Mathieu (White Flame Trilogy)

by Paula Flumerfelt

  Nathan’s face held the same polite blankness that it had since entering the tower. “I’ll do that. But how do you know what goes on in my domain?”

  The mousy haired boy giggled childishly before practically skipping back to his chair, his soft footfalls creating a mesmerizing pattern that continued even after he had come to a halt, echoing deeply into the towel. “This,” he ran long, thin fingers over the veil that shrouded the other chair, “is how I know. He is a god, after all. He sees all.”

  “Oh. If you’re using him to spy on us, will you deign to let us meet him?” Nathan said with a raised brow. “It’s rude to peep, you know.”

  “I wonder what manners his mother taught him.” Solomon joked quietly. Mathieu swallowed hard to keep from laughing. The child, Enak, was kind of awkward in his motions, almost like his head and his body were disconnected.

  The boy hopped into his chair like it was a throne, crossing his legs at the knees. “No. I don’t think I shall. You’re not nearly refined enough for him.”

  Solomon scoffed. “I was doing refined before you were a thought in the knee-knocker relationship that spawned you.”

  “And I would think one of your age would be more mature than this…” Enak checked under his fingernails for dirt.

  Mathieu gently brushed his hand against Solomon’s side, trying to silently calm him, all the while his attention was on the boy. Solomon seemed to get the picture because he took a calming breath. “I don’t behave to please you.”

  “And that is why you’re a lowly grunt and I am not.” Hopping up, Enak smoothed his hands down the front of his tailcoat. “Where are my manners?” He shot the blond man a nasty look, “Shall we have a spot of tea?”

  Nathan bobbed his head and held a hand out in a sweeping motion. “After you, Enak.”

  Enak sighed and crossed the black fire again, acting as if these small motions were painful for him. He led them out of the room with two chairs and into a side chamber with a wall made entirely of windows. Only clouds were visible beyond and Mathieu moved to stand by it for lack of anything else to do. The other two men sat at a small, octagon shaped table, their backs to Mathieu. He looked around the room at the rest of the furnishings. There were two other tables in the room, there was a dark blue rug on the white floor, and the walls were paneled with tapestries; if he hadn’t been looking at one, he wouldn’t have seen it split down the center, opening as a doorway for a servant to enter through with a tray. The servant efficiently passed out the tea cups, poured the tea, and disappeared back from whence he came.

  “Now,” Enak dropped a cube of sugar into his tea and stirred it. “Since you took the long trip to come see me, at least do me the honor to tell me how the rest of the others are fairing. I only bother watching you, Nathan, so you’ll need to fill in the blanks.”

  Nathan sat back in his seat, a regal air about him as his fingertip traced the rim of his teacup. “Well,” He said, looking as though he were searching for the right words. “Zanika and Zerieve are in negotiations with the outer countries for their crops to get us more capital to work with, Elise has been devising the initial attack blueprints, and we expect Ayame and Akira back tonight at my home. They have started the recruitment on that end. By the way, I do like the remodel on the Tower, much more beautiful than the ice. Warmer, too.” The redhead said, changing topics.

  The boy smiled shyly. “Thank you. It was my idea. I like the look much better and now I’m not afraid of losing a few toes when I walk around bare-foot.” He smiled and looked pointedly at his feet.

  “That would be a relief.”

  “Solomon, where did this come from?” Enak asked curiously as he leaned forward, plucking a very white strand of hair off of the blond’s shirt.

  Nathan and Solomon looked at each other discreetly. “It, uh, must have come from the inn we were staying at. Why?”

  “White is such an odd color. I wonder if someone old stayed there last. I would complain about the service next time I was there. Oh well.” Enak wrapped the strand into a ringlet before setting it on his saucer. “Are you sure it isn’t from say…a spectator?”

  “A spectator?” Nathan’s voice was skeptical.

  Enak set his teacup aside. “Yes. Like say, the one that might be standing by the window, casting a shadow on the floor, and where Solomon’s eyes seem to be drifting to rather often?” Silence met his statement. “Come out, come out, mystery guest.”

  Mathieu swallowed and cast a fearful look at Solomon who subtly nodded. Shaking slightly, he took a deep breath and lifted his hands to his hood, letting it fall back. His hair had faded by to its normal white and he looked at Enak’s saucer but didn’t move from standing by the window.

  The boy stared at him for a long time, during which Mathieu didn’t move an inch. It was like Enak was pinning him with his gaze, keeping him rooted to the spot. “What is your name?”

  Frowning, the answer seemed to come out without his permission. “My name is Mathieu.” He pushed his hair back and scurried to stand behind Solomon.

  Standing and moving around the table, Enak touched Solomon’s shoulder to keep him seated and stopped in front of Mathieu. “Why wasn’t I told that you two had brought a third?” He asked, not looking at either man he was addressing. “I sensed him not long after you entered, yet you concealed him from me. Do you not trust me?” A spark of energy stopped Enak’s hand from touching Mathieu as it reached out, causing the boy’s eyes to go wide. “What a peculiar talent. I need to consider this development. See yourselves out.”

  Solomon pushed Enak back and took Mathieu’s hand, dragging him out of the room. Mathieu cast a look back at the younger male who was still as a statue before the blond practically forced him to run out of the Sky Pillar. As soon as they were out in the fresh air, the blond stopped, looking around in a paranoid way.

  “Solomon, what’s wrong? What happened?” Mathieu said, clutching the man’s wrist.

  “Instinct.”

  “That’s a rather unhelpful answer.” Mathieu huffed, nose wrinkled. But it did him no good. Solomon didn’t say a word until Nathan exited out the front door and mounted his tuvash. The blond grabbed him and forced him onto their shared stead and followed the redhead away from the tower at a breakneck speed.

  ~*~

  The sun was setting over the mountain when they stopped in a gully for the night. Nathan started a fire and Solomon set up their bedrolls. Standing around awkwardly, Mathieu watched the other two. “I-I’m really sorry. It’s my f-fault that things didn’t g-go right, isn’t it?” Unwanted tears welled in his eyes and he had to turn away or risk showing them. It was so stupid of him to being getting emotional over this, but he couldn’t stop it. A few silent tears rolled down his cheeks before he could stem them. The one thing that they had asked him to do, stay hidden, he had failed at.

  “I’m going to go check out the perimeter.” Solomon’s voice was as icy as it had originally been with Enak, only now it wasn’t aimed at anyone and washed over Mathieu as if directed at him. The blond walked away from their encampment, leaving Nathan and Mathieu alone.

  With a sigh, Nathan sat on the ground beside the fire. “Don’t blame yourself, Mathieu. You didn’t do anything wrong. Solomon has an analytical mind, so when he overlooks things like your hair on his shirt, he rakes himself over the coals. He’ll be okay in a while.”

  Mathieu nodded. somewhat thankfully, and sat beside Nathan. “He’s mad at me though, isn’t he?” He wiped his eyes.

  “Hm, a bit, I think; although, I haven’t the faintest idea why.”

  Looking away from Nathan, Mathieu let his hair fall forward over his shoulders. “Something kind of happened.”

  “Oh?”

  “He and I kissed while we were staying at the inn.”

  Nathan rolled his eyes. “I already heard. He was acting like he’d committed a cardinal sin. So you two are attracted to each other, it happens. Still doesn’t give him a reason to act like a child. If you killed Mina
, I could see him being upset, but not over a kiss.” Nathan said the word in an overly exaggerated way, clearly mocking the situation.

  Mathieu lay back in the grass and yawned. “I guess you’re right…” He said, closing his eyes. The stars were beautiful, but with the sudden rudeness of Solomon, he didn’t want to look at them.

  Nathan left him alone for a few minutes before clearing his throat. “Hey, are you hungry?”

  “Yeah, actually.” Now that the man mentioned food, he was starving. He hadn’t eaten since that morning. Mathieu sat up with a grunt, folding his legs under him. “We brought some stew, right? I’ll heat it up.” Going to the packs and digging through them, he got out a pan and set to heating the leftover stew. It gave his hands something to do.

  Solomon eventually wandered back to them, looking significantly less cold.

  “Are you hungry, Solomon?” Nathan asked the blond.

  The blond shook his head, and laid on his bed roll, his back to them.

  Mathieu sighed and dished up a bowl for himself and Nathan, then sat down and watched the fire as he ate. The impromptu meal went by in relative silence before the redhead offered to do the dishes. Thanking him, Mathieu wiped his hands and face down, then lay down to sleep on the grass so that he didn’t have to be near Solomon.

  Chapter

  Thirteen

  “So how did it go?” Kiev asked from her position on the bathroom counter. It had been two days since they had gotten back from the Sky Pillar, and he hadn’t seen hide nor tail of Solomon since.

  Mathieu rolled his eyes. “Oh lord, the usual. I messed up big time, Solomon avoided talking to me, we came home. The end.” He leaned against the wall and flicked his bangs out of his eyes. “Jerk…” He murmured.

  On a more interesting note, however, Mathieu had met the oddest pair of people who were also now in his bathroom. Ayame and Akira were their names, and they were siblings. Ayame was a spy in the Unithian Court for Korinth, posing as the right hand of one of the top brass. He was tall with black hair that he kept short and greatly resembled his sister who was the feminine version of him. To say that Akira was pretty, though, would have been incorrect. She was stunning, but not in a traditional way with a rather oval face, a button nose and eyes slightly too big for her face. But she was apparently beautiful enough to land the King. After all, Akira was the man’s mistress.

  “Solomon is so temperamental.” Akira said as she stood beside him, primping her hair and wiping the corners of her mouth, cleaning up any residual lipstick. Her tone was light, yet slightly stuck-up and fit her personality well. “So when you kissed him, was it like full on or not really?” She batted her lashes at him, curious.

  Ayame rolled his eyes. “Akira, it’s not your business.” Despite the six year age difference between the siblings, they got along incredible well. “Just because you’re a succubus doesn’t mean that everyone else’s sex is your business.”

  Wrinkling her nose and throwing her brother a tart look, Akira turned to Mathieu. “If Ayame doesn’t want to hear the gossip, he can ran away and go play with the boys. But I want to chit-chat.”

  Ayame pulled his little sister into a headlock, tugging on her ear. “If you’ll remember, you insisted upon me coming into this dinky little place; I didn’t volunteer.”

  Kiev laughed at them and poked Mathieu with her toes. “Seriously though, tongue or not?” Her eyebrows wiggled.

  “Jeez. No tongue. And I doubt it’ll happen again, so don’t bring it up, ‘kay? I don’t need him to glare at me any more than he does.” Mathieu did a very bad impression of an angry Solomon.

  “Not that it’s my business, but have you tried, you know, talking to him? He’s generally pretty reasonable.” Ayame said, folding his arms. He was thin and tended to look at people through his bangs.

  “That stupid ass is avoiding Mathieu like the plague. I’ve witnessed it.” Kiev said derisively, nodded in agreement with her own words. “It’s like that time that Mina lost his riding boots. Remember that?”

  Akira laughed, tossing her head back in a way that made her practically sparkle. “That was such a great night!”

  Rolling his eyes, Ayame caught the other male’s eye. “So, I got in contact with Venee, as supposedly requested by you.. She was devastated to hear about Avian and says that anything she can do to help, she will. Then, she passed the news on to Narrie and she says that as soon as she can get the money together, she’d headed here. I gave her directions on how to get here, so she should arrive in a week or so.” The spy shrugged one shoulder. “Just thought you’d like to know.”

  “Thanks. I know that I’m asking a lot of you, but I need you to find one more person for me, if you can.”

  “I can find anyone. Who is it?”

  Mathieu looked away slightly. “Well, it’s an old man that goes by ‘Grandpa’ and works in a knick-knack shop in the industrial district. Tell him that you know me and what happened to Avian. If we can, getting him here will be beneficial. He knows things people shouldn’t.”

  Ayame nodded in understanding. “I would, except that Narrie said that she would talk to him, already. I didn’t know who he was, but I didn’t want to argue with her.” Flushing slightly, he looked away. “I hate to admit it, but she was kind of scary. All this hollering and throwing of things…”

  “I appreciate it very much.” Mathieu said, completely understanding how someone could find Narrie a bit scary. “Well, how do I look?” Mathieu puts his hands on his hips and turned to the girls, faking a smile. “I’m supposed to meet Lenore about making my sword. I should have done it sooner, but I thought Solomon would be going with me…”

  Kiev patted the top of his head. “Oh, don’t worry. She’s very forgiving. Do you want me to go with you?”

  “Uh, would you? I haven’t really met her and you know how bad I am at first impression.” He made the joke at his own expense about his small ‘tantrums’ when he first started living at the manor.

  Laughing, she jumped off the counter. “I don’t mind going at all. Are we going to take a tuvash over?”

  Mathieu’s eyes went wide. “I don’t think so. Tesla can turn into a big thing, so I’m hoping he can carry us both.“ Tesla?

  I’m here. Is it time to go already? The deep voice filled his mind in a familiar way. It was a comfort to know that even with Solomon mad at him, Tesla was still there.

  Can you carry two? I want Kiev to come with, if that’s okay…

  A short huff preceded a response. Yes, that’s fine. I’ll meet you outside.

  “He says he can take up both. Are you ready to go?”

  Nodding, Kiev tucked her arm into the crook of his elbow and smiled. “I’ve never ridden on a Shadowrider. Lead on, darling.” She blew a kiss back over her shoulder at the siblings, who waved them off.

  “Bye guys.” Mathieu took her outside and found Tesla curled up in the sun, currently in his largest form. “Tesla, get up you fat, lazy-”

  A growl broke his sentence as the Shadowrider stood to his full height, taller than either of them. His fur had becoming like armor, and his fangs were downright scary, but he nuzzled his nose against Mathieu’s hand before kneeling down so that they could mount him. Helping Kiev up first, Mathieu hopped onto the beast behind her and told Tesla where to go. “Thank you for coming…”

  “No problem. Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course you can.”

  The blonde girl patted the Shadowrider’s neck, “Did you and Solomon ever figure out who has custody of these darlings? I mean, he made them, but they walked out on him. Then you show up and you’ve got them and they’re kind of attached to you…”

  “That’s another thing that he’s pissy with me about. Tesla still likes him well enough, but Nikola pretends he doesn’t exist. I swear, I should just go limp whenever I go see him anymore. He acts like I’m trying to ruin his life or something. What does Avanon say about it?” It hadn’t escaped Mathieu’s attention that everyone in the house
gossiped about everything.

  Kiev sighed as Tesla ran, his muscles bunching a relaxing under his armored skin. “Oh, she thinks he’s being unreasonable. I told her that you guys kissed and that now he’s being weird. She says you should just give him a good thump on the head, but that the next time they’re alone she’ll talk to him. If anyone can talk some sense into him, it’s her.”

  Mathieu frowned slightly. “I hope that’s soon. It’s kind of awkward when we run into each other in our room. He charges at me like a bull until I move and I jump out of the way so we don’t make contact. I’ve given up wearing red because of it.”

  Kiev tossed her head back with a giggle. “I don’t think you have to be that extreme.”

  “Red was never my color anyway.” He joked. “So, Ayame and Akira are pretty interesting.”