The plate outside Caleo's door held cold chicken, two heel pieces from a seed loaf, and a wedge of pear glazed with honey. Jack ate all of it sitting beneath the blanket while Caleo carried the basin downstairs and returned with hot water, soap, and a squat green jar.
"Auntie says the trousers must be rinsed now or they will dry hard enough to stand by themselves. She also says this is for whatever they rubbed raw. She was exact about not needing to see it."
Jack took the jar. "Please thank her for me."
"She heard you eat the pear. That may be enough."
Caleo knelt over the basin and separated the vest from the trousers. The emerald chain remained hooked across the open front. He worked one end free and laid the chain on a folded cloth, where the green stones caught the lamplight.
"I have held necklaces worth less than one of these links," he said.
"You hold many necklaces?"
"Only the ones people ask me to mend. I possess no secret collection."
Jack set the empty plate aside and joined him on the floor. The movement pulled behind both knees. He lowered himself with one leg extended and took the vest before Caleo could object. They washed the uniform together, Caleo scrubbing fountain grit from the trouser hems while Jack worked soap through the vest with his uninjured hand. The basin water clouded gray. When they poured it away, Caleo stretched both garments over the line crossing one corner of the room, directly above the warmth leaking through the bakery ceiling.
The gold-and-emerald chain remained on the cloth beside the bed.
Jack opened the green jar. The salve smelled of mint, rendered fat, and something bitter enough to clear his head. He rubbed it into the skin above his heels first. The scrape on his knee stung. The matching bruises behind both knees had darkened into narrow bars, and bending either leg drew the battered skin tight.
The wet trousers had done quieter damage. A raw patch followed the crease beneath his balls and reached onto the inside of his left thigh. Another reddened place lay along the underside of his cock where the clinging cloth had shifted against him for most of the walk.
Caleo followed Jack's attention to the reddened skin.
Caleo held out the salve. "That explains the way you climbed the stairs. I can help if you need it."
Jack dipped two fingers into the jar. "Not unless it becomes impossible to reach my own cock while looking directly at it."
The first touch of salve burned cold. Jack hissed and nearly dropped the jar.
Caleo took it from him before it overturned and waited until Jack had recovered before placing it within reach.
Jack spread the salve carefully over the abraded skin. Caleo turned to straighten the washed vest, granting privacy without pretending he had seen nothing. The soreness eased from sharp heat to a cooler throb. Jack left the blanket off when he returned to bed. Even soft wool dragged unpleasantly across the raw place beneath him.
Caleo banked the globe until its white-gold light became no brighter than a low fire. He dropped his shorts beside the washstand and climbed in naked as he always slept. Jack lay on his right side to spare the bruised hip. Caleo settled on his back beside him, one arm bent behind his head.
For a while they listened to the bakery empty beneath them. A peel scraped over stone. The rear door opened, admitting a brief rush of voices from the yard, then shut behind the last employees. Mrs. Gowrie called goodnight from the bottom of the stairs. Caleo answered, and the building grew quiet around the ovens cooling in their brick hollows.
Jack moved closer. He curled against Caleo without drawing his knees up far enough to tighten the bruises behind them and rested his head on Caleo's chest. Caleo's heart struck a steady rhythm beneath his ear.
"Tell me about the apprenticeship," Caleo said.
Jack watched the uniform drip above the warm floorboards. "There isn't much to tell. I hadn't begun it."
"Tell me what you expected, then."
He had expected early mornings, dirty hands, and several years of being told he knew less than he believed. He had expected a badge clipped to his shirt, tools that belonged to somebody else until he earned his own, and an older technician checking every connection he made. The work would have started with houses and shops. Engines might have come later if he proved good enough.
"What kind of engines?" Caleo asked.
"Carts that move without horses. Pumps. Machines in factories. Anything someone had built and then trusted to continue working forever without maintenance."
Caleo considered that. "So people are the same there."
"Very much the same. We only give ourselves faster ways to discover it."
Jack laid his palm flat on Caleo's stomach. The skin was warm and almost hairless, the muscles beneath it moving with each quiet laugh. He had told Caleo about death, another world, and the possibility of a cruel boy living somewhere in his reflexes. Caleo had answered by asking what work Jack had wanted to learn.
His fingers moved down.
Caleo was soft when Jack first closed his hand around him. The foreskin covered the head, smooth and loose beneath Jack's palm. He stroked once without lifting his cheek from Caleo's chest. The cock lengthened slowly through his hand.
"Does that hurt you?" Caleo asked.
"Not where I am."
"That was not quite the question."
Jack angled his head to see along their bodies. His own cock had grown hard despite the salve cooling the raw skin beneath it. Clear fluid welled heavily from the exposed opening, ran over the head, and gathered in a wet line against his stomach. He left it alone. "I don't need you to touch me. I want to touch you."
Caleo's free hand came to rest in Jack's hair. He did not praise the answer or search it for hidden damage. His thumb moved once above Jack's ear while Jack stroked him again.
The chain caught the dim light beside the bed.
Jack reached for it with his bandaged hand, failed to gather the fine links cleanly, and used the other. Caleo lifted his head enough to see. Jack let the gold spill across Caleo's stomach and guided it lower. He wound it once, loosely, around the hardening shaft. The tiny emeralds settled against sun-browned skin, absurdly rich above the pale-gold hair at the base.
"This suits you nicely."
Caleo raised himself far enough to inspect the ornament. "I had hoped sudden wealth would make me taller."
Jack turned the chain until one emerald rested against the underside. "It has improved the important part."
Caleo laughed beneath his cheek. Jack felt the sound travel through the ribs supporting his head.
He kept the chain loose while Caleo grew fully hard within it. The gold shifted over the shaft when Jack stroked, never tightening, the green stones following the movement of his hand. Caleo's cock was slimmer than Jack's, long enough that Jack could watch the foreskin draw back and gather below the head without moving from the warm place on his chest.
"Will you go back tomorrow?" Caleo asked.
Jack drew his thumb across the moist opening. Caleo's stomach tightened. "Yes. I walked out in front of everyone who laughed at me. If I stay here now, Dorian gets to decide what that meant." Jack stroked him slowly, watching clear wetness spread over the glans.
"Did you know where you were going?"
"Not until I reached the road."
Jack loosened the chain and let it pool around the base of Caleo's cock. He trailed one finger upward over the hairless stomach. At the deep line beside the lowest muscle, he stopped and tickled.
Caleo jerked beneath him. His hand closed harmlessly in Jack's hair. "That is treachery."
"You made me climb a wall near an open gate."
Jack tickled the same place until Caleo tried to twist away without dislodging his head. The movement pulled at Jack's bruised knees, and he stopped with a small breath. Caleo went still at once.
"I'm all right," Jack said. "It only reminds me when I bend too far."
He moved his hand higher. One fingertip circled Caleo's nipple until it tightened. Caleo watched the wandering hand with an attention that made Jack's own erection throb against his stomach. It had begun dripping badly, leaving several clear trails across the muscles below his navel. Neither boy did anything about it. Jack followed the smooth centerline down again, passed the twitching muscles, and returned to the cock decorated in borrowed gold.
He swirled one finger gently over the tip.
Caleo breathed in above him. Jack felt the chest rise beneath his cheek and heard the breath leave less steadily.
"I can walk with you," Caleo said after a moment. "Not into Thornfield. I have work here, and I suspect arriving beside a half-dressed herb gatherer would improve none of your difficulties. I can take you to the hill."
"I want you to."
Jack circled the opening again, spreading the clear fluid until the head shone. Then he closed his hand around the shaft and began to stroke in earnest. The chain remained loose at the base, green stones shifting against Caleo with each movement but never bearing pressure.
Conversation became less ambitious. Caleo asked what Jack would tell his friends. Jack said he would begin with where he had gone and discover what came next. Jack asked whether Caleo truly believed an emerald chain made him look taller. Caleo attempted an answer that broke when Jack drew the foreskin back and pressed his thumb beneath the crown.
Jack watched everything from Caleo's chest: the muscles tightening beneath his forearm, the small patch of pale hair stirring at the base, the cock moving through his hand, the emeralds flashing whenever the chain turned. Caleo's hips began to lift. Jack adjusted his grip rather than asking him to be still.
"Jack."
The warning arrived one stroke too late.
Caleo's cock pulsed in his hand. The first spurt crossed the short distance between them and struck Jack along the cheek and nose. He shut one eye. A second landed against Caleo's stomach and the back of Jack's fingers. Caleo made a strangled sound above him while Jack worked him through the remaining release, slower now, until white semen ran over the gold links gathered at the base.
Jack stared down at the result. Warm fluid began sliding toward the corner of his mouth.
He laughed against Caleo's chest.
The movement shook them both. Caleo laughed too, first breathlessly and then without restraint, one arm folding across his eyes while his softening cock remained in Jack's wet hand. Jack tried to wipe his face on Caleo's ribs, which made Caleo twist and laugh harder. The bedframe complained beneath them.
"You could have aimed elsewhere," Jack said.
"You were holding the relevant equipment."
Jack lifted his head. Semen shone across one cheek. "Then I did aim it."
That defeated both of them again.
When they could breathe, Caleo reached for the cloth beside the bed. Jack removed the chain before Caleo softened enough for the loose loop to slip. They cleaned Jack's face first, then Caleo's stomach and Jack's hand. The clear mess from Jack's neglected cock remained streaked across his lower belly. Neither of them reached for it. Caleo rinsed the gold and emeralds in the water left at the bottom of the pitcher, dried them carefully, and laid the chain across the folded vest.
"It still suits you," Jack said.
Caleo returned to bed and drew Jack against his side. "You may lend it to me again when you are less thoroughly injured."
Jack settled his head back onto Caleo's chest. His own erection continued to leak as it eased without being touched.
They slept.
The bakery woke them before sunrise. Heat had dried the uniform but not softened every crease. Mrs. Gowrie fed Jack eggs and yesterday's seed loaf at the end of the long worktable, supplied a smaller tin of salve without discussion, and made him stand while she inspected the trousers from a practical distance.
"They will do for the walk," she said. "Have the Academy launder them properly before you wear them through another day."
"Yes, Mrs. Gowrie. Thank you. For the food too. And for letting me stay."
She turned toward Caleo, who was attempting to steal the browned edge from the egg pan. "I have discovered that refusing entry rarely keeps certain boys away."
Caleo ate the stolen piece before she could reclaim it. Mrs. Gowrie struck his wrist with the folded towel and returned to the ovens.
Jack dressed carefully. The salve kept the cloth from catching the worst abrasion, but the bruises behind his knees announced each stair. He fastened the clean emerald chain across his vest. Caleo watched the stones settle against Jack's chest and smiled without explaining why.
They left through the open yard gate.
Morning mist lay in the lower Briartown streets. Bakers, porters, and market sellers were already moving beneath it. Caleo knew half of them and was known by more. He returned greetings, promised to examine a leaking cistern after midday, and refused payment for a packet of dried berries an old woman pressed into his hand. At the edge of town he gave half the packet to Jack.
The road climbed beneath trees still dripping from a rain that had never reached the roofs below. Caleo walked beside him until the black walls of Thornfield rose clear above the canopy. The old fortress caught the first direct sun along its towers while Briartown remained in green shadow.
At the beginning of the final hill, Caleo stopped.
Jack did not want to turn the parting into another promise he might fail by accident. He put both arms around Caleo and held him carefully, avoiding the healing hip. Caleo's face pressed beneath his chin.
"I'll come Saturday," Jack said.
"You had better. I have become accustomed to emeralds."
Jack kissed his hair. Then he released him and climbed alone.
He reached the lower hall while breakfast was still being cleared. Finn, Edric, and Kai occupied their usual end of the table. None of them was eating. Edric had three notebooks open before him. Finn was grinding something dark green in a tiny stone bowl. Kai sat facing the doors.
He saw Jack first.
Relief crossed his face nakedly enough that Jack understood the smile replacing it was a moment late.
"You look terrible," Kai said.
"I have been told my chain does most of the work."
Kai stood as if he meant to cross the room, reconsidered, and pulled out the bench instead. Jack sat slowly. Finn's gaze dropped to the careful movement of his knees.
"Those trousers injured you," Finn said.
"Dorian and the bedframe began it. The fountain and the walk improved matters. Mrs. Gowrie gave me salve."
Finn held out his hand. Jack gave him the tin. He opened it, smelled the contents, and scraped the smallest amount beneath one thumbnail.
"Good for friction. Poor for broken skin. I have something better for your heels."
"Thank you."
Finn returned the tin and resumed grinding without asking where the friction burns were.
Edric turned one notebook toward Jack. "I copied the practical sequence. It will not make yesterday less public, and I cannot identify why you produced nothing, but you should have the same notes as everyone who remained."
"Thank you," Jack said again.
Kai leaned both forearms on the table. "Now that everyone has demonstrated unbearable restraint, where did you go?"
"Briartown. The boy who found me in the forest lives above a bakery there. His name is Caleo. I stayed with him."
Kai's attention flicked to the emerald chain and back to Jack's face. "Is he beautiful?"
Jack caught one of the little emeralds between his fingers. He remembered the chain loose around Caleo's cock and Caleo laughing beneath him. Heat climbed into his face. His cock began to rise inside the trousers, dragging the cloth against skin that remained tender from the previous day. Jack shifted farther beneath the table in an unsuccessful attempt to hide it.
"Yes, very."
Kai's gaze dipped once. His smile widened. "I see."
Finn made a small sound that might have been disapproval of the question or approval of the answer. Edric closed the least useful notebook.
"You walked past us," Kai said. The humor remained, but the hurt beneath it did not disappear merely because Jack had returned.
"I did. I couldn't answer anyone in that yard. I didn't know I was going to Briartown until I reached the passage and chose the gates." Jack placed both hands on the table. "Next time I will leave word."
"Good," Finn said. "We spent an hour deciding which roads an injured idiot might take."
The name did not sting. Finn pushed the little bowl toward him. The paste inside smelled strong enough to numb Jack's nose.
Kai sat back. "I favored kidnapping. Edric favored collapse. Finn favored both but assigned probabilities."
"I did not favor either," Edric said. "I considered them."
"I'm sorry," he said.
The apology was not enough when all three of them had spent an hour trying to calculate where he might have fallen. Jack put one hand over the other on the table so he would stop worrying the edge of the bandage.
"There is something I should have told you before this," he said. "The attack on the lower road hurt my head. I don't remember most of my life here."
Finn stopped the small stone pestle beneath his fingers. Edric's attention moved from Jack to the copied practical sequence. Kai remained still beside him.
"I remembered Thornfield, Drake, and Eomer. Sometimes a face brings back one moment, or my hands know something before I do. I couldn't read when I arrived."
Edric drew Jack's copied page closer. The earliest lines leaned uncertainly across it. By the bottom, the same hand had begun producing recognizable words.
"Master Voss spoke while she wrote," he said. "You began reading during the lesson."
"The sounds joined to the marks. I still don't know why some things return and others don't." Jack glanced toward Kai. "Kai worked out most of this in the practice yard. He didn't tell you because I hadn't given him permission."
Kai took the damaged plum from beside Edric's notebooks and pared away the tooth mark with a small table knife.
"Does the Academy know?" Edric asked.
"The registrar knows about the attack and the stolen papers. He doesn't know about my memory, and I don't want this traveling beyond the table. I can do the work. I need people to tell me when I am missing something everyone else learned at six."
Finn resumed grinding. "Correction or explanation?"
"Both, unless I ask for only one. Don't pretend the question isn't strange. I usually know when it is."
Finn tipped a little more powder from a folded paper into the bowl and resumed grinding.
Edric turned his notebook sideways and began adding words beneath the copied ward sequence. He wrote where the breath belonged, what each line received, and where the force was supposed to leave. The notes he had brought recorded the exercise. The new ones explained it.
"You can repay me by learning the final consonant before Master Draek makes the entire yard listen again," he said without looking up.
The receiving ward remained dead beneath Jack's copied diagrams. Nothing in the careful lines offered him light. He accepted the notebook anyway.
Later, in War Arts, Master Draek stopped him beside the staff rack.
"You left an ordered exercise yesterday, Drake."
"Yes, Master."
"You will complete the missed ward work after instruction."
"They may all fail."
"Then you will have failed the work assigned. Take your staff."
Across the yard, Dorian had arrived with his emerald chain bright against black cloth. Akira stood in his usual place beside him. The boy on Dorian's other side might have been the third fountain attacker or merely someone who wanted the table's favor; Jack still could not name him.
He chose the long ash staff. His palm remained bandaged, his hip ached, and the bruises behind his knees resisted the first lowering of his stance. He adjusted until the pain became information rather than command.
Draek set the class to the shortened recovery. Jack sent one end down the marked line, arrested it before the packed earth, and let the shaft travel through his rear hand. The old flourish opened in his shoulder. He refused it. The opposite end came forward by the shortest useful path and stopped level with an imaginary rib.
"Again," Draek said.
Jack repeated it.
On the fifth pass the movement belonged neither to a remembered balcony nor to the frightened boy who had failed before the clay plate. It belonged to an aching body in a sunlit yard, choosing what to keep.
When Draek called the halt, Jack stopped.
Finn's knives were still. Edric held a practice rod and watched from the next rank. Kai gave Jack one small nod before arranging his face into something less sincere.
Across the yard, Dorian was looking too.
Jack returned the staff to guard and waited for the next count.