Miss Moony would like to say that she doesn't own Emelan and that she had no help with this story from Miss Wormtail, Miss Padfoot or Miss Prongs.
Pasco/Evvy, unrequited Evvy/Briar, for prompt 7 at the circlefic livejournal community: Love Trianges.
I sincerely apologise if any of my Chammuri is incorrect, but I'm on a time-limit here: 50 minutes (the limit was an hour), 956 words.
------- I solemnly swear that I'm up to no good -------
Five Things
Finally travelling towards Emelan and Winding Circle atop a plucky little pony which Rosethorn had purchased when they'd left the desert, Evvy stared. Not at the scenery, but at the people. Or one person, in particular.
Pahan Briar Moss was her teacher, and she didn't think she'd ever admired anyone more. He'd taken her in, taught her, agreed not to dump her on that takemeru stone-mage who'd been all set to tutor her in the Great Art.
That, she thought, was probably why she found herself feeling more than just gratefulness to the pahan: He was everything she'd never expected him to be, understanding of her plight (he was a thukdak, too, though she'd scarcely believed it at the time), and he'd bought her things without ever expecting her to repay the favour with other, less pleasant ones.
Though maybe, just maybe, she wouldn't find such activities so unfavourable at this point in her life, thinking back on these new feelings she'd unearthed. She tried to make a subtle hint at it once. Pahan Briar didn't notice.
Maybe that's a good thing, Evvy thought. Maybe it's not.
-------
The school towered up in front of her, and Evvy hesitated for a second before following the unwitting object of her affections inside the building. It was better than that Citadel place, anyhow.
Once inside, she was immediately struck by the relative quietness. She could hear constant thumping from the floors above, as the dancers all attended their classes, and, briefly, she wondered what Lady Sandry would be doing here, since she had undoubtedly learnt to dance long ago.
Pahan Briar led her upstairs, he in turn being led by another boy, and through a door on the third floor. There was a grid of pink ribbons stuck to the floor, and a teenage boy, just a little older than Evvy, weaved in and out of them, never once even brushing them.
Evvy took a moment away from her study of the way her teacher's shoulders moved to admire the boy's poise. Then he opened his mouth.
'Briar!' the noble girl (Lady Sandry, Evvy thought. Clearly not learning to dance) called out, and flung herself into his arms joyfully.
'Oh great,' the boy said, slumping down outside the pink-ribbon grid, 'now there's two of you.'
Which was a bad thing, probably, but only for him.
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After finally being coaxed inside the Citadel walls, Evvy was expected to go and live there. Along with Pahan Briar and Lady Sandry and with her student Pasco as a regular visitor. The last of the three, she could definitely do without: Pahan Briar was superior to him in every way possible.
He walked alongside her, with a merciless spring in his step, interrogating her every inch of the way. Yes, she grew up on the streets; yes, she was an ex-slave; yes, she'd been taken in by the pahan Moss, and would he please shut up now!
He grinned that infuriating grin of his which she was already fed up of after having known him for only an hour or so. 'Touchy,' he said, and then bounded ahead to say goodbye to Lady Sandry and pahan Briar before he left.
Thank the gods, Evvy thought. This was most definitely a good thing.
-------
After a few weeks, the interrogations stopped, and instead he began unsubtly prodding and poking her into arguments. Pahan Briar merely laughed at the sight, and muttered something about "pulling pigtails" to Lady Sandry. Evvy wasn't sure what to make of the statement.
By the time a week was up, Pasco Acalon knew every weakness she had, and exploited them all. Even the ticklish points, though, for no reason at all that she could determine, she couldn't quite manage to persuade herself to be upset about this.
Pasco sat next to her at every meal they both attended, and prattled on about all kinds of things, from the disgraceful, thieving ways of the Summersea street-rats (his eyes sparkled as he goaded her) to whatever criminal he was hoping to dance into his net in the near future.
Every day, Evvy found herself objecting less and less. Which may or may not have been a bad thing, Evvy thought, but she couldn't tell for certain.
-------
Pasco grows less irritating with every visit. On some occasions, she even finds herself liking him, but she always manages to catch herself just in time.
He flirts with her, she knows, since she's not as oblivious as pahan Briar is, and she sometimes finds herself flirting back. Then when she goes back to her rooms at the Citadel, she carefully washes her mouth out with soap, no matter how bad the taste is.
And then, just as he's getting into her good books, he begins to talk about pahan Briar. 'Why are you so defensive of him anyway?' he asks, his voice taunting, and she flushes angrily. 'You act like you're in love with him, or something.'
He laughs playfully, and Evvy in mortified, but neither moods last for long, when Pasco goes uncharacteristically quiet, and then kisses her. Surprisingly, she finds herself kissing back, and there isn't the slightest urge to wash her mouth out with soap anymore.
She does look over to pahan Briar, though, when she's done kissing Pasco. He's looking at them with amusement and satisfaction in his eyes, and when he grins at Evvy as Lady Sandry hands over a few coins (Evvy can't remember them betting on anything, though), there are no acrobatics in her stomach, only the fleeting, light-footed, steady thump, thumps of Pasco's memory.
This is a good thing, she thinks, and then grins back and she's the one who initiates the next kiss.