961

It felt like St. Agvir's Day couldn't come early enough that year. For near on two weeks (or 19 days, 285 hours, 28500-some minutes, any way he thought about it, it was entirely too long), no matter the time of day that he rode up from Maurgen Hundred to Ostinhold, his favorite cousin had been nowhere to be found. Cailet kept him company when she wasn't buried in one of her books or reluctantly doing schoolwork, but as entertaining as her commentary on Ostinhold's denizens could be, it wasn't the same as Alin's voice alternating between soft and cutting while he talked about everything from history to horses to his eldest sister's horrible taste in men.

Today, he had decided to take matters into his own hands. Cailet swore that the Scholar Mage returned with Alin—from wherever they went each day—over two hours before, more than enough time for Alin to have eaten, washed, and responded to any of Val's twenty-seven notes. (It had been one every other day, at first, then one each day, then somewhere around day 12 things began spiraling out of control. It wasn't his fault Ostinhold was so close by, that multiple couriers traveled between their homes every day, or that persistence—not obstinacy, thanks much, whatever Alin might say—was in the Maurgen blood.)

What might be considered wings anywhere else were, at Ostinhold with its organic growth in all directions across centuries, usually called "sprawls." Alin's favorite quiet spot was near where his older sister Margit once had a small suite, at the tail end of the North sprawl. Trailing along behind Val, Cailet's footsteps drifted from side to side as they walked up a narrow, crooked side hallway that would take them as far as the third-oldest addition, her light voice echoing off mismatched walls. "Then I told Taig what Geria said to me, that I should go to Lady Lilen for the money that she was trying to steal from me to begin with, and..."

Nodding where it seemed wanted, Val let her chatter wash over him; the First Daughter of the Ostin Blood was the embodiment of petty greed, and even if he could wish for better timing, Cai deserved to vent about her. They reached the fourth branching of the hallway and he turned, then led them up the second stairway to the third floor of the second-newest addition. "...But Taig slapped her, Val! He hit her! And her nose was bleeding everywhere!"

Now that was less usual. Hadn't happened in years, probably since he'd been Cailet's age, but he remembered a good handful of times that First Daughter Geria had pushed one of her siblings too far and been made to eat dirt. He told Cai as much—her expression was somewhere between appalled and gleeful—and tried to remember whether they needed to take the first or second turn after the blue door on the right side. She picked up the thread of the story again as he decided to try the second.

This new hallway had almost no light, though there was enough to see that the walls had been painted bright orange in an effort to counteract that. The ceiling was low and uneven enough that he found himself hunching down nearly to Alin's height to be certain that nothing would catch the fabric of his brown coif and pull it against his throat, even if the laces were untied, as had become his habit since turning fifteen at the start of the year. (Alin scoffed at what he called Val's attempts to appear dashing and just rebellious enough for the kind of girl willing to sneak around with a son of a Third like him, and...well, to be fair, there wasn't much he could argue with there, but he felt compelled each time regardless.)

Cailet had backtracked to tell him about the first two books in the series that she'd asked Geria to pick up the third in, and while the scraps he registered did sound like an interesting story, and he felt bad not giving her his usual attention, they were about to reach the trickiest part of their trek: a hop down from the window straight ahead in this dead end hallway to a thankfully wide, but still nerve-wracking, ledge.

"Taig gave me the third one for my Birthingday, and..." The shutters against the Waste's acid storms were latched so tightly that he had to put his back into it, trying to loosen the hooks; her story trailing off, Cailet came up to help after a moment, her small fingers wriggling in to unlatch each one as it came free. That sorted, they pushed the shutters back, and he threw one leg over the windowsill. She took his offered hands, and he lowered Cailet down to the ledge, then shimmied around in preparation to slide down himself. Her pale hair fluttered in the dry wind as she peered up at him where he balanced half in and half out of the window. "But Val, there was something Taig said, it's still bothering me."

"What's that?"

"He said..." She paused again while he twisted his other (much too long for this) leg up and over the sill. "I know Geria's always bullying them, or trying to, but Taig said this time she's..."

Val dropped to the ledge and cocked a brow at her. Her face was screwed up like she was chewing on the sourest fruit out of Tillinshir. After a moment, he huffed a laugh and beckoned her to follow him.

"Geria's been bullying Alin into signing a contract, she—"

He stopped dead two steps down the ledge.

"—wants to marry him off. Hey—!"

Val spun around, one hand flying out without conscious thought to catch Cailet's shoulder before she could stumble off the edge. "He didn't, did he?" While Lady Lilen lived, Geria was limited in what she could do to her siblings, but that had rarely stopped her from trying. "...Is that why he's been ignoring me?" Ah, he realized, that's what I've been feeling, then?

The look she had on now was frankly judgmental. He couldn't tell if it meant she thought he was completely wrong, or completely stupid for not figuring it out earlier.

"...Cai. Go back inside." Now her bottom lip stuck out and she started to look Maurgen-like, which was to say, obstinate, but he was firm. "I'll come tell you if I found Alin before I go! Just...please." He held out clasped hands to boost her back up through the window, and finally she let him do it.

Alone, he took stock. Alin...may or may not be around two corners and up half a story. If he wasn't, then Val truly didn't know Alin's mind anymore at all and might as well go find a cock-broker to sell away the rest of his miserable life. If he was, then...well.

That was the question, wasn't it?

The sun was setting, his backside hurt, his legs were starting to get tired of dangling over the side of the ledge, and Val still hadn't figured out what was going on.

One part he'd narrowed down—he felt adrift, was what it was. Even after they'd both left Longriding Academy—Val was a year ahead to begin with, but between his wandering attention in school and Alin's driven brilliance, they'd come out at the same time—near every day had been spent in Alin's company one way or another. In the back of his mind, of course he'd known that Alin as a son of the Ostin Blood had a certain value that could be measured in gold and influence (beyond his personal qualities that Val just so happened to find priceless beyond any worldly measure). But when he thought about his future without Alin in it, and somehow much more to the point, with Alin the property of some woman Geria had picked out, his gut twisted.

It certainly wasn't what he'd expected to find and muddle through in himself when he'd rolled out of bed determined to storm Ostinhold this morning.

Well, no matter. It was past time for Alin to be coming inside to eat, if he truly had been out here all this time.

The wind was whipping around the furthest point of the North sprawl by the time Val got himself in hand and traveled the length of the final addition. It blew Alin's golden-white hair hard across his eyes and tugged at the burnt orange coif shoved down to his nape, a sight that inspired a queer ache in Val's chest.

"You idiot, have you really been out here all this time?"

Alin started, shoulders twitching, but his face staring out into the hills of the Waste remained as stiff as stone.

"You know I..." Val hesitated, cursed himself for a fool. Sighed and moved across to flop down beside Alin. "If you've been avoiding me because you think I'd ever give up on my best cousin even if he's shuffled off on some undeserving woman a continent away, stop, because you know I would f—"

Follow you.

It wasn't what he'd planned on ending that sentence with, but now that it'd happened, he realized it was true.

"That's not it." Alin had the scratchy voice of someone who'd been silently fuming into the Waste for hours, but his sideways half-glare was as fresh as if it were half-Fourth and Val had shaken him awake for a marvelous dawn ride. (Mostly for the reaction, he had to admit, but also because there was something about the way the rising sun was sifted through Alin's sleep-mussed hair that satisfied any restlessness in him.)

"Hah, is that so? Then what is it?" He tried not to look at Alin, because he knew it would immediately turn into peering right into his face and shoving his hair out of the way to stare him down until Alin spilled, the way he'd done when they were in single digits. But it had never been so difficult.

"It's—I didn't want to see what you—the magic, you know?" Alin's voice had settled properly a few months ago now, but it still misbehaved when he was under stress, and right now it was all over the place. Val winced on his behalf, no matter that Alin continued to have absolutely no expression. "It's, I thought it would change something—us, change us. That I'm Mageborn."

Val swung his head around to frankly stare at Alin, eyes the widest he thought they'd ever be. There was nothing to say to that level of foolishness, really. But if he had to try, and he did, since this was Alin: "You know, it's not as though you suddenly became Mageborn now and you haven't been all along, there is that 'born' part right there in the word."

Alin whipped his head around to stare at Val, with a betrayed look on his face that yet had some hint of fragile hope.

"You idiot," Val said again, comfortable. "It's been two weeks, the twenty-seven notes weren't clue enough that you'll never be rid of me?"

Alin mouthed 'twenty-seven' to himself, eyebrows rising.

"...So you didn't even bother to count. Hmph."

Val ducked the shove that Alin sent him, and chuckled. It wasn't right just yet, but now he had an end to unravel, and that was better than he'd started the day.

"You know I wouldn't leave you," Alin said after a few minutes' silence.

"You know I wouldn't let you leave." Val slid an arm around him and tugged until Alin gave in and then nearly collapsed into his chest. The shaking that began a moment later was a little concerning, but, he figured, it had probably been years since Alin had last done anything close to cry and this had been a hell of a couple weeks.

The sun was nearly down. "Let's go inside, huh?" Val told the boy huddled against his chest—no, truly, Alin was a man now, wasn't he, fourteen and with his magic come?

That was an odd thought, prickling uncomfortably down his back, and he had no idea why.

...Ah well. Right now he needed to live up to his name and provide, even if it was only scrounging dinner. He chivvied Alin into getting up to lead the way back inside, the setting sun turning golden hair blood-crimson in front of him.