"This is in no way easier than walking through the snow." Kiram wobbled and Javier pulled him close.
"No, not at all. But it's much more fun, you have to admit."
Kiram didn't have to admit anything. In fact he had spent the last month fighting nearly every admission he wanted to make to Javier. But this once he relented.
"Yes," he said. "It is."
Once they had reached the orchard bridge and exchanged their skates for boots, he asked, "Do you really have a paper to write?"
"I do, but not until later tonight. I was thinking of taking Lu- naluz out to give him a little exercise while the weather holds." Javier smiled up at the clear sky. "Care to ride with me?"
"I took Firaj out this morning." Kiram briefly considered joining Javier, before reminding himself that he was trying to keep from falling back into the easy trap of Javier's company. "I really should work on the engine." But seeing the disappointment in Javier's face Kiram couldn't leave it at that. "It's not just for the Crown Challenge, the steam engine I mean. Scholar Donamillo thinks it could help him break the curse's hold over Fedeles…It could free you both."
Javier raised his dark brows, studying Kiram's face intently.
"How can you care so much for me and mine and still seem to care so little, Kiram?"
"It's not-" the words caught in his throat, only coming out in a rough whisper. "You know it's not that I don't care."
If anything it was just the opposite. If he'd felt just a little less for Javier, then perhaps he could have accepted the necessity for Javier to disguise his nature with brothel orgies and eventually a wife. "But you're Cadeleonian and a duke and we both know what that means."
He couldn't meet Javier's dark gaze and instead lifted his eyes up to the pale expanse of the sky. Javier remained silent beside him.
A dark silhouette spread ragged wings as it soared overhead and for a moment Kiram thought it was another of the countless jays. But this bird was far too black. Kiram's dread changed to delight.
"Look, a crow." Kiram pointed and then waved.
Javier glanced from the crow to Kiram and raised a brow questioningly. Kiram supposed he did look odd waving to a passing bird as if it were an old friend.
"Alizadeh told me to befriend any crows that I saw here," Kiram informed him.
"Ah," Javier replied and then indulged Kiram by offering the rangy crow a brief wave.
To Kiram's surprise the crow dived low and circled them twice before alighting on Kiram's shoulder. Kiram stared at the glossy black beak warily. The crow gave a low clicking call that sounded almost like a laugh to Kiram. It cocked its head to study Javier with rust orange eyes.
Javier stared at the crow with an expression of surprise that Kiram had rarely seen on his face. Very slowly he extended his hand to stroke the bird's chest. The crow indulged him for several moments, even tracing Javier's finger with its beak once. Then it took wing again, swooping across the stream into the darkness of the surrounding orchard.
"It would seem that your new suitor has somewhere else to be," Javier commented.
"My suitor? He seemed more taken with you than me."
"Well, that's certainly never going to work." Javier flashed a wry smile. "Not only is he obviously from a different religion but he seems the flighty type."
"Very funny."
"I do try." Javier turned towards the academy and Kiram joined him. They followed one of the many ancient, crumbling stone walls that had once stood against assaulting armies.
"Will I see you at dinner?" Javier asked as they approached the stables.
"I'll be there," Kiram promised.
Javier accepted that with a nod. They parted at the stables. Kiram stopped off at their room to put away his and Javier's skates and to get a new bottle of writing ink, as well as fresh quills to cut pen nibs from. He packed them up and then dashed down the stairs.
"Kiram!" A distastefully familiar voice called. He spun around to see the odd tableau of Holy Father Habalan's plump, silk-clothed figure waddling alongside the leathery, gaunt War Master Ignacio.
"Kiram Kir-Zaki! Come here, boy. Come here." Holy Father Habalan waved him over. Plump and plain, Habalan appeared utterly benign and yet Kiram knew he was no such thing. Kiram had to suppress a glare every time he caught sight of this man who routinely poisoned Javier and no doubt had used the shadow curse to destroy the entire Tornesal family.
Unable to bring himself to speak, Kiram simply bowed his head and stepped just a little nearer his two instructors.
"No need to be shy." The holy father beckoned Kiram closer. "Master Ignacio and I have a question for you."
Kiram didn't dare ignore Master Ignacio. Only after his outing to the Goldenrod had Kiram risen from the torture of the war master's disdain to the respite of his total disinterest.
"If you can, Underclassman Kiram, describe what you understand of God," the holy father instructed.
"Which god do you mean?" Kiram wasn't quite sure what the two of them were after. "The Cadeleonian God or Mirogoth Lore or-"
"No, boy," Holy Father Habalan snapped. "Do try to follow the question. It's really quite simple. Describe your understanding of God. The divinity of your heathen faith."
Kiram didn't even bother to dispute being called heathen; he'd sat through far too many of the holy father's history lectures to bother. Though, he would have liked to point out that he wasn't a Bahiim and therefore asking him to sum up the ancient and esoteric theology of his entire race was much like asking a horse to explain the history of mounted warfare. But he knew such a response would only be taken for insolence. So instead he offered them the simple tenet that his grandmother had taught him and which he truly believed.
"All life is sacred. Whether it takes the shape of a moth, a man, or a great oak, every life is precious and part of a greater whole, because no matter how different our physical bodies, all our souls arise from and return to the same divine union of the shajdi." Kiram could see at once that his response did not please Master Ignacio, but Holy Father Habalan smiled and clapped his hands together.
"You see. Every living thing. Flies, worms, mice." The holy father turned to Master Ignacio. "Very primitive spiritually, hardly better than those Mirogoth animals. There is always the possibility of conversion, of course, but in most cases it's not worth the effort of trying. Higher purpose is simply beyond most of them."
Master Ignacio scowled and handed two gold coins over to the holy father, who happily pocketed them.
"Thank you, Kiram." The holy father patted Kiram's head as if he were a pet of some kind that could not have possibly understood his insulting words. "That's all we needed."
Savage anger flared through Kiram and it took all of his restraint not to simply slap the smug smile off of Holy Father Habalan's face. He wanted to see Habalan's expression when he spat in his face and announced that he knew Habalan was the man responsible for the brutal deaths of the Tornesal family.
But he had no proof and no hope of anyone backing him up if he raised his hand against a Cadeleonian holy man. Kiram bowed and quickly left them.
In his rush for the dormitory doors he crashed into Scholar Blasio, causing the young, pallid math instructor to spill the armload of the kindling that he had been carrying. Blasio almost fell as well but Kiram caught him.
"I'm so sorry, sir," Kiram told him. Then he dropped to the floor, regathering Blasio's wood.
Blasio knelt beside him, worry showing on his soft features and golden brown eyes.
"Kiram? What's happened?"
Kiram didn't want to admit anything but he couldn't help himself.
"That fat fuck, Habalan-" Kiram began but then shook his head, knowing that his anger was too fresh, too raw to express in anything but a string of obscenities.