Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

7:00 AM - FIVE YEARS AGO

Even the air itself was a stagnant echo of the cries of many, an orchestra that spanned across church pews, those that had become much more recognizable over just the past few years. The stained windows of the cathedral themselves strummed a deep rooted familiarity in his heart, like the cord of a harp. He thought to himself when he composedly traced the carvings upon the bench before him. He had always prepared for his induction into the facility, why his parents had spoken amongst themselves about it in his presence many times: in the stables, the library of his father’s manor house, and finally, the last time, when they had guided him up to the railway carriage. His dear mother could not bring herself to stop crying, and his father, even in his own kindly way, could not bear so much as look at him. They never seemed entirely convinced that this was the right choice, but the night he was found in the woodshed seemed to change their mind. A little tap of his fingers imitated the clunk of his luggage being thrown aboard with careless hands, and helped dim the recurrence of a Sunday mass.

His lips twitched amusedly, but upon seeing the solemn, closed-eyed expression of the student beside him, he realized now was not the time again, no matter how many times they had all run through the tri-monthly bearings of the institution. Victor Alton once again switched between reading from the language guide in his hands and gazing up at the priest. The headmaster preached one word that sent the boy furiously flipping through the pages, scrambling to find whatever it meant as he slurred in the most butchered French hymnal with the rest: Au ciel dans la patrie.

The most satisfied and slightly stupid grin upon Victor’s face as he, once again, tried and failed completely unbeknownst to himself, was enough to make Quinn stifle his own hysterics. His mouth only shut when a heavy book crashed upon the back of his head, replaced with his own hand shortly thereafter to ease the throbbing left behind. No sooner did he come face-to-face with the culprit, as he turned and met the icy, cold gaze of Sister Luna. “I do not care who you are related to,” she whispered furiously from the aisle beside him, brandishing her scripture in the most intemperate threat he had heard from an old nun, “you will act with the utmost respect within these walls. If I ever catch you making a mockery of this cathedral again, you will remember every edge, and crevice, and dent in this book just by the bruises it leaves on your skin.”

Quinn cleared his throat. Eyes flickering between the holy writ and the scowl on the woman’s face, he nodded. “I’m truly sorry, Sister Luna. I didn’t mean to get distracted. It won’t happen again, I promise.”

She huffed at his answer, but must have been satisfied by it, for she did not press any further. The nun merely passed through the colonnades to the other side of the alley, returned to her spot at her pew, and despite shooting him one last warning leer, recited the responses of mass. Quinn, still rubbing circles into his parietal, did not stop taking in his surroundings—silently this time, of course. Augustin Dupont stood to be the most concentrated, only partially rivaled by Nico Agosti, both parroting the hymns at an almost competition with each other. One louder than the other, both drowned out by a symphony of voices. Oh, the thought flickered in his head despite his familiarity with the process, he was supposed to be singing, wasn’t he?

It felt off to open his mouth, regardless of how the verse posed no threat to him. There was a sort of humor to be found in it now. But even still, he took in a deep breath of roses and blessed water, and joined them. Because that was all he could do. He did not stop his search, however, for something different, something new. A needed break from the endless repetition of so many visits. There was not a single face he had not seen before, so he thought. In the early hours of the morning, he practically had to be dragged from his dormitory into the stain-glass glow, and yet no one else protested nearly as much as he did. It was boredom, more than anything, that spaded a hole into his brain.

And then he found his earlier assumption was contradicted. His eyes finally caught an unfamiliar face on the other side. Between lines of enraptured students was the most miserable looking boy, about his age. That in itself would have been enough to warrant a second glance, as Quinn was convinced he was the youngest inductee (even his friends were at least a couple years older than him, and they permitted him to follow them around like a younger sibling), but the other was also the only one to not speak the refrain of the headmaster in the entire cathedral. He couldn’t have been new, he argued to himself; the year was drawing to a close. Who in God’s name would be admitted into the institution merely a week before their final exam and why? Had his eyes just swept over absentmindedly, he might have mistaken his inert stillness with a grave statue. There was something dreadful about his disposition, but from afar, he could not tell what it was. All he knew was that the rosary at the new student’s side was practically throttled in the tightest grip; he could almost hear his white knuckles cracking even though there was nothing audible over the others.

Odd.

When mass finally drew to a close, and the ocean of chittering students filed out neatly, all that remained were three bodies in an empty cathedral. Quinn hardly noticed at first. He tucked the prayer book within the wood binding of the bench, and only when he lifted his gaze, did he see that same student again. Still in the same spot, staring up at the massive crucifix in an almost horrified stupor. Maybe he was having some sort of spiritual awakening, Quinn considered it half-cynically and half-bemused, and it caused a lighthearted snicker to fill the church. Instinctually, he surveyed the area for any sightings of that damned abbess; the last thing he wanted was to be struck with a book again, or a ruler, or whatever Luna had at her disposal now. Yet despite the echo of the sound, he could not find the woman, and the student still did not stir.

He frowned slightly. It took very little debate to gather the courage to approach him, and he did, in the most measured strides. His conscience even considered this caution to be quite misplaced. Eventually, he did march over to the newest addition to their grand university, and was able to observe him closer.

”Are you alright?” Quinn asked unevenly.

Those words were enough to snap him out of it, whatever it was. Quinn saw the boy finally blink for heaven’s sake, shaking his head almost to rid whatever cloud had washed over him, and turned. Gold flecks glimmered in the wide-eyed, emerald gaze like starlight, hidden behind glass lenses. His face had paled. In every essence by matter of expression, it seemed like the boy had seen a ghost. Rather, he looked like he might have been one himself. Quinn watched the boy observe him carefully—study his face, rather. The blonde’s expression was by all means a more relaxed (albeit growing much more concerned) one, and that seemed to confuse the stranger. It was almost like he was searching for something, like he was looking for some kind of understanding. An exchange. And in an instant, he must have found it. His mouth tried to find the words, stammering open, but he was unable to start or finish whatever sentiment would follow, for the headmaster stepped between them.

“Now, Quinn, what have I told you about pestering the new students?” the man chuckled, placing a hand upon the unfamiliar, cadaverous boy’s shoulder.

Quinn frowned up at the priest. “What? I didn’t,” he insisted. “I’m not pestering anyone.”

”But of course, and I suppose you didn’t mean to cause trouble during mass either?”

Quinn remained silent. He hardly saw what that had to do with anything. The new boy was clearly startled by something, even now he looked upon the elder’s hand frightfully. Quinn’s eyes narrowed at that realization.

”Come, my boy,” the man commanded before Quinn could say anything else, “we must talk about your new living arrangements.”

Quinn stood by as Father Girard guided the student down the main aisle of the cathedral. And in only a matter of a moment, the blonde was left alone, staring at the grand wooden doors as they swung closed.

When left alone, the boy’s tone shifted and he scoffed to himself at the all too typical behavior of the headmaster. Yes… pestering, why any approach to a student would be considered pestering if done by Quinn. He should have known better than to speak to another student, unless spoken to before.

Otherwise…

”I do think this is the best choice for him, surely. If you’ll forgive me, I’m sure his current school is all well and good, but given the circumstances, it would be better to develop a strong religious foundation… We wouldn’t want him to do something drastic now… would we?”

The cathedral inexplicably seemed a lot colder and quieter than it did when he was in the crowd. All the memory did was cement a terrible taste in his mouth that he endured, but someone snapped him out of it before he could be bothered with too much thinking.

He was never really good at thinking.

A sliver of brighter light shimmered into the cathedral as the doors creaked back open, just a little, bit by bit, for Victor to peek out his ginger framed face. Was he going to ask what the boy was doing standing in an empty nave all on his lonesome? Perhaps at first, but surely there were more pressing matters to consider beforehand—which encouraged him to cut the silence. “Nico's back from his secret little foray into into town. I hear his parents brought him some things.”

He was one of the very few, if only, students that was permitted even the rarest of visits from his family at the institution; a dividend even Quinn was not so much as offered, but he supposed if he had good grades, had transferred there for all the right reasons as opposed to being sent away for the wrong ones, and for the most part seemed to keep a clean reputation, then maybe even he would be provided a yearly contact with someone who wasn't a student, priest, or nun. It seemed unlikely, however, especially when it was those around him that were pushing him into conflict.

”The rooftops?” Quinn asked after it dawned on him.

The older student cracked a devious grin. “Where else?”

~~~

9:00 AM

”Who would have thought, out of all of us, Quinn would be the one getting into trouble during mass? And to think, you always blame us for your troubles.”

”Because you are to blame. The only reason our dear Jeanette Luna is cross with me is because of what you had me do last winter,” Quinn snickered. “Doesn’t matter how long I’ve been good, you know she has had it out for me ever since the incident..” He rolled his eyes, and dissolved the conversation into little more than the scritching of pencil on paper; truly he should have been using his booklet to study, he knew this, but instead the margins became common place for illustrations of anything other than holy work. The view from the edge of the rooftop upon which he stood, behind precarious railing, gave rise to more artistic endeavors than theological: there was not necessarily much he could see past the lake, and if he were to somehow stumble or lose his balance—common place for him, surely—he would be lucky if neither he nor his dear logbook tumbled down over one hundred meters below. He could say the same for the empty glass in Victor’s hand, and he almost wanted to jeer at how expectant the older student was for someone to fill it. The boy peered over the edge of the rail if not just to remind himself how high up he was. And in doing so, he, like a hawk, spotted the black and white spec of a veil and coif atop the head of someone bickering with a leaving student. It took very little insight to determine who the tall figure was even from the top of the cathedral, so he muttered, “Speak of the devil.”

Victor joined him. ”Figure she’s out for a smoke,” he speculated, only partially joking. “Augustin says she once confiscated a fag from another student, snuck out to the neighboring woods, and took the rest of it herself.”

”Well perhaps Sister Luna and I are more alike than I thought. Augustin does tend to be right about those things. And everything else.” Where was he anyway? The blonde checked his watch.

His companion snorted. “I don’t know. Remember that time you asked him for the answers to the midterm and most of them were wrong–”

He nearly forgot. ”Right… he did that on purpose to ‘teach me a lesson.’”

”Dick move,” Victor sneered. “You were better off guessing. Speaking of which, have you been studying for the final exam?”

Quinn shrugged his shoulders somewhat carelessly. “What do you think?”

”I think you’re in deep shit once your uncle gets tired of making excuses for you.”

Even when he was upset, his expression retained a kind sense of softness. He mulled over Victor’s comment; he was the only one who knew of his relation to the head priest–though heavily implied, he did not tell him. It was the Englishman who discovered it for himself and tried to use that information to his benefit, but Girard only seemed to tolerate Quinn like a close relative would. He figured for a moment that Victor did have half a point. And then he denied it, figuring the man could not send him back to his parents; as it was Girard’s fault he was there, and that would require him to admit that his school couldn’t fix everything. Or everyone. “I’ll figure something out. I always do.”

Victor snapped his fingers, as if struck by a brutish and awful epiphany. He decided to relay his strategy, "Just follow in my footsteps: spot the most intelligent student in your class and threaten to beat him if he doesn't take the test for you. Simple as that."

"That is perhaps some of the worst advice I have ever heard. I am not going to threaten to harm anyone, Victor."

"Suit yourself, but it does work. Trust me."

The blonde sighed and disapprovingly returned to avoiding his upcoming workload. Only about a second later, he heard a rattling sound behind him, and both he and Victor turned. The doors to the rooftop shuttered open at the hand of an extremely, visibly nervous companion. As if he had been summoned by their gossiping, Augustin crawled out atop the oxidized shingles, followed shortly by Nico, who brushed past him with much more ease and grace even while carrying fragile items. “I come bearing gifts, boys,” he announced facetiously. One of which, a steel blue pack of cigarettes that he tossed to Quinn, who caught it with palatable hesitance. “For you, signorino.”

One of the tiles slid from beneath Augustin’s palm. It did not fall upon the small crowd gathering at the portico of the school, thank heavens, but remained precariously half-lodged there. “Dear God!” he yelled. “Why do you keep choosing to meet up here? It’s dangerous!” Yet that fact did little to stop him from joining them.

”Shhh!” Quinn waved his hands about him. “Don’t yell, Augustin. Someone will hear you. And if anyone found out what we were doing up here, the headmaster will have our heads for sure.”

Naturally, Victor bit back a remark about how it would be theirs in jeopardy, most likely–with Father Girard’s leniency it would be Quinn who would get out of the ordeal with his head still on his shoulders, and maybe little more than a metaphorical or literal slap on the wrist. There was something about that he despised.

Augustin shuffled out to the makeshift balcony, muttering and complaining as per usual. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but you all know how much I hate heights.”

”And yet you still came up here because you wanted to have the champagne. Typical.” Nico carefully set down a bottle of pale gold in front of Victor.

Victor swiped it just to admire the label, though despite the fact that none of this should have been happening at all, he showed a certain reluctance. ”I thought you said your parents were bringing wine.”

”It was difficult enough to get this inside the school as it is. Take it or leave it.”

Quinn unraveled the thin layer of plastic ”How did you even manage to sneak this in?”

"Really I don't see why that should be any of your business. Would you just outright ask an illusionist how he does his tricks?" He wasn't actually too miffed about the question, if his lighthearted expression was any indication, but he did gesture for the blonde to open the box quicker. Seeing him struggle with the packaging was making him anxious "Go on, have one of the Gauloises before I consider giving that to someone else.”

Victor mused aloud, ”I think it’s safe to assume your parents sent you here because of your smuggling activities?”

Nico took up a seat on the roof and laughed. “Don't be ridiculous. They could care less about that. I'm here only because my mother wanted me to go to a prestigious Catholic school. They do say this is one of the best in Europe. Father wanted me to stay in Italy, but what could he do? Argue with her?” He snatched the bottle away from Victor and began to twist off the aureate speckled wax at the shoulder. “But something tells me you were sent here because you did something bad.”

”They thought this place would instill a sense of morality. Apparently tormenting the servants wasn’t as humorous to everyone else as it was to me.”

Nico seemed delighted by the fact that he had guessed right though anyone could have probably come to that conclusion themselves, and tilted the jade bottle over Victor’s glass, then both of them glanced at Augustin as he presented his own. “I suppose I’m the only one here because I want to be,” the scrawniest of the four mentioned.

The fair-haired of the group decided now was the time to open a thin, paper cartridge, and pluck a cigarette from the box. Off on his own by the railing of the canopy, he commented somewhat to himself with fondness and the yellow filter between his lips, as they all seemed to share the hard-to-adjust troubles of dismissal from family life. All except Augustin who seemed to be doing better than the rest; if he didn’t know any better, he would say that the other Parisian student was destined to be here. “Probably.”

”They have a nice library here,” Augustin remarked, as if that was reason enough to be confined to a boarding school. “Even if it’s often busy at the end of the semester.”

Whatever it was, something about Quinn’s little interjection–as short as it was–may have inspired curiosity within Victor, who rose and approached him, his own glass in one hand and an empty one and the bottle weighted between his fingers in the other. He extended his offering to Quinn. “Well, what about you, Quinn?” he thought to ask, brow raised when he studied the other. “We’re all sharing." His eyes traveled to the journal resting in the crook of his arm thereafter, and muttered an afterthought of, "While you're at it, you could also tell us what's in that little book of yours."

Quinn immediately halted in pouring himself a drink, champagne splashing over the edge of the glass, and took a step back. “What?”

It seemed that same keen interest was, to a lesser extent, shared by Nico. Though, the latter did not hound him as much as the former. He hummed softly and his focus shifted between the two of them. “Why were you sent here, Quinn?” He posed the question akin to a therapist. It was enough to make Augustin snort; he found it ill-suited with his accent.

But Quinn remained the side of a different spectrum, not finding it as interesting or amusing as the others. He rolled the stem of the glass between his fingers like an anxious patient of said hypothetical psychiatrist, and worried the cigarette casing with his teeth. “I’d rather not talk about it, really, it’s nothing.” And trying to gap quite some distance between his analytical peers and him, he took another step back when he likely shouldn’t have. He leaned his arm against the barrier, and the old structure trembled beneath a light push. With the old building being as fragile as it was, he himself should have been so lucky as to not plummet to his gruesome death, but instead it was the viridescent bottle—that poor Nico worked so hard to sneak into the school—and his glass that took the fall for him. The four of them watched with dread as the fragile items sunk down, down, down, until they crashed upon the dirt below, scattering the small group that had gathered by the egress. From even all the way up there, they could hear the three nuns startled shrieks. One of them looked up to the arched rooftops for the source of such a disturbance.

Quinn gasped, and ducked down behind the now broken banister. Surely it wouldn’t do much to hide him, not when he could still see them so clearly. But regardless of the flaw in his hiding spot, the others also lowered themselves as out of sight as they could manage as well.

The other three joined him. Augustin whimpered. ”Oh no. Oh no, I told you this was a bad idea! Someone is surely going to come up here and find us now and it's all your fault—”

”Shut your fucking mouth, Augustin,” Victor whispered back, “for heaven’s sake.”

Quinn watched the gathering. Two of the nuns started conversing with each other about the apparent accident; he could only so much as guess what they were theorizing, perhaps the building was finally collapsing in on itself—no, even if it was established decades ago, the institution was not that rundown, but whatever it was, if they had not already summarized it was the clumsiness of a student on forbidden property, it would likely cost a fortune to remedy. He reminded himself that he was merely imagining their troubles, which he had admittedly done quite often, especially when he was left alone. Observing the two, he noticed the third guide another student away from the small but startling mess. That student had not so much as flinched at the splash of sparkling gold. Instead, he stood with that same far off look that he recognized only at a brief inspection. “There he is again…” Quinn muttered.

Victor glanced over at him. “Who?”

”The new student.”

”New?” Nico repeated questioningly, following Quinn’s line of sight to the subject of their conversation. “Who would transfer now? The school year is almost at its end.”

”Beats me.” A swift silence consumed their conversation. It left a long pause that was enough for Quinn to instigate a change in the subject, seeing as none of his colleagues seemed as interested in any of this information as him. There was just something so strange about him, he reasoned: the utter shock in the cathedral, to seemingly hardly flinching when glass fell from the heavens a few inches away from the nuns.

When Augustin had calmed enough to take a peek himself, he frowned. That boy… he knew him from somewhere. “He looks familiar…” Surely it would come to him, but for now it escaped any coherent thought.

Quinn watched how most of the group below departed from the grounds, all except for the new student, who stayed behind and somewhat wordlessly inspected the mess. He hardly bothered to look up, caring not for what caused it, but he did take up the strangest task of kneeling down and cleaning it up, plucking up the shards from the earth with bare fingers as if he had been instructed. Though stiffly mechanical, he collected what he could in the palm of his hand, enclosing around it. Quinn winced. What the hell was he doing?

A coo from Victor turned Quinn’s attention elsewhere, “Way to ruin everything, Quinn. How hard do you think it must have been to smuggle alcohol beneath the headmaster’s nose? Not to mention you nearly killed a nun.” He stopped and grinned almost mischievously, and glanced at the others. And in response, the other two were nearly, wordlessly instructed to chime in the way the taller boy would have liked. Thus began a symphony of disagreeable "Nice going, Quinn," and "We're all going to get in trouble because of you." Predictable. The duo knew to follow Victor in tow for the most part, and Quinn being the youngest and newest addition to their group was set as a proper target.

And Quinn was growing tired of the routine. "Look, it wasn't my fault. I'm not the one who chose to meet up here in the first place, and you were all prodding at me for answers and—"

"Oh, come off it now, Quinn," Augustin murmured. "It's not our fault you're so clumsy."

Those words may not have been as objectionable as some of the other insults to his character that he had been on the receiving end of, but given the state of affairs at hand, it sealed the end for him. The blond was not a confrontational person, nor necessarily capable of anger in the same way as his peers, but he was shocked into a hot-tempered silence, unable to even clear his mind enough to make a retort. It was instead, to his dismay, Victor who once again took the hindmost. "Alright, alright mate, calm down. Quinn will just have to find some way to make it up to us," he said as he slyly wound a sturdy arm around the subject of their torment.

When Quinn had managed to cease chewing his teeth into his cigarette in order to keep his words at bay, he mumbled around the filter, "What are you talking about?"

”Well it’s only fair after you wasted all that good champagne. There must be a proper replacement.” It was only a matter of where to begin for the English student; why he could concoct a plan like no other, but convincing another person to do his misdeeds always took a great deal of poking and conniving. Now when he thought about it long enough, it really was no wonder his parents sent him away; it was either him or the sanity of their housekeepers. “Rumor..." Yes, rumor, because sweet, innocent Victor knew little about Quinn's relation to the headmaster—not unless he had to reveal it, because a fact like that was sure to cause a disturbance not just with Quinn's associates, but the entire school. The chaos that would arise. If only there was just some way, something Quinn could do for Victor that would keep him quiet. "Rumor has it that Quinn here knows where the headmaster keeps the key to his communion wine.”

Augustin and Nico perked up like two feral cats.

“For heaven's sake, Victor, you can't be serious,” the blonde pleaded.

“Oh come on,” Victor struck a match for Quinn, “you know the headmaster won’t be too cross with you. Besides, you owe us.”

Quinn rolled his eyes. ”Can’t you go one day without causing me trouble?” He recalled the only time he had ever allowed one of his friends access to something they should not have had–nothing as daring as sacred wine, but still something that should not have fallen into improper hands; he, himself was not caught, but they were no longer at the institution. He regretted the fact that he had ever even allowed Victor to know about some of the ins and outs of the school. But they were friends, weren’t they? Friends were supposed to share secrets. Those that were safe to tell.

And Victor hardly ever stopped a pursuit. “I take it you already know the answer to that question.” He knew, if there was any way to convince Quinn, he had to approach it differently. Always cunning, and always manipulating those around him like a puppet on strings, using any power they possessed for his sake. Even though he knew the little influence his friend possessed was wearing thin, he had to obtain what he could before the cord snapped and the priest decided enough was enough. Perhaps this would be that time, if they were ever caught, but that was for Quinn to deal with. Victor crossed his heart, one of his hands raised like a scout. “Here, I also promise I will forever drop the subject of why you were sent here if you’ll only fix this mess you got us all in. That doesn’t seem too unreasonable, does it? You know I don't ask a lot from you.” He watched Quinn’s expression change, resigned, and contemplating his words. Bargaining was his favorite device, his divine weapon that glimmered beneath his tongue like a backhanded contract. It was counterintuitive, it only made him more curious, because was he really that desperate to not be asked about his origin? How outré.

It seemed so, because only a moment passed before the relative to the head of the school was buckling under the proposition. It could be seen in his face. The way he inhaled thick gray smoke desperately, and funneled it out, as sharply as the winds themselves, through white teeth. All without looking at any of them. He peered below for the curious student that had somehow vanished. Quinn felt a chill overtake him, despite the sun in the sky, and the summer heat, and everything everywhere that told him that reaction was completely unfounded. And thus began an internal monologue, long and loud, as the young boy wondered if it was better to tolerate likely unending questions–because he would try to avoid it indefinitely–or risk expulsion. Victor had such an uneven temper anyway, and well, the cathedral might have still been empty. If they were quick, surely they wouldn’t be caught. Surely they could get away with it. He surrendered. “Fine,” was how he began when he finally gave in, and the tide of his turmoil rolled back into the shore. “You can find the key to the tabernacle hidden behind the painting in Mattieu’s… Father Girard’s office.”

”Oh what a friend you are,” Victor chirped, squeezing his companion’s shoulder. Barely a tick of Quinn’s pocket watch after the secret had been revealed and he was already planning out how to cross the grounds ”What say you both?”

Augustin passionately protested. His protestation was likely misplaced. ”I say it’s a terrible idea. We shouldn’t steal anything from the church, much less the holy mustum. It’s blasphemous and wrong… besides, I much prefer sweet wine.”

Victor remarked under his breath, ”Pansy.” Before Augustin insulted him in return, he stared right through him to Nico.

Nico rubbed the stains of wax from the champagne bottle off his fingers. ”I say I could likely sneak in there in a matter of seconds and snatch it before anyone notices.”

”Ah, but whoever could we ask to fetch the key?”

Quinn only looked up from the ground when silence began to crowd him, and he immediately met the mischievous, expectant gaze of three others. It took little mental gymnastics to be able to figure out what they requested of him. “No, I told you where to find it. Now leave me out of this. I don’t want any part of your ploy.”

”Oh please, Quinn, you’re the only one who can enter that office without suspicion. If you’ll only help us with the key, then I swear on my mum’s grave that we will leave you out of it for good.”

Quinn flicked some ash out the end of the used paper. Some specks of cinder landed close to Victor’s shoes, and he wondered why he had not aimed just a little bit closer to the left. ”One, your mother’s not dead, and two, no.”

”Alright... Then it would be in everyone’s best interests for me to tell them that Father Girard is actually Quinn’s—”

The blonde swept in with just enough speed to muffle the rest of his fellow student’s attempted reveal with the flat of his palm. God, he was such a pain. At times like this, he wondered why he was even tied with him. “For heaven’s sake, fine, fine,” he sighed, whispering an ending note, “If it will keep you quiet.” He snuffed out the rest of his cigarette on the bottom of his heel.

The other boy paused, and fought hard to keep his mouth from twisting with satisfaction behind his hand. He fixed him with an unreadable face, and gestured to the open wooden hatch that lead to the attic. ”That wasn’t so difficult, now was it?”

Quinn lead the three boys down the empty stairwell like a mock reconnaissance, keeping an eye out for any officials as they glided through hallways and crowded corridors. Without the knowledge of their schemes, it could be posited that nothing seemed out of the usual for them, but as they neared the headmaster’s office, that began to change. There was but one woman that would have been suspicious of them regardless, and the last thing Quinn wanted to do was encounter her again. He was on high alert for any sightings of skeletal figures and disdainful eyes until he met with the elegant, polished door in a place they were not usually meant to enter. This was such a dreadful scheme. Not a second of their little journey passed without that troubled thought crossing the boy’s mind. Over and over again, a repetition of reason tried to break through the pressure of Victor, Nico, and to an albeit lesser extent Augustin’s anticipation and intrigue.

It was Sister Luna he was mostly worried about. She would not hesitate to strike any of them with the fury of a flogger at the smallest offense, aided only with a wooden switch in her grasp. Given both their already incredibly strained relationship and the nature of the much older man, Girard would not lay a baleful finger on him. He let the others take care of that.

But they were already there, were they not? What was the point of heading back if the gold handle to the room was already cooled beneath his hands. His fingers played a hesitant sort of dance around the knob; he heard it rattle quietly at his aversion. It was nothing compared to Victor’s insistence.

Well, what about you, Quinn? We’re all sharing.

Why were you sent here, Quinn?

"While you're at it, you could also tell us what's in that little book of yours."

Victor’s actual voice, real and tangible, pulled him from his train of thought, “We don’t have all day.”

”What if he is still in there,” was a thought posed by Augustin aloud. Quinn perceived those few words so internally. He ripped his hand away from the gold decor. His mind scrambled because what if he was still there? That was not the worst that could happen. He could always lie and say he just wanted to talk to the older man about something, make up a concern to discuss to avoid suspicion. But then he would have to put up with that look he always gave him: a strange blend of disgust and concern, and atop of all that, he would have to withstand whatever his friends would think of him for backing out. He wished he was better at resisting pressure. It wasn’t like the communion wine was anything to write home about anyway so why in God's name was Victor so enamored with the idea of stealing it? He wished he had better friends, but a more delusional sphere worked against him, assured him that he was the problem; and at the end of it all, he wished he was a better friend himself. Perhaps, by any other means, it would be simpler to evade the question to the end of time, or even better, make something up rather than give in to unnecessary coercion. He was always quite good at lying, and there was no guarantee that this would be the last time his friends would bring it up, even after what he had done for them.

”N. Nonsense,” Quinn assured, returning his hand to the door and steeling himself. “The headmaster’s rarely in his chamber’s after mass. Heaven knows what he’s up to.”

He swung the door open, absent of any hesitation or thought, and briefly investigated. The desk at the end of the velour red carpet was only accompanied by an empty chair. Any other presence in the room seemed absent enough. Just as he said. Just as he expected. That was good… right? No one to stop him, and no one to talk him out of it. Victor poked his head into the doorway moments prior to Quinn recognizing what this meant, or that he should probably either note the dangers or run headfirst into the jeopardy before the headmaster returned. Victor remembered what he wanted to remember, unable to recall certain words in French except those that mattered to him, but the location of the key—that would never slip his mind, if everything went well he would keep that information for future reference.

So brash, Quinn noted, as his counterpart awaited his dirty work. He took spirited strides past the maroon sofa on the left side and to the wall, where the oil portrait of The Mother of Mercy was embedded. He felt around the underside of the golden frame, and after a moment, was able to pry it away from the wallpaper. Inside a dark little recession, hidden by the painting, were cast iron hooks dangling the keys for all the necessary locations of the institution. Quinn flickered through them, the key to the headmaster’s personal library, that which opens various facilities, and a long, antique one he snatched up as soon as he noticed it. He accompanied the others, and tucked the key between Victor’s fingers.

And thusly, he dusted his hands off as if ridding himself of the matter. That was what he wanted; all he insisted upon was someone to fetch the key so he himself would not be caught. Quinn would not aid in something so worrisome at the site in the cathedral. Why, he did not care much for the sacrament of it, but he was beginning to reach a state of revelation; the few times he had been in trouble all resulted from a single source and it began with a ‘V.’ It was an exhaustive cycle. ”Now,” he finished. “I am going off to my dormitory. If anyone asks, I didn’t say anything, do you understand?”

But before he could take another step and rightfully abandon the plan, Victor caught him by the arm. ”Oh don’t be ridiculous, who said anything about you leaving? You’re going to have a drink with us like a proper friend.”

Quinn stared at him indignantly, when his demands took a few seconds to finally sink in. ”What?” came first, an alarmed, confused interjection. Then what followed: nothing other than Quinn’s staunch refusal to believe that someone who so often claimed to be his friend would seek to drag him deeper and deeper into one of the greatest offenses he could think of. He snapped, wringing and wrenching his arm, “No! You said that if I only lead you to the key then—”

But Victor was not one to take no for an answer, and his grip tightened against the struggle. ”Come on, we’ll be out before anyone notices. Remember, none of this would be happening if it wasn’t you who dropped the bottle.”

The cathedral had always been relatively quiet after mass, and that day had been no exception. However, even with that reassurance, his waltz into the holy space was void of any confidence; he made a direct line for the veil draped over the high altar. The tabernacle gleamed and beconned to them beneath. It stood as the centerpiece within a concave, a hollow slated between ornate, painted porcelain, precious metal, depictions of Biblical passages, and the cross that inspired so much horror within that other boy. In this matter, Quinn had the same reaction, only for a different reason. His stomach churned and coiled the closer he walked.

Like a repetitive imitation of the action they had taken earlier that same day, the boys hid behind the altar table while Quinn worked. The boy’s throat was dry. His hands were clumsy. He hardly managed to slot the key into the lock the three first times he tried. To be fair, again, he did not care about the sacred symbology of it, but even he had his limits. The consequences worried him. This was wrong, even he knew that. He couldn’t trouble himself with the legality of it before the lock softly clicked at the rotation of his wrist.

He carefully pried the cupboard open and beheld the glass vase of dark merlot. Naturally, Victor became the first. It sickened him how easily he took the glass and raised it. How his lips closed around the rim and swallowed: the closest thing to available alcohol, sure, but it must have been bitter. The boy drank with familiarity. He passed it to Nico, who looked it over once, shook his head, and exchanged it with Augustin. “It’s probably not very good,” Nico remarked, “I do wonder why you were so eager to have access to it.”

”Stop talking like that, Nico,” Augustin snickered, taking a sip himself. He scrunched up his nose at the taste. It was both sweet and a tad bit sour. “You sound so clinical.”

Quietly, Quinn listened to them speak. Their sentiments barely reached him, for he was focused more on his surroundings. The cathedral was empty, he assured himself that, but every so often he leaned to his side to catch the view beyond the Lord’s table. Surely he would hear the creak of the doors if someone approached.

”Yeah, what are you, an alienist?” Victor scoffed at Nico and wiped his mouth. “Father used to let me drink all the time. What does that tell you, doc?” His sarcasm eased, and suddenly he was serious. “I’m unused to not having one in the mornings and evenings. It feels so unnatural.”

Quinn interjected without thinking too much about his words, “This was a mistake. Someone is going to catch us.”

”Relax, Quinn, it’ll be fine—”

On the most dreadful que, Victor’s reassurance was overtaken by the long, melancholic wail of the massive cathedral doors. Whoever was in the process of opening them fought slightly against their weight, so it took a moment for them to wedge ajar, but the delinquents could take a guess. It took a moment for the shock of potentially being caught to wear off, and their sense of self-preservation to be set into motion; even after everything, no one dared be caught at the scene of the crime, Victor included, though he did not think to return the bottle to its rightful place first. A slew of expletives were whispered by the leader of the four, and like rats, they scattered about for a hiding place or an escape.

Abandoned by the rest of the group in their haste, Quinn was left to fend for himself, and had no choice but to take the former. His frightened eyes flickered from the still opening doors to the confessional on the side of the pews, and he bolted for the wicker booth. He closed the cabinet door partially, but kept a sliver available for him to peek out at their unexpected visitor. Barely able to conceal his nervous breathing, he clasped a hand over his mouth as footsteps drew nearer to the altar. They were not meant to be there, and what they had done after they entered… Sister Luna would not hesitate to strike him until his skin wilted, and that fact only made panic set in even more harshly. He could feel his spine tingle with fevered suspense.

But his shoulders dropped when the little sliver of observation provided a view of the guest. No, it was not Sister Luna who approached the altar, as he expected.

He reasoned, when he made the realization, that he should have understood it to be someone else just by how languid and careful the footfalls were on the nave. The church goer looked up, shadowed by the astounding size of the crucifix, his mournful eyes so dead set on the holy carving that he didn’t seem to even notice the empty tabernacle. No longer burdened by sheer horror, but still standing with the most rigid posture, Quinn recognized him immediately. Another sighting of the recent L'Institute phantom.

The new student had returned. And Quinn had no idea why.

Because why return to a place that had seemingly caused his earlier stupor?

But it was as if he was drawn there, with no other reprieve. His movements were mechanical, like this had been practiced. He checked his surroundings once to ensure he was alone. Perhaps it was poor eyesight (he couldn't help but blame the glasses) that caused him to graze over the confessional without spotting the intruder, but Quinn held his sigh of relief nonetheless. With the student’s hands, abraded and scratched with the microscopic markings of sharp glass, pressed together and lifted before him, Quinn finally heard him speak for the first time. The deafening silence of the church was shattered by the voice of a nightingale that refused to sing—weary and reposeful.

His mouth hesitated on how to start, but he eventually made up his mind.

”I don’t understand it…” he admitted.

The brief confession was bizarre even to him, like a secret he had kept tucked away to himself finally being set out into the open air. It was ripped from him, rather, as he closely examined what he could of the intricately painted details of the shrine; each frame a depiction of suffering.

He lingered there, positively dead-eyed and so exceedingly still.

It was just silence for the longest time then.

He continued just as quiet, “I don’t understand any of it… Why them–why, her? Was it…” he trailed off at the thought, and a revival of horror surged through his veins. His voice wavered unsteadily, but he tried to swallow down the knot forming in his throat. “Was it to punish me? For what? What did I do to deserve this? I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, I. I never wanted this.“

Quinn recoiled from the little slice of light seeping through the crack, hiding himself more so in the dark corner of the stall. Pangs of guilt shot through him for listening, for overhearing, and he tried his best to tune it out for the sake of both of them. This was a right mess he had allowed himself to be dragged into. Now he was stuck listening to some unfortunate sap's desperate prayer. But it was not like he could leave now. Not without startling the other. His plea sounded so despairing, so personal, that he couldn't find it within him to rightfully decide what was worse. Interrupting or staying.

"I didn't want them to die," he professed. It seemed the floodgates opened then. Of remorse, of sorrow, it was anyone's guess. "I didn't want to be sent away. I didn't want everyone to be so afraid of me. I don't want to be alone. I just wanted Father to stop looking at me like that.." The boy hardly seemed to notice his hands were shaking until he finally lowered them. "I didn't want him to hate me anymore." The boy looked downward, unable to meet the eyes of the statue any longer. His fingers were at a constant fidget at his sides, clinging desperately to his rosary. The beads might have snapped from the string had he been any more forceful. And as he struggled to steady his breath, already beginning the humiliating process of unsuccessfully blinking back tears, his tone thickened from his unresolved grief.

"I did everything he asked of me. I've done nothing but what everyone has asked of me my entire life, and now I'm… Now I'm here."

Trying and failing to reason with the empty altar. The student must have been aware of how pitiful this would have seemed if anyone had been misfortunate enough to be present. But even still, he remained blissfully unaware of the observer; and he took comfort in the thought that he was alone, however untrue. Apparently enough comfort to let his resolve fracture and hail at long last, for there was no use in keeping it pent up when the Lord would not listen to him either way.

So he allowed the tears to finally spill, and his shoulders trembled with the violent force of his emotions. Any eloquence was slowly stripped away as his confession blabbered around broken sobs. Bordering on unintelligible, almost pricked with the tiniest needlepoint of rage, his manner of speech remained all too anguished.

“Why? Why me? What did I do? I don't understand. Why do I bother with repentance and prayer if all You'll ever do is have me suffer?"

The sudden rise of volume from the outburst, as slight as it was (because even when betrayed it appeared he didn't quite have it in him to outright scream, especially in such a holy place) was enough to make Quinn start. The hand he previously rested upon the old door jolted reflexively, causing the cabinet to creak long and slow.

The boy gasps, and his attention snaps over to the confessional in a manner all too quickly, and the two sole inhabitants of the sanctuary meet each other's eyes for the second time. They both shared the most horrified leer at one another for what felt like an eternity, alone. The boy scrambled to swipe the streaks of tears from his cheeks and compose himself. Quinn thought to say something, perhaps to break the tension, to apologize for stumbling upon… whatever this was, but alas, someone else managed to catch the scene sooner than he had the chance to utter a single sentiment. Another pair of clicking footfalls, this time much more urgent and direct, echoed the arrival of a third party.

”I should have known I’d find you sneaking into our place of worship like an infestation,” a familiar low croak interrupted any part of their encounter, like her vocal chords themselves milled against gravel rocks to produce syllabic imitations of sound. Sister Luna towered over the boy, with the only expression she ever seemed to manage: disapproval—spindly brow raised with utter revulsion. “You were supposed to stay in your room until further notice.” She looked up to the pulpit. “Until the rest of your arrangements were settled, yet here you are—”

The woman was a more astute observer; Quinn could pinpoint the exact moment it dawned on her, because he saw recognition and dread creep into her features as her focus traveled to the empty tabernacle. She grasped at her mouth and recoiled, muffling a gasp that was surely unlike anything either of them had heard before—it was more of a shriek than a sputter of shock. Quinn had never seen the cold, composed woman react that way. He may as well have been covered in blood.

Not understanding her horror, the stranger followed her line of sight, and he too–for the first time–noticed the forsaken cupboard. He managed his own little shocked noise, but his breath hitched when the woman seized him by his shoulders and wrenched him around.

”What did you do?!” she demanded. “Where did you put it?!”

”W-What?” The boy stammered, frightened, and Quinn winced as he watched from the safety of his hiding space.

”The sacred wine. I come in here and I find you alone, who else could have taken it?”

Once more, the boy’s gaze travels back to Quinn. A brief flash of accusation sparked within his eyes, as he came to understand the situation, and the blonde dreaded the moment the boy would raise his hand and point to him, reveal him to the abbess. But the fear must have been evident on Quinn's face, for his sternness subsided and in the end, all the stranger did was turn back to the woman and shake his head. He attempted to even out his own voice. “I don’t know,” he assured her.

She seemed to consider the claim for a moment, but it hardly lasted very long. Quinn noted, from the way she spoke, there lied an implication she had it out for him much longer than this incident, and this was her chance to take him by the arm and drag him, of which she was met with surprisingly very little protest. “A rotten liar and a thief,” she snapped. ”Ohoho, just wait until I tell the headmaster about this. Not even a single day in our institution, and you are already out here committing a grave sacrilege the likes of which I have not seen anyone dare to attempt in all my years as a prioress. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

"I should, I suppose," he murmured shallowly, "but I was not the one who stole it."

When Sister Luna hauled him down the nave by his wrist, her bickering and shouting did not cease until the doors were shut behind them. The cathedral filled with a dense silence once again. Quinn slid down the wall of the confessional booth as all the pent up adrenaline drained from his body, leaving him a breathlessly nervous slump. The scenario continuously replayed in his head accompanied by the truth of the matter which was: You were almost caught, Quinn. You almost got caught and you would have been if it was not for that strange boy you keep seeing. His brows furrowed. What reason did he have to protect him like that? He hardly even knew him. The most he had managed so far was a simple question about his behavior during mass, and he had not even been able to elicit a response. Yet there he was, saved from the rage of the wicked nun by the skin of his teeth.

For what reason? He had little time to think it over. Given the record of how many people had been able to barge in and out of the cathedral at their own whim only in the past few minutes, he figured he had better abandon the place now while he had an opportune chance.

Quinn carefully slipped out from behind the stall door, and shut it without conflict. Sunlight of the early afternoon streamed out across the empty church pews. Dust modes floated, suspended through the air in an elegant little dance. The boy took in a deep, shuddering breath of reassurance; he bit his tongue at the fact that he really was alone in the cathedral, truly. It had all happened in such a rapid manner, being lead to the altar under dire circumstances, his friends all but leaving him on his lonesome when they feared they may be caught, and nearly being discovered.

He checked the empty tabernacle again. His mind played a fickle game of judgment, and he decided to slide the sacrament house closed again. Not that it would do him any good, he reasoned, with its contents still in his associate's possession. But perhaps now, it was less noticeable. He couldn't count on everyone to have as dreadful eyesight as the boy who came in.

Quinn peered up at the monumental structure of wood and gold, as some of the sensibilities of that impassioned prayer were unable to leave him, though he tried with all the manner of a polite individual unlike himself to forget them.

I don't understand…

Why me?

After a pause, Quinn snickered, dryly and to himself. "Why anyone?"

~~~

5:00 AM - THE NEXT MORNING

Apparently, the consequences of his actions approached a lot sooner than Quinn would have expected, for it seemed the moment his eyes opened in the early morn, someone was at his door, awaiting him. An unknown visitor was there before the sun had even teetered over the horizon. The sky’s hue outside his window was a pitch black, drowning his quarters in darkness. He hesitantly tossed beneath his covers when he heard the first knock, and stirred with rapture at the urgency of the second, tumbling over the clothes scattered on the floor to answer their call with haste. Without solving the mystery as to who was on the other side of the hall, his nervousness still came back within him vengefully. Even with his head foggy from sleep, it took a nonexistent amount of wit to assume what they--whoever they were--had stopped by for.

With that fear bearing down on his conscious, he stood frozen at the knob for longer than he realized. The third and loudest knock was what it took for his hand to propel forward. His stomach dropped as he came face to face with the draped, swathing of serge fabric and a black cord cross. He blinked up at the vexed facade of—

"Sister Luna," he greeted, coercing his quivering lips into what could be assumed was supposed to look like a smile, one would hope, "How wonderful to see you so early. How are you this morning?"

A few doors down the living hall opened, revealing the equally exhausted other residents who must have been unfortunately roused at this hour as well from the sheer cacophony the nun sought to cause. Her mouth upturned into a grimace. Not one for fake flattery, clearly. She scoffed in response, "I have no time for this, boy. Get yourself dressed. Father Girard wishes to see you in his office urgently." The woman did not wait for a reply before she was turning on her heel, so Quinn shut the door and supposed he had no choice.

He clambered over to his dresser and changed out of his night dress into something more… well, not quite comfortable. What was a proper term for it, Quinn pondered as the uniform itched into his skin—suffocating. When he stepped out, he was addressed by nothing but the noiseless vacancy of the corridor. Sister Luna did not have the need to guide him; he had been to (or been dragged to) the office enough times to be familiar with the directions by now. Not only that, but every authority was aware of the relation between the headmaster and Quinn, but no one dared mention it in the presence of students, at the headmaster’s request, after his nephew made a daring plea for it to be kept secret.

Before his journey forward, Quinn took notice of an abnormality. The door nearest to his, the last at the very end of the hall and fairly isolated from the others, now had the etching of a room number. They converted the storage closet into a dorm? He noted such, frowning slightly at the idea. Uncomfortable, windowless, no doubt, but that was less of his concern than the hope that whoever now lived by him wouldn’t raise hell in the middle of the night...

Quinn, never quite one for direct confrontation, took more time than necessary to reach the other side of the institution. Fears raged within him like a blazing storm, some of which were surely irrational, he knew well enough that this was his own doing. He should have never let Victor have control over him, or listened to anything he said. Yet, the familiarity of this situation also held a certain relevance. This was not the first time, just likely the worst. Father Girard did not peer up from the papers upon his desk when someone entered his office, without bothering to knock.

”Ah, my dear nephew,” he welcomed him nonetheless with a chillingly pleasant grin upon his face. “Please, have a seat.”

Quinn did as instructed, settling down into the plush red cushion of the chair across from the man. Only then did the priest set aside his work and fold his hands in front of him. He never once dropped the deceptively gleeful expression, not even when his eyes narrowed in stark contrast against it, and he muttered the psalm, “For those who lead this people lead them astray; and those who are led by them are destroyed.”

The boy shrunk back into his seat, as if it could save him, conceal him from the stern glare and patronizing smile. An odd amalgamation, but the headmaster’s gaze eventually softened. He did not begin the way Quinn expected him to. The first order of business was unconventional, to say the least. The headmaster reached into the breast pocket beneath his clerical robes and slowly retrieved a starch white envelope. “Your father wanted me to give you this letter.”

For a moment, Quinn was able to forget his recent conflict, and now his thoughts were centered over the document hovering in front of him. “Since when do you let students communicate with their parents?”

”You’re my nephew. I think I’ll let this pass, just this once.”

That, and the fact that the crimson wax seal had already been severed, made him squint. Since when had his uncle ever been so accommodating? But he snatched it up with fervor, for he could not remember the last time he spoke with them. Not with civility, at least. He examined the front of the envelope, an ink embellishment of his father's pristine cursive.

Quinn

Just Quinn. Not Dear Quinn, or My Son, or even Quinny as was his mother's nickname for him when she swept him up in an embrace that was equal parts endearing as it was embarrassing. It was only his name, with a formality that left a vile taste in his otherwise silent mouth. He considered reading it there, but tucked it away when his uncle moved on to a different subject. A more pressing matter.

“I heard about what happened. Sister Luna told me that the new student stole from the sacrament house, and well, I just couldn’t believe that. It just seemed so unlike him to do something so awful. Besides, the only person to ever know where I keep the key is you.”

Quinn solidified that thought by shamefully viewing the portrait of Mother Mary.

“I thought I could entrust you with it, but we all make mistakes.”

There was of course a grit of guilt that pricked the back of his neck at the fact that he brought (or could have brought) so much trouble to the other boy. ”Is he alright?” he thought to ask.

”Of course he is. No one did him any harm.”

”Did he," Quinn hesitated. "Did he tell you I was there?”

”He said nothing about you, but he hardly had to. I can draw my own conclusions, dear nephew.”

So even after everything, he said nothing about Quinn’s involvement.

Neither of them said anything more for a moment. The blonde could not find the ability to speak again, and whether it was shame, embarrassment, nervousness or even disdain that numbed his tongue, he himself wasn’t even sure. But he could hardly look at his uncle, so he could only hear the man’s tone change to one nearly hinting at sorrow. “Why did you do it, Quinn?”

The answer came swiftly and simply enough, “It was Victor. He was the one who told me to take the key from you, and I listened to him.”

Father Girard reclined back and sighed at how pitiful it was. “I figured as such," he muttered. "Those friends of yours are only going to get you into more trouble. You shouldn’t associate with them any longer."

”I know…” Quinn was not a complete moron. That choice would benefit him the most surely, he knew that, but truly he wouldn't have been doing any if this if he did not feel like he had to. His only friends—not very good ones, but his only ones, and even though he had been contemplating it off and on, Father Girard's demand inspired him with rapturous opposition. "But what do you expect me to do?" he asked crudely, in a manner that has his uncle drop his usual, pleasant act. "They're the only friends I have. It's not like I ever wanted to be here, you're the reason I have to live in this awful place."

"Quinn," the man started, and reached out, to which his hand was promptly slapped away and the boy reeled back as if frightened of him.

"Don't touch me," Quinn urged, gaping at him in a wide shock. Suddenly his voice sounded much more desperate than he would have liked. "Please. You know I hate it when you do that."

Father Girard withdrew slowly, retracting his hands back to their place and doing nothing more than returning his nephew's stare. He looked upon him much like a discouraged parent would. But he wasn't his parent, the blonde bitterly thought to himself, and he refused to accept such a patronizing role from him. "Quinn, we've had this conversation too many times to count. You don't want to be here, you've made that perfectly clear, but I know what's best for you. I know what's best for every soul within my institution. You need to understand, this is the only way for you to get over this," he struggled with what to call it, flailing his hands about him until he settled on something that had the boy cross his arms in defiance, "mania of yours."

Quinn scoffed. "Mania?" he grumbled under his breath, softly enough for it to be completely glazed over by his relative. "Is that what you're calling it now? I thought it was an illness."

"That's… that's not what I brought you here to talk about anyway. Given what happened at the cathedral, with the theft of the holy wine which is still missing, might I add-"

"Victor has it."

Father Girard huffed exasperatedly at the interjection, but digressed regardless, "I've decided it is only fair to extend your education."

That was enough to yank the petulance out of the blonde. He lurched forward in his chair. “What? You can’t do that!”

”I think you’ll find I’m being quite lenient given the circumstances. Anyone else would be excommunicated from The Church.”

That idea was intended to be a threat, but he would have welcomed it with open arms. ”Then excommunicate me!” he insisted, grasping despairingly at the edge of the desk as he rose, “I don’t want to spend another day here. I want to go back home!”

The man tried to usher him back down without standing himself. ”I cannot, in good conscience, return you to your parents the way you are. You lack discipline, you have poor grades, and your immorality is putting my reputation at stake. If I were to send you back, what would that say about my methods and my teaching? Your parents expect you to come back a changed person, and by the Lord’s Grace, I will see to it that you do.”

Needless to say his uncle’s efforts were unsuccessful, and the fuming Quinn was left pacing, racing impatiently in the small space across from the carpet ”Oh stop it, will you?” he asked. “If you didn’t tell them then none of this would have happened in the first place. I trusted you. You broke the seal of confession.”

”I could not allow my own flesh and blood to live in sin.” Father Girard reasoned as much as he could with a sense of regret, but nothing could get through to him, understandably, because truly he was the one who went wrong. But Quinn supposed every head in his institution meant another check, another donation of funds, and he just happened to confess at the wrong time. Quinn didn’t think he had ever seen any outright expression other than delight take hold of the elder’s face; even when his gaze was disapproving, and it often was with his nephew, his loathing was veiled from those outside their familial relationship with an unwavering smile, and it never changed. Until now, when his nose wrinkled in disgust and crows' feet creased at his temples. “I could not keep it a secret from them. Your feelings towards Hugo were unnatural.”

Quinn halted instantly.

Silence befell the room as his nephew turned to face him again, and the sound of a pin dropping upon the carpeted floor might have crashed against the walls in a rapturous discordance in comparison. His heart began to pound in his chest like a drum of war. Hands balled up into fists, molars grinding against each other with so much force they could have broken; he was not known for his temper, but it was like water, for a long time imprisoned with the confines of a pot, finally began to bubble over in a seething froth. It was something about what the man said, how he said it, with such simplicity. Yes, unnatural. Wrong. Immoral. It was his fault. That was what everyone had said.

Even him. When he finally gathered the courage to tell him.

So Quinn felt cornered, like he had when he confessed. But unlike that time, he finds the grounds to lash out like a wounded animal for the first time ever. Victor’s influence admittedly rubbed off on him more than he would dare to admit.

”Don’t. Say his name.” urged the boy, with much more fire than he thought he was capable of. “I told you not to, time and time again. Don’t mention him. Don’t talk about him. Don’t so much as fucking think about him. I won't stand for it.”

Father Girard let his nephew’s outburst pass. Once again, returning to an unassuming and neutral disposition, the man waited until the boy began to calm before he placed his hands upon the surface of the desk and lifted, himself.

“You speak like that again under this roof, nephew, and I will have you beaten black and blue,” he stated—measured, calmly. “Need I remind you, you are the one in the wrong here. Your profanity will not sway my mind. If you do not pass every upcoming exam with a perfect score, I will see to it that you are the oldest graduate in the history of this institution, and that is final.”

Quinn really was just about to protest, to find whatever remaining spark lied within him before it died out, but he never had the chance. An old grandfather clock in the corner of Girard's office reminded him of the time, as it chimed a somber ring throughout the chamber. Unironically, like clockwork itself, his cruel expression washed over, replaced by the kindly facade he usually wore, and it was as if the former one was never even there to begin with. “You better scurry off to class. You wouldn’t want to miss the practice exam, would you?

Quinn felt his misplaced confidence shatter almost as if it were a physical object itself, and he withdrew with the letter in tow. The envelope had wrinkled and worn from the force of him tucking it beneath his vest.

"Oh, and Quinn," his uncle once again had the last word when he was on his way out, "you'll want to read that letter sooner rather than later. Believe me. Who knows? It might even convince you to change your attitude."

The blonde let him have the final say, though he had no choice in the matter; his fighting spirit, as short lived as it was, fizzled out into an evaporated cloud by the time he reached the egress. Sister Luna awaited him as he stepped out, and judging by her usual manner, she was prepared to scold him and reprimand him for a myriad of crimes: unlocking the tabernacle, yes, letting another student--though she might have already despised him–take the fall for his actions, sure, and speaking to the high priest like he was beneath him, if she had pressed her ear against the door, she must have heard most if not all of it. But the boy ducked around the corner into the empty hall sooner than she could utter one of her signature condescending remarks, and slid the envelope out from under his sweater.

Without sparing too much of his attention to his headmaster's ravings, he read the letter his father had sent out to him; the first chance of communication months after they had last spoken, and it was not an apology. Not exactly, not in the way the boy had come to expect, and much more brief than he would have hoped. His eyes trailed across each line of neatly, formally written penmanship. Not a splash of ink was out of place, and he smiled at the fact, for it reminded him in his absence that his father always took care to write so properly to his colleagues. But the more he seemed to recall that miniscule character trait of his father, the more it bothered him, for that was the way he wrote to near strangers. In any other manner, it seemed that the notes he sent to his family were haphazard, desperate to be sent off and to await an answer. It was then that he finally began to read in earnest, and it dawned on him that his parent no longer wrote to him like he would his own family.

Quinn:

There it was again, the haunting dedication of simplicity.

It was with great sorrow and regret that led your mother and I to come to our decision. I implore you to understand that it was not easy for either of us to send away our youngest of kin, but you must know that we both care deeply about you and your future. But more so, we care about the future of this family, and I am afraid it is within our best interests to protect our reputation first and foremost. And therefore, I can no longer call you my son.

I know this news will be hard for you to withstand at first, and it may cause you a great pain, but I am making the proper choice, all things considered. Your mistake has brought humiliation and embarrassment to the Dubois name. Do you have any idea just how much we have suffered because of you? Emily is inconsolable. It took weeks to convince Oliver not to pack away or destroy your belongings. And your poor mother can no longer bear the sight of you, even in photographs. It will be your uncle who decides when you are able to return home, and I trust he has the means to ensure you mend your waywardness. The door will be open when that time comes. It will be difficult, but one day you will understand. I am sure of it.

- Jean

Each word became a devastating blow, somehow worse than the last; the ink itself was a cannon that shot right through his heart, but really what did he think he would receive? His parents had not reached out to him since he was sent aboard the train, did he really, truly, think he would hear them retract their actions? Perhaps, ask how he was faring in such a different environment? No, of course not, but the pain—like his own father... or, not father suggested—remained worse than he anticipated. It was nearly an instant before he began to feel the oncoming, tell-tale signs of an emotional storm: at first it was his throat, dry and sore, and then his vision began to blur against the collection of tears. His unstable hands smudged some of the crueler words on accident, but he still held it tight. A sob he hardly managed to restrain cracked itself out when he realized the letter was all he had left of his immediate family. Why did he think his father would care to check in on him? It was a thought that his own uncle echoed with enough malice to turn Quinn’s disappointment to bitterness. At that point, he would have taken anything over complete disownment. A proper chastising full of curses and abuse, even. Anything that would have told him that they had not forgotten about him, that they had not moved on. But all he had was an envelope sealing his fate away to Girard’s own hands.

Quinn could gather that he was to be there for a very, very long time.

~~~

8:00 AM

A significant stretch of time had to pass its course before Quinn was able to calm down, and even more to relax completely, for after that period, each time he looked or so much thought about the letter, his sorrows would threaten to surge up again. All he needed was a little convincing—convincing, whether by his own mind and lips or by someone else's, that the utter shit show (instinctually, Quinn half-heartedly scolded himself for his language even if it was only in his own mind) that unfolded only a few hours before could have been a lot worse. The headmaster could have sent in someone that would have caused him harm; it would not have been the first time. But despite the severity from their conversation, he flashed the tiniest of smiles towards every classmate that passed him in the hall then–as scarce as they were, and a weight hung from overhead.

He had awoken so early with misplaced adrenaline, and it was finally beginning to wear off in lieu of fatigue. It was so early that there was nothing to do but prepare for class, as Girard instructed, because if he were to return to his bed, he was convinced it would only worsen his exhaustion, so there he was outside the door of his first class about half-an-hour before it began.

Given those circumstances, the boy expected to be the first one in the lecture hall, aside from the professor perhaps. Handling his books like they were fine porcelain, he eyed the usual decor: the muted scene that was to be expected with dark wooden furniture, and drawn crimson curtains that worked to conceal arched windows. His eyes traveled to the furthest corner of the hall. There proved to be a contradiction to his earlier assumption, as that same recurring student from before had already taken up a residence distant enough from Sister Moreau’s desk. With how many times the boy had become a familiar sight within the past few hours, Quinn supposed he should not have been too surprised to see him, but it was a jarring coincidence. Like the hauntings of some morose apparition, the brunette appeared unspeaking and cold. The ascertainable, quiet nature that permeated around him was not enough to stop the blond from remaining a curious observer on the steps. He heard the clattering of Moreau shuffling through her desk for something; that was the only sound that echoed, as the new presence stared out the window, face resting in his hand, and Quinn wondered whether or not he should approach him as soon as possible. Would that be too forward?

The remaining rows wrought desolation, so where else was he to sit? Alone?

Quinn shed that idea from his mind immediately. No, sitting near him couldn't be that weird; they had encountered each other numerous times. The only (albeit vaguely) familiar face present. He let slip the fact that one of these notable encounters involved him nearly having the student lashed at by Luna, but he figured this was an opportunity to voice a brief apology anyway.

He took the first step toward the back of the class without thinking. Quinn figured there was no harm in sitting up there first, establishing some sort of connection. One small action could have transpired one of two ways, maybe he would strike a conversation with him, or sit in silence for the entirety of the lecture and wait until the end. Either way would have appealed to him. So in essence, his inquisitiveness presided over his limbs, and he slid into the seat right beside the apparent stranger sooner than he could argue against it.

He noticed the new student shift, out of the corner of his eye, when he slowly placed the unread text books down upon his desk. The younger boy–perhaps only a year younger, he reckoned–looked at him for a brief moment and later returned to staring at the black slate without a word.

For minutes it seemed Quinn tried to conjure up what he was going to say, rehearsed internally how he was going to say it as well. A silence brewed until other attendees began to file in. One by one, and then in groups, they took their seats. As class began to commence, Quinn considered asking him about what was wrong during the morning mass yesterday first, but immediately decided against it. Maybe that was an improper start. The boy already looked uncomfortable enough with him being there, so maybe something lighter. Something simple and truthful.

"Thank you," he began softly, though neither of them drew their attention away from the front of the classroom, "for not telling Sister Luna about where I was hiding yesterday."

It did not spare him from the consequences delivered by the headmaster, but it still could have been worse. Had the old crone gotten her rigid and bony hands on him immediately after witnessing the empty sacrament, he shuddered to think of it. But even so, Quinn knew the other did not have to do that for him, and he was certain more than anything else that he would not have the wherewithal to take the same steps himself. Clearly not.

The boy responded with nothing more than a swift silence.

For a second, Quinn mentally backpedaled when a nagging sort of conception was inevitably conjured up out of nowhere; it all transpired only yesterday, but what if he hadn't recognized him? Or more likely, what if he hated him after what happened?

He considered repeating himself, until the other boy finally spoke again. "How much did you hear?” he asked with seeming regretfulness.

Quinn wasn’t sure how to respond. He wished he could say that he had listened to nothing, but they both knew better than that. ”Everything, I think,” he admitted after a pause. At least, he hoped that was everything. Sensing the boy’s unease, he quickly added a semi-panic-stricken apology. “I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to listen to it. I was just hiding–”

”From Sister Luna,” the usually quiet boy interjected. His tone was one of accusation, but it still was not void of its usual softness. “Because you stole the wine for consecration.”

Well it sounded much more awful when it was put that way, but that was more or less what happened. ”Yes…” he muttered.

For the longest time, it had seemed like their less than typical conversation had drawn to its conclusion, ending with a rift between him and the stranger for the trouble he had caused. And yet, the bespectacled student eventually sighed as if relenting. ”I don't blame you for hiding, you know." He spoke with an unforeseen casual manner about him, still refusing to face him or raise an octave above a whisper. "I would have done the same."

That turn of phrase did wonders to alleviate some of the guilt, and now that they were actually speaking to each other, he sought to pursue other conversation.

And yet, Sister Moreau was at his desk sooner than he could properly turn to his side. That became the only interaction between them before the session neared its start.

”It’s good to see you, Quinn,” she greeted, only half-heartedly. She had been handing out papers to each student in the class, and he was no exception. ”You have been doing quite well this year, but I know how you get with these tests. Please try to do better on this one than you did on the last one.”

Quinn nodded and reluctantly pulled the sheet closer. The woman moved on, and he listened to her speak to the boy beside him in a completely different tune. “It’s only your second day here, you may answer it if you would like, but I don’t expect you to.”

But the stranger silently held out his abraded hand anyway, and accepted the paper.

Moreau flashed a small smile, then chose to address the rest of the class. “I do hate to give you difficult course work so close to our last week, but consider it preparation for our final exam.” She returned to the front of the room. “I will be marking and returning your papers later during the lesson, so do try to have them finished in time. Your test begins now.”

Such a simple phrase, and yet it spurred the students into motion with awe-inspiring power. It was at instances like these that reminded Quinn about the academic standing of the institution, reinforced the notion that Quinn surely did not belong there–not when everyone around him seemed to be scribbling with the speed of a motorwagen, and he sat, staring morbidly at a question he did not have the answer for, filling the margins with apprehensive little sketches. The pencil lines were shaky and imprecise, and he did not realize until he looked upon the poorly scribbled amalgamation that might have been intended to be a person at one point, that his hand was shaking. It was not so much the test itself; not only was he well-versed in failing tests, and this practice one hardly had any merit. But rather, it was the promise his uncle left him with.

Every failed test from that meeting forward was to be another year added to his metaphorical prison sentence, and he just could not allow that. What was he to do, being held back in a school he despised, under the caring claws of his estranged uncle until he decided to convince his parents he was worthy of returning home. A dreadful situation no matter how he looked at it.

He tried his damndest to return his focus to the question he was stuck on. He had been able to truthfully fill out a few, bullshit his way through others: it was not until he reached a specifically drawn out and specific question that he felt hopelessness creep in further.

Outline and thoroughly describe each aspect of reform debated at the Council of Trent.

He all but dropped his pencil and gave up. What the fuck was he supposed to do with any of that? As far as he was concerned, he wasn’t even entirely sure what years the council was held.

Or what it was.

Must have been something Catholic related.

He considered asking the strange boy beside him for help–this was merely practice, and that sort of engagement was not completely forbidden. The only reason he had not heard any other students chatting amongst themselves was on the simple basis of their professionalism. However, he had caused the boy enough trouble, and besides, he had already seemed to turn his test over.

Thirty minutes. Already, half the room seemed to have completed their assignment in full. Quinn grew restless. Honestly, at that point he had already somewhat thrown in the towel, and he half-wished that the timer would run out already so he could accept his shallow fate and wallow in his dormitory. About what? He was not quite sure. After all, there was quite a list to be miserable about.

An hour. Quinn had attempted to recount a lecture from last week’s studies, but all he could recall was Victor distracting him, throwing things at him, and then pointing his way when the teacher rightfully confronted him about the commotion. A senseless joke–that was how he could describe his time in the hall. He wondered ironically if Victor had managed to ace his way through his practice exam, despite reducing his to miserable, half-lucid ravings.

The last grain of sand filtered through the slender neck of the hourglass, and Quinn was the one most hesitant to part with his work. Moreau had instructed the students to read as she analyzed each paper, utilizing her own skillful interest in the matter to briskly make marks upon the incorrect answers, unaccompanied by any lesson book. Barely any time at all had passed before she was making her second round to the desks, and dispersing the fate of nervous students.

Quinn held his breath when she reached him, she said nothing. Hardly even acknowledged him. She just quietly walked towards the desk in the far corner. For some reason, she seemed insistent upon returning the stranger’s first. Every time, thus far at least, when she passed the blonde’s desk, it seemed she was crossing a threshold into a different, cheerful emotion that did not seem suitable. Moreau had approached him and returned his work with his grade clear for viewing, and Quinn—who could admit when he prying into other people’s affairs, something that occurred often—could not let the score go unnoticed. A perfect twenty.

Show off.

The nun sang the boy’s praises, which only worked against Quinn further. “Excellent work.”

When Sister Moreau departed, the quiet boy accepted his exam and observed his grade closer, and where other students might have been delighted, his expression remained entirely reserved. Quinn's spout of jealousy was soon overwritten as Sister Moreau approached him next. He was, for some odd reason, the last in her line, and she assured that the paper made it back to his desk, first page down. Quinn knew it would fare to be a disaster the moment he carefully reached for the test, but his heart still sank when he flipped it over. It was merely a practice test, yes, he had assured himself that repeatedly in order to calm himself, but he couldn't shake the words of his uncle. Just as he suspected. If this were to reflect the real examination, he was in dire straights, and it sent him sliding down into his seat with an audible sigh like he was decompressing.

That dramatic display was enough to catch the other student's attention (he truly wished he had a better name for him). He looked at Quinn with a fixated, passionless stare—the last time he seemed to have any visible emotion of the sort was the pure horror at the cathedral. But now he had the chance to actually communicate with him, and in a sense, a chance to push aside the memory of his failed grade for the time being. And as he returned the brunette’s gaze with a much more sunny sort of spirit, he spoke to him uninterrupted for the first time. The first words tumbling out of his mouth were more than obvious, “Hey, I keep seeing you around, but I’ve never had the chance to actually talk to you.” It seemed he couldn’t avoid him ever since yesterday morning. He was honestly surprised that there seemed to be no rapport between them already; it seemed like every time he tried, he was somehow interrupted, or circumstances made it impossible. It was like some unnatural force had assured to keep them separate.

But Quinn didn’t believe in that sort of thing.

It was a little more than that, however; he had not seen him before yesterday, and the entire situation was somewhat curious. Quite an inopportune time to be admitted into a boarding school, despite the fact that he seemed to be holding his own more than well. Quinn liked seeing an unfamiliar face, admittedly. “What’s your name? I’m Quinn. Quinn Dubois.”

The new student gently placed his exam upon the desk. “Theodore Valentine,” he started with reflex, but seemed unnerved somehow by the utterance of his own surname. His shoulders visibly tensed.

”It’s a nice name,” Quinn complimented in an effort to pacify this unexpected reaction, not particularly capable of recognizing what sparked the change in his behavior, nor completely caring if he were to be completely honest. His gaze lowered to his companion’s desk. He decided to pry with a small grin. “You must have studied these things before.”

Neither of them paid much attention to the woman at the front of the room, but they were unable to ignore the shuffling of a class coming to a close, as she uttered her final notes to students gathering their texts and book bags. Theodore decided to join them. He rose from his desk and snatched his satchel from the back of the chair. ”You could say that,” he replied.

”A perfect score is quite impressive. I would be very proud if I were you.”

The boy frowned. “I suppose…”

Quinn rose from his seat, gathering his books up in his arms for he had nothing else to carry them with. The two tread down the steps of the—by then—nearly deserted lecture hall. “Where are you from, if you don’t mind me asking? Different school, perhaps?”

The boy shook his head.

”Well you can’t tell me this is your first time at a school.”

”Not quite, but it certainly feels like it.”

Quinn squinted in confusion. Theodore certainly wasn't making the task of learning more about him easy. “Huh… then, um, where are you from?” He couldn’t imagine he was from anywhere around the university. No one was, lest they lived in the middle of the woods.

It was a farce that could not have gone unnoticed by either of them. He was quite quick in trying to establish a familiarity between them, and he could not think for what reason. He had managed his objective of expressing gratitude and apology, but there he was, trying to charm his way into the association of such a bizarre individual, an endeavor that was part of the way he originally snuck into Victor's little club.

Theodore kept his attention straight ahead, but his eyes shifted once at the question like a suspicious child. Seeing as his hands were folded delicately in front of him, in many ways, he walked similarly to an altar boy, and the other noticed despite being uninterested in those matters. “Paris,” he answered, formally. Like this was some evaluation by the request of a doctor. Perhaps within an office of that sort or back inside that drafty little classroom it would have been understandable, but his solemnity and off-handed responses remained alienating in this context.

A boy of very few words. Regardless, even though it sounded simple enough, the blonde suddenly surged with an actual excitement. His eyes glimmered with mild fascination. “You’re kidding. I used to live in Paris,” he admitted, grinning a bit to himself, “I’m surprised I haven’t seen you about before.” After a pause that seemed a lot longer to Quinn than anyone else, he clarified his last statement. ”I was joking, of course. There’s a… there are quite a few people in Paris, I mean it is a massive city. The chances of us meeting are—or were very low-”

"Are you always this bad at making conversation?"

The question came like a punch to the gut. Quinn coughed abruptly as if it actually was one.

”What?” he practically sputtered in response, as though all the air had left him.

Theodore’s expression remained neutral as they meandered the halls, his hand wrapped securely around the band of his satchel as if it was to be stripped from him. “No one has ever tried this hard to speak to me, not without reason… Is there something you want?”

Quinn blurted out his answer more abruptly than he intended, but the accusation deeply insulted him. Did his character really seem that poor. "No! I just, I just wanted to apologize to you about the whole wine incident-"

Once again, the boy interrupted him. "And you did. So I'll ask you again, is there something it is you want?"

It was just curiosity was all, a bubbling curiosity that bitterly simmered down into a nonexistent foam each time the aloof student opened his mouth. Theodore's response had him wondering why had even bothered. "No," he reasserted, eyes narrowing sharp as daggers.

Theodore straightened his posture more so. "Good," he muttered. He did not return the stern look. In fact, he remained as formal and withdrawn as he had the second time the blonde had spotted him. "Then I suppose this is where we part ways. Goodbye, Quinn."

Quinn watched in a sort of irritated awe as Theodore wandered off down the other side of the hall, leaving him to relish in one of the oddest interactions he had ever had. So much for making conversation with a stranger, he mused, and set off on his own way in spite of it. Perhaps if he was lucky enough, he would never cross paths with him again.

~~~

2:45 PM

So a lot had happened in just the early morning of the school day, and it was enough to leave Quinn reeling with a debilitating migraine. A talk with the headmaster, being officially disowned, and having a conversation with the human equivalent of sandpaper all before noon. With a break following his past three classes, he was finally left to his own devices. The letter left an ominous hole in his left pocket, the same for the practice test in his other; everything seemed to bear down on him more than usual, quicker than usual.

Perhaps God Himself was punishing him. Though he scoffs at the thought, rightfully so, because the notion is ridiculous, unfortunately, he knew it would be proposed by members of the board if he were to seek their counsel during these difficult times.

So he didn’t.

He sought out the only friends he had, the ones who got him in this situation in the first place. They were the only people he could turn to, and even then he would not dare tell them the entire story. He wasn’t stupid; they would never understand.

He knew just where to find them at this hour. If not the rooftops, then the athenaeum, and he could not imagine they would return to the same place after what happened yesterday.

When Quinn entered the library, he found that not a seat in the profoundly expansive labyrinth of full shelves was vacant. Instead, what would supposedly be deserted rows were densely populated with older students, hard at work. Not a clatter was to be heard despite this crowded state, and even any whispers about the content of those religious volumes were scarce. But the blonde was not interested in lingering there for an area of study, he was searching for something himself. Peering down each rustic aisle, after a daring search, he finally found what he was looking for, or rather, who: Augustin, Nico, and Victor, all gathered around a table in a chattering huddle. It figured they would be the only ones to disturb the peace.

Quinn approached them, somehow sliding unnoticed regardless of how direct his steps were, or how tall he stood on the centered rug. For once in his life, he was relieved he was invisible to them, because it made it so much easier when he yanked a plush pillow from a vacant cushioned chair, swung back, and pelted Victor in the face with it. That was what it took to finally have his undivided attention.

Victor shouted, though it should not have harmed him as much as taken him off guard. "Ow! What the fuck is your problem?!"

An unknown but academically inclined student in a row nearby took the opportunity to shush him. It did not silence Victor, who promptly ordered them to ‘mind their bloody business’ at the same volume.

"That's for ditching me in the cathedral," Quinn spat. He was quieter than his friend. On top of everything he had been dealing with, he did not want a report of his inappropriate behavior in the library to be added. "It was your idea to steal the wine, and you just left me there."

"It isn’t our fault you didn't run," Augustin chose to intervene, however, the disagreeable manner of his speech partnered with the fact that his eyes were narrowed at a book in his hands hinted that maybe he was irritated at something completely unrelated.

Quinn didn’t bother asking what his deal was. Yes, perhaps he should have run instead. Perhaps he should have made a break for it the moment Theodore began to open the cathedral doors, but an even better option would have been for him to not be dragged there at all. Before he could utter any of what was on his mind, Victor chimed in again.

"Don't be too cross with us, Quinn, I'm sure the headmaster only gave you a stern… slap on the wrist, so what’s the issue?”

”I’ll have you know he’s thinking about holding me back because of you. If I don’t ace the finals, I’m done for.”

That sent them all into a proper shock, short lived, but genuine. ”You’re kidding!” Nico chucked, “how unfortunate for you.”

Quinn ignored his remark, but he did make his way over to Augustin’s side. If there was anyone he knew that was capable of helping him, it was Augustin; he practically lived and breathed exams and academia. He kneeled beside his chair. It was pathetic, but he was practically begging on his knees. “Please, Augustin, you’re the smartest one here. Could you help me study for the final?”

Augustin did not even think to lift his gaze from his reading, and Quinn’s hope shattered into a million pieces when he replied, “Not a chance. I told you to start studying for it weeks ago. I’m not going to waste my own time bailing you out now.”

Victor tutted at the bad news and Quinn came quickly to understand that trying to get him to feel a speck of regret was like holding a conversation with a brick wall. ”Maybe a few extra years might do you good, Quinn,” he poked and prodded, taking pleasure in the exasperated look that crossed the blonde’s face. “You always were a little dense, weren’t you?”

Quinn wires his jaw shut for a second. But after a moment of quiet resolution, and ‘inner reflection,’ and realizing he should be the bigger person still having shared a slice of blame in the whole endeavor—he immediately throws all of that potential logic away and retorts, “And you always were a little cunt, weren’t you?”

He barely had a chance to relish in the way Victor’s face drops, because after only a minute pause, the other boy leaped upon him. Quinn winced when his back hit the ground, and he opened his eyes just in time to catch the swift raise of his supposed friend’s fist, up, and then crashing down on his cheek with the force of a hammer. Fiery pain spread through his jaw, he felt his bottom lip split open; it’s enough to water down the outside world to a slur of warbling voices. Somewhere distantly, he heard someone shout for Victor to stop, but it’s practically unintelligible—it could be Augustin, or Nico, or the whole damn school. It wouldn’t matter, because soon enough he gets over this sudden disorientation and lifts his knee into the stomach above.

It was juvenile and clumsy, more like wrestling, this fight of theirs—hair pulling, cursing, surely the other two members of their entourage should have recognized this sight, but as Quinn flipped himself over Victor, two pairs of hands captured his arms and hoisted him upwards.

~~~

4:00 PM

Once again, Quinn was alone, but at least this time he took solace in it. Over the span of the last few hours, any time spent alone had not been met with any semblance of peace, but this was different, he mused. The stone masoned facade of the institution stood a few miles behind the trail he followed, a familiar path to the lake he could see from outside his uncle’s office window: La Lagune des Lilès he called it, for it was his own secret spot to claim as his own. Through the forsaken woodlands surrounding the dreaded university. The sun had not even threatened to set, but the way the old oaks tangled their branches out and across right above him, reduced the glowing afternoon light to mere golden streams. It was not a far walk by any means, but he still took his time. Maybe to enjoy the lingering scent of bittersweet earth. Maybe to clear his head. His face still throbbed. He could feel it every time he swallowed the metallic-tinged saliva pooling around in his mouth.

The centerpiece of a quiet clearing, the lake was a sliver of a beautifully smudged mirror, an imperfect cast of the sky and brush, with depths so vodka clear he could see deeper and deeper into the far ends as he approached. A gathering of tangerine-scaled fish scattered in a startled cluster as soon as his steps ended at the edge of the lakeshore. And meeting eyes with his reflection, he couldn’t exactly blame them. His right cheek swollen red, his eye encapsulated by a splotchy, indigo bruise; it made him wince just looking at all the occasional cut and discoloration.

He sighed, easing himself down onto a grassy patch by the water. He had brought his sketchbook with him, and silently flipped through the pages, only stopping at a particular portrait. One that, when composed beside the occasional, half-rushed sketch, had seemed photographic. The creases of a broad smile, sparkling eyes that seemed so kind, perfection, everything that was distinctly, unmistakably…

”Hugo,” he whispered.

The seam of his mouth sealed shut, as if repulsed by the name it intentionally uttered.

It seemed as though he considered it as he sat in silence: his thumb and index finger, gripping at the edge of the page with the thought of tearing it from its binding, tossing it in a crumple into the river to have the elements eat away at it. But he couldn’t. He just… he couldn’t. He pulled his hand away and simply turned to another page to not bear the sight of it any longer. With a pencil in his hand, he did what he did best to clear the fog inside his head. The lake was the only subject he could love just as much without the same guilt. So the graphite nib glided across the page in smooth strokes. The trees themselves seemed to bend in the wind beneath his hands.

He traced everything he could notice no matter how insignificant. From the stray stone settled in wet soil, to the leaves shedding from their limbs in the breeze, it was the most comforting activity in the world to him. That was, until he heard footsteps and spotted someone else invading the space he swore was his one and only refuge. The second he saw brown hair, and freckles and glasses—and you have got to be kidding me, Quinn’s blood boiled. Him.

His eyes narrowed as Theodore entered the clearing with his own book in hand, a thick leather, excessive-paged… thing–whatever it was, he could not see the cover clearly enough to read it from where he was sat, and to be completely honest, he did not care enough to try. All he knew was that it was one of the texts from the library, bound with the ‘borrowed’ tag and all; a morbid part of him wondered if he was there when the fight broke out too. A shadow come to follow him everywhere. The other student had not seemed to take notice of the blonde despite their proximity, so he cleared his throat and watched him jolt. It’s just my luck that I can’t get away from you, Quinn thought numbly. The words trickled at the tip of his tongue, ready to spill. Instead, trying to maintain some civility considering he had gotten into enough fights today, he merely asked, “beautiful, isn’t it?”

Theodore started dumbstruck at the student beside him. His expression of shock was probably the result of a few issues at hand: one, he probably had not expected any one else to have snuck out of the campus grounds and find the clearing, and two, he had not expected it to be the student he had a tiff with, and three, he most surely had not expected to see his face bashed in. He blinked, his neutral demeanor returning like a mask. His mouth twisted back into its usual frown. “It’s just my luck that I can’t get away from you,” the brunette muttered.

Quinn’s mouth dropped open, both insulted and–to be fair–impressed that they both had the exact same thought in mind, phrasing and all. Unbelievable…. He turned back to the view with a huff.

Nothing broke the silence except for the scribbling of his pencil. Neither of them were comfortable in each other’s presence, but then again, neither of them were willing to give up their respectively claimed territory either. This stubborn game continued well into time when they should have both been returning to the grounds of their campus.

At one point, Quinn could feel the other’s focus on him. Theodore’s gaze raked across the black eye and the nick at the corner of the blonde’s eyebrow. He eventually stopped his inspection with a sigh.

He was the first to break the rift, no matter how reluctant. ”What happened?” was the first question that escaped.

It nearly caught Quinn off guard, and he glanced back at him with the same reserve. His nostrils stuffed up, and he sniffled. His eyes darkened as he searched for an answer, finding nothing worth mentioning. So he sneered instead of providing a truthful response. ”I thought you didn’t want to make conversation,” he stated resolutely.

Theodore returned the leer without the same playfulness. Without another word, Theodore clicked open the buckles of his satchel and whisked out a handkerchief. He offered it to Quinn, who merely blinked in confusion, and only then, did he notice something dripping. He dabbed beneath his nose with the side of his hand, and pulling away, saw it smeared with crimson. He sniffed again, and accepted the rag. “Thank you,” he muttered under his breath, but he squinted with confusion.

”You were bleeding all over your uniform,” he explained briskly, as if that was reason enough. “It was foul.”

Quinn rolled his eyes. Figured that the boy with the most pristinely kempt clothing would be concerned at the sight of someone else’s sullied; sure, it was only his second day at the boarding school, presumably, but even at this point, anyone was bound to have at least a wrinkle in their collar. With Theodore, he was void of such afflictions.

Without so much as looking at him, Theo stated the obvious. ”Your friends aren’t very nice to you.” His thumb swept over the front cover of the book he was cradling.

So he was there… Quinn bundled up the handkerchief and pressed it up to his septum. ”I know,” he chuckled humorlessly.

”Then why do you stay with them?”

More silence stewed. Theodore did not press him to answer the question. Something about that was comforting, despite how unnerving their sparse but quarrelsome interactions had been so far. He cautiously watched the water on the surface of the lake ripple. “Everyone asks me that,” he admitted, and he was not sure why. “I ask myself that a lot, actually… And honestly, I-I don’t know. I guess it’s just… better than being alone.” He forced himself to smile. “Pathetic, right?”

Quinn saw Theodore’s reflection shake his head. “No…” he said without a hint of malice. Yet another pause; for some reason, the threading instances of soundlessness between them started to make the blonde feel uncomfortable instead of at ease. Perhaps a part of him no longer wanted to sit in quietude. Neither did Theo really, but he could think of nothing more until…

Quinn’s mouth stretched to a cheesy, smug grin. “You should see the other boy.”

Theodore raised a brow.

It was enough to make his cheerful exterior immediately buckle. “You shouldn’t… actually, he looks a lot better than I do. I mean, I barely got a single punch in.”

Quinn awaits whatever smart comment is set and ready to go in response, but all Theodore did was stare at him blankly, unreadable. A short, forceful exhale escaped his nose. And then, little by little, the corners of his lips quirked up into the tiniest similarity to a smile–barely noticeable, yet nearly a laugh, if he was even capable of such things. “I assumed so, yes.” Sadly though, this reprieve from his stoicism was short-lived. “Is it true? That the headmaster will hold you back if you fail the upcoming final?”

The boy nearly choked on his own spit. He spat out red into the dirt. ”You heard that as well?” he queried. “Yes, it's true. If I don’t pass every test over the course of my schooling with flying colors, I’ll be here year after year after year. And I just received a letter this morning telling me I'm disowned until I graduate, so I'm stuck here during the winter and summer months as well.”

Theodore nodded in acknowledgement. “Well then, I'm practically as trapped here as you,” he revealed. He leaned back to look at the sky, nearly wistful in doing so, his hands placed flat on the dirt. “This is my new home. My last remaining family sent me away, I… I doubt I'll be able to return home even when my time here ends.”

”Parents are quite a pill, aren't they?”

Theodore abruptly clawed his fingers deep into the earth, his expression unexpectedly grim. “Quite…” he curtly answered.

Another thoughtful pause got in their way. Far off, the low pitch of the bronze church bells resounded through the woodlands, the final hour of class for the day; had he really been sitting out there for that long? He checked his watch, the glass face crackled and broken. Quinn lifted himself up from the ground, patting the dirt and grass off his trousers as he rose. “I suppose that means I'll be seeing you around.” With that, he began to take his leave.

Theodore chewed at his lower lip, clearly thinking about something he hesitated to mention. He chose to avert his attention to something else in the landscape. “I might be able to help you… if you wanted me to.”

Quinn immediately stopped in his tracks, spinning around on his heels with the fear that he had not heard him correctly. ”Really?” his blue eyes lit up with surprise, and soon, his intuition took the reins. The enthusiastic spark slowly dwindled and died, for what reason would someone he had one full conversation with help him? “Why?”

The other boy quickly blabbered an excuse, ”I-It’s nothing personal. I just feel sorry for you is all.”

The other boy sort of gawked at that, insulted, his eyes had no other choice but to bore a hole into head that was faced away from him. The absolute nerve of someone that was crying at a statue to say they felt sorry for him. “You're the one that–” but he interrupted himself when he heard the other laugh for the first time, as though he knew what he was thinking and agreed that it was shameless. Theodore turned back to him, with the kind of beam that was lopsided and ghostly from lack of use, and he had the kind of smiling eyes that reminded him of someone. Quinn immediately faltered, and all the moisture in his mouth dried up. It's his turn to avert his gaze. ”You really are a strange boy, Theodore.”

Theo shrugged his shoulders. “So I've been told.” He set his sights on the grove of trees standing proudly on the opposite side of the lake. The lush canopy of emerald ferns and leaves shook despite the lack of any summer breeze. For whatever reason, the brunette stared out with the most serene sense of peace. He was almost reluctant to break it, his voice barely even a whisper when he said, ”I hear birds.”

”What?” Indeed, when Quinn too, quieted down, he could also hear it: a melodious twittering chant from across the expanse of water, and then another followed in response, as if they were talking.

”Mother said they were the closest thing to angels.”

A strange thought. Quinn hated the part of himself responsible for being a little judgemental, but he could help being somewhat amused. “Oh, yeah? And what about demons? What’s the closest thing to them?” He did not expect an actual answer, nor one so calculated.

Theo did not catch the sarcastic lift to his question. “Other people.”

Quinn frowned slightly at that. He spared one last peek through the trail up north as he reminded himself of his place; L’Institute towered even from afar, a beacon of responsibility and expectancy staring back at him with the massive rose window that was nearly an iris in itself. He sighed softly, his chest heaving before he decided against it. What was the point anyway? He approached the silver ruffle where the water met the shore, and bridged the semi-dramatic gap that was between him an his new… should he say acquaintance? Didn’t matter. Whatever the title, he sat beside him again. ”Your mother sounds like a smart woman.”

Theodore did not seem to mind his nearness. Hardly even mentioned it, or so much as reacted; he was back to that unreadable quality he had isolated himself with–brooding but not all there. ”She was…”

The birds huddled closely in a carefully crafted nest. At first, there were only two on their own, pecking at the encircling twigs, and then there were four. The sun, indirect and fleeting, cast over their long, sweeping feathers and illuminated the darkness into a triad of rich colors; the reflected light colored them in blue, copper, and violet. High pitched and warbly, the black birds gathered on the branches held their little symphony. And who were either of them to interrupt?

Looking at Theodore closely, both concerned and intrigued, Quinn tried once more, his tone soft. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he asked again, only this time, genuine.

And instead of anything spiteful, Theo simply breathed without taking his eyes off the nest, “Yes…”