Finally… finally, there was a moment to rest. The second week of the Pendragon joint workshop wasn't any easier to deal with than the first, and while the pair of teachers eventually managed to get along well enough to teach, Dean hadn't helped Cedric understand any of that with his ceaseless chatter. At least Cedric's actual skills easily managed to surpass the boy's unfortunate physical abilities, but it just threw the fact that one unusual episode was enough to ruin his standing for the rest of… well, that was kind of his general reputation now, so possibly forever. Not that one single breakdown would cause that, but even infrequent ones seemed to do the job quite well enough. And that wasn't even touching the midterm exam, which had passed in a stressful blur, and Cedric was half certain that he'd failed the written portion, though he admitted that part of that might have been unfounded paranoia… but not entirely.
At any rate, that was over, now, and he was sitting in a hackney cab that Sofia's mother had hired to pick the both of them up. It was… odd, traveling this way. Somewhat uncomfortable, given the bouncing of the carriage that wasn't present when pegasi were pulling a carriage through the air, though possibly better than the acute, if temporary, nausea Cedric got from traveling magically.
There weren't windows in the carriage, so Cedric wasn't sure where to focus his attention, though, so he looked down at his fidgeting hands for most of the ride. After not very long, Sofia's mother broke the silence, "So, Cedric - it's nice to meet you, you seem like a fine young man."
In what was perhaps not the wisest reaction, Cedric snorted and rolled his eyes. "I do believe you're the first person to have thought that," he said in response, though he was closer to facing the carriage wall than the woman sitting across from him.
"I'm sure that's not true," and Cedric could see some movement from the corner of his eye but he was still resolutely not looking her way. She continued, "You can call me Miranda, though I won't object to Missus Balthazar. I'm just glad to see Sofia's getting along well at Hexing Hallways, and falling in love to boot. My baby's growing up and it's adorable!"
A chuckle wanted to bubble its way out of Cedric's throat, especially at the way that Sofia said, a bit too loudly, "Mom!"
There wasn't much more to make conversation about, so the carriage was weighed down by an awkward silence - but at least 'awkward' was the worst Cedric could describe his current state, and anyhow it wasn't terribly long before they were piling out of the carriage. Cedric finally got his first taste of where Sofia had come from, and found himself a little overwhelmed. The sounds and smell of the town were louder and stronger than he'd been expecting and a bit of an unpleasant surprise, but… probably manageable. Visually, at least, it was very muted browns and greys, which was both a little depressing and soothing to his senses.
Inside, the sound of the streets was lessened - but not wholly absent, unfortunately. At least the smell was significantly better inside. It was also… smaller. Cedric knew that he'd been born to wealth, but the entire abode was very efficient, Cedric supposed he'd put it. The ground floor of the building was devoted to cobbling, the storefront taking up a large portion of the level but near the back there was also a workshop, hidden from the average customer's eyes behind a locked door, and the stairs to the first floor's living quarters.
There were two bedrooms, a washroom, and a kitchen/dining area, and the hallways to connect these together. Of course, these rooms weren't bare, and the smaller bedroom had plenty of full bookshelves, and there were knicknacks and plenty of evidence that the house was quite lived in.
Just as something was beginning to feel off, beyond the fact that Cedric was out of his element here, Sofia spoke up and asked, "Uh, mom? There's only one bed in my bedroom…" Ah, that was it. "I thought you said you'd borrowed a cot for Cedric to sleep on?"
Miranda paused and glanced at the room herself, then snapped as she found the answer, Cedric supposed. "Ah, that's right, I did. That actually ended up falling through. Honestly, though, I know you're teenagers - I won't tell anyone's parents if you won't." She winked at the pair of them and continued towards her own room, ignoring Sofia's embarrassed admonition.
Cedric, however, had just looked down and subconsciously scratched the side of his chest, where his binder clasped. "That's, ah, going to be a bit of a problem…" Cedric said.
"Yeah, no kidding," Sofia said, then put her hand to her mouth with wide eyes. "Not- not anything against you, I just don't-"
"You're fine," Cedric said. "The same applies for me." ...That was probably not true in any sense, but Cedric didn't really want to hear whatever it was that Sofia had been about to say. "Also, I believe I tend to thrash about as I sleep, and with elbows like these I'm afraid you'd end up with stab wounds."
Sofia chuckled at that, and Cedric was glad that for once he was able to make a joke. He thought his sense of humor was great, but he didn't end up exercising it very often, and it tended to be understated, especially compared to Sofia's and Greylock's personalities, so it was… nice, to make someone laugh without him being- well, he was still the butt of the joke, but it was different, somehow, when it was self deprecating humor.
At any rate, the two followed Miranda and cleared up the situation without too much trouble, at least. "Sorry, I didn't realize it would be an issue," she said. "Well, no problem - one of you can have my bed. I'll stick around here during the day, spending most of my time in the shop probably, and then sleep at my boyfriend's place at night, I know he won't mind. Sound good?"
Sofia was hiding her rather red face behind her hand, but Cedric nodded and said, "That sounds like a decent plan to me. I'm- I'm sorry to be an inconvenience like this, given you're letting me stay here and all… I don't mean-"
"Shush, you, it's no trouble at all," Miranda interrupted him. "I'm glad to get to meet Sofia's first love, it's exciting and I'm so proud of her," she said, grinning.
"Mom, why," Sofia said from behind her hand.
* So after it was decided that Sofia would sleep in her own bed and Cedric in her mother's, they had to deal with Cedric's suitcase - he hadn't brought more than he'd thought necessary, but it was still decently sized given it not only contained his clothes for the next few weeks, but had his extra phials of Elixir in one pocket and his toothbrush and toiletries and… all of that. It ended up finding a temporary home in one corner of Sofia's room, which felt unfortunate in that he was imposing on her space and he could quickly see his things becoming a tripping hazard - troublesome both in hurting himself or Sofia as well as possibly breaking anything of his - but there wasn't much to be done about it, really.
Then, once that was taken care of, the coach was relieved of its duty, and the house was calm. There was time to rest, no pressing need to get things done, to get things set up and ordered, to need to do anything.
"So… anything you want to do?" Sofia asked, after a minute of awkward silence.
Cedric shrugged. "I'm… not sure. What do you tend to do in your spare time?"
Sofia shrugged back. "I guess it depends? Well, a lot of the time I was helping my mom work on making or mending shoes, but I don't know if I'll be roped back into that while I'm back for break or not. If I do, I've got plenty of books you can read-" Sofia gestured to the bookshelf at the side of the room - "or if you just want to read, that's cool. I'm not going to pester you if you want to do that. Uh, if you want to go someplace else, there's not a whole lot around here that I know very well. Dunwiddee isn't exactly a tourist location, you know?" Sofia tilted her head as she thought more. "You meeting Lucinda might be great, or might be awful. She's - a bit of a handful, I guess, but I think that's part of witch culture - anyway, I learned all the magic I knew before I got to Hexley from her and her family. Mostly just her, but her family was nice too."
It took Cedric a few extra moments to process all the new information. "I see," he said eventually. "I, ah, brought my coin purse - so if cost is an issue, I can cover that without issue. If what I've brought turns out not to be enough, I believe Mum could and would send me more through magic circles. It would take a few minutes to draw the necessary runes on this end, but that's about all the trouble it would be."
Sofia shook her head. "It's not a big deal, really. I mean we're not royalty but we're a far cry from being the poorhouse. Mom isn't renting thus building, she owns it completely - it used to be both hers and dad's, and it's been harder since then sure, but we've always managed, and I don't… I don't like feeling like I owe people, I guess."
...This just seemed illogical to Cedric. Or, well, not wanting to incur debt made sense - he didn't like the feeling being leveraged against him either. However, he thought that he and Sofia had at least established enough rapport that she'd know he wouldn't hold something like that against her. (In the back of his mind, he heard Greylock's voice chiming in about holding something against her, but he smothered that by making a short humming sound.)
To cover the oddity of making a noise for no apparent reason, Cedric spoke up, "I… believe I'm too tired from traveling and… everything to do much out and about today, but Wassalia is coming up and I'd like to try to… I should probably send something to my parents if nothing else." Was it rude to mention buying someone a Wassalia gift to them? Or was it rude to insinuate that they hadn't thought about it? Cedric hadn't actually considered it before now, and he had little idea what Sofia wanted - but he didn't want to pester her like Cordelia had to him, and besides there was something… impersonal, he supposed, about exchanging gifts that were things one might have bought for oneself but instead put on a list for someone else to buy.
Sofia nodded. "That sounds like a good idea. Are you hungry, would you like anything to eat? I'll probably help mom make supper later, but we've got crackers and cheese and things to snack on before that, and drinks - I don't know how much tea we have, or… how old it is, but you're welcome to any of it."
Cedric nearly cringed at the last bit - technically, dried tea leaves didn't go bad, per sé, but they did definitely go stale. ...But then again, stale tea was hardly a large problem, and if he really needed something fresher he could probably buy some while out shopping for gifts. "That sounds good, yes," he said, and followed Sofia to look through the pantry - which was pretty well stocked, Cedric was glad to see. Some of the tea did look old, but there was new chamomile which was… not something he liked, much, but it would admittedly help him sleep on unfamiliar bedding. The cheese and crackers were tasty, and Sofia recommended Cedric try some dried fruit bits or jelly along with the cheese on the crackers. It was… certainly odd, but very good. Sweet and savory both.
They retired to Sofia's room, then, and chose different books from her shelf to read. Amusingly, the longest individual series of books was about a girl named Millie going to a boarding school, much like Hexley Halls - but sans magic instruction. It wasn't a knight's school, either… Perhaps it was a parody of Royal Prep, then? It didn't seem to feature actual royalty, but did seem to be a preparatory school for young women planning to be married off, rather than those intending to go into higher learning or the arcane arts, like Hexley.
...There wasn't really much more to the book than interpersonal drama that Cedric couldn't relate to, and school woes that were either as foreign as the interpersonal aspects or familiar in a thoroughly boring way. Cedric stood up to replace the book on the shelf, and Sofia said, "Not so fond of Millie? I can't blame you - I loved those books as a kid, but she's kind of awful, really. I'm surprised you made it as long as you did."
Cedric chuckled. "Terrible people I don't mind so long as something actually happens," he said. Scanning the titles on the books' spines, Cedric weighed the pros and cons of rereading a Shakespeare play. On one hand, he would be able to put it down without much issue; on the other hand, reading something new that Sofia also enjoyed would give him a topic he could speak to her about would be nice. Instead, he chose… a novel called Witch Week, which ended up being another story set in a school, with a distinct lack of magic - but this time, that was quite intentional, for it had been entirely outlawed. Looking at the date of publication of this novel, it seemed more like a grim-dark far future setting than scathing political commentary, but the way that it reminded Cedric of the murmurings among the nobles he'd heard of through Professor Layton was… darkly interesting.
The afternoon faded into evening as the two read, and Mrs Balthazar called her daughter in to help with preparing supper, as Sofia had expected. Cedric followed her and offered to help, but he was woefully uneducated in cooking, and ended up retreating to the table to wait while out of the way of elbows and kitchen knives and hot stoves.
Dinner was a thick stew, or perhaps noodles with sauce… it was hard to place exactly that to call the dish. Creamy broccoli sauce/broth of some kind with two different kinds of noodles, some dried vegetables, and bits of meat that had been salted to preserve it for the winter. Cedric hadn't had salted meat in stew before, though it was quite good - if still perhaps a little tough, it was much easier having hydrated in the broth than it was normally.
Conversation over dinner wasn't a big production, which Cedric was thankful for. No bragging about one's accomplishments and throwing siblings under the bus - not that Sofia had anyone to do that to - no pointed questions about grades and future plans and how he'd deal with whatever Goodwyn had had to deal with this week or month or whenever at the castle. There were questions about his goals, but Miranda seemed genuinely curious rather than sure Cedric had failed whatever expectation before he could even answer.
After supper they put on candles to keep reading for a while longer- it was odd, not to have the oil lamps Cedric was used to. He liked the aesthetic of candles, but he couldn't stand to read for very long in their flickering light, so excused himself to get ready for bed.
All in all, it had been… a strange day, certainly, but a nice one. Even as Cedric laid down in Sofia's mother's bed, not sure where to lay on the large mattress and slightly uncomfortable from the way the cotton stuffing was clumped in places, well… Minor discomfort was worth the price for a little peace of mind, he thought. His body seemed to agree, given how quickly he fell asleep.