Chapter Text
Rook is building a card castle and he's almost done. He wrinkles his nose as he concentrates on putting the Old Nevarran ace of spades on the top to finish it, stepping back carefully. It had taken him all morning, ever since Myrna and Vorgoth had left just after the 7am bell for the lower halls of the Necropolis where the disciplinary court is held. The card castle sits on top of his old desk. He tries not to remember when Myrna had given him the desk at the age of 5 when he'd asked her to teach him his letters. She'd been so pleased by how fast he'd learned to write the Nevarran alphabet that it had been his birthday present. Vorgoth had presented him with a matching chair. His own desk and chair for his bedroom, far too big for his child-self, but perfect now that he's an adult. Myrna has always thought ahead like that.
Six years old had been a happy birthday. Sleeping in as late as he liked, bucnica for breakfast with a rare cup of milky tea, Myrna finally freed from the Library on some dismal inheritance matter at the insistence of Vestus Pentaghast (that bitter, mean old kurac shem), Vorgoth promising he would only leave AT THE UTMOST DANGER TO THE DEAD, card houses and games, allowed (after a thorough warning from Myrna, birthday or no, Rook thinks nostalgically) to eat lunch with them in the senior Watchers' dining hall. A quiet afternoon of reading together and then there had been a knock on the door, Myrna opening it and then her hands cupping his cheeks, saying she thought he deserved a good place to study when he started proper lessons. Especially since he'd worked so hard on the Nevarran alphabet and-
The castle looks fine. Not as grand as some he's built, especially on long nights with Cas and Viktor, but he only has one pack of cards. Rook doesn't want to think about Myrna. Or Vorgoth. Or anyone here, really, but surprise, surprise. Here he is, shuffled off to Myrna and Vorgoth's apartment. He'd got his face put back together here after the War of Banners and then been put in a holding cell for two days, the pain around his eye guaranteeing a miserable time. At least the minute he'd been released they'd been there with a pain tincture, both of them, saying they had guaranteed his good behavior until the hearing.
That had been two weeks ago now. Two weeks of being cooped up here, not quite a prisoner, but not free to live his life until the Council gets together to decide his status.
The hearing that's happening right now while he sits here in his childhood bedroom and stews that if he had only one more year as a Watcher he'd be entitled to sit in on his own trial.
“Juniors are not permitted in the Court if the lich lords are in attendance,” Rook says in a mocking tone, swinging his arm out and knocking down his card castle in a moment of spite. “Dusty old kuracs with their ancient rules.”
Rook conveniently disregards how much he loves the rules and traditions of the Mourn Watch. Well, he supposes it doesn't have to be convenient disregard. Just because he thinks some of the rules about people, like Necropolis orphans or juniors, are outdated doesn't mean he hates everything. Their daily rituals ground him and the traditions remind him that even if he doesn't have family then he's part of an ancient order. He's earned it- scraping past all the mages to top of their cohort even when all he'd heard was knife-ears. Rook had taken the same oaths as Cas, a nobleman's son, even the same oaths as Vestalus Pentaghast, a noble and a mage. Being a Watcher is supposed to make everything equal, but he wonders if that only applies when a Watcher is human and a mage.
They'd told him not to leave the rooms. Rook wouldn't be so concerned if Myrna hadn't said that to him, very seriously looking him in the eye. His smart response died on his tongue and he'd just nodded while she'd squeezed his arm and gotten up from breakfast to leave, Vorgoth behind her. As always.
Rook's nerves feel raw, scraped. He could take his nerves between his hands, entangle them in his fingers and pull hard, but he doesn't think it would match the tension snaking through his shoulders and chest. He wishes he could at least go spar, but he hasn't held his daggers in weeks. And he can't leave the bloody apartment.
He hears the main door open. He'd spent hours listening for it as a child, wanting Myrna or Vorgoth home. Rook stays standing in the middle of his room, the black and red rug under his feet so familiar, even though he still feels torn between thinking of these rooms as home again and reminding himself that he'd never been meant to stay here permanently. The Necropolis is permanently in him, of course. He's been mired in Watcher life since he'd been found in the Memorial Gardens, the last Necropolis orphan of his cohort. But this room with Myrna and Vorgoth had always been temporary. Now and when he'd been a child.
If it's so temporary, then why do they still have your rug, your desk and chair, your bed, your old lesson books. Your drawings still on one wall in the kitchen area-
There's a few sharp raps on his bedroom door.
“Rook,” Myrna says, “come out here. We must discuss the hearing and the Council's decision.”
He's known since the front door opened that the hearing must be over. But Rook sits on the edge of his bed and watches his door. Myrna has never been impressed by the concept of privacy and, as he'd known, his door latch begins to wiggle. Too bad he knows enough about locks now to fix it, more the fool Myrna for encouraging him to pursue being a scout. Although, Rook muses, when Vorgoth could materialize in and out it seems ridiculous to hold his door latch against Myrna. Come to think of it, there are some impressive looking scorch marks on the desk and he has a flash of remembering how those got there.
His miniature career in alchemy had not been long-lived- about twenty minutes between trying to figure out how to set up an alchemical beaker and Vorgoth materializing in to drench the flames while Myrna had needed to kick his bedroom door open.
Ah, yes, that was why she'd forbidden him to lock his door for almost two years. Feeling suddenly more than a little embarrassed Rook gets up and slouches to the door. He opens it and Myrna is looking down at him, her face unimpressed.
“Have you been sleeping all morning?” she asks. Only at the moment she says that Rook looks down at his sleeping clothes, rumpled with mismatched buttons over his chest. She had definitely told him to change and look presentable, we don't know who might decide to see you after the hearing.
“Er.”
“Change now,” she says, but there's no sharpness or impatience, as Rook might expect, and that only increases his sense of unease.
“Myrna, please,” he says. “Just tell me-” she looks him up and down, sighing, but he squirms when she meets his eyes again, her own face going soft for a few seconds before he sees her usual aloofness settle back over her.
“It's difficult, Rook,” she says, “but I believe there is a solution, if you'll agree. You need to be presentable, however. Get dressed and come out so we may discuss it.”
Rook sees her go to the small kitchen table and begin putting the tea set together. He breathes in and exhales through his nose as he closes his door. Someone is coming to the apartment then. It's not like he has a lot to be presentable. Rook's hands dig through the clothes folded on top of the small dresser and he pulls out a plain white linen shirt, Watcher-style with the sleeves only to the elbow. There's an old Nevarran name for it, Vorgoth had told him- kosuljalatka. His fingers touch the buttons on the cuffs; his isn't a true kosuljalatka. A real one is meant to be worn with cuff links; the more grave gold the merrier, after all. Buttons are a dead giveaway, but it's not like Rook isn't with the majority of Nevarrans with his fake shirt. Who can afford cufflinks when there's bracelets, rings, and earrings to scrape together?
He tosses his sleeping clothes onto his unmade bed and pulls on the shirt with an old, plain pair of black trousers. Viktor had practiced his healer stitching on the knees, but Rook doesn't think it's noticeable. At least in the gloom of the Necropolis.
His grave gold sits on the dresser next to his clothes and he puts it on, his two rings and two bracelets. One ring on his right thumb, the other for his left pinky. While he turns to look at the door his fingers rub over the golden skull of his thumb ring, the pad of his index finger pressed into the emerald eyes. He's still allowed to wear his grave gold. Unless they try to take it from him. That's not a thought worth repeating, he thinks to himself.
There's one more knock on his door.
“The professor will be here shortly,” Myrna says. “If you're dressed we need to speak.”
The professor. Always promising. Probably a senior necromancer here to give him a long, drawn-out lecture about respecting the undead who caused a civil war and threatened the Necropolis itself- no big deal, after all, if a few poor commoners who work in the kitchens, laundry, and records rooms die before the senior members of the Watchers bothered to intercede.
Rook opens his door and slips out, his fingers reaching for the frame of one of Vorgoth's landscape paintings that line the hallway where his bedroom sits. Across from him is their bathing room, which sits next to Myrna's room. Myrna and Vorgoth's room. Vorgoth doesn't sleep, but when Myrna turns in for the night Vorgoth follows her. Rook tries not to contemplate it too much. What does he do in there while she sleeps? Stand there and watch her? When he'd been a child seeking comfort after a nightmare Vorgoth had always opened the door just before Rook could knock.
On his right is their shared study, books over-crammed into several large shelves and spilling everywhere, two desks facing each other on opposite sides of the room. Myrna's neat, orderly desk contrasted with the pieces of astrolabes spread out over Vorgoth's, his tools always carefully put away in the locked chest that he prefers to sit on over a chair, when he bothers to sit. Rook's favorite spot is the corner of the fireplace closest to Vorgoth's desk. He'd read so many of his first books perched on a huge pillow with the sound of her quill writing out Watcher correspondence and his tools etching out a new plate for an astrolabe with a new latitude and city.
Rook glances over to Myrna's back to him from the living area, Vorgoth hovering near one of the mismatched armchairs sitting in front of the fire. He's not sure if he hates being here, trapped in his childhood home with his guardians, or if it's a relief to be insulated from what is definitely a lot of juicy Watcher gossip. People who say Orlais is dangerous haven't had to contend with Watchers, who hold onto every bloody slight and have nothing better to do than yap about the past while they tend the dead.
Rook flops down into the chair opposite Vorgoth as Myrna finishes up the tea. She says nothing else while she makes a cup with two spoons of honey and a bit of cream, handing it to Rook. He takes it and watches her make her own cup. One honey only, as he knows. She sits in the other chair, sipping at her own tea.
“Drink,” she says. Rook almost rolls his eyes and sips at his tea. It's very good, his favorite Nevarran orange blend exactly how he likes tea, but he wants her to say something, anything, about his hearing.
“So?” he asks.
“They wanted to exile you,” she says bluntly. “I had to bargain and pull out a by-law no one even thinks about anymore-”
They wanted to exile you- exile him? From the Necropolis, from Nevarra? Could they do that? Or did they know a disgraced Watcher could never stay in Nevarra so the technicalities don't matter-
“Am I still a Watcher or not?”
Myrna pauses while Vorgoth says, “YOU ARE ALWAYS A WATCHER.”
“Metaphysics aside,” Rook snaps. “You know what I mean.”
“You are still a Watcher,” Myrna says. She's as calm as ever. “If-”
“You said I have to agree to something,” Rook says in a low tone, suddenly remembering.
“Yes,” Myrna says. She lifts her tea cup and sips, eyeing him over the painted-gold rim of it. “There's an old by-law that states Watcher spouses are always entitled to access to the Necropolis and grounds-”
Oh no, Myrna. Oh no-
“In similar circumstances to yours, they've previously ruled in favor of the spouse, though they too had issues with the Watchers. They won't rule against themselves. I told them the truth. I have a someone willing to marry you in order for you receive Watcher spouse benefits. ”
“Er,” is all Rook can manage to say. He blinks at her and then looks to Vorgoth, as impenetrable as ever. He looks back to Myrna regarding him calmly. Her tea cup is still in her hand.
She sips again.
“Did you think to ask someone else?” Rook finally says. He wants to be angry, but this might be worse. It's numb- it's absurdity. This is the biggest most ridiculous load of kuracjo he's heard in years, even including all the novitiate hazing he'd been told after finishing his apprenticeship.
“Who else need I ask?”
Another tea sip.
Rook tries to take a sip and realizes his hands are trembling. He spills tea down his chin and wipes it with the back of his hand. For the first time in the conversation Rook finally hears some emotion from her.
“Lothar, use a handkerchief,” she says with impatience. “If you're to go through with this-”
“Oh,” he says nastily, “I didn't realize. I'm too busy wondering why someone who says she has my best interests at heart says I'm getting married- to a senior necromancer-without bothering to bring it up or ask-”
“Of course I'm asking you. That's what I'm doing now. You do not have to marry him, if you don't want to.”
“I don't?” Rook breathes, relief making him lean forwards. He tries to take a sip again, but his hands are still trembling. For a different reason now, at least.
“No,” Myrna says, but hesitates slightly. Rook thinks only he or Vorgoth would be able to tell. “But if you don't, I- it is exile. Temporarily, at least.”
“What a fucking choice,” he says sullenly, slouching down again. Myrna giving him a choice had always been dicey. If it wasn't celery, he had to eat sprouts. He could either stay sick or take the vomit-inducing potion she kept wafting under his nose. 10,000 lines or a month's worth of detentions in the Gardens? Marry a senior necromancer or leave the entire Order behind? Rook doesn't kid himself- temporarily turns into as long as the noble kurac toffs feel like dangling him from the Necropolis, from Nevarra.
“Language, Lothar,” Myrna says. Another fucking tea sip from her.
Besides, an senior necromancer might not live that long. Maybe that was Myrna's point, not that she'd ever say so. That would be far too impolitic.
“How old are senior necromancers anyway?” he asks. All the ones he's ever met are hunched over, hands curled from casting magic, hygiene questionable much of the time. Some of them are rather determined to live too akin to their charges.
Myrna exchanges an indecipherable look with Vorgoth and Rook isn't even curious about it- what a thing for him, to feel deprived of his own curiosity as something else grows inside of him. Maybe disappointment, maybe something worse. Or something in between, if only because only an hour ago he'd been so sure he'd never see the Necropolis again.
“The youngest are usually in their mid-to-late thirties,” Myrna says, “but you know this, Rook. You know how our ranks work.”
“Fine, how old is this one?”
“Professor Volkarin is 53,” Myrna says, “and you will do well to speak to him respectfully. His agreement is the only reason this is an option, you realize. Otherwise you might well be packing your bag right now rather than have the luxury of arguing.”
Right, stay in his home and marry a man he's never met or be forced out of his home, away from all the people he knows, his entire world. The best thought Rook can muster up at the moment is that at least 53 years old is better than the 70-80 year old he'd been imagining. Or a worse thought, if Volkarin ends up being a complete creep about elves.
“So d'you know him?” Rook asks, trying to aim for a less sulky tone. He really can be mature, but something about everything in this conversation and this place moment makes him regress into the same child who'd once tarred these walls to his guardians' horror. And had broken an unfortunate amount of items. How many ugly ceremonial vases had been sacrificed on the days he'd been restricted to the apartment?
Besides, maybe Volkarin has a horrible collection of his own vases Rook can entertain himself with. If he goes through with this- if- he might as well try to figure out how a place feels like home.
“We are acquainted, though we have different circles,” Myrna says, “but as Keeper I'm very familiar with his work- his work approaches spirits and wisps the way you do, you know. His reputation is impeccable and he is quite a high ranking member of our order.”
“He's not-” Rook blurts that out in a moment where his hand had come up to run through his hair, brushing one of his ears. “That's not what I mean, Myrna. He's not, like, weird about elves?”
“Of course not,” she says briskly. “I looked into him very thoroughly. He has, in fact, gone on record several times during various meetings in support of different elven causes, particularly the right of Alienage elves to be interred with the same respect as human commoners. There are no complaints, not the barest rumor of impropriety.”
“Doesn't mean he's still not weird about elves,” Rook mutters. Some human men were. Mostly about pretty elf girls and women; sometimes, as he knew, young elf men.
“Rook, when I say I looked into him thoroughly, I mean it. Almost his entire life has been in the Necropolis so, frankly, it was simple. I have access to every Watcher document. For all my research, Emmrich Volkarin is a model necromancer and is hugely popular among students and his fellow faculty.”
“But if he's so great, shouldn't he hate me too?” Rook asks. “Like all the others.”
He's surprised that she stares at him, thrown off track, when he says that. All of this getting suddenly stuffed down his throat and she doesn't bat an eye while she stomps over his life again and it's when he says that Myrna is- he suspects she's upset, but he can't say why.
“Lothar, the difference between the politics of this and what most Watchers actually think, but don't dare yet say is vast. The situation is still too fraught for the noble families involved-” she pauses again and adds- “Volkarin is a commoner name. Plenty of Watchers know it could have been their own families at risk.”
“So I'm a scapegoat until the noble families find their next scandal, but no one wants to say it.”
Myrna nods. “It's a difficult position to be in. I-”
“Then why?” Rook asks. “It's not going to make him exactly popular, being married to a heretic.”
“YOU ARE NO HERETIC,” Vorgoth says and Rook almost fidgets when it feels like Vorgoth's attention is entirely on him. That's the thing about Vorgoth- even Myrna and Rook can forget he's always listening from shadows. There's a reason he “PURSUES THOSE WHO ABUSE THE NECROPOLIS,” an ominous statement for a very young Rook, who had asked him at dinner what he does for the Watchers one evening. He'd learned Tycho Nowacik's Watcher foster-father was a blacksmith. Yet Rook is still not entirely sure what Vorgoth does.
“I approached him,” she says, “and it took a great deal of convincing. Not because the professor has a problem with you, Rook. He is- well, he is rather older than you. He's only agreed conditionally, mind you, so for once please think at least once or twice before making one of your... ill-timed jokes.”
“Less jokes,” Rook says, “got it.”
She's staring at him over the rim of the cup again.
“Er, no jokes,” Rook says.
Myrna sighs. “Now, he could be here at any moment. What else would you like to know?”
“You did tell him- he knows about me, right?” Rook asks. “Like, my potions and- uh-”
“I asked him about his previous lovers,” Myrna says calmly.
“What-”
“Professor Volkarin has had a variety of attachments,” Myrna continues, “some of whom are men in the same manner as yourself. Others-”
“Myrna, I really don't need my mo -you telling me about my potential husband's previous lovers, thank you.”
She sniffs. “Well, it shouldn't be an issue, in any case.”
“Not the point, but thank you,” Rook says. “If I want to know about his lovers I'll ask. I just didn't want him- I don't know. To expect someone else.”
“We spoke of you at length,” Myrna says and Rook stops himself from sighing. She always sounds so matter-of-fact when she's like this. It's when she wins arguments with him, wearing him down with her domineering reasonableness.
“Of course you did,” Rook says and finally rolls his eyes. Rook thinks she misses it at first in a rare moment of inattention as she's silent for precisely five heartbeats.
“I have not tolerated that since you first learned to do it,” she says and her tone is supremely unimpressed. The sort of unimpressed that lets him know he's hit his mark and Myrna is trying not to let him know it. “Please refrain, Lothar.”
There's a long second where Rook debates doing it again, like striking out against that silly card house. What point does it serve to antagonize her? Probably because antagonizing Volkarin is out of the question, not if he's at least sort of decent and Rook decides to hang his hat there.
What's the point of that metaphor? Rook doesn't even like hats. They always look terrible with his ears.
Come to think of it, being mature and responsible had only led to him getting put in charge of a whole lot of Common tongue fuckery combined with Nevarran kuracjo which now has the title “War of the Banners.”
He does roll his eyes again.
“LOTHAR.”
Ah. He's made a miscalculation about who the second eye roll would infuriate more. Vorgoth intoning LOTHAR like that is Myrna's equivalent of Lothar Ingellvar!
Then again, Rook shouldn't be surprised by the reprimand. Vorgoth's weak points include Myrna, landscape paintings, the wildflower field just outside the Necropolis where they stargaze, and opera. The list being in order of preference. Vorgoth knows, of course, that the eyeroll wasn't for him.
“YOU ARE BEYOND CHILDISH THINGS.”
It takes a moment to register in his brain and then Rook feels small, like his earliest memories toddling over these stone floors and scraping his knees. He feels small, but rotten, like all the times he'd smashed one of Myrna or Vorgoth's possessions. Mostly they had been childish accidents, but not every time. Rook is good at throwing his hands out and destroying more things than he means to. Just ask the three noble families from the War. Just ask Myrna or Vorgoth or one of their many former Nevarran antiquities.
“I'm sorry,” he murmurs to Myrna. “I don't-” he rubs his eyes, pressing the heels of his hands into his cheeks- “this is a lot to take in.”
When he realizes that his eyes are getting hot Rook pushes it down as best as he can. He hates crying. It doesn't do any good (and for a moment he's back in the infirmary and the healer says not to cry because it's interfering with the healing under his eye but it hurts, it still hurt constantly and it had been Myrna who'd brought him a mysterious lotion for the pain).
Crying had never done him any good. It only makes him feel small again with the same scabbed knees and palms.
“You needn't make up your mind today,” Myrna says after a pause. “Professor Volkarin is a good man, Rook. Let's have tea with him- amicably, please. The attitude is a poor reflection of the young man you've matured into. You have a perfect right to be upset, but he agreed to meet you because he has much sympathy for your position.”
Her reasonableness again, but Rook supposes that at least it's on his side this time instead of persuading him to somehow do something that sounds barking mad. For now, anyway, until her agenda for him changes. She'd posted study schedules above his desk, he remembers, but only because of the amount of times Rook had been left with some retired Watcher for the day. At least most of them love reliving their glory years; not a lot of studying had been done, but he reckons most of his knowledge about the Necropolis's shifting halls and rooms comes from listening to them.
He tries not to resent it- and he doesn't think he does, mostly. He knows the sanctity of Myrna's and Vorgoth's oaths, after all. He's taken the same ones now too. They'd raised him a mini-Watcher his entire life. And he'd gone “to work” with them plenty, when they were sure their ward wouldn't accidentally be eaten by something dangerous or have his eye put out by some frenzied undead's sword.
He'd met Viktor that way- another Necropolis orphan being raised by a married Watcher couple. One of his mothers works under Myrna and they'd spent hours exploring the oldest records rooms within the grand wing that houses the Necropolis's vast (and Rook could never emphasize enough, vast) records.
Viktor calls them both 'Mum.' Rook knows for a fact he writes to them as 'Mummies,' but in not a single world would Rook think of slagging on him for it. Orphans stick together. His eyes look at Myrna and Vorgoth.
You get what you get when you're a Necropolis orphan, he tells himself. And maybe what he's got isn't something other people would understand, but it is his. Looking at Myrna he thinks of his desk with the burns all over it. Vorgoth always knowing when to open the door.
“Alright,” he says, “I'm done being- anyway, fine. Let's have tea.”
Rook takes a sip of his cooled tea to make a point.
They exchange one of their looks about him. Maybe he can't always tell with Vorgoth, but he can tell with Myrna.
There's a knock on the door. Rook sets his tea cup down on the long table in front of the sofa, rising since he's the closest. He hopes something comes out when he tries to talk. His hand fumbles on the latch and he desperately wills the damn thing to open, his fingers finally closing around the metal and opening the door.
The man on the other side is tall. They're standing closely enough together that they both take a quick step back even as Rook cranes his neck up to look. For a few seconds Rook thinks he's seeing the ideal necromancer- the grave gold gleaming even in veil light and clinking together from his step back, the austerity in his profile, a proper kosuljalatka to show off his grave dowry, a smart waistcoat and dark trousers with a red waist sash. His eyes linger on his grave gold, the bangles and bracelets and rings.
Rook's second thought is that the warriors have definitely got shafted. Well, he had got shafted. If Emmrich Volkarin had strolled in instead of some of the mummified (once literally) senior necromancers who'd taught the rudimentary Fade classes to non-mages he might have learned something useful rather than having to dig through the Library for hours to write essays or study for exams.
The more he looks at Volkarin's tall, gangly frame the more Rook feels something new and odd in his chest, expanding when Volkarin smiles warmly at him. Rook sees his mustache move and is entranced by it for a moment before looking at his nose, the sort ancient Nevarrans had once carved into statues that still dot the country side. His black hair is streaked liberally with gray, his brows dark and relaxed while he looks Rook over. Rook's trained enough to see the way Volkarin's eyes flicker over him, though he's quickly meeting Rook's eyes again and offering his hands with wrists crossed, a traditional Watcher greeting (not Traditional, despite the best efforts of more annoying Watchers).
“Professor Emmrich Volkarin,” Volkarin says and his tone sounds genuinely pleased as they lock eyes. “But please, just Emmrich, if you prefer. We needn't stand on formality.”
Rook feels like he's standing over the edge of something and if he looks down or up or to the side he's going to lose his balance. And he's not sure what will happen when he does. Professor Emmrich Volkarin has beautiful hazel eyes, green and gold, the kind that show up between the swaths of black hair and dark eyes so common in Nevarra. King Casper Pentaghast had been hazel-eyed, making them a sign of good fortune among every social class.
“Watcher Lothar Ingellvar,” Rook says and is quite aware of the professor- well, no. Emmrich's grave gold pressed into his arms. Their wrists are still crossed, hands still held together. The gold is cool compared to the warm weight of Emmrich's hands in his own.
“But you can call me Rook,” he adds hastily. “It's my Necropolis nickname.”
“Rook,” Emmrich says as if trying the name out. “Like-” Rook hopes he doesn't say 'like the chess piece,' Maker not that again- “the corvid species?”
Oh. Rook realizes they're still holding hands and lets go, feeling his arms awkwardly hanging at his sides again. He's spent a good chunk of his life tumbling and learning to dodge, parry, and riposte and he feels incredibly stupid, wondering what Emmrich is thinking while looking at him with his suddenly clumsy arms and posture. Emmrich's posture is straight and tall, his shoulders held up, while he folds his hands in front of himself. Rook eyes the red glove- is it the necrotic damage that necromancers suffer from or something else?
“Exactly,” Rook says and grins at him. Emmrich looks startled for a moment, his brows quickly drawn together and then relaxing again before he's pulling his manners back out.
“How lovely,” he says. “There's a large rookery just-”
“Over by the wildflower field,” Rook says. “That's where- well, Vorgoth and I have spent a lot of time stargazing there. It's how I got my nickname.”
Rook hears Myrna clear her throat, but when he turns she's sipping her tea again.
“Do invite him inside, Rook,” she says and Rook knows it's amusement in her voice. It's harder to read her face behind the tea cup, but she's definitely humored by something.
“Er, come in, Prof- Emmrich,” he says, correcting himself almost as soon as he thinks 'Professor.' His pulse is quick enough he feels it faintly from his carotid artery in his throat. “How do you like your tea?”
“Just a splash of cream,” Emmrich says. Myrna rises to greet him and Vorgoth extends his own hands for the old Watcher greeting. Rook busies himself making Emmrich a cup while they shake and say hello. Myrna and Vorgoth retake their positions while Rook hands Emmrich his tea and mutters, “you're welcome” at Emmrich's thank you.
Emmrich takes a seat at the far end of the sofa near Rook's chair. Rook sits back down and picks up his tea cup to sip it. He's not sure what he's supposed to do now. Is he supposed to start talking about
getting married? The weather? No, Orlesians talk about the weather. Nevarrans talk about their latest near death experience. Or their cousin's step-mother's brother's near death experience; third-hand accounts of death are dreadfully dull and lacking in good detail. Perfect for small talk.
Vorgoth's contribution to the conversation begins with “THE FLOWER FIELD IS GOOD FOR STAR-SCRYING.”
“Yes,” Emmrich says and he doesn't sip his tea like Myrna. He takes a proper drink. Rook watches his throat bob up and down as he swallows. “Quite a nice blend, Watcher Ingellvar-” Rook almost says thank you until he realizes that 'Watcher Ingellvar' is Myrna right now.
“It's Rook's favorite,” Myrna says in a tone that is far too casual for the Rook in question. “The blend is from Rothenburg. Lovely village out in the country side going west along the Minanter.”
Rook eyes her. She's up to something. Myrna doesn't usually do this sort of chit-chat.
She looks back at him, unblinking, while she sips at her cup.
Rook thinks this is the most bizarre tea he's ever had. Foster-spirit-father-figure Vorgoth tucked into the corner, listening for every detail, foster mother Myrna sitting primly in her beloved armchair, somehow using a tea cup as a shield against Rook's best instincts about her. The (handsome) senior necromancer sitting here with them, all of them picking through silly shit-chat while Rook's stomach roils and reminds him he can be homeless or he can get married. Right. Easy choice that, he thinks sardonically.
“I do find the field to be a fine place when I need to consult my astrolabe,” Emmrich says. Volkarin is a commoner last name, but he holds his hand on the cup like a noble, his pinky finger hovering over the delicate porcelain stem of one of Myrna's favorite tea cup. “Some Fade experiments are quite unforgiving about what others see as minuscule adjustments- luckily we have access to an ideal clearing. I've had colleagues who- well, you know how stubborn some Traditionalists are.”
“I do know,” Myrna says dryly, “more's the pity.”
Emmrich barks a laugh. Rook sees laugh lines on his face with crow's feet at his eyes. Both are deep, but it just... well, Rook isn't sure what it's doing to Emmrich's face except enhancing it. His already very nice face, that is.
Rook tells himself he doesn't want to hear Emmrich laugh again except he does. He's not supposed to want to marry a shem, a bloody senior necromancer at that. Well, want to marry is strong. But he should be doing this kicking and screaming, telling Myrna and Vorgoth he'll be exiled, it's fine. He can find something to do. He doesn't need to go along with this scheme Myrna's cooked up. Probably to keep him here because she'd discovered that he had been the one to put a few (non-venomous) snakes in the bed of a noble novitiate five years ago. She'd let him go without punishment, but she had promised that he'll write lines for her, even if she has to reanimate him, if she ever finds out it was his doing (because honestly, Lothar, how thick headed would a young Watcher be if he gathered snakes at the risk of being bitten by an asp down by the river?). The perils of Watcher guardians, punishment into the afterlife.
Rook misses what else Myrna had said, but he hears Emmrich laugh again and he resurfaces to the conversation, glancing over at Emmrich's smile. His eyes. His nose and grave gold.
“-the current exhibit features DeJardin's travels in Nevarra. Vorgoth and I haven't had a chance to go, although one member of the Council said that she thought that his painting of the Month's Crowning of the Undead Royalty was uncannily familiar to King Markus. A lovely piece, Inga says-”
“RICH IN TEXTURE,” Vorgoth adds, “IT IS SAID HE INCLUDED MANY FINE DETAILS.”
“Undoubtedly a beautiful painting,” Emmrich says. “Yet the premise is utterly ridiculous. King Markus isn't even eligible to be the undead king! I suppose the frame is covered in gold?”
Rook laughs when he says that and Myrna chuckles. Orlesians. He'd met too many noble tourists who assume he's an errand or stable boy, even as he walked the corridors in his Mourn Watch armor. On a few memorable occasions visiting nobles had taken great offense that he could wear weapons openly. Rook had thought about the shape of his ears and then reassured himself by touching the handles of his daggers. Knife-ears. And any mage from Tevinter was much worse. An Orlesian might piss on him if he were on fire, but a Tevinter mage probably started the damn thing.
“I didn't ask,” Myrna says. “It seems such a waste of what could be a beautiful grave dowry.”
“Orlesians,” Emmrich sighs and Rook is paying close enough attention to see how he sits up slightly straighter, leans forward. That was positively dismal by Nevarran small talk standards, but Rook supposes they're going to get down to the embalming table, a strange metaphor considering it's marriage on the table here, right?
He bites his lips to stop himself from the inopportune desire to laugh. The amount of times he's laughed nervously and given himself away is perhaps much higher than he'd prefer. The amount of lines he's written and weeds he's pulled from the Memorial Gardens from pranks he couldn't keep secret when Myrna and Vorgoth look at him a particular way. His hand touches the still fresh scars on his face, the clean but obvious slice across his cheek and the purplish-red twisted curl under his right eye. He'd laughed right before that sword got him in the War of Banners too. He mustn't laugh now.
Besides, given how intertwined marriage and death are in their home Rook reckons it's appropriate. Oh, no. Not the urge to laugh again, he thinks, still managing to hold it in, and wonders if Myrna would assign him lines for screwing this up or if she'd think exile is enough punishment.
He realizes that his hand is still on his cheek and pulls it down abruptly. Emmrich is watching him. Myrna is looking away, as if on purpose, but she knows- she had seen him right after he'd finally been allowed to look in the mirror. Vorgoth is, well. Vorgoth-y. Definitely watching him, but merely floating there as always.
Emmrich takes a sip of tea and clears his throat.
“I had thought that Rook and I might take a walk,” he says. “As the other party here, we ought to at least introduce ourselves and have a private conversation before proceeding.”
It takes everything in Rook not to jump up and demand to leave. What a marvelous idea from Professor Emmrich Volkarin. A break from this apartment and Myrna is what he needs. He knows she's plotting something. Maybe some fresh air after being cooped up will help him make a rational decision anyway.
“Lead the way,” he says to Emmrich, who gracefully rises. Rook is already near the door as Emmrich tells Myrna and Vorgoth they'll be back soon. Rook bounces on his feet. Two weeks is too long to be stuck in one place. He hasn't even seen the Memorial Gardens since before the War of Banners.
“Goodbye, Rook,” Myrna says and looks for a moment as if she wants to roll her eyes this time. Rook wishes her good luck- perhaps giving in to her feelings once in a while would make her less. Er. Prickly.
“It's not like I won't be back,” he says. Then realizes that maybe there will be a time, maybe soon, where he does leave and not come back. Not literally, but- he glances over to Emmrich. Well, he needs a lot more details. What does it mean to be married when it's supposed to just keep Rook in the Necropolis and not with all the courtship stuff he'd had to learn as an apprentice? Where's he suppose to live? Myrna and Vorgoth had been a convenient place, but technically, as he'd been reminded by a letter a few days before his hearing, he doesn't have the right of abode for their apartment. He's supposed to be in the barracks.
Actually, he needs any details.
“'Bye,” he says to Myrna and Vorgoth, opening the door and stepping into the hallway. “Be back soon!”
Rook waves over his shoulder and steps into the hall. Emmrich walks after him and Rook tries to rack his brain for a topic of conversation. Emmrich closes the apartment door and Rook stops when his eyes catch the usual plaques on the door. Keeper of the Seals- Mynra Ingellvar, Vorgoth's sigil followed by Vorgoth in Nevarran, and- still- Lothar “Rook” Ingellvar.
Someone had to have gone to the Watcher dorms to get his plaque. Rook turns away from it and looks up at Emmrich, feeling strangely shy now that it's just the two of them. It's still early- the 10am bell hasn't rung yet and the halls are empty until Watchers break for lunch.
“I'm afraid the Gardens are lost right now,” Emmrich says. “I tried to go last week and the doorway that had led to them only takes one around a curve and back into the Lower Belfry. It'll turn up again, but in the mean time-” he trails off and looks at Rook with a slight smile.
Emmrich offers Rook his elbow and Rook tentatively takes it, his hands on the fine linen of Emmrich's much more impressive kosuljalatka. He's suddenly aware of having bought his own at a secondhand shop in an alley just off Van Nuys Avenue. But Emmrich doesn't appear to notice or care, unlike a lot of senior necromancers. Some of them had a lot to say about Necropolis orphans.
“I don't suppose the senior Watcher dining hall is appropriate,” Emmrich muses and takes a step forward. Rook wonders for a moment at bothering to take his elbow. Even the aforementioned senior necromancers have enough innate Nevarran courtesy to escort their guest- and Rook knows he's a guest right now. But Rook had seen it and not even considered ignoring the invitation.
If Volkarin were anyone else, he suspects his natural ability to be difficult would have manifested magnificently. If he were even a few years younger, probably in a jaunty chase across the grounds. He's more mature now, but he suspects in some ways he's not that mature.
Rook looks up at Emmrich suspiciously, but he appears to be in a moment of thought himself, his gloved hand curled under his jaw in an absent way. Had Myrna finally snapped and started using Tevinter style blood magic? On him or on Emmrich?
No, her reasonableness is a magic all its own, as Rook knows.
Commoner with sympathies or not, does he want something from Rook? Is that why he'd agreed to Myrna's initial proposal- although she had said she'd had to convince him. Rook wonders just how long Volkarin had held out against her annoyingly reasonable requests. She had probably presented him with 25 Good Reasons to Marry complete with footnotes and the proper use of Old Necropolis as a citation method. Kuracjo, for all Rook knew such a thing would really work on someone like Emmrich. Maybe a thought to shelve for later.
“Your office?” he asks Emmrich.
Emmrich looks momentarily scandalized and Rook resists the urge to snort at him- he's quite proper. How far ahead had Myrna actually thought, putting someone like him with Emmrich Volkarin?
“We're not even courting,” Rook says, letting himself snort this time, but he feels a smile pulling at his lips. “So I'm not sure courting rules about supervision or public spaces count, do they?”
“I suppose not,” Emmrich says, a chuckle emerging as he looks brightly down at Rook. “My office then.”
Rook nods for fear of saying something ridiculous. He's still holding Emmrich's elbow, the linen under his fingers soft and light. When Emmrich starts walking down the corridor, Rook takes one more look back at the apartment where Myrna and Vorgoth are and shakes his head a few times, trying to clear it. There was always going to be an end, he knows, he was always going to move forward somehow. He'd known the temporary reprieve of Myrna and Vorgoth taking care of him one more time wouldn't last.
When they reach the end of the corridor, Rook makes sure not to look back.