"All right, all right," he said."I'm sorry."
"It's fine," Aaralyn replied as he took his seat."Three different people have already called me a harlot today, and Davud glared at me like I'd murdered his firstborn."
The man beside Mehr, Hamed, snorted derisively."Davud couldn't make it in even the shittiest whorehouse because the man comes faster than the tax collector when your payment is overdue."
Aaralyn choked on his tea as he laughed at the wrong time.
"That's not very nice," said Nima, the man next to Aaralyn."My uncle works in the tax office, and he never rushes anything."
"I have questions about your relationship with your uncle," Mehr said dryly.
"That is not what I meant, and you know it," Nima said with exaggerated primness.
"Oh, do I?"
Aaralyn shook his head and ate breakfast while he continued to listen to their teasing and ribald jokes, until Mehr nudged him.He looked up in silent query.
"What are you drawing today?"
"Nothing, actually.I'll be copying text over the next few days.Eventually, I'll need to draw a special type of frog, but I've no idea where in the world I would ever begin to find any frog, let alone a specific one.Likely just go to the library and hope I can find books to copy reliable sketches from."
"Frog?"Nima asked."Why on earth do you need to draw a frog?"
"It's called a poisoned dagger frog, and apparently it has many medicinal uses, though working with them is exceedingly dangerous because it takes the very smallest dose to kill someone."He shrugged one shoulder and tossed back the rest of his cooled tea."If there is one thing I've learned doing this work, it's that the difference between poison and medicine is a mere drop."He stood and picked up his tray."I'll see you all later at dinner?"
"Oh, probably, unless I'm arrested for finally choking Lady Atousa with her own hair ribbons," Mehr said cheerfully."You certain you're feeling well enough to get back to work, Havarin?"
"I know I'm sick of sitting in my room all day."
They laughed and bid him farewell, and he headed off for his workroom.
He was accustomed to being stared at.Back home, it had been for his shockingly bright, out of place hair that his mother said came from his great grandmother, or because he had worked such a specialized, 'fancy' job instead of anything to do with saffron, because he'd gottenabovehimself, like that wasn't twisted, depressing thinking greatly encouraged by the Havarin ruling class.
Still, the staring had never been this bad.Outside of a few bullying nobles, largely Feyz and anyone who happened to be with him at the time, he was more or less ignored.Tavala, the royal capital, was an international hub.Even with his obnoxious hair, Aaralyn did not stand out terribly much, especially as the hair made everyone think he was from Tritacia.
Now, though, the eyes never left, and whispers often followed.Because Prince Bakhtiar had bought him a new leg?Because of what Feyz had done to him, prompting the kindness from His Highness?He was known for his exceeding kindness, though, so surely this wasn't remarkable?Was it something else?That made even less sense, because there was nothing else.
Closing the door of his workroom behind him, he leaned against it and sighed in relief.Thank the gods today would be nothing but sitting here carefully copying over text.He'd already done the translations of a few of the articles being compiled, as that was easy enough to do while sitting in bed.
Now he just had to copy everything over to the signatures that would become the pages of the finished book.
It was slow, meticulous work, because if he messed up even a single letter then he would have to start all over.Mistakes were permissible here and there, but given the importance of the information involved, and his own stubborn determination to present only a book as close to perfect as possible, he gave himself no leniency.
After a couple of hours, he stood and stretched, then decided to go for a brief walk in the gardens.He had learned the hard way—several hard ways—that generous breaks were necessary to keeping focus and lessening the chance of mistakes.
He walked through a section of the public gardens that was comprised entirely of roses, breathing in the lightly perfumed air, almost wishing he'd brought his sketching supplies along, but then he would have gotten distracted, and there was far too much to be done.
"Aaralyn!"
He turned and watched as Lady Hedieh came striding toward him, eyes bright with excitement."Good afternoon, my lady.I've begun the final copying for the frog volume.I should be done in three days and ready to move on to the drawings."
"That's why I came to find you!"she said, gripping his arms excitedly.
Touch had always been a complicated thing for Aaralyn.Too many people touched him as though they had the right to, especially back in Havarin, but also here.He did not mind Lady Hedieh, his friends, who all had earned the right.But Lord Feyz and others of his ilk, random people who wanted to touch his hair or prod at his leg or poke at his freckles… It was tiresome.He wished he could scream in their faces to stop touching him.
If he had remained in Havarin, had accepted defeat and become enslaved in Pollux's harem, his body would have never been his again.That more than anything had given him the courage to flee.Others had already taken his leg from him; he would not let anyone take more.
"Oh?"he asked with a laugh."Did you come with a poisoned dagger frog in your pocket?"
