…or, The Empress Marlot Has Spoken
At nine, I headed out of my room, then straight down the hall and around the corner to Marlot and Missy’s room. I hadn’t thought much about having the room on the end before, but in a way my room was almost as much a part of the girls’ side as the guys’. I could look out my peephole and see right down their hallway.
The floor was awake now, with music, TV noise, and conversations coming from behind the closed doors and through open ones. Kira’s room was closed, and quiet.
The door was open, but I knocked on the frame before I stepped in view of the doorway, anyway. Marlot was sitting at her desk, sketching quartered circles. It hadn’t sounded like her signs class had given her any homework, so chances were good she was doing this for her own entertainment. Missy was nowhere in sight, though unless Marlot had suddenly embraced my love of E-Pop music, she had to be around somewhere.
“Hey, loser,” Marlot said, pausing in her work.
“Hey,” I said. I walked over to her desk and picked up the piece of paper and pretended to study it. “Loose.”
“What?” she asked, looking up at me in confusion.
“I thought you were going to ask me what kind of leaf this was,” I said.
“I can’t believe you’d debase your cultural heritage for cheap laughs,” she said, grabbing it back.
“Yeah, it’s much better abused for picking up chicks,” I said.
“Tell me about it,” Marlot said, jerking her head in the direction of Missy’s arcadia crystal and rolling her eyes. “I want you to be careful with her, Jamie.”
“For her sake, or mine?” I asked.
“Both of yours,” Marlot said.
“She told me you tried to warn her off a bit.”
“I don’t want to see you using her to try to prove something,” Marlot said. “That wouldn’t be healthy for you, or fair for her, or most importantly, pleasant for me, since I’m stuck with both of you.”
“Yeah, I know, no hustling your roommate,” I said. “In any sense of the word. Where is she, by the way?”
“In the bathroom,” Marlot said. She fluttered her eyelashes. “Making herself all boo-tee-full for you.”
“Nothing wrong with a girl who likes to look nice,” I said.
“Of course not,” she said. “Do you want to get my hat off the wall for me?”
I climbed over her bed, which was covered with the same paisley print bedspread she’d had since she was eight. She had over a dozen hats on an accordion peg rack on the wall above it.
“Which one?” I asked.
“The black one with the flower,” she said, referring to a battered black bowler with an even more battered black rose pinned to it. She liked to tell people it was worth eight silver, which always got an incredulous look or an eyeroll. She didn’t tell them that this was because she’d hidden eight silver coins inside its lining.
“Here you go,” I said, dropping it on her head. “You okay for going over to the union?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “I only asked you to get it because you were up.”
“Okay,” I said. “I just wondered. You seemed a little worn down, yesterday.”
“I just overdid things yesterday. I’ll do better today.”
“What’d you do yesterday that you can avoid today?” I asked.
She didn’t say anything.
“Why not go to the healing center over lunch, if it’s bugging you in the morning?” I said. “You can cut the stress right in half.”
Healers couldn’t do anything for her leg except ease whatever pain and strain her knee and hip had taken recently; the root of the problem was beyond their abilities. Arcane options for a permanent solution included having her entire leg permanently altered, which would have been ruinously expensive, or replacing the entire leg with a golimb.
The second option was only just on the right side of affordable. It was doable, but would have required borrowing money against the tavern. Her family had been willing to do it. Marlot hadn’t. She’d put her foot down, and since that was the foot on the chopping block, that had been the end of it.
“I’ll think about it,” she said”. “But I couldn’t do that every day.”
There was no practical reason that she couldn’t. The healing center was free to all students, and she had a valid use for their powers. I didn’t think that’s what she meant, though.
“Oh, not every day, no,” I said. “But if it’s really bugging you in the morning, it’ll only be worse by the end of the day.”
The subject dropped itself with the arrival of Missy. She was wearing her hair up again. I thought she’d overdone the makeup a bit, but I didn’t say anything. Her face was her lookout, not mine.
“Hey!” she said. “Ready for breakfast?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Awesome. Let me just grab my purse,” she said, as she went to get it off of her bed.
“Don’t forget your knife, too,” I said.
“You really think they’ll check?” she asked.
“Didn’t you hear Annie saying the guards tried to fine Kira twenty-five silver, before she got them to look at her card?” Marlot asked.
“So, she really does have an exemption?” I asked.
“Seems like,” Marlot said.
“Interesting,” I said.
“Not really,” Missy said. “I mean, Anankan, right? I still think that’s a bunch of shit. I should leave my knife here and claim religious discrimination if they try to ticket me. Why should I have to do something they don’t?”
“So, does this Annie hang out with Kira?” I asked Marlot.
“Why, you want an introduction?” Marlot asked.
“Maybe she’s not even really Anankan,” Missy said.
“Wait, what makes you say that?” I asked her.
“Juliana swears she’s an Argenti,” Missy said. “Don’t they worship trees and rocks and stuff?”
“‘Worship’ probably isn’t the best word for it,” Marlot said. “Anyway, weren’t we going to breakfast?”
“Yeah,” Missy said, turning and heading for the door. “Let’s go.”
“Knife?” I reminded her.
Once Missy was properly equipped, we headed over to the union. There were more non-humans using the dining room now, though they weren’t all in one group any more.
The human-looking girl who’d caught my eye the first day was sitting on the dwarfblood’s lap. She looked seriously bedraggled, her clothes and hair both damp and plastered to her skin. The two of them were there with the blue-haired sylph, who was shoveling food into her mouth as fast as her four arms could manage. Which, it turned out, was pretty fast.
“Khersis, will you look at that Harlowe kid,” Missy said when we’d taken a table. “She looks like a drowned rat, and I know that’s the same shirt she had on yesterday.”
“I wear the same shirt again sometimes,” I said, though I had to admit she looked pretty terrible. The best that could be said about her appearance was that Missy couldn’t snark about her not knowing how to use a shower. A towel and a hairbrush, maybe, but not a shower.
“Why are they so interesting, again?” Marlot asked. She was looking down at her omelet, and she sounded irritated. It wasn’t the over-the-top mock indignation she liked to affect for outrageous effect. This was bugging her.
“Mar, you were the one jumping and pointing at them in the first place,” I said.
“Yeah, in the first place,” she said. “Three days later now. Can we please move on?”
“Look, those two aren’t even eating anything,” Missy said. “They’re sitting there, groping each other. It’s like they showed up just for the attention.”
“Yeah, so why are you giving it to them?” Marlot asked.
“Excuse me for caring,” Missy said.
“For caring about how somebody you don’t even know looks and dresses?” Marlot asked.
That took Missy aback, but only for a moment.
“Not for that,” she said. “Because of the inappropriate physical display. They’re practically making out over there.”
“Let’s just all drop it,” I said. “Okay? Missy? Mar?”
“Okay,” Missy said.
“What are you looking at me for?” Marlot asked. “I wanted to drop it in the first place.”
“Fine,” I said. “It’s dropped.”
We sat mute for a minute, with no sound but the clicking of forks and the squeaking of Marlot’s knife on her plate as she cut tiny pieces off her omelet.
“So, Jamie,” Missy said finally. “When are you going to see Iason again?”
“Tomorrow, I guess,” I said. “That’s when we have class again.”
“You didn’t make plans?”
“He’s not a big fan of planning, turns out,” I said.
“You could surprise him,” Missy said. “Just turn up on his doorstep, like he did at yours.”
“How do you know about that?” I asked.
Caught, she blushed.
“I saw him sitting there when I got back from class,” she said. “I didn’t know for sure what he was there for, but I had an idea. Well, I thought it was a bit far-fetched, but I still hoped.”
“Well, I wouldn’t know how to find Treehome,” I said. “And if I did, they might welcome me with arms, but I don’t think they’d be open.”
“They wouldn’t recognize you as an elfblood?” she asked.
“They might recognize that I have elven blood,” I said. “I’m not sure that would make them like me any better than any other human.”
“But, you really aren’t, Jamie,” Missy said, looking at me like I’d just told her that Khersentide was canceled. “Any other human, I mean. You’re different. You’re special.”
“Like that Harlowe kid?” Marlot asked.
“I thought you didn’t want to talk about her,” Missy said.
“You know, I think I’m done eating,” Marlot said, though she’d only made it halfway through her cheese omelet.
“Who put you in charge of what we do and don’t talk about, anyway?” Missy asked.
“Talk about whatever the hell you want,” Marlot said, struggling to her feet. “I’m gone.”
Again, I let her leave. If I followed Marlot and tried to calm her down when she got mad, she’d usually get more flustered and break down crying. Getting mad made her frustrated, or vice versa. I wasn’t sure which it was. Probably, it was both. The point was, she got over it the fastest on her own.
“Sweet Khersis, she’s bitchy,” Missy said after she’d left. “Who does she think she is, freaking Vera?”
“That’s my best friend you’re talking about,” I said.
“I’m sorry, but she is. Can I just get her to give me a list of things I can and can’t talk about?”
“She isn’t like that,” I said. “Honestly, she has a point about the Harlowe students. There are more interesting things.”
“Yeah, I guess.” She sighed. “So, you don’t have any classes in the morning?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve got my thaumo lecture and mixed melee in the afternoon.”
“You going back to bed after this, then?”
“And what, sleep two or three hours just to get up for lunch?” I asked.
“I’d go back to bed if I could,” Missy said. “I’ve got my conjuration lab in a bit.”
“Conjuration?”
“Sounded useful,” she said. “And not too complex. Also, handy. I lose my keys all the time. You take a lab this semester?”
“Herbalism,” I said.
“Is that all, though?”
“Doesn’t make sense to take any heavy lifting ones before I’ve got my major figured out,” I said.
“Oh, yeah, I guess that’s true,” she said. “Sorry I called Marlot a bitch.”
“I’d say you should apologize to her, but you didn’t say it to her,” I said. “She’s temperamental.”
“So I’ve got to walk on tiptoes around her?”
“No. Honestly, it’s not the end of the world if you do set her off,” I said. “It’s not like she’s going to hate you forever for it. Just don’t, you know, go out of your way to provoke her. If she’s getting prickly about something, just realize it isn’t anything personal, and decide how important it is for you to not back down.”
“Seems like an awful lot of work to be friends with someone,” she said.
I shrugged.
“We’ve both been patient with each other,” I said. “I guess I don’t think about it that much.”
“I’ll try to get along with her,” she said. “I mean, I kind of have to, right? We’re roommates, and even if we weren’t, I know better than to try to come between friends.”
“Yeah,” I said. “That wouldn’t go well for anybody.”
“Anyway, I should probably get going,” she said, standing up and picking up her tray.
“Yeah, I’ll bus that for you,” I said, standing up and reaching for her tray. “I was thinking of going back up and get some bacon, anyway.”
“Thank you. I guess I should have guessed that elves weren’t vegetarians, from the way you eat,” she said.
“Missy, you know that technically, I’m really not an elf,” I said. “I mean, I like that you like me, but if you’re looking at me and seeing some character from an ethernet porn fic, I think we might run into problems down the line.”
“Oh, I’m not!” she said. “I know there’s more to you. I thought you were cute before I knew, when I first saw you with Marlot at the meeting. When she said you were part elf, it just caught my interest even more. It’s like a bonus.”
“Okay,” I said. I could honestly stand the thought that my heritage was an added incentive, as long as it wasn’t the only reason for her attention. “Just so we’re both on the same page.”
“Absolutely,” she said. “Um, if you’re not doing anything with Iason, you want to try again tonight? I swear I won’t fall asleep.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Okay. I mean, definitely.”
“Great!”
“Yeah,” I said. “See you at lunch?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I guess we’ll come wake you up when we’re ready to go.”
“I’m not going back to sleep,” I said.
“Okay,” she said. “Well, do you want us to go by your room or just meet up in the food court?”
“It’ll probably be better to meet at the dorm,” I said. That seemed like the easiest solution. Leaving aside that Marlot wasn’t there to be let in on our plans, I didn’t have her schedule at my fingertips. There was no sense having somebody sit around waiting in the food court for the rest of us to arrive.
“Okay.”
A couple of hours later, she was knocking on my door to wake me up for lunch.
