A metallic tang coated Lysander’s tongue. He lay on his stomach, face pressed into the cool linen of his bed, the scent of lavender and shame a potent cocktail in his nostrils. Even in the dazed aftermath, instinct had guided his numb fingers to slide the bolt home, securing the heavy chamber door. A dim satisfaction flickered, brief as a candle's gasp.
His awareness seeped back slowly, like water through parched earth. Every joint in his body felt stiff, protesting any movement. A dull throb pulsed behind his eye, radiating across his cheekbone. Raising a hand, the movement sent a sharp, jabbing pain through his shoulder. He swallowed a groan.
“Ah…”
Fingers, usually so precise with a stylus, fumbled over his face. Tender spots, unnaturally hard, met his touch. He pushed himself up, leaning on an elbow, the ornate carvings of his bedpost blurring into abstract patterns. Cold sweat slicked his skin.
He sat on the edge of the mattress, the silence of his chamber pressing in. Moonlight, fractured by the leaded glass, painted his reflection on a polished silver basin. A raw, guttural sob tore itself from his chest, an alien sound. He clapped a hand over his mouth, as if to force the pain back down, but the tears came anyway, hot and relentless. His throat felt scraped, voice torn.
An irrational fury, sharp and sudden, seized him. He sprang up, scattering the scattered charcoal sticks on his drafting table. A clay pot, holding dried pigment, crashed to the marble floor, blooming into a dust cloud of ochre. He raged, a silent, desperate storm, until his legs gave out. He slid to the floor, cheek pressed against the cool stone.
Eyes clamped shut, but the tears kept coming, a silent deluge. He gasped, each breath a struggle.
“Damn it all.”
The world could end. He wanted to cease existing. Not just now, but for what had transpired in the shadowed alley, after Kaelen’s urgent summons. The window had been tightly latched. Could anyone have heard? The servants? A passing guard? The thought sparked a new wave of terror. Veritas was a city of whispers.
Why had Kaelen found him? Why had Alaric been there? Why did they have to tear his already threadbare dignity to shreds?
“By the gods, damn it.”
Alaric hadn't merely struck him. He had crushed Lysander's fragile pride, ground it into the very cobblestones of the Veritas night. The humiliation was a deeper wound than any bruise, worse than the years of Alaric's casual disdain. It was a violation so profound it made him weep until his vision swam.
Even in this abject despair, a familiar, wretched voice echoed: *What would they think if they saw you?* The question, cold as winter stone, cut through his haze. He flinched.
The silence in the room registered, stark and sudden. He glanced at the tall grandfather clock in the corner. Just past the predawn hour. A terrifying clarity snapped into place: if his valet, Elian, came for his morning toilette, Lysander’s world would shatter. A wave of ice spread from his scalp down his spine.
His mind cleared with brutal efficiency. No one, absolutely no one, could see him like this. Scrambling to his feet, he righted the overturned stool, swept the scattered charcoal and pigment shards under the drafting table. He wiped the tears from his face with the back of his hand, his breathing shallow. He sat, waiting for the inevitable knock.
It came minutes later, soft but insistent. Elian. Lysander’s voice, when it emerged, was a strained rasp, but he forced a normal cadence.
“Do not enter, Elian. I’m quite unwell. A sudden chill. I shall forgo the atelier this morning.”
“Truly, Master Lysander? Shall I summon the physician?” Elian’s voice, muffled by the thick door, held genuine concern.
Lysander swallowed a bitter taste. “Later, perhaps. If this malaise persists.”
“Very well. Would you care for some hot broth, then?”
“Leave it outside my door, please. My gratitude.”
“As you wish, Master. Rest well.”
He would skip his duties. He was in no fit state to appear before Master Valerius or face the keen eyes of his peers. The thought of it made his stomach clench.
---
There was a small pot of healing balm on his nightstand. He uncapped it with trembling fingers, its herbal scent a weak comfort. He smeared the cool ointment over the tender spots, wishing desperately for the pain, physical and emotional, to recede. Then, he crawled back into bed, pulling the heavy velvet drapes closed, plunging the room into artificial twilight.
The balm pot slipped from his fingers, clattering softly to the floor. He didn't move to retrieve it.
His entire body trembled, a bone-deep tremor. But the raw, gnawing shame eclipsed any physical discomfort. It was as if cruel, tiny fingers pinched his very core. He burrowed deeper under the covers, desperate to hide his tear-streaked face from the nonexistent light, from himself, from the memory of Alaric’s sneer. Only the oppressive weight of the blankets felt like a shield against the crushing despair.
*Sleep.* He needed to sleep. He had to sleep. He squeezed his eyes shut. It would be fine. Master Valerius did not know. Alaric would not broadcast his cruelty. It would be fine. Uttering the hollow reassurance, he buried himself deeper.
---
It was not fine. Not at all.
Hidden beneath the oppressive layers of silk and down, he muttered words that tasted of ash. To the Silent Saints, to the Grand Patron, to anyone—he wanted to scream it, a torrent of righteous fury.
*Please. It was Alaric. Alaric struck me. He trampled me. That swine. Alaric is mad. He’s a beast. Unhinged. All because of some petty slight from Kaelen... After all these years, everything I respected in him, he crushed it. Crushed it right in front of Kaelen. I am a fool. I showed that pathetic side of myself to Kaelen, too. And the horrifying thought that someone might have seen it all...*
He stopped the frantic train of thought. A wave of self-loathing, sharp and sudden, swept over him. He wanted to die.
The saddest irony was what he did after the storm of tears subsided. His first desperate act was to retrieve the crumpled letter Kaelen had sent, the one that had summoned him. He tore it into tiny pieces, then burned them in a small ceramic dish, scattering the ash from his window. He meticulously searched his private journals, anything that might hint at the burgeoning connection with Kaelen, erasing or obscuring it. That night had become an unholy secret, a shameful stain no one could ever see.
---
Three days passed in a blur of forced inactivity. Despite the hideous emotional wound, his body healed with surprising resilience. Perhaps it was the darkness of his rooms, or the nourishing broths Elian left outside his door. The visible injuries were minimal—a faint purpling beneath his jaw, a tender spot on his temple, easily concealed by his hair. Nothing life-threatening, but deeply humiliating. He spent those days under the covers, weeping in silence, ignoring the polite inquiries Elian relayed from the Grand Atelier. He refused to open his door for anyone.
He thought he could hold out longer, until the last vestige of physical trauma faded. But fortune was not on his side. Master Valerius, who had been absent on a long visit to the Merchant Guilds, returned to Veritas with an unexpected urgency. Lysander had no choice but to panic.
“Lysander, my boy, what has happened to your face?” Master Valerius’s usually jovial voice was sharp, concerned. He stood framed in the doorway, having bypassed Elian’s protests.
“Master… I…” Lysander stammered, pulling his hand away from his bruised cheek.
“Elian said you were unwell. A chill, he claimed. Yet your face tells a different tale. A scuffle?”
As Master Valerius’s gaze sharpened, Lysander scrambled for an explanation.
“No, not precisely a scuffle. I… I was walking through the lower market, perhaps a bit too late, after retrieving some rare inks…”
“And?”
“And I… I was jostled by a drunken reveler. I… I stumbled and struck my face against a stone stall.”
“What sort of stumble leaves a young artist looking like this? Who was this lout?” Valerius’s voice rose, indignation coloring it.
Lysander frantically waved his hands. “No, no, Master, truly, it was nothing. I do not wish to cause trouble. He was a commoner, perhaps too much ale. We parted ways soon after.”
“Come now, tell me—why did you not report it to the city guard?”
“...Well…” After a moment of desperate thought, he concocted a truly pathetic excuse.
“I… I may have, ah, accidentally offended him. I believe I commented on his rather… garish tunic.”
“What?”
To Lysander’s surprise, his ridiculous answer seemed to defuse the Master’s anger. Valerius let out a sigh of disbelief, then a sudden, low chuckle.
“Garish tunics, eh? The perils of a discerning eye, Lysander. You artists.”
“Indeed, Master…”
“Mind your words, boy. And your step.”
“...I shall.”
The relatively minor appearance of his injuries also helped. Thankfully, the incident seemed to blow over, at least for now.
But something strange happened at supper. Lysander sat across from Master Valerius in the small, intimate dining room. The Master suddenly brought up Alaric.
“By the by, are you still much aligned with young Lord Alaric these days?”
“What?” The question hit Lysander like a physical blow.
“He rarely seems to grace the atelier anymore, not since his ill-fated commission for the Duchess of Lyra. A shame, such potential, if rather ill-tempered.”
For a man so often away, Valerius possessed a startling grasp of atelier gossip. The mere mention of Alaric forced his image back into Lysander’s mind, souring the excellent broth. Lysander snapped back, a tremor in his voice.
“Our paths rarely cross, Master.”
*Our paths rarely cross, my ass.* Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. He felt such a profound shame and humiliation, he wished the polished floor would swallow him whole.
“Didn’t young Kaelen of the Artisan’s Guild visit your chambers recently? Elian mentioned it. Is he a new companion?”
Lysander’s body went rigid. Slowly, he turned his head towards the antechamber, where Elian was supervising a young page setting out sweetmeats. A cold chill, sharp as a winter blade, ran through him. Had Elian heard? Could he have heard anything that night, any of the sounds from the alley, or Lysander’s subsequent breakdown? Was it possible he had pieced together the fragments?
“Lysander? Is something amiss?” Valerius’s brow furrowed.
Startled by the question, Lysander blurted out a response without thinking. “Yes. We… we are becoming acquainted.”
What Master Valerius said next, Lysander couldn't recall. The sheer terror that rooted him to the spot wiped everything else from his mind. What he *did* remember was the lingering look in Valerius’s eyes when he mentioned Alaric. It was the kind of look one reserved for unpleasant news, for a fallen star.
*Why?*
That single thought pushed him further into a spiral of fear. His fingers grew cold. No. Elian was discreet, and his chambers were soundproofed. He couldn’t have heard. But why? Why did it feel as if something was terribly wrong? All he could do was offer a desperate prayer to the Silent Saints he barely believed in.
---
Three more days passed. Master Valerius began gently but firmly urging Lysander to return to his duties. Lysander absolutely did not want to. But if he continued to absent himself, Valerius would surely suspect a deeper problem than a mere stumble or a ‘garish tunic’ incident. That was the last thing he wanted.
So, he forced himself to put on a cheerful, serene face. There was nothing wrong with him. Nothing at all.
The days leading up to his return were filled with endless, sickening worry about what he’d do if he encountered Alaric or Kaelen. Would Alaric lash out again? Would he humiliate Lysander in front of the other apprentices—or worse, in front of Master Valerius? Would he continue to trample on Lysander as if he were less than dust?
The thought alone made him nauseous.
When he finally arrived at the Grand Atelier, he hung his satchel of tools on a hook by his drafting station, then scattered a few unfinished sketches over his desk. He sat, staring blankly at the polished wood as the usual cacophony of the atelier gradually swelled around him. The scrape of charcoal, the murmur of voices, the sharp tapping of chisels. As soon as he heard the familiar footsteps of fellow apprentices approaching his station, he buried his head in his arms, feigning a sudden exhaustion.
If he pretended to be asleep, no one would notice his lingering facial marks. At least not for a while. But he hadn’t accounted for one thing: the adjacent station belonged to Cassian, who, despite his sharpness, possessed a curious disregard for social niceties.
As soon as Cassian arrived, he stood by Lysander’s desk. A cool hand slipped under Lysander’s chin, tilting his face upwards. Lysander didn’t even have time to resist. He was forced to meet Cassian’s unblinking gaze. Cassian raised an eyebrow, his pale eyes scrutinizing Lysander’s face. He spoke bluntly, his voice low, audible only to them.
“What in the nine hells happened to your face?”
“...Nothing of consequence.”
“Did you trip again, Lysander? Into a particularly sharp pile of misfortune?”
“Yes. Something of that nature.”
“Truly?”
Cassian clicked his tongue, shaking his head. He abruptly let go of Lysander’s face, causing Lysander’s head to nearly hit the desk.
“Gods damn it, Cassian!” Lysander glared, startled, but Cassian merely offered a crooked, enigmatic grin, as if lost in some private, unsettling thought. Whatever he was pondering, Lysander had no way of knowing.
Neither Alaric nor Kaelen were present at the Grand Atelier that day.
But during Lysander’s absence, a rumor had begun to spread through the court and the atelier alike.
“Have you heard? Lord Alaric… that arrogant bastard actually…”
No one directly questioned Lysander about his injuries, but it was clear from the sidelong glances and hushed conversations that the rumor had already made its insidious way through the halls. A strange sense of unease, mixed with a dark relief, settled over him. It seemed he was luckier than he’d thought.
---
The rumors centered around Alaric and, surprisingly, his sudden downfall. Neither Alaric nor Lysander had attended the atelier since the day the whispers began, and Kaelen, too, seemed to have disappeared shortly after, leaving no one to dispel the burgeoning tales. With Lysander’s subtly bruised face as visible, if circumstantial, proof, the rumors spread with astonishing speed.
The story went something like this: Lord Alaric, in a fit of pique over his failing commission and accusations of artistic fraud, had lost his temper, culminating in a public disgrace. And, more salaciously, that Alaric had been entangled in a forbidden, scandalous affair with a low-born commoner, a revelation that had irrevocably damaged his standing with the Duchess and the court.
“That brute, I’m telling you, he utterly disgraced himself over some mere street performer.”
“A street performer? Gods above, imagine! The pride of House Thorne, brought low by a juggling peasant!”
“He truly looks like a man who’d lose his head over something utterly base, doesn’t he?”
The atelier was filled with these kinds of conversations. Whispers snaked between drafting tables, behind easels, and through the courtyards. Lysander heard them all.
“All those who championed Lord Alaric are now finding themselves quite… isolated.”