Ch. 17 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Seventeen of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a whirlwind ensues.

Griswold frowned. “What sort of hound is it?”

“Bull-and-terrier.”

Her left brow arched. “Rat-catcher?”

Rat supposed it was rather funny for a man of his name to keep such a dog. “Aye.”

Whatever jokes Griswold might’ve made, she kept to herself. “Not catching rats at present, though.”

“Not in a pit. Though she does get hold of ‘em now and again in the corridors. Palace is big enough,” Rat added as Griswold’s right brow shot up to meet her left. “She’s plenty of room to find ‘em.”

“And they leave her to it, at the palace?”

Rat felt strange discussing palace life at university, where everyone play-acted as if they all stood on a level field. “She has a keeper. He sees to her needs particular.”

It hadn’t seemed right, throwing her in the kennel with the hunting dogs. She got on better with Iskandar’s long-shank cats and sleek sight-hounds. A palace pup through and through. Spoilt rotten, and who could begrudge her it?

“So she’s not wanting for company, then,” Griswold concluded.

“No,” Rat admitted with some hesitance. He couldn’t speak for the dog’s feelings on her constant companion abandoning her for greener pastures. But she wasn’t altogether alone, either. He hoped that might count for something.

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Ch. 16 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Sixteen of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a lock is proffered.

In the penny bloods a lass giving a lad a lock of her hair meant she wished to marry him when they were reunited. But Emlyn wasn’t a lass. More than a lad, certainly, but if xe were a lass specifically Rat rather thought xe would’ve told him. Or at least mentioned it in the letter if it were a recent development.

Yet Emlyn had said nothing. Not even a word about the hair itself. From the ink on the page one might never know the lock existed.

Rat had no idea what a lock of hair meant between lads and more-than-lads. He knew the sight of that precious dark curl made his heart leap into his throat and flutter in its cage and plunge into his guts all at the same time. The faint and familiar scent of it gave him the sort of head-ache that foretold burning eyes. And if any of the boys Rat had known in London caught his tears falling over such a thing, they’d give him far worse to cry about.

He wasn’t in London anymore, though. Gods willing he’d never find himself there again.

And here, gentlemen danced with gentlemen.

Rat reined in his wild flying hopes. The thing with feathers, as Pandora and her box would have it. It fought him all the way down.

Gents might dance with gents here. More-than-lads might befriend lads.

But princes didn’t dally with paupers in this realm or any other.

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Ch. 15 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Fifteen of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein an ocean is crossed.

It took Emlyn longer than it ought’ve done to perform the arithmetic. In no small part because the first two times xe came up with the answer xe discarded it out of hand for sheer improbability. Yes, the hours had seemed to stretch into eons in the cold dark void, but xir perception must’ve been skewed by fear. Xe couldn’t possibly have drowned for—

“Three days?” Rat whispered in evident disbelief.

The void Emlyn had narrowly escaped reappeared in xir chest.

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Ch. 14 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Fourteen of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a princely test is passed.

A hand clasped Rat’s—Emlyn’s hand, he realized, a half-second before his instinct would’ve flinched from the touch. Emlyn’s grasp, however, warm and familiar, anchored him fast.

As did Emlyn’s voice rising with arch command to ask, “When will the governor arrive?”

The ambassador’s smile widened. “He arrived not a quarter-hour past, your grace. He awaits your friend in the withdrawing room. If you would be so kind as to accompany me, Master Ratcliffe,” the ambassador added, turning to Rat.

Before Rat could decide whether to follow the ambassador or make a break for it through the window, Emlyn tangled their arms together and drew them up shoulder-to-shoulder.

“I’m going with him,” Emlyn declared.

And for the briefest instant, Rat thought he might have the courage to face the workhouse governor.

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Ch. 13 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Thirteen of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a princely repast is consumed.

The embassy folks called it “afternoon tea.” It involved a long table laden with more food than Rat had ever seen at once in all his days, served on silver salvers by silent-yet-deferential footmen.

Rat recognized the watercress, of course. And he’d seen advertisements for the chocolate biscuits pasted up on omnibuses and alley-walls but never had the chance to taste them for himself. Everything else, however, appeared altogether unfamiliar, though the sight and smell of it sparked an appetite that habitual starvation had rendered long-dormant. A queer shame arose in him, both from his hunger and his ignorance.

He glanced up from the bounty to find Emlyn gazing on him with a furrowed brow that banished with a smile.

“Would you care for some poached figs?” Emlyn asked, reaching for a shallow porcelain basin of plump green fruits floating in a sweet-smelling golden sauce.

Rat dutifully held out his plate so Emlyn might ladle the figs onto it. Biting into one made its pink flesh burst over his tongue in a riot of flavour.

“Try a muffin,” Emlyn suggested next, taking up a basket of small breads. He piled two on each of their plates.

Rat watched as Emlyn tore a muffin in half with his bare hands, exposing spongy innards. The butter he spread on them melted into the crevices. Rat followed suit and took a bite—warm, savory, and rich. He forced himself to slow down. This wasn’t the workhouse. No one lurked over his shoulder or at his elbow ready to snatch anything he didn’t eat fast enough.

“And some petit-fours?” Emlyn enquired, passing Rat a platter of tiny cakes drenched in a spectacular rainbow of coloured icing.

Rat paused his chewing as he realized what Emlyn was about. Offering up each individual victual by dropping its full title into conversation—which meant Rat didn’t have to make a fool of himself by asking what everything on the table was. Taking a portion of everything Rat accepted onto his own plate and showing by example how it ought to be eaten. Sparing Rat’s pride and keeping him fed all in one fell swoop.

It was hard to swallow around the unaccountable lump that’d formed all of a sudden in his throat, but Rat managed it all the same, if only for Emlyn’s sake.

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Ch. 12 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow on Patreon!

Chapter Twelve of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a prince’s worth is proved.

“Very well,” said the ambassador after a marked pause. “We thank you for your service to our prince. The clerk will direct you in how to collect your reward.” He nodded at the scrivener.

“Reward?” Rat echoed stupidly.

The ambassador served him a blank look. “The reward for our prince’s safe return.”

Then he named the sum from the pasted bill that’d sent Rat’s head spinning.

“The clerk will assist you in contacting your solicitor.” The ambassador paused. “Or perhaps in finding a solicitor for you. Someone to aid you in managing your fortune,” he continued in response to Rat’s bewildered look.

Rat still didn’t quite believe it. The sum would set him up for life—or anyone else, for that matter. He supposed the embassy might just send him on his way without the reward. Would certainly save ‘em a pretty penny if they did.

But he didn’t want the money. Not if it meant parting with Emlyn.

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Ch. 11 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Eleven of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein our hero survives a laboratory accident.

“I’m sure he’s just nervous,” Alistair assured Emlyn for the fifth time that afternoon.

For a fifth time, Emlyn found xe couldn’t believe him.

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Ch. 10 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Ten of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein a wretched dinner is endured.

“Caught you at last,” Emlyn declared with a grin.

Rat froze on the threshold to their dormitory, his fingertips still on the knob. His hand no longer had any putrefying fluids on it, as he’d undergone a hearty scrub up to the elbows before he’d left the dissection laboratory, but he felt as if he tarnished the knob nonetheless. Particularly beneath the gaze of his pristine prince. “What’s amiss?”

Which was really just a less overtly obsequious way of asking what his prince—his captain—required of him.

Emlyn blinked. “Nothing’s amiss. Just wanted to bring you down to dinner.”

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Ch. 9 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – m x nb romantasy on Patreon

Chapter Nine of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein favoritism goes awry.

“You needn’t look so sour,” Alistair told Emlyn in a tone of gentle teasing. “It’s full marks.”

This did nothing to improve Emlyn’s opinion of the essay that the professor had just handed back to xir.

Xe had dashed it off a scant hour before it was due. Its core argument—if it had any, and if xe were questioned now xe knew xe couldn’t give its summary—was borne not of rigorous study and reflection but rather of a flailing hazard towards points xe’d heard fellow students make in the lecture. It was not xir best work, and xe knew it. Therefore the essay could not have received full marks on its own merit.

Which left Emlyn to wonder what other reasons might lead xir professor to grade it so highly.

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Ch. 8 – A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow

Chapter Eight of A Mirror for the Prince’s Shadow – a historical m x nb romantasy featuring dark academia, hurt/comfort, and dragon royalty – is now on Patre♡n! Wherein friendships are forged.

The library wasn’t quite so bad as the dining hall, by Rat’s reckoning. For one thing, it proved quieter. For another, his nerves weren’t frayed by old instincts gnawing at the back of his mind, insisting everyone lurking over his hunched shoulders intended to steal his food. After all, the posted rules on the end-caps of shelves reminded students that no food or drink would be permitted on the premises.

Stares and whispers, however, continued.

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