There was one very definite positive to this school his father was sending him to: he wouldn't have to see said father — for generous stretches at a time, at least. Of course, he still had his... affliction to deal with. Knowing his father, there were two things his father might do: offer him no help whatsoever to make him suffer through his classes or assign him a scribe intended to humiliate him and remind him at every waking moment of the reason he was so helpless. But there wasn't much choice. He despised his father, and the feeling was very much mutual. Besides, it was very likely his only chance at going to university. He might not be studying exactly what he had in mind for himself or be doing anything other than getting out of his father's way, but he would make the most of it. Maybe even make some friends.

It wasn't like he'd set out to disappoint his father. Or gamble away half — okay, most... fine, ALL — of their money. He really did want to be at university and learn and all that bullshit. Every single person at that school was just so dull or stuffy or chronically anxious or some ungodly combination of any and all of that that it made his pants itch. Perhaps it was time to make a change, though — save what could be saved and make the most of the opportunity that had cost his father's life savings. Maybe he'd join the choir. Or the theater department. How much trouble could he even get in if his free time was actually spent at university, anyway?

—

Wylan collected the last of his things in a messenger bag sitting lonely on his recently emptied bed. There wasn't much to collect, after all — it wasn't like he needed any more reminders of the house he was desperate to leave behind with this move. The most important items (as well as clothes) had already been shipped off in great big crates Wylan had long since last seen.

Picking up the bag with its worn brown leather (it was in and of itself possibly Wylan's most prized possession anyway; it had belonged to his mother before she died and Wylan cherished it more than life), Wylan took in the sights of his bedroom for what he promised himself would be the last time.

Empty bed, stripped of both sheets and pillow, peeling brown floral wallpaper (specifically in the corner by where the wardrobe sat) where he'd picked at it when he was little and his father had been in one of his moods, the desk where he had been both slapped and taunted for the simple fact that he couldn't read or write, and the very ornate door that never locked but Wylan had still figured out a way of blocking off if he so desired. Every inch of the room was permeated by the stench of memories that Wylan was all too happy to be leaving as memories, locked away in a dusty corner of his mind.

Some shout from the maid downstairs met Wylan's ears. Without so much as an uttered farewell, he passed his father's office — the door closed and locked despite the shuffling of feet within, not that Wylan even bothered to try the doorknob — and down the stairs, through the grand front door (after a smiled thank you to the maid handing him his lunch), before onto a coach altogether much nicer than he'd learned to expect from his father.

Black leather seats rimmed in copper detailing were a nice touch, along with the grumbling face of his escort — not a man he'd met before, but then again, his father cycled through the low-level servants like nobody's business. It was all too likely that the man had been hired for this job alone.

Closing the latch behind him, Wylan sat down.

"Lovely day," he said brightly, clutching his hands on top of the messenger bag upon his lap. The man opposite him said nothing.

His eyes looked out from under a dark bowler hat, and the majority of his face was covered by a thick mustache curling slightly at its ends, and an altogether large nose with a bit taken out at the middle, where a pair of spectacles would rest. His clothing looked, at the same time, poor and put-together. He wore a slightly off-white buttoned shirt, not buttoned at the top two buttons, with a dingy but fashionable vest, which also had the misfortune of not being fully buttoned. Or rather, it was rather fortunate for it, as it didn't seem like it would have managed the trip.

The man's arms were crossed, and, as Wylan's gaze traveled further down, he noticed both that the man's trousers were at least an inch too short, and that the man's left shoe was untied.

Wylan mentioned none of this and was perfectly content to spend the trip in silence. He heard the driver call to the horses, and off they were, the well-maintained coach doing nothing to prevent the bouncing from the poor conditions of the country roads.

—

Jesper sat on his bed in the dormitories of Ketterdam University. He was thinking — not uncommon for him, only the depth of the thoughts providing much resistance. Despite that, he was thinking.

He had heard that, with the start of a new semester swiftly approaching, some people, who hadn't previously had roommates (one of which he was), would be receiving them. Them being roommates, of course.

Anyway, he had been wondering whether he would be one of the few, and whether he wanted to be, and whether there was anything to do about the matter.

His room was neither very well decorated nor very neatly organized. The door was situated in one corner, shabby as it was. There were holes in it from where people had, presumably, pinned up artwork or letters or the like, as well as a nick right above the doorknob — the result of some "light roleplay" gone a bit too far (Jesper's fault, though he would never admit it). The bed, in the corner furthest from the door, where Jesper himself slept —most of the time, at least — was rarely made. The other was across from the door, and it didn't even have any sheets. It served mainly as a dumping ground, of clothes, hats and probably an essay (or what should've been one) or two.

Beside Jesper's bed was a nightstand containing a lamp and an alarm clock that hadn't been set in at least four months. At the foot of his bed stood an armoire, which he had to admit was quite nice — several feet wide, a foot and a half deep, and built with a deep mahogany wood. There was detailing at the top that Jesper never really paid attention to, but thought was quite pretty, nonetheless.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door, jerking Jesper out of his deep thoughts and half-assed analysis of his dorm room. He rose from the bed, picked his way through the mess collecting specifically around his bed, and opened the door just a crack, enough to look and see if it was someone important enough to require a three-second tidying of the room.

"Yes?" Jesper had poked his head out so as to flash a foxy grin, as per his obnoxious character within these halls, but refrained by the moment of meeting eyes with his educational advisor — polite speak for both what was essentially his jailer and parole officer. "Ah– sir. I wasn't expecting you."

Jesper was very glad that he was wearing both a shirt and trousers, casual as they were.

"I can see that," said the obviously older man, whose age was enough that it was impolite to ask but enough so as to demand proper, meaningful respect. "Well, Mr. Fahey—" the man shifted his glasses further up his nose, shifting his gaze along with them while Jesper closed the door behind himself— "you are alive."

"Whatever gave you the impression that I wasn't?" Jesper flashed a half-toothed grin that he only slightly regretted — he had gone down that path with his advisor some ill-begotten months ago, and while that night hadn't been particularly awful, it wasn't exactly his goal to repeat it, either. At least his advisor wasn't an actual professor — they could have gotten in trouble for inappropriate student-staff relations if they had been caught.

"You haven't responded to any attempts to get in contact with you. From the school, I mean. About your tuition payments. That, and you are the only student not to have acknowledged that you are being assigned a roommate."

As of this moment, Jesper was aware of the fact that there was very little room between him and the man across from him. His own back was practically right against the wall — owing to the fact that his room was at the very end of the hallway — and his advisor had not moved after Jesper decided to join him in the hallway.

Jesper cleared his throat while taking a polite step to the side, allowing a safe distance between them.

"Well, Mr. Debree, thank you very much for your diligence." His advisor, — the Mr. Debree — gave him a look.

"Yes, well, that's not all. It's all important because the headmaster wants everyone to meet their new roommates beforehand. In his office. Your meeting is in fifteen minutes," he added, nearly an afterthought despite it being the most important piece of information he'd been kind enough to share.

—

Wylan was soaking wet. His beautiful reddish golden curls were plastered to the sides of his face, one springing up to curl at the nape of his neck. He was treading water, and despite his best efforts to look more serious, he gave off the appearance of a wet and very unhappy kitten. The ferry he was on — or rather, had previously been on — was slowly gliding further away, its strong yet silent engine pushing massive amounts of water towards Wylan.

As yet another wave of thick, murky river water tugged at his feet, Wylan attempted to swim. Any which way was fine for the moment, but out of the steam ferry's current was preferable.

Spying a ladder built into the canal wall — for people who found themselves in Wylan's situation (or similar situations, as he supposed not many others had been attempted at being murdered by a man hired by their fathers) — Wylan made his way toward the edge of the river.

His foot whacked something in the water below him. As he was both unable to see into the vaguely brown water and was all too aware of Ketterdam's reputation, he tried very hard not to think about what it was.

Wylan's hand met solid metal — slick and slippery as it was — and he began to pull himself to safety. Once he was out of the water, he promptly began to shiver.

His trousers hung from hips much lower than they had before; he'd lost his belt. Water trickled from every scrap of clothing that was pulled down by gravity — that is to say, nearly all of it. Wylan removed his jacket and wrung it between his hands. A splattering noise as a large amount of water from it hit the ground called more attention to him than even before.

Not that there were many people to observe the pitiful scene, of course. A street vendor whose cart was suspiciously empty of any goods all but Wylan's full audience. Other people dotted the street, too, but most were too busy to notice some rich man's drenched son.

"Oi, laddie," called the street vendor, who, as Wylan turned to look at him, had only one eye. "Are ye..." He waved around a spatula with one hand. There was no food in sight for him to be cooking.

Wylan swallowed and clenched some more water out of, this time, his shirt. "I'm fine," he said as his voice cracked so that it was obvious that he was, in fact, not fine. The strange street vendor with one eye gave him a once-over with his one eye.

"C'mere, laddie, aren't ye cold?"

Wylan, not looking where he was going, stepped in a pile of horse shit that was handily plopped by the side of the curb. He wrinkled his nose, realized he was still in drenched clothing in the middle of a dangerous city, and decided he didn't have the time or energy to be disgusted by poop on his shoe. He made his way to the one-eyed man.

Despite the chill of the early afternoon air (it was approximately a quarter bell past one and you could not see the blue of the sky for the ash and smoke of the factories), Wylan's clothes were miraculously drying bit by bit.

The one-eyed street vendor was in the process of getting both socks and a shirt out of the car that still held no goods that the man could be selling. "Here ye are, laddie. Don't go catching a cold before ye have a chance to get over yer first attempt on yer life." He (literally) eyed Wylan with a certain malicious intent. "That were what happened, aye?"

Wylan had already peeled off his shoes and soaked socks and looked up at the man from his hastily taken seat on the ground. "I– I think so," he said, trying to figure out how to put on the fresh socks without immediately getting them wet, too. "What do I do about it?"

The man barked out a single laugh. "Well, ye give 'em hell!" he said, flashing a grin that lacked several teeth. "Where ye be heading, laddie?"

Wylan, having decided that his decency was already forfeited, was in the process of unbuttoning his shirt. He paused momentarily to answer, "The university. Or at least the ferry stop closest there to." and then resumed the undressing in pursuit of a fresh, dry shirt.

The old man spewed out a set of directions — straight up that way until the statue with a bucket by the feet, a left there and a right after three streets and then the university ferry stop was a block down that way. Wylan had then buttoned his replacement shirt and put on the extra socks, and he rose to give the one-eyed man his thanks.

Much to his surprise, there was no one there. Staring straight at the spot where he could've sworn the cart was just a second ago, someone bumped into him from behind, hitting his shoulder. Any sort of apology died on its way out of his throat as he collected his things — wet socks were stuffed in his jacket pocket and shoes were in his hands. As he followed the disappeared man's instructions, he realized that there wasn't a single street name in them — nothing he'd need to read at all.

By the time Wylan reached his appointed goal — the university — the ferry had docked. Recently, by the looks of it; stragglers collected their belongings on the upper deck, while a majority were clustered on either side of the thin gangway.

Wylan tucked himself behind a column across the street — he spied the bruiser who had pushed him overboard without so much as a second glance. To his surprise and slight irritation, the man carried Wylan's mother's bag in one great paw, getting his grubby fingerprints all over the fine leather. Wylan attempted to convince himself that he didn't have time to get all worked up over the mistreatment of his mother's messenger bag.

His attempted murderer had passed the congregation of tourists by the water's edge. Wylan crossed the street, ducking behind carriages and carts in time to avoid the gaze of his mark.

He was nearing the man now, and, miraculously, the man set down the bag on the ground as he pulled a very beat up map out of his pocket. He fit in astoundingly well with the equally confused tourists around him, despite being a head taller than the vast majority of them.

Wylan couldn't believe his luck as he sidled up behind the man, picked up his bag, and strolled along with it in hand, not a care in the world. His heart was beating faster than it ever had before, and his fingers were clenched so tightly around the handle that it would take a miracle to unravel them even willingly, but he'd done it — he'd pulled off his very first theft. Even if he was only stealing back his own things.

With his catch securely in hand, Wylan walked confidently onto the university campus. He had been told that he was to be there at precisely two bells past noon, and if his sense of time was remotely reliable, that was in just a few minutes.

★ author's note ★

yayyyyy first chapter out!! looking
forward to all of your comments
omg <3 hope yg like it; next part
is out in a week, next friday :]

word count: 2,824