Too Close to the Sun

by wtfel

Or, "An Exploration on the Emotions of an Outwardly Emotionless Man." In which Rommath and Kael are the best of friends, until they very suddenly aren't. (Featuring unsolicited commentary by Aethas Sunreaver.)

10. -VIII-

-VIII-

"Kael…?" Rommath repeated.

The prince hadn't heard. He stared at the horizon as they strode through Silvermoon's streets, squinting against the sunlight. "Hm?"

"The sky." His gaze flicked across the crowds clinging to the sidewalk—Feth's Way was full of rich folk and windowshoppers, but today, all eyes were on the prince. "Beautiful isn't it?"

Kael spared him a sidelong glance, complete with his characteristic crooked smile. "Didn't notice," he told him. "The colors—a good omen, you think?"

Shrugging beneath the weight of his backpack, Rommath lifted his eyes back to the clouds. "I'm praying."

"Well, don't waste your breath," said the prince. That glance of his was rapidly approaching the border between polite and prying. "Ought to save it for your introduction."

Rommath frowned. "You said I sounded fine."

"Yes, well—" The prince waved a hand, either dismissing the comment or the busty lass who grinned at him from across the street. "—it did sound fine at five in the morning," he told him. "Sounded even better when you promised it was the last time before bed."

"Do you think it needs more work?"

The prince pinched the bridge of his nose, letting out a lengthy sigh. "More?"

"I'm stressed," Rommath said matter-of-factly.

"You're always stressed," Kael muttered. "I don't know how you can live like this, honestly. One day your heart's just going to quit on you, I swear."

Rommath's frown deepened.

"Oh, don't—" Kael shoved at his shoulder. "Stop that. The thing with your lip. Don't be all pouty, now—"

"—I'm not pouting—"

"—you look pathetic when you pout. If you make that face in front of the grand magister, he's going to think you're a fool."

"You're not very helpful," Rommath told him.

"I stayed up till dawn packing your things with you!" he cried, incredulous.

And had promptly passed out sprawled on the floor with a pile of Rommath's possessions as his pillow at the first sight of light on the horizon. But Rommath had woken beside him, so he wasn't in much of a mood to complain.

"Would you feel better if you gave it one more try?" Kael asked, pushing the words past his lips on an exasperated sigh.

Rommath shrugged. He supposed he'd feel better if he knew the next time they'd be seeing each other.

An intrusive thought, cramming its way into his cluttered mind and dredging up a dozen other Kael-themed images with it.

He banished them with a smile—false, but convincing enough to do its job. Didn't suppose the prince would recognize it anyhow, if this was the first time Rommath had faked it for him.

"Go on then," Kael told him. "Show me some confidence."

Rommath cleared his throat, a vain attempt to dislodge some of the emotion that strangled him silent. "G-Greetings, Grand Magister Salonar. Archmage Rommath, of the Kirin Tor. It's an honor to make your acquaintance." He lifted his chin a little, because the prince had said it made him look less like he'd just pissed himself out of sheer fear. Or perhaps that had only applied at five in the morning. "And then I'll shake his hand and smile."

Kael shook his head, ashamed. "Louder," he ordered. "Doesn't matter if you've got the best smile in Silvermoon if he can't hear a word you're saying. Try again."

"What's this about my smile now?"

"Try again."

Rommath sucked in a steady breath. "Greetings, Grand Magister—"

"Louder," Kael insisted.

"Greetings—"

"Louder."

"That's it," he said helplessly. "I don't—I can't get any louder."

The prince graced him with the suggestive smirk he usually saved for someone he wanted to bring to bed. "So they all say."

"Why are you like this?"

"Lacking parental guidance and an utter absence of role model material," the prince replied. "Now let me see that smile."

Rommath gave him the same smile he'd been giving strangers since he was eight. He'd practiced it for four hours at his brother's wake; by the time his father decided to have their family portrait repainted, just the two of them, he'd just about perfected it. Not that it mattered, anyway. The High Minister of Arcane Magic had destroyed the painting down to the frame within a week. Didn't like to look at it.

"A real smile, if you would," Kael told him.

"That's as real as it gets," Rommath said flatly.

The prince rolled his eyes, surely oblivious to the glint they gave off when he set his stare skyward—gold flecks in his gaze, glittering like the sun itself.

To Rommath, he might as well have been.

But to the prince, it was just a simple gesture, the prelude to another drawn-out sigh—same-old, same-old.

"Eventually, you're going to realize you're a fool for trying to fool me," the prince told him. "But in the meantime, are you sure you've got everything?"

Rommath stopped short at the street corner. "This it?"

The spire that stood before them stretched a good six stories skyward, with banners that soared so high they seemed to scrape the clouds and a shadow that stretched halfway down the street.

Daunting.

Kael tossed an arm around his friend, clapping him on the shoulder for some sort of comfort. "You've got nothing to worry about, all right?"

"But what if—"

"You brought a spare pair of boots?"

"Yes, but—"

"Good. And gloves?"

"Yes, but Kael—"

"Fireproofed?"

"Of course. I was just—"

"Brushes?"

"Mmhm, I j—"

"All of them?"

"I'm just here for a week—"

"Just in case. You know you'll be upset if you want to do something with those bangs of yours."

Rommath sighed, counting them off on his hand: "Soft-bristled, boar-bristled, round brush, fine-toothed comb, wide-toothed comb, teasing brush—"

"Hair product?"

"Yes, Kael."

"All right, all right, so you didn't forget anything." The prince wet his lips—there was a weak spot in his smile. "Long as you remember to come visit me, hm?"

"Forget you?" Rommath watched the prince turn away through wind-whipped hair. "I couldn't if I wanted to."

The prince's lips twitched, just the slightest of smiles, and maybe it was just the time of day—a trick of the light, perhaps—but it seemed to shine. Blinding.

Rommath wanted to reach for him, clutch at his clothes, pull him close for a proper goodbye, but the scene was a hauntingly familiar one, and he didn't suppose the prince would hear if he called his name either.

So he smiled his false smile as Kael blended back into the crowd, save for that white-gold hair of his, so pale it seemed to throw the sunshine right back to the sky, like some mid-afternoon moon or the like—

—and then, in a flash of arcane, the prince materialized before him, so close Rommath could feel the air buzzing with the telltale tingle of a teleportation spell. Dangerously close, in fact—if Kael had miscalculated by even a centimeter, he might've ended up inside him, and while Rommath had admittedly entertained the thought on more than a few occasions, that wasn't at all the way he'd hoped it would happen.

But the prince's spellwork was, as usual, perfection—effortlessly so, enviably so.

His words, on the other hand...less so. "C'mere," he mumbled, a clumsy foreword to a clumsy embrace—nearly sent them both sprawling.

Rommath reeled accordingly, breathless and winded. But he held on, clung to Kael like his final breath.

"You'd better take care of yourself," the prince muttered, spitting out bits of hair as he spoke. "I'm serious."

"Now, there's a first," Rommath wheezed.

"Fuck, Rom, I'm not kidding," he insisted. "You've just—you've got to, all right?"

It could've been a threat or a plea; sometimes it was impossible to tell with him.

Rommath smiled anyhow, an assurance and apology all in one. "I will."

The prince pulled back, holding him by the shoulders as he scanned him over for any trace of falsehood. "Good. Don't think I won't take the first portal back here the instant I hear even the faintest whisper—no, breath—of any rumors that you're—you're—" He paused as his gaze and his grip slipped lower, tracing the marks along Rommath's arms through silken sleeves. "Promise me, Rommath. Swear you'll take care of yourself."

He managed a nod for him. "On my honor."

For a moment, Kael stood there staring, just two cobblestones between them; his princely posture suffered when he deflated his lungs for one last sigh, but that smirk of his was bleeding relief.

In that moment, he looked less like royalty and more like Kael the boy.

Kael who skipped lessons to frolic in the snow and never ate his carrots and cried when he was alone. Kael who suffered from stress dreams, the same ones, again and again, Kael who sneaked into Rommath's sheets to steal a pillow when he when he woke scared and sobbing, Kael who swore he'd shear off all Rommath's hair if he so much as breathed a word of this to anyone, Kael who was always snoring softly at his side when the sun slipped through the curtains. Said he was sorry every time, never meant it.

But the moment passed, as moments do, and he'd collected his confidence with crossed arms and a crooked grin. "Go on then. Remember, louder." He lifted one hand, aglow with a whirl of arcane, fingers twitching in the shape of a spell—long-distance teleportation, this one would take him far. "And smile. A real one. I did mean what I said—best in Silvermoon, all right?"

The prince was swallowed up by a burst of violet before Rommath could reply, but it mattered little. He was smiling—a "real" one, however bittersweet.

And after an appropriate wait, which he spent summoning up the courage to march up the stairs, he stood on the top step to the grand magister's spire, hands shaking when his knuckles met wood.

The second the grand magister showed up at the door was the second that Rommath began to realize the grand magister was nothing close to what he'd expected.

He showed up at the door, for one. And promptly, at that.

Belo'vir Salonar was a bit skinny, even for sorcerer, though one wouldn't have guessed he had a drop of magic in his blood at a glance. He kept his hair cropped short and combed like a common man, and he dressed much the same, clad in lynxskin leathers and a less-than-striking brass chain that plunged past his collar, weighed down by a pendant hidden somewhere in his tunic.

Keen eyes, though. He kept them pinned to the pages of a tome he'd stuffed with scraps of paper till the spine bent, seeming to skip from margin to margin as he scribbled along the borders.

Rommath got a good look at them when the grand magister glanced up at him, waiting patiently for him to say something—anything, Rommath realized.

"Greetings, Grand Magister Sal—"

"Belo'vir is just fine," he interrupted, lips tracing a couple silent words as he went on writing. "No need for titles."

Rommath cleared his throat—a meager attempt to swallow his doubt that almost had him choking. "M-My name is Archmage—"

"You must be the boy from Dalaran," said the grand magister. "The accent speaks for you."

He hadn't rehearsed for this. All the words he'd practiced fell back down his throat, and Silvermoon's best smile was looking more like a vacant stare.

Salonar spared him a glance between pages. "Name?"

"Rommath," he answered. At least he sounded certain of that much.

Belo'vir lifted his gaze from the pages, looking him up and down before his eyes settled back on the book. "So you're Edienor's boy?"

The question stung him. Rommath told himself it didn't, but it did.

"You're damned near identical, the two of you." He turned on his heel as he resumed writing, nodding for Rommath to follow. "Down to that nick in your eyebrow."

Absently, he ran a finger along the rend in his brow. "My...um, father's is on the other side…"

"Hm," said Salonar. "I haven't seen him in eons. But I knew him well, years ago." He tossed Rommath a glance over his shoulder. "Do come in, would you? Please. Yes, walk briskly, if you will. Forgive me, I've got dinner to prepare. How is your Darnassian?"

The grand magister walked briskly indeed, turning corners with a crisp pivot and scaling his spiral stairwells two steps at a time.

A ghost of a smile touched Rommath's awestricken expression as he trailed the grand magister down a cavern of a corridor. "Decent," he breathed. "Haven't spoken it in some time, but I can read it well enough."

"I see." Salonar came to a precise halt about halfway down a hall somewhere on the sixth floor, facing Rommath with his nose still buried in his book. "You pack light," he noted, with a polite smile peeking out from the pages. "I admire that."

As he shifted beneath its weight, Rommath wasn't so sure. It seemed a lot for just a week-long stay, but Kael had insisted he bring along everything he could carry ("just in case!"), and Rommath hadn't the heart to admit he'd been hoping he'd have to come back to Dalaran.

"You can leave your belongings in the room on the right," he said, and went on annotating again.

Until Rommath reached for the right-hand doorknob, anyhow.

The grand magister shut the tome with a snap, tossing it to the throes of a levitation spell to give him a hand free to pull the door shut before Rommath even got a whiff of whatever lay beyond—mothballs and mildew, judging by the gust of stale air that escaped with a whoosh as the door clicked closed.

Salonar smiled stiffly past the tome suspended in the air between them, spinning idly on the breeze. "My right," he clarified.

The dust stung his eyes, but chagrin stung worse. "Apologies," he choked, lowering his eyes. "I thought I—I didn't mean to overstep any—"

"No, no." Belo'vir cut him off with a curt wave, but the words weren't unkind. "Simple mistake, if it qualifies as a mistake at all. We'll call it a misunderstanding, how's that?" He frowned. "Stop looking like I'm going to smack you, if you would. Makes me a tad uncomfortable."

Rommath wet his lips, still wary. "Apologies."

"Nonsense," said Salonar, dismissing it with a flick of his wrist.

To his credit, Rommath didn't flinch—blinked a little harder than usual, but that was all.

"Eyes up, young man," he told him. "You know, I always thought if I sired any children, I'd send them to Dalaran. Not so strict as Silvermoon—they don't strike their students there, at least." He kept his stare earnest. "But you had teachers before Telestra, didn't you?"

The blush had washed out of Rommath's cheeks in a matter of seconds, leaving his face blanched and bloodless.

"You thought I'd invite a stranger into my home without doing some research first?" The grand magister's eyes glimmered, foreshadowing a good-humored grin. "What kind of scholar would that make me?"

A poor one, he supposed, but that didn't sound like the right reply. "I—" Rommath tried, but the sound died in his throat. "Apologies."

"It was a joke," Belo'vir explained. "Or an attempt, at the least." He shook his head. "Fear not, lad. You're not my student, and I don't think I'd want you walking around with any scars shaped like my signet ring even if you were."

Rommath took a breath—felt like his first in centuries. "Yes, milord."

"Not to say you won't be doing any learning here, but I'd prefer not to treat you one, that's all," he said, nudging the book in Rommath's direction. "Would prefer you didn't treat yourself like one either, if it's all the same to you."

He tugged the book out of the air, hugging it close to his chest till the spell wore off.

"Translated a good chunk of it already, but rest assured, I've left plenty for you." He tapped at the book's leather-bound spine for emphasis. "Don't feel rushed or anything—it's nothing pressing. Ought to get yourself settled before you do anything else, really."

A frown pulled at Rommath's lips. "You...don't want to ask me any questions…?"

"Questions?" Belo'vir echoed. "We've got the rest of our indefinite futures to get to know each other, boy. No questions. I've got a dinner to prepare." He flashed him a grin—pride, but not the usual highbrow arrogance magi wore. "Should give you fair warning, I've got a couple of guests coming up. Nothing extravagant, but...I'm sure they'd be delighted to meet you."

"Me?" he asked, hoarse with disbelief.

"I might've told them about you—just a bit, not a lot—well, maybe a lot, but not in a weird way, I assure you. More of...ah, eager anticipation. Not a big deal."

"Told them about me?"

"You're the new aide, are you not?" It had the makings of another joke, but there was a hint of suspicion somewhere beneath Belo'vir's sarcasm. "Light, I hope I didn't send for the wrong Rommath…"

The young man shrugged a shoulder in a most reluctant agreement. This was by far the most unconventional interview he'd ever seen. "I guess I am."

He suddenly felt very glad that he'd packed all his brushes.

"Good." Salonar slapped him on the shoulder, and this time, he didn't even bat an eye. "I'll leave you to it, then. Dinner in two hours. An hour and a half if it all goes well, but...bet on two hours."

Rommath had lived in Dalaran long enough to recognize that a teleportation spell twitching on someone's fingertips translated to a farewell in any language. He didn't take any offense when the grand magister vaporized into thin—albeit smoky—air.

When the arcane residue had cleared out of his lungs, he figured it was about time to stop standing there staring aimlessly at the floor and head into the right room.

His room, he supposed. And by the Well, if it didn't exceed his every expectation.

Seemed more like a wing than a room at all, with a floor wider than his house back in Dalaran and vaulted ceilings high enough to fit at least four of him—a remarkable feat, considering how often he was teased for his long legs. Three wall-length bookshelves, brimming, two desks with high-backed chairs, and a bed that was just as regal—done up in sheets of Silvermoon blue, with an absurd amount of disk-shaped pillows populating the upper half.

His.

All his.

Of course, he'd miss Dalaran—or Kael, if he was being completely honest, and since there was no one else to see, he was. But Light, he had his own little library here. Enough books to keep him distracted for a lifetime, perhaps two.

But he'd start with the one in his arms. He hoped to have it finished by dinner, eager as ever to make a good impression—or to make up for the impression he'd already made. After all, he had "the rest of his indefinite future" to explore his quarters. So he chose the taller of the two desks, cracked open the tome at the middle, where Belo'vir had marked his place, and a picked up a quill pen.

Historical Highborne texts were simple work, but by no means painless. They all read the same, with all that flowery prose they'd passed down to the quel'dorei, and invariably fell into one of three categories when it came to content: Queen Azshara, ancient arcane, or some combination thereof.

Light of Lights and Her Lady's Royal Courts was no exception to this rule. One thousand six hundred twenty-three pages on nobility under Azshara, and then nobility on top of Azshara, whom the author claimed to have kept no less than eighteen royal consorts, at any given time.

Azshara didn't seem very discriminatory when it came to her company. Tall elves, short elves, light elves, dark elves, elves dressed in the finest of silks, elves scarcely dressed at all, ladies and lords alike—the queen welcomed anyone who was willing to kneel for her.

In the words of Her Majesty's Sixth Royal Scribe, "Immortality breeds decadence."

Rommath couldn't suppress a smile when a certain Sunstrider came to mind.

Selective breeding put the prince just four generations down from the very elves that crossed the Great Sea, after all—it was no small wonder that the prince had been born so susceptible to self-indulgence. In fact, if the sixth royal scribe spoke the truth, Kael could've been way worse off.

(Worse off being one of the numerous poor souls who'd died due to suffocation when Azshara's famed "rosepetal roof" collapsed, though all the survivor accounts said it was a true spectacle, not to be missed.)

Rommath heaved a sigh, clearing his lungs and his thoughts of princes with them, and went on with his tedious work with renewed vigor.

Which lasted about ten minutes, anyway, till he reached a...particularly detailed page of illustrations featuring some particularly detailed depictions of an Aszunian orgy to commemorate the coming of age of some young prince, who had been presented with a number of...enlarged genitalia in celebration, exaggerated to show "particular detail."

His conscious brain said to roll his eyes and easily acknowledged the excessively explicit art.

His subconscious brain was sending a sizable sum of his blood rushing south, effectively silencing its counterpart.

But Rommath had spent his "formative" years sharing a room with the subject of all his sexual fantasies, see, and if he hadn't learned some semblance of self-control early only...he didn't like to think what might've happened had Kael caught him "studying under the sheets."

Well...maybe he liked to indulge his imagination from time to time. It was actually a pretty common subject of the aforementioned sexual fantasies, but—

Stop.

He didn't need to dwell on that, not now. He had pressing matters to attend to. None of which included the matter pressing against the inseam of his pants.

He gripped the pen a bit tighter, because he supposed he had to grip something, and the quillpen was the most prominent—no, productive, productive, Rommath—most productive object in sight.

You're better than this.

Rommath had been breathing for nearly two decades by this point—now was not the time for exact dates—and he had never punctuated a sentence so precisely as he did when he'd finished with that page. He let the ink bleed as he sighed and swallowed and steeled his nerves, ready for relief when he flipped to the next—

And instead found a full-page, full-color, graphic elaboration of the fertility festival of the spring solstice. Not that Rommath needed any elaboration—Silvermoon had plenty just like it, and the high elves had dragged all their traditions down to Dalaran—but he'd never seen anything quite so...dramatic…

Fucking Highborne.

No, no. Think of—I don't know, any other descriptor. Please.

Think of—just...don't think. That's better.

Using his free hand like a blinder, he trained his gaze on the opposite page, with his pen pressing ever-harder against the parchment. For the four minutes following, his handwriting had never been worse.

But ultimately, his critical mistake was trying to distract himself from all that detail by letting his mind drift toward the art itself—who painted it, how had their hand stayed so steady, could they teach him how to do that, how long had it taken, how had the models used as reference felt—

Light, no. Rommath. Stop.

He slouched deeper into his chair, sacrificing good posture to dedicate all his energy to self-restraint.

All right. All right. Lean back, breathe. Yes. Like that.

Another. No, a deep breath.

Deeper.

Deeper than—

Rommath. No.

Think about...frost spells? Okay, that's a good one. Frost spells. Could always work on those. The...ah, the intricacies of complex frost barriers, lattice-patterned ice versus web-patterned—I hate frost spells.

Ice water, maybe? That's cold. And easier.

Very cold water. Cold, stale bathwater. Gross. Probably forgot my towel, again.

Saw towels on the shelf above the bed, though.

Bet you could use them to clean up—

He exhaled a shaky sigh, fingers twitching absently as they strained in search of something to occupy their attention, besides the obvious.

You're useless, you know. Seven hundred pages of ancient Highborne text to translate, minus however many full-page illustrations, and you're sitting here trying to persuade yourself that your time's not better spent pleasuring yourself on that pile of absurd looking pillows.

Useless.

But the door locks. It's a sign.

So he went for the towel anyhow.

The desk was only a few wobbly steps from where he stood, and that accursed book only a few inches farther, but Rommath didn't have any intentions of returning to that tome till he'd sorted out the situation it had risen. He took a seat on the edge of the bed instead—not on, but adjacent to those absurd-looking pillows.

To hell with the book. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it quickly, and unless that tome had an updated afterword on the Sunstrider dynasty and its youngest heir, he'd have better luck relying on his vivid imagination.

Kael was long-gone by now—had probably already picked a pretty companion for the evening, maybe even a couple—but Rommath had spent enough evenings with the prince snoozing on his shoulder to visualize his weight there, effortlessly.

And he'd watched Kael kiss enough girls from the armchair across the parlor, forgotten, to picture himself perfectly in their place—how the prince always twisted up the hair at the base of their necks, gripped tight at shoulders, hips, bones where he could hold tight to their very frames.

He'd heard the youngest Sunstrider shudder a sigh along their throats, hot breath on skin wet with kisses, made their skin tingle and break into goosebumps, and they were always so captivated by Kael's lips that they never noticed when he worked his way into the ties of their clothes.

The prince had often said that all Sunstriders were sorcerers, in every sense of the word; always spoke the words through a smirk.

As often as he'd found himself the tagalong to all Kael's misadventures, Rommath had a good idea just which methods the prince favored—could play them out effortlessly on the backs of his eyelids as they fluttered closed, paired with a smirk of his own as he slipped a slick hand past the laces of his pants.

But the smile was short-lived anyhow, succeeded by a shiver when his fingers found their grip on something slightly more satisfying than a pen, settling on a steady pace so as not to interrupt the increasingly explicit works of his mind.

His thoughts made the seamless transition from kissing to graceless grinding, hips knocking clumsily against each other in the loosest definition of rhythm and chests pressed so close there was only a breath between them—rapid breathing, flanks heaving.

Rommath had never seen Kael undress anyone—the prince usually asked for some privacy when he started tugging at his trousers—but he had a few theories regarding his technique, none of which were all that gentle. Pulling, tugging, yanking—never tearing, even princes had their boundaries, and for someone who seemed so intent on unclothing all of Dalaran, he'd always been fond of fabrics and finery.

Once they'd stripped down to the last layer, just skin against skin, then Kael would take it upon himself to fuck him, as Kael was wont to do—and brutally, at that. Hasty, desperate, white-knuckled, pulse-pounding, please-please-please-don't-stop fucking. The kind that even made "sex" sound too intimate—even his boundless imagination couldn't fall for a fantasy that resembled anything more—more, more, Light—

But he didn't have to imagine the tension building in his tendons, or the occasional intermittent jerk of his hips, or his lungs as they made the sudden subtle shift from breaths to gasps, just shy of groans. What little air he had left pushed its way past his lips with an unceremonious moan, cut short by teeth clenched in his lower lip. And when the lust spilled over, it did so quite literally, beading on the bathtowel, cooling as it sank through the linen, darkening into splotches that mirrored the spots in Rommath's vision.

The scenes that lined his mind ground to a halt as his senses returned to him, one by one, followed in due time by a welcome surge of blood to his brain as his heart began pumping properly once more.

He rode out the headrush flat on his back, eyelids heavy as his pulse roared in his ears, with four half-moon marks fading from his palm and his heart beating like a cadence in his chest; as Kael faded from his thoughts, so did all else.

---

"Should I just leave it by the door?"

Rommath blinked blindly at the darkness before him, lashes fluttering as his mind scrambled to put his thoughts in order.

No sun streaming through the west-facing window, no light at all, save the yellow glow leaking in from beneath the door, divided in two by the shadow knocking at his door.

"A moment please," he called, running his tongue over chapped lips. "A-Apologies, I'll be right there."

Light, he hadn't meant to fall asleep—but then, when did he ever?

Rommath made himself decent as he could manage as he stumbled through the darkness, smoothing out his composure—and his shirt, for that matter—as he unlocked the door.

He was met with a curtsy from a quaint-looking lass, sun-tanned shoulders and copper hair tied back in a ponytail, with a little crease under each eye that suggested she spent a lot of her time smiling.

She held a platter nestled in the crook of one freckled forearm, stacked with fresh fruits and a myriad of skewered meats. "Dinner," she explained, offering him custody of the food. "Belo'vir had me run it up to you. Figured you were busy unpacking and all." She flicked her gaze toward his bedhead, but smothered her smile behind a few fingers. "I've got another theory, myself."

Rommath smoothed self-consciously at his hair, tucking a loose strand behind his ear. He had neither the heart nor the audacity to correct her.

"Some sliced melon, about six sorts of grapes for you, blackberries, few types of truffles, couple raspberry tarts, and then you've got a nice assortment of meats—rabbit, pheasant, sauteed lynx, roast lynx, um, more lynx, and the potatoes, which I highly recommend." She grinned. "Hear they're a real treasure."

One whiff and he believed her. But knowing Silvermoon's nobility like he did, Rommath would've wagered Salonar's kitchen staff was trained to a much higher standard of culinary excellence than anyone within Dalaran's walls.

Telestra had raised her boys on porridge and bread with holes where she'd carved out the moldy bits. Rommath hadn't eaten anything the likes of this since he was eight years old and his life still made sense. He wondered if Kelemir was still manning his father's kitchens, and the rest of the estate when the High Minister of Arcane Magic wouldn't leave his locked study.

"I made the potatoes," she said, speaking the words like a secret.

He nodded politely, mumbled his thanks with one hand resting on the doorknob.

The girl did not take the hint. She swayed to and fro instead, cheerfully oblivious to his discomfort. "Of course!" She clasped her hands behind her back as she rocked on her heels. "If you need anything else, don't hesitate to ask. But, um..."

"Ah," Rommath realized with a start. "Apologies. You're dismissed."

"Dismissed…?" She halted mid-sway, staggering a couple steps in an effort to keep her balance—quite literally taken aback. "Well. The way Belo'vir was going on about you, I'd have guessed you were at least marginally less arrogant than the rest of the sorcerers in this Lightforsaken city," she said with a scoff. "Just what Silvermoon needs, another self-centered prick who thinks they're the next sun, come to redirect the tides or some shit. But I'll bet the only thing big enough for that is your damned ego."

Rommath ignored her deliberate glare, directed right below his belt. "Well, the sun doesn't affect the tides all that—" Light, she looks scarier. "—ah, um, nevermind."

"What?"

"The moons," he mumbled, hasty and unintelligible, at least he hoped. "The moons control the tides."

"Oh, whatever. Try to make you feel welcome and this is what I get. Condescension, plain and simple." She stopped short to suck in a breath, but her glare never wavered, not for a heartbeat. "Being compassionate doesn't put me beneath you, y'know. It's that mindset that makes this city so damned miserable all the time. And all the socialites sit around with their fake smiles wondering why everyone north of the Elrendar is about as emotionally accessible as an arcane construct. Light. Fucking absurd, that's what it is."

Rommath stood there, stiffer than a preybeast pinned down beneath her state.

"Nothing? You don't have anything to say for yourself?" she asked. "Wouldn't want to seem approachable or anything, would you? Light forbid—give me that—" She snatched a single tart off the rim of his plate, but he learned in a matter of split-seconds that no amount of powdered sugar could sweeten that scowl of hers. "—by the Well, when he said you were your father's spitting image, I thought the similarities stopped skin-deep."

"He's not my father," was how he should've replied. No doubt the High Minister of Arcane Magic would've responded in kind.

"You know my father?" he blurted instead.

And he hated himself instantly for it, the way those words dripped with desperation. As if the not-so-serving girl had any idea whether the man thought of him, missed him, mentioned him in smalltalk, still hung a stocking every Winter Veil with his name embroidered down the center, empty and sagging the way his brother's had.

Edienor Falor'dore was more enigma than man; if his son had ever crossed his mind in the last year, the words would've never passed his lips.

"Well, not personally," she muttered. Of course not—no one did. "But I've heard plenty from Belo'vir. High Minister of High and Mighty, more like."

The realization hit him like blunt trauma, but he took the blow unflinching, unblinking. That was what they'd see when they looked his way—he could spurn his father's name, his house, his inheritance, but he couldn't renounce the blood that ran in his veins.

Because he had his father's face and his mother's voice, too soft to speak against their assumptions.

The same voice that caught in his chest now, came out like a cough when he stuttered, "I just thought—the curtsy—the food—the potatoes—"

All that did was pour a nice thick layer of ire over her indignation. And further cement Rommath's hypothesis that he was simply awful at women. "You thought I was a servant?"

"I-I—I realize the error now—"

"Light, no—I'm just a nice fucking person," she said, oh-so-convincingly.

He'd never felt so small as he did on the sixth floor of Salonar's spire, in this colossal city, next to a scrawny lass with a temper as fiery as her hair. No one would mistake him for his father now, of that he was certain.

"I'm sorry," he said, with his shoulders sagging.

It could've been the way he squeezed his eyes shut, like he was awaiting the back of her hand, but she stayed silent, eyes narrowed to slits.

"H-Honest," he said. "My sincerest apologies."

"Apologies?" Her sickle-sharp stare softened. "I'll be damned. Maybe you're not a magister after all."

He shrugged; only by right of blood, he supposed.

"Liadrin," she said, after an appropriate cooling period. "Didn't mean to snap at you. Eternally at war with my temper and whatnot. But that's all well and good—'through our toils we're made stronger.'"

He knew the words. His mother had spoken them—often, in the last few months he'd known her.

She stuck out a hand, presumably a gesture of goodwill, and Rommath shook it—slowly, still half expecting her to scratch his eyes out. But nevertheless, he held her gaze, and for a good three seconds at that—a record, far as he was concerned—before a familiar little relic caught his eye.

Rosewood and ivory, tied tight to her wrist.

"Prayer beads," she explained, like she'd spoken the words before. "Old tradition—don't worry, it's not real bone or anything. I know a couple priests who still save knucklebones from their loved ones lost, but I think it's starting to fall out of practice."

Rommath had a set just like it hanging from his neck—a gift from the prince, all those years ago, but eight years had diminished neither their perfumed scent nor sentimental value. "They're exquisite," he murmured.

"You think so?" Liadrin lifted her arm to admire them in closer detail. "I'll have to tell Elenora they scored me a compliment. It'll make her day, I'm sure."

Rommath's ear twitched at the tip. "Who?"

"El?" she asked, shaking the beads back below the cuff of her sleeve. "Another priestess. Made the beads for my seventh birthday. A real sweetheart—she and Vandellor got on pretty well, both grew up in the temple, as—"

"We've met," he said, in a voice like a whisper.

Liadrin leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed and curious. "Oh?"

"Yeah."

Was the same woman who'd held him the whole way home on his last day of lessons, smoothed back his hair and shushed his sobbing. Kept asking what happened, wanted to know where the blood was coming from.

"Remarkable woman," Liadrin went on. "Teaches anatomy of healing on weekdays."

Head wounds bleed a lot, sweet boy. They often look much worse than they are. Let me see your back, hm? Did he lash you through your shirt? Your father will have to have a word with him. No, no, you don't have to go back, Rommath, we'll get you a new teacher. Shh—come here—take a deep breath, all right? You don't want to what? I can't understand you when you mumble, love. Well, you don't have to learn magic, then. He'll still be proud of you. I promise.

"Think she's been there for years," said Liadrin, but her words barely reached Rommath's ears. "Just weekends, at first. Then full-time, when she moved back to the sanctuary."

The High Minister of Arcane Magic, just a few years into his reign at the time, had not been pleased. When he spoke, the room got colder: "Who?"

And with a flick of his wrist and a tight grip on his son's, they'd been ripped out of existence and dropped at the feet of Instructor Antheol in a burst of violet light. The young man was still collecting his materials when Edienor seized him by the collar, with a fistful of arcane pulsing dangerously close to his face.

Rommath couldn't see from where he'd stood, head hanging to hide the last of his tears, but he could hear just fine, even when his father's voice dropped dangerously low:

Perhaps you misunderstood, instructor, but I paid you to teach my son, not pummel him with a stick. I will expect full reimbursement for the rest of the quarter—ah, ah, no flinching, arcane burns, you know—I'll need that by the end of the month, if you'd be so kind. And if you ever lay a hand on my son—or anyone's, save maybe your own—I will personally oversee the economic evisceration of your House, and everyone whose name just so happens to sound like yours. Am I clear?

"Was a real tragedy, though," Liadrin continued, clucking her tongue. The sound hardly registered with Rommath. "She never said a word, but talk around the temple said her husband threw her out, just out of the blue—"

Not quite.

"—and we were all happy to have her, of course, but she just couldn't stop crying."

His mother and father had fought like snakes, soft voices slithering in through the crack beneath his bedroom door, when the hour was late and the night was darkest.

You told him what?

He doesn't want to practice magic, Edie, please—

Because you've been filling his head with nonsense, naturally. Said he wanted to be a tailor two weeks ago and you've let him pick out all your outfits since. You can't indulge that rubbish, don't you understand? No, I don't suppose you can—the intricacies of social class are bred, not learned.

She'd been corrupting his son with her "base thinking." She had to go.

Rommath hated it, but he understood.

His father had never been wrong, not once in the eight years Rommath had known him.

"But she's always smiling, now." Liadrin's words were a lifeline to the young archmage, adrift and drowning in distant memories. But the tides rolled with unstoppable force, like the waves of the Great Sea, crashing against the cliffs of his childhood home. "Doesn't say a lot, though."

She'd spoken with him before she left, a shadow kneeling by his bedside—kissed him on the forehead, tears sparkling in the dark, she hadn't meant to wake him.

I've got to go, Rommath, my sweet boy, my precious boy. I don't know, I...I'm not sure how long. I'm going to miss you too...you know I'd bring you if I—well, I didn't ask you what your father wanted, silly boy, what do you—no, he won't be mad, not at you, love—please don't cry, quiet now—

His mother had long hair, red-amber like the sun setting over the sea; his father had taken a handful of it and pulled her to her tiptoes, while she sobbed out sorries—Edie, please—and Rommath had hidden his face in the blankets, but he could still hear his father's voice, clear as the one in his head:

Your audacity precedes you. You will not take my son from me. Get out of my sight. Go.

My son, he'd said. My son.

The words had bounced around the walls of Rommath's skull like a whisper in a cavern; he almost couldn't hear the thunk when the High Minister of Arcane Magic prompted her with the flat of his hand, his signet ring against his lips.

Almost.

Eleven years, one month, six days.

"Don't suppose she should've been so quick to for—"

"She's my mother," Rommath said softly, his reluctant return to reality.

Somewhere in his periphery, Liadrin was refocusing her gaze, working her features into a frown. "No shit," she breathed. "So you're the one she's been writing all this time?"

He stared at a fixed point on the opposite wall, chewing at the inside of his cheek as he searched for something to say. Fifteen seconds of straight silence and all he could come up with was, "Is she okay?"

About eleven years too late.

"Okay?" She shrugged a shoulder. "Sure, can always tell how she's doing by the state of the wildflowers along the southern wall. They're blooming beautifully now—she takes good care of them—but...well, I think it'll be nice for her to be so close to you."

Rommath winced like the words were a weapon, aimed just inches from his heart.

"I'm sure you'll love it here too," she told him, twisting her fingers awkwardly. "The city's a bit scary, but you smart folk seem to manage just fine."

His collar felt tight—too tight, like the smile twitching on his lips. "Don't know if I'd call myself smart," he said. "Just got...connections, I guess."

Veins and arteries connected to a heart that beat his father's blood.

"Connections?" Liadrin repeated. "Oh, well, I—Belo'vir said he made a number of excellent points for your approval." Shifting her weight to the balls of her feet, she peered past him, into the darkness over his shoulder. "But I want to see all those awards for myself."

"He—I didn't bring them," he said hastily. "M-My—you said my father—he recommended me to the grand magister?"

"What?" She gave her head a quick shake. "No, the prince. What'd you do with them, then? Just left them in some dumpster in Dalaran?"

Rommath's smile stiffened like a fairly fresh corpse. "The prince?"

"Wha—no, the plaques—"

"That prince spoke to Grand Magister Salonar?"

Liadrin crinkled her nose in a frown. "Oh, yeah. Seemed to think quite highly of you," she told him. "But y'know, I'm hearing this all secondhand, so I don't have all the details. Vandellor said he approached Belo'vir with a thoroughly decorated portfolio and made a case for your approval—he was very adamant, Belo'vir told me he thought the prince was making a case for himself. Till he dropped your name, anyway—recognized it from—are you all right?"

"I'm fine," he said. Parched words forced from shuddering lungs—not so convincing.

"You look a little pale," she observed.

As if he wasn't aware.

"I don't—I don't know why he'd do that," Rommath breathed. "I don't—it makes sense, I suppose, the grand magister's notes were much neater, but I didn't—I thought—why would he do a thing like that?"

Liadrin pursed her lips, looking reasonably perplexed. "I'm going to need you to slow down."

"I just—I didn't know," was his best explanation, or at least it seemed like one in his head. "About the prince, that is. I just thought the grand magister—"

—was impressed with me.

The words sounded foolish even on the opposite side of his ears.

"Hey…" Liadrin's voice was soft, and her hands were softer, smooth when they squeezed at his fingers—reassuring. "Hey, none of that—look, look at me—I don't know much about magic, but I do know Belo'vir. Quite well, as a matter of fact, so believe me when I tell you that he's an exceptionally shrewd man. He'd never have picked you if you didn't meet—nay, exceed—his qualifications. Royal recommendations or no. Understand?"

Rommath smiled wanly—it was a valiant attempt on her part—but his stomach still sat in his gut like a stone.

Kael sent him away.

So much for stained glass. Or senseless drunken toasts. Or late nights, just them—the prince and his constant companion, his closest confidant—and whispered confessions from the cold, clammy floor, when Kael's breaths came long and even and heavy with the smell of liquor.

Rommath wasn't fooling anyone, no, but he'd still wound up playing the fool.

"I really ought to get back to dinner, though," Liadrin was saying. A quick exit to an uncomfortable situation. "Vandellor's probably wondering where I've gotten off to, and I guess he does that enough back at the temple. Ought to give the old man a break."

One last squeeze, and she was stepping back, retreating.

Rommath didn't blame her. He felt like a little much, right then.

"Am I dismissed?" she asked, pricking a brow.

His response was a distant, disembodied nod.

"Thank you, milord." She dipped her head in a curtsy of sorts, smiling when she straightened up. "I'll see you around, yeah? Enjoy the food."

Rommath always did as he was told, but just once, he didn't. No matter how he tried, he couldn't seem to work up an appetite.