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Lucius’s attitude was getting old fast. If not for the fact that we would probably be living together—and as large and comfortable as each of the houses seemed, they weren’tthatbig—I would have gone out of my way to avoid him.
“This is my dormitory,” he said, pushing open the door to the third house on the left. It was not lost on me that he didn’t welcome me in or speak as though I had any part of the house. “I share it with Leander and Darius, and with Mara. I shouldn’t have to share it with one more.”
The interior of the house was cool, and though it wasn’t barren or dirty, it felt institutional. There were no decorations on the walls, though as Lucius led me into a room that took up what I figured was about a third of the space of the house as a whole, there were comfortable couches with decorative pillows. The room held a table with four chairs around it, two desks, and a bookshelf that had four shelves and very few books.
“This is the common room,” Lucius explained. “That’s my room. You are not to go in there.” He pointed to the single door on the right side of the house, at the far end of the common room.
There were three doors about equally spaced along the left-hand wall. “Those are the other rooms,” he said. “That one is Mara’s, that’s Leander’s, and that’s Darius’s.” He deliberately made it seem as though there wasn’t room for me.
I thought about being stubborn and giving Lucius a hard time just for the hell of it, like I knew Jace would, and probably Peter too, but I would rather have taken a more Neil, Sebald route and sought a solution that would make everyone happy.
“I could live in a different house, if that would be easier,” I said with a sigh. “I’m sure Magister Titus would—”
“There are no other rooms, you twat,” Lucius snapped, making me jerk in offense. “The healer’s course is full. Every bed in every house is taken.”
I was reminded of what Horacio had said, about how healers were in such high demand in the Old Realm and how they were treated as special. It made sense that the college would pack itself to the rafters in order to accommodate all the people who wanted to raise their status.
“Then you’re stuck with me,” I said. “So you’d better tell me which room I should put my things in. Then show me where to go for class.”
I half expected Lucius to turn around and march out, leaving me to figure things out on my own. He probably would have, too, if not for the house’s door opening behind us and two men walking in while they were in the middle of a loud conversation.
Every part of me pricked up the second the two of them came to a stop in the common room and looked at me. Every part of me. Because not only were the two men some of the most beautiful men I’d ever encountered—and beautiful was the right word, they would have given Peter a run for his money in the beauty department—they were exactly identical.
“That’s Leander and Darius,” Lucius muttered, as if pointing out plague victims who were coughing and vomiting all over everything. “I would stay away from them, if I were you.”
“Who have you brought us, Lulu?” one of the twins asked as Lucius stormed past them. Lucius shoved one aside so he could stomp out the house’s door, leaving the three of us alone.
“Well, something’s gotten up his ass,” the other twin said with a laugh. “Not you, I hope,” he went on, turning to me and sweeping me with a lascivious look.
“Nothing has gotten up Lulu’s ass,” the first twin said. “That’s his problem.” He stepped closer to me. There was a fluidity in the way he walked, but it wasn’t fey or feminine. Quite the opposite. The twins were well-built and muscular, as if used to hard labor, but I could see that their hands were soft. “You, on the other hand, seem to be our problem now,” he said, lowering his eyes enough to be coy, then offering me his hand. “I’m Leander Soranus.”
“And I am Darius.” The other twin stepped forward as well, extending his hand. “Who often has a sore anus.”
The twins laughed as though it were the funniest joke ever told.
I laughed as well, but not for the joke, which was a little on the nose, or so I figured from the way the two men ogled me. I laughed because the Old Realm was turning out to be as morally lax as the Wolf River Kingdom after all. A blind man could have seen that both Leander and Darius had no qualms whatsoever about fucking around with men. Or perhaps more specifically, that they had no qualms about fucking around with me. And my hunch was that it wouldn’t be a few inexperienced and inept thrusts in the dark beside a wagon either.
Dushka would be so happy for me.
“I’m Conrad,” I told them, my smile broadening by the second. “Conrad Kettering. I’m late, but I suppose I’m to be your housemate?” I made it sound like a question because I still had no idea what I was doing.
Leander and Darius exchanged a look, and with it a level of communication that I supposed only twins had.
“No wonder Lulu has his drawers in a pinch,” Leander said. “He was counting on that room to store his things and to be his private study.”
“Poor thing,” Darius said. “He’ll be forced to eat and study with the rest of us now.”
“Or keep to his own room?” I suggested, already feeling drawn in to the twins, who I was certain would be my friends.
“Or that,” Darius agreed with a nod. “Although Lulu comes from one of the high families, albeit one from the countryside, so he’s used to having more than one room.”
“Is that why he seems so set against me from the start?” I asked, hiking my pack higher on my shoulder. I would ask what exactly it meant to be from a high family later. I assumed it had something to do with rank, and the houses up on the hillsides, even though the twins had mentioned the countryside.
Leander and Darius seemed to notice I was standing there with a pack. They launched into motion, coming forward to take it, and my jacket, off my shoulders.
“You can have the middle room,” Leander said, though as they moved around me, switching places, I started to lose track of who was who. “Darius and I will take the end room.”
“That will put us as far from Lulu’s room as possible,” Leander said. “He’ll like that.”
