slips on the doublet so that Jared can join it to the breeches on either side
with the ribboned points, tying up the bows to sit enticingly on the top arch
of each hip. "Just as well that Lady Joanna won’t be here this evening,"
Richard says, a rueful tilt to his smile as he watches Jared work. "She has an
awful tendency to snap the ribbon as she’s unwrapping her prize."
Richard prefers the boots with the two-inch heel with this suit, and Jared
helps slip them on and turns down the tops just enough to get a teasing glimpse
of the white silk of the hose over the soft calfskin. When Jared stands again,
Richard is closer to average height, and he’s also—stunning.
"Am I ready, dear?" Richard says, as always, eyes flicking over himself
professionally in the mirror, checking their work.
"You’re beautiful," Jared responds, as he always does, and even if it’s their
ritual it makes Richard smile at him in the mirror, warm and kind.
Distantly, Jared realizes that music is playing. The evening’s entertainment
has started already, and guests must be arriving. He follows Richard a pace
behind from the bedchamber down the lamplit rear servants’ corridor, then down
the back stairs to the main floor of the house. Other adepts are gathering,
too: Phoebe in a pink velvet gown that sets off her crown of blonde hair,
Marcus in a navy blue silk, Antoine in his grey with the tiny embroidered birds
that Jared loves so well—and Antoine tosses a kiss and a grin to Jared when he
sees him looking. "Ready to smile for Gaultier?" Rose calls to Amelia, almost
smirking, and Amelia shoves lightly at her shoulder and rolls her eyes, but
she’s smiling, too.
Félicie swirls past, adjusting her pearl earrings as she briefly glances over
each adept in turn, checking their presentation before they enter the great
hall. She nods at Richard, smiling, and so he turns to Jared and smooths his
hair behind his ears, presses a kiss to the top of his head. "Ask Naamah’s
blessing for me, darling," he whispers, and Jared nods, flushing all over
again. He backs away, going to stand in the shadows by the stairway, so that
when the door to the hall opens and the light and sound flood through he can’t
be seen. Félicie leads the way, and Jared can’t quite see the guests but he can
hear the round of applause, a joyous call, rowdier and brighter than Balm ever
was. When Rose’s skirt sweeps last through the doorway the footman behind the
screen closes the door with a bow, and then—it’s quiet, again, but Jared can
still hear the music.
It’s exciting, every time. He clutches a hand over his breast, where his heart
is speeding a little below his tunic.
"Come on, Jared," he hears. He turns—Laura. She’s at the door at the end of the
hall, neat in her simple rose livery just as Jared is, but she has tugged her
hair out of its caul so that it tumbles in messy dark waves over her shoulders.
"Cook will have supper waiting, let’s go."
He sighs, but only quietly, and follows. She’s only two years older than him,
but is close to her dedication, and is very fond of bossing him around with her
little additional experience. It’s a good thing she ended up in Orchis, he
thinks, less than charitably. Balm would have sold her out in a heartbeat.
They wend their way through the dim servants’ corridors to the kitchen, dodging
a servant hurrying by with a fresh carafe of wine and clean glasses. "Did
Phoebe have an assignation tonight?" he asks. Phoebe’s a particular
favorite—only eighteen, but in great demand for her happy laugh and wide white
smile.
"No, but we heard rumor that his grace the duke would be here with his
entourage this evening." Laura pushes into the kitchen, where Cook is shouting
at some of the undercooks about the turbot planned for the Dowayne’s private
supper. They dodge out of the way of another rushing servant, and Laura steals
a small slice of baguette from the baker’s tray laid by the fire. "If she’s
lucky, she will call his attention again."
Jared whistles lowly under his breath. Phoebe is Laura’s mentor, and Laura
brags often with secondhand pride about the patron-gifts Phoebe earns. The Duke
de Trevalion left a particularly generous gift which earned Phoebe a full three
inches of her marque, and Laura is always happy to mention it. Richard is more
discreet with his own gifts, but Jared likes to think he wouldn’t brag about
them, even if he did know.
The adepts ate hours ago, so they would not begin the evening with full
stomachs, and the children eat well on their leftovers—a rich stew of morel and
duck, thick and warming for the cold night ahead. Percy joins them after a
while, cheeks flushed nearly the color of his darker livery. Already dedicated
at fourteen, he is allowed to serve during the evenings while the house is open
to guests, and as he sits and plows into his own meal he’s already full of
gossip about the night’s business.
"A rich merchant has brought his son for his sixteenth birthday," he reports,
expertly speaking around his full mouth. Not something that would be allowed
near the adepts, and certainly not near a patron, but when it’s only them Percy
can get away with it, rushing to get back to the fete. "And Trevalion is here,
yes, Laura, you needn’t ask again."
"Is the son pretty?" Jared asks, leaning in close.
Percy rocks his hand back and forth, chewing. "I wouldn’t be eager to have him
pay my virgin-price," he says, finally. "But a very pretty mouth, I’ll give him
that."
Jared sits back, disappointed. A sixteenth birthday usually means that rich
parents will pay extra for their child to lose their virginity to someone
special, and he knows Richard particularly favors those assignations, but—well,
that is part of serving Naamah, too. Not all patrons can be as beautiful as
Naamah’s servants.
"Marcus will take him, if no one else will," Laura says, practically, and Percy
snorts while Jared tries to hide a smile. Marcus is sweet, but even Jared can
tell that he’s a little dim, and as the youngest of the apprentices the less
appealing contracts tend to be filtered toward him.
"I’m sure the Dowayne will secure an appropriate contract," Percy says,
diplomatically, but he winks at Jared as he says it and Jared can’t help but
let his smile spread, though it’s still small.
With his supper finished, Percy goes back to the main hall to continue
attending. Jared has barely swallowed his last bite when a harried servant
swipes his bowl away to be washed, and an undercook flutters her hands at them,
getting them out of the way so that the valuable kitchen surface can be
reclaimed. Laura smiles prettily at one of the teenaged scullery boys until he
gives them two of the little late-harvest apples, and then kisses his cheek for
his trouble. His face flushes dark red, and he says, "All right, off, bedtime."
Jared smiles at him, too, and scurries off through the rear corridor after
Laura.
The children’s rooms are much smaller in Orchis than in Balm. Percy and Laura
share one little room and Jared shares the other with the youngest, Gemma, a
cheery spoiled six-year-old born to the house. He comes in quietly, but she
seems to be asleep. The room is barely lit by the small brazier at the foot of
the bed, so he lights a taper to give a bit to see by as he undresses
himself—hangs the livery over the dressing frame, places his soft boots by the
door, and then in his shirt he nudges Gemma’s starfish-sprawl out of the middle
of the bed and tucks himself into the warm blankets on his side. With the taper
on the side-table, he slides his fingers down the side of the mattress, into
where the sheet tucks against the bedframe and there—yes, he closes his eyes in
relief. Still there. Gemma’s fast asleep and so he pulls out the last letter.
Almost a month ago, now.
Daphne has me reading plays, he reads again, Jensen’s fine familiar hand
scrolling smoothly over the creased paper. They’re often bawdy, since they’re
meant for the patrons’ entertainment, but I think you’d like some of them. The
one I’m reading now features a young shepherd who falls in love with the stars,
and while he’s dreaming they come down from the sky to return the favor. It’s a
happy play, supposed to make the audience laugh. It made me think of you.
Jared touches the last word, where the ink smeared, and then closes his eyes.
When he can bear it again he reads the rest of the letter, and then once more,
no matter that he’s read it so many times he nearly has it memorized. Gemma
stirs behind him, and flops over, her little breaths coming steady and even.
Jared scrubs his wrist over his eyes and refolds the paper, tucks it back into
its hiding place. Correspondence isn’t forbidden—the courier brought Jensen’s
letter with all the rest of the adepts’ messages between houses, just the same
as anyone else’s—and yet it’s… his. He keeps it safe. He blows out the taper,
finally, and curls into the pillow alone, and listens to the music from the
fete below. It will go on for hours, long after he’s asleep. He listens for a
long time.
                                       *
The days creep along, as they do, as the weather grows colder. Jared has been
of Orchis for four months now, nearly five, and as the Longest Night approaches
he is well familiar with the house’s rhythms. He hasn’t yet been dedicated, not
like Percy, and so he and Laura and Gemma share the same responsibility: simply
to live, and to learn. He and Laura play around the grounds during the daytime,
with Gemma sometimes tagging after them. They race through the garden while the
adepts are sleeping through the morning, and Laura’s older but Jared’s faster,
almost always wins. Laura pouts, but she’s cheerful and soon forgets her mood.
They’re all happy, here.
They’re in the small solarium, now, running through their daily exercise.
Marcus is guiding them, in his way: he’s sprawled in his dressing gown on the
chaise, and Jared thinks he might be making up some of the exercises. He’s
never been asked to bend backwards to touch his heels, before. Still—
"I can’t believe you actually—! Marcus!" Percy says, and Marcus starts
laughing, while Jared peeks at him upside down. He hasn’t quite reached his
heels, but he’s arched backwards at any rate, his palms flat on the floor.
"I was only joking!" Marcus says, and then he hops up and grasps Jared’s
ankles. "Ready?" he says, and Jared’s not sure for what, but then all of a
sudden—his weight shifts and he’s aloft, balanced on his hands with Marcus
holding him steady. They take a few staggering steps across the flagstone
before the blood goes too much to Jared’s head and he gasps out wait, stop, and
then Marcus picks him up bodily in a show of easy strength, spinning him up
into the air so that he’s panting down into Marcus’s grinning face.
"Are we training to be acrobats, now?" Percy asks, a little sarcastic.
"I want to try!" Laura says, never wanting to be left out, and so Marcus plants
a smacking kiss on Jared’s cheek and drops him to the chaise cushion, gamely
going over and swooping Laura up so that she shrieks and giggles. Jared slides
down to the floor, breathing hard while the dizziness lets him go. Percy is
stretching his thighs, shaking his head while Marcus fools about, but he’s
smiling, too.
There’s an ache, somewhere in Jared’s chest. The house is warm, bright, even
though snow is threatening outside and the day has gone a sullen grey, and his
playmates are laughing, and tonight the house is closed to visitors and so he
will get to take supper with Richard and hear stories about the week’s patrons,
which he always loves, and yet. And yet.
Percy fostered from Eglantine, and though he didn’t have their creative spark
and was always destined for Orchis, he was still raised by their singers, and
he starts a simple bawdy song, clicking his fingers for the rhythm. Marcus
spins Laura around again and starts to dance with her, an inelegant gavotte
which involves tickling on the pass, and when he reaches out his hands for
Jared, Jared gives them, of course, and lets himself be spun around. Laura
embraces him and twirls him to Percy, who spins him in a full circle and pushes
him to Marcus to be tickled—and he laughs, can’t help it in their infectious
company, but there’s always something missing.
                                       *
It’s a clear morning after the year’s first snow when Jared is called to
Félicie’s office. He wears his livery, not sure how else to attend, and follows
a yawning Rose up to the house’s top floor. The Second’s office is tucked away
from the public areas—not like the Dowayne’s, open and elegant, where
negotiations and meetings are held. When Félicie calls her welcome at Rose’s
knock, Jared steps in and finds his Second wearing a simple deep brown gown,
her bright hair caught in a loose caul at the nape of her neck. "Thank you,
Rose, that will be all," Félicie says, and so the door closes behind Jared, and
he’s left alone there, with a sudden nervous turn to his stomach for company.
Or—no, not alone, because Gemma is there, too, curled up asleep in the plush
reading chair under the window.
"Good day, Félicie," Jared says, bowing his head. He’s never seen Laura or
Percy or any of the adepts do the same, but it was their manner at Balm and
it’s only polite.
"Good morning, Jared," Félicie says, with a small smile. There’s a tea set
there and she pours a cup for him, nods him to the upright little chair before
her desk, and he takes both automatically. There are stacked papers all over
the desk, books and scrolls and packages, and the settee crammed against the
other wall is completely covered with fabric samples, swatches of bright silks
and velvet and even gauzy, nearly transparent lace. He wants to touch it—even
Richard only has a few pieces of lace in his wardrobe, and he saves it for
private assignations. "We’re preparing for the Midwinter Masque," Félicie says,
and he snaps his eyes back to her, flushes at being caught staring. She takes a
sip of her tea, and he copies her, he hopes as gracefully. "Do you know what
our theme will be, this year?"
He overheard Phoebe and Amelia gossiping over it in the garden while they took
some sun, and licks his lips. "Myths, I think? From Alba?"
Félicie smiles wider, and it’s warmer than the fire at her back. "Yes, nearly.
To honor Her Majesty’s ancestry, we’ll be playing as the fair folk, from the
stories of Alba and Eire. Faerie, changelings, swan-maidens, selkies."
"I know those," Jared says, startled. "The seal ladies who are turned, and live
on land with a human husband!"
It’s a story Jensen used to tell, from the book he took with him from Balm.
Félicie raises her eyebrows, surprised, but she laughs softly. "Clever Jared,"
she murmurs, shaking her head, and then nods at the settee. There’s a luxurious
pile of charcoal-colored velvet at the top of the stack, so thick it would be a
treasure to touch. "Don’t you think Richard will make a lovely selkie?"
Jared blinks, imagines it. Richard’s black hair, his so-dark eyes; all that
white skin a shock against the dark fabric, playing soft and feminine and coy.
He nods, biting his tongue, and Félicie rests her chin on her palm, watches him
for a moment.
"Jared," she says, finally, and he puts his teacup in its saucer with a slight
rattle, because her voice is more serious than he’s ever heard it. "You know
that when we pair a child with a mentor, the mentor reports to me and to the
Dowayne, don’t you?"
He stares. Has he— "I’m sorry," he says. Félicie frowns, delicately, and Jared
rushes on, says, "I’m sorry, I haven’t meant to—I didn’t mean to discredit the
house," and he doesn’t know what he could have done, he’s been on his best
behavior, he’s trying, but Félicie raises her hands, stops his rush of words.
"Darling, stop," she says, and looks—sad, maybe, which isn’t an expression he’s
ever seen her wear. Not one he’s seen on anyone from Orchis, and he swallows,
looks down at his lap where he’s cupping the tea and saucer between both hands.
"Richard was concerned, the other evening, when he woke you to go to your own
bed," she continues, and now Jared squeezes his eyes closed. He knows the
evening she means. In the brief quiet, a log cracks in the fireplace, and he
breathes deep. "It’s not the first time you’ve wept, in your sleep."
He doesn’t know what to say. His stomach hurts, and he can feel his eyes
growing damp, even now. Joy in laughter, he remembers, from his birthday. He
knows the canon; he knows what the house expects, what patrons will. All he’s
wanted, his whole life, was to serve.
"Gemma, sweetheart," Félicie says, standing. Jared blinks hard, looks up. She
takes the two steps over to the chair and pats Gemma’s little face, and gets a
sleepy blink and outstretched arms, Gemma artlessly asking for love as she
always does. Félicie does scoop her up, presses a kiss to her flushed cheek.
"Time to go play, sweet."
"Want to stay with you, Mama," Gemma mumbles. Oh—Jared had never put that
together, but it’s obvious now. Their matched red hair, the tilt of their
mouths, though Gemma’s eyes are a cloudy blue instead of Félicie’s deep green.
Félicie pats her back, kisses her brow, and then puts her on her own feet.
Gemma rubs her eyes and stops at Jared’s chair on her way out the door. "I hope
you feel better," she says, earnest, and kisses him on the cheek before she
exits, and skips away down the hall.
Jared puts a hand over his cheek, over the little damp spot left. He still
feels like he might cry. He’s not paying attention, and so he startles a little
when cool fingers touch his chin, lift his face. Félicie searches his eyes,
then taps her thumb where he’s biting his lower lip. "You’ll tear the skin,"
she reminds him, gently, and he lets it go immediately, face heating for
forgetting his lessons.
She rubs her thumb over the dents he left, and then takes the cup and saucer
out of his hand, sets it on her desk. "The seamstress finished something for
you today," she says, unexpectedly. There’s a bundle of linen on the desk,
balanced atop some parchment, and she unties the knot with a practiced flick.
Out comes a weight of fabric—a cloak, Jared sees when she shakes it out, a
heavy serge the color of a summer sky. He stands up at her gesture, and she
settles it over his shoulders, the weight of it settling soft against him, like
an embrace, the hem swirling all the way down to his ankles. "Ah, yes," she
says, tugging at the collar. "Yes, that color’s just right."
"My lady," he says, through the thickness in his throat. If it’s a going-away
present—if he’s to be sent—where? He doesn’t know.
"None of that, Jared," Félicie says. She puts her hands on his shoulders,
squeezes lightly through the cloak. "You’ll accompany me today, but it’s near
frozen outside. You’ll wear your boots, and the brown breeches, and—yes, borrow
Percy’s smaller doublet, the cream. Hurry along, now. I’ll expect you in the
front hall."
He’s ushered out of the door and it closes behind him. He still—he doesn’t
know, but he clutches his new cloak around him, blinks away tears. If the worst
comes, at least he’ll be warm. He trots down the stairs, back down to his own
room, determined to do Félicie’s bidding. He’s met nothing but kindness, here,
and he must repay that with obedience, if he can do nothing else.
                                       *
He’s dressed and ready, standing nervously in the empty hall and watching the
maids scrub the parquet in anticipation of the evening’s entertainment, when
Félicie comes down the main stairs. She’s still in her plain gown, though she’s
touched up her face with a light application of kohl, a red stain on her lips.
She swings a russet cloak over her shoulders and nods to the footman, who
sketches a shallow bow and opens the door for her. A coach is waiting, the same
that first brought Jared to the house those months ago, and the footman hands
Félicie in with a deeper bow, and then offers Jared his hand, too, helps him up
out of the snowy courtyard into the plush interior.
Félicie offers no explanation, turning her attention to the satchel of papers
she brought, and so Jared sits quiet, tucks his hair more neatly behind his
ears and watches out the coach window. Mont Nuit isn’t busy, so early in the
day—the only assignations that might happen before evening are special
appointments, and those are rare enough. The trees have lost their leaves, for
the most part, and the bare branches stretch elegantly over the boulevard,
rimed with white and sparking in the sun. It’s only the second time he’s been
outside of a house’s walls, and he leans further into the window, fascinated.
There, a cart passing slowly by, laden heavy with boxes, driven by a boy so
wrapped up in wool Jared can’t even see his shape, only his pink face as he
curses at his donkey. A few men, trudging along in the cold, that glance up as
the coach passes, and when one winks at him Jared blinks, and smiles cautiously
back. He sees the man nudge his companion and point, maybe seeing the livery or
the orchid sigil of the house, but by then they’ve passed and Jared can’t see
them, anymore. They pass Dahlia, the smallish estate sitting well back from the
street, elegant cypress lining the way to their gate dusted silvery with snow,
and Jared wonders—would he have done better, there?
The coach slows, then, the footman calling out something that’s muffled through
the roof, and Jared blinks, turning to look out of the other window, and—oh.
The footmen on the ground call something in response, and the coach swings
around, the horses’ shoes striking sharp on the cobblestone, and then they’re
entering a new courtyard, through scrolled iron gates. Félicie tucks her papers
back into her leather satchel, and Jared’s heart hammers in the base of his
throat while the coach pulls around an elegant, empty fountain. The horses stop
and a footman in a white doublet with a green cloak and breeches immediately
comes forward to open the door of their coach, bowing low.
"Welcome, my lady, to Eglantine House," he says.
Jared snaps his eyes to Félicie, but she’s already stepping down from the
coach, her hand set lightly on the footman’s arm. "Inform my lady Thibault that
we have arrived, please," she says, while Jared is helped from the coach. The
footman nods at a page, who scrambles away into the house, and the footman
leads them at a more elegant pace toward the entry. The doors sweep open before
Félicie’s path and warmth spills out into the cold day, and Jared gets his
first view of Eglantine House.
The entry is separate from the main hall, unlike in Balm or Orchis, and at
Félicie’s nod he takes the opportunity to knock away the little snow his boots
accumulated. A maid bobs into view, murmurs that if they please she will guide
them to the study to wait, and so they follow her down the corridors while
Jared does his best to gawk around unnoticed. The house sprawls—that’s the
first thing he notices. It seems to be three stories from the outside, much
like his current home, but it spreads out wide, encompassing much more of the
estate than either of the houses he knows. The corridor turns, several times,
and he knows he’ll be lost if he tries to find his way out alone, but finally
the maid brings them to a wide double-door and pushes through, then curtsies
them inside. A fire is laid in the huge hearth, and Félicie gestures Jared to
the cushion near it. He kneels abeyante, but not before he takes in the walls,
lined wholly with bookcases, full nearly to the ceiling on every side—and where
there aren’t books there are paintings, as fine as any he’s seen. The one above
the fireplace is of a couple entwined, a man’s broad back and the woman’s hands
set elegantly upon it, her eyes meeting the viewer’s over his shoulder, serene
with knowing satisfaction. Jared gazes at it, a little shocked, for a long
moment—until the door opens, again, and he ducks his chin and hoods his eyes,
forcing his form to be absolutely perfect. His long cloak is pooled about him
like a puddle, hiding his body, but he’s sure Félicie can tell, anyway.
"My dear," he hears, and there’s the click of heels over hardwood. The voice is
sugary, too ingratiating. "Such a cold day for such a pretty petal."
"Hush, Roxane," Félicie says. Jared risks a glance up—oh! Roxane Thibault, the
Second of Eglantine.
He watches the women give each other the kiss of greeting, Félicie grinning and
Roxane’s eyes crinkled with mischief. She’s likely a decade Félicie’s senior,
but she’s still beautiful, dressed today in a gown of sage green that rises
high against her throat. Jared drops his eyelids again, but he can see enough
through his lashes to catch it when Roxane glances at him, kneeling, and then
turns her eyes with a question back to Félicie. She doesn’t ask it,
though—instead, calls for the maid again in her normal throaty voice, and
orders tea and refreshment, and then the ladies both settle onto the settee
before the fire, their long skirts brushing together with a whisper of silky
fabric. Félicie tosses her cloak over the chair nearby, casual when they’re
speaking one Second to another, and by the time the maid reappears with the tea
tray and promptly disappears with a silent curtsy, the two of them are deep in
gossip. Jared kneels, silent and still, and attends.
The fire is well-made, the kneeling cushion positioned just right so that Jared
can appreciate the lick of warmth on his skin but not grow too hot, even in his
cloak. He shifts his weight, imperceptibly, hands clasped neatly against his
thighs, and watches the light flicker over the parquet, and traces the complex
patterns in the fine Ephesian rug with his eyes, and listens. The Duke de
Trevalion spent lavishly for his friends on his last visit to Orchis;
Eglantine’s theme for the Masque this year is as yet a secret, even to friends,
but a hint lies in the songs of Hellas that the adepts are now learning; a few
of the female adepts are weighing whether to accept Eisheth’s blessing, and the
two women speak with gravity but also practicality over the choice to bring new
children into the houses. Jared’s eyelids grow heavy. He grew up in the Night
Court and has long had the gift of attending: to be silent, to let conversation
wash over one’s unobtrusive presence, to rouse only when required. He’s lost in
the rug’s pattern, his mind slow and registering the Seconds’ voices only as a
distant music, when something Roxane says catches at his attention.
"So, you made a bad investment? And here I thought your criteria was so simple
for little orchids."
Jared breathes in slow through his nose, out through his mouth. He lets his
eyes part a little more, sneaks a look under his eyelashes. Neither woman is
looking at him. Roxane has her head propped on her hand, leaning against the
high upholstered back of the settee and watching Félicie, who is sitting more
upright—less casual, now, and Jared thinks that they must have finally gotten
to whatever business brought them here. His heart thumps slow and hard in the
base of his throat.
"It is, and we did not," Félicie says—still with good humor, but a trifle
exasperated. "And yet. There is a shadow, where one shouldn’t be. We aren’t
Eglantine’s mysterious artists, with fickle moods, or Dahlia’s distant icy
cliffs."
"Joy in Laughter," Roxane quotes, with a curve of smile.
"Our motto," Félicie acknowledges, and then after a second shakes her head.
"I’ve always thought it was written backwards. Apologies to our ancestors."
Roxane hums, thoughtful. Her hair is only loosely bound back from her face, and
she twirls a long coil of it around and around her finger. "How to create the
joy, then?" she says, finally. "Is that the advice you’re asking?"
"No," Félicie says. She glances at Jared, at last, and he drops his eyes
directly to the floor. Roxane laughs, softly, and he can feel the color rushing
into his cheeks. He can do nothing right, lately. "Do you remember? Last year,
when we met with Maxime."
"Well enough," Roxane says, and then— "Wait," with her beautiful voice gone
suddenly sharp. "What do you suggest?"
"Nothing so shocking," Félicie says, a little pert. "Only that… flowers bloom
better when they’re allowed some sun. And some need, perhaps, a specific sun."
Roxane huffs. "Poetry isn’t your forte."
"Cast your mind back," Félicie says, more urgently, and Jared tries, too. That
meeting, with the Seconds—he was so caught up in the excitement and dread and
joy of what was happening that he hardly remembers any details. He remembers
the Seconds, judging them. Jensen pressed warm and nervous against his side.
There’s a long pause. Finally, Roxane says, "I remember. It’s why we allow the
letters. But we have our own training, Félicie, and our own methods of molding
apprentices."
"I wouldn’t presume to ask if I thought it would affect that, dearest," Félicie
says, with her voice soft. "I ask because—even if the situation didn’t go
against the canon, even if there weren’t a contract. All considerations of
business aside. It would break your heart, to see it."
Jared closes his eyes fully, heat rising up behind them. That night, with
Richard. He’d fallen asleep on the foot of the bed, while Richard bathed and
undressed, and he doesn’t remember what he’d dreamed but Richard had looked
stricken when he shook Jared awake, when he hugged Jared into his chest. He
wishes no one had ever seen. All it’s caused is trouble, Richard’s smile dimmer
when he looks at Jared, and now it has spread into another house.
There’s a rustle of skirts, and heels thudding over the carpet and then
striking sharp against the wooden parquet. A murmured conversation that Jared
can’t overhear, a pause. The heels come back, and there’s a sigh. "An
experiment only," Roxane says, at last.
Félicie makes a soft sound, and when Jared peeks again she has thrown her arms
around Roxane’s neck, lifted up on her toes to embrace her fully, and she only
pulls back enough to cup Roxane’s face in both hands and kiss her mouth,
generous and soft. "Thank you," she murmurs, looking up into Roxane’s eyes, and
Jared looks down again, flushed for another reason.
There’s a silence for a moment, the fire crackling loud enough to hide any
other soft sounds they might make. The door opens again, after a short while,
and Roxane says, "Come," her voice lower and warmer. Another rustle, a maid
arriving with a curtsy to murmur in Roxane’s ear. "Very well," Roxane says,
dismissing the girl, and then: "If you’d care to accompany me?"
"Jared," Félicie says. He looks up, and Félicie is standing, while Roxane waits
by the door. Félicie gestures and Jared rises smoothly to his feet, adjusting
his shoulders under the cloak so it falls elegantly with his movement, and he’s
rewarded by a small approving smile. Roxane is watching, eyes assessing, a
little more distant than before. "Come along, sweet," Félicie murmurs, and so
he moves ahead of her as she indicates.
Roxane’s gaze flicks over his head, communicating something unheard to Félicie
behind him, but then she only shakes her head and turns and flings open the
double doors herself, leading the way down the corridor. Jared follows,
obediently. For the first time he sees that Roxane’s gown isn’t one of casual
day dress, not like Félicie’s—a wide cut has been taken out of the bodice, a
scoop so low it curves nearly to the base of her spine, so that her whole back
is bared, framed by sage silk all around, and her long-completed marque is on
full display. Is she seeing a patron today, Jared wonders, or doing business as
the Second of Eglantine? He admires the lines of it, having not seen the design
before—abstract green leaves radiating wide from the base of the spine, the
scrollwork dotted with the little pale pink eglantine blossoms, narrowing as it
rises up to the finial at the base of the neck, just under the gown’s high
collar. Her olive skin holds the colors beautifully, the dress clearly designed
to show off the marque to its full glory. Jared has a moment when he thinks,
clear and sudden, that one day Jensen will have the same marque, that his
golden-pale back will hold the same leaves and lines and colors, and then they
turn through yet another corridor, on the east side of the house now so the
morning sun streams clear and bright through the high windows, and Roxane goes
through an archway to another gallery, this one full of bookcases just as the
study was, but also full of light, and she takes a step to the side and
silently gestures and Jared takes another few steps forward and there is
Jensen, leaned over a wide mahogany table, reading with his head propped on his
hand.
Jared—he can’t make a sound, for a second. Jensen’s wearing a dark green
doublet, informally open at the front to show his shirt. His hair has grown
long, tied back casually from his face with ribbon, and he’s frowning at
whatever he’s reading, that little furrow between his brows that Jared knows so
well, that Marina and Florent and Josephine all tried to train out of him so he
wouldn’t wrinkle, but Jensen just—couldn’t help it, as long as he was absorbed
in whatever he was reading. He must have sensed movement, somewhere deep under
the book’s hold, because he looks up after a few seconds, and goes stiff and
shocked all over, his hand dropping to the table.
"Jensen," Jared says, almost helpless. Jensen shoves up from his seat, and
Jared grins at that expression, can’t help it, and then he forgets all decorum
and races across the gallery and Jensen steps out from behind the table and
Jared crashes into his chest, Jensen’s embrace wrapping tight around him and
taking his breath.
"What—" Jensen says, muffled into Jared’s hair. "What—I can’t believe you’re—"
Jared laughs, crushed in against Jensen’s throat, and struggles just a little
so that Jensen’s arms loosen enough so they can see each other. Jensen keeps
him close, though, and Jared doesn’t want to move another inch.
"You’re taller," he says, accusing, though his grin is so wide it barely
counts.
He is, too—fourteen, now, almost fifteen, stretched up in the time they didn’t
see each other. Jensen sweeps Jared’s hair behind his ears, eyes moving all
over his face. "You’re shorter," he replies, a few seconds too late, but Jared
laughs again anyway and Jensen finally smiles, crooked and a little shy, but
really happy looking, happy like Jared can barely remember him being ever, and
he goes up on his tiptoes and flings his arms around Jensen’s neck, joy fizzing
so hard in his belly it almost hurts.
"My lady," Jensen says, his hand wide between Jared’s shoulder blades, tucked
under the cloak.
Jared sucks in a breath and tugs back, turning around to face the Seconds where
they’re waiting in the entry, though he stays tucked in close against Jensen’s
side. Roxane is watching them; Félicie is smiling, but she’s watching Roxane.
"I have business with my lady nó Orchis," Roxane says, after a moment. "I trust
that you can entertain our guest for an hour or two, Jensen?"
"Yes, my lady," he says, bowing his head just as Jared does to Félicie, and
Roxane nods and then touches Félicie’s arm, and they walk together out of the
gallery, their heads bent together in discussion, and that means finally that
Jared’s alone with Jensen. He looks up and finds that Jensen’s already watching
him, too, and he smiles again, hugs Jensen around the waist and buries his face
in the soft warmth of his shirt, shakes his head. He can hardly believe his
luck.
Jensen returns his embrace, his nose buried again in Jared’s hair. Jared
breathes him in. He smells of rosehips, of ink and paper. When he finally pulls
back, Jensen lets him go only slowly, and Jared’s chest aches in the best way.
"What are you doing here?" Jensen says, at last. He draws Jared down to the
bench beside them, his eyes locked onto Jared’s face.
"Accompanying Félicie," Jared says, with a shrug. There may be something else,
but he’s not sure, really, of her reasons. They hardly matter, right now. "I’m
just so glad to see you."
Jensen smiles, again. His eyes the same green-gold, set off beautifully by the
doublet; same sprinkle of freckles over his nose. Jared drinks him in. "Letters
aren’t the same," Jensen says, and tugs at the length of Jared’s hair where the
tail of it lays over his shoulder. He pauses for a moment, fingers twirling the
end of the tail around. "Are you well-treated?"
The tone is more serious, and Jared blinks. "Yes—yes, of course," he says.
Jensen searches his face, and whatever he sees must leave him satisfied,
because his shoulders relax and he settles, at least a little. Jared frowns,
thinking. "What about you?" he says, uneasy. If Jensen is thinking—and he
wouldn’t put it in a letter, because surely the couriers or someone might read
it, and if he was hurt or unhappy—but Jensen is shaking his head, already, his
hand finding Jared’s and squeezing.
"I’m all right," he says, and though it’s softer, Jared believes him.
He’s full of questions, then, and Jensen wants to know things, too. Jared’s
notes back are always short, and he feels like he has so little to say, nothing
to tell about his silly unfull days, not like Jensen. Jensen still won’t tell
him anything about his lessons in the bedchamber, though. "That will come," is
all he’ll say, and Jared pouts but Jensen doesn’t budge. He talks about his
artistic training, instead, and that’s nearly as riveting as whatever secrets
lie past the dedication.
The gallery they’re in is a quiet place, only the fire against the far wall
providing much noise with the crackle and pop of the wood, and Jensen says it’s
where he likes to study, early before the house truly rouses. Jared drinks in
his stories, pressed in close so they’re nearly sharing the same air. Daphne is
his mentor, instructing in both the art of the bedchamber and the art of the
pen, and she’s exacting with both. "She crossed out nearly a whole poem, last
week," Jensen says, wry.
"I’m sure it was wonderful," Jared says, loyally, but Jensen shakes his head,
the corner of his mouth turning up.
"She was right, it wasn’t," he says, and shrugs. "That is how we get better,
though. Trying, and failing, and trying again."
Another adept comes in, a while later, sleepy looking and wearing only her
dressing gown with her hair a tumbled mess, and she doesn’t acknowledge either
of them while she plucks a few books from the shelves and wanders out again.
Jensen turns faintly pink when Jared asks about the informality, but only says
that he had heard she took two patrons last night, and now planned to rest for
this whole day.
Jensen’s telling Jared about the play he’s reading now, because Daphne wants
him to study the dialogue—a fairy story, a girl wandering into a wood and
meeting nymphs and dryads full of tricks—and Jared is fascinated, trying to
imagine the costumes, the acting, how an audience might enjoy it, when he hears
a click of fingers, and looks up to find that Félicie and Roxane have returned.
He and Jensen both rise, immediately, bowing their heads in synchrony.
"Jensen, I have business with Daphne, so you’ll study today with Raphael,"
Roxane says. He’s silent, next to Jared, but nods. "Come, you may help me
escort our guests."
The visit’s over, then. Jared licks his lips and his hand finds Jensen’s,
lacing their fingers together and squeezing tight. Félicie tips a smile at him,
but she turns and follows Roxane out of the gallery and so they must, too,
trailing a few steps behind. Jensen’s grip is firm, and he matches his stride
to Jared’s, their elbows jostling as they walk too close.
"Ready to tell me I was right?" Félicie says—quietly, but not so quiet Jared
can’t hear it.
The women’s skirts rustle, their heels louder on the floor than Jared or
Jensen’s soft boots. Over that small noise comes the faint huff of Roxane’s
laugh. "There may be something to it. Though I cannot see what we get out of
the bargain."
"The cost is little enough," Félicie says, linking her arm with Roxane’s. They
walk on, passing from the brighter galleries into the corridors, and Jared’s a
bit lost but he thinks they’re nearing the front entry. His heart pounds in his
throat and he looks up at Jensen, who glances down at him and tries to smile.
In the foyer, a maid is waiting with Félicie’s russet cloak, and she presents
it with a curtsy. Roxane takes it, settles it over Félicie’s shoulders. "I
still say it may amount to nothing," she says, slowly tying the cord at
Félicie’s throat.
"It may," Félicie says. Her eyes are crinkled with amusement as she looks up at
Roxane. "You may also recall a pretty adept who told pretty stories about
artists inspired by Erato and Thalia."
Roxane glances at the two of them, and then raises her eyebrows at Félicie in
an amused arch. "Well, if that is what I’m getting," she says, "then I have
received the far better side of the bargain."
She leans down, then, and gives Félicie the kiss of parting. They linger over
it, for a moment, and they’re beautiful together but Jared looks back to
Jensen, squeezes both of his hands.
"Come along, Jared," Félicie says, then, and Jared takes a deep breath and
embraces Jensen one last time. Jensen’s hand cups the back of his head, holds
him tight for just a moment—and then lets go, takes a step back. Jared
remembers his manners and bows to Roxane, but he knows it’s obvious that he’s
looking back at Jensen as the doors open and the cold air sweeps in to embrace
them both. Jensen wraps his arms around himself and gives Jared a small smile,
and Jared tries to smile back—and then, the coach, and the footman has his hand
out to help Jared in, and he climbs inside and settles onto the cushioned bench
and by the time the door closes and he can peek out the window again—the door
to Eglantine is closed, and the driver has clucked to the horses and they’re
moving, again.
Heat rises behind his eyes and he blinks hard, looks down at his knees to hide
it. It was a kindness, to let him see Jensen, a kindness that Félicie even
remembered their friendship. It wouldn’t do to appear ungrateful.
"How was your friend?" Félicie says, after the carriage has cleared the gates
and they’re moving along the boulevard again.
"He’s well," Jared gets out. He takes a deep breath and looks up, and meets
Félicie’s gaze with a smile. "I’m very thankful that I was able to see him.
Thank you, my lady."
"No need to be so formal, Jared," she says, waving her hand. She lowers it and
pats the leather satchel beside her. "Do you know what I have in here?" He
shakes his head, and she continues with a small smile curving her mouth. "An
agreement, with my friend Roxane, and the approval of their Dowayne, my lord nó
Eglantine. A cultural exchange, we’re calling it."
He frowns, confused. "I don’t—a trade of books, or plays?" They have enough at
Eglantine, he supposes.
"Not precisely." She leans over the space between them and tucks his hair
behind his ear, cups his cheek for a moment, meets his eyes with her dark green
ones. They’re so lovely, though not as striking as Jensen’s. She smiles at him,
a bit wider, and then leans back into the cushion on her own bench, hands
folded loosely in her lap. "You’re a clever boy, darling. We haven’t had a
child quite like you in Orchis for some time. Our training will serve you well,
and you will be a great example of Orchis’s charm and joy and beauty. For you,
though, we’ll add an additional piece of training—you’re to go to Eglantine,
once per month, and learn a bit more of the arts."
He sits up straight, mouth parting.
"Playacting was my suggestion, but Roxane and her adepts will judge what’s
best," she continues. Her eyes are dancing, though. "Perhaps your friend Jensen
will have an idea of what to do, hm?"
He slips off the bench, goes to his knees in the footwell and grasps her hands.
"Truly, my lady?" he manages, blinking hard and searching her face. "Am I—I’m
to be allowed to go back?"
Félicie squeezes his hands. "Yes, darling," she says, and she’s still smiling,
but it’s just a little smaller. She takes one hand back and touches his cheek,
where his dimples must be showing. "I hope we see that smile more often, now."
His heart swells, in his breast, and it might be overstepping but he presses a
kiss to the back of her smooth white hand. "Thank you," he says again, and
again, and when she lifts his chin again, says, "I will be a credit to the
house. I promise."
"I was never in doubt of that, Jared," she says. She nods at the other bench,
and he drops back onto it. He feels like he’s fairly throbbing with shock, with
joy. She smiles at him again, and then looks out the window to the snowy day
outside. "Perhaps you’ll cheer your patrons with a recitation of comic
Caerdicci verse."
"I will," he promises, immediately, and she softly laughs. He doesn’t know if
such a thing even exists, but he’s sure he and Jensen can find it. He catches
his breath, staring blindly out the window as well, watching the busier
movement on the street now that the day’s a little warmer. He’s going back.
He’ll see Jensen, often, and talk with him beyond the insufficient exchange of
letters, and they can share details of their training and learn together, and
they will neither of them be alone. He’s smiling foolishly, he knows it, and he
covers his mouth with one hand, trying to temper it. He can’t, though. He
doesn’t really want to.
                                       *
Winter freezes the city almost to stillness, but the Court of Nightblooming
Flowers never falls quiet. Patrons come and go and the nightly entertainment is
as merry as ever—merrier, perhaps, to ward off the season’s chill. The house
seems brighter, now, to Jared. Richard kissed both his cheeks when he revealed
his good news and said, there is our little sunbeam, and Jared flushed bright
red but that only made Richard laugh. Laura frowned and thought it was odd,
saying she’d never heard of such a thing, and why would an adept ever be of two
houses?—but Percy scoffed, dismissing that out of hand. "I think it’s
wonderful," he’d said, and tweaked Jared’s nose. "Maybe one day you’ll sing as
well as I do."
The Longest Night comes, and goes. Richard is exquisite in his selkie costume,
more beautiful even than Félicie had promised. Jared helps get him ready, his
mouth dry as he makes sure the dark waves of Richard’s hair fall in an artfully
wild mess, tumbled as though with a sea’s wind. Félicie is radiant as a faerie
queen, with the Dowayne a regal faerie king at her side, the adepts a rowdy
laughing bunch of colorful folktales behind them, and Jared is as proud seeing
them off as he ever was with Balm’s gentle beauties. He stays up until midnight
with Percy and Laura, though little Gemma falls asleep before the bells
toll—and is awake, still, when half the adepts return, flushed and tipsy.
Richard laughingly succumbs to Jared’s questioning and tells of the other
houses’ themes: Balm came as garden animals, bees and dragonflies and bright
hummingbirds; Jasmine as nobility from far Bhodistan, in cunningly draped sari
silks and exotic jewels; Eglantine as the gods and goddesses of Hellas, Roxane
radiant as tall Athene and their elderly Dowayne as a still-regal Zeus. Jensen
hasn’t begun his service to Naamah and so wouldn’t be allowed to attend the
Midwinter Masque, but Jared knows some little of Hellene mythology and thinks,
when he at last goes to bed and lays there with his mind whirling in tiredness,
that if he were to choose any costume for Jensen, it would be fair Apollo.
With the new year arrived, it is time for Jared’s first trip to Eglantine. In a
turn of events, Richard helps him to get ready that morning—though there is
hardly as much work to be done for a child’s visit as there is for an adept to
prepare for a patron. Still, Jared is touched. "Tell me about your friend,"
Richard says, combing out his hair before the mirror in the bathing room, and
so Jared does—nothing private, but he describes Jensen’s beautiful coloring,
and his sweet thoughtful manner, and his brilliance, and his skill at writing.
"Perhaps he will write you a poem, dear," Richard says. He has tied Jared’s
hair into a simple queue at the nape of his neck, held with his pink ribbon,
and is resting his hands on Jared’s shoulders. "Since you have already composed
sonnets for him."
Jared flushes, ducking his head, and Richard squeezes his shoulders with a
laugh. "Don’t be shy," he says, and reaches forward to hold Jared’s chin,
making Jared meet his eyes in the mirror. "Elua said love as thou wilt, dear
one. It is the only thing that matters, in all the world."
Jared nods and Richard pats his cheek, smiling, and then sends him to finish
dressing. He has no instructions, though Félicie did underline that he was a
guest in Eglantine House and so should behave accordingly. He wears his soft
pink livery, breeches and the knee-high boots, and when he’s wrapped up in his
cloak again he goes downstairs and finds one of the footmen waiting for him at
the base of the rear stairs.
"Ready?" the man says, and Jared nods, already almost breathless with
excitement.
It’s still so cold, a fresh layer of snow over the ground, and so they take a
carriage—not the one owned by the house, with its official livery, but a rented
one that the house hires sometimes to take the patrons home when they’ve had
too much drink. The footman nods familiarly to the driver and hands Jared into
the interior, and then takes his own seat, silent. It’s a quick ride down the
boulevard, and the footman doesn’t speak to Jared, but Jared hardly has the
mind to be offended, or even curious.
Soon enough, the gates to Eglantine swing open at the carriage-driver’s call,
and they pull into the courtyard, and a footman from Eglantine opens the
carriage door with a bow, and then a startled look and a grin when he sees that
it’s only a counterpart and a child. "Delivering a parcel, Thierry?"
Eglantine’s footman says.
"A guest," the footman—Thierry—says, and rolls his eyes a little. Jared holds
back, shy, but Thierry does descend from the carriage and bow him out of it, as
solicitous as he would be with an adept, and so Jared takes his rougher hand
and steps down into the snow, flanked by both servants. Thierry puts a hand on
his back, briefly, and nods to his friend. "Announce to the house that Jared nó
Orchis has arrived, guest of my lady Thibault."
The footman from Orchis huffs, but leads them inside, and gestures for Jared to
sit on the wide stiff sofa in the foyer. Thierry stands to the side, hands at
rest neatly behind his back, while the other footman disappears into the house.
Jared sits upright, ankles crossed and his hands folded in his lap as though he
were waiting abeyante. He’s not used to being a guest. The foyer is so
different from Orchis’s, or Balm’s. There are wide double-doors directly across
from the entry, which Jared assumes leads to a hall for fetes, but it’s odd
that it’s closed away instead of open to guests—and doors lead away, to the
east and west sides of the estate, closed corridors that separate the various
areas of the house. The parquet is polished to a high sheen, though, and art
lines the walls—perhaps painted by adepts of years gone by, Jared thinks. He’s
studying a portrait of an older woman whose eyes meet the viewer’s with a
secretive humor when the eastern door opens, and a beautiful adept is there,
dressed in a grey gown so simple it could be a shift, if Jared couldn’t tell
that it was silk.
"Jared nó Orchis," she says. Jared immediately finds his feet and sweeps her a
bow, careful to ensure his posture is perfect. When he rises again she is
watching with slightly narrowed eyes. She flicks them up to Thierry and says,
"You may wait in the kitchen," and before he has even completed his own bow she
gestures to Jared and turns, disappearing into the corridor, and so Jared
scrambles to follow.
They walk roughly the same path that Jared remembers from following Roxane,
just over a month ago. This adept is tall, nearly as tall as Roxane, with ash-
blonde hair braided into a crown around her head and fair, fair skin—not a
creamy white as Richard’s is, but almost translucent, as though she could have
been born from frail Cereus House. They pass doorway after mysterious doorway,
through corridors lined with more paintings, and plinths holding busts and
elegant sculpture, and it’s early enough in the day that they don’t see another
adept before they turn into the bright hall on the farthest-east side of the
house, and then into the gallery where Jensen is waiting.
Jared feels his face break into a smile, just upon seeing him. Jensen’s
waiting, this time, sitting on a bench facing the door, and he rises
immediately when they enter. He’s dressed casually, again, in a green jersey
coat and simple breeches, and Jared feels overdressed compared to them both.
He’ll have to ask Jensen what’s best, later. A fire is laid, crackling brightly
in the hearth, and the room is open and empty but for the three of them. Jensen
smiles at Jared, though it’s only little.
"Well, she was right about that," the adept says, cryptic, and Jared looks up
to find her standing with her arms folded, just off to the side. She looks down
at him, after a second, and her eyes are a light amber, direct and focused.
"Introductions are in order, I suppose. My name is Daphne Descoteaux nó
Eglantine, adept of Eglantine for eight years, and Jensen is my pupil."
Jared bows, again, and murmurs his greeting. She’s unlike any adept he’s
met—her words and manner are sharp, clear and direct. He wonders if this is
what she’s like with a patron.
"I’m given to understand that you’ll be studying with us," she says.
"Yes, my lady," he says, bowing his head politely.
"Sweet manners," she says, but it’s not to him any longer. "Your little friend
from Balm, yes?"
Jensen nods, sitting back down on the bench. "Jared’s very clever," he says.
His voice isn’t quite as soft as Jared’s used to—gained from her, perhaps. It
makes Jared blush with pleasure, anyway.
Daphne raises her eyebrows, and looks Jared up and down. He expects something
cutting, from her expression, but she only says, "A good thing that Orchis has
the sense to encourage it, then," and with a nod she directs Jared to the
table, where he sits beside Jensen on the bench. "We only have you one day each
month, so I don’t expect that you’ll be the next Edouard Rinforte, but we can
develop a talent in you. Jensen, fetch your work from yesterday."
Jensen rises immediately and finds a volume unerring in one of the gallery’s
dozen bookcases. Daphne sits in an armchair by the fire and rings a bell, and
under the bustle of a maidservant coming in and Daphne ordering tea, Jared
leans in close to Jensen’s ear. "Who is Edouard Rinforte?" he whispers.
Jensen smiles at him, opening the book to its marked place. "The most famous
actor of the century," he whispers back, and he wraps an arm around Jared’s
shoulders, hugging him close at last. Jared relaxes into his side, taking in
his familiar scent, though it’s tinged again with rosehips.
"Jensen, take the part of Benjamin," Daphne says, having sent the maid on her
way. "Jared can play Mierette."
Jensen shows Jared the names, marked clearly on the page, and the lines he’s
meant to read. "The play is about a young girl who falls in love with an older
man, but he doesn’t return her love," Jensen explains. "She tries to earn his
affection, but he thinks of her only as a child, and in the end he marries
another and she takes her own life."
Jared startles, looking up at the side of Jensen’s face. "But—that’s so sad!"
he says, and Jensen is surprised in his turn. "Don’t the patrons mourn?"
"Not all art is for patrons," Daphne says, and when Jared twists around she’s
watching them, her chin rested delicately on her fine-boned fist. "And not all
patrons want a bawdy love-tale, or a lark."
Jared feels himself frowning, but he turns back to the book. "It’s all right,"
Jensen says, softly, and tugs him close again so that they’re both leaning over
the page. He speaks quietly into Jared’s ear, like they’re the only two people
in the room. It reminds Jared of being tucked close in their old shared bed.
"This scene is one where Benjamin reads a letter from his beloved, and asks the
maid Mierette for her advice in wooing the other lady."
Already reading ahead, Jared sees the lines he’s meant to say. You could speak
of her beauty, my lord, Mierette says, and Jared can only imagine how sad she
could be. "How should I—what am I meant to do?"
Jensen glances up, over Jared’s head. Daphne doesn’t offer instruction, and so
Jensen says, after a moment, "Just think about her, about the feelings she
might have, wanting to speak honestly to her love but unable to."
He takes a deep breath, already nervous. Jensen finds his hand and holds it,
and Jared looks up and finds his eyes, crinkled a little at the corners with a
small smile. "It’s only me," Jensen says, quiet. "Just us, reading together.
All right?"
Jared squeezes his hand, and laces their fingers together, and nods. "All
right," he says, and looks down at the pages, Jensen tucked warm and solid
against his side. "Ready."
                                       *
Training becomes Jared’s life. He hadn’t thought of it that way in his first
months of easy living in Orchis’s casual embrace. He only assisted Richard,
after all, and learned, and lived. It seemed simple. With his additional
perspective from Eglantine House, though, he sees more of how the puzzle of the
Night Court fits together. Every day, he walks among his peers and the
beautiful, laughing adepts of his home. He breathes their air; he lives as they
live. He exercises daily with the other children and apprentices, and plays,
and basks in the easy joy of life—and, he now sees, his wants are affirmed and
retrained, every moment, to the manner in which Orchis House serves Naamah.
Richard tweaks his nose and makes him smile, and Jared makes a fine jest and
even Laura has to laugh, and that is joy. Merriment suffuses the house from the
hall, every night, and he can’t wait to be part of it.
It is the stark contrast with Eglantine each month that makes it clear, though
Jared comes to love it there, too. Of course he does; Jensen is there. He
doesn’t know if he would have flourished there, if he could have been one of
their adepts, but to get a glimpse inside is wonderful. He meets some few other
adepts, and they are nothing like those of Orchis, or Balm. Young Denis, dark-
skinned and slight, trained as an actor, with a rollicking jesting way about
him that makes even Jensen laugh, and he could have fit at Orchis—but when he
comes in to read lines with them he can turn his big dark eyes to any emotion,
and his version of Mierette makes tears roll down Jared’s face. Lilia, the spry
acrobat near Jared’s own age, who goes about in boys’ breeches and is full of
sneaky mischief and is, more horribly, prone to leaping out when Jared least
expects and scaring him half to death. A trio of female singers, all sopranos,
but each with moods that turn with the breeze, and Jensen whispered to Jared
that Estelle actually slapped a patron after a performance—and still made a
contract with him, that night, and gained a full inch of her marque.
Jared comes, every month, and he will never fit fully with Eglantine but he
grows comfortable there—not quite a guest of the house, anymore, but perhaps a
cousin. Jensen has begun constructing his own short plays and so Jared helps
read through the lines, and while so doing tries to learn about playing some
other person under Daphne’s strict supervision, and always she asks—why? Why
say the line this way? Why does he make this assumption, or that? What is he
thinking? She’s not cruel. Jensen worried—asked, quietly when Daphne stepped
out of the room, is it too much? Is she scaring you?
"No," Jared said, and meant it. "I just… she’s nothing like Richard. That’s
all."
Only—that’s not quite true. Richard, too, questions constantly. Why that scent?
Why the softer rouge, tonight? It’s almost like a game of riddles, with one
goal: to guide him into serving Naamah in the best way that he can, not simply
to be a molded copy of every other adept. The months go on and he tells Jensen
stories of his friends, and meets Jensen’s companions in Orchis, and more and
more he sees the subtle variations that make each member of the Night Court a
different kind of beauty. Marcus might be dim, but he’s truly merry—perhaps a
bit thoughtless, but his laugh comes easy, and he’s a muscular beauty, built
like one of the Hellenic statues in Eglantine’s corridors. Phoebe is sweeter, a
bit more flattering, and her jokes come slyly to surprise the patrons with her
wit. Richard is kind, not prone to giggling but always full of a deep warm
happiness. Rose is bawdy; Percy’s sarcastic. In the house’s shrine, the
priestess Noemie teaches them all that Naamah bestowed herself on men and women
alike in thirteen variations—and more, because the gift of love is infinite,
unending. Noemie touched Jared’s cheek, just where his dimple would be, and
said, in her sweet voice, "And why will you lie with your patrons?" Jared
breathed in, kneeling in the pool of sunlight with the other children, and
said, "To bring joy," and Noemie smiled at him for it.
In early summer, Percy turns sixteen, and his debut is a wild rollicking fete
which Jared so very much wishes he could attend. Laura does, since she’s been
dedicated, and she tells Jared that the auction for Percy’s virgin-price was
merry, the patrons jesting at each other over their wine and Percy egging them
on. The winner is a comte’s daughter, with a fine price of three thousand
ducats after Percy leaned over and whispered something in her ear that made her
squeal with laughter. Percy moves into adept’s quarters, after that. That
autumn Eveline comes to Orchis to replace him in the nursery, black-haired and
black-eyed with a high trilling giggle like birdsong. Eveline tells Jared,
after she has been welcomed into the house in ceremony, that her father is the
High Priest of Naamah at the Great Temple in Namarre, and she begged to be sent
to train in the Night Court when she was of age. It took the Dowayne and
Félicie only minutes to determine that she would be a perfect fit, and they
immediately made an offering to the Temple in exchange for her term of
indenture. Rose falls pregnant the next month and immediately stops serving
patrons; gossip among the adepts says that the patron who got the babe on her
was likely that minor baron who spent lavishly and whose coloring would look
well with Rose’s own, and hopes are high that the new child will be a good fit
with the house.
The week before the Longest Night, Richard surprises Jared by taking a day
away. When he returns, he calls Jared up to his room and, flushed with delight,
he shows off his completed marque—a few generous patron-gifts saved up earned
him the last inch, and he went right away to the marquist to have the inking
finished. "It’s so beautiful," Jared says, and he’s being honest. Though each
house’s marque has a set design, each adept is allowed minor variations, and
Richard’s is gorgeous on his creamy skin: the twined stems rise through the
scrollwork in subtle blacks and greys, the finishing touch the blush of deep
red in the center of each orchid.
There is a small ceremony, the next night, which Jared is allowed to attend. In
the Dowayne’s office, made warm by the fire, he kneels abeyante to one side and
watches dry-mouthed while Richard enters in his dressing gown, his bare white
feet barely making a sound on the thick carpet. The Dowayne sits at ease upon
his wide throne, with Félicie standing at his side. Richard doesn’t bow, or
kneel, but lifts his chin and says, quietly, "My lord, my marque is made."
The Dowayne rests his hands on the throne’s arms, leaning back. "Step forward,
and disrobe."
Richard takes one step, so that he’s just before the low dais on which the
throne sits, and unties his dressing gown with a single twist. An elegant shrug
lets it flow from his shoulders and it falls into a puddle about his feet,
leaving him completely naked in the warm air. He turns, gathering his hair over
one shoulder, and bows his head so that his back is exposed to the Dowayne’s
eyes. Jared can’t see it, from this angle, but he can see Félicie’s smile
widen, and the Dowayne’s expression go soft. The Dowayne stands, and spreads
his hands over Richard’s shoulders, sliding them down the expanse of his back
with a whisper of skin-on-skin to bracket his bare hips.
"Beautiful work," he murmurs, and the corners of Richard’s mouth turn up. The
Dowayne takes his hands off and steps back, sitting again on the throne. In a
louder voice, he says, "Your marque is made." Richard turns around again,
lifting his head, and the Dowayne nods, acknowledging him. "Richard Toluard nó
Orchis, your term of indenture is complete. You are free to serve Naamah or
not, however you choose."
"Martin Plaisance," Richard says, slowly, and Jared blinks. He hasn’t heard
anyone use the Dowayne’s full name to his face in the entire time he has lived
in this house. Richard steps up onto the dais and smoothly kneels, just before
the Dowayne’s feet, his marque fully on display to Jared. He looks up into the
Dowayne’s face, for a moment, and then says, "If it please you, I will stay.
Orchis is my home."
The Dowayne smiles, the fine lines by his eyes crinkling, and takes Richard’s
face in his hands. "Nothing would please me more," he says, and then kisses
Richard’s mouth, soft and full.
Félicie claps, laughing delightedly, and when the Dowayne releases Richard she
comes in and draws him to his feet, kissing him in her turn and then embracing
him about the shoulders. The Dowayne rises, too, and claps his hands. "Wine,"
he calls, and then stoops and picks up Richard’s dressing gown himself, helping
Richard to shrug it onto his shoulders. The Chancellor of the house has been
waiting quietly, in a seat near to where Jared kneels, and at the Dowayne’s
gesture he rises, bringing forward a rolled contract on slightly-yellowed
vellum, tied with a blush-colored ribbon. This is rolled out on the desk on the
far side of the room, and Richard signs something at the bottom, and then the
Chancellor and the Dowayne bend their heads together, murmuring over something.
That leaves Richard free to come to Jared and draw him to his feet and squeeze
him tight in an embrace, so tight that even slight Richard manages to pick
Jared up off the floor with the strength of it. Jared laughs, too, and when
Richard sets him on his feet again he’s kissed all over his face, a flurry of
joy that makes his heart fill.
"You’ll keep assisting me, won’t you, dear one?" Richard says, holding Jared’s
shoulders and smiling down into his eyes.
He’s so beautiful. Jared laughs, almost incredulous. "I wouldn’t give it up,
ever," he promises, and Richard kisses him again, on the forehead, and then a
soft brush of lips over his mouth that makes Jared’s heart leap in his
chest—and then a maid arrives, with a tray of wine, and Jared is dismissed for
the evening while the adults celebrate.
At Eglantine, on another frozen day a few weeks after the Longest Night, Jensen
frowns when Jared tells him the story. They’re in a different library this
time, a cozy, almost fusty little room on the house’s second floor, working
through some of the poets’ tales of Alba in Cruithne that Daphne has set Jensen
to. Jared’s already better with the verb conjugation, which makes Jensen roll
his eyes, but Daphne says that Jensen has the better accent.
Jensen splays his hand over the page he was reading, to hold his place. "But—he
finished, didn’t he? He earned his marque, so he's paid back the cost of his
training."
"Yes," Jared says, drawing it out a little. He draws his stockinged feet up
onto the cushion of their shared settee, wrapping his arms around his knees.
"Richard has some patrons who would follow him, I’m sure. But his home is
Orchis, and the Dowayne was glad that he chose to stay. He might go and set up
his own salon, later."
He gets a low hmm, for that, Jensen looking down at the open book and tapping
his fingers restlessly against the page. Jared is about to tell him of the new
suit Richard commissioned, which will finally allow him to publicly show his
marque—it will be linen, dyed a beautiful deep lilac, to be worn in the hot
summer—when the door to the library opens and a patron wanders in, glances at
them, and begins perusing the shelves.
This is the thing that sets Eglantine so far apart from what Jared’s used to,
though he’s more accustomed to it now. Jensen doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge
the man with even a flicker of an eyelash, but instead begins reading the poem
aloud again in his smooth voice, while Jared follows his finger as it runs over
the page. He understands it well enough, since they’ve gone over it almost half
a dozen times now—the black boar runs, and the swan takes silvered flight—and
so he’s free to glance through his eyelashes at the patron. He isn’t really
searching for a text, or at least not seriously. His hand rests on a thick
leather-bound tome, but he’s just leaning against the shelf now, and he’s
watching them, running his thumb restlessly over and over his lower lip. Jensen
pushes their book a little closer to Jared, and he takes over the reading,
letting his eyes flick up subtly enough that he can gauge the man’s dress—lace
at sleeves and collar, fine velvet, minimal jewelry, no cosmetics. If he’s
nobility, he’s understated about it, but the wealth is obvious, as is his
taste.
Jared’s halfway through the passage when the man clears his throat. He looks up
and the man hasn’t stepped closer, but he’s watching them intently. "Your
pronunciation is off, young man," he says, in a surprisingly deep voice. "That
word, the o sound is meant to be softer, held in the mouth. As in ‘love.’"
It’s not said cuttingly; just an offer of instruction. Jared says the word
again, slowly, and the man nods with a small smile. "Very good." He’s perhaps
older than Jared had estimated, a few fine lines resting at the corners of his
eyes, a strand or two of grey in his unbound dark hair. He looks Jared up and
down, and Jared knows that patrons are allowed throughout the house
unaccompanied in Eglantine, but it’s still—strange, to find himself the focus
of one, and he can already feel himself flushing. The man’s smile widens, just
a touch. "I don’t think I’ve seen you before, cherub. What do they call you?"
"He is not of Eglantine House."
Jared blinks. Jensen has gone stiff at his side, shoulders square, and his
voice was as quiet as it always is but there was steel beneath it. Jared licks
his lips and doesn’t say a thing, and the patron’s attention is caught
completely.
He tilts his head, considers Jensen, his eyes narrowed for a moment before his
expression eases. "Ah, yes. Jensen, isn’t that right? Daphne’s pupil." Jensen
nods, but doesn’t respond otherwise. The man nods down at the book between
them. "An excellent collection you’re reading. We’re fortunate that the Straits
opened and Alba and Eire can share their wealth with us. Perhaps you’ll write
an epic to rival the Elegy of the Cullach Gorrym, someday."
"Perhaps," Jensen says. A few seconds too late, he adds, "My lord."
The man regards him steadily for a moment, then glances at Jared, and the
corner of his mouth quirks up. "Good luck in your studies, boys," he says, and
takes the volume he’d been handling off the shelf. He bows very briefly, his
eyes amused, and wanders out, as easily as he came in. Only once the door
closes does the tension seep out of Jensen’s body, and Jared takes the
opportunity to elbow his side.
"Why did you talk to him like that?" he demands, while Jensen claps a hand to
his ribs and mimes at pain. "He could have been a patron of yours, soon!"
"He likely will be," Jensen says, shaking his head. He abandons the book to the
nearby table and leans his elbows on his knees. "That was Faolan Garneau, a
great patron and lover of the theater. He supports Daphne’s plays—pays almost
as much toward them as he does toward her purse—and I know she’s told him about
me."
Jared frowns. There’s still much he hasn’t been told about how to attract
patrons, and of course Orchis’s instruction about etiquette are different from
Eglantine’s, much as they are different from Balm’s—but he hadn’t thought they
were that different. Jensen glances over at him, and smiles a little at
whatever’s on his face. "Don’t worry about me, Jared," he says, and tweaks the
end of Jared’s plait where it lays against his shoulder. "When the time comes,
I’ll know how to serve my patrons."
It has begun to snow again, outside the high windows, and Jared leans back into
the corner of the settee, pushing his toes under Jensen’s thigh to warm them.
Jensen pats his shin, absently, but he’s clearly thinking of something else,
and that gives Jared a moment to watch him. The nearly-straight line of his
nose, the blush-colored plump of his mouth. His hair has been trimmed, since
the last time Jared visited, but it’s still long enough to be swept back into a
neat queue at the base of his neck—the light brown set off by a blue ribbon,
this time, to match the dark blue coat he’s wearing open, as casual as ever.
Percy told him a long time ago that new adepts at Eglantine may design their
own clothing, for their debuts—and just thinking it, a little jolt hits Jared’s
belly. "When the time comes," he echoes, and Jensen looks over at him,
frowning. "Your birthday is only two months away!"
"Oh—right," Jensen says.
"Right!" Jared sits up, tucks his knees under himself. "You’ll be sixteen! Will
there be a fete? What has Daphne said, or Roxane? Have you decided on your
outfit?"
Jensen waves his hands, stemming the flood of questions. "Jared," he says, with
a brief laugh, though—he’s not smiling, really. He runs a hand over his head,
tucks a stray bit of hair behind his ear. "I won’t have my debut on my
birthday." He forestalls Jared’s outrage with a look, and swivels so that he
can draw his own feet up onto the settee, his longer legs prodding into Jared’s
space. "The Dowayne and Roxane have already declared it, and Daphne agrees that
it’s best, since I started so late."
He seems to be at ease, but Jared’s been watching body language since he was
born and he knows Jensen’s best of all, and he watches Jensen pluck at a loose
thread in the settee’s upholstery, restless. He bites his bottom lip, and sets
both hands on Jensen’s knees. "So," he says, more calmly. He remembers his
lessons from Balm well enough, still. He slides his hands over, and around,
massaging Jensen’s calves with a light touch through his fine wool stockings.
"When will you debut?"
Jensen props his head on his hand, elbow resting against the settee’s back. "At
the end of summer," he says. His eyes are on Jared’s hands, or perhaps are
looking through them. "Just after your birthday. There will be a fete, timed to
coincide with the anniversary of the Battle of Three Princes. Part of a war, a
long time ago," he explains, at Jared’s confusion. The corner of his mouth
turns up. "When Terre d’Ange defeated the Skaldi, the first time, before
Selig’s War. I don’t know if the Skaldic reference is meant to be a jest, or
not." He shakes his head, dismissing that. "There will be a performance, a
short romance about one of the princes and his lover, and then at the fete
afterward the auction will be held. Daphne has already started to put about
that we’re writing the play together, so there will be some interest."
Jared thinks about that man Garneau, the way he watched them both—and how many
other patrons, he realizes, must wander through and watch the young artists of
Eglantine grow. A more intimate way than Orchis’s, where some have their
favorites but patrons and adepts pair together for a lark; the gentlemen and
ladies who know their way around the sprawled twisting corridors of Eglantine
know, too, which apprentices to follow, which talents to foster. Faolan Garneau
loves theater, and knows poetry, and Jared feels his face heat when he
imagines—him, sitting idle and watching Jensen write with ink staining his
fingers, just as Jared has, and yet he could beckon Jensen over and ask for
poetry directly from his lips, and Jensen would lean in and settle into
Garneau’s lap and whisper pretty words into his mouth, if he asked.
"All right?" Jensen asks.
Jared looks up, startled. He’s pressing his hand to his hot cheek, he realizes,
and he shakes his head. "Just thinking," he says, and Jensen raises his fine
brows. Jared smiles. "So, what will you wear? You must have thought of it."
He makes his voice cheery and Jensen rolls his eyes. "Daphne and Roxane can’t
decide between pine-green velvet or a sapphire silk," he says. He stretches his
legs out so they bracket Jared where he’s kneeling on the cushion, and smiles a
little, though it’s rueful. "I just asked not to wear a stock or cravat, and
they agreed. If they hold swatches of fabric up to my cheek one more time,
though, I’ll go to the Dowayne and beg his mercy to wear a shirt and nothing
else."
Jared laughs, imagining. "It might do well for your virgin-price," he says, and
Jensen rolls his eyes again, but his smile seems more honest, and Jared counts
that as a job well done.
                                       *
There are lessons on comportment, on poise, on when to drive the jest higher
and when to let it gracefully evaporate. Jared and Eveline sit in on the rapid-
fire conversation between the adepts at their luncheon, laughing along to the
high humor and merriment but also watching, learning. Eveline has been paired
with Audette, a fairly experienced adept of twenty who lets fly with sharp
barbs belowstairs and giggles sweetly with patrons in the hall. Percy drops a
kiss on Eveline’s forehead and whispers, not all laughter is extracted by
flechette, sweetheart, with a wink to Jared, and Jared hopes she takes it to
heart. They and Laura work through the newest edition of the Peerage and during
exercises they make a game of testing each other, naming marriages and cousins
and mistresses and sons.
Eveline sings like a lark; Jared is shy with his singing, always aware it’s not
as good as the others’, but he’s improving on the lyre and harp all the time.
Jensen tells him about the new instrument Eglantine has acquired, a
harpsichord, and he thinks that they’ll let Jared play it, too, since he’s
nearly one of their own by now. Their Cruithne lessons continue, and now Jared
is learning Caerdicci too. Antoine’s grandmother hailed from Millazza and it
was the tongue of his childhood home, and he helps Jared practice conversation:
flirting little jests about flowers, the fertile rush of springtime, greetings
and goodbyes and love-talk. Jared learns how to pay extravagant compliments and
how to curse like a carriage-driver—though Richard, even if he laughs, cautions
to be careful where he uses that particular skill.
Jensen and Daphne are hard at work on the new play; with her own name attached,
Daphne is more exacting than ever. Jared receives a letter, just after Jensen’s
sixteenth birthday: there was wine, with Daphne and Denis, but with no fete it
was right back to work, and my hand aches from constant rewrites. On a visit,
Jared is allowed to read some of the completed pages, and it really is
charming—sweet, like many of the plays meant for patrons, but there is a deeper
thread running through, since all Terre d’Ange knows the tragedy of Prince
Rolande de la Courcel. The prince will be played by Auguste, a tall adept with
beautiful eyes who kisses Jared full on the mouth in greeting, making him flush
down to his collar; Denis will play Anafiel, the prince’s young lover, and
during a brief practice while Jared’s in the house he gives a demonstration of
his tender love, caressing Jensen’s face and speaking soft and gentle. My
liege-lord, Denis whispers, and Jared’s chest goes tight even as Jensen blinks.
My swan. I would that I could shelter beneath your great wings and live all the
days of my life without the sun. What need have I of light that is not
reflected from your eyes?
"Perhaps too much," Daphne says, chin resting on her fist.
Denis flops back onto the settee, the emotion draining away like it was never
there. Jared’s throat is tight and tears threaten the back of his eyes, and
Jensen looks to him and considers. "It is a romance," he says, finally. He
turns to Daphne and shrugs. "The greatest love of the age. Gilding it further
for patrons can hardly hurt."
Daphne lets her hand drop to the table, and taps her polished nails against the
wood. She glances at Jared, too, and he dashes the back of his hand across his
eyes, embarrassed. Denis performed the line very well. "Perhaps," she says,
finally, and Jensen flashes Jared a secret smile, turning to a new page. It
will stay in, then. The patrons will weep, Jensen thinks, and Jared can’t see
how it could be otherwise.
July arrives, at last, and Jared turns twelve with little ceremony. Jensen’s
debut is set for a scant three weeks later and Jared can hardly contain his
excitement. It’s just a few days after his birthday that he’s allowed to again
come down the hill to Eglantine, and when he arrives he’s sent to a new room,
one he hasn’t seen yet in his explorations of the house.
It’s a riot of color, bolts of cloth scattered over every surface and producing
a rainbow of silks, velvets, serge and linen. Jared blinks and then has to bite
his tongue on a smile. Jensen is stood up on a little platform in front of a
huge mirror, dressed only in a shirt with his long pale legs bare under it, and
his arms are crossed over his chest with the most mulish expression on his
face.
"No stock," he says, to the petite lady in front of him. "They’re torture
devices."
"It would be gorgeous with your skin tone, you absolute fool," she says, fists
propped on her hips.
Jensen finally notices Jared behind him, in the mirror, and spins around. "It
was my only request!" he says, not even bothering with a greeting. Jared nods
dutifully, but he’s doing a bad job of hiding his smile and Jensen rolls his
eyes, shaking his head.
"Isabella," he hears. Daphne is there, too—half-obscured behind a pile of
linens, but there, reading a book and seemingly paying no attention. "No
stock."
Isabella sighs and yanks Jensen about again. "Poets, always the best judge of
fashion," she says, shaking her head and measuring Jensen’s shoulder span with
a tape. "Certainly, why would one consult an expert? Pure foolishness."
Jared can barely keep his smile contained behind his hand. Jensen gives him a
sour look. "Hush," he says, and Jared tries to blink innocently, sitting down
on a box where he should be out of the way. Jensen looks down at the top of
Isabella’s head. "I thought we’d finished with measuring."
She sends a glare up at him. "Do I tell you how to rhyme? No. No more
complaining."
Jensen sends a pleading look at the ceiling, but he doesn’t speak again, and
Jared watches Isabella work. She has a slight accent and dusky skin, and Jared
guesses that she has blood from Aragon; she’s also beautiful, exquisitely so,
and he thinks she might be an adept. Eglantine loves all the arts, after all,
and a couturier could do very well in this house.
Eventually she finishes her measurements and makes a soft hmph, under her
breath. "Charles!" she calls, and a young man pops his head out from the
adjoining room. "It will fit, bring it out."
Jensen’s suit—Daphne puts her book down, and Jared sits up straight, staring.
The sapphire blue ended up winning out, evidently. The coat accentuates
Jensen’s newly-broad shoulders, fits close and tight against his back and ends
just above the generous swell of his buttocks. The shirt they chose is a cream-
white silk, left open at the throat and chest, and his skin is just barely
kissed with summer’s sun and fairly glows in contrast. They’ve given him a low-
slung waistcoat and breeches in a blue several shades darker and they fit
breathtakingly close, showing off the tuck of his waist, his wider hips, the
lovely weight of muscle in his thighs. Jared doesn’t know what Eglantine has
him doing for exercise, but it’s working.
"The cobbler’s sending the boots tomorrow—they’re the mahogany leather, you
remember, scuffed a bit as we discussed," Isabella says, looking Jensen up and
down. Charles stands further back with a wooden box, and he’s maybe a year or
two older than Jared, but he’s got the same assessing expression: looking at
the fit, the effect, already turning an artist’s eye. Daphne stands and
gestures briefly at Jensen, and he dutifully turns in a circle, his eyes cast
down to the floor.
Jared doesn’t have an artist’s eye for clothing, he doesn’t know if there’s
some cleverness to this design or not. It’s simple, despite the high quality of
the fabric—an open coat rather than a doublet, the gapped collar and almost-
bared chest giving him an already-rumpled look. Isabella taps a finger on her
lips, and then turns to Charles and rummages through the proffered box. From
this comes a length of dark gold braid, glinting subtly in the sunlight
streaming in through the windows, and she lays it along the shoulders and
collar and says, "Look up, poet," and Jensen does, and—oh. Jared takes in a
breath. The gold catches at the flecks in his beautiful eyes, glows against his
skin, and it’s just the touch of finery needed.
"Yes," Isabella says, and she’s not asking. Daphne nods, anyway, and Isabella
swipes the braid away, gives it back to Charles. "We’ll add it tomorrow. Now,
the coiffure."
Afterward, Daphne shoos the two of them out to the small garden to the rear of
the estate. The play is nearly finished, but for a word here and there, and now
it’s up to the actors. They walk along, arms bumping gently until Jared tucks
his hand into Jensen’s elbow, and Jared tells the story about the time Amelia’s
violet gown was torn ten minutes before presentation and Félicie and Phoebe had
to help strip it off and re-dress her right in the corridor, the maids racing
to fetch different jewels while the rest of the adepts quietly catcalled.
Jensen smiles to hear it, though he doesn’t laugh.
They settle quietly on a bench below the great oak that dominates the garden.
Jensen lets himself be turned by the shoulders so Jared can fuss with his hair.
He leaves it in a queue, much of the time, and apparently that was Daphne’s
suggestion—to maintain his more casual appearance, understated and honest,
giving patrons the impression of simplicity, an artist hard at work who has no
time for the fuss and polish of court life. It matches the clothes he tends to
wear. Still, with how thick and lovely his hair is, it’s a waste as far as
Jared’s concerned. He undoes the ribbon and runs his fingers through it, long
scratching pulls just like Honore showed them, so long ago. It’s a warm day,
hardly a cloud in the sky, and Jared scatters the golden-brown weight over
Jensen’s shoulders, letting the air into it. Jensen sighs, and when Jared peeks
over his shoulder he sees that his eyes are closed, his mouth set in a line.
"Isabella—is she the couturier for the house?—she did a wonderful job with your
outfit," Jared offers. Jensen hums. "Good thing they finally decided on a
color, so you won’t go naked to the fete."
Jensen’s eyes fly open and he darts a glance at Jared before he remembers, and
huffs. Jared grins at him. "Yes, they finally did," Jensen says, shaking his
head. He leans on one arm, looks up into the branches of the oak. "Isabella was
the tie-breaker, finally. Apparently green would have been—unsubtle, for who
knows what reason. And, yes, she’s the couturier. She made her marque three
years ago, so now she’s saving money to open her own couterie, and training
Charles to replace her before she goes. Poor lad."
Jared smiles, gathering up Jensen’s hair again. He begins to braid it, starting
at the temples and winding back along the fine shape of Jensen’s skull. "You’ll
be beautiful," he says, after a moment. He will, too. No cosmetic, the ladies
had decided, and Jared had nodded fervently before he caught himself. A queue,
hair caught back messily from his face with loose strands falling down from his
temples, as though he’d been running his hands through it while watching his
play be performed. Knowing Jensen, it’ll be the truth.
It’s quiet between them. A breeze slowly picks up, stirring the leaves, blowing
cool relief against the damp back of Jared’s neck. He’s nearly finished with
the braiding, joining the ropes of it at the base of Jensen’s skull, when
Jensen says, "I wonder who it’ll be."
His voice is—odd. Not like Richard’s, when he and Jared chat about the possible
patrons of the evening. Perhaps it’s different, when it’s the first. Of course,
it would be.
"Do you know who will attend the fete?" Jared says, trying to think
practically.
"Some of them." Jared wants to ask—can only imagine, really, but he’s seen only
a few of Eglantine’s patrons in his visits to the house and he wants a clearer
picture. Jensen looks down at his lap, though, and he’s running one thumb
restlessly over his own wrist, and Jared bites his tongue. Jensen continues,
after a moment. "I think what I’m dreading is the auction."
Jared frowns. "I’m sure the price will go high," he says. "After your wonderful
play, and everything? How could it not?"
Jensen lets out a short laugh, just one low ha under his breath, and he puts a
hand back, catches Jared’s hand where it’s resting on his shoulder. "And a
great patron-gift, too, no doubt," he says.
"Of course," Jared says, exaggerating it ridiculously, and Jensen sends a small
smile over his shoulder. A little rue, in the corners of his mouth, but still a
smile. "Enough to make up half your marque. I’m sure of it."
"From your lips to Elua’s ears," Jensen says, still smiling, but then turns and
wraps his arm around Jared’s shoulders, tucks him in close. Jared goes easily,
of course—it’s his favorite place to be. They sit quiet, just for a few
moments, Jared leaning in and listening idly to the birdsong all around, the
wind through the leaves. It’s remarkably private, today; no sounds of the city
to be heard, no patrons wandering through, no adepts disturbing them. Jensen
squeezes his shoulders, a little tighter, and then turns and catches Jared in a
full embrace, awkwardly pressing their chests together and burying his face
against the top of Jared’s head. Jared returns the embrace, immediately,
breathing in Jensen’s sweet smell. It’s not—Jensen isn’t weeping, Jared can
tell that, but without seeing his face he can’t tell what emotion is driving
this, not for sure. He holds on, as best he can, gives Jensen whatever he
needs.
It’s a full minute before Jensen takes a deep, cleansing breath and releases
him, his hand cupping the back of Jared’s head. "I’m sorry," he says, quiet,
and Jared shakes his head, looking up into Jensen’s face. Jensen strokes a
thumb over Jared’s cheek, the corner of his mouth turning up for a moment. He
leans in, making Jared’s breath hitch in his chest—but the kiss is pressed to
Jared’s cheek instead, Jensen’s mouth soft and plush, lingering. Jared can feel
the color rushing to his face, that reaction he just can’t train away, and he
tangles his hand around Jensen’s wrist, holds him close. When Jensen finally
pulls back, Jared’s heart is thumping, and he wants—
Jensen tucks the loose strands of Jared’s hair behind his ears. "Come on," he
says, after a pause. He stands up, catching Jared’s hand with his own. He
looks—not happy, certainly, but calmer. Resolute. "Daphne’s too busy with
supervising the practice to worry about what we’re doing. We can raid the
kitchen and see if there are any sweets being prepared for this evening, maybe
read The Mendicant’s Promise."
Jared lets himself be drawn to his feet, and tucked under Jensen’s arm again
for the walk back toward the kitchen. "Only if you’ll do the pirate’s part," he
says, and Jensen smiles down at him.
"You’re just trying to get out of singing," Jensen teases, gently, and Jared
protests, of course, but really only for show, just to make Jensen roll his
eyes and smile.
He’s thinking too hard, after the day’s done. Eglantine is preparing for a
private concert for patrons and Jensen has a private lesson, and so Jared’s
sent home a little early, walking back up the hill with Thierry. It’s still
warm, though the day is dwindling. Thierry walks on his left side, shielding
Jared from the street in case any carriages pass too close, but they’ve made
this trip enough times that he’s relaxed, not guarding so much as just
following along.
"What’s the matter, chatterbird?" Thierry asks, after a while. Jared blinks and
looks up, around. They’re nearly past Dahlia already and Jared’s hardly paid
any attention. "The artists didn’t steal your tongue for their sculpture
garden, did they?"
"No," Jared says, shoving lightly at Thierry’s hip. The man doesn’t budge, of
course. He’s strong—not like Marcus’s beautifully sculpted muscle, but stocky,
solid. He doesn’t hold Jared’s hand while they walk, nor does he even allow
Jared to take his arm—says it’s below Jared’s station, and above his own—but
they’re friendly, now, as much as Thierry lets them be. "Just thinking.
Jensen’s nervous about his debut."
"It’s an important day," Thierry says, placidly. Jared kicks at a small stone
pried up out of the cobbled street, and Thierry lands a gentle smack to the
back of his head. "Go nicely," he says. "You’ve an image to maintain."
"No one knows who I am," Jared argues back, but he leaves the stone, folds his
hands behind his back and steps more carefully, hips rolling smoothly as he was
taught. Thierry grunts in approval and Jared ducks his head, smiles. "I feel
bad for your children," he says. "Such a taskmaster for a father."
"My children shan’t grow up to be pretty little scoundrels, so I take it as a
compliment, young master," Thierry says.
He has two, Jared knows—a boy around seven, and a girl who’s barely walking.
His wife is a cook, in the household of a comte who lives in the City, and
Jared is reliably informed that she’s the most beautiful woman in the world,
though she nags like a fishwife. Jared drums his fingers against each other,
tucked against the small of his back, and watches a carriage go by—driver on
top, footman beside him, but the footman looks about Jared’s age. "What do you
think they’ll be?" Jared says, not really thinking about it. Thierry looks down
at him, frowning. "Your boy, say. Will he be a footman, like you?"
Thierry’s gait doesn’t slow, but he doesn’t respond for a few moments. Jared
glances up at his face, making sure he didn’t cause offense, but Thierry’s just
looking ahead, sturdy and calm as ever. "He could be," he says, finally.
"Natural enough job, in the City. Enough rich houses that need a good steady
lad. Juliette wants to get him an education, teach him his letters and all. I
think he’d do better to get an apprenticeship in a trade, like you lot. A
smith, say, or a cooper."
Jared smiles, imagining—a little boy, with Thierry’s plain square face,
stubbornly turning out barrels from chubby hands.
"But, no," Thierry says, then. "He’ll like as not be a servant, just like his
mother and father." Jared glances up again, and Thierry gives him a little
smile, rests a big hand on his shoulder. "We are what we’re raised to be, young
Jared, unless blessed Elua guides us otherwise. Imagine—one day, my Paul could
be running and fetching for you in my place, and you’ll probably teach him all
your terrible rock-kicking tricks." He’s jesting, in that dry way he has,
but—Jared frowns, unaccountably dismayed. The image of the little cooper
dissolves away. Thierry squeezes his shoulder, then gently urges Jared just one
step ahead, into the place he’s meant to walk. They’re approaching the first of
the long line of linden trees, which means they’re nearly back to the Orchis
estate. Jared lifts his chin, makes sure his gait is smooth and perfect, and
Thierry falls in quietly behind. If any patrons pass in a carriage, or if
another adept goes by, they will see a child of the Court, elegant and poised,
exactly as he’s meant to be. Thierry’s right: he can’t let down the house.
                                       *
Over the next few weeks, Jared is distracted. Richard has to tell him twice
which suits to bring up from the laundry, and during exercises he finds his
attention drifting enough that first Percy and later Rose ask if he’s getting
sick. During a sermon in the house’s shrine, Noemie tells the story of how
Naamah lay with strangers in the stews of Bhodistan that blessed Elua might
eat, and she asks Jared and Eveline and Laura to think about what the story
means to them, about how Elua’s sole precept of love as thou wilt matches
Naamah’s actions. Jared tries, he does, but he finds himself staring out the
window of the shrine instead, eyes on the birds flitting in and out of the
eaves and seeing nothing.
"I’m not sure the sermon did much for you today," Noemie says.
Jared startles, and when he looks up the others are gone and Noemie is watching
him, her great dark eyes gently curious. "I’m sorry," Jared says, bowing his
head.
Noemie doesn’t respond to that. She rises gracefully from her kneeling cushion
and begins to tidy the shrine: scooping the other cushions up and stacking them
to one side of the room to be stored away, blowing out the candles lining the
wood-paneled walls, her movements slow and easy, unhurried. Jared would leap to
help, but she hasn’t dismissed him. She’s young, their priestess—years younger
than Félicie, her face still untouched by time, her body slim and graceful in
the scarlet robe of her office. Naamah’s statue stands silent above them both,
arms extended in welcome, a smile on her marble lips. The censer placed on the
sideboard is still emitting small plumes of smoke and she opens it up, blows
the flame out. The silence in the room sits softly against Jared’s shoulders,
no expectation or demand, but he still finds it hard to speak. Eventually, he
takes a deep breath. "My friend, Jensen," he says, slowly. "His debut is in
only a few days."
The censer is stowed away in the cupboard before Noemie turns and looks at him
again. "Are you nervous for him? Jealous?" He frowns, looks down. "Jealousy
would not be unheard of. You haven’t yet been initiated into Naamah’s
mysteries, but you are a child of the Court. You know some of what serving her
involves."
"I don’t—I want him to be happy," he says, and then immediately has to correct
himself. "I wish him success. It’s only…" He trails off, and swallows. Noemie’s
eyes are still on him and he looks away, knows that his cheeks are flushing
dark. "It’s—stupid. I know better."
Noemie comes and stands before him, offers him both hands and, when he takes
them, pulls him easily to his feet. She’s only a few inches taller than him,
but he still feels—small, young, face-to-face with her. His face feels hot. "We
each serve Naamah in our own way, for our own reasons," she says, voice gentle.
"Each patron that comes to us becomes part of us, and we part of them, in ways
great and small. Only remember that desire of the body is not the same as
desire of the heart, though they can often blend or become confused."
He nods, ashamed, and she tilts his chin up with a finger so that he’s forced
to look at her. Her expression is warm, knowing. "You wish your friend well,
and that is a kindness. No matter what private thoughts you have of him, or
what worries you might have, surely he would want to know at least that."
That night, after he assists Richard and the night’s fete begins, after he and
Eveline have their supper, he leaves Eveline to play with Gemma and goes to his
room alone, lights a candle and finds a scrap of paper and pen and sits, and
tries to think how to be honest, and kind. He’s not a writer, doesn’t have
Jensen’s gift of saying just the right thing. He thinks of Jensen, beautiful in
the sapphire silk. Of his fingers, stained with ink, splayed flat over a book
or cramped on a pen. The flat, calm expression he fixed on Faolan Garneau; the
abstracted distance as he fretted, that day in the garden, and how he’d looked
at Jared after.
The note he writes, eventually, is simple. His days since the last time they
saw each other, a dream he had, hopes that the play will be well-received. He
ends it with: I will pray to Naamah for you, and he means it.
The courier takes the note away, and there isn’t a response before the
scheduled day. Jensen’s debut is on a night that Orchis is closed to patrons
and Richard doesn’t require his assistance for anything. Jared goes to the
shrine. Noemie opens it to him, kisses his brow, and leaves him alone. He
lights the candle at Naamah’s feet, the great one made of beeswax that smells
so sweet, and he lays a spray of anemones cut from the garden before her, the
petals deep red and bright against her white stone flesh. He kneels, abeyante,
the sun sinking behind the statue, and he looks up into her gentle face and
thinks, please. He doesn’t know how to articulate it better than that.
His next visit to Eglantine is scheduled for ten days later. He dresses
carefully, in the fawn-colored breeches and a pale green shirt passed to him
from Percy, his better boots, his hair braided prettily over his shoulder.
Thierry doesn’t needle him on the walk, for which Jared’s grateful. When they
arrive, he’s allowed to go directly to Jensen’s room—but a maid has to take
him, because of course Jensen has been assigned to adept’s quarters, now. He
follows the girl quietly, his heart beating high and hard in the base of his
throat, memorizing the new directions: up to the second floor, past the east
wing’s sculpture gallery, into an unfamiliar corridor on the south side of the
house, passing door after door until finally they come to one with a painting
of a beautiful city by the sea beside it. The maid curtsies to Jared and
disappears down the other end of the corridor, and he’s left to knock.
"What," comes Jensen’s voice, muffled behind the door.
Jared swallows, and tucks his loose hair behind his ears. "It’s me," he says,
and then he hopes unnecessarily, "it’s Jared."
It’s only a moment before the door opens, and then Jensen’s there, smiling at
him. He looks—entirely the same, and for a second Jared doesn’t understand how
that’s so, but then Jensen is embracing him about the shoulders and he leans
into it, closing his eyes in relief. Jensen’s wearing only breeches and that
old shirt of Luc’s that he brought away from Balm, better-fitting now, his feet
bare and his hair loose over his shoulders. He looks at ease, in a way Jared
wouldn’t have ever expected, but is grateful to see. The room, once Jared’s
drawn in and Jensen closes the door again behind him, isn’t precisely massive;
not like Richard’s, not nearly so sprawling or opulent. There are high small
windows on the south wall, dim light from the morning spilling over the dark
wood floor, and a little fireplace tucked against the far wall, a thick rug
before it and a desk to its side, and already papers and books are scattered
across it, a pen stuck in an inkwell where Jared must have pulled Jensen away
from his work. The bed dominates the other side of the room, a mattress twice
the size of Jared’s with only a simple drapery the color of dark forests tied
between the posts, the cream blankets twisted and unmade. Jared swallows again,
and turns his eyes from it, but Jensen is watching him with a rueful smile when
he turns around, and he knows he was caught.
"It’s all right," he says, while Jared squirms. "I know you have questions."
Jensen sits on the foot of the bed and pats the blankets beside him, and Jared
doesn’t have much choice but to hop up and sit where he’s told. The familiar
arm doesn’t come to lie over his shoulders, and he bites his tongue, missing
it. He leans into Jensen’s side, anyway, jostling his shoulder with his own.
"How was the play?" he asks, finally, and Jensen laughs, and tells him the
story.
The Dowayne and Roxane had arranged for the performance to begin just before
sundown, with a carefully selected list of invitees. Daphne’s patrons were all
invited, of course, but also all of those who loved the theater, those who
enjoyed literary salons, a selection of nobility and the wealthy and artists
alike. Jensen had introduced the play himself, carefully costumed as the
rumpled writer. The patrons knew what would come after, but they listened
politely enough, and watched the play, and applauded sincerely once it was
done.
"Denis was perfect," Jensen says, leaning back on his hands on the mattress.
Jared has taken off his boots and shifts to sit crosslegged beside him, raptly
watching his face. He’s more comfortable, talking about the work. "Even the
lines I still wasn’t sure about, he made Anafiel come to life. I saw some of
the patrons wiping tears away, in the scene just before the end."
Jared remembers the scene. I, and thou, he thinks, and puts a hand to his face.
"So—they were pleased?" he says.
Jensen glances at him. "They were," he says, more slowly. He casts his eyes
down, looking at his knees, or at nothing. "At the reception, after, several of
them came to me and Daphne, expressing their… admiration."
Wine flowed, and intelligent conversation. Denis and Auguste were both
applauded, the patrons already well-familiar with them both from performances
past. After some time, the old Dowayne called for Jensen to give a reading of
one of his original poems—they’d chosen the one about autumn, a little somber
and rich with meaning. "Whoever's homeless now, will build no shelter," Jensen
recites, his eyes distant.
The auction, then. "Who won?" Jared says, after a beat of silence.
Jensen sits forward, lacing his fingers together between his knees. "My lord
Didier Clavel, Comte de Souverain. He told me that it was the poem, more than
the play, that made him keep bidding." He glances at Jared and his mouth
quirks, at the corner. "No, I won’t tell you anything about it."
Jared’s face is warm, again. "I wasn’t going to ask," he says, and it’s such a
lie that Jensen laughs, even if it’s only little. Jared grins, in response,
even if his heart’s not totally in it. Jensen hasn’t volunteered the final
price, and Jared makes up his mind not to ask that either—nor does he ask after
the comte’s looks, or his skill, or what he asked for, much as Jared’s gut
roils to know. He nudges Jensen with his elbow, instead. "At least say—did he
give you a good patron-gift? I did say he would."
Jensen smiles at him. "Yes, prophet," he says, tweaking the end of Jared’s
braid. "He did."
He slips off the foot of the bed to stand, and then pulls the old shirt off
over his head. Jared takes a shaky breath in—Jensen’s body is familiar, but
it’s been so long since it was bared to him. He’s bigger now, of course, at the
age of majority. He’s not slim like Richard, or sculpted like Marcus, but his
shoulders are broad, his stomach flat, and when he turns, and puts his back
toward the sunny window, Jared’s taken by the shape of him, the way his back
narrows down toward his waist, and there—
"Oh, Jensen," Jared says, almost breathless.
"I visited the marquist, just as soon as I could," Jensen says, looking at
Jared over his shoulder. His breeches sit low, low enough that Jared can see
the dimples beside his spine, and there at his back’s lowest point there’s
already ink, etched into his skin. It’s not quite black, but instead the
deepest brown of bistre. Scrollwork only so far, forming a shape almost like a
spade that widens out over the valley of his spine before it’s abruptly cut
off. Only two inches, Jared estimates, and the skin around it is still a little
pink and inflamed. Jared reaches out and touches it, just one finger, and
Jensen flinches just enough that he yanks his hand back, apologizing. "It’s all
right," he says, and catches Jared’s hand to squeeze it. "The marquist only
wants me to make an appointment if I can afford at least an inch, but we
already worked out the design. The male Eglantine shape, of course, with the
scrollwork in bistre and the leaves of darkest green, only a few blush flowers
scattered here and there. The art was lovely."
"You sound excited," Jared says, smiling at him. It has been—a very long time,
since he heard that from Jensen.
He gets a shrug, but Jensen doesn’t quite deny it. "I’m glad to start," is all
he says, and he squeezes Jared’s hand again.
Now that Jensen is an adept in his own right, Daphne isn’t precisely his
instructor, but she is still his mentor in his writing, and they meet with her
that afternoon in the east gallery. She gives Jared a rare smile, so lovely for
a moment that Jared has to catch his breath. "Have you congratulated Jensen’s
success, orchid?" she asks.
"I’m very proud," Jared says, solemn, just to make Jensen roll his eyes.
"We all are," she says, and it could have been a jest but she sounds—sincere,
truly, her expression soft in a way Jared’s never seen. Jensen ducks his head.
She puts her hand on the crown of it, slides down to cup the back of his skull,
and then straightens, lifts her chin and looks serious once again. "We cannot
rest on our laurels. There were a few lines that needed to be reworded in the
fourth scene. Jensen, you know the ones I mean."
"Yes, Daphne," he says. The manuscript is waiting on the table, a clean-copy
all ready to be marked up again. Jensen sits and gets a pen, Daphne sinking
into the armchair near the banked fireplace. Jared looks back and forth between
them, a little dismayed, and Jensen gives him a little grin. "Come now, Jared,"
he says. "You’ll be our Anafiel, won’t you?"
"Yes, Jensen," he says, parroting Jensen’s tone, and resigns himself to an
afternoon of lovelorn dialogue.
                                       *
Jared prays more, in the time that follows. He speaks to Naamah and sometimes
to Elua, and in a way more bound to the earth with Noemie, and Richard, and
Percy. He watches the adepts, ruffled and relaxed and sometimes sore on the
mornings after their assignations, and listens to their gossip about their
patrons. Phoebe is kind, and kinder when she’s left a good patron-gift; Amelia
is hardly kind at all, but if a patron pleased her well then she will at least
pay the gentleman or lady a good compliment. Richard tells Jared, when they’re
alone, not to listen to the other adepts, not to imitate them or hold their
opinions above his own. "When you serve," Richard says, while Jared’s watching
him dress, "you do it for your own reasons. You’ll know them, when it’s time."
"What if—" He's worrying a thick length of velvet ribbon between his fingers,
wrinkling it, but he—doesn't know how to say what he's thinking.
Richard stills his hands, and Jared looks up to find him smiling. "You'll think
yourself sick, dear one," he says, and Jared huffs. Richard tweaks the point of
his chin. "It's nothing to do with logic, not in the end. You'll see." He drops
a kiss on Jared's forehead, then pulls him to his feet. "Now, help me with my
doublet, dear. I like the way you tie the points."
From Jensen's stories, he learns that the adepts of Eglantine are less busy
than those of Orchis—though perhaps it's more correct to say that they're busy
in different ways. While Orchis's adepts gather as they will in the great hall
each night the house is open, to fete and make merry with patrons and form
contracts at each other's whim, Eglantine's adepts are separated more
distinctly. There are events multiple nights each week, but one night will be
for the singers, another for the acrobats and musicians, another for the actors
and playwrights. The painters and sculptors will host exhibitions and their
patrons will come and admire their work, might buy it to take home to their
great houses, and an assignation might come after—but the art is the focus of
the thing. Jensen draws an assignation perhaps once a week, and often less than
that. "But then," Jared says, perched again on Jensen's unmade bed, watching
Jensen at his calisthenics. "How are you ever meant to make your marque?"
Jensen's braced rigidly on the rug before the fire, balanced on his elbows,
lifted up on his toes. It has started to grow cold outside, but it's warm in
here, and sweat is beading on his bare back. His marque has gained barely an
inch. "I have my writing," he says, voice shaking a little with the effort of
holding the pose. "Daphne thinks it won't be too long before I can have a
volume published—proceeds going mostly to the house, of course, but I'll get my
portion."
He relaxes finally, dropping down and then rolling onto his back on the rug. In
the firelight he's all gold, his almost-straight nose lit in lovely profile,
his generous mouth open and panting a little. Jared tucks his hands under his
thighs, tries not to stare. "And in the meantime?"
"In the meantime," Jensen says, and lifts up onto his elbows to smile a little
at Jared. "There are enough patrons of literature who wish to discuss the
latest works at the salon that my coffers won't run dry."
That year, for the Longest Night, Orchis goes with an animal theme—Richard is a
sleek, gorgeous panther, Félicie a bright peacock, Marcus a grinning laughing
lion, his golden hair a wild mane about his face—and Jensen succumbs finally to
Jared's wheedling and then outright pleading and tells him that Eglantine will
go as a band of Tsingani travelers, bedecked in gold and bright silks and armed
with tricks and stories and pranks to play on the guests at the Midwinter
Masque. Jensen pulls a ducat from behind Jared's ear, to demonstrate, and Jared
laughs aloud, delighted.
He doesn't get to hear about Jensen's patrons, beyond a name here or there,
sometimes a brief tale of how the contract was made. Faolan Garneau wrote
Jensen a letter, praising his debut play, but also offering gentle critique of
some of the themes and offering suggestions for change. Jensen was so irritated
with him that, at a salon hosted by Daphne and one of the other literary
adepts, he went to Garneau himself and disputed his criticisms—and Garneau said
that he would only entertain further argument if the Dowayne drew up a
contract, for that very night. Jared flushes dark, up his chest all the way to
his cheeks, but luckily Jensen is busy looking for a book on the west library's
shelves and doesn't see it. "He—might have been right, after all," is all
Jensen says about it. "Perhaps. But only about some of it. The speech at the
end was perfectly done, I won't change it."
"No," Jared says, wrapping his arms around himself. He remembers the way
Garneau had smiled at Jensen. He wishes he was still wearing his cloak, if only
to hide his flaming face with it. "You shouldn't."
In the spring, Antoine makes his marque and leaves the house, with one last
great fete. Jared can't attend, of course, but he's there to see Antoine off
when his carriage arrives. He always loved Antoine, just a little, the first
adept of Orchis he ever met—after Félicie, of course. Antoine kisses Jared on
each cheek, then tweaks his nose, and then stands and gives Richard and Félicie
and Rose, carrying baby Remy, proper kisses of farewell. "Go on, then," Félicie
says, shoving him lightly at the shoulders, and he grins and sweeps a bow
before he disappears into the carriage. It's one with proper livery, a golden
shield on deep green, which Jared recognizes as that of the minor baronetcy of
Rocaille. Félicie and Richard stand together for a moment, arms linked, nearly
of a height with their heads tipped together. "He'll do well," Félicie says, as
the carriage leaves the courtyard, Antoine blowing kisses from the open window.
Richard hums. "A kept plaything of a bored baroness, is what the nobles will
say. Did you see her, though, when she came?"
"She loves him," Richard says, as though it's the simplest truth. Jared gazes
after the carriage, though the footmen are already closing the great gates, and
can hardly imagine. "Her patron-gifts were as large as her purse could manage,
spring and autumn. He'll be the declared consort of Lady Philippa by summer."
"I should seduce a prince," Rose says, rueful as she pats Remy's little back,
and Félicie laughs as they all turn to go back inside. "Imagine the wardrobe
he'd buy me!"
"I'm not sure that love as thou wilt was meant to apply to gowns," Richard
says, with a smile tipped down at Jared, and Jared grins as Rose immediately
begins to protest that love of silk and velvet could be as strong as any other.
Spring slips into summer. Jensen's marque grows by another inch, a single dark
green leaf etched into the smooth golden skin on his lower back. Daphne has
approved another poem for the volume of verse they're putting together, and
he's constantly working, his fingers almost always spattered with ink. His
patrons don't mind it.
At the beginning of July, the days hot and bright and apricots heavy in the
tree at the farthest end of Orchis's garden, Jared is sitting and playing chess
alone in one of the sitting rooms. Richard is out of the house, contracted with
a patron for a long visit to the country, and they've already finished lessons
for the day, and he doesn't have aught else to do. He's been teaching himself
the game, after finding a book on it in Eglantine's library, and he's leaning
over the board trying to plan out his moves when Gemma trots into the room.
"You have a visitor!" she exclaims.
She's so pleased and proud over her message that Jared's distracted, for a
second. "You—what?" he says. "Me?"
Gemma nods vigorously, her bright copper ringlets swinging around her face. "An
adept," she says, savoring it. She comes over to the chess table and leans in
close. "He's beautiful."
One of the maids comes in, at a significantly more sedate pace, and bobs a
curtsy. "Jensen nó Eglantine has arrived," she says, and glances at Gemma,
who's now bouncing. "As you may have heard. The Second says you may receive him
in the garden, if you wish."
Jared blinks and shoves up to his feet. He's—not dressed for visitors, not
really, just in a loose white shirt and short breeches, because it's too hot
for anything else. Jensen wouldn't expect him to be grandly attired, of course,
but—
"Gemma, sweetie," he says, going to his knees in front of her. "Can you braid
my hair, please?"
She claps her hands and hops behind him, easily tugging his hair loose and into
her hands. It's almost down to the middle of his back, so she has a lot to work
with, but hair-braiding is an easy way to entertain her and she's already a
master at it. She'll do right by him.
It's only ten minutes before Jared comes out onto the verandah behind the house
to find Jensen waiting on the wide stone bench, below the arch of honeysuckle.
He's dressed with a bit more care than usual, in a linen suit the color of
seafoam, his hair tied with a matching ribbon. No stock, though, of course.
Jared tucks his loose hair behind his ears and comes down the steps, his bare
feet warmed through by the stone. "What are you doing here?" he says, and
Jensen startles, standing up.
"I can travel, now—alone, that is," Jensen says. He's clutching a book to his
chest—when isn't he, really—but he smiles at Jared, small though it is. "I
thought, well. You've come to visit me, so many times. I wanted to see you."
Their last visit was only last week. Jared smiles, pleasure seeping through his
chest. "I'm happy that you did," he says, truly, and Jensen's smile widens a
little.
They sit on the bench, the honeysuckle thick in the air around them. Jared
recounts a story of the twin brothers who contracted with Phoebe and Amelia,
and how the girls had laughed over the boys' rivalry, each wanting to outdo the
other in the bedchamber. Jensen smiles, responds with a story of Auguste's
about a noble lady who thinks she can act and contracts with him for 'lessons,'
as much as she does for his other skills. Jensen lifts his voice into a
falsetto, having apparently met the lady: you're so talented, my darling, he
shrills, and Jared laughs aloud, leaning against Jensen's shoulder.
They're quiet for a moment, then. Jensen finds his hand and holds it, open
against his own knee, tracing the lines of his palm. His skin is still pale,
compared to Jared's own. "Your birthday will come soon, won't it," Jensen says,
not asking.
Jared looks up, at Jensen's face. He's watching the motion of his finger, a few
strands of honey-brown hair fallen down before his eyes. "Just a few weeks,"
Jared says. His heart beats harder, just thinking of it. "I'll be dedicated,
finally."
Jensen makes a low humming sound, and wraps Jared's hand in both of his own. He
still doesn't look up. "I'm going to ask you a question. I don't—I don't want
you to be upset with me, or think—anything bad. It's only a question." Jared
tilts his head, and covers Jensen's top hand with his own, so that their four
hands are in a pile, one atop the other. Jensen's mouth tilts, seeing it, and
he finally looks up, meeting Jared's eyes squarely. The smile fades, though, as
he licks his lips, and takes a deep breath. "Have you ever thought of… not
dedicating yourself to Naamah?"
"What?" Jared blinks. Of all the questions— "Why?"
Jensen pulls his hands back and stands, pacing a few steps out. "You could be…"
He shakes his head, and turns around. "Jared, you could be so many things.
You're so clever. You're better at languages than I am. You could go to be a
player in one of the theaters in the city, or learn—anything, navigation, or
horticulture, or to be a scholar of history. I know you borrow books from
Eglantine's library." Jared bites his lip, guilty, and Jensen waves a hand,
dismissing that. "My point is—you could be anything, Jared. Anything at all."
"I—" Jared shakes his head, confused. "Why are you telling me this?"
Jensen comes in close, swiftly, and kneels before Jared on the grass. He lays
his hands on Jared's knees, commanding his full attention—as though he doesn't
have it, always. His eyes are steady on Jared's, the beautiful green turned
almost bluish with the color of his jacket, clear and focused in the bright
sun. "I just want you to consider it," he says, voice low but strong. "You
don't have to serve, if you don't want to. The house will—they'll find
something for you to do, and I'll save money toward your marque myself, we can
figure out a way. If you tell me, I'll do it."
Jared's thrown back, in his memory. A night, years ago, when they were both
children at Balm. Jensen's hands tight on his. He draws back a little, now,
something tight forming in his breast. "I want to," he says. He shakes his
head, frowning. "You don't—do you not think I can? That I would be a poor
Servant of Naamah?"
A bit of shock widens Jensen's eyes. "No, of course not," Jensen says, but with
a note in his voice like he's trying to mollify Jared. Something Jared has
heard adepts use on patrons, but not something Jensen has ever used with him.
He pushes at Jensen's hands and slips off the bench, takes a few steps away.
The apricots are fragrant, close to dropping, and he keeps his eyes on them so
he doesn't have to look around. This isn't something he ever thought he'd hear,
not from Jensen. "I don't know why you're asking me, then," he says, and his
voice is—frail, a tremble to it he didn't realize would be there. The tightness
in his chest has spread and he swallows, blinking hard. "Are you trying to send
me away?"
"Jared," he hears, the tone of it almost anguished, and Jensen turns him around
and crushes him into his chest, strong arms wrapping tight around Jared's back,
and Jared hugs him around the neck, face pressed in close against his throat
and his breath coming thick and hot against Jensen's skin. Jensen's hand cups
the back of his head, and the apology is murmured fervent against the top of
his ear: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you, truly. I never want you to be
far from me."
It eases something. The tears spill over all the same. They end up sitting,
under the shade of the apricot tree, Jared half in Jensen's lap and his face
buried in the fine linen of Jensen's coat, his hands tight in it and crumpling
it, his shoulders shaking despite Jensen's arm around them. The storm passes
soon enough. Jared's left sniffling, his head aching a little and his face hot
and clammy. He turns his face, enough to let the air touch it, and looks out at
the bright garden, the neat paths and hedges, the vines climbing the high stone
walls with the city obscured behind them. Jensen's thumb is dragging up and
down the soft skin at the base of his neck, under the braid that Gemma did so
prettily for him, the motion soothing and slow. Jared finds his other hand
where it's resting on Jared's arm, lays his own hand on top of it. Jensen
tangles their fingers together, right away, and Jared closes his eyes, tipping
his forehead against Jensen's collarbone.
"I'm sorry," Jensen says, again. His voice is soft, and honest. "I truly didn't
want to hurt you, Jared, I'm so sorry that I did."
"I know," Jared says. He does. It wasn't only the shock that made him cry,
though, and he knows that too. Everything has felt like—so much, lately. He
sniffs, again, and tries discreetly to wipe his face. When he pulls back, his
eyes almost well over again. "Oh, look what I've done to your beautiful coat!"
Jensen drags his thumb over Jared's wet cheek and, when Jared reluctantly drags
his eyes up, only shrugs. "It's only water, and a bit of salt," he says,
gently. He pulls a handkerchief from an inside pocket of his coat and Jared
takes it, wipes his face more thoroughly. It's lovely soft linen, embroidered
with a single eglantine blossom in cream and green at one corner. When he tries
to give it back, Jensen just folds his hand over it. "Keep it," he says. He
smiles, or tries to, at least. His eyes are a little red, too. "It's the least
I can do, as an apology."
The handkerchief is duly folded and tucked into the pocket of Jared's breeches.
Jared drags his toes through the grass. They're still sitting a bit at cross-
purposes, Jared's shoulder leaning against Jensen's chest, facing different
directions. Jared tucks his head down, leans it against Jensen's shoulder, and
Jensen presses a kiss to the top of his head. Jared closes his eyes, and grips
Jensen's hand tight. They sit, quiet, for a long time.
                                       *
The morning of Jared's thirteenth birthday dawns clear, the day bright and hot.
He bathes early and Richard comes to wash his hair, his fingers gently
massaging Jared's scalp, washing him clean. Under Richard's direction he
dresses simply—no doublet, no livery. A little after the city's bells strike
noon, he comes to the Dowayne's office in his best white shirt, his softest
breeches and boots, his hair left unbound over his shoulders. Félicie is
waiting for them, and she opens the door, gestures Jared inside, closes the
door behind him.
He's never been alone with the Dowayne. He crosses to the kneeling cushion set
before the throne and sinks abeyante, head bowed and hands folded in his lap.
"Jared," the Dowayne says, voice warm. "Look up, child."
The Dowayne is sitting forward on his throne, his elbows resting on his knees
while he looks down at Jared, considering him. Jared makes his face serene,
solemn, and the Dowayne grins at him, unexpectedly.
"You don't need to stand on ceremony, not right now," the Dowayne says. He
laces his fingers together, his hands only barely showing his age. He's in his
sixties, perhaps, but still graceful and handsome, his eyes the grey-blue of a
clouded day as they search Jared's face.
"The adepts speak well of you. Félicie is very pleased by your progress and
Richard has nothing but praise for your sweet nature, your good humor." Jared
smiles and ducks his head at the compliment, and earns himself a soft laugh.
"And there's the shy charm that keeps the bloom of you fresh."
There's a little pause and Jared peeks back up. The Dowayne smiles at him, more
softly. "I have a question for you, Jared. I am required to ask it, by law, and
I know it will seem like mere formality, but I charge you to answer me
honestly. Will you?"
Jared swallows. "Yes, my lord," he manages, but it's barely more than a
whisper.
The Dowayne beckons him closer, and he rises as though drawn up by strings,
steps up onto the dais. His face is taken in two well-manicured hands, holding
him still and in place so he can't duck away. "Is it your wish to be dedicated
into the service of Naamah?" the Dowayne asks, finally, his voice soft between
them. "By the oath of my office I will accept any answer you give."
Jared is nodding, almost before he's stopped speaking. "Yes, my lord, yes,
yes," he says, words stumbling as he tries to get them out. "More than
anything, please. I wish it."
The Dowayne smiles at him, wide and true. "I told you this when you joined the
house, and I hold to it," he says, stroking his thumbs over Jared's cheeks.
"Jared, you will do Naamah proud."
He releases Jared and rings the bell beside the throne. The door opens,
immediately, and when Jared turns Félicie and Richard are both waiting, smiling
at him. "Come along, dear one," Richard says, holding out his hand.
The shrine, at the house's rear, is full of light, warm apricot-scented air
streaming through the open window. Noemie greets them in her scarlet robe, her
dark hair tumbling loose around her kind face. "My lord," she says, bowing
ever-so-slightly.
The Dowayne bows slightly back, to Jared's surprise. "This child is come to be
dedicated to Naamah," he says, and Jared knows he's repeated the same phrase
dozens of times with dozens of other apprentices, but the smile he sends down
to Jared, his elegant hand on Jared's shoulder, still warms Jared through to
the bone.
Noemie offers her hands to Jared and he steps forward, takes them. She stoops
just a little to kiss him on both cheeks. "Be welcome, brother," she murmurs,
and Jared closes his eyes for a moment, her smell like incense and honey going
straight to his head.
There is another man there, an acolyte with a long golden braid in the same
scarlet surplice as Noemie's, though he's years younger than she. The shrine
has been bedecked with flowers, great vases on the sideboard and on either side
of Naamah's statue, their blossoms huge and bright with summer's blush. Jared
expects to kneel, but Noemie draws him instead to stand in the center of the
floor, where the light is spilling in. The Dowayne and Félicie and Richard do
kneel, all of them, bearing witness.
"Is it your wish to be dedicated to the service of Naamah?" Noemie says,
echoing the Dowayne perfectly. She holds Jared's eyes with her own, the
question simple.
Jared still doesn't have to think. "Yes," he says.
The young acolyte, kneeling, proffers a stone basin full of clear water. Noemie
dips the silver aspergillum and sprinkles a few drops, each hitting cool and
heavy on Jared's hair, his shoulders. "By Naamah's sacred river," she says, "I
baptize you into her service." The words have the weight of ceremony to them
and Jared's lips part. Next, the acolyte offers a perfect honey-cake and Noemie
breaks off a small piece and places it on Jared's tongue, tipping his chin up
with a single finger. It's still warm from baking, the taste a shock in Jared's
mouth. She holds his eyes until he swallows. "May your flesh be bound unto the
sweetness of desire." Next, a fine-wrought goblet full of crimson wine, which
Noemie tips up to his lips so his mouth is filled with the blackcurrant flavor
of it, the alcohol sharp after the honey. "May your blood rise to the headiness
of passion." At last, the acolyte holds up a glass vial of clear golden oil,
into which Noemie dips her fingers. She smears it over his brow in a line, then
rests her curled knuckles against Jared's cheek. The oil smells of roses. "May
your soul ever find grace in the service of Naamah," she says, softly, her eyes
dark and luminous on Jared's.
Tears prick behind his eyes and his blood feels too-warm, rushing up to his
cheeks but also—everywhere, his skin sensitive and tingling, his body awake and
bright. Above Noemie's head the serene marble face of Naamah wavers in his
vision and his breath shudders in his chest. He closes his eyes and feels a
oneness—with the adepts of his house, with the adepts of every house, with
every servant who has ever laid down in worship of his goddess. With Naamah
herself, and with Elua, brightest of angels.
"So mote it be," Noemie says, and when Jared opens his eyes the tears streak
down his face, but she smiles at him. If any were to understand, it would be
her. The acolyte has withdrawn, and Noemie steps to the side, sweeping her arm
toward the statue. "You may offer your service."
Richard appears at Jared's side. In his hands he holds a small cage, domed in
bronze with thin bars, and inside is a dove—white on her head and the thick
down of her belly, her wings speckled with grey and brown. Beautiful. Richard
smiles, whispers, "Go on," and Jared carefully opens the little door and
reaches in with both hands to catch the bird, as gently as he can. She beats
her wings against him, surprised, but he removes her safely and holds her for a
moment to his chest. He takes the two steps across the sun-warmed parquet and
kneels on the bare floor before the statue, bending his head in supplication.
The dove quivers in his hands. He looks up and finds Naamah's face, heart
thudding, and then he tosses the dove up into the air. She explodes into
motion, wings flapping furiously, and she turns a full circle around the room,
once and then twice, and then finds the open window and flies out into the
golden day, free.
Noemie touches his shoulder and he rises, heart so full he can't speak.
"Welcome," she says. "Servant of Naamah."
On a day that a child is dedicated to Naamah, the house is always closed to
guests. There is a feast that afternoon in the great hall, all the adepts of
Orchis gathered to greet their new member. Jared sits between Percy and Nicole,
honored and teased by turns, and they dine well, the wine flowing, though Jared
is allowed only two goblets.
When the sun begins to sink over the city, the Showing is prepared. Jared
hasn't been to this room before—at least, not when it was in use. Balm's was
smaller, more intimate. At Orchis, the Showing chamber is just off the great
hall—still open only to those guests who are invited, of course, but any adept
of the Night Court may attend the rites of Naamah's servants. The room is
arrayed somewhat like the theater at Eglantine's heart: wide tiers rise around
the stage in a half-circle, though instead of seats there are only thick
kneeling cushions scattered here and there, that the viewers may repose at
their leisure. Félicie leads Jared to the very front and center, a scant ten
feet from the stage, dropping a kiss onto his head before she takes her leave
and finds her own place. He sinks down to the cushion, kneeling automatically.
Esme and Percy sit somewhat near him, smiling his way, but conversation is low
and murmuring, what laughter he hears muted. His mouth is dry with excitement.
Candles are lit all around the stage and the chandelier above blazes. Laura
blows out the lamps by the door, so the room dims somewhat. The adepts go
quiet.
Simple music begins to play: single plucked notes of a harp, low and gentle.
The heavy curtain draws back and revealed are—Audette, kneeling in a blush-pink
robe on the left side of the stage, and Victor attired the same and in the same
pose to the right. The harp plays its lowest note and there's a pause while it
hums in the air, and then they each lift their heads and stand, in unison. They
walk to each other, moving slow and purposeful, and when they meet the harp
emits a rich trill and Victor smiles, breaking like dawn over his pretty face.
Audette smiles back, reaching up to cup his jaw, her hands pale and delicate on
his darker skin, and then he leans down and kisses her, precise and beautiful.
Jared breathes in deeply, his hands clutched together in his lap. They're so
lovely together. Victor is very tall, his hair cropped close to his head in its
tight curls, and Audette has to tilt her head back to meet his kiss, her eyes
fluttering closed when he presses her mouth open with his tongue. He runs his
hands through the long fall of her amber-honey curls, gathering them around her
face like a cloud, and then pulls back to press one kiss against the long white
column of her throat. She gasps, then laughs softly, and he's smiling when he
stands back up to his full height. He moves his hands to the sash of her robe
and it drops so smoothly, slithering backward off her narrow shoulders in a
river of silk so she's left bare to the warm air, her skin fairly glowing
peach-and-cream in the candlelight. She releases his robe, as well, and naked
together they're a study of contrasts—he dark and she light, his firm muscle
next to her softness. They were chosen perfectly as the Pair, for this Showing.
Victor takes Audette's hands and they move together toward the center, the
harp's music growing more complex behind them. Audette urges Victor down to the
wide plush cushions and he lays back with utmost grace, she kneeling between
his just-spread legs. She draws her fingertips gently down the broad span of
his chest, over his stomach, over his hips and down his strong thighs, and then
she gathers his cock between her two hands, bowing over it and breathing out
over the shaft. He shudders, his fingers touching the crown of her head, and
she smiles before she opens her mouth over it and slides down with perfect
ease. Jared's face goes flaming hot even as Victor lets out a soft groan, his
head tipping back with pleasure. Kneeling close as he is, Jared can see the wet
darkness of his cock moving gently in her mouth, her cheeks hollowing, her own
eyes closing as she makes a soft noise, the color rising over her high
cheekbones. When at last she pulls away, her hands braced on his thighs, his
cock is fully-hard, rising high and proud from his hips, gleaming with her
effort. Victor looks back down his body and offers her both his hands and
Audette slides up, her breasts brushing lightly over his stomach, his chest,
until he meets her mouth with his own, kissing her deeply, burying his hands
once again in the rich weight of her hair, caressing her like she is something
precious—and then his hands urge her closer, higher, until she is knelt up,
braced on either side of his head, and he rises on his elbows and puts his
mouth between her thighs and she cries out, her hips surging, hands cupping her
own breasts. Jared can't see what he's doing well but Audette flushes, the
blood rushing under her skin, her face tipped up to the candlelight and her
mouth open on constant moaning sighs. Beneath her Victor is arched tight, his
wet cock brushing his belly, and it's only when Audette again cries out that he
pulls back, his hands clutching her hips, and she shudders for a moment before
she relaxes, looking down at him.
A drumbeat begins to accompany the harp, a skittering soft thumping to
accompany the rich trills. Victor catches Audette's narrow waist and twists
elegantly, laying her on her back on the cushions. She spreads her legs, making
a cradle for him to lay himself into, and he drags his hands from her belly to
her breasts to her face, cupping it worshipfully between his hands before he
braces them on either side of her head, leaning in to kiss her, softly, just
once. The drum pauses, the harp letting out one last high note. The watching
adepts are silent, Jared's heart thundering in his chest. With a surge, Victor
pushes in and Audette lets out a rich groan, a deeper noise than Jared has ever
heard a woman make—and then the drum beats again when Victor begins to thrust,
his hips working a sinuous flexing rhythm against hers, the muscle in his back
and buttocks and thighs clenching and releasing. Audette cups her palms over
his neck, rubs her thumbs over the high angle of his jaw, her hips rising in
perfect counterpoint to meet him.
Jared's breath comes quickly, the arousal pouring forth from them both lighting
up his blood. This is unlike anything he thought it would be. He knew the basic
mechanics of how two bodies meet; he'd grown up hearing gossip from adepts and
servants alike. Sometimes the adults made it sound—vulgar, tawdry. Victor
shifts his weight to one hand and slides the other down to cup Audette's
breast, his fingers playing gently over her budded-tight nipple, and when she
gasps and surges against him he smiles, the expression heartbreakingly sweet,
and though the blood pricks hotly in Jared's cheeks he smiles, too, because
this is… lovemaking. Beauty, like he'd always hoped. The harp thrums, the notes
coming quicker, and so too does Victor increase his pace, leaning forward into
the welcoming altar of Audette's embrace, her knees rising high around his
hips, her arms twining around his neck. He bends his forehead to meet hers,
their eyes closed and their parted lips separated by barely a breath, and Jared
can't help but hear Noemie's voice, murmuring close—flesh, and blood, and the
soul's exquisite grace, a ritual of love and desire given in homage of Naamah.
The drum beats harder, matching Victor's pace, louder and louder and louder so
that it matches the thunder of Jared's pulse in his ears until finally
Audette's face changes and she cries out, her hands fisting and her hips
flinching hard, and Victor pushes in just twice more before he groans, deep in
his chest, holding still and tight against her, clutching her close, until
finally he relaxes, his hips working gently to push inside her, soft, the
tension bleeding away from his shoulders and her fingers trailing soothingly
against the corded muscle of his arms.
The drum softens, a slowing pulse. The harp gentles, too, the song losing
complexity while they gently embrace, when Audette tips Victor's face up and he
kisses her once more. She lets her foot slide over his calf, and when their
kiss breaks he puts one hand to her face, brushes her nose with his, and she
lets out a rich, satisfied laugh, while the harp reduces once again to single
notes, the space between widening more and more until, at last, the music
stops.
The curtain draws closed. Jared closes his eyes, the beauty of their joining
still bright in his mind. Heat has risen between his thighs and he's made—very
aware, of his own genitals, of his belly and fingertips and lips. Rustling,
around him, while the adepts stand and move away, in ones and twos, their
conversation hushed in deference of the ritual they've just witnessed. At last,
he hears his name, spoken gently. He has no choice but to open his eyes again.
Félicie, in her splendid sky-blue gown as fits the occasion, smiling at him.
He's taken to the Dowayne's nearby office, though Martin isn't there. Félicie
directs him with a nod to the settee under the window and he sits, flushed,
while she moves to the sideboard opposite. She returns with two glasses of
sweet cordial and sits beside him, watching until he takes a swallow, the
alcohol burning warm down his throat to his already-hot stomach.
"Was it what you hoped?" she asks, after a moment.
Jared puts a hand to his face, too jumbled inside to feel embarrassed over his
blush. "Yes," he says, his voice coming out faint. She tilts her head and he
swallows, puts more strength to it. "Yes. Everything I hoped and more."
Félicie smiles and takes a sip of her own cordial, relaxing back against the
settee's arm. She looks up, out of the window, where night has fallen over the
City, stars glinting outside the house's circle of light. "Your instruction
will begin tomorrow," she says, after a moment. In the gentle lamplight her
eyes are dark, her hair burnished to russet. He's aware of her in a new way,
now, and her smile has a curve which says she knows it. He takes another sip of
cordial, to cover his discomposure, and she lets out a soft laugh, leaning
forward to cup his cheek. "You will charm your patrons to their knees,
dearest," she says, eyes crinkling. She tips up his face, then, and kisses his
mouth, her lips soft and tasting of sweet dark berries. He gasps, can't help
it, and she laughs again, kissing his cheek before she pulls back. "Run along,
now," she says, relaxing again into the settee. "The house may be worshiping
Naamah, but you're still a child, for tonight. Be merry, little flower."
He leaves the last of the cordial on the side table. His lips are warm, his
limbs almost weak with want for—something. The door to the office closes behind
him and he faces the bright hall, the adepts grouped together in twos and
threes, some in conversation but some closer. Marcus is seated at the long
table, leaned back against it with Richard straddling his lap, Richard leaning
down and murmuring into Marcus's ear, making him laugh. Marcus's hands cupping
the sweet swell of Richard's buttocks and squeezing, intent. Jared closes his
eyes, just for a moment. He has an image, now, of what he wants, and for a
second he tastes honey so strongly on his tongue that his mouth floods and he
has to swallow.
"Sweet boy!" he hears, and when he opens his eyes—there is Phoebe, and Percy,
and they both descend on him and lay kisses all over his cheeks and hair, so
that he squirms and giggles, batting at their tight embrace. The tension in him
eases, at least for the moment, and they draw him over to the huge settee below
the curving stair, sit on either side and demand to know what he thought of the
Showing, their eyes dancing and their intent kind, and he laughs, submits to
it. He'll have time to think later, in bed. Tonight, at long last dedicated to
his goddess and initiated into her mystery, he will celebrate.
                                       *
As promised, his training begins the next morning.
Richard meets him in the blue sitting room, gentle light streaming in through
the gauzy curtains. "You need to understand something about your training,
dear," he says, over cups of tea fragrant with jasmine. Jared sits up straight,
practically humming with attention. Richard smiles at him, over the thin china
rim of his cup. "In Orchis House, the standards of behavior are—somewhat more
lax than in other houses. Are you aware of that?"
Jared cups his tea between his palms. "Yes," he says, drawing it out as he
thinks. "Dahlia would require haughtiness and pride, and Alyssum shy modesty,
and Camellia strictly perfect decorum. Is that right?"
Richard nods, crossing one leg over the other. "Very good, yes. Orchis—much
like Eglantine, in a way—encourages a bit more… individual expression. Of
course, our canon is joy, but we allow any expression of that, do we not?"
Marcus's simplicity; Percy's sarcasm; Richard's warmth. Jared nods and earns
another smile. "Very good, dear," Richard says. "Now. Of course, judging the
desires of a patron comes with experience, and I and the others will do
everything we can to aid you before your virgin-fete, but in some ways you will
be on your own that night. What we can do is train you in Naamah's arts."
Richard nods to the table before the unlit fireplace, and Jared follows his
eyes to see a pile of books stacked upon it—thick tomes, bound in leather and
clearly well-used. With Richard's permission he leaves his tea aside and goes
to his knees before the table, tugging the books toward himself.
Trois Mille Joies, says the one on top of the stack, the letters barely legible
in flaking gold leaf; the one below, even more battered: The Ecstatica. There's
half a dozen more, of varying age and thickness, the pages much-marked and
ruffled. Jared splays his hands over the cover of one called The Journey of
Naamah, looking up at Richard with some confusion.
"Every adept serves Naamah in their own way, I've told you," Richard says, his
slender finger tracing the rim of his teacup. "But in this we expect
perfection. This is what separates a courtesan of the Court of Night-Blooming
Flowers from a common prostitute of the street. You may not use every skill
with every patron, and there are some who will want nothing but simplicity—but
you will know the steps of every variation of the dance, every method of
arousement, the way you can play a body like a lute. You will be an artisan,
Jared. I expect you to know your art to the last detail."
Jared swallows, nodding, and Richard's mouth curves again. "Good," he says,
softly.
The door opens, then, and Percy enters, clad only in a dressing-gown with his
hair bound artlessly over one shoulder. "Am I late?" he says, yawning.
"Only by the length of a speech," Richard says, with a wink at Jared that
startles him into grinning. Richard gestures and Jared retakes his seat in the
armchair, perched on the edge attentively. Another gesture has Percy shrugging
out of his dressing gown, tossing it casually over the settee behind them, so
that he's left naked to the morning light.
Jared blinks, while Percy shivers a little. "At least it's summer," he says,
shifting his weight onto one hip. He's waxed of hair everywhere below the neck,
his body slender, his cock peachy-pink, just a little larger than Richard's
when it's soft.
Richard shakes his head, then drains the last sip of his tea and stands. "All
right, pay close attention, dear," he says, turning to Jared. "The texts are
very informative, and we'll go through every page, but we start with this." He
taps Percy on the shoulder and Percy stands up straight, looking forward and
relaxing. Richard kisses his shoulder, absently, and then picks up his lax
right hand, turning it palm up toward Jared. "Here," Richard says, pointing,
"the first line of arousement, on the middle finger as it traces back toward
the palm," and Jared leans in close and drinks in the information, ready and
eager to learn every single thing he can.
There is so much to learn. He has lessons every day—often with Richard, but all
of the more experienced adepts step in when needed, Victor and Audette and
Mathilde and Yves, each of them with years and years of serving behind them and
instinctive knowledge they try to impart. Anatomy, first, with the help of
Percy and Marcus as models: learning the names of every single part of the
body, in d'Angeline but also in Caerdicci and Cruithne—and then in the slang of
the streets, vulgarities and charming nicknames alike, so that Jared can model
his speech by whatever the patron might prefer. He strips naked in his room,
when Gemma is fast asleep, and by candlelight he names them to
himself—pectoralor chest or breast or tit, stomach or belly or even tummy,if
the patron wants to indulge in fetishizing youth. He splays his hand over it,
dipping his thumb into his navel. The Trois Mille Joies devotes a full third of
the text to the arousement, the methods of heightening the blood before the
genitals are even touched. He's read the section over and over again and so he
knows that a line traced featherlight from the navel up to the sternum will—ah,
yes, the blood rises in his cheeks and his nipples pull tight, gooseflesh
shivering over his chest. He closes his eyes, lets the feeling ripple through
him.
It was another long talk with Richard, this one more serious. "You will
practice some of this on yourself, of course," Richard said, as though it was a
conclusion long forgone. "And we will move to practical demonstrations in the
bedchamber, when it's time." Jared blushed, of course, and Richard cupped his
face over the heat of it, made sure Jared was looking at him. "If it has not
happened already, then your cock will begin to stir, soon. You're of the age
for it. You are bound by your contract with the house to reserve your virginity
until your sixteenth birthday, and we expect you to honor that. What you might
do on your own time outside of that, within reason, is your own business. There
is no shame in it—just be thoughtful."
Now, his slips his hands lower, bracing them on his own hips, framing his
flushed cock, his sac. The want is singing low and insistent under his skin,
his flesh calling for something—and he knows he could give it, one way or
another. He pulls his hands, back, wraps his arms around himself and breathes
slow, deep, calming. Not yet.
                                       *
Rain sifts gently over the City, warmly pattering on the carriage as Jared and
Thierry ride the short distance down Mont Nuit to Eglantine. Jared wanted to
walk; Thierry turned a solemn look to his pretty new doublet and ordered a
coach. Splashing through puddles might have been a nice distraction, was all
Jared had been thinking, but of course—it wouldn't do to arrive sopping and
bedraggled to their sister-house, and now that he is an apprentice in his own
right he must bear himself even more thoughtfully. Lucky that Thierry has the
right mind for that sort of thing.
The wheels spray water through the courtyard and Eglantine's footman, a new boy
who's barely older than Jared, hands him down under an umbrella and lets him
into the house. Thierry goes off to the kitchen right away, and Jared's about
to head up to Jensen's room, a small knot formed in his belly, when Lilia
bounds into the foyer, dressed in boys' clothes as always. "You're here,
finally," she says, twining the long black mess of her hair on top of her head.
"Daphne and everyone are in the south gallery, she sent me to tell you."
"Thank you," Jared says, trying to be polite. Lilia rolls her eyes and then,
when he passes, darts in and tugs his braid, hard, back-springing away before
he can retaliate. She grins at him and then trots away, out into the west
corridors, and Jared breathes in deep. She's a horrible tease, but he's being
good and he won't chase after her, or find a pot of flour from the kitchen to
pour down her stolen breeches. Much as he might wish otherwise.
He's so distracted by Lilia that he almost forgets to be nervous—but then, of
course, he comes into the south gallery and finds Denis and Daphne and some new
adept waiting in the sitting area before the cold hearth, and there's Jensen,
too. His stomach flinches, when Jensen picks up his head and looks at him, but
Jared smiles, putting on his best cheery look, and Jensen smiles back even if
it's close-lipped and small.
"Here at last," Daphne says, looking up from her book. "We're working on a new
production and we need a third. Jared, you'll take the shepherd's part."
Brisk, as always, though Jared's learned not to take it as dismissive. The new
adept, a pretty girl of perhaps nineteen with rich chestnut hair and freckles a
bit darker than Jensen's, smiles abstractedly at Jared but turns back to her
script, her lips moving as she reads. Denis rolls his eyes and comes over,
slinging an arm around Jared's neck. "I hear we have a newly dedicated Servant
of Naamah among us," he says, leaning in close and conspiratorial.
Jared grins, can't help it. "Yes, just a few weeks ago," he says, his heart
fluttering just at the fact that it can be said truly, and not only in his
dreams.
Denis pinches his cheek, drops a kiss on his head. "Good," he says, simply
enough. "Now we can tell you all our secrets and not sully precious innocent
ears, can't we?"
That last directed perhaps at the girl, but certainly at Jensen, and Jared
licks his lips, finally looking Jensen's way.
It's not—disappointment, at least, but Jared finds it hard to read his
expression more deeply than that. "Crass as always," Jensen says, dry in that
way he has. He glances into Jared's eyes and then looks down at the script. "My
assignations will stay in the bedchamber, not spread about the halls and
gardens and halfway down Mont Nuit."
"Be dull if you must," Denis says, airy. He drops down onto the settee next to
the hearth and sprawls out, comfortable and confident as always. Jared hopes
for half of his ease, once he's older. He sends a broad white smile to Jared,
eyes crinkling. "Talk of me in the bedchambers of players and innkeepers only
makes the legend of Denis Bernard grow."
"Attention," Daphne cuts in, closing her book. She stands and paces to the
window, the skirt swishing around her ankles barely audible over the rain on
the roof. "We will go through the second act, there's something that isn't
working in the third scene."
The girl is called Bijou and Jared sees that, even if her beauty isn't as
exquisite as some of the adepts he's seen, her skill at acting is remarkable.
She's a match to Denis, or better, her features transforming with immediate
natural emotion as the script requires. She is the young kidnapped comtesse to
Denis' bandit, Jared the shepherd who interferes with the criminal's plot. It's
a silly little play, mostly absurd contrivance and innuendo, and Jared's
surprised to learn that it was written entirely by Daphne. They work through
the second act, as requested, and he enjoys playing his shepherd part first
shocked, and then afraid, or simple, or solemn, stealing from Thierry's working
face. He makes Denis laugh aloud with his reading of the line But my lady, why
has your gown disappeared?, and when he carefully glances over—Jensen is
smiling, too, even as he marks up his copy of the script. Something relaxes,
slowly, in Jared's belly.
They run through the act again, and then back to the introduction scene in
which Bijou is 'kidnapped' by Denis, he picking her up bodily and declaiming a
monologue while she batters ineffectively at his shoulders and then slumps,
bored and ridiculous, waiting for him to finish. Jared's character won't appear
until later and so he gets to just sit and watch, laughing as Bijou begins
picking irritably at her fingernails while Denis goes on and on about his
prowess. When he looks Jensen is just sitting and watching, arms folded loosely
over his chest, and when he catches Jared's eye he smiles, no shadow to it at
all.
The rain hasn't stopped by the time Daphne releases them, and so they walk
through the galleries instead, watching the water spattering the glass. Jensen
pauses in the east gallery, where they first met again, and leans into the
alcove of one of the great floor-to-ceiling windows, looking out. Jared watches
him, fiddling with the end of his braid.
Finally, Jensen sighs, and glances over at Jared with a rueful tilt to his
lips. "I can't remember a time it was ever uncomfortable between us, can you?"
It surprises Jared into a little laughter. "No," he says, ducking his head. "I
can't."
Jensen turns and leans back into the wooden frame of the alcove, his arms
folded again over his chest. His mouth is still compressed with faint regret.
In the clear grey light his eyes are exquisitely green, the gold faded away so
they're the color of glass, and Jared takes a deep breath, even as Jensen's
mouth quirks a little. "Come on, then," he says, at last. He sits in the window
seat and arranges the plush cushions so there's room for Jared, too, and then
holds out his hand. "Come and tell me about your dedication," he says, and the
apology in it is clear. Jared takes his hand and Jensen smiles, if only
briefly, and then Jared finds his place tucked up close against Jensen's side,
Jensen's arm around him again, where it belongs. He rests his head against
Jensen's shoulder, closing his eyes with relief. Jensen says, quiet, his voice
warm and close, "I want to hear every detail," and that's a lie, but it makes
Jared find his hand and squeeze it, anyway.
                                       *
Jared lights the candle in the censer and closes the little door. Richard has
started his dressing by himself, in the inner chamber. "What scent tonight,
dear?" he calls out.
"Jasmine," Jared says, and grins when he hears Richard laugh. He comes into the
bathing room to find Richard already in his shirt and stockings, his hair a
lustrous black tumble against the soft grey silk. "Your favorite, isn't it?"
Richard smiles at him in the mirror. "You know it is." He gestures and Jared
brings over the suit for the evening—dark grey, almost somber if it weren't for
the cunning traces of blush-pink embroidery peeking through at the cuffs and
collar, and if it weren't for the cut of it. Richard steps into the breeches,
lacing them tight, and then Jared helps him into the doublet. It's cold at
night, now, but the hearth will be blazing at the fete, and so it will be warm
enough for this; Jared gathers up the concealed ribbons under the shirt and
peels it apart, the back splitting cunningly with the doublet so that Richard's
marque is fully exposed. A tuck and fold, while Jared slips the ribbons through
the breeches' darts, and then the points are tied securely so that the ensemble
looks modest. From the front, at least.
"Fabre and Boisvert may attend tonight, I hear," Richard says. He adjusts the
collar of the doublet, ensuring that just the right amount of silk shirt peeks
from below. "They're known for large and boisterous retinues, and splashy
spending."
"Do you favor either?" Jared buttons closed the small strip of the doublet
remaining so that it sits under the dimples at the lowest point of Richard's
back, a full frame around his creamy skin, then pats him gently on the shoulder
so he knows it's done.
Richard sits at the vanity, turning his head back and forth. "Boisvert is
pleasing in the bedchamber," he says, a little distantly. "A smallish cock, but
he wields it well."
In the mirror Jared's face colors, immediately, but he's a bit more used to
this, now. Since his dedication, the adepts are freer in their talk with him,
no longer proscribed by the Court's dictates.
"Fabre is more generous with his patron gifts, but his moods push him more
often toward female adepts," Richard continues. He licks his lips and purses
them in the mirror, lids going heavy for a moment in playacted desire, before
he blinks and straightens, his eyes meeting Jared's in the mirror. "A chignon
tonight, dear," he says, mouth quirked. "With the seed-pearl pins. Perhaps my
lord Michel will choose to take his pleasure with a boy as pretty as a girl."
When they're done, Jared can't see how the man could do anything less. He goes
with Richard down to the staging area and privately thinks that Richard
outshines every beauty there, though Cherette and Victor are also both looking
particularly fine.
When Richard gets the nod from Félicie, he turns to Jared and touches under his
chin, holds his face up to the light. "Lovely, dear," he murmurs, and Jared
grins. Richard sighs at him. "Go to your place, spoiled thing."
Phoebe isn't attending tonight and so Laura is already in place at the doorway
when Jared arrives. The musicians are already playing, harp and lute streaming
through the curtain along with the murmur and laughter of the patrons. Laura
looks him up and down, then says, "You have soot on your cheek," and Jared
hurriedly scrubs even though she's already laughing, because he does fall for
that every time.
Before he can push her over the Dowayne arrives, regal tonight in a blue suit a
dozen shades darker than his eyes. Jared and Laura bow and curtsy,
respectively, and the Dowayne rests a hand briefly on Laura's head, smiling
down at her. Jared tries not to be envious. "Very well, then," he says, almost
under his breath, and so Jared sweeps the velvet curtain aside and the Dowayne
steps out, and the fete begins.
It's a swirl of color, all gaiety and light. As Jared follows the Dowayne
through the crowd of revelers, he sees that Richard was right—Fabre is here,
tall and handsome, and Boisvert too with his short shock of copper hair,
laughing hard at some jest Audette must have made. Félicie holds court with a
group of gentlemen and ladies in the far corner, resplendent in her sky-blue
gown, and she claps her hands when the Dowayne draws close, and gives her the
kiss of greeting. They look well together, he with his tempered humor and she a
gay flame. Jared and Laura wait just outside the circle of adults, quiet and
watching.
"My lord L'Envers has taken a mistress, did you know?" one of the ladies says.
Her too-heavy cosmetic doesn't hide the fading bloom of her youth, but her
voice is rich and mirthful.
"What does my lady L'Envers think of that?" Félicie says, leaning forward in
faux conspiracy.
"One can't imagine that she has unburied herself from her pile of boy-poets
enough to notice," one of the men says, smirking behind his fan, and the group
laughs.
The Dowayne smiles, then cuts his eyes to Félicie. She nods, almost
imperceptibly, then takes the man by the elbow. "Dearest, have I introduced you
yet to Percy?" she says, a force of warm amusement, and the man smiles down at
her, says, "I simply cannot wait to be charmed, I'm sure," and she sweeps him
across the floor to where Percy sits with a noble lady. Jared cannot hear what
they say, this far off, but Percy stands and bows when the man arrives and the
lady looks him up and down with pleasure, and Jared thinks, ah. Perhaps a
shared assignation tonight, then.
The patrons' discussion continues, all light gossip of who is in love with who,
and who is marrying who—not, as Jared has learned, always overlapping sets. The
Dowayne glances at Laura, and then away, and she slips smoothly off, her rose
livery dipping between and around gowns and suits. She returns with Marcus and
Rose preceding her, and Rose cries out greeting to one of the ladies, with whom
she is already a favorite. "Pardon me, I must attend—" the Dowayne murmurs, and
the patrons smile and curtsy or bow, and then he is off to another group, Laura
and Jared his shadows, to make more matches. As they pass, he sees that Félicie
and Richard are now speaking with Michel Fabre, and Fabre's forefinger is
tracing the light furrow of Richard's bare back even as he laughs with Félicie
over something unheard. Richard catches Jared's eye and winks, his mouth curved
generously, and Jared ducks his head to hide his wide grin. The chignon was a
success, then.
Over the few months since his dedication, Jared has learned more of how his
house works than in the previous thirteen years of his life. Roughly a dozen
adepts are on the floor each night, entertaining perhaps thirty or forty
guests, and not every patron thinks of an assignation each night. While it is
their purpose as Servants of Naamah, that is not all the adepts are for. The
business of Orchis House is to bring joy, and that is what Jared sees on the
faces they pass.
Richard explained, the first night he was set to attend, as the seamstress
tailored his livery to fit him precisely: his task was to assist the Dowayne,
to follow his direction and aid in every respect, but also simply to soak in
the atmosphere of the fete, to understand the house in a way that he didn't
realize was impossible from the outside until he was in it. He learns to move
gracefully through a crowd, to smoothly insinuate himself into conversation, to
send silent signals to adepts and bring them where the Dowayne or Félicie
wills. He learns to recognize familiar faces among the patrons, learns their
preferences. Vailancourt, the chevalier from L'Agnace, laughs hardest at Rose's
bawdiness in the evening, but he contracts more often with sweet Phoebe; Lady
Irène likes male and female adepts alike, but her preference turns swiftly
toward larger and larger muscles as she drinks more and more wine. While he
learns, he is aware at all times that someone is watching—Richard and Félicie
keep an eye out, of course, to ensure his good behavior, but the patrons don't
ignore him, either. This is a part of growing up in the Court, he realizes now.
Balm lets the children be seen in controlled circumstances, training them in
gentleness; Eglantine allows the patrons to watch their apprentices at their
art; in Orchis, though they must wait until they are dedicated, the apprentices
are shown off every night. Patrons will stop Jared, sometimes, and ask for
wine, or send him to request a song from the players, or simply to ask a
question, and he does as he's asked, of course, and is aware that there's more
at play.
He speaks about it with Laura, once, while they dine quickly with Eveline on a
break in the fete. He's been too shy to bring it up with Richard.
"Of course they're watching, fool," she says, rolling her eyes. Eveline darts a
look between them, her fork frozen halfway from her plate. "I'm eight months
from my debut and already Phoebe has a list of who will take my virgin-price
narrowed down to three."
Jared feels the heat rise in his face. The cooks are making their usual racket,
running madly about the kitchen around them, even though Jared knows there's
nothing more pressing than the usual hors d'oeuvres for the fete. "I wonder,"
he says, soft under the noise.
"Some patron is already waiting for your debut," Laura says, shaking her head
like he's simple. Her compliments are often buried in her supremely irritating
attitude, but he smiles at her for this one, anyway. The conversation then
turns to other things, as Eveline asks about the patrons at the house tonight,
and it's left to turn in his mind for another day.
                                       *
It is late spring, two months before Laura's debut. In the garden, Jared and
Eveline are going through the wedding announcements from the peerage, since
she's so unfamiliar with the great families from having been raised outside the
City of Elua, when there's a shout, from the courtyard, and a clamor, hooves
striking the cobblestone and the clatter of wheels. "What's the matter?"
Eveline says, but Jared's already moving toward the front of the house. He hops
the low wall that separates the private garden from the arcade near the
servant's entrance, and when he comes around to the courtyard he sees—
"Call the chirurgeon!" Amelia cries out, tears streaming down her face. There's
a confusion of people and bodies, footmen and maids and a few of the adepts and
strangers, too, and then the Dowayne comes out into the courtyard, his coat
unbuttoned and his silver hair streaming out behind him. The crowd backs out of
his way, and from his spot peering from behind a column Jared can see, at last:
Phoebe, sprawled awkwardly in the back of the wagon, her hair unpinned into a
golden mess around her head. She doesn't move, and when the Dowayne gestures to
a footman to lift her out of the wagon bed she lays limply in his arms, her
limbs slack. When the footman turns, Jared covers his mouth so he won't cry
out. Her skirt is a rich brown, but her jacket is cream, and it has been
lacerated, soaked to deep maroon all over her back.
The story comes out in fits and starts, gossip racing through the house so
quickly that it takes time to sort the exaggeration from the truth. Phoebe and
Amelia were out of the house for the afternoon, shopping for jewelry. Phoebe's
horse startled—Jared never learns how, and Amelia is too much in a fit of grief
to be asked—and took flight, while Phoebe struggled to hold on. A drover's
cart, blocking part of the road. The horse's awkward jump. The wrought-iron
fence dragged great lacerations through Phoebe's skin when she landed on it,
though she was lucky not to be killed; the horse snapped its foreleg on
landing, and had to be put out of its misery. Jared cries over both, when he's
told.
An unaccustomed solemnity descends on the house. Amelia is distraught enough
that she stops serving, as well; Rose and Cherette take the girls' places,
making up the numbers for each evening. Patrons ask after them both, and
Félicie's smile is perfect when she lightly says that they have taken ill, but
nothing serious, never fear, my lord. Jared learns to make his face a mask.
Laura isn't as successful and there are many times she has to turn away, trying
to compose herself.
A month, and the chirurgeon returns to check Phoebe's wounds. The news isn't
good.
"She's—flawed," Jared says, the next week. He draws his knees up under his
chin, perched on Jensen's bed. It's raining, again, a hard April storm
drenching the City. Seems only fitting.
Jensen frowns, shaking his head. "What do you mean?" He's sat at his desk, had
been marking up a poem while they talked, but all his attention is suddenly
fixed on Jared.
Jared blinks at him. "What do—" he starts, bewildered in his own turn, but
then, of course. It happens so rarely. Phoebe is only the third that Jared has
heard of, and Richard says it's only the second time it has happened at Orchis
since he arrived. No wonder that Jensen doesn't know. He licks his lips and
rests his cheek on his knee, eyes on his finger tracing infinity-loops in the
bedspread. "Each house has a canon," he says, speaking slowly as he remembers
how it was first explained to him. "But the Court has a canon that supersedes
all others. We aren't prostitutes of the street, to tumble strangers for money;
we are Servants of Naamah in the Court of Nightblooming Flowers, the finest
practitioners of her art in all the world. Our bodies are vessels of that art,
offered in homage to Naamah, and as such they must be… unmarred."
When he looks up, Jensen's expression is alarming. "Are you all right?" Jared
asks, distracted, and Jensen cuts his hand through the air, asking immediately,
"What's wrong with her?"
Three great gouges in the fine pale skin of Phoebe's back. One was healing
well; the other two would not, the chirurgeon said, and would leave thick and
ugly scars that nothing could cover, slashed through the nearly-finished
pattern of her marque. "Flawed," Jared finishes, shrugging miserably. He never
was particularly close with Phoebe, but she was always kind to him. "The house
cannot let her serve Naamah, not like this."
Jensen stands and walks to the fireplace, bracing a hand against the mantle.
After a long moment, he says, "Her marque. How is she meant to finish it, if
she can't take patrons?"
Jared shakes his head again, though Jensen doesn't see it. "I don't know," he
says, chest feeling tight. "The Dowayne must decide."
There's a long pause. Jensen turns and sits down directly on the rug before the
fireplace, his eyes pinned to the floor. "I didn't know," he says, softly, like
Jared's not even there.
Jared hugs his shins in lieu of hugging Jensen, and wishes there were something
he could say, but there isn't. It is such a rarity to be cut off in the middle
of the term of indenture that he doesn't know if there is a tradition in place.
He imagines how Phoebe might earn money, in some other way than her art—has the
absurd image of her washing pots with the scullery boy, and almost wants to cry
again.
In the end, it is his grace, the Duke de Trevalion, who saves the day. Richard
tells the story to Jared with some relief while they are readying for another
evening—how the duke sent word ahead that he would contract with Phoebe on his
next visit, and was informed of the accident with apologies from the Dowayne,
and then it wasn't three days before the duke's seneschal arrived at the house
to negotiate. Five hundred ducats, in the end; enough to make up the last
inches of Phoebe's marque and to pay for her board at the house until she is
well enough to travel.
"She will be a lady's maid and companion for the duchess," Laura says, at
breakfast the next day. Her shock has faded and she is once again all
practicality, though her pride from Phoebe's position has entirely gone. Jared
wishes it hadn't, at least not for this reason. "The duke does not intend to
make her a consort, but she may be a part of the household."
"Lucky," Jared says, and immediately wants to bite his tongue. Nothing about
the situation has involved good luck.
Laura nods, though, worrying a bit of toast between nervous fingers. "Without a
devoted patron, with deep pockets… I don't know what she would have done."
It sits in the back of Jared's mind, and in the minds of the house as well.
Just a few days before Laura's debut, Phoebe whisks away in the early morning
in a carriage from Trevalion. No great fete for her, not like Antoine was
given. Amelia has resumed serving, though there is a bitter cast to her mouth
at meals and she participates more rarely in conversation. Félicie supervises
readying Laura for her debut, instead. Jared gets to see her before her
introduction on the night of the fete, fully gowned and beautiful, waiting
behind the screen at the top of the great staircase for the Dowayne. Dark hair
a braided crown around her head, garnets to match her gown dangling from her
ears, lips stained to a deep bitten red—he squeezes her hands and smiles at
her. "May Naamah smile on you," he whispers, and she's startled into a wide
happy smile, her eyes sparkling. It's the happiest he's seen her in a month.
Just a week after the debut, Jared, Eveline, and Gemma gather before Félicie in
the solarium. "My lord the Dowayne and I have discussed much in the time since
our recent misfortune," she announces, sitting upright on the chaise. She pats
Gemma's cheek and squeezes Jared's hand. "We are responsible for training you,
for teaching you to make your living, but more than that we are responsible for
your well-being. We should prepare you as best we can for any situation you
might meet, and do our best to ensure…" She trails off, shaking her head. It
isn't often that Félicie's good humor falters. "You may refuse, if you are too
frightened," she says, instead. "But I hope you will not."
So it is that Jared and the other children find themselves in riding lessons,
once a week. They are taken down to a set of stables in the city, the first
time Jared has ever been off of Mont Nuit—he and Gemma both peer excitedly
through the carriage windows at the market stalls they pass, at the close
narrow buildings, busy streets and unfamiliar faces. The grounds on which the
stables sit are walled off from the city, too, but there is a small riding
track circling the building around which the horses can be put through their
paces, and on which the Dowayne has made a deal that the children will learn.
The owner of the stable is a kindly older lady, Madame Perrin, who meets
Félicie with the kiss of greeting on their first visit and who watches with a
critical eye as her grooms carefully teach how to deal with the great tall
beasts. Jared and Gemma are both learning on a brown mare with a white spot on
her forehead, who moves gently and slow. She lipped curiously at Jared's hand
when he held it out to be sniffed, and he fell in love that instant. "Holly is
a sweet one," Madame Perrin said, patting her firmly on the neck. She pinched
Jared on the cheek, smiling down. "Like you, hm?"
Laura and Percy attend a few of the lessons, too, both nervous but trying to
make a good show of it. Eveline rode when she was small and living at the
Temple, but only ever bareback, and so she is put with a livelier horse to
learn how to navigate saddle and stirrups and reins. Jared tells Jensen about
the lessons, in his next letter, and when they arrive at the stables the next
week Jensen is there, in a fawn-colored day suit made dusty from the dirt of
the track, trotting around quite capably on Eveline's palfrey. He waves hello
when they pile out of the carriage and easily dismounts, sliding down to the
ground to accept Jared's hug.
"What are you doing here?" Jared says, delighted.
Jensen has dirt on his cheek and smells strongly of horse, and he looks
positively carefree, grinning down into Jared's face. "Madame Perrin gave
permission for me to join you each week, if I wish," he says. He pats the
palfrey on her neck and she snorts, peering around at the two of them. "I
haven't been able to ride since—" He shakes his head, dismissing that, and then
nods to where one of the grooms is leading Holly out. "So, will we be racing,
then?"
"I think I would be left thoroughly in your dust," Jared says, and Jensen grins
again, slinging an arm around his shoulders. Horse, yes, but also just—sweat,
the rosehip smell of Eglantine's soap and any scent from his clothes washed
entirely away. Jared takes a deep breath, turning his face in toward Jensen's
body, and squeezes him back.
It's wonderful, having Jensen there. He doesn't come every week—while he has
plenty of free time during the day as an adept, he does still have his writing
and duties for Eglantine to be done. When he does come, he rides alongside
Jared, or walks if Eveline is using the palfrey, and he doesn't ever supersede
the groom's instructions or Madame Perrin's called-out commentary, but he stays
close. It isn't only for his own entertainment, Jared soon realizes. He
watches, makes sure Jared's horse isn't startled or spooked; when they ride
together around the track, he keeps to the outside but so close that he could
reach out and grab Jared, if needed. It makes Jared's heart clench in his
chest, a sweet ache he's still not used to.
His other lessons continue. He has learned the steps of languisement for men
and women, though of course he is not allowed to practice on a real living
body. In a bright bedroom he watches Marcus spread Esme's smooth brown thighs
and open her wide, demonstrating the techniques as Richard narrates, a soft
voice at Jared's side: thecaress of summer wind as Marcus breathes out hot
against the mound of her sex, the navigator's gambitas he drags a curled
knuckle between her lips and smears her own wet up to her pearl of Naamah.
Percy models as Cesare drags closed lips up the pretty pink side of his cock
and Richard murmurs, the virgin's kiss, but Jared's eyes are on Percy's face,
slack and smiling with pleasure. He is allowed to practice on the house's
implements: a model of the female sex in rosewood and buttery-soft leather
which he works until his tongue is sore; a curved bronze phallus with a smooth
ridged head, which Richard holds for him as he closes his eyes and struggles to
let his throat accept the cool weight of it.
Jensen still doesn't like to answer questions Jared has about serving with
patrons, always shy about discussing his assignations even though Jared is now
allowed to know and discuss Naamah's arts. Jared tells him about his training,
anyway, since it's most of what fills his life now and he has little else to
share—and Jensen will talk about that, at least. They're riding the track one
chilly afternoon, a light dust of snow on the ground but the sun peering weakly
through the grey clouds overhead, and Jared is complaining about the difficulty
of the devotee's promise. "I'm still hoarse," he says, rubbing his throat to
demonstrate, and Jensen laughs, just a little.
"Just remember to breathe through your nose," he says, eyes on the track ahead
of them, "and look straight up. You'll get over the choke response soon, don't
worry."
Jared doubts it, privately, but Richard said the same thing and so he only
huffs, hands gentle on Holly's reins. He's grateful for his cloak, with the day
so cold. "A trot to finish?" he says, and Jensen tosses him a smile and nods,
and so he carefully urges Holly faster, her big body moving smoothly under him.
He's learned to compensate for the jostling, despite the strain on his
thighs—though Richard says it's good for his form, so it's just as well,
really. Jensen pulls a little ahead on the lighter palfrey, of course, but he's
more confident of Jared's skills now and so they let it become a gentle race,
one that Jared was always going to lose.
Gemma stayed home today, and Eveline is inside the house with Madame Perrin, no
doubt drinking honeyed tea and hearing stories of when the Madame was a great
adept of Bryony House in days long-by. Jensen wins their little race, of
course, and Jared pulls Holly up beside him and sticks out his tongue. He gets
a wink for his trouble, and then Jensen slides easily to the ground and gives
the palfrey's reins to a waiting groom. He holds up his hands for Jared to get
down, and Jared lets Jensen catch his weight and slides down, thrilling for a
moment in the close easy play of their bodies, he still slight enough that
Jensen can carry his weight—and then someone calls out, "Jensen? Jensen, it
cannot be—is that you?"
Jensen whirls, his own cloak swirling forest-green around him. He's square in
front of Jared and so Jared has to peek around his shoulder, tucked safe
between him and Holly's calm solidity. There's a tall man leading a beautiful
dappled filly, wrapped up warm in sturdy grey, frozen in the yard with the
gates closing behind him. He's in his thirties, perhaps, and handsome with it,
his hair a long honey braid over his shoulder. Jared frowns, something pulling
at his memory.
The man tosses his reins to a waiting groom and strides across the forecourt,
the speed of his gait whipping his cloak back enough that Jared can see the
sword belted at his hip, the swan insignia embroidered into his doublet.
"Luc," Jensen breathes, and—oh.
Luc, who brought Jensen to the Night Court rather than send him to an
orphanage. He holds out his hands as he comes close and Jensen lifts his own as
though on strings, letting Luc catch and squeeze them tight in his gloved grip.
Up close, Jared can see the finest of lines starting beside his eyes, carving
into his cheeks as he smiles. He has aged well into his face. "I'm so glad to
see you," Luc says, and he means it truly. "You look so well."
"And you," Jensen says, sounding almost dazed.
The groom comes to take Holly back to her warm stable and Jared is left
awkwardly exposed, so he steps lightly to the side and back, trying to be
unobtrusive. Luc's eyes dip to him for a moment, but they return immediately to
Jensen, taking him in from head to toe. "Honore told me you were adopted into
Eglantine House," Luc says. His voice, pleasant enough in timbre, still shakes
as though he's seeing a vision. "I never thought to see you again. Please, tell
me you're well."
Jensen smiles, looking up into Luc's face. Jensen is tall, now, nearly six
feet, but Luc is still taller. "I am, truly," he says, and it's—honest, real.
Not the voice Jared has heard Jensen put on when patrons stop to talk to them
at Eglantine. Jared wraps his cloak more tightly around himself, ignored as
they look at each other. "And you? Still a soldier, I see."
Luc glances down at his doublet, the Courcel swan glinting subtly in the thin
light. "It's the only life I know," he says, and then looks back to Jensen, his
expression turned just a trifle shy. "I've been promoted, only this week. I'm a
lieutenant, now, commanding a platoon in the First Company that guards the
City."
Jared has no idea what that means, but Jensen smiles. "No one could deserve it
more," he says, warm.
That earns a helpless smile from Luc, his cheeks creasing sweetly as he looks
down at the snowy ground. Jared licks his lips. The situation and the people
involved couldn't be further from the great hall of Orchis House, but he sees
what's building here.
Indeed—Luc says, a little awkward, "And you? You must be of age, now," and
Jensen's lips part, his chest rises in a deep breath, and after a pause he
says, "I am," his voice just a little deeper, soft.
They haven't released each other's grip and Jared watches Luc smooth his thumb
over the back of Jensen's hand, the leather dark against his freckled-pale
skin. "I'm sure your patrons are the toast of the City," Luc says, the jest
weak.
Jensen turns his hand over, smoothly, and laces his fingers with Luc's. Luc
looks up, startled, and Jensen doesn't smile, really, but his face is open as
he says, "Not all," and then, looking down at their twined hands: "Not the ones
I like best."
Tension, drawing the air between them to a heat Jared has only seen from the
outside. Luc's eyes linger on Jensen's downturned face and they are dark, below
his lashes, his body tuned to Jensen's like a singing fork.
"Boys!" comes a cry, and Luc releases Jensen's hands as though he were caught
at something. Madame Perrin stands in the door to the house, her furs drawn
about her as though like armor, Eveline peeking curiously out behind her bulk.
"Come, the tea is going cold, and you must be going, soon."
A glance at the sky says that, yes, the day is drawing into afternoon and
Thierry will return soon with the coach. Jensen tucks a stray lock of hair
behind his ear. He's rumpled with their day of riding, sweaty and dirty, and
Luc looks at him like a man starved. "You live in the City, now?" Jensen says,
and Luc nods. Jensen looks back and forth between his eyes, and then turns and
stretches out his hand for Jared's. Jared gives it and Luc glances at him as
Jensen pulls him close, but his eyes go right back to Jensen's face. "I hope I
will see you soon, then," Jensen says, with a polite bow of his head.
"I hope the same," Luc says, almost breathless, and he watches them go as
Jensen walks them across the forecourt to the house, their steps crunching
beneath them. Jensen's body is tense, warm, and Jared slips his arm around his
back underneath his cloak. He looks back, before the door closes. Luc stands
alone in the empty yard, watching with naked yearning, even when Jensen can no
longer be seen.
                                       *
In his lessons, Jared is studying The Journey of Naamah, Richard helping him to
extrapolate concrete details from the parables of the goddess. The art of
judging a patron's desires, their needs, is more intricate by far than the arts
of the bedchamber. With Laura and Percy, he trains in dancing, learning by
heart the steps of the gavotte and the allemande and the passepied, learning
how to lead and how to follow, watching the eyes and hands and the shifts of
weight in his partners. Still following the dance, there are the ways to gently
tease up arousal and desire—and ways to cool it, too, to make even intimate
closeness unfraught, ardor deflected. Jared spins Percy about the empty great
hall, Cherette plucking out a simple song on the lyre for them to follow, and
slowly he learns how to gauge the silent voice of the body, words never needed.
February brings with it Gemma's tenth birthday, and a surprise: she will not be
joined to the house. Jared tells Jensen the story over a game of chess in the
north sitting room, a gentle snow sifting over the grounds outside the window.
Félicie had seemed a trifle disappointed when she told Richard over tea, Jared
studying his texts in the background, but Gemma had listened to Eveline's
stories of growing up at the Great Temple, of how her father and the other
priests and priestesses served Naamah there, and Gemma had informed her mother
that she would very much like to be one of them.
"What did Félicie say?" Jensen says. He's studying the board with a furrowed
brow. He learned the rudiments of the game at Eglantine, but he says he doesn't
have the mind for it. It's an indulgence that he plays with Jared.
Jared pulls one of his heels up onto his chair, hugging his shin close to his
chest. "She told Richard that she and Gemma spoke with Noemie for hours, so
that Gemma could ask all the questions she wanted. She hoped secretly that
somehow Gem would change her mind, but she just seemed more excited. She'll go
north to Namarre when the weather turns a little warmer to begin her
apprenticeship."
Jensen hums, low, and finally moves—the queen's side knight, taking one of
Jared's exposed pawns. Jared hides a smile in his knee, and pretends to think
about his next move for a moment before his bishop crosses the board and takes
Jensen's piece. Jensen sighs, but Jared doesn't think he's too aggrieved. "Was
she born of the house, or is she Félicie's own?" he says, drumming his fingers
on the table.
It took Jared a long while to figure that out, himself. If a child is born of a
love-match by an adept with a completed marque, then the child belongs wholly
to their parents, and if they grow up inside the house then the parents need
only pay back the cost of room and board. If still bound by their term of
indenture, however, then a female adept could only accept Eisheth's blessing to
become able to bear children with the permission of their Dowayne, and the
Dowayne would have a stake in the child born to the house—and if that child did
not become a full member of the house, then the indenture would need to be
repaid, one way or another. In this case, at least, "She was Félicie's," Jared
says, planning moves for what he judges Jensen might do next. If he's right,
then the game will be over in roughly sixteen moves. "Though I never have heard
who the father might be—an old patron, maybe. I will miss Gemma, though. She's
a sweetheart."
Jensen hums, again, and moves—what? His king's side bishop, to a spot of no
strategic importance at all. Jared's plan crumbles behind his eyes and he
squints at the board, trying to gauge Jensen's thinking. His hand moves to his
queen, and then he hesitates, looking up at Jensen's face—who's now looking out
the window at the snow, not paying attention to the board at all. "Jensen," he
says, and Jensen starts, dragging his eyes back almost guiltily. Jared sighs,
and lets his leg drop back to the floor. "We don't need to play, if you don't
want to."
"I do," Jensen says, shaking his head and sitting upright. He smiles at Jared
and it's honest, if rueful. "I'm sorry."
Jared raises his eyebrows. "You just left yourself open to losing in about
three moves." He points to his queen, to Jensen's rook, to his own pawn, and
then to where the king would be left trapped and exposed, almost immediately.
Jensen follows, apparently, because he slumps back into his armchair, looking
aggrieved enough that Jared laughs. "You're not that bad, I know it."
"Kind of you to acknowledge," Jensen says, dry. He rests his elbow on the arm
of his chair, running his fingers restlessly over the line of his brow, and his
gaze shifts to the distance. "I'm distracted."
"I would never have guessed," Jared says solemnly, and Jensen rolls his eyes.
"What's the matter?"
"There's no—matter," Jensen says, but he pushes to his feet and paces over to
the mantle to stare into the cheerfully flickering fire, and by Elua he is a
truly terrible liar, at least when it's just the two of them. Jared stays
quiet, playing Jensen's lost knight between his palms, and eventually Jensen
glances back at him and cracks, as Jared knew he would. "Luc came to see me,"
he says, and Jared closes his fist around the marble piece.
Jensen never speaks of his assignations, not without cause. Jared licks his
lips. "He made a contract?" he says, and Jensen nods, looking at the floor.
He's flushed, just a little along his cheekbones, and Jared's mind cruelly
recalls how Jensen had stared into Luc's eyes, how Luc stared right back, his
smile handsome and crooked, his hands big and gentle on Jensen's. Imagination
so easily provides Luc waiting breathless on Jensen's small tumbled bed while
Jensen undresses before him, bare honey skin bathed warm in the firelight.
Jared swallows. "I'm surprised he could afford it," he says, and even to his
own ears his voice sounds strange.
He gets a surprised look at that, Jensen frowning just for a moment. "He was
just promoted," he says, and waves a hand. "It's not his purse that—" He shakes
his head, and covers his face with both hands. When he speaks from behind them
he's a little muffled. "Luc spoke of—of me, of my skills, with some of his
fellow officers in the company. He said they plied him with wine after they
found out and demanded to know—details." He drops his hands and he's blushing,
as flushed-red as Jared knows he still gets. He shakes his head again. "He's
already written twice to apologize."
It would be funny—it is funny, really, except that Jensen's so deeply
embarrassed. Jared would hate Luc for it, too, on principle, except that even
from their so-brief meeting he knows that Luc cherished Jensen too much to
betray his confidence willingly. He can admit that to himself, no matter what
else he thinks. He passes his hand over his mouth, tries to make sure he's not
smiling, before he says, "Has Denis stopped needling you yet?"
Jensen drops back into his armchair, staring down at the forgotten chessboard.
"It's not that," he says. "Luc's superior, the commandant of the battalion, he
apparently has a liking for poetry, and he was so—so impressed, at Luc's story,
that he wrote to our Dowayne and now—there's to be a Showing." Jensen looks up,
face still flushed with embarrassment. "I'm to perform."
There's a moment in which Jared almost doesn't understand. After it, his whole
body flushes, the heat pooling in his center and unfurling, from his belly to
his cheeks. He places the knight back in its place on the board, careful. "A
Showing for the officer?" Jared says. His voice feels frail and he clears his
throat. "He must be very important, or very wealthy."
"Both, I think," Jensen says. He runs his hand over his head, the hair that has
escaped his queue falling messily around his face. "I've never—they usually
choose the actors, if there's to be a Showing for patrons. I've never—"
"It's an honor," Jared says, and he does mean it truly, no matter what else he
might be thinking. Showings are performed by the best of each house, for they
are done in homage to Naamah before anything else. Jensen knows this, or at
least should, but he's still fidgeting even if his blush has faded. He reaches
across the table and catches Jensen's hand, squeezing it until Jensen meets his
eyes. "You'll be amazing."
Jensen bends forward slowly and puts his forehead flat on the table, though he
lets Jared keep his hand. "It is an honor," he repeats, muffled. Jared rubs his
thumb over the smooth bumps of Jensen's knuckles, and closes his eyes. Jensen's
nervous, and worried, and Jared is his best friend and should be nothing but
supportive. He is, he's trying to be. It's only that he also knows that, even
in another house, Showings are open to all of Naamah's servants.
                                       *
Jensen's birthday has passed and March is subsiding gently toward April with
soft spring rain, the trees all budding and new flowers peeking forth from the
ground. Jared dresses with care, braiding his hair into the tail over his
shoulder as he prefers; his best doublet in the deep blue Richard likes him in,
fawn breeches, his boots polished to a high sheen. He swings his cloak over his
shoulders and takes a deep breath, looking at himself in the mirror. He can't
pass for older, not yet—his growth has come on slow, and he's still slight—but
he at least looks like a true member of the Night Court.
Thierry has called the carriage, with the rain coming down. When Jared meets
him in the hall he looks Jared up and down and raises his eyebrows. "Very fine,
young master," he says, and Jared smiles instantly, ducking his head just a
little. Thierry doesn't bother with flattery or lying, at least not with him.
The ride to Eglantine is as short as ever but Thierry doesn't chatter, and so
with just the pattering on the carriage-roof and the clatter of the wheels on
cobblestone in his ears Jared has time to compose himself. He isn't—he isn't
lying to anyone. He was meant to come to Eglantine, as he always does, for his
lessons with Daphne. At riding lessons a few weeks ago, Jensen mentioned the
date of the Showing when Jared asked how the preparations were going, and when
Jared came home to Orchis—well, it was easy enough to suggest the date as his
next trip to Eglantine. His lessons there have become routine enough that no
one questioned it.
Eglantine's footman hands Jared down out of the carriage and into the foyer;
the page immediately runs for Daphne, recognizing Jared by now. Jared swallows,
but puts a hand on Thierry's elbow before he can disappear off to the kitchen.
"I'll be staying late tonight, to watch a performance," Jared says, keeping his
voice light. "May I send the page for you when it's over?"
Thierry frowns, for a moment. Orchis is closed to guests tonight, for which
coincidence Jared went down to his knees and thanked Naamah, and so Richard
doesn't require his services and Thierry won't have his usual duties to
perform. "All right, then," he says, slowly, and then Daphne appears in the
east doorway. He bows and excuses himself, and Jared turns around, taking a
deep breath.
"Come," Daphne says, turning immediately on her heel, and Jared scrambles to
follow as smoothly as he can. They wind their way through the corridors back to
the study where he first came to Eglantine, where Roxane and Félicie first made
the deal that let him see Jensen. No fire, no lamps lit, so the room is full
only of the grey rain-tinged light from outside, and Daphne is pale and austere
in it as she turns and fixes Jared with her penetrating, assessing gaze. He
finds the kneeling cushion and sinks to it abeyante. It isn't something Daphne
has ever required, but at the moment he thinks every little bit helps.
"Jensen does not know you are here," she says, after a moment.
He blinks and looks up. "You didn't tell him?" he says, before he can bite it
back.
Daphne ignores the redundancy, though she usually wouldn't. She sits on the
settee before the cold fireplace, crossing one leg over the other under her
grey silk skirt. Her eyes are dark in the dim light, fixed on Jared. "Have you
seen a Showing, beyond the one for your initiation?" she says, instead. He
shakes his head and she watches him for a moment, then looks out the window.
"It is a coup for Jensen to be requested by the commandant. Gaspar de Mereliot
is a minor cousin of the Lady of Marsilikos, and yet he is well-regarded in her
majesty's army—both a decorated soldier and an intelligent, cultured member of
the peerage. He has visited Eglantine House before, and my lord the Dowayne was
eager to accept his request. It's very likely this will turn into an
assignation for Jensen, and a favored patronage, if he's lucky."
Jared swallows. He cannot imagine the commandant—old or young, handsome or not.
"Jensen said he—that he liked poetry?"
"He does," Daphne says, still looking out the window. The rain soughs against
the house, a constant undertone to her calm, straightforward voice. "As do many
of Jensen's other patrons. He has collected a few admirers, did you know?
Impressive, for so short a career. You'll see many of them, tonight. Until
then—" She stands and moves to the bookshelves at the far side of the room,
pulling off a volume and bringing it to him. He takes it with both hands, but
she keeps one finger on the cover, tapping it to keep his attention. "Read this
today, while you wait. Pay particular attention to the third story; there are
elements you could use for your acting. A servant will bring you luncheon."
He looks down at the cover, and sees that the author is René nó Eglantine—the
current Dowayne, though this book is old enough that it must have been written
when he was a practicing adept himself. He's curious, for Daphne never assigns
work without reason, and he has already opened the book, settling more
comfortably on his knees, when Daphne speaks again.
"Jared," she says, and he looks up to find her paused by the door, arms folded
over her chest while she regards him. "I have not told Jensen, and will not.
You are my pupil, too. Tonight, I want you to think. Consider, carefully, what
you asked for, and what you learn. I will not do this again."
"Yes, Daphne," he says, bowing his head, and she leaves the room without
another backward glance.
As instructed, he reads. The old Dowayne wrote beautifully—a spare, simple
style, but the feeling burns clear in it. The third story, the one Daphne
wanted him to focus on, is a tragedy, told in subtle strokes. The man loves the
princess, the ardor in his heart clean and noble; though she has affection for
him, her love for her country burns stronger, and she marries a foreign king in
a political match that keeps the nation safe. Love thwarted, and at first Jared
thinks that it is blasphemy—but as he sits and eats the simple luncheon a maid
brought, and thinks harder on it, he reconsiders. Would that I were Terre
d'Ange, the man says, his heart breaking in his chest—would that I were her
rich fields and mountains, her rivers and shores, that you might see me, and
hold me close in your heart, and love me best.She does not, and cannot, and the
man lives alone, to the end of his days.
A knock on the door rouses him from his rereading—the rain has stopped,
sometime when he was paying no attention, and the sun has begun to set over the
city. One of the pages, sent by Daphne, who sweeps a bow and asks Jared to
follow. The Showing chamber in Eglantine is large, set at the very back of the
house, the stage surrounded by tiers of seats and two grand chandeliers blazing
with candlelight above it. Guests have already begun to gather when Jared
arrives and he immediately lays claim to the worst spot to watch: the last row,
as far to one side as possible. The room isn't enormous—only about half as
large as the theater-room, if Jared estimates aright—but still, he doesn't want
to be seen. Not really. He settles onto the kneeling cushion, watching the room
behind shuttered eyelids, and waits. His heart is already pounding.
Patrons speak to each other in little groups, spread throughout while they wait
for the Showing to begin. Ladies and gentlemen, both. Jensen's patrons would be
here, from what Daphne said, and Jared doesn't know them but he wonders, all
the same. Faolan Garneau, he does recognize; the man is speaking quietly to a
lady of middle years, dressed with wealthy simplicity as when Jared last saw
him. Roxane enters, resplendent in a gown of bright ochre with black pearls at
her throat, and Jared shrinks further into his corner. There is a man with her,
a patron by his looks, black hair and Kusheline colors, and it is a long minute
before Jared remembers: Baptiste de Morhban, who had been at Balm so long ago.
Roxane brings him across the room to an older man in the deep violet of House
L'Envers, curtsying to them both, and de Morhban catches her hand and kisses
it, lingering, a smirk hovering in the corner of his mouth. With his lessons,
with what he knows now, Jared sees it as the tiny power-play that it is: his
posturing, her pausing to allow it but not acceding. She disengages her hand
smoothly and Jared cannot hear what she says over the murmur of the crowd's
discussion, but de Morhban laughs, perfectly at ease, and turns easily to speak
with the L'Envers lord. There are politics and patronages here, just as at
Orchis, there must be, but Jared cannot see them. In truth, there is only one
reason he's here.
The room is nearly full when the door swings open, one last time, and the
crowd's murmuring hushes. An old man enters, white-haired and his skin fragile
as crepe, wearing fine sage silk and—ah, the gold chain of office. The Dowayne,
René nó Eglantine. Jared knew that he was elderly, but he hadn't realized how
close he was to his end. Roxane comes to him and takes his arm, leading him
slowly down the steps to the chairs in the very front row, he leaning hard on
her bracing arm. She will be Dowayne, soon, Jared thinks. He sits in the
center, and Roxane curtsies to him, and then to another man, who comes forward
and leans over the Dowayne's hand to kiss it. This man wears a doublet in
midnight blue, silver accents at cuffs and collar and a ceremonial sword belted
at his hip—and when he takes the seat at the Dowayne's left, Jared knows this
must be Gaspar de Mereliot. He is perhaps forty, but the years have settled
kindly on him, his dark hair only barely touched by silver and his face barely
lined, handsome when he smiles at something the Dowayne says. Jared wonders at
him, this man who with a whim could make this event happen—but then Roxane
claps her hands, twice, and takes the seat at the Dowayne's right side, and the
guests and adepts of Eglantine settle into seats and onto cushions,
respectfully falling silent, so that the Showing might begin.
Jared's breath comes too loud in the quiet and he bites his lips between his
teeth, heedless of his lessons. Flute, high and sweet, skirling little
flourishes in the empty silence. The curtain draws back, and there are three
adepts on stage robed in cream silk, standing in a line with their heads bowed.
Estelle the singer, Jared recognizes, and Amaury the tall haughty painter, and
then—Jensen, his hair tucked behind his ears but left loose, and Jared has to
consciously breathe in slow through his nose so that he won't make a noise.
The adepts disrobe one by one, while a harp joins the flute in its sweet
bouncing song. First Estelle, her breasts and thighs heavy, her skin a smooth
bronze; then Amaury, tanned and tall, his russet hair in a braid that reaches
down to his buttocks; and then, Jensen. He's turned away from the audience and
the robe slides slowly down the honey-pale of his back, revealing the still-
short beginning of his marque, catching for a moment at his wrists before it
drops, and then, there—the generous curve of his buttocks, his strong thighs,
the long line of his legs. Estelle and Amaury turn toward him, catching him on
either side and sliding graceful knowing hands up his arms, their fingers
delicately skimming over his skin. Jared knows that, now—the caress of spring,
one of the simplest they learn, followed by the worshiper's invitation as they
find his jaw and lift it, gently. Their hands move in beautiful synchronicity,
flowing through the steps of the arousement so elegantly that a patron could
never guess at the hours of practice that made each seem as simple as instinct.
Amaury and Estelle are both older, their marques completed, and Jensen looks
young between them as first one, then the other, turns his face and takes
kisses from his mouth. The audience can see his face only in profile, but even
from his poor seat Jared can see the flush rising gently under Jensen's skin,
the plush curve of his mouth pinking under their attention. Jared's hand lifts
unthinking to his own lips, covering where his breath is coming faster, just at
this.
Small bells join the flute and harp, each note rich and mellifluous as they
radiate through the room. The adepts kiss, and caress, and move fluidly against
and around each other, and Jensen is always at the center. Eventually they turn
him so that he faces the audience and he's… stunning, flushed at cheekbones and
throat, his flat soft chest rising quickly under the attention, and below, his
cock stirring, pretty dark rose and the weight of it proportioned perfectly to
his body. Jared sucks in a shaky breath, to see it. Amaury moves behind him,
leaning down to kiss the broad pale line of his shoulders, and Estelle goes to
her knees before him to begin the languisement. Jensen tosses his head back, a
short moan leaving his parted lips, and the music pauses so they can all hear
it, deep and true. In the front row, de Mereliot leans forward; Jared cannot
blame him.
At the stage's center is placed a wide chaise, big enough for play. It is there
they move to continue the languisement, and Jared watches transfixed while
Jensen puts his mouth between Estelle's widespread thighs, his eyes closed
while his tongue works complex patterns—while he sits up and Amaury comes
close, and Jensen bends his head to suck in the pale length of his cock,
sinking down to the base with ease, moaning softly around the thickness of it
when Amaury cards through the loose weight of his hair—when he looks up at last
with dampened eyes and Amaury smiles at him, thumbs stroking with sweet care
over the perfect line of Jensen's cheekbones. Not long, then, before Amaury
urges Jensen off of him, leaning down to kiss the reddened wet parting of his
mouth before he eases Jensen back, Estelle easily catching him against the
welcoming curves of her body, so that Amaury can go down to both knees and part
Jensen's thighs, push them up and up and then dip between them, licking deep
enough there that Jensen gasps—and then Amaury lifts up, leans in, and Jensen's
thighs wrap immediately over his waist, clenching high and eager, and then—oh,
the push in, and Jared doesn't see it because his eyes are fixed on Jensen's
face, but he knows the instant it happens because there, there, the way his
mouth parts, the heavy distracted cast to his eyes as he stares up into
Amaury's face, the half-shocked grunt that leaves him. Not playacting, nor
falsity, and not a sound Jared has heard in any of his training, from any other
adept. That was Jensen. Amaury begins to thrust, steady and strong, and Estelle
braces them both with her hands moving over Jensen's skin, the music beating
faster and more complex, and they are beautiful together, the three of them,
their limbs tangled, their skin standing out strikingly against the chaise's
emerald velvet, but Jared's eyes are fixed only on one place.
Jensen's head turns, his eyes closed and his brow furrowed, his attention
caught somewhere deep. Estelle and Amaury kiss over his shoulder, and Jared
sees that she is pleasuring herself, too, the three of them racing together
toward the same goal. The blood is beating through his own body at a furious
pace, his eyes dry from hardly blinking. The Showing for his initiation was—a
sacrament, beauty and grace. This is different, if only because it feels like
his heart can hardly take it.
The end comes too-swiftly, no matter how much time has actually passed. Amaury
leans back and picks up Jensen's hips, raises him into a new position, and
Jensen cries out, high and strained, his hands caught in Estelle's grip and
held above his head. He's rose-and-gold all over, his body gleaming, muscle
drawn tight in his thighs and stomach and buttocks. Caught in the grasp of his
pleasure, he's—a shock. Somehow more vivid, more real, the flesh and blood of
him pulsing below Jared's skin. When he finds his climax it unfolds almost as a
surprise—Amaury is still moving, Estelle's grip still firm, and Jensen's cock
spills over his belly untouched, jerking urgently against his own skin twice
and three times before he groans, loud and long and unvarnished, his body
freezing to stillness between them. Jared's breath is stuck in his chest for a
long moment before he gasps in air. He hardly notices when Estelle finishes, or
Amaury. Blood has risen so high in his cheeks that he can feel his skin
prickling, his stomach almost cramped with wanting. Jensen relaxes, slowly, the
muscle in his thighs and stomach twitching as he comes down, and it is to
slowing harp and the gentlest strikes of the bells that they kiss him, and each
other, their bodies twining pale and gold and bronze together. When the curtain
draws closed, the last thing Jared sees is Jensen's face, turned slightly away
from the audience with his eyes shuttered, lax and satisfied.
There is no applause; there isn't, after a Showing. Jared kneels in his corner
with his hands pressed to his face and tries to compose himself. He wanted
this, so badly. Now that he has it, he hardly knows what to do.
The adepts and patrons begin to stand, and exit. Assignations will likely be
made tonight. De Mereliot is leaning in to talk to the Dowayne, his expression
pleased, and Jared thinks with a strange bolt of shock that—he will bed Jensen,
this man. He stares, at de Mereliot's pleasant inoffensive face, and when he
tears his eyes away they land on Garneau, watching him with a faint smile.
Garneau nods to him, polite, and Jared blinks in pure befuddlement for a
moment, all decorum gone from his mind, when suddenly Daphne appears, blocking
his view of the room, beautiful in a gown of champagne-colored silk. "Up," she
murmurs, but there is steel beneath her voice, and he raises up on quivering
legs. She considers him, her eyes cool and assessing. "There is to be a
reception, after, which you will not attend," she says, after a moment. "I will
send a page to fetch your man, and a carriage will be waiting. Go home, Jared."
When she points, he goes, avoiding the gentle egress of the adults and making
his way through the west corridors of the house. He reaches the foyer in a daze
and sits, waiting for Thierry, his eyes closed. He wishes he could have that
last moment cast in bronze, caught, never to be degraded by time.
"Master Jared," he hears, and there is Thierry, standing before him with his
brow crumpled. "Is something amiss?"
Jared shakes his head, slowly. His chest is so tight and his heart so full he
barely can speak, but he manages, "It's time to go," and he doesn't cry, but
it's a near thing.
The night is cool, the air fresh and dewy with the day's rain. They clatter
along in silence, passing other carriages, the boulevard alive with the
business of the Night Court. Jared hasn't been out at night, before, and he
stares out the carriage window in a tumble of thought. The gate at Orchis
swings open immediately to them at the carriage-driver's hail and it's only a
moment before Thierry is stepping down onto the wet cobblestones, turning to
help Jared out in his turn.
"There you are," they hear, and Thierry stiffens and steps to one side with a
bow, and there is Richard, wrapped up in his plum velvet cloak in the doorway.
Jared blinks at him, doesn't know what to say. "Where have you been?"
"I—" The words won't come. His face still feels flame-hot, the world somehow
shifted a step apart.
Richard's eyes go to Thierry. "He was meant to be home before dark," he starts,
and Jared has never heard Richard's voice cold like this. "Did you lose your
way?"
Thierry bows again, begins to murmur his apologies, and Jared must step
forward, then. "It wasn't—I told him I was to stay," Jared says, stumbling. "It
was—I wanted—please, it wasn't Thierry's fault."
A moment, where Richard studies his face with that same cold distance, and the
weight of his disappointment is a blow. "You're dismissed," he says, finally,
and his eyes dart only for a moment to Thierry. "Inside, now."
Jared follows Richard's slight form into the house, glancing over his shoulder
to find Thierry frowning again. With the house closed to guests, no one is
lingering in the great hall, and he follows Richard quietly into the rear
corridors, up the stairs and to Richard's own room, where the fireplace is
merrily crackling and the candles are bright. The door closes behind them,
smoothly, and Richard says, "Sit," absent of any warmth. Jared sits, on the
settee by the fire, eyes fixed on his knees.
"You're lucky," Richard says. "The Dowayne is at the palace tonight and will
not hear of this until the morning."
Jared closes his eyes. He hadn't thought—
"Luckier still that the servants of this house serve the Dowayne first, so the
fact that Thierry was with you means you couldn't have done anything too
foolish."
The tiniest softening of his voice, there. Jared keeps his eyes screwed shut,
but he feels the settee shift when Richard sits beside him. There's a pause,
and then a sigh. "Speak up, dear," Richard says, and he's perhaps a bit
exasperated but at least there's no more of that awful chill, and tears spring
to Jared's eyes, a terrible tightness behind them.
Jared sucks in a shaky breath, and says, "I was at Eglantine," and when he
looks up Richard is watchful, but still distant, and Jared licks his lips.
"There was a Showing." Richard frowns, with a moue of confusion. "A patron
requested—Jensen was—" Jared shakes his head. His hand goes to his cheek and
feels almost frozen compared to the heat there.
"Ah." Richard sighs, again. "That does explain some things."
"I didn't want to—" Jared bites his lips between his teeth. "I thought I
wouldn't be allowed to go, and I…"
"I understand, dear one," Richard says, and smiles, at last, though it's only
small. "I do wish you would have told me. I worried for you."
Fresh tears, then, though only one or two spill over. "Ah, now," Richard
murmurs, and pulls Jared into his chest, petting gently over the back of his
head. Jared shudders, trying not to ruin the velvet cloak. Richard's arm goes
around his shoulders. "Was the Showing very beautiful?"
Jared nods, wiping at his cheeks. "Jensen was—perfect," he manages, even though
that's not even close to sufficient.
He is an utter mess, but when Richard pulls back and looks into his face, he
smiles regardless. "Darling," he says, rich with a meaning Jared cannot
decipher. Richard shakes his head, then tucks Jared's loose hair behind his
ears and kisses him, on both damp cheeks and then his forehead, lingering there
and sighing softly against Jared's skin. "Elua has blessed you, Jared," Richard
says, quiet. He pulls back and puts his fingers under Jared's chin. "Would that
we all could be so favored."
Jared doesn't know what that means, but Richard only shakes his head again and
then stands, drawing Jared up to his feet. "We will talk again in the morning,"
he says, and it's without a smile but he touches Jared's cheek softly, so it
must be all right. "Go to your room, now, to bed. There's much to think on, I'm
sure."
Jared inclines his head, but then lurches forward and embraces Richard about
the shoulders, impulsive. Richard laughs, soft, but hugs him back. They're of a
height, now, Jared realizes. He doesn't know when that happened.
His room belowstairs is empty, now, with Gemma gone away to become a priestess
of Naamah. It's still early—if the house were open to guests, the fete wouldn't
even be close to through—but he strips off his finery and lays down, anyway,
watching the candles burn steadily on his bedside table.
Details rise up in startling clarity behind his eyes. Jensen's lashes, thick
and soot-dark, casting shadows when his eyes fluttered closed in the pleasure
of the languisement. In the brightness of the chandeliers his freckles were
blotted away, but the way his skin glowed, creamy-gold like it was lit from
within. The moment when Amaury found his climax and Jensen shuddered, arching
up into the finale, welcoming and cracked-open, his pleasure stunning in its
honesty—
Heat has risen again between Jared's thighs and he shudders, closing his eyes
and reaching down. His fingers drag in unison down his belly, find the barely-
there cut of muscle at his hips, and then—oh, oh. His cock flushed and full,
his sac below tender, the wanting that had ridden so high under his skin
surging back all at once, long-denied and now urgent, leaping in the pit of his
stomach. He knows the movements, the way he could tease and prolong, goading
himself to a pleasure that could set his teeth to aching—but no, not now, not
with how fresh it is. He curls his fingers around and remembers, and it's easy,
then. Rubbing and tugging, his hands hot and his flesh demanding, his skin
tight and shimmering with—Jensen, Jensen, arching and twisting. Jared digs his
heels into the mattress and lifts up into his own hand and there behind his
eyes is Jensen smiling at him, his arm slung around Jared's shoulders as he
leaned in, green-gold eyes and his smell, his hands, the way he crushed Jared
into his chest and Jared could listen in close to his heart beating—
Climax rips through him and he makes a noise, his hand working fast and steady,
his balls clutched up high and pulsing everything out. It's—oh, a bloom of
heat, a clench and pulse, shooting so strong it's almost worrisome, wet
spilling over his belly, smearing his hand, everything slick all at once. By
Naamah—he's spilled at night, in his bedclothes; he didn't know it could be
like that. He lays there and breathes, eyes closed. Jensen's face, there at the
end, floats behind his eyes: lax, and satisfied. He'll never get more than
that, and he doesn't hope to, but this—this could almost be enough.
                                       *
As promised, he is brought before the Dowayne in the morning, Félicie standing
behind his right shoulder and Richard sitting at the side. He kneels abeyante
and explains what he did, his eyes fixed on the wood floor. When he finishes,
there is a sigh, and the Dowayne finally says, "Look up, Jared."
The Dowayne’s kind face is set in solemn lines, and Félicie behind him seems
disappointed. Jared bites the inside of his cheek and forces himself to hold
the Dowayne’s gaze.
"I have discussed the matter with your mentor," the Dowayne says, nodding to
where Richard waits. "You have not broken your bond with the house—your
transgression was not even particularly wicked—but you did deliberately mislead
us. Worse, you took advantage of the trust we have placed in you."
Heat surges to Jared's face, his eyes stinging. "I'm sorry," he says, voice
wavering and thick.
The Dowayne's expression softens, if only a little, and he tilts his head as he
considers Jared. "I know you are," he says, gentle. "But you will still be
punished. I hope it will remind you of your responsibility."
He is dismissed, then; he follows Richard out of the Dowayne's office with a
fine tremble under his skin and tears still threatening. He has never been
punished before. Richard squeezes his hand and sends him to study, to await his
sentence.
In the end, the Dowayne's punishment is both kindness and cruelty. Punishments
are rare for children of the court, but he knows that Félicie has a tawse in
her office, and he has heard from Jensen that some of the fosterlings in
Eglantine can act up badly enough that a spanking or even lashes will be meted
out to tame them. However, it transpires that his Dowayne prefers to meet
misbehavior with punishment in kind. Instead of a lashing, he will be confined
to the house, for a full month, which means no riding lessons at Madame
Perrin's stables and, more pertinently, no visit to Eglantine. No Jensen. He
wonders if Richard spoke to the Dowayne on his behalf. When he is released from
the Dowayne's office once more, he dashes the damp from his eyes, and then goes
out into the courtyard and around to the carriage-house to find Thierry taking
his luncheon, and there he goes down to his knees on the cobblestones and
apologizes with all his heart for his deception, asking Thierry's forgiveness.
He's pulled up to his feet by two strong hands, cutting off his babbling. "Up
you get, young master," Thierry says, quiet. "You'll ruin your breeches,
getting down in the muck like that."
"Tell me you haven't been punished, please," Jared begs, catching one of
Thierry's big hands in his own.
Thierry lets him have it, just for a moment. "It's none of your concern," he
says, but kindly. He disengages his hand and cups the side of Jared's head,
then turns back to his luncheon. "The grooms will think I've done some terrible
thing," he says, mild, and Jared looks around to see that, oh, yes, there are
other servants about, some of them looking politely away and some of them flat-
out grinning at the child who has come into their midst. He flushes, looking
down. Thierry tears a piece of bread from his loaf and offers it to Jared, who
takes it for lack of a better option. "I'm fine, Jared," Thierry says, and when
Jared looks up Thierry gives him a smile that transforms his rough, simple
face. "But I thank you for the apology. Now, eat that and scurry along. You've
lessons to attend to, I've no doubt."
He does—and he throws himself into them, in the time that follows, trying to be
an exemplar of one of the Court's children. During the day, he studies the
texts and is attentive at practice and demonstration, absorbing everything he
possibly can. He can hold even the longest carved phallus in the back of his
throat with ease, his gag reflex trained away at last, and can hold his breath
for almost a full minute. Contact with the adepts is not allowed, as he is
still not of the age of majority, but instead he tests his knowledge by
choreographing lovemaking, Richard supervising while Cherette and Percy act out
his murmured call for Camael's gambit, or the caress of the waning moon.
Cherette flushes and Percy hardens and they meet their pleasure, and it is a
job well done.
When at last he comes again to Eglantine, he's—nervous. Unaccountably so. He
walks down the hill, the first days of June warm and beautiful and the sky an
unbroken perfect blue, Thierry guarding his side from the few carriages and
wagons moving on the boulevard, and the memories flush up high in him. He's
going pink before he even enters the house gates. He breathes steadily, using
the techniques Richard has taught him about quelling desire. Perhaps not the
exact situation Richard was envisioning, but it cannot hurt to try.
By the time they come into the house and he finds Jensen in the wide east
gallery, he thinks he has himself somewhat under control. Jensen looks up from
his book and a smile breaks over his face like dawn, and he says, "At last!"
and stands to embrace Jared, and—well, then Jared must put in extra effort. He
hugs Jensen back, of course, and breathes in the wild rose of him. Oh, he has
missed this.
"Where have you been?" Jensen says, pushing him back by the shoulders and
searching his face.
Jared puts on a small frown. "Didn't you get my letter?"
Jensen shakes his head. "You were 'busy'?" he says, skeptical.
Jared sighs, and sits at the table, where Jensen's books are spread all around.
He glances at the corner, where Daphne sits with tea in hand, watching him
steadily over the rim of her cup. "Richard had a number of private assignations
that required special attention," Jared says, putting a note of suffering into
his voice. "And then Félicie asked me to assist Victor, too. I wish the timing
had worked better. I missed our lessons."
He has practiced this, with all the time he's had to think. A plausible lie,
the last he hopes ever to tell Jensen, capped with the softening of the truth.
Jensen's mouth quirks, and he sits beside Jared on the bench, tugging him right
into his place. "I've missed the lessons, too," he says, soft like it's a
secret, and Jared—oh, Elua, he loves him.
Jared swallows, almost dizzy for a second. Jensen's arm curves easy around his
shoulders, and Jared catches his dangling hand, holding it against his chest.
His heart pounds. "How—" he starts, and has to clear his throat. "How did your
Showing go?"
"Oh," Jensen says. A glance up and Jared sees that—oh, for once, it's Jensen
who's flushing, blood rising high on his cheekbones and pinking his ears. He
shrugs, looking down at the book of poetry before him and flicking through the
pages, dissembling terribly. "We were—well-received, I think. All went
smoothly."
"Too modest," Daphne says, from her corner. She stands, with a rustle of silk,
and paces over to their table. "Commandant de Mereliot was most impressed.
Jensen has already taken an assignation with him, and another scheduled for
August."
The man's handsome smile flickers in Jared's memory—but foremost still is that
last moment, Jensen satisfied. "That is a coup," Jared says, smiling, and he
means it.
Jensen shrugs again, still pink, and keeps his eyes on his book. "What shall we
work on today?" he says, clearly embarrassed, and Jared squeezes his hand
before he looks up at Daphne.
She's watching his face, cool and assessing. All he can do is meet her eyes,
open as he can be—he's relying entirely on her discretion, and owes her that at
least. Her eyes slide to Jensen, after a moment, and then she shakes her head,
looking out the windows. "We will re-examine The Chronicle of Hyacinthe," she
says, finally. Jensen nods and slips off the bench, going to the shelves to
pull the book. Daphne glances at Jared while his back is turned, expression
almost rueful, then shakes her head again and crosses to the bell at her tea
table. "I'll call for Bijou to play the Comtesse; Jared, you will be
Hyacinthe."
He bows his head. When Jensen returns with the book, he's none the wiser as to
what passed between them—and then there's the play to consider, and the
emotions to unpack, and they slip back into their routine, as though they never
left it.
In October, Orchis greets two new children: twins, a boy and a girl, raised in
Bryony but neither of them with a head for gambling or any real desire for
wealth. Geneve and Gilbert are both fair, dark-eyed, prone both to giggles and
squabbling, and Jared likes them both immediately, for the entertainment of
their bickering if nothing else. For ease, they rearrange rooms, so that Jared
shares with Eveline and the twins have their own room together. Eveline sighs,
watching the maid hang her livery and few gowns in the wardrobe with Jared's
things. "I could complain more, you know," she says, and falls backward on the
bed. "But I think you won't chatter my ear off, at least, so I may have gotten
the better end of the bargain."
"I shall try not to kick you," he promises, hand on his heart, and she laughs,
and then tosses a pillow at his head. He falls over, dramatically, and puts the
pillow over his face to make her laugh more. It will be less than a year of
sharing, though; soon enough, he'll be sixteen.
Lessons continue. Jared is a perfectly adept rider, at this point, at ease even
on the quicker palfrey, able to gallop and even to jump, though Jensen nearly
expired from nervousness when Jared tried it. He still likes Holly best,
though, and Madame Perrin takes no issue with them coming to exercise her
horses once a week. It helps to get out of the house, and stretch and move, for
the growing pains have started to take Jared. Richard tells him it is natural,
at his age, but that doesn't stop it hurting, terribly. He's several inches
taller than Richard, now, and Félicie and the Dowayne think he will only grow
more—especially as he's hit by hunger at all times of day, his belly grumbling
even as he and Eveline shadow the Dowayne at the nightly fete, or when he
attends at lessons in the morning. When he reaches Percy's height, the house
puts him onto a new exercise regimen—following Marcus's example rather than
Richard's, working on his strength and giving his always-lengthening muscle
something to do. Richard shakes his head, circling Jared's new biceps with his
delicate hand. "You were such a little boy," he says, rueful, looking up, and
Jared grins and ducks his head. There are extra dancing lessons, to take his
new height into account, extra balance and agility exercises to ensure he knows
how to use his longer limbs, but it's worth it to finally not be so small.
Gossip among the adepts indicates that Audette thinks of retirement; her marque
has been made for a year, nearly, and Percy and Laura speculate privately to
Jared that she grows tired of Court life. They are proved wrong, abruptly, when
instead Audette asks for Eisheth's blessing, and falls pregnant before the
Longest Night. There is no secret of parentage, this time: Fabien, the oldest
of the adepts besides Richard, fathered the child. Jared had no idea the two of
them were involved with each other. The Dowayne throws a small fete, to
celebrate, and the adepts toast to the babe's good health, and to Fabien and
Audette's love. Jared had always thought Audette too sharp for it, but her face
when Fabien leans in to kiss her, the tender way she cups the nonexistent swell
of her belly and smiles—well. He was wrong, and cannot be gladder about it.
A chilly morning, later, and the children and what adepts are awake after their
night of feting and assignations are at breakfast. Victor is in the middle of a
story about one of his recent assignations, a noble lady who has steadily
visited each of the thirteen houses in turn, trying to decide which suits her
tastes best—but arrived at Orchis with no real sense of humor, leading Victor
to try even tickling her feet to make the woman laugh. "Orchids do not suit her
fancy, I think," he says, in his deep amused voice. He taps Gilbert's button-
nose, making the boy giggle. "Perhaps she can go off to Gentian and the mystics
can dream up her desires, hm?"
Richard lets out an uncharacteristic snort, and Jared smiles into his tea.
"Like as not she will be drunk on poppy-smoke and not remember anything,"
Richard says, slicing into a preserved apricot, "and the dreamers will claim
some profound discovery."
Esme sighs—she grew up in Gentian, and has more sympathy for their more
esoteric methods than Richard ever will—but before she can retort there is a
clatter from the front hall, and they all turn their heads almost as one to
watch one of the maids come into the dining hall, curtsying.
"I am sorry to interrupt," she murmurs, and Richard beckons her in, as the
senior adept present with Félicie still abed. "Jensen nó Eglantine has arrived,
here to see Master Jared."
Laura, drowsy at the end of the table, lets out a little catcall, setting
Gilbert and Geneve both to giggling. Jared sends her an exasperated look, set
to rise, but Richard stands first. His hair is a tangle, caught messily over
one shoulder, and he's wearing just his dressing gown and warm slippers, but he
pats Jared's shoulder and gestures for him to come along. "Thank you," he says,
to the maid, and then turns a smile on Jared. "Shall we?"
Off-kilter, Jared follows—acutely aware of his own ruffled appearance, only an
hour out of bed and not even bathed, yet, though at least he's in breeches and
a decent coat handed down from Marcus. Richard sweeps out into the main hall,
carrying his teacup, and there they find Jensen waiting with a hat clutched in
both hands, snow still white on his shoulders, and he blinks when confronted
with Richard's mussed beauty but sweeps a quick bow, eyes darting to Jared.
"Good morning, Jensen," Richard says, warm and sounding somehow amused. Jensen
murmurs a greeting, rising again. "A very early morning, in fact. Would you
like to join our breakfast?"
"I apologize if I've—interrupted; I did not mean to disrupt the house," Jensen
says, polite.
"Not at all," Richard returns, lifting his cup of tea. "I only wanted to meet
the famous Jensen nó Eglantine. Our Jared speaks of you exclusively in
superlatives."
Waiting quietly a step behind, Jared feels himself start to flush. Jensen
smiles, but briefly, and there's a pause—only a moment, but enough that Jared
gets a better look at him. He's dressed, in his fawn day-suit with his blue
coat over the top, but his hair is mussed, the ties on his shirt poorly done,
like he came in a rush.
"I was hoping—" Jensen starts, and has to clear his throat. "I wondered if I
might speak to Jared."
A strain in his voice, nearly buried, but with Night Court-trained ears made
sensitive to the slightest shift in mood Jared catches it, and Richard
certainly does. He nods, thoughtful, and then offers his hand. Jensen hesitates
for just a fraction of a second before he takes it. Richard smiles at him,
warm. "My thanks, Jensen," he says, "for being such a friend to Jared. We could
all hope to have such a bond." From someone else, it might have had a double-
meaning. Jensen blinks, and Jared ducks his head, but before anything else can
be said Richard pulls back, and cups his hand to Jared's cheek. "Remember,
darling, we have a lesson at midday," he says, and Jared nods. Richard smiles
up at him—still so odd, to look down into that face—and then nods to Jensen and
sweeps back to the dining hall, leaving them alone.
"I hope I won't get you into trouble," Jensen says, that strain still shivering
in his voice.
"Richard is sincere," Jared says, shaking his head, and then he goes to Jensen
and catches his hand, squeezing it. "Is something—amiss? You never come so
early."
Jensen looks at him, full-on, and there is no mask there to shield his
thoughts, his eyes reddened as though with tears. Rare, to have him so caught
off-guard. Jared frowns, and draws Jensen up the main stair, up to the sitting
room where they've played chess on Jensen's few visits to the house. He
installs Jensen on the settee and rings for the maid, ordering tea and a fire
built, and it's not long before the room is cheery, comfortable and warm in
contrast to the February chill outside the windows. When the tea arrives Jensen
has taken off his coat, at least, but he still stands stiff at the mantle,
looking down into the fire, and it's left to Jared to pour the tea and wait,
watching worried while Jensen seems to grow ever more agitated.
"If you can't say it," Jared says, finally, when his own stomach has tied into
knots, "at least sit with me. Your tea will get cold."
Jensen lets out a huff, but does at least sit, close enough that his knee
brushes Jared's. He picks up the cup Jared has prepared, looks down into it,
and then sets it back down again with a clatter that sloshes liquid into the
saucer. "I had an assignation with de Mereliot last night," he announces,
abruptly.
Jared freezes, his cup halfway to his lips. A second too late, he remembers
himself and puts it back in its saucer, more carefully than Jensen had. "How
did it go?" he says, trying for calm. The last time he can remember Jensen
volunteering anything about his patrons was—almost a year ago, in this exact
room, when Jensen first learned of the commandant and was nervous enough that
it spilled over.
"He was—it was fine, that wasn't—" Jensen shakes his head and stands again,
pacing to the window and looking out. A light snow sifts down, outside,
frosting the city with white. "Afterward, while he watched me writing. He—he
told me something. Bragging, the way patrons do, trying to impress. I don't
know why they bother, with the contract already sanded and sealed."
Jared licks his lips, imagining: Jensen, perhaps nude or in just a dressing
gown, firelight gilding his profile, the commandant watching from a bed tumbled
with their efforts. He can guess, why they try to make Jensen look at them
again. "What did he say?" he says. For an awful moment he wonders if it's
something like a proposal to be a consort, or to travel with the regiment, or
to buy out his marque—something that will take Jensen away.
"Military campaigns." Jensen runs a hand through his hair, turning and leaning
back into the window. He can't settle, fidgeting with his collar and sleeves,
his weight shifting nervously. "He usually wants to talk about the latest
novels, I don't know why last night he decided to—" He shakes his head, looking
down at the floor. "Before he was promoted to commandant of the First Company,
he was a captain of one of the companies that guard Namarre, and he told me—his
company had been responsible for neutralizing a group of bandits, who had been
terrorizing the farmers and merchants on the road. It would have been no great
feat, but the bandits weren't only bandits. They were mercenaries, sacking
caravans."
Jared frowns. There's a distant, terrible expression on Jensen's face, his eyes
looking into some other place, and it's too long before the connection clicks
into Jared's mind. Mercenaries, bandits. Of course. "Oh, Jensen," he says, and
Jensen looks up at him with wet eyes. It's just a few steps across the room to
take Jensen in his arms, hug him close and tight. Jensen makes a soft noise,
deep in the base of his throat, and Jared closes his eyes. "It cannot be the
same men, can it? I thought they were all—"
"Dead," Jensen says, muffled into Jared's shoulder. "I saw it. They were all
dead."
Heat rises up behind Jared's eyes. He's never, ever forgotten the story, told
to him so long ago. He shifts, slips an arm around Jensen's shoulders and just
holds him. Would that there were some means to take the memory away; even in
Jared's heart it is an ugly sore, and how much worse for Jensen, to have it
ever-present. Almost a decade ago, now, and his smile so rarely comes without a
shadow. Jared turns his head and puts his lips to Jensen's temple, no intent
behind it but comfort, and Jensen shudders, wraps his arms around Jared's waist
and tugs him in, finally returning the embrace. Long moments, the fire warm at
Jared's back and Jensen warm and solid in his arms, the chill from the window
barely felt.
Finally Jensen shifts, sliding his hands to Jared's hips, and Jared loosens his
embrace just enough to lean back. Jensen's eyes are damp, but he's not weeping,
and he smiles even, brief though it is. "When did you get so tall," he says,
and tweaks the end of Jared's braid. Jared smiles, ducking his head. They're
almost of a height, now. In a more sober tone, Jensen says, "I'm sorry that
I—it's only, I have no one else to speak to, about…"
"Never apologize for that," Jared says, cutting him off. He catches Jensen's
hands, holding them tight in the little space between their breasts. "You can
tell me anything, always. I'll always be your friend, Jensen. I swear it."
No matter what else he feels, that is true, and it must ring so to Jensen. He
looks back and forth between Jared's eyes, his own almost startled, and then he
must accept it, for he leans in and presses his lips to Jared's forehead. A
soft kiss, so gentle that Jared's eyes sting, and he closes them.
When Jensen pulls back he isn't smiling, but he isn't so distressed, either. He
squeezes Jared's hands, and then takes a deep breath. "Would you care to thrash
me at chess, before your lessons?" he says, in a voice that's almost light.
Jared smiles, and hugs Jensen quickly, one more time before he steps away. Balm
taught gentle care, but Orchis leads him now. "Are you sure you're ready to be
humiliated that badly?" he says, with false concern, and Jensen rolls his eyes
with enough exaggeration to make Jared grin. He could wish that nothing would
ever put that frightened look on Jensen's face, ever again—but he can help, at
least, and there's a swell of warm pride in his chest, that that's so. The
pieces are already laid on the board and Jensen sits at black, letting Jared
take the white, and Jared tuts, opens with Cassiel's gambit, and knows that he
will always, always, be whatever Jensen needs.
                                       *
That spring goes by slowly, each day and week creeping past so tediously Jared
is certain that somehow the sun has grown lazy and sluggish. He has reached the
final stage of his lessons, and now all that is left to do is perfect his
knowledge. Richard helps to guide him through preparing himself for a patron,
the last few details of grooming and hygiene that will be required before he
begins to serve. He is still growing, and with Marcus and Claude he works to
put on muscle and breadth, but even so his mealtimes change, taken with the
adepts instead of the other children so that when the time comes, he will be
ready to seamlessly transition.
At the nightly fete, while he and Eveline follow the Dowayne and Félicie, he
sees the patrons taking notice of him, more often. Lady Irène catches his eye
and smiles at him, looking him up and down obviously before she turns to greet
the Dowayne; a minor baronet and his friends all a-gossip pause when Jared
brings a new carafe of wine, and one of the drunker lordlings catches Jared's
hand and kisses the knuckles in thanks, his lips hot and purple-stained, and
Jared's heart pounds in his throat before Félicie appears next to him and
smiles, sending him back to the Dowayne. He asks Richard, who he thinks it will
be, and Richard smiles and does not tell him. "Naamah will take you in her
hands, darling," he says, calm, "no matter who is lucky enough to have you."
There are fittings, and re-fittings, and the couturier the house uses threatens
to charge double if Jared grows another inch. They trim his hair, creating a
few shorter layers around his face, but it's still midway down his back. He is
inspected, nude, by the Dowayne and Félicie, Richard staying by to consult, and
the Dowayne smiles at him and gently pinches his cheek where he's blushing.
"You'll charm them to their knees," he says, kindly, and Jared's chest blooms
with warmth. They decide to keep his body hair, little though it is, and send
him to take some sun in the private garden, letting his skin take on a tinge of
bronze all over.
At Madame Perrin's, just a month before the debut, he and Jensen are watching
Geneve and Gilbert take their first slow ride, Gilbert nervous and Geneve
making a show of bravery to show him up. Jared folds his arms on the top rail
of the fence around the little paddock. "I'm… nervous," he says, finally, eyes
on Geneve whispering into Holly's perked ear.
Next to him, Jensen leans his back against the fence. They haven't talked about
this, very much. "What makes you nervous?" Jensen says, after a pause.
Jared huffs a laugh, planting his chin on the back of his folded hands. "What
if I—I don't know. What if the patrons do not want me and I shame the house, or
what if I forget my lessons and let down Richard and everyone."
"You won't," Jensen says. It's soft, but there's conviction in his tone.
Jared lets his head rock to the side so he can see, and Jensen is looking off
into the distance. In the sun, light catching the gold in his hair, freckles
darkening over the perfect slant of his cheekbones—he's so beautiful. "You
don't know that," Jared says, just to be contrary. "Unless you are a soothsayer
and haven't told me."
There is a little squabble, out in the paddock—Gilbert insisting that it is now
his turn, Geneve's bravery having sparked in him the need to outdo her. Jensen
glances their way, and then turns to Jared. He considers Jared for a long
moment, eyes roving over his face, and Jared straightens a little under it. "I
will ask the question, once more," he says, voice serious. "Is this what you
want to do?"
A little lurch, in his belly, remembering—almost three years ago, now. It
doesn't hurt now like it did then, knowing that Jensen really does have only
his best interest in mind. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, giving
Jensen the courtesy of thinking before he answers. In his mind flashes an image
of Naamah's statue, smiling and kind in the house shrine. Honey and wine on his
tongue. "Yes," he says, and opens his eyes, and finds Jensen watching him
still. He shrugs, helpless. "It is everything I know, and what I am. It's what
I want."
Jensen reaches out and finds his braid, running his fingers down the length of
it until he can give it a little tug. "Then you needn't worry," Jensen says.
"Whoever it is won't deserve you, but you'll enchant them. I know it."
He isn't smiling, or even making one of his dry jests—it's just honesty. Jared
finds his hand and squeezes it, blinking away the little surge of emotion. Some
days it is all he can do to keep his feelings in line. Before he can say
anything, there is a cry from the paddock—Geneve, calling out, "Jared, Gilbert
is being mean!" and he sighs and swiftly climbs the fence to handle the two
little hellions, and it's left again for another day, or never.
The day before his birthday, Richard takes him in the house carriage down into
the city. Rather than going to the outskirts where the Perrin stable and estate
are, they go toward the center, down streets and boulevards Jared has never
seen. The palace, in the distance, glimmers white and massive, closer than he
has seen it from Mont Nuit. They move down a long boulevard lined with silver
birch, the carriage dappled with shade, until they come to the Great Temple of
Naamah: a small building of white marble, set a little away from the noise of
the city. The acolyte who comes to greet them is young, perhaps Richard's age,
his long hair loose over the shoulders of his scarlet surplice. He must
recognize Richard, for he gives the kiss of greeting and smiles, squeezing
Richard's hands, before he turns to Jared. "You must be a Servant of Naamah,"
he says, in a light, musical voice.
"I am," Jared says, almost a whisper.
The acolyte draws him close and kisses both his cheeks. "Be welcome, brother,"
he says, and extends his arm, allowing them to enter. The Temple is full of
sunlight when they walk inside, candles lit all around and flowers scattered
throughout. Richard nods toward the altar and Jared goes to it, kneeling
without thought on the cushion and gazing up at the great ancient statue.
Naamah's face is simpler here than at the shrine at home, her eyes blank white
and her features picked out less delicately, but she is still welcoming, still
kind and open and compassionate. Jared gazes up, breathing slow and steady in
the silence, and finds himself at peace.
He sleeps late, in the morning. When he wakes, he goes to the bathing room and
soaks in waters perfumed with oils of orange and jasmine. Richard helps to wash
his hair, and then combs it out until it's thick and shining. The day passes
slowly. He plays himself, at chess, and manages to drag himself into a
stalemate; he reads another chapter in the book he borrowed from Eglantine. He
eats lightly, at luncheon with the adepts, though his nerves have mostly been
eased, and Laura teases him only a little. Félicie shows him to his new rooms
and he loves them—they are Antoine's old chambers, near to Richard's, and they
are as beautifully appointed as anything else in Orchis, done in rich shades of
amber and sky blue. His eyes are drawn immediately to the bed, spread with
fresh snow-white linens, but for him they have also added a chessboard on the
little table before the fire. He throws his arms around Félicie in thanks, and
she laughs, leaning up to kiss his cheek. "Welcome home, Jared," she says.
When it is time, he prepares himself. No real penetration is allowed before his
virgin-night, but he cleans himself and carefully oils his entrance, dipping in
just one finger. The Dowayne decided on a light bergamot scent, for this first
evening, and he touches it to his throat and wrists and thighs, years of
watching Richard do the same rising up in his memory. He comes out from behind
the screen in his bathing room to find Richard and Félicie waiting. They dress
him carefully in the suit chosen for his debut: sky blue, again, the color
Félicie has always liked him best in, with small flowers embroidered at the
wrists, bronze threading thick at the collar and the closures of the doublet.
His boots are a deep brown, polished to a glossy sheen, folded down just below
the knee. Félicie herself braids his hair, a complex tail that curves over his
shoulder tied with a blue ribbon, the layers around his face left loose.
Richard lines his eyes with a soft brown, dabs the smallest amount of gloss on
his lips so that they shine as though freshly licked, and then—
"You're ready," Richard says, sliding his thumb down Jared's jaw. He's smiling,
proud. Jared catches his hand and presses a careful kiss to it, his heart full.
"Come along, dearest," Félicie says, holding out her hand, and he stands. They
inspect him in the full-length mirror and he hardly recognizes himself—but
then, he does. This polished adept, sooty-lashed and wrapped in richness, is
him. Behind him stands Félicie gorgeous in her green gown, and Richard
beautiful as always in his mahogany suit, and he feels like one of them.
Félicie smiles at his reflection and he can do nothing but smile back.
They move circuitously through the rear corridors as the music begins in the
main hall. Richard kisses him once more, before he has to join the rest of the
adepts, and he whispers in Jared's ear Naamah bless you. Félicie leads him out
on the careful path that blocks any guest's view until he's hidden behind the
screen at the top of the great staircase, and then Eveline is there, murmuring
that the Dowayne is nearly ready. "Smile, dearest," Félicie says, looking up at
him with warm eyes, and he does, helplessly. She laughs, soft, and touches one
of his dimples. "Precious as ever."
Eveline squeezes his hand, looking as though she can hardly contain her
excitement, and then disappears into the rear corridors, leaving him to close
his eyes and listen. The room is full, the patrons already merry, and he knows
that wine is flowing freely, the kitchens bustling to keep up with a debut
night. There is the surge of noise when the attending adepts enter, a
smattering of applause and a few catcalls; then the Dowayne's entrance, and the
fete truly begins.
"Welcome, my lords," the Dowayne calls, and the music stills, the crowd drawn
to attention. "I believe you know why you are here. Orchis House tonight gains
another blossom." A cry of at last! from the audience and Jared feels the blood
rush to his cheeks, the grin he's been wearing on and off all day tugging again
at his mouth. "My lords, I present Jared nó Orchis, who today has gained his
sixteenth year."
The prearranged signal: Jared takes a breath and steps out from behind the
screen, into the light. The Dowayne is waiting for him at landing on the turn
of the great stair and he descends to meet him as the crowd applauds. He takes
the Dowayne's extended hand and bows, deeply, aware that all eyes are on him.
He has watched this from the crowd—very different, to be the subject of it, but
the nervousness he expected to leap to his throat doesn't arrive. The Dowayne
continues, introducing him and making some jest that makes the gathered patrons
laugh, but Jared doesn't hear it. Faces jump out, patrons he recognizes from
his years of serving, some new, some watching him with undisguised desire and
some leaning in to gossip. Richard stands beside Michel Fabre, his dark eyes
fixed on Jared, and he sends an encouraging smile Jared's way which Jared
returns, easily.
At the Dowayne's nod Jared takes a step forward and extends his hands, spinning
a slow circle to display himself to the crowd. "A hale, handsome young man,"
the Dowayne says, and takes Jared's hand again. "Surely, my lords and ladies,
you will do Naamah justice for the favor of his virgin bed."
"My lord, you need say no more!" calls out one of the assembled men—it is
Fabre, unexpectedly, grinning with his arm around Richard's shoulders. Richard
winks at Jared, his white hand placed delicately on Fabre's breast. "I begin
the bidding—two hundred ducats!"
"For such a treasure?" a lady says, with a scoff. "Two hundred fifty, easily."
A very tall man by the sideboard raises his goblet—a merchant, Dufresne, who
pinches Jared's cheek while he's serving. "Three hundred, and a dozen kisses
for my lady Félicie as a bonus!" he calls out, making the assembled laugh and
Félicie blow him a kiss across the hall, and then the bidding begins in
earnest, the patrons egging each other on with jests and challenges. Jared
laughs along when Boisvert mock-challenges Fabre to a duel over another
'insulting' bid, and blows a two-handed kiss when the Baroness Roydenne and her
sister promise to serenade him to sleep afterward. He knows the eddies of
influence in this game, though. Fabre has no intent of taking him to bed,
likely only spurred to honor Richard's apprentice, and Boisvert's main
enjoyment is sparring with Fabre. Some of those watching, though—he can see the
desire in their eyes. He flushes under it, inevitably, his body reacting as
though under a compulsion.
At the last the bidding comes down to three: Baroness Roydenne, the Comte de
Chavaise, and the Chevalier Emile Landres, each of them pushing up in ever-
higher increments. When it comes to two thousand ducats the Comte drops out
with a wounded cry, and Percy throws his arms around the man and hugs him for
the loss. At three thousand, Jared's heart feels fit to pound right out of his
chest. The baroness hesitates, and calls out for three thousand two hundred.
Landres, holding his goblet of wine casually against his chest, smiles up at
Jared and calls, "Beautiful boy, should I bid again?"
His eyes are dark, his desire easy and obvious, his voice rich with the rounded
vowels of Eisande. Jared smiles down at him. "My lord, it is your decision—to
make a mighty homage to Naamah tonight, or not?"
Boisvert lets out a whoop and several patrons laugh, delighted. It lights in
Jared's stomach: there is power, here. He understood it only distantly, before,
but he has it now in hand.
Landres raises his goblet in a toast. "Three thousand five hundred, then," he
says, "and a case of wine from my estate to the Great Temple of Naamah, if
we're talking of homages."
The baroness hesitates again, and then shakes her head, and the Dowayne claps
his hands, declaring the auction over. Jared meets Landres' eyes and a frisson
shivers over his skin, chest to stomach to the base of his cock. The crowd
applauds again, someone calling out encouragement to Landres and another
demanding a shipment of this wine, if it is good enough for Naamah. The Dowayne
offers Jared his hand, smiling, and together they descend the stairs into the
fete, the patrons drawing back so that they have a clear path. When they meet,
Jared bows again, and the Dowayne places his hand in Landres'. He bows to kiss
it, in his turn. His lips are warm, his breath momentarily hot on Jared's skin.
The music has begun again, a rollicking cheerful allemande, and Nicole is
dancing with a patron, drawing some attention away. "Will you retire
immediately?" the Dowayne asks, under the noise.
Landres runs his thumb over Jared's knuckles. He's a few inches taller than
Jared, in his late thirties and still handsome, laughter-lines crinkling beside
his eyes. "I think so," he says, his eyes on Jared's face. "Is that agreeable
to you?"
Jared nods, dry-mouthed. Landres smiles at him, kindly, and then turns to the
Dowayne. "A moment first, my lord. Your office?"
The Dowayne inclines his head and leads the way. The Chancellor of the house is
waiting for them, a contract already half-drawn. Jared is barely paying
attention, his focus entirely on the point where their two bodies connect, and
so it's a surprise when a lady follows them into the office before the door
closes behind them and the noise of the fete is muffled.
"My wife," Landres says, inclining his head. He doesn't release Jared's hand.
Jared faces her, the name coming to his mind after only a second. "Lady
Hilaire," he murmurs, bowing.
She laughs, bright. "Emile, you were right," she says, looking up at Jared with
sparkling eyes. "How could I have doubted?"
She's several years younger than Landres, perhaps Richard's age, and she's
beautiful—a tumble of blonde curls, eyes of a deep dark blue, skin firm and
flushed with youth. Jared smiles at her, taken by her vivacity.
"My lord," Landres says, to the Dowayne. "I have purchased the virgin-price for
myself, but I will gladly pay more for my wife to join us, if you will allow
it."
Jared blinks and glances between them. Hilaire tucks her hand in at his elbow
and he automatically accommodates her. She smells of herbs, somehow, a
startling change after the usual flowers and sweetness of the adepts. The
Dowayne lifts his chin, eyes suddenly sharp. He is kind, Jared's Dowayne, but
he is also a businessman. "Jared?" he says, finally. "I will allow it, if you
accept."
Somehow, he manages to find his tongue. "I am honored to, my lord," he says.
Hilaire squeezes his arm and smiles up at him. "I'm so glad," she whispers.
Landres kisses Jared's hand again and then goes to the desk, where the
Chancellor is adding new lines to the contract. There is a murmured
negotiation, whatever additional the Dowayne is charging added to the scroll,
and then Landres signs, followed by the Dowayne, and the Chancellor stamps it
with the official seal. Jared takes a breath. It's done.
They go out, through the fete. It is almost a blur. Someone says something, to
him or to Landres, but Jared doesn't hear it; he leads the way up the stairs,
another smattering of applause and catcalls following them, and through the
public corridors to his own chambers, lit by dozens of candles.
Jared goes to the center of the room and turns. "What do you wish, my lord?" he
asks, his voice barely steady.
Landres stands hand in hand with his wife, both of them looking at him, just
for a moment. Finally, Landres kisses her on the temple and nods, and she goes
to sit on the foot of the bed. "Do you know why I bought your virgin-price?"
Landres says, turning to Jared.
"No, my lord," Jared says, and it's in earnest.
He comes in close, and tucks Jared's hair behind both his ears. "Look at you,"
he murmurs, close, and Jared ducks his head. "There—that's it, that's why.
Hilaire, you see?"
"Yes," she says, a smile in her voice. "Blushing like a rosebud."
That only makes the heat rise higher in Jared's cheeks, but clearly they don't
mind. "Just in this room," Landres says, lifting Jared's chin with one finger.
"I am Emile, and she is Hilaire. Yes?"
"Yes," Jared breathes. "Emile."
He smiles, kind, but his eyes are dark and Jared can feel the desire, as though
it radiated from his skin. "I would like to kiss you, Jared," he says, and
Jared sucks a breath in between his teeth.
"Please," he manages, and Emile leans in and does just that.
His mouth is—oh, the spark of it, lighting up a heat in Jared's belly, like
lightning to dry tinder. Jared remembers his lessons, the appropriate movements
rising up without him needing to think. He slides his hands up Emile's chest,
the fine silk of his jacket warm under Jared's palms, and Emile catches the
back of his neck in a smooth wide palm, his mouth firm and precise, bending
Jared's head back just a little with gentle force. When he licks in Jared opens
for it, easily, but he makes a faint noise he didn't expect and feels the blood
rush hot in him.
Emile pulls back, just a little, and smiles. "Good," he says, like Jared's done
something to be praised. "We don't need your practiced arts tonight, Jared, not
this first time. Just let us guide you. All right?"
Jared looks up into his eyes and nods, helpless to do otherwise. Already he
wants this man, more deeply than he thought he could want anyone but Jensen. At
Emile's request he disrobes, sitting on the chaise to remove his boots and then
standing again to shed doublet and shirt and breeches until he's standing in
nothing but his stockings, still tied at the top of his calves. Hilaire smiles
at him and beckons him over, and so he goes, and she kisses him, hands stroking
over all his bare skin. Her mouth tastes of sweet wine and she's gentler than
her husband—who steps up behind Jared, grasping him by the hips and pressing in
close so that Jared can feel the swell of him up against his buttocks, a shock
that makes him gasp into Hilaire's mouth.
"Impressive, no?" she says, winking at him, and he laughs breathlessly.
"Very," he says, faux-serious. He arches his back, just enough that Emile
presses harder against him, and Hilaire grins when Emile makes his own low
groan.
"None of that, now," Emile says. He kisses the topmost knob of Jared's spine,
then reaches over his shoulder and draws a finger down Hilaire's white throat
all the way to the shadow of her cleavage. "Why don't you keep my lady wife
occupied?"
Hilaire raises her eyebrows, inviting, and Jared smiles and kisses her again,
because she makes it easy. He lets his hands drift down to the closures of her
gown, deftly finding the hidden ties and pulling the violet silk away, exposing
her corset and the soft high swell of her breasts. A kiss to each nipple, then,
and a flick of tongue, the names from the Trois Milles Joiesflickering through
his mind as he teases her to budded tight rose. "Oh, treasure," she says, with
a sigh, and he sinks to his knees, knowing instinctively—he raises her skirts,
slipping his palms over the silk of her stockings to the silk of her bare
thighs, his thumbs dragging up and up until they meet the hot damp of her sex.
Ah—and it's soft, the gentle plush of it so real and giving under his touch.
She tips her head down and meets his eyes with a smile, says, "Go on,"
encouraging, and he grins up at her and then licks deep and wide, one steady
stroke before he truly begins the languisement.
"How is he?" Emile says, somewhere beyond the warm haven of Hilaire's thighs.
"Delicious," she says, and makes a soft noise when he lets his nose brush her
pearl of Naamah. She's sensitive, he can tell already, and he keeps it gentle,
probing only lightly and tracing her entrance around and around with his thumb
while she grows ever wetter. "Ah—" she says, breathy. "Emile, remind me to do
something pleasant for you, at some point."
"What shall it be?" he says, amused, and she says, "Oh, I don't—something,
darling, you'll think of—" and then Jared slips a finger inside and sucks at
the mound, more pressure now, and she cuts off with a cry, her muscle clenching
around him. All those hours and hours of practice paying off, now, and Jared
smiles against her, just for a moment. He could do this for the rest of the
night, just this. There's a soft noise, and another hand comes to help hold her
skirts high and out of his way. Emile—and the soft sound above is their kiss,
Hilaire making soft constant moans against her husband's mouth. Jared curls his
finger, in just the way he was taught, and moves his tongue like that, and
Hilaire's hand flashes down to hold the back of his head as her hips lift
and—oh, she ripples around him, wet and clenching, and he holds exactly to the
same motion until her hand unclenches from his hair and she sighs. He lifts his
head, gasping as quietly as he can, and when he does Hilaire and Emile are both
watching him, Emile pleased and Hilaire flushed pink to the brow with pleasure.
He wipes a thumb over his chin and smiles, and she makes a soft noise and tips
over backwards, flopping happily onto the mattress.
"Well, that was easy enough," Emile says, and guides Jared up from the floor.
Hilaire reaches out and thwacks his hip, but weakly, and Emile only lets out a
short laugh and bends to lick into Jared's mouth. He's taking the taste of her,
the brine of it, and Jared shivers. Emile has stripped away his own clothes,
naked together with Jared, and their skin glancing against each other
is—distracting, flickers of pleasure as Emile draws him in close. He may be a
landed chevalier but he has not gone soft, his body firm and strong against
Jared's. His hands drag down to cup Jared's buttocks and they're pressed
together, thighs and hips and chest, Emile's cock pressed in against Jared's
belly.
"Hm," Emile hums, into Jared's mouth. He pulls back, just enough to look down
into his face. "What now, do you think?"
Jared licks his lips. "May I suck your cock?" he says, and it's only honest but
Emile groans, and Hilaire laughs breathlessly from the bed.
"You should let him," she says, lifting up on one elbow. "Then perhaps you'd be
more sympathetic, brute."
"Perhaps next time," he says, bending a smile at Jared, and Jared sucks in a
breath. Next time. "For now, I think…" He slips two fingers into Jared's cleft,
dragging down to where he's soft and oiled, and Jared's breath stops in his
chest.
He's laid out flat on his back. The warmed oil is waiting on a dish for
patrons' use and Emile knows exactly where to go. Hilaire leans over and kisses
Jared, slow steady presses of her lips and tongue, so skilled that Jared
wonders almost if she was trained in the Night Court, and it's almost enough of
a distraction that he forgets what Emile is doing—until oil-slick fingers
return to his entrance and he gasps up against her. She pulls back enough that
they can both watch his face, and he knows that this is part of it, that they
want to see—oh, the moment when his fingers breach Jared's body, warm wet
pressing inside. It's not completely unfamiliar, but it is the first time
someone else has touched him, like this. He draws his thighs farther apart,
higher, welcoming, and Emile laughs softly, fingers burrowing deeper. Hilaire
pets his hair away from his face, smiling at him, and then kisses him again,
her hand slipping down his belly to find his cock, rigid and wanting, playing
idly while Emile stretches him enough to be fucked.
It goes on long enough that Jared has been taken by a fine trembling, his
thighs shuddering and his hands fisted uselessly into the sheets, and by the
time Emile finally says, "All right," his voice a rumble, Jared almost sobs
with relief. Hilaire pulls back and Emile kneels up on the bed, his cock deep
red with waiting, and Jared's mouth waters and he opens, eyes fixed on Emile's
when he falls into place, the simplest position. Emile spreads a hand on the
side of his face, thumb stroking over Jared's cheekbone, and then he—pushes,
and Jared feels his mouth drop open and he drags a leg high up against Emile's
side, because that's—that's—
"Oh," Hilaire says, somewhere, and Emile smears his thumb over Jared's open
mouth and says, "Breathe," amused, and Jared does, a deep shocked inhale that's
pushed right out of him again when Emile begins to thrust, a slow steady
rocking into the cradle of Jared's body. It's—so different, from what he'd
imagined, so very—
He's making a sound, a low continuous spill of moaning, and he should try to
harness it but evidently neither of them mind. Emile kisses his cheek, with a
smile, his hips still moving in that steady surge, the heavy solidity of his
cock moving inside, making a new space for itself. It's so strange that it
doesn't even feel like pleasure—not like the pleasure when Jared has taken
himself in hand, rare though that is. It's too deep, too new and odd. Emile
murmurs, "All right?" and Jared nods, says yes, and yes again, and Hilaire
laughs and Emile shifts, pulling one of Jared's legs up so that his knee is
hooked over Emile's elbow, and that change is enough to—oh, there, and Jared
groans shocked out loud and Hilaire shifts in close, kisses Jared's knee just
above his white silk stocking and then Emile's shoulder, slips her hand down
between them to squeeze his aching cock and says, "Go on, husband," smiling
down into Jared's face, and then—then Emile thrusts hard and Jared yelps, but
it feels so good he arches involuntarily, his hands buried in Emile's dark hair
and his belly and cock and sac all throbbing, and then Emile does it again, and
again, and then it's all Jared can do to hang on, fucked steadily and long and
good, on and on and on until something buried deep in him coils tight, and he
gasps, and then—
He drifts, almost hazy. Emile spills inside him, at some later point, his
thrusting suddenly even slicker, and Jared moans softly for it—then he's being
kissed, by one and then the other, and then they kiss over the top of him,
their mouths making soft wet sounds. He thinks of Jensen, then, for some
reason. His eyes glinting green-gold in the sunlight.
"How was that, treasure?" Hilaire says.
He's smiling already; when he forces his eyes open, Hilaire raises her eyebrows
in amused question and he smiles wider. "Just… wonderful," he says, on a sigh,
and she lets out a delighted little laugh.
They have him again, during the night. Hilaire sheds her gown entirely and he
pleasures her again while Emile rocks into him from behind, doing his utmost to
distract Jared from his duty; she performs the languisement on him while Emile
holds him close against his chest and he shudders and spills, nearly spent,
pleasure radiating through every part.
When he wakes, in the hour before dawn, they're making love beside him,
clinched close. He stretches out on his side of the bed, watching their bodies
move in the half-light from the melted-down candles. Hilaire lets out a soft,
hurt noise when she finishes. Emile bends his head to her breast and rocks in
again, and again, and she cradles him close through those last thrusts. Jared
holds his breath, wonders if he shouldn't be watching—but then she opens her
eyes and sees him, and smiles. Emile holds hard against her hips and shudders,
with a long sigh, and then he turns and looks at Jared, too, and beckons him
close, and they draw him between them and hold him, their bodies still hot with
pleasure and sweat, smelling of their completion. He cries a little, then,
overwhelmed at last. Hilaire pets his hair back from his face and Emile kisses
his temple, tender and kind.
It is full morning, light streaming in through the open windows, when he wakes
again and they're gone. He blinks at the canopy of his new bed. He's sore, but
not unduly so, though he desperately needs a bath. A monumental effort lets him
drag his arms up, and he rubs his eyes. He feels… heavy, his body well-used and
aching pleasantly. A little memory flickers through him and he turns his face
against the warm linen of his pillow, smiling, and then he blinks. On the
sideboard, the sculpture of Naamah's hands—they're full. He staggers out of bed
and finds the purse, heavy with coin, and tied to it with his blue hair-ribbon
a note in a well-educated hand: in homage to Naamah, for her sweetest servant.
He puts the note to his lips and closes his eyes. Soon, he will need to start
the day, and see the others, and report to the Dowayne that all is well. He
will have to count out his patron-gift, and make an appointment with the
marquist. For right now, in this moment standing naked in the warm summer
morning, he presses the note to his chest and stands alone. His whole life has
led him to this point. He smiles, to himself, and looks out the window to the
new day. At last, years of waiting and training and hoping behind him, he is a
true Servant of Naamah.
 
End Notes
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