Page 11 of The Lost Art of Finding Where You Belong (Lost Arts #2)

Chapter Five

I n the morning, Perian woke in a tangle with something that was digging insistently into his hip, and after a very confused moment where nothing felt right and the body pressed up against him was definitely not the one he expected, he realized it was the hilt of Nisal’s sword, and he burst into laughter.

There was a groan behind him.

“Whazzit?”

“Sorry,” Perian said, “sorry. You’ve still got your sword on, and I thought you were, uh, excited to see me.”

There was a moment of silence, and then a giggle that turned into slightly hysterical laughter.

“I’m not actually sure why I’m laughing so hard at the idea that you could find me appealing,” Perian said, still laughing.

He had twisted around so he could see Nisal now.

“You’re pretty,” they said. “Not really my type.”

“What is your type, if you don’t mind me asking?”

They shrugged. “Physically, I tend to be attracted to the, uh, big and well- formed.”

“All the muscles,” Perian said with appreciation.

They sighed a happy sigh, nodding in agreement. “The ability to, uh, lift and move me easily is really appealing.”

Perian nodded.

“But,” Nisal continued, “as much as I’m attracted to that body type, at the end of the day, I want a good person, and it doesn’t really matter what they look like, male, female, nonbinary, well-muscled or not.”

Perian eyed them. “Am I supposed to be feeling really insulted?”

Nisal blinked at them, then their eyes went wide. “Oh, earth and air, no! You are a great person!”

This was said very vehemently, and Perian relaxed a little.

“Sorry, it’s still early o’clock after a lot of drinking,” they said, scrubbing at their face.

“I was still trying to finish the thought. I definitely have what I’m attracted to superficially.

But someone who looks like exactly what I want but doesn’t treat people well is not actually appealing at all. ”

Perian nodded, understanding that.

“And sometimes, independent of someone’s being attractive to me, there’s just that… spark. Or the absence of the spark. I consider you a friend, but I don’t want you sexually or romantically.”

Perian nodded. “Oh, yes, exactly that. You know, in reverse, for me towards you. You’re attractive, but we don’t spark.”

They smiled, nodding. Then their expression suddenly turned puzzled. “Did I want to smell Brannal last night?”

Laughing again, Perian explained their determination to see if they could smell Brannal in the bed, confounded by the fact that they couldn’t remember what he smelled like.

They rolled their eyes.

“Wow. Remind me not to drink so much in the near future.”

“I think you were surrounded by people who were a lot bigger and taller than you.”

They eyed him. “You’re not that much bigger than I am.”

“But I clearly hold my alcohol better,” he observed with the superiority of not being hungover this morning.

They made a face but didn’t argue the point .

“Why don’t you use the water closet first, and I’ll go see if there’s any tea yet. You look like you could use it.”

They nodded and managed to carefully crawl out of bed as Perian headed into the sitting room and saw that the ever-efficient staff had indeed delivered breakfast. It was only for one, but portions were always generous, and Perian was sure he and Nisal would manage.

There were two teacups with the tray, and Perian wasn’t sure if that meant they were way more aware of what he was doing than he wanted, or if they simply always provided two just in case someone came for a visit…

or maybe in case you wanted to drink two cups of tea at once?

Perian tried to remember if there had been two cups yesterday, but he had scarcely been paying attention.

A few minutes later, Nisal emerged, looking rather damp around the edges. They appeared a little more alert, and less as though they were in pain, which was good.

Perian immediately poured them that cup of tea. “How do you take it?”

“Right now? Black like my heart.”

Perian laughed and held it out. “Black it is.”

They held it cupped in their hands, inhaled, and then sighed out with a more content look on their face. After a moment, they took their first sip.

“Better?”

They slid into the chair across from him, humming a sound of agreement that didn’t require removing their mouth from the rim of the cup.

Perian smirked and drank his own tea. (This one had milk in it because his heart wasn’t doing so badly this morning compared to Nisal’s.)

He managed to nudge them into eating by putting food on their plate when he served himself.

The whole, “Oh, it’s only a little bit, why don’t you have just a mouthful or two, see how that goes down,” worked just fine to soon get them consuming their whole breakfast. And Perian, who had been having trouble eating since Brannal left, found that it was much easier to eat when he had company.

He still missed Brannal, but this was nice.

Finally, though, breakfast was over, and Nisal looked like they could function again.

“Fire and water,” they exclaimed, “I’m supposed to be with the Queen this morning! I’d better go.”

They rushed out. Perian finished his tea, went and got cleaned up, and then went to find out if he was capable of defending himself with a knife. Or at least, you know, holding one without cutting himself.

It went… better than Perian thought it would, but that was possibly just because he’d thought it was going to be terrible. His concentration was a little bit better today, and the time spent with his friends last night and this morning had reminded him that he really wasn’t alone.

Onadal was not about to let Perian do any actual fighting with people yet, for which he was very thankful.

But there were twelve of them who were complete novices—although the ones actually training to be Warriors were training more than Perian was and thus advancing faster (or maybe they just had the aptitude).

They started with safety and then worked on hand and footwork and got the feel for the blade in their hands.

Onadal actually told Perian he wasn’t quite as terrible as he had expected, which made Perian laugh and thank him. Given how much of a novice he was, he was totally willing to accept that as a compliment. Yes, he was still training with a dull blade, which he was very grateful for.

His hecklers were making snide comments and showing off, but Perian wasn’t expecting to match the actual Warriors with years of training.

If they honestly didn’t have anything better to do, then Perian pitied their attention spans and the genuine enjoyment that they were going to get out of life.

You didn’t really rise up any taller because you tried to stand on other people, but they had clearly not learned that lesson yet.

Since nothing got past Onadal, they also got sent on more laps. Perian thought there was a pretty easy way to stop having that happen if it annoyed them so much, but they really seemed to prefer making faces at Perian and acting as though it was not their behavior that was the problem.

Onadal did make the new recruits run the whole path around the castle’s giant inner quadrangle. Perian had actually managed it twice, under duress. But it was definitely not his best skill. He’d argued that he was here to learn defense, and Onadal had shot him his most unimpressed look.

“And which do you think is a better defense: running away or keeling over because you are out of breath?”

Perian tried not to be so obvious about his heavy breathing. “Probably the first one?”

Onadal gave him a stern nod and his best “unimpressed” face, and Perian had managed another lap.

But really, yeah, not his best skill. He’d leave the running to his (borrowed) horse.

Riding like the wind, that was awesome, and it was clear Prince Horsey enjoyed it completely.

Running on his own two feet… not his favorite.

Perian was feeling pretty good overall, though.

He got cleaned up from being a sweaty mess before heading out with the blankets to pick up the picnic basket, and he entertained Renny with a rendition of their adventure the night before and the fact he was still alive after his knife work this morning.

“Though,” he admitted, “knife work is probably a bit of an exaggeration. It was more like ‘learn how to hold a knife and not cut yourself getting it in and out of its sheath.’”

She giggled.

“Yeah, it sounds stupid, but when you have sheaths in your boots or at your back or, I don’t know, strapped to your underwear or something, you really don’t want to get it wrong!”

This just made Renny laugh harder, especially when she managed to giggle out, “Kee says only one ‘knife’ is supposed to be there.”

And this made Perian laugh, because that was definitely “something long and hard” teen boy humor. The Prince would be twenty-two now, the same as Perian, but he’d died—or disappeared or turned invisible or whatever had happened—when he was sixteen.

Perian was glad he could keep them both company.

That afternoon, he took plenty of carrots and apples out to Prince Horsey and went for another ride.

He still felt… a little weird under his skin, like something didn’t fit quite right.

He tried to push the thought out of his brain and focus on what he was doing in the moment.

It really was lovely being out with Prince Horsey.

Almost as if he was aware that Perian needed a distraction, he galloped off in a different direction from the one they usually used.

Perian had never been out this way. Like most of the royal park, though, trees were blossoming, spring flowers were in bloom, and everything was green and growing. Prince Horsey wasn’t galloping as fast as he normally did, almost like he was giving Perian the chance to take in the scenery.