Those Who Would Not Be Gods

4. Appointment: Raff

"Appointment day, appointment day, everyone up!" Diego boomed, the dorm-leader calling out for what would be his last time at the ever-unpleasant hour of precisely five o'clock. Raff groaned, shifting lazily on the bed. It was just appointment day. They'd all troop through the Shrine and get muttered at, get handed their weapons, and that would be that. He could sleep in a bit. Especially since Raffaele Senza-nome was low on the alphabetical list.

Then Diego rang the bell, clattering it up and down the hallway, and he knew there was no escaping. "Up, up, everyone up!" he sang, the bell growing louder as he walked closer. With a reluctant sigh, Raff hauled himself up.

At least they had rooms, now. At first it'd been a cot in a dusty secluded warehouse, a handful of other no-names all huddled together, everywhere from toddlers to pre-teens. Then a set of bunks in a building clearly meant to house people and not things, and finally, as he became an upperclassman in the Schola, a room. The walls were thin and the mattresses felt thinner, but at least it was a room.

Above him, the upper bunk creaked as Sab sat up. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and shot a glare in Raff's direction. "Someone murder him," he grumbled.

Raff smirked. "C'mon, there'll be too many witnesses if we do it here," he said, gesturing him down.

Sab grumbled something else under his breath, but Raff's logic must've gotten through to him, because he hopped down from the bunk.

It was amazing what a few potions and the power of an old soul could do, Raff thought, taking Sab in. The Shrine was used to it, had the potions on hand as soon as Sab's sage-hood had been confirmed. Like a rubber mold that, once distorted, returned to the same shape, Sab's body had changed. Muscles grew, his body stretched taller, his chin grew hair, and his voice deepened. Sab had been reborn into the wrong body, but looking at him now, Raff wouldn't have been able to pull him out of a crowd of men, even in his nightshirt.

The soul, too, was important, they'd said. Souls were the root of magic. Anyone could take the potions the water-mages brewed, but they'd have a lesser effect unless their soul wanted it, too, whether the potion was for healing or for changing.

"Dress greens, everyone," Diego boomed, travelling back the opposite direction, the bell still clanging away.

"We know!" someone shouted, sick of the bell. Raff chuckled as he yanked his trousers on and shrugged into his dress jacket. Silver thread picked out the shape of the noble albero d'ambra across his chest, and he struggled, as ever, to do up the concealed buttons under the left-flap of the coat. What's wrong with visible buttons, anyways, he thought, biting his lip as the flat discs slipped out of his fingers for the hundredth time.

"Hold up, hold up," Sab sighed. He moved closer and took over from Raff, closing the buttons one-by-one. Raff stood there, close enough he could see the ambra stone hanging loose from its chain around Sab's neck over the top of his nightshirt, his chest beneath. He averted his eyes out of politeness' sake. There was nothing there, not anymore, but it wasn't polite to stare. "Clumsy. You remind me of my eldest son sometimes."

"Because I'm so handsome?" Raff joked, which earned him a tired look.

Sab tugged him close and did the collar button a little more roughly than necessary, then gave him a push. "Alright, there you go. Go get Diego to shut up, will ya?"

"Do my best," Raff said. He raked his long hair into something resembling presentable, the curls as unmanageable as ever, then tied it up tight. Some of the others were stumbling to the bathrooms to shave, but one way or another, Raff had never been blessed in that department. Blessed, or cursed? he thought to himself as he made his way to the mess hall early. Less shaving time meant more time to eat.