“We saw our future’s barren waste watching us opposite an immeasurable time. A mirage. An insubstantial dream flickering in a suggestive rhythm. Inspiring. Foreboding. We could touch the dust in its wake until it was suddenly truth in an all-consuming moment. We took up tools, poison by its more vulgar name as poison was and is the woman’s preferred kiss, and elevated ourselves for a purpose. Potions were our first foundational toehold, and our grails a far-flung second for the rest of the foot! Women sharpened their knives. Women steeled their wills. Women honed their flesh. We Lucias would unmake, and unname, all the Herricks and their strangling Vines. Finished was playing victim as thralls for males in their pervasive, moon-touched fantasies.”
-from Pistil Supremus Abena, House Flora, A History of Potions, 1923
Eccentric Flora Potions Master, general grump, and one of an insane five males within their experimental disaster, Master Childs completed moisture level analysis and health on a nasty little climbing onion recently imported for a task.
His evening was spent among various espalier and colorful racemes dangling like angler lures overhead, each species varying in its toxicity based upon classification, application, tick, and grace.
Each carried nasty teeth, and it was David’s task making them all date-ready for a Venin’s eventual kiss.
Inevitable, one earned ivory kisses carelessly poking depravity’s depths.
All around David’s tall, lean figure, riotous blooms, herbs—a floral menagerie grew to feed the Guild’s monstrous appetite. Life that stopped life rose up in an emerald avalanche, a cacophonic wonder paused crashing with deadly possibility.
Apothecary leathers scraped and creaked with every movement as he moved between biomes in miniature, billowing sleeves rolled and buttoned so as not to catch or brush against plants and equipment. He wore subtle browns, deep greens, and a crisp white linen shirt making him resemble a character from the 1800s. He liked it, despite looking a man from an older era who had aged in reverse within outdated work attire. Bronzed buckles and fastenings polished to a gleam, boots nearly reaching his knees, pants tucked into their tops.
An older, clean look. Presentable. Some might say dashing, even, though about as useful as being the handsomest pig in the pen when you were a guy in a Guild like his.
His Guild adelaide, center for House Flora’s work in Salas Chapter, was built into their Chapter house compound’s Southwest corner of the second floor. No one had wanted this space for their own adelaide when they began building. He had expected a fight, as this fresh attempt at the Guild’s grand experiment, housing each Guild House under a single Chapter, presented heated argument at planning.
However, plants required air, light, and space. He had won his argument after feeble dissent, being a legacy House offering perks and favoritism.
Vestigial evening light trickled through towering windows to mingle with grow lamps across a polished stone walkway through colorful miniature biomes, behind glass, others open. Greenery threatened crashing like a great consuming wave, forever burying in molasses slow motion the singular man among all manner of alchemic tools, devices, and glassware only one of the Guild’s Potion Masters employed.
This adelaide was a wide, chaotic space to untrained eyes. For David, it was controlled chaos utilizing space based on need, rather than organization. Carefully curated manufactories tucked in and between colorful dwarf forests beating within their compound’s unassuming concrete walls. Vaulted ceilings allowed space for an open second level where other plant species grew along walls and in hydroponic systems happily gurgling as it kept happy, healthy plants for eventual murder.
His tiny kingdom held equal parts significance and purpose in its potion majesty, every square foot, even places where floor gave way to open soil or moss, was dedication to Flora’s flowery propensity. He had scored a lovely spot where he could imbibe a little, watch sunsets, and read his books without worrying whether another Guild house was going to create a problem for him.
David Childs gave an honest, handsome grin tending new sproutlings of a slow-tick species Datura stramonium, sure for its deadly effect, but also because he just really loved their purple trumpet flowers.
No one said he had to cultivate for practical purposes alone.
His smile persisted through his work, even while another message lit his lensed periphery with a message, reminding him of his servitude to a particularly thorny woman, and now not just a woman, but an angry, newly raised Venin. David represented one more voluntarily collared male, Guild Potions Master, and singular supplicant to this Chapter’s House Flora among thousands the world over. He was happy. Content. A kept male or pet.
Yet, he itched without more projects.
He cupped a flower, holding it gently in a gloved hand as its juices could make him ill with his grail’s protection, and possibly kill anyone else without one.
“Elyse will be loud, violent, disruptive, and I apologize now, my darling,” he said into a particularly pronged set of petals.
Taking a knee by a shaded corner, he gently tipped his small nutrient supplement into the soil of his particularly stubborn hybrid Circaea lutetiana. A whole month he cared for this typically harmless lady. David had started this particular project because Sepal Lainia had given him a plant, a purpose, and instructions.
Lainia keeps pushing for diversity and explicit use-cases, for what? She acts like Flora is going to war and I’m tapped as weapons master.
Now he had growth in his little Circe, but as Lainia had told him—vulgarly, as always for a Sepal, he added mentally—she needed more allure; a serious case of dentata in a previously timid lady. She was one of many projects Sepal Lainia had casually tossed in his lap of late. In Lainia terms: a potion some poor Venin would use as aphrodisiac and slow-tick unnaming, preferably delusions, mental transformation, and terminal case of coma, which was more vegetative and less pig, in David’s opinion.
It got the task done.
Sighing heavily, David stood, arching his back until he felt several cracks along his spine.
“Your namesake is at risk, and your modesty is showing, m’lady,” he said to his special tenant. “You are giving us tickles instead when you should be luring tasks to their ends like the stories.”
His rounds terminated at his adelaide’s West corner. His spot, where he paused, marveling at a distant shimmering liquid sliver. Purple sky hung heavy and darkly vibrant while pinpricks from other distant cities, their lights twinkling crystal sands. Why the Guild chose here and not there, he presumed another oversight in a generally stupid plan.
Because posturing Salas, hunched at their Chapter’s feet.
Shadowed, nearby Salas with its fingerlings spreading out drab grey and white, anemone-like, below their mountain stronghold. It was a place more obvious in its need for Guild care. You could see its crusted rot and it advertised speckled white, orange, and blue in the dark like all dangerous creatures in nature. Dangerous with cartel activity, noisily lithe summoning less honest industry with its call.
You’ll get it, and more, now that we’re here. All you worthy monsters, thieves, traffickers and politicians, he thought, shaking his head.
Woe anyone who was sent down there. It had appetites much larger its size.
Up here, however, David was a guarded lordling in his high tower. Safe. Swimming shadows could not reach him here. And what they must have thought in Salas when they suddenly found a vast building putting down roots on a looming hill, its final growth looking unlike any other building in their county. A lovechild between San Diego’s Geisel library, London’s Barbican, and Saint John’s Abbey Church, all concrete brutalism, vast glass windows hard as steel, botanical gardens, and feeling you walked into a small church cathedral, rather than a house of death.
And I stand here in my corner, worshipping among nature, “out of this wood do not desire to go, thou shalt remain here whether thou wilt or no,” he quoted, drinking in his view.
Reluctant, David pulled himself away and repositioned his Potion Master Childs mask. He saw a ping in his vision signaling an approaching visitor.
He hummed to himself, fitting a small respirator so as not to inhale a compound he rhythmically worked in his pestle and mortar at his adelaide’s central work table, a hammered copper-covered table centered among growth and powerful floral scents. If he screwed up, his grail would contain the worst of the potion’s kiss.
Another ping in his vision, this one a message from a House Fang Corolla—fantastic—one he thought her Sepal kept outside her inner circle. Poor bitch. Here was one admitted drawback living with other Houses: infighting.
It could have been an email.
A bitter-looking woman whose face looked too pinched and aged for her young years popped up and opened with a tirade. “Master Childs!” His name profanity in her mouth. “This is the second message regarding Fang’s stolen asset belonging solely to House Fang and her Potions Master! You will return said property to Master Carter, or I swear I will elevate this to the Pistilary and have them deal with you themselves! A male of all people stealing from a House is about the stup-”
He immediately regretted opening it, swiped his hand through the air stopping her predictable posturing mid-sentence.
He grinned nefariously looking up at dull droning overhead. Fang’s engineered bees, whose steady, rapid-firing wings in the hundreds busily pollinated flowers he had placed within their biome. He watched them cross overhead in their pollinating tasks among the closed off oleander. The bees created a deadly honied kiss while also helping his adelaide thrive. Sweet pain and death all the way down.
“Nope, I don’t think so, Corolla Sceles.”
He bent back to his work, humming along with his bees under his breath.
Buzz, buzz, buzz, our little busy bees, busy buzzing makers making honey just for me. He laughed, imagining anthropomorphic bears getting stuck in rabbit holes. “Joke’s on him, if he eats this honey.”
The ingredients smelled sweet if someone stupidly sniffed at its caustic parfum. He generously scooped richly dark powder with one gloved hand, added water, then set his concoction to a low boil eventually becoming candy. Deadly candy. Any extra powder he carefully stoppered as this stuff getting airborne made for dangerous clean-up.
“The candy man can, ‘cause he mixes it with love and makes the world taste good,” he started singing, humming the tune to himself. He tipped exotic honey into the compound, stirred it again. “Oleander and just a touch of Jatopha curacas to give it that diarrhetic kick you want in a deathly sweet treat. Ooohhh yes, this will be artistry.”
His adelaide’s glass door crashed open hard enough it struck steel supports and a gust of cool air rushing past his sweat-moistened face. His anticipated visitor’s furious voice called out his name, curiously interwoven with some lovely swearing across three languages, according to his lenses. “You’ll do what, to my what, while my father watches, Trainee Elyse?”
The entrance door stuck open, Elyse stampeding his direction.
Not looking up from his work, he said loudly, “If paying a visit to your House’s inner sanctum, at least close the damn door. My residents are sensitive to both your poor choices and your vulgarity, girl.”
A wince escaped when he looked up and saw her. She seemed positively used. Beaten up. Murder colored her face.
He averted his eyes pretended deep fascination with an empty note. “You’re alive. Congratulations on your successful trial, Venin,” punctuating that word with two taps of his pestle against the mortar’s edge.
“To hell with you and your congratulations! I could have died! Or worse! And it was you!” More profanity following. Was he getting older, or was it a “her” problem, like Sepal Lainia?
She stomped away. Out the corner of his eye, he noticed, despite Elyse’s fury, she contained sense enough to turn back for his adelaide entry, kicked it closed, and brushed at a sizeable dent she might actually regret, admit it or not.
Her tirade unfinished, Elyse came at him again while he removed his mask.
He used a small, ornate spoon to scoop several grams of buds he had worked into a powder. His before giving it a shake, then held it to the light above and watched the liquid cloud beautifully.
Art. It was the only art—the only beauty—he could make in this place.
Elyse was finally on him, now that she had fixed the door shut. Maybe it was the door, maybe the stewing, but she seemed angrier now, if that were possible.
Calmly, delicately, David withdrew a large pinch from the powder in his mortar. He listened to her hasty stomping. She had just reached his table when he twitched in her direction and blew the powder into her face with a quick puff.
Elyse immediately shut her eyes and spun away with a snarl. He could already make out signs of the powder taking as Elyse worked her face against the likely immediate pain and grit. She refrained from rubbing it in. Good girl! But she had started waving her hands in her face. A curious response.
“You…asshole!” she managed while bending over to cough, sputter, and shake her hair and face. “What’s this powder?” Her voice grew smaller, cowed, more respectful as more pain was growing in her eyes. With that pain, she regained composure, remember who she was, where they were, and a forced stoppage recoloring her speech and behavior.
Childs considered how long he should let pain leech her anger. It was unbecoming for a Venin to fly into rage against any Potions Master, despite technically outranking them. Technically. He was only male, after all. It was different with Elyse, though. He had helped raise the girl, and sidelined her emotional garbage.
“My own blend,” he said. “Thank you, Venin. I was hoping I wouldn’t need to ask around or borrow one of the girls in training for testing. Makes me look the ass dousing random sisters. Douse your homegrown women instead. It’s safer thing in a mixed Chapter.”
While Elyse hovered and hissed, David withdrew a small, worn leather notebook from his back. He observed her tears welling up, hissing between teeth, trying to blink away the powder. However no emotional tears. Good girl.
“I have a report I need to finish before I meet with Sepal Lainia, and her meeting in the Calyx,” he said, noting Elyse’s reactions, her twitching, and what he suspected was discomfort without severe burning. “Certain Sepals are still trying to impose reforms.”
When he looked up again from his notes, he found she was more focused on the discomfort and trying not to brush against any of the numerous bottles, standing cylinders, and equipment in which any number of surprises turned fatal. Again, he found himself surprised and proud of her caution, even after what he suspected was a hell of a night on her trial.
“Not a proper kiss, more an experimental tool I am crafting,” he explained. “I respect our Guild laws and do not use potions against my…betters. Do you understand acts of propriety, Venin?”
Her anger persisted, though David heard past her clipped tone, caution winning out. “Yes, Master Childs. Would you please help me. Please,” that last word straining her effort and control.
He already had a bowl of water and something slick on the surface readied. Childs guided her hands—Elyse flinching at his touch at first—to the bowl, noting the mucus starting to crust along her clenched eyes.
“Rinse with that. It should relieve and restore your eyes shortly.”
Elyse calmly did as he commanded, though not without small, jerky motions, her stubborn protests still waning. David swept a hand through fine mocha-colored hair, fixed what Lainia called arrogant faded turquoise eyes on Elyse as she rinsed and sniffled. He jotted down additional notes in his notebook, a pinned lab animal for study, adjusted the proportions he calculated as the other symptoms were not manifesting as he predicted.
Maybe just a little…but no. Powders not ingested came in too few varieties without drastic or maiming results. He needed to measure-
He became aware Elyse stood at the table, studying him. As well as she could, at least. She was still recovering and bloodshot with twinges of discomfort at the corners of her eyes. Deep fury still swam in that face. She looked more in command. A proper Venin before a Master of her Guild. Not an equal…never an equal. It made him somewhat sad, really, looking into that young face. She truly was his better having completed her trial. A Venin. No male of the Guild held a position as important as a Venin or higher. Only trainees were below, and even they brought contempt for males before any Guild member had at them.
That old twinge of frustration crept up and gripped his heart, sank barbs into his soft soul. It was your choice, boyo. You cannot forget that. You had a choice.
“I notice you do that a lot,” Elyse said, rubbing at one eye with the back of a finger and watching him with the other, head tilted.
David pushed away his thoughts else Elyse read him using those damn instincts and piercing analytics. “You mean solve my problems with my brain? Are you…unfamiliar?” Voice golden, melodic, the voice of someone who should have had its own show on virtuals or radio cranked to eleven. She did not take the bait. Maybe she was getting better at this.
“You hide away in here from the politics and the marks and the Corollas and all sorts of trash the Guild is handling. You hide here with the plants. You hide, while we take your work and go out to deal with the world’s monsters and try not to become monsters ourselves, is that it?”
He scribbled notes, which were nonsense, but she needn’t know that. “First, I had not expected you to quote a bastardized version of Nietzsche, but good on you for trying. Second, I do not hide, Venin, I am here seeing to your potions, conducting studies you should appreciate as this is for your benefit, not mine.”
“That’s a lie. You love this.”
“Partially. But I don’t go into the field and- no,” he cut her off with a gesture, “I know you think I have pull or clout I can swing around my head but us in the Guild not blessed with the right nethers have nothing but our knowledge and expertise to offer. I accepted it a long time ago. You know this. You live this. Why is this all coming up now?”
“Poor you. I’m sure you feel so damn disappointed you aren’t out there getting groped, slapped, worse. I’m not here angry because I need daddy’s help. I need you to tell a Venin who tried to get her killed this evening, because my trial’s task had a potion, Master Childs. Not some random pills. And Lainia already told me it was traced back to here. Back to you. I know you know.”
That damned woman sharing way too much with our Venins again. “Sepal Lainia, I imagine, explained it to you, what, over a drink with your unnamed male dead on the floor between you? Sounds like her. Melodramatic as hell.”
“Sepal Lainia told me potions slipped on your watch. And I was almost a victim of it.”
“But you handled it, and you are here. Lainia must have been ecstatic she won her bet. That woman…I did not lose anything. They were taken from the armory, and our armorer was also interrogated. We have no trail.”
“She said that.”
“Then I’m telling you again. What, you want an apology for our tools getting robbed? Me doing my job too well and you almost dying because someone else screwed up? Because I will not, and you’re a fool thinking it.”
“Your ego is incredible! Do you jerk off to mirrors, too?”
He felt anger flood his face unbidden and knew she saw it there. He was not about to let her know how much raw guilt he felt curdling his stomach, iron knots twisting along his shoulders. Unnatural in a Potions Master to feel guilt when the Venins all waved potion, knife, worse at each other. He was loathed to give Elyse more, but Gods, if Lainia had confided these details with her...and he now noticed with renewed observation at the bruising along her arms, likely other places her Guild fatigues hid. It was not an easy trial, she must have missed something, fallen into a trap.
Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.
More reason for him to speak with Lainia now.
Aloud he said, “This is out of character for you and her. Your trial, then…it must have been something difficult for her witness.”
Elyse waited patiently as she observed his face, reading whatever she could in the twitches and creases like reading entrails, but more intimate to him.
“I just returned a couple hours ago, and it was,” she said, finally. She breathed deep, “So you’ll give me what I need?”
David paused, “You really think someone from our own Chapter tried to get you killed.”
Elyse’s worked through shifting shades of shifting emotional weather patterns. “Seems more about humiliating our house, not really me. Unless someone had a personal grudge…which could also be. My mouth gets in my way. You already know that much. I see it in your face.”
“How do you know this was not all part of your trial? Was the kiss successful? Your male unnamed and unmade?”
Her knuckles, he noticed, were white as they gripped the table and she sniffed, shaking her head.
Abruptly, he began clearing away his tools and sloshing his stoppered bottle. His candy cooled for a later chipping into usable pieces. Cleaning let him focus while he spoke.
“From the Carpel, where the highest sit, down to our Sepals and their Corollas, no one wastes talent over fractures. They test whether you can bring your training and personal talents to bear with a Potion Masters minor input. That is the germ of Guild philosophy.” He paused, shrugged, the most human thing he felt he had done this whole conversation. “The other Houses enjoy ignoring our combined strength and look to wrestle for prestige, including other Venins getting a man’s sting or two for the humiliation of the house’s Venins. You should address this now before talk starts and you end up fighting with the others.”
David made an unusual, even inappropriate, choice for a Potions Master. David gripped Elyse by her shoulders and held her almost in an embrace, burrowing his gaze into hers with such intensity that Elyse nearly looked away at the naked intimacy in it.
He could be reported with light consequences for the impropriety. Rumors would fly if they were caught, this of many moments where he had decided novel approaches with wild buds of Flora.
“Politics, Elyse,” he whispered, before releasing her again. “Lainia knows, so do others. Fractures were always there, now things are growing out of them,” his subtle elocution made his leathers groan distractingly as he enlightened the girl. “Venins take more enjoyment from other Venins failing than I care think about among rival Houses.” He slowly released his hold. To her credit, she did not shy away, rather she stood her ground and listened intently. “Stupid nonsensical word, rivals. We should be a united front against our common enemies. We’ve seen this the last year or two, but there was a shift. Deaths. Disappearances. This is no longer about humiliation between Houses, and we have just escaped one such instance.”
David straightened, beckoning for her to follow him from his adelaide. “I cannot tell you a House, Corolla, Sepal, nothing. I provide you tools and their detailed use. I- I have no real power here.”
Lainia’s scheduled meeting in the Calyx should adjourn before they reached her office. Wandering from his sanctuary to navigate their House’s wing, hopefully it was true.
“I am Master of little but the potions you employ; a glorified weapons master sharpening your knives and not far above our special sector like cooks, security, medical, all of them,” he said in hushed tones beside her.
None acknowledged him in their wing despite him knowing many of their faces. They were not rude, but neither did they greet him, or wave hello. He was any stranger off the street.
The right words eluded him.
“I’m truly sorry.” More surprisingly, David truly was sorry he could not say more.
She remained at his side as they walked past a meditation room, private training, dorms, other rooms done up in Flora’s colors and particular aesthetics.
“Make it up to me by telling me who tried to sabotage the trial and get me used and dumped in a bin somewhere,” Elyse blurted. “No one is supposed to know the specifics for trials or field missions but Sepals, sometimes Corollas. Someone wanted me dead. I need to know who.”
Sunlamps shifted like tracking sunflowers while the walked their wing. Compared ot his adelaide, it was much, much cooler, dimmer, hallway corridors lit by shifting sunlamps that tracked people via body heat and general movement.
Great, aesthetically and artistically along iron and glass wall sconces. They could also function as a security measure, as they only brightened and moved when they detected people.
Like non-Flora infiltrators.
Carpet muffled Elyse’s slippered steps. Master Child’s more substantial leather work boots creaked. They crossed several vaulted cross sections on their way into Chapter common rooms where one could find food, mingle with other Houses, play games, gossip, or access other House wings. There were only common areas connecting wings. It gave their compound a rough starfish shape, all six houses take an arm to themselves.
He saw their library was packed with Venins researching. It was often full evenings, though only certain Houses spent much time using its resources.
Fang least common cracking a book, physical or digital, unless there were pictures. And a lot of wild sex.
Sepal Lainia should have been leaving the Calyx chambers soon. A chance meeting with Sepal Lainia might be necessary. He knew Elyse was not overacting, and Lainia would have downplayed the night’s trial to avoid internal matters growing beyond a Venins prodding at boundaries.
A sudden shout from his left had David palming one of several small throwing Komodos on his person. He postured, ready to throw it at their attacker loping their direction. Only when he had cocked his arm did he register that shouting was giggling, their attacker a tall girl excitedly running for Elyse.
“I knew it! There was nothing to worry about, right!?” Majaji called, grabbing Elyse in an embrace, lifting her up so Elyse also shouted delight. “Was it brilliant!? How did it feel!? Did you remember the rites?” She asked excitedly in precise, clipped English.
Majaji Madueke pounced on Elyse again, squeezed her House sister in a long-limbed grapple. Tall, knotted muscle in a lanky frame fit for a dancer, she rocked Elyse to and fro before releasing her and standing her full height. A bright dazzling smile testing the elasticity of her face and made others want to smile with her. She wore a casual House uniform, suggesting she had been here a while rather than in the field. Likely expecting Elyse home and wanting to be here to celebrate Elyse completing her trial.
David watched tension bleed from Elyse as though Majaji had banished it in a way he could never manage without good drugs, and alcohol.
That was not to say Majaji had missed ragged edges and broken pieces held together by will alone.
Majaji’s smile powered down, withered like fall leaves, cheer burned away in all the swiftness of melting snow.
Hands brushed blonde locks, face, bruised arms, trembling hands as though Majaji had felt a loose piece slip from place and Majaji determined to get it back where it belonged. She held both Elyse’s hands in hers, squeezed, pulled Elyse into a very different embrace, one more for healing than celebration.
David felt a difference, watching. If asked, though, he lacked words explaining that difference. It just was.
Now Majaji could not keep her hands off Elyse as though the girl were a lost, hurt puppy Majaji could not believe was returned her.
Watery blue eyes never gave David a glance, and he was glad for that because he still clutched his dagger at his side, his adrenalin ramped up. You are more wound up in recent events than you realized.
All Majaji’s attentions were for Elyse, who had also forgotten David. It was becoming awkward, he some creepy voyeur who should move on before being asked he insert his card.
She cupped Elyse’s face in both hands. Elyse grimaced. “I’ll tell you all about it later. Right now I need to go with Master Childs. It’s urgent. Are you going back to our dorms?”
“Like hell you are going without me,” said Majaji. “I demand details!” and when Elyse hesitated, added, “Come on, Elyse, do not shut me out in the cold! I want to hear all that happened. I will sweeten the deal with snacks, no? Something sweet?”
David cleared his throat. “Elyse, maybe it’s best you do go with Majaji. I need to speak with Sepal Lainia anyway and you are a little fresh from your trial.”
Elyse hesitated, Majaji wrapping herself around Elyse’s arm and playfully tugging her away from David. Elyse frowned indecisively.
“Seriously, go,” David assured her.
He knew that look. If seeing her friend brought her near the edge, what would a session in Sepal Lainia’s office do to this girl? He didn’t wish that rough woman on anyone at their best.
“I’m afraid Majaji will burst if you don’t give her something of your evening,” David reassured her. “Start with drinks. We’ll meet with Sepal Lainia when you are rested.”
Her polite reluctance caved. Majaji’s gravity winning out, Elyse bowed her head slightly, forgetting she was now David’s superior, not the young trainee, but he returned the bow anyway, watching a little jealously how Majaji knew instinctively how she could manage Elyse. David had tried and failed.
Or he worked under women and didn’t understand, this not being a first among many Venins he had attempted counseling.
So innocent, yet she ended her task as a Venin. There is ugliness in their craft, but something of the child among the razors, barbs, and thin adhesives keeping her together, he thought, watching them leave, Majaji’s arm clasped about Elyse’s shoulders as both support and necessary guide.
A masculine voice purred behind him. “You’re such a softy, David. When will you ever stop hoarding broken tools?”
David spun, his dagger still gripped tight in hand. He saw no one until—there—partially obscured behind wall sconce and a tall bookshelf, greenery waterfalling from its shelves. Propping himself against the wall by a shoulder, his harlequin smile—maybe more Cheshire than harlequin?—piercing in shadow. House Fang’s Potions Master, Sebastian Carter, manicured and styled into almost celebrity perfection stepped from hiding, his layered Masters tunic in colors of dried lichen, bone yellow, and sanguine outlines brought a wildness to an otherwise modern aesthetic. He rustled when he walked, most of his clothing reinforced for strength and mobility.
When you worked with a lot of sharp teeth, claws, and stingers, you wanted light, durable clothing.
Sebastian hunted. He waved amiably enough at David, though it looked practiced, like everything else Sebastian did or said. He had to practice being human.
David scowled. “Don’t you have orgies you need to arrange? Book burning? Animals to torture? I’ve heard Venins avoid your smell. Blood and desperation reminds them of starving predators.”
Sebastian titled his head thoughtfully. “Charming, David. Those are strange jokes. Are they meant to hurt my feelings? My lenses suggest you are being almost amicable. Are you? Being amicable?”
David’s hand casually wrapped around his Komodo, hoping Sebastian hadn’t seen him pull it when Majaji surprised him. His grip grew painful, a hope it had not slipped against any part of the blade. They were highly venomous edges on Komodos. It was why David kept more tucked in straps pressed against his forearms within loose sleeves no longer rolled up.
Mockingly, Sebastian clutched first his heart, then his groin.
“You wound me, brother! That’s how it goes, right? I don’t really do emotions, most of the time.” He flicked a glance at Child’s hand and smiled again, horrible in the dim lights and with too wide—too toothy—to be natural. “I wanted to extend my congratulations on your new Venin! Rude of me not to share a moment you worked hard in achieving, no? A friendly exchange, here in our commons where other Houses might see our camaraderie between Guild brothers?...That’s what brothers of our Guild do. Congratulate each other?”
David turned his back on him. Sure he knew better than have his back to an animal, jury still out on whether he was rabid. There wasn’t time for Sebastian, or patience. David needed words with Lainia.
Sebastian might hesitate following towards the Calyx at a busy hour?
His presumption collapsed as, unfortunately, Sebastian thought it a fantastic means for conversation as he followed, talking at length to David’s back, following him first through the commons, then down the central hall towards private Sepal rooms, including the Calyx chamber proper.
David picked up his pace.
“Did I miss a memo on some new status you hold within the Calyx?”
At a curve where they would be out of sight by others, David whirled on Sebastian. “You’re right, Sebastian, my apologies. Thank you, and I should not have gone on the offensive so quickly. You are a brother, and I should have opened with something more appropriate like asking after your pets, or your own Venins, or anything but how fucking weird you are!” he whispered more harshly than he intended.
Sebastian stepped back still sporting that constructed idiot’s grin.
David twitched involuntarily. His hand hinted at something being in it, a warning. Sebastian’s eye twitched at it, any significance hidden or disguised from David’s perspective.
It was time David tried another approach.
“Give me a reason, Sebastian. I’ve heard the talk about you, Venin being uncomfortable, hell, even your Corollas stay away because people just get a sense about you, even if they can’t figure you out.” David leaned in slightly, his own slowly spreading smile. “Do you really strap down trainees during your little projects? Poke at girls too scared of you? I hear all sorts of shit from the women even only a few months in. I hear you favor victims of very personal, very private traumas. Is that it? You small, sick pup!”
A snarl flashed and was gone. Sebastian was not moved to violence, though David saw in the man’s face how he longed to inflict real harm on him; longed to do any number of unspeakables, likely locked away in virtuals, where they could be entertained over, and over, and over—and he had to admit the security on their network did not make him feel safe enough. Not around someone as arguably brilliant and careful as he knew Seabstian to be.
Sebastian shifted his stance to something more passive. His hands first balled up, then released along any tension in his body. David knew then the man was considering. The claws were out, fangs trembling.
“Little girls are timid, and bigger girls get cocky. Our Guild makes whores out of good people who think they have to slit throats and take a cock because it is what the world needs them to do. It makes them avenging women. My House. Your House. No differences between them besides the how and appetites. We’re kept things, you and I. You see it, and I have come to understand you better. I know you do, hiding in your adelaide the way you do while I spend most of my time among the people, observing, analyzing.”
“Stalking, upsetting, all at your disgusting Sepal’s pleasures,” David interrupted.
“Honestly, neither of us are her fans. Don’t insult me lumping me with that…woman,” Sebastian said, honestly disturbed since he started rambling.
David caught a glint in Sebastian’s hand. A short, weighted needle, Seabstian’s weapon of choice, protruding between fingertips. He had good authority that it had a small payload of venom, likely all derived from specially bred reptiles in the bowels of the Fang menagerie Sebastian maintained. His House’s version of an adelaide more zoo than lab.
“Threatening me, Master Carter?” asked David.
“Wishing you would see me for me, David. Not what others see. We are similar! But for my lack, I can’t get you to see reason or evidence. I think I have been rather calm and pleasant, considering you’ve had a knife ready for me this whole time.” He shook his head sadly, tapped finger to palm, then started picking at his teeth with a manicured nail, sucking, looking at the floor as he continued. “Threats are for fools, anyway. If I want you, I’ll come for you. You need to go in for the kill, pierce that jugular. Really send a message that you don’t play.” He rolled something wet between fingers and flicked it to the carpet.
“That’s it, then, Sebastian? If this isn’t a game, what are we even doing here?”
“Funny, David. I ask that same question of my Sepal but she has yet to give me a straight answer. That’s the Sepals for you. We’re only males. We grind and grind and sharpen the tools in our shed, swing them around, mind our gardens and our grounds, but for what? And what about your needs; your vices? Obviously not wealth. Not flesh. Fun? Are you getting something on the side from one or more of your pieces back there? I tell you, if I were you--”
“You are not me! They are people, not things to be groomed, spent, and thrown away at a whim!” David nearly howled into his face.
That smile returned. Damnit! He always finds a way. Always!
“Here I thought you didn’t understand me! You do, then. Your problem is vision, or at least you seeing mine clearly. We both want to save women! White knights here to rescue them before they finally kill each other, and the world with them. You and I are on the same team, David!”
Sebastian said it with so much enthusiasm, David suddenly thought maybe he missed something between angry outbursts and his own fixation on getting as far away from Sebastian as possible.
“Maybe spend less time with your seedlings, and your roots, and your flowers? Especially that particular potent flower back there rumor has it you enjoy plucking? I guess I see the appeal, but isn’t it a little like a daddy sticking his-”
David lunged at Seabstian blade in hand and flicked his wrist, throwing it without intending to hit Sebastian, but close enough it might spook him into taking off.
It made a quick, woody thunk! The blade didn’t quiver, didn’t wobble as it had penetrated up to the hilt. He had meant it as a feint but the conversation had him and his only desire now was to do harm to this creature.
Sticking deep into the wall at his back, Sebastian had stood still, not even shifting his weight so sure David lacked nerve.
Sebastian’s face grew stony, him shifting into a familiar fighting stance among Guild members. David saw, however, how he moved his fingers and cradled another needle in his previously free hand.
Sebastian lowered his center of gravity, staying low and sliding his feet, his powerful leg muscles bulging beneath pant legs pulled taught by his low stance. It resembled an animal’s hypnotic shift. One of several techniques learned through his House.
The feet were wider, the hands shifting positions as though he were preparing to tumble. He finally moved in with surprising speed his Masters tunic should have restricted.
David lurched away, though not fast enough. He felt hot pain on his arm where one of Sebastian’s needles carved a gash through linen above protective leather. Sebastian feinted, dove in again. He was so fast! David saw no openings, remaining on the defensive as Sebastian pushed them further towards the Calyx doors, away from onlookers in the common areas.
When David leapt back from another of Sebastian’s strange low strikes, he pulled another of his throwing knives and hurled it expertly where he anticipated Sebastian’s next move. It missed, clanging into a metal vase and knocking it over with water and flowers noisily spilling on to the carpeted floor.
Sebastian’s face had started coloring, burning cherry red from effort it took him maintaining his stance and keeping up his pace.
Maybe David could outlast him? Make him over extend until his strength waned?
Sebastian shifted, used his momentum to plant his feet behind David score another scratch rather than stab him as he expected, and just as he tried leaping away, David slashed down at Seabstian’s hand, elation filling him when he felt resistance telling him he had scored flesh.
In his excitement, David went for a grapple, jerking back Sebastian’s limb, turned, tried to flip Sebastian into a lock, but the smaller man slipped away and flicked a finger near Child’s hand to draw third scratch.
He felt his grail feebly guarding him from the potion species laced in Sebastian’s needles. Male grails were like that, for reasons he did not quite understand. His body felt warm and tingly, the space just above his groin where his grail had been surgically inserted hot and tender, and his testicles feeling as though he were bodily dropping from a great height.
Sebastian must have felt it too, because he grimaced and backed away while he worked through the worst of it.
Adrenalin was also working against both of them. He was growing tired and jittery.
In an almost calm moment between them, Sebastian gambled a ravenous leap forward.
David embraced him, grinning.
His second dagger popped from his spring-loaded hilt. David grasped its handle with practiced movements, flicked it wide all in fluid finesse aiming a cut across Sebastian’s unprotected face, knowing the potion lacing in his blade’s razor edge could not kill Sebastian, but it would weaken him while his grail had to compensate, leeching resources from his body to change the potion into something harmless.
Sebastian instinctively moved hands to protect his face while David dropped, locking him in an expert grapple, then heaving Sebastian crashing hard and fast into the nearby wall with a gush of noisy breath and slapping limbs.
David tasted metal having bit his tongue, but it was worth it. Sebastian had the wind knocked out of him and one of his needles flip-flopping out of reach somewhere among lush carpeting while his other remained gripped tight in Sebastian’s right hand.
They held there, struggling, grunting, each attempting a break or advantage. They were both fighting fatigue, partially because they were not field agents, partially because their grails were uncomfortably working out potions attacking their systems.
Before another exchange, however, Sebastian suddenly kicked against the wall. David was forced to release him, letting Sebastian stagger backwards.
“Woo! Well, quite the practice and exercise, Master Childs!” he yelled, bobbing his head and hopping on his toes.
David looked on confused. He was ready for another go! He could take out all his frustrations on Sebastian’s torso with his knife. It was this moment he realized they had a growing audience. All their noise had drawn unwanted attention from women nearby enough they could hear.
David and Sebastian had also made a mess in the Sepals’ hall. Big no-no, male or not. While Sebastian tried playing it cool, impossible anyone believing him, David wondered how anyone would look at them and think they were practicing? In the middle of a hall this near Calyx chambers?
A Corolla David recognized from House Mycelium among their onlookers stepped forward delicately, shaking her head at them. “Your practice ends here, Masters. Look at the mess you created! The Sepals will be furious with you, and you can be sure someone will tell both your Sepals their pet males made messes in a common areas! This is why we use training rooms, gentlemen!”
No…fucking way…aloud, David cleared his throat. “Yes. Sure. Our apologies, Corolla. We are deeply sorry for our…poor decisions.”
“Certainly,” Sebastian added, smoothing his clothes and fixing his hair. “Though I did enjoy our understanding between one another. My Guild brother and I will do better going further.” He flashed their audience that strange cobbled smile.
David’s grail pounded at his stomach and nethers in steeply-diving rollercoaster drops weakening his knees. Sebastian’s potions were strong, and they were playing games with his internals. He needed a rest, though this hall had no chairs and he was not about to have a seat on a table with everyone gawked disapprovingly.
Instead, he pushed back his deep need for violence and reasserted his “Master Childs” mask, bowing to a growing number of women investigating their commotion.
“Thank you, Corolla. Sebastian, I will see you again. Soon,” said David. He hoped Sebastian’s lenses picked up on enough nuance in language that it translated David’s meaning.
“I’ll be waiting, Master Childs! Please do make sure it is soon,” Sebastian said, nodding, revealing nothing of intent.
Trainees, Venins, and a couple Corollas all observing and judging in mixed disgust, interest, and indifference at males being “male,” David hobbled away, not sure how well he hid his queasiness. He had gone too far, even as a Potions Master. Lainia will hear about this and get another earful from her.
Fucking great, he sighed inwardly. This had not turned out as he hoped. No Elyse as interception. Cuts and bruises. Fighting in public between Houses, and not even trainees doing the fighting. He would hear it all, and again find himself wishing he were back in his adelaide where he couldn’t be yelled at or have his life threatened other than by his own accidental stupidity, not someone else’s.
He felt eyes at his back, Sebastian doing whatever Sebastian did when—if—he suffered embarrassment. Wishing his groin stopped bungee jumping against his will. Women judging him. There was a small chance his Sepal would overlook today, as she, too, knew something about standing out in all the wrong ways. It was David’s only reassuring thought when he turned a corner and saw the great doors of their Chapter’s Calyx chamber,
Security guards were posted before it. Which meant they were in session late.
Yup. Because of fucking course, David groaned.
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