red admiral.

ék

—3. left right left right

look both ways before you cross the street.

__

"a general rule of thumb for fencing is that a feint should be followed by a lunge—a subversion of this is also well known as yìmàorik's twist.." your teacher has one of the most mind-melting voices known to man. this should get her fired on the count of just generally horrible qualities of a teacher—but you think it might be a requirement. your other three teachers had voices just as boring.

you also have yet to meet with the crown prince—so this isn't going well. màožyk is in most of your classes, so it isn't all bad; he chats your ears off, but he's disgustingly good at any sport that involves violence. you didn't even want to fence. you wanted to do geography. pāpá insisted that you learn more than one sport this year—three sports next year. a boy knows to fight in every tournament, a man knows to win. something something masculinity something something war something something violence. you don't really care much for that type of stuff—schooling, or, well, this school in particular is five years and based entirely in a need for political mingling of the upper class—and that one commoner who got in. you don't really care much for it.

āžesaōvyk-aoxíža is, in layman's terms, the only reason you're even in this school. or—well, your pāpá living vicariously through you and wanting to get with renaì's own father is what got you here. semantics. anyway—!

"when do you think the introduction to fencing part of this is going to end?" your buddy màožyk says, he put his hair up—which means he actually thought he'd be fighting today. hah. loser.

"i'd give it a week or so—teacher's with mixed class-years always have to start with the bare-bones of rules."

your buddy màožyk rolls his eyes—they catch purple in the light of the window. "you eating inside or outside?"

"inside," you say—renaì prefers the inside, and you're really just her loyal husband-to-be in the building. devotion is ridiculous. "you're either—"

"come on," your buddy màožyk whines, "this is why you're so pale you know—you always stay inside."

he says this like renaì isn't just as outside-averse as you. her skin is maybe four shades lighter than his and you look like snow when you sit next to her.

"my father is outside all the time and he's just as pale."

"the driven snow, you—" he rolls his eyes, "—just, gah—i'll ask your renaì if she can withstand the presence of the sun while we eat, how about that?"

you smile, "sure—good luck with that."

(you are the most unlucky person on the planet—the—the opposite of a fucking rabbits foot—)

(what's your name? žarìkōž rāńyk—hand of god. gift.)

your heart sort of hurts, but it sort-of-always does. màožyk is good at every sport that you can think of—he's your kind of cousin, from what you remember about your family tree—but you don't really—it might be an honorary thing—the two of you have no shared blood. what is blood, in the end—kánaō's voice is high pitched and loving in your memories and—you promised, didn't you?

"—convincing people, važaik shouldn't be any different." he grins, "is she really a naōfèr like everyone says? hah?"

(your buddy màožyk has never met renaì—how dare he?)

you feel angry all the sudden, and it must slip on your face, because the all-fight, all-giving, no-regrets màožyk takes his word back immediately—he sputtering, "sorry, sorry—i didn't—sorry—"