A cloying scent of stale wine and an overabundance of narcissus clung to Lord Cassian, a testament to a night spent either in riotous revelry or calculated politicking. Puffiness, a subtle betrayal, softened the sharp angles of his face. Feigning a mild irritation, Elias nudged a chilled tumbler of spiced cordial across the polished mahogany of his study table. An unspoken ritual. On days Cassian indulged his baser instincts or intricate schemes, Elias always presented a cool, restorative draught. It amused Elias to note Cassian’s face was singularly prone to such swollen consequences.
“Cast off that ludicrous mien, my lord, before you become the subject of an unfortunate verse.”
Cassian grunted, reaching for the glass. “My thanks, Elias.”
“Did your father, the Duke, not find occasion to chastise you this morn?” Elias asked, a subtle probe.
“Thanks to your timely intervention, no,” Cassian replied, a smirk playing on his lips as he straightened. He preened, a peacock convinced of his own plumage. Elias merely pursed his lips, a silent acknowledgment of the delicate dance they performed.
Turning to reclaim his own seat, Elias’s gaze snagged on a parchment scroll spread across the adjacent desk, lying abandoned beside Cassian. His eyes lingered.
Elias was shorter than Lord Cassian by a handspan. Sir Garrick, however, stood half a hand taller than the volatile lord. Thus, by the cruel geometry of courtly seating arrangements, Sir Garrick always found himself situated nearest Cassian. Elias often cursed his own stature, clinging to the small comfort of the outer position, close enough to observe, yet never quite central. It was his solitary consolation.
Burying even that quiet gnawing of vexation deep within, Elias gestured, an almost imperceptible flick of his wrist, towards the recumbent figure of Sir Garrick.
“When did Garrick arrive?”
Cassian drained his cordial. “No notion. He was thus entombed when I entered.”
“One who retired early last eve appears… remarkably indisposed.” Elias’s words hung in the air, a silken barb.
With a rustle, the parchment scroll shifted, revealing Sir Garrick’s half-lidded eyes. His narrow gaze swept over Elias and Cassian before he opened his mouth wide, a languid yawn escaping. The sound was surprisingly resonant in the hushed chamber.
“...I swore I would indulge but a fleeting hour more, and alas.”
They spoke truth, the old wives’ tales of yawns. Cassian, in a moment of unguarded mimicry, stretched his own jaw, then scrunched his features into a smug grin. “This rogue. He presents as a dissolute rake, yet his studiousness outstrips even the Archivar’s own son.”
“Go to the devil, Cassian.”
“Indeed, you oaf.”
Whether Sir Garrick registered the jest as mockery or affection, he merely leaned back, letting out a hearty chuckle. Elias watched him for a moment; their eyes met. Garrick’s gaze drifted to the window, then back to Elias. A strange prickle stirred beneath Elias’s skin. He cleared his throat, adjusting the lace at his cuff, and returned his attention to Cassian.
The antechamber, in these early hours, often held a deceptive air of pleasantness. Such idle conversations frequently set the day’s precarious tone. Soon, younger courtiers, lesser lords and ladies, like the Baronet des Croix or Lady Marguerite, would drift in, seeking Cassian’s ear, their eyes alight with admiration as they hung upon his every word. The accustomed ritual would unfold: hushed chatter, carefully modulated laughter, and, eventually, the arrival of the Duke’s Grand Vizier, signaling the commencement of formal business.
For young nobles considered the very height of courtly fashion and influence, it was a surprisingly benign commencement to the day.
But at the day’s closing, they were still merely men of twenty. Tales of wild, ruinous assignations from the night before, particularly when Cassian was implicated, often left a sour taste in Elias’s mouth. Still, he played his part, feigning amusement, an appreciative audience to the spectacle.
Despite it all, these mornings had not been entirely ill-favored. Yet, everything had fractured a month and a half past. The fault, entirely, lay with Master Leif.
“Observe, Master Leif approaches.”
“By the Saints. A wretched sight.”
“Does that dullard truly believe he can show his face after the rebuke he suffered?”
The Baronet des Croix openly mocked Master Leif, pointing with exaggerated disdain, a gesture Elias found particularly vulgar. At the Baronet’s pointed finger, Master Leif shuffled into the chamber, attempting to obscure his face behind the curtain of his lank, straw-blond hair. He moved towards a small, inconspicuous desk in the front, placed his rather threadbare satchel upon it, and immediately slumped forward, burying his face. Watching that hunched, pathetic figure, Elias let out a sigh, heavy with an irritation that felt almost physical.
Master Leif was utterly pitiful. His voice thin, his frame slight—a truly meager specimen. As the murmurs of the courtiers swelled, Lord Cassian glared daggers at Leif’s bowed head, muttering imprecations under his breath. Elias loathed it. That peculiar, almost visceral sensitivity of Cassian’s—it grated upon his very soul.
Snatching a forgotten court gazette, one which had moments ago served as a makeshift cushion for Sir Garrick, Cassian crumpled it in one hand. Then, with a casual flick of the wrist, he tossed it. It struck Master Leif’s head with a soft thud. Leif’s already slumped posture seemed to deepen further against the desktop.
“By the Fiends, do not parade that ghastly visage before us at the dawn of day.”
Master Leif placed his arms upon the desk, burrowing his face into them, doing precisely as Cassian had commanded. Yet, Cassian observed this with an undisguised contempt, kicking lightly at his own desk.
“Ho! Do you not intend to answer me?”
When Cassian abruptly rose, his voice sharp and carrying, Master Leif, still hunched over, stammered a reply, his voice a trembling whisper. “Y-yes, my lord.”
“Lift your head, look upon me, and speak with proper address.”
Did Cassian even perceive the sheer absurdity of his own pronouncements? The brazen illogic of his demands provoked a bitter, humorless laugh from Elias, quickly suppressed.
Whether or not he registered it, Cassian moved. He advanced upon Master Leif. With every measured step Cassian took, the unpleasant feelings inside Elias grew more vivid, more raw. Cassian was closing the distance. That solitary act alone made Elias feel as though he was losing all purchase upon the emotions he had so painstakingly suppressed. This was not the familiar, low hum of jealousy he felt when Cassian sought out Sir Garrick. Instinctively, Elias knew. Deep down, he harbored something just as sinister, just as ravenous, as Cassian did. That was why watching Cassian with Garrick had, in time, become bearable. But his interactions with Leif unsettled Elias with an ever-growing intensity. His hands began to tremble. He clenched them tightly, forcing them into stillness, hoping to conceal the tremor.
Cassian’s foot struck Leif’s desk with a sharp thud. The desk lurched violently, almost toppling. Leif jolted upright in alarm, his voice still unsteady, fragile. “F-forgive me, my lord.”
Cassian stood there, silently looking down into Leif’s face. Leif’s eyes glistened, unshed tears hovering on the brink. Yet, in that precise moment, Elias felt as though he was the one poised to shatter.
Cassian never dispatched Leif on trivial errands, yet his gaze remained fixed upon him. If Leif excused himself to the necessarium during a brief respite, Cassian’s eyes would track his retreating figure, even as he conversed with the assembled company. Elias knew this because he never ceased his own vigil upon Cassian.
To speak plainly, Elias’s first impression of Master Leif had been one of utter anonymity. His complexion was not particularly flawless, but his youthful features lent him a face that was, if nothing else, inoffensive to the eye. When he smiled, it held a genuine, unburdened happiness, and even his neutral expression carried a certain guileless brightness.
Before Cassian had begun his cruel torment, no one had harbored any particular dislike for Leif. He had seemed like a lad nurtured in a warm, loving household, albeit one perhaps shielded from the sharper edges of courtly life. While he was not precisely gregarious, often preferring to spend his hours alone, there was no trace of worry or discomfort in his quiet demeanor.
Most considered Leif a decent, unassuming soul. As he never boasted of the affection or privilege he’d received in his upbringing, he garnered even more subtle praise. Humble, quiet, bright, and inexplicably pleasant in his presence—that was Master Leif.
But Elias had not, from the outset, particularly liked him. He did not hate him either—he simply did not care. To say he had not even registered on Elias’s mental map would be more accurate. Yet, whenever he spoke with his acquaintances, with Cassian, or with Garrick’s small coterie, and Leif’s name chanced to arise, Elias found himself casually offering the polite lie: “Ah, him? He is quite tolerable. Agreeable enough.”
Cassian, much like Elias, had initially paid little heed to Leif. Cassian was never one to concern himself with the quiet scholars or the less prominent figures of the court. After Leif’s arrival in May, he and Cassian had not exchanged a single meaningful word until June. Such had been the unremarkable state of affairs.
But one day, something shifted. A small, sharp deviation formed in the mundane flow of courtly life. It happened just after the midday meal, and looking back, Elias could not recall an action he regretted with such an acute, persistent sting as what transpired that afternoon.
Leif, as was his custom, had taken a corner seat during a brief respite, absorbed in a tome. He was the sort of individual who found solace in the quiet companionship of books. Elias, on the other hand, possessed a deeply ingrained habit of cultivating overly cordial relations with individuals of good, unblemished repute.
Thus, when he chanced upon Leif, Elias initiated a conversation about the very book Leif was perusing. Elias himself was no true scholar, merely one who excelled at masquerading as such, at appearing cultured for strategic advantage.
“You possess a singular fondness for books, it seems?”
“Oh? Ah, yes, I suppose I do, Master Renard.”
At the time, Leif and Elias remained distant acquaintances, separated by a polite, formal chasm. Perhaps that very distance had made the approach seem simpler.
“Have you concluded that particular volume?”
“Indeed, I am nearing the final pages.”
“Then I implore you, close it now. The denouement will disappoint you. It is one of those unfortunate narratives wherein the ending tarnishes all that preceded it.” Elias offered this with a practiced air of intellectual weariness.
“You have read it, then?” Leif’s eyes widened slightly.
“Aye, some time ago. A fleeting diversion.”
To sate his intellectual vanity, Elias habitually sought out reviews and critical analyses of any tome he chanced to skim or hear praised, ensuring he possessed an informed, if superficial, opinion for future discourse. Drawing upon those dim recollections, he offered a critique—not a genuine one, merely sufficient to sound erudite. Leif’s face, in response, brightened with a genuine, guileless pleasure. It caught Elias quite off guard.
“You are the first soul I have met who has read this work, Master Renard, besides myself.”
“Oh… indeed?”
“Yes, but I shall still finish it. Contemplating the precise reasons for its conclusion is, I find, part of the joy.”
“Well, naturally. Opinions are as varied as the stars in the night sky.”
“Hearing you speak of it thus only deepens my anticipation.”
That smile, so open, so trusting, still lingered in Elias’s memory, an uncomfortable, almost cloying sensation. Was it some instinctive unease he had felt even then, a nascent disquiet?
After that day, Master Leif began to seek out Elias with greater frequency. Though Elias found it a trifle irksome, often silently wondering, *Why me?*, he never outright rebuffed him. Leif, with his unblemished reputation and scholarly pursuits, was not an undesirable connection to cultivate. After all, serious tomes—beyond state ledgers and tactical treatises—were practically verboten for young nobles of their station. Even if one found the time, books were little more than glorified doorstops to them. For Leif, Elias was likely the sole individual within the court who could engage in such discourse.
That day was but one of those routine encounters. Yet, it proved to be one of the most ill-fated amongst them.
Sir Garrick bore a measure of blame. To this very day, Elias could not fathom why he had acted as he did. Why he, a man who never meddled in others’ private affairs, chose to insert himself where he had no business. Why Garrick, of all people, had left his detailed, annotated report on the Duchy’s timber yields splayed open for every passing eye.
Elias, who detested having his own meticulously crafted reports or scholarly notes exposed to casual scrutiny, naturally assumed Garrick would share this sentiment. So, he reached out, flipping the parchment over to obscure its contents. That was when he saw it: the crisp, precise annotations, the insightful projections, the sheer acumen displayed. It was a revelation.
He blinked in disbelief and checked again. The depth of analysis was undeniably Garrick’s. Considering the prevalent gossip regarding Garrick’s supposed indolence, this display would barely register for most, dismissed as a fluke. But Elias saw it. It was the first time one of his carefully constructed preconceptions had been utterly shattered. It was a minor tremor to realize Garrick was not as much a lost cause as courtly whispers suggested. Naturally, that realization led him to muse upon Cassian’s often-reckless assessments. Now, *he* was the true prodigal son, one who marked every question with the same careless flourish and slept through the critical briefings. Cassian had never once managed a truly respectable, comprehensive judgment on any serious matter.
Perhaps that was why Elias felt such a dizzying mix of emotions—like he had unearthed a glimmering jewel amongst common stones, only to find the true treasure lay not where he expected. A man he had once dismissed as merely charming but shallow, now revealed more salvageable depth than the man he meticulously observed and subtly influenced. That strange epiphany must have dislodged his usual composure, for he did something he would normally never have contemplated.
It was nothing grand. He simply grasped a nearby quill and, with a subtle flourish, scribbled a short note upon the corner of Garrick’s report.
“Your observations on the Veridian highlands are remarkably astute. Should you focus your keen intellect thus, the Grand Vizier’s favor will surely be yours. A fine effort, Sir Garrick. —E.R.
P.S. My apologies for presuming to glimpse your work. I merely sought to protect its contents from idle eyes and chanced upon your remarkable insight.”
The sheer arrogance of evaluating another’s work and offering unsolicited advice, however veiled, made Elias feel a blush rise. He rambled on in the post-script, a frantic, silent justification. He could not, to this day, articulate why he had written it in the first place. At the time, he must have been entirely bereft of his usual reason. Looking back, it was clear this was the first, ill-advised stitch in what would become a complex, tangled skein of entanglements. Every tragic unraveling began with a poorly fastened first button.
If he had not written that note, he would not have encountered Master Leif, book clutched tightly in hand, approaching him with an expectant smile, seeking a deeper conversation about the nature of endings and new beginnings.