A peculiar disquiet settled within Elias Thorne, one afternoon, after observing Alaric Finch and Rhys Blackwood. He watched them drift through the academy's grey flagstone corridors. It began as a flicker of simple, almost crude curiosity. The way Rhys, a shadow of himself, moved with Alaric always a step behind. Elias found himself wondering about their journey home. Was it always like this?
He knew Rhys never walked quite abreast of Alaric. Instead, Rhys moved with a careful, almost timid pace, Alaric following. Rhys’s slight form seemed to pull the taller boy in his wake. Alaric’s gaze, Elias noticed, was a constant, almost physical weight on Rhys’s back. It was a suffocating devotion, a strange, terrible magnetism.
Elias felt a prickle of unease. A cold dread crept along his spine, akin to touching a forgotten, ancient artifact. He sensed a dangerous energy, a truth better left undisturbed. It was like a crypt door, tempting with its promise of revelation, yet threatening with the despair that might be found within. Or worse, the cruel, insidious hope.
“This is madness,” Elias murmured, the words barely a breath. His own voice sounded thin, alien.
He understood the peril. Yet, he could not resist. He found himself trailing them after their last lesson. His movements were hushed, a shadow amongst shadows. He kept to the older, seldom-used paths that wound behind the towering, ivy-clad walls of the North Wing.
Sunlight, already weak in the perpetually damp air of the moors, struggled to pierce the academy's dense, ancient oaks. It dappled the cracked flagstones, revealing their rough, worn surfaces. A rusted iron gate, long disused, stood ajar, groaning faintly in the breeze. Dust motes danced in the muted shafts of light filtering through the grime-streaked panes of a forgotten conservatory.
This neglected corner of Aethelgard Academy seemed to mirror the scene unfolding before Elias. Two figures, stark against the decaying grandeur. Rhys, his shoulders hunched, leading the way. Alaric, a predator disguised as a devotee, following. And Elias, a silent observer, shrouded in his own internal gloom.
Everything about it felt raw, pathetic, sickening. Elias halted. A bitter taste coated his tongue. He spun on his heel and walked away, the hollow echo of his own footsteps a mockery in the still air.
---
Later, in the solitary refuge of his chamber, lamplight casting long, shifting shadows, Elias found a strange satisfaction in his decision. Curiosity was a dangerous mistress. He had peered into the abyss, then wisely retreated. The thought of what further depths he might have witnessed, had he continued, tightened his chest. It was better this way. Better not to know. He was not so foolish as to pry open a forbidden crypt for the sake of morbid interest.
Alaric's obsession with Rhys seemed to deepen with each passing day. Rhys, Elias observed, carried a perpetual tension in his shoulders, a slight tremor in his hands when Alaric drew near. Fear, undoubtedly. Or perhaps, a profound distaste.
Yes, Elias thought. Dislike. Hatred even. How else could one feel towards a constant, suffocating presence? A part of Elias felt a grim vindication. He had done nothing to intervene, to alleviate Rhys's discomfort. Perhaps that was for the best. He leaned back in his high-backed chair, lacing his fingers behind his head. He gazed at the vaulted ceiling, the intricate plasterwork a silent testament to a life of comfort and privilege. Born into lineage, cherished, denied nothing.
“Bloody hell,” Elias muttered.
He had once believed himself immune to such base human frailty. Untouchable. Until Alaric Finch had proven him wrong. Alaric, with his careless power, had shown Elias the brutal truth: life bent to no one's will. Elias wondered if Alaric, too, was learning that lesson now.
The world, Elias conceded, was a relentlessly cruel master. He, at least, had learned to curb his emotions, to cloak his desires. Alaric, however, was a tempest unbound, his feelings writ large across his face, in the intensity of his gaze. That raw, abnormal emotion must be a torment for Alaric himself.
Elias recognized the sensation. He had felt it too. But while Elias had endured, concealed, Alaric had surrendered. Instead of subtly drawing Rhys near, Alaric’s actions only pushed him further away. For Elias, this suited him perfectly.
“Remain oblivious, Alaric,” Elias whispered into the quiet room. A faint, almost imperceptible tremor ran through him. Or, better yet, for Rhys to grow weary, to seek distance from the academy, from Alaric. Elias did not wish for Alaric to turn his attention to him. That kind of consuming love, that terrifying devotion, was the last thing he craved.
He wanted only one thing: for his own feelings for Alaric to wither and die. And for Alaric to find solace elsewhere. A simple, impossible wish. The world, Elias knew, rarely granted such mercies.
---
Then came another shift. Alaric, with his usual disregard for decorum, engineered a change in the classroom seating arrangement. He moved his desk. It now sat directly beside Rhys Blackwood’s. The spot was directly in front of the master’s lectern, a terrible position given Alaric's imposing height. He completely obscured the chalk-board from half the room. Rhys’s former desk-mate, a junior scholar named Fenwick, offered an awkward, apologetic glance to Elias and Cassian Vance. His expression was a mix of embarrassment and genuine discomfort.
“Gentlemen,” Fenwick mumbled, a nervous smile on his lips. Elias and Cassian exchanged a brief, shared look. They offered curt, almost imperceptible nods. “Ha-ha,” Fenwick offered, the forced laugh hanging in the air. Neither Elias nor Cassian indulged him with a reply. They simply weren’t interested.
Alaric sat beside Rhys, silent. His presence, however, was a roaring gale. Elias found himself wishing – no, desperately praying – that this fragile, awkward tension might hold. For another year, another term. That someday, this moment would dissolve into a forgotten nightmare, a vague, distant memory.
Another change followed. Alaric, who had once spent his weekends indulging in the less reputable establishments of the nearby market town, seemed to have curbed his proclivities. The whispered rumors, carried by the younger scholars in Cassian’s orbit, hadn't ceased entirely. But at least, Alaric no longer boasted of his conquests in the common room. The faint, cloying scent of cheap perfume and illicit spirits no longer clung to his uniform. For Elias, it was a small mercy. He no longer had to endure the tangible proof of Alaric’s escapades.
“Alaric, old boy! No more midnight adventures, then?” Gareth Price, a boisterous, gangly youth, swayed suggestively. His hands mimed a crude gesture near his crotch, a vulgar display. Alaric’s face twisted, a flash of pure revulsion. He darted a quick glance at Rhys. “You absolute cur!” Alaric's voice was a low growl. “I told you, no more of that filth in front of people!”
“Why the sudden modesty, eh?” Gareth pressed, undeterred.
“Mention it again, Gareth, and you’ll regret it,” Alaric seethed.
“Come now, Alaric—”
“I said, silence!”
“...Very well, then.” Gareth shrugged, a smirk still playing on his lips. The others, a small circle of boys around them, clearly felt a sense of disappointment. Alaric, with his imposing height and worldly air, had once been the perfect conduit for their own burgeoning curiosities, their adolescent hormones.
These were not naive boys. Most had already fumbled through clumsy, ill-advised experiences. Compared to the truly innocent, they were easily stirred. With Alaric’s wellspring of dubious tales suddenly dry, their attention drifted to Cassian. Cassian Vance, however, merely bared his teeth, a look of unadulterated disgust on his sharp features. “You depraved wretches,” he spat.
“Ah, there he goes again! Cassian with his pious pronouncements.”
“Such a fanatic. A waste, truly.”
Laughter rippled through the common room, loud and fleeting. Most of the boys in their circle had, at least once, crossed some forbidden threshold. But for reasons unknown, Cassian Vance had not. They teased him good-naturedly, calling him ‘The Unblemished,’ or ‘The Abstinent,’ but no one truly disrespected him. He was Cassian Vance, after all. He possessed an almost cavalier disregard for most things, which made his casual pronouncements and sharp wit surprisingly approachable. Many found him charming, despite his formidable, almost severe countenance.
“Cease your glaring, you oaf. You’ll curdle my blood.”
“Yes, his face is quite terrifying, isn’t it?”
“Do you imbeciles have a death wish?” Cassian scowled. The group erupted in laughter again, though there was little humour in his words. Even some peripheral acquaintances, loitering at the back of the room, offered their hollow laughs and chatter, adding to the general din. Elias sat amongst them, staring blankly at his lap, lost in thought.
He recalled. He had never felt that particular stir of arousal towards a woman. Not truly. He supposed that made him... what? Born different. He had felt fleeting urges, certainly, when observing certain engravings or forbidden texts involving men and women. But never had he fantasized about a woman’s form in moments of private solitude. The former, he concluded, was an attraction to the raw intensity of the act itself, rather than the participants. The latter was simply an absence of desire.
He had once, long ago, been dragged to a disreputable establishment by Alaric Finch, only to be turned away at the entrance. He lacked the proper identification. He had waited outside, in the chill night air, until Alaric re-emerged. Brothels? The very thought curdled his stomach. He could not comprehend the allure. Why would anyone?
Because of this, the others in their group jokingly called him ‘Thorne, the Pure,’ or ‘The Monastic Scholar.’ But his abstinence, Elias knew, was born of an entirely different nature. A profound sigh escaped him, unnoticed.
The others were too preoccupied with Cassian’s sardonic wit to notice. Elias seized the moment. His gaze drifted to Alaric, who sat in almost rigid silence. Alaric, in turn, was staring fixedly at the back of Rhys Blackwood’s head. Rhys was hunched over a tome, ostensibly studying across the room.
And, as always, Elias regretted it. Why did he look? Why did the curiosity seize him so? To banish the ache, he turned to Cassian, a pointless question on his lips. “So, are you truly committed to a life of celibacy, until a solemn marital vow?”
Cassian, lounging in his chair with proprietary ease, slowly, deliberately, lowered his gaze to Elias’s lap. His stare was so persistent, so unnerving, that Elias instinctively crossed his legs, a protective gesture. What in the blazes?
“You are not my intended, Elias. Why does it concern you? Or are you making an offer?”
Of course. Cassian always possessed a malicious wit. The others chuckled. Elias kicked Cassian sharply in the shin. This was the rhythm of his days. Over and over. The same, unchanging cadence.
---
Alone in his chamber, the gaslight humming softly, Elias often lost himself in thought. His mind, unbidden, spun intricate scenarios. Today, the morbid fantasy took a different turn. He found himself wondering what it would have been like, had his heart, so unwisely, chosen Cassian Vance instead of Alaric Finch. It seemed, in the abstract, a gentler fate. He would not have had to endure the specific torment caused by Alaric’s blatant obsession with Rhys. Nor Alaric's own messy, public entanglements.
Yet, the heartbreak would still have been present.
Neither Alaric Finch nor Cassian Vance, Elias knew with a certainty that chilled him to the bone, would ever return his affections. But at least, his heart would not ache with the same sharp, specific agony, born of Rhys Blackwood’s fragile presence.
That melancholic train of thought inevitably spiraled into feelings of inferiority, then simmering resentment. In the end, Elias simply wished for accelerated time. To graduate. To become a stranger to Alaric Finch. A ghost to a ghost.
---
A new habit had taken root, without Elias’s conscious intention. Whenever he sat at his desk, his hands would instinctively find their way beneath the polished wood. This quiet ritual had truly begun in his second year. The catalyst, always the same. Men.
His fingers traced the cool metal buckle of his breeches. Should he? Or shouldn't he? A faint, metallic click echoed in the quiet room as his nail tapped against the brass. Just as his thumb applied a whisper of pressure, a tentative knock sounded at his chamber door.
“Elias? Are you engrossed in your studies?”
“...Ah, no! I mean, yes! Indeed!” Elias’s heart leaped into his throat, a sudden, violent drum. Today, it seemed, was decidedly not the day. Mortified, he buried his face in his arms. Confound it all.
---
Lately, Alaric Finch had become particularly grating.
Sometimes, when Rhys Blackwood’s gaze, fleeting and uncertain, flickered towards Elias, Alaric would deliberately engage Rhys in conversation. Rhys, caught in the middle, would shift his eyes back to Elias, his lips parting as if to speak. Then, as if suddenly remembering Alaric’s looming presence, he would press them together, dropping his gaze. He would answer Alaric in the faintest of voices.
“Y-yes, Alaric...”
Just like that. A silent capitulation.
Rhys, Elias noted, had also begun to seek him out more often. And, astonishingly, had started to address him simply as ‘Elias.’ Aside from his parents and the most familiar of the academy masters, almost no one used his given name. The change was stark. Rhys, it seemed, believed he was being discreet. He was not. The worst part was Alaric’s barely concealed discomfort whenever Rhys attempted anything remotely familiar.
“Rhys Blackwood, cease bothering Elias while he is engaged in his studies.”
“What?” Rhys’s head snapped up, bewilderment in his eyes.
“I said, leave him to his books. Do you not comprehend?”
“Oh... uh, y-yes...” Rhys stammered, his gaze darting away. Alaric, childishly, slammed his fist against the leg of the desk beside him. Elias pretended not to notice. Annoyingly, the utterly oblivious Rhys seemed to think the coast was clear. That his use of ‘Elias’ was now an accepted familiarity. He grew bold, using it casually, as if it were the most natural thing.
“Uh, Elias... forgive me for interrupting your studies.”
Elias stiffened, staring at Rhys in disbelief. Had the boy lost his mind? Alaric was sitting right there.
Sure enough, Alaric’s fist slammed against the desk again. Damn it all.
“See here, Rhys Blackwood!”
“...Huh?”
The atmosphere in the classroom instantly curdled.
“I told you.” Alaric’s anger was blatant, a low, dangerous rumble. “I told you not to call him ‘Elias,’ did I not?”
“...W-well...”
“Call him Thorne. That is his name. Elias Thorne.” Alaric’s gaze sharpened, turning predatory, fixing on Elias. Elias hated that look. He instinctively lowered his head, his spine stiffening. At that precise moment, Cassian Vance, seated beside him, casually draped an arm over Elias’s shoulder. Cassian’s low, distinctive voice murmured near Elias’s ear.
“Alaric Finch, you persist in this, and you will, without question, regret it.”
“What in blazes are you prattling on about?” Alaric demanded.
“I am stating, quite plainly, that you will live to rue this day.” Cassian smirked, a wolfish glint in his eyes. Elias felt a sudden, inexplicable flicker of irritation. For one reason only.
“Alaric Finch, you are a fool.”