Tiiran dropped his head but he had nothing to frown at in his lap and nothing to do with his hands. He crossed his arms tight, squeezing his chest but it didn’t feel like when Orin did it.
They don’t need him for this conversation. Whatever they were speaking of, it wasn’t Nikoly’s markings. Although if Orin wanted to see those, Tiiran had no say in that no matter how they teased him. Orin had noticed how Tiiran looked at Nikoly. He wouldn’t look at Nikoly in the same way, but only because Orin was better at concealing things than Tiiran would ever be. But Orindidlike Nikoly, he had already said as much. Nikoly was handsome and far more experienced than Tiiran.
Well trained, Tiiran remembered.A well-trained pup.
Those words were different now. Tiiran should have paid more attention when they’d first been said. Orin and Nikoly hadn’t hidden anything. Tiiran was just useless at anything that wasn’t copying someone else’s words.
They’d had a whole conversation with Tiiran believing they were talking about education and tea breaks.
Nikoly had pleased Orin at least, and quite a bit, judging from how Orin leaned back in his chair to listen to Nikoly talk. Tiiran heard their voices but the words were indistinct. He was tired, and he supposed two biscuits and half a cup of tea reallyweren’tenough to get through the day.
His heart was beating fast. The skin of his face stung with overwhelming heat.
Tiiran had brought Orin a duckling. He should have expected this. Hehadexpected this, imagining Orin and Nikoly kissing or fucking when they’d slipped into his mind while he bathed or tossed and turned on his bed. Now he imagined that, but also Orin putting the pretty tears in Nikoly’s eyes.
They had also spoken openly about Tiiran and how fond they were of him… and how he didn’t understand what others did. They’d known he hadn’t followed their real conversation.
Stupidly innocent, Fial had said once, perplexed about how Tiiran could have such a foul, spiteful tongue but not know how such games were supposed to be played.
Tiiran should ask them now if they’d like him to leave. They’d answer honestly, maybe even be fondly amused with him again for having to ask. He was tired of being amusing. Being worldly, just once, would have been a small grace.
He had wished. Tiiran hadn’t even realized he had until now. But Orin undoubtedly knew, and if Nikoly didn’t, he would soon enough. Tiiran had called Nikoly in here because he’d wanted….
Too much. Things that didn’t make sense when all jumbled together. But that was the problem exactly. Tiiran wasn’t good with people, and the two of them were, and he’d been hoping one of them would untangle it all for him. For Orin to tell him what it was he felt, and what Nikoly felt for him. For Orin to approve of Nikoly. For Orin to tell Tiiran what he felt for Nikoly and for Orin wasn’t embarrassing. That those feelings might even be returned. For either of them to tell Tiiran what to do about any of that.
Tiiran had been wishing again and hadn’t even realized it. Like a child, really.
“Tiiran?” Mattin’s gentle voice was distant and slightly raised. “Tiiran? You weren’t on the third floor. Are you here?”
Tiiran was up from his seat and at the entrance to the nook before Mattin appeared, tugging on the end of his single braid decorated with tiny chiming bells. In his other hand was a folded piece of paper, which he pushed toward Tiiran. “Toak sent a note—oh.”
Mattin leaned to the side to peer around Tiiran, looking from side to side before focusing on Tiiran again, more flustered than he’d been only a moment before. “Sorry,” he told Tiiran earnestly, then repeated, louder, apparently to the others. “So sorry!”
“Mattin,” Orin greeted him pleasantly, possibly too pleasantly. Tiiran wondered if they had ever fucked. Mattin was oblivious to the flirting of most outguards, but Orin wasn’t most outguards.
“Orin.” Mattin bobbed his head at Orin, but his worried attention was almost immediately back on Tiiran. “I thought you were working alone, I didn’t mean to burst in. We received a letter from Toak and I knew you’d want to see it right away. I should have listened to Po and waited.”
“Toak? Waited? My ass.” Tiiran snatched the letter from him and nearly tore it open. It had already been opened and read, which explained Mattin’s haste to show it to him.
“I will do my work for the library from my family home. Have it sent there. Toak.” Tiiran read it once silently and then again out loud, his voice rising at the end. “That piece of crusted dog shit. As if we have time or money for that. As if that many library materials are allowed elsewhere, even for Master Keepers. That spineless, arrogant, midden heap of a man. Head so far up his own ass he thinks we’ll really do this just because we need a Master Keeper?”
He was aware that he was nearly shouting, but it felt good. As did waving Nikoly away without looking at him and ignoring the calming, “Kitten,” from Orin.
“Thinks he can give orders,” Tiiran sneered at the note. “Thinks this isn’t our library. We’re the ones here. We do whatwewant.”
“He’ll contest anything we do to the palace Head of House,” Mattin pointed out, not arguing, just thinking like a noble.
“There is no palace Head of House,” Tiiran snarled, crumpling the note in his fist. “If Toak wants his salary passed on to him, he can fucking well do his work here like the rest of us. If not, it goes to the library and I’ll tell him as much.”
“Be careful,” Orin said, almost in unison with Nikoly’s low warning, “Tiiran.”
“I’ll write him back now.” Once he’d said it, Tiiran could breathe and unclench his hand. Mattin stared at him, waiting. He must agree, because he offered no objections.
It was the two of them and the library. Tiiran nodded firmly for Mattin’s sake, then swallowed. He didn’t turn around. “I have to go do this but I’ll come back up for the mess.” If Orin and Nikoly wanted him to return, they had only to say so.
“I can get it, Tiiran,” Nikoly assured him.
Orin nearly purred. “Is it your honor?”
