Chương 113: Chapter 110

Apparently, 'The Right did it' was not an acceptable explanation for what happened to the headmaster's desk. Which he felt wasn't fair, because he was certain she could get away with saying that.

"It really wasn't a big deal," he said, stabbing a spoon into a cup of yogurt.

"She just wanted to talk about our club trip." Alice hadn't wasted a second before pulling him out of there, spouting some noble bullshit in response to protests. Propriety apparently lost all meaning, because they raced down the tower's steps before finding a place to regroup. He would have assumed that would be the dorms, but someone had smelled pancakes, and here they were. The eatery they found was a small one, and they'd nabbed a corner table, huddling around it as they ate breakfast.

It wasn't exactly private, but from the foot traffic he was seeing, this place was more for take-out than dine-in. That left the staff to worry about, and while he kept a passive eye on them, he hadn't spotted anything overtly suspect. He supposed there was also the window to his back to watch out for, but he felt it was tinted enough to not be concerned about. Cal was in a decent mood, all things considered. The Right totally knew about his alter-ego, but she also hadn't caved his face in.

That was a win, and as long as his story checked out, which it did, everything was going to be alright. He knew it was optimistic, but strange comments aside, he felt they got along all right. All he had to do was pretend to be competent, and according to multiple sources, he was good at that.

"We've long established your ability to retell events is…" Alice trailed off, likely searching for a polite way to put it.

"Horrendous. Tell me word for word what occurred." Or maybe she wasn't. So much for manners.

"Honestly, my heart was racing pretty badly, so I couldn't do that if I tried," he said evasively, pointing his spoon at Lily.

"And are we sure she hasn't drowned?" Lily had been acting like a zombie since they left and currently had her face in a bowl of soup. It was a strange choice for breakfast, and he'd chosen it for her in an attempt to inject some life back into the girl. Somewhat ironically, things were going in the opposite direction.

"If she," Alice said, stealing glances to ensure no one was paying attention to the face-in-a-bowl noble.

"Wants to act like a child, let her." Alice wasn't thrilled about Lily deciding to chug a bottle of wine. She was even less thrilled when she had to pry it out of the girl's grip—resistance that struck him as an unconscious reflex from someone half‑catatonic. Bubbles emerged from the soup, indicating she was still somewhat aware of the outside world.

"Try talking louder," Cal said, offering words of encouragement and nothing else. The bubbles got bigger, splattering the tablecloth.

"For the—" Alice took a breath, inhaling sharply before grabbing the back of Lily's head and yanking her free.

"Lilliane. Compose yourself at once." Orange soup dripped down her face, making an even bigger mess. Her lips moved, yet nothing intelligible came out.

"She seems normal enough," Cal provided, spooning more yogurt. Positive thoughts were important right now. They distracted him from thinking about how, if Lennard had been missing, Miss Justiciar might be as well. Alice muttered some very un-noble-like things before grabbing a napkin and dabbing the other girl's face. After thoroughly soaking two of them, purple eyes began rapidly blinking. Then they squeezed back shut, and he saw her hands clench in her lap.

Her face grew increasingly tight, and at this rate, he thought she might give herself a stroke.

"Lily," Alice said, releasing Lily and lowering her voice.

"What are you doing?" Trying to pretend she didn't exist?

"I'm trying to pretend that didn't happen," she rushed out, keeping her eyes shut.

"If I keep doing this, there's a chance I'll forget." Cal thought the odds of that were low. Unless she was the mind mage. Granted, he didn't know if that was actually a thing mind mages could do, or if it was simply an excuse Mask liked to use. Neither of them responded to the girl. Only the sounds of workers and the occasional passing student indicated the passage of time. Eventually, one of Lily's eyes peeked open.

"Aren't you supposed to tell me it's not that bad?" Given his current attempt at maintaining positivity, he considered how to spin Lily's ineloquent introduction into a good thing.

"What if," he started, preparing to say something he didn't believe, "she saw chugging a bottle of alcohol in front of her as an act of courage. Most people probably refrain in front of someone who abstains, but you went at it." The girl tilted forward, and Alice moved the bowl, allowing her head to hit the table. Cal noted that she could have just caught her.

"It's a single setback," Alice said in a softer tone.

"I'm certain your second impression will be a vast improvement." Lily whimpered into the tablecloth.

"You did better than Rolland," Cal added, ignoring that it hadn't been the prince's first meeting with the woman.

"She really doesn't like him." Maybe next time they saw each other, he should bring up how he broke the man's nose during their first meeting or how he threw beasts at him for fun in the Waste. Although he couldn't guarantee she wouldn't use that against him later on.

"Hurray," Lily said in a muffled voice.

"She didn't try to take my head off." Now she was getting it.

"Since you still have it," Cal said, tapping his noggin.

"During your next impression, try not to short-circuit, or whatever that was." Her face grew increasingly red, rivaling his hair in hue. Alice placed a hand on her back, rubbing small circles into it in a way the other girl had done for her in the past. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"I believe Lily was merely overwhelmed," she offered kindly.

"It is not often one gets a chance to meet someone of that standing, let alone in such a private setting." And then she'd flubbed it. With how she treated other figures of authority, he wouldn't have expected it. Then again, it was a Hand. He'd seen plenty of Federation citizens forget basic things like breathing when meeting a member of the Constellation for the first time. Perhaps her original suggestion to attack the Right wasn't such a bad one.

There was a lot less to worry about when shooting lightning at someone's face.

"Don't mull over it too much," Cal said genuinely, thinking about his own interaction with the Hand.

"She's not so bad." Alice's eyes flicked to him, and Lily picked up her head, looking at him through narrowed eyes. He got the sense that he should have brought backup.

"If you can't provide a comprehensive retelling," Alice said in a skeptical tone.

"Can you at least explain what happened to the headmaster's desk?" Why did everyone care about a piece of rubble? Their stares were held steady on him, suspicion heavy in the air. If he didn't know them better, he might have been alarmed. Since he did, he could tell they thought he had done something exceptionally stupid. Well, if that's what they wanted…

"We were arm wrestling," he said with a straight face.

"I won." In perfect sync, both of their faces went flat.

"Okay, you got me," he said after thirty seconds of judgmental silence.

"She was showing me her pin thingy." He raised a palm, making it clear what he was referring to. It had been an intriguing experience for him to hold the symbol of a Hand. They were two very different people, but the gap at that moment appeared to narrow.

"Claimed it was indestructible. I said nothing was indestructible. She responded by placing it on the desk and…" His fist closed, and he brought it slowly down on the table.

"... broke said desk." The amount of force she used should have destroyed the desk outright, along with the floor, but the strike had been directed cleanly, and almost all the energy was expended on his star, which took the blow without complaint. Predictably, they didn't seem to believe that any more than his wrestling joke. Which was a shame because it wasn't that far off from what had actually happened. He ate his yogurt, indicating that was his story, and he was sticking with it.

The girls took a moment to process that, and he wondered if he was going to be the only one actually eating their food.

"Somehow, that makes me feel better," Lily said, soup still dripping down her face.

"I have to rethink everything I've ever heard about her and try not to think about what it means for my future, but still—better." Cal did not understand her thought process.

"That may have been an unorthodox way of showing you favor," Alice commented, clearly distrustful of her own words.

"Did she make any comments on you or your character?" Yes, but most of it was calling him a snake, which he couldn't exactly share. Although… there was one other thing she called him.

"She said I was a professional." In a shocking turn of events that he could have never predicted, neither of the girls looked ready to accept that immutable fact. Normally he'd not label it as such, but if the Right claimed he was a professional, then that was that.

"Callum, this is serious," Alice stated with a certain level of severity.

"Was there anything you did that could have instigated her?" Exist in her general vicinity? That seemed to be enough for a large subset of people.

"I didn't compliment her hair, that's for sure," Cal quipped, seeing the way Alice's face grew ever sterner. He continued, easing off the levity in his tone.

"Like I said, we mostly talked about that club trip. She wanted to hear what I had to say before going off to confirm some things. If she's mad at anyone, it's our northern friends." The Right had said a lot of strange things about the contingent from the Holy Enclave, but her displeasure with them was clear. How they found out about Infinita Nox's meeting was still a mystery to him, but they clearly jumped the gun in dealing with it.

"Vic isn't happy with them either," Lily said, wiping her face with her hand and licking the soup off her fingers.

"This is the first time they've ever set foot on campus, and, politically, it's already a disaster." Showing up and immediately executing a prisoner was certainly a choice. Just not a good or sane one. If the mercenary had been kept alive, even if he didn't know anything of value, he could have been used as bait. Killing him was a waste.

"They're unlikely to be removed straight away," Alice added in a pondering tone.

"But their stay will undoubtedly be made more difficult. The headmaster won't leave them without minders, and while the choice remains with us, I'm not inclined to entertain their inquiries." Alice had mentioned that they'd want to question her and Lily about the warehouse incident, but considering how their last interrogation went, that didn't sound like a good idea. The bar for their critical thinking skills had been set extremely low in his mind.

"Neither am I," he muttered, already dreading the inevitable interaction. He knew it was coming, but he'd rather avoid it.

"Give me the walking cotton mouth any day." It wasn't hard to see why the woman had once been known as the Drought. She'd sapped the saliva straight from his throat, making it feel all scratchy. His regeneration had already handled it, but he'd have to be careful of that if they ever fought again. Belatedly, he noticed the two of them staring at him in question.

"When you put cotton in your mouth, it dries out," he explained, realizing the expression was too foreign for them.

"Same way it does when you're around her." Lily raised a hand, picking at the dried skin of her bottom lip, only to inhale sharply as the table jostled. Cal wordlessly bent backwards and then leaned toward the right, lifting up the tablecloth just long enough to see that Alice's heel had landed on Lily's foot.

"Not everyone can burn theirs off," Lily said, huffing as she grabbed a napkin to finally work on the mess that was her face.

"And don't let him distract you from how weirdly casual he's being." With one hand, she pointed at him in accusation, and with the other, she picked at her lips from behind the napkin. Her tactic proved sound, causing the other girl's attention to return to him.

"Is it weird if it's me?" he asked with slight confusion.

"Me and respect don't go so well together." Alice took a deep breath, staring at him with either acceptance or resignation. He couldn't tell which.

"I would have coached you longer if I thought it would have made a difference," Alice said forlornly, picking up a fork and finally starting on her pancakes.

"I live in fear of the day we present you to our Emperor." However odd she thought that conversation might be, Cal knew she was underestimating it. Earlier, he would have shared her sentiments about the prospective meeting, but now that he knew the Emperor had signed off on his presence, all he could think about was how best to lay into him without causing a diplomatic incident.

"See that," Lily said, gesturing at him again.

"That's the look of someone who's going to get me executed by association." He'd put down the Emperor before that happened.

"Lily," Alice replied with a scoff.

"Don't be ridiculous…" Realistically, he'd have to go through the Left before getting a shot at the man himself. Difficult, but maybe not impossible. The Left was advanced in age. He couldn't be the same man who drove off Harbinger. If he could sneak past without detection, he might have a real shot—"Callum," Alice said heatedly, pounding the table with a palm.

"Please cease whatever you're thinking." What were the odds the mind mage was hiding under his nose this entire time?

"They were good thoughts," he defended to their incredulous gazes. Maybe not good for the sitting Emperor, but that was neither here nor there.

"Don't you two have classes to get to?" he followed up, knowing he wouldn't win that argument.

"I need to start heading out myself." Not for classes. He would still be relying on Evergreen to get out of those. No, with the Right away, he needed to use this opportunity to do things he didn't want her to know about just yet.

"I can see why," Lily said, her tone half dry, half teasing.

"You Arderes really like to play with fire." Her statement was a tad bewildering, and he looked to the other Ardere present, who was staring at him with thin, pressed lips. At least, he thought she was looking at him. Upon closer inspection, he noticed her eyes were just off-center to him. Turning in his seat, he looked behind him, glancing out the window. An ordinary girl stood on the other side of the glass, and he suddenly wondered how Mia would feel about paying a visit to the heir of a City Lord.