Graydon Pan stepped into the pub with only one thought in mind: finding a good ale and settling in the corner to watch his cousins go to work. They were younger than he; they did outings like that every few months, gathering up young men to take to Amos University to be trained as a mage.
A rogue wildling was new for the cousins.
That was why he was there.
Graydon was almost certain his cousins could handle a rogue wildling. The mage was only labelled as rogue because he evaded capture, but most wildlings were grateful to be taken to Amos. Being a mage meant a life better than that which they were born into. Depending on their skill and how hard they studied, a wildling could do verywell for themselves.
Few of them were rogue on purpose.
They just didn't know better.
Graydon motioned to the man behind the bar as he slipped past tables. He found his way to the back of the pub and settled into a booth. A small candle flickered in the middle of the table.
He looked up as his cousins slipped in, garbed as members of the Seven usually were. Their family crests adorning their cloaks, hair cut close to prevent anyone from using it to get the upper hand, shoes polished to a shine.
Then there was Graydon, in trousers and a linen shirt. The only mark of his heritage the physical features he shared with his father, the flare for the dramatic he shared with his mother—or so his father said.
The barmaid brought over an ale and set it on the table before him. He slipped her a small coin, a token of his appreciation.
The Seven never had to pay.
The smart ones still did, however.
Graydon paid when and how he could, depending on the situation. Some days he needed to make a point, making that point sometimes meant not paying a bill. The barmaid took his coin and smiled, even winked before she turned and slipped off to another table.
As he raised the mug of ale to his lips, a woman slipped into the booth.
She was rough around the edges, handsome but not the beautiful Graydon was used to seeing. Her brown hair was thin and pulled back, tied into a hasty bun which the hair was already escaping. There were dark rings under her eyes and a bruise along her jaw.
"I need some help," she said.
A street rat looking to rob him.
Graydon glanced at her brown eyes, over her curves, and then over her face. Fear danced over her features. He followed her gaze, to his cousins. Then he glanced over the other tables and realized she hadn't chosen him as a mark, so much as the only man not sitting with a woman.
His cousins scared her. Rumours abounded among street rats as to what the Seven did with an orphan. He could understand where her fear came from, even if it was unfounded.
"Why are you running from the Seven?"he asked, hoping his accent didn't give him away.
"I'm not," she said hastily. "Every time they show up, they scoop one of my friends. When that happens, they go questioning. When they question, people disappear."
Graydon raised an eyebrow and slid his ale toward her. The woman picked it up and took a gulp, then thumped the mug on the table.
She had a right to be afraid.
The report he read mentioned a woman running with the street rats. She had been new when the first one, Maeno, was picked up. Young, but not young enough to pass as a girl any longer. Each successive report mentioned the woman. Lenfer had been dancing with her. Dor drawing something, explaining something as they picked him up.
Graydon glanced around the pub but could detect no one watching the woman.
If she was present during each incident, it meant her lover, or stalker, or secret admirer, was the mage. He had lashed out in a jealous rage, drawing the Seven down on his competitor.
The fastest way to draw the mage out would be to flirt with the object of his affection.
Graydon casually raised his hand, gaining the attention of the barmaid once more. She nodded and smiled at him before she turned away. He focused his attention on the woman sitting beside him.
"Graydon," he said.
"Naena," she responded, jabbing her hand toward him like they were sealing a business deal.
He glanced at the hand and arched an eyebrow, but reached out and took her hand, shaking it.
"Naena..." he said.
"Just Naena," she said. "You? Since you insist on last names?"
"Mikent," he said, using his mother's maiden name. "Graydon Mikent. Does your husband know you're out?"
"Not married."
"Betrothed?"
"Nope."
"Lover?"
"What do I look like, some corner woman?" she asked. "Just because I'm a bastard doesn't mean I'll work a corner. The side of the sheets you're born on doesn't change your standards."
"I'm just trying to be friendly," he said.
"Oh," she said as another ale was delivered, set before Graydon. "Does your wife know you're out fishing in pubs?"
"No wife, betrothed, or lover," he said.
"Yeah, fine," she said. "I need help, not to be kept as a woman."
"Be a kept woman," he said.
"Yeah, that," she snapped.
He pulled his ale toward him and tried to figure out where he went wrong. He was often told that with a face like his, he didn't have to say much to talk the skirt off a woman.
Graydon glanced down at the woman's trousers and wondered if that was the problem.
He had been warned about women like her.
"Oh," he said.
"Oh?" she demanded.
"I didn't realize, is all."
"Realize what?"
"That, you know," he looked down, then back up and met her eyes. "You prefer to wear the trousers."
"I prefer skirts."
"Isn't that what I just said?"
They stared at one another. Her eyebrows drew down, darkening the brown of her eyes. Graydon swore he felt a spark of something across the back of his arms as his hairs rose off his skin. The feeling prickled up the back of his neck, lifting the hair off his head just slightly.
He had the attention of the mage.
"I'm not gay," she said.
"Such a vulgar word for such a beautiful woman."
"And I know I'm not beautiful, so save your lies for the ladies."
"I'm trying to flirt with you," Graydon said finally.
"I know, and I don't like it one bit," she said. "Dear sir, I think I'd rather risk the Seven than sit here with a man venturing to put his hand in my trousers."
"I'm not—"
"Sorry, your dick."
Graydon choked on air. He coughed, chest heaving as he tried to get a breath in.
"Do you have a problem with the word, dear sir?"
"Now, don't do that."
"Why not? I've finally remembered where I know the name from. Mikent. Dean of Amos. You're one of his sons, so you think you can just buy me off."
"You got me," he sighed with a shrug. "But I'm not his son, I'm his grandson. We're very poor as far as mage families go."
"Are they here looking for you, then?" Naena asked.
"No, I brought them here."
"And you're just going to sit there like you aren't a danger?"
"I'm not."
"My mother warned me about what mages wanted from virgins."
He choked again, but quieter, more subtle. He turned on the seat and cleared his throat, wiping at his lips. He turned back to Naena, a burning question boiling up.
"What?" she asked.
"The Seven never go out looking for virgins," he said. "Yes, a mage would have to find one, if he's given permission to use one, but the Seven never facilitate such a transaction."
Naena looked to Graydon's cousins, then back to him. Wariness returned to her features as she studied him.
"You're looking for a virgin?" she asked.
"No. How are you even still a virgin?" he asked. "Aren't there men roaming the land, deflowering women to protect them from just that?"
"There are, and they are rather insistent, yes."
"Well, I hate to push, but on that note of being insistent, how are you still a virgin? You're a street rat, don't you run with a bunch of men?"
"Who don't touch me," she said. "They've never tried to. I was safe until they took Maeno away, then the group fractured, and we came back together under Lenfer, but he was weak. I told them I should lead, and they laughed at me. Then the Seven took Lenfer. Then they came for Dor when he tried to help me take over."
She was a wild woman.
Graydon's mother had warned him about them.
His father had suggested laying back and enjoying it.
He went with the second option.
"That explains where I went wrong with my flirting," Graydon said.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm used to mage women, well, the women born to mage families. Demure and quiet and obedient. You're Hellfire incarnate, aren't you? You'd bite a man's face off for trying to touch you, and since we have that established, how about we move forward assuming I will not touch you without permission, shall we?"
Naena was quiet, watching him as he tried not to smile.
"And?" she asked.
"The next question would be, what would you like to talk about?"
"Tell me about the balls," Naena said.
"The what?" Graydon said, hoping he pronounced it adequately enough that she understood what he said.
"The mage balls?"
"Oh, oh, those," he said.
He looked her up and down again.
Just because she was a wild woman didn't mean she wouldn't appreciate satin and lace. She didn't have those things, that much he knew.
"Well," he said. "If you were to go with me, let us hypothesize."
"What's hypothesize?"
"It's like saying, let's pretend," he said. "If you went with me to the ball, then this may happen."
"Oh, all right, I understand."
"Let's start with the dress. What's your favourite colour?"
She flushed red and looked away.
"Come, now, it's just imagination," he murmured. "What's the harm?"
"Blue," she said. "I like blue."
"Like the sky?"
"Cagn blue. I've seen a sky that colour before. It was beautiful."
"Well, you can't have Cagn blue because neither of us is Cagn," he said. "But there are some colours near enough to it I think we could pull that off."
She smiled, and he was almost certain he had her wrapped around his finger.
Not quite, but almost.
So, he flirted carefully, uncertain of how the night would turn out. Anytime he became too confident, he seemed to stumble and would have to build himself back up.
She giggled, she laughed, and the wash of magic over him seemed to change. It was no longer threatening, but soothing. The change made him want to ask about a brother, a sibling of some sort. Maybe even her father or an uncle. Maybe it was not a lover they looked for, but a loved one protecting Naena.
The pub slowly quieted down, the cousins drifted in and out, and Graydon talked and joked with the street rat of a woman who would never just accept a man.
When their ale finished, somehow their conversation turned to what the cousins were doing. He told Naena they looked for a mage, couldn't help himself. She asked, and he spoke the words without even thinking. She giggled and edged closer to him, asking more questions.
Until finally:
"You said they have a way to tell, how?" Naena giggled, her hand on his leg, shifting upward suggestively.
"It's easy, really," he murmured, reaching into his pocket to pull out a dragon scale. "Anyone out looking has to carry one of these. It flares in the presence of magic."
"What's that?" she asked.
"A dragon scale," he said. "This one is from a hydra."
"Hydra?" she asked, pulling away, her hand snapping off him. "That's Pan's symbol."
"A scale is a scale," he said, trying not to seem like he was too interested in her reactions.
Naena made a sound and reached out. Her hand hesitated, fingers outstretched to the dragon scale.
"You want to hold it?" he asked.
"No, I shouldn't," she said with a shake of her head as she snatched her hand away from him.
She held her hand against her chest protectively, as if hurt by the presence of the scale.
Some magic reacted to dragon scales. The sort of magic that Graydon needed to report to his father, the kind of thing he needed to take care of before it got out of control.
"Here," he said, holding it out. "It's perfectly safe."
Naena smiled at him and took the scale. She held it in her hands, and Graydon felt a strange something. An absence of magic.
"That's not so hard," she murmured.
"What's not so hard?" he asked.
"What?" she asked, looking past the scale to Graydon.
Graydon frowned because he had heard a relief in her words. He reached out and set a hand on hers, aware of what his touch could do to others. Aware that Naena might reach out and hit him for crossing a line.
As his fingers settled on Naena's hand, the scale lit up.
Their eyes met over the scale, both startled by the blue light emitting from the iridescent dragon scale.
"You're a mage?" he asked.
She swore, and the pub exploded in a brilliant display of magic and creativity.