Player's Guidebook (ao3 link)
Kolivan had a roaring headache. He tried to blink it away, but that only made him dizzy.
“Representative?” Lurok’s stern voice came to him annoyed.
“You’re exceeding my patience, Lurok.”
“I come to you as a concerned citizen. Is this how you intend to keep your job? By neglecting it?”
“Your concern will be revised as soon as possible,” Kolivan gritted out. Lurok seemed smugly satisfied and exited Kolivan’s office at a near strut.
Kolivan shoved the report into a thick file labeled Lurok , where he kept all the poorly concealed militaristic agendas Lurok came up with. Sometimes Kolivan brought the file to Krolia so they could laugh at the increasingly ludicrous veils Lurok came up with over drinks. Krolia kept her own file.
Today, however, Lurok had pressed all the wrong buttons, starting with entering the office with a snarky reminder that it had been his “not too long ago” and ending with an almost blatant accusation of nepotism, Kolivan only having kept the position because of his entanglement with “the Altean bootlicker,” which was all kinds of rich —
Kolivan took a not so calming breath, dragging a hand along his face. The obnoxious beeping of a call came ringing, making his ears flatten. He answered without looking.
“ Darling! Wait—this a bad time? ”
Coran’s voice came like a wave of relief. A small smile pulled at Kolivan’s lips.
“Only a little,” he said, sitting up and opening his eyes.
“ I was just double checking for tonight’s plans. That is, if you’re feeling up for it. ”
Tonight. What had he agreed to again?
“ I certainly wouldn’t want to bore you ,” Coran said hurriedly. He was on the verge of rambling; he was insecure of whatever Kolivan had agreed to.
“You could never bore me, Coranic,” Kolivan said confidently. “Once I’ve finished here, I’ll head over. Don’t fuss so much.”
Coran chuckled, the blush on his cheeks a soft tinted blue through the call. “ Alright. I’ll see you soon, love. ”
“Yes.”
“ Bye-bye. ”
The call ended. He still couldn’t recall what he had agreed to, but he was sure he wouldn’t have done so if he hadn’t found it at least a little interesting. It didn’t really matter. Spending time with Coran always lightened his spirits, seldom a dull moment between them.
He hurried through the paperwork on his desk, meeting requests and project authorizations and Blade deployments that needed special permissions. His temple throbbed, but he’d be home soon and that was somewhat soothing.
“Rest well, sir,” his secretary, Ubzir, said as Kolivan handed him the outgoing correspondence of the day.
“I expect to, thank you,” Kolivan said with a half-smile.
It was odd, these courtesies. They were words that had no real use, no purpose other than well-wishing. They were foreign to the Galra tongue, still acclimating to their more recent role in history. It was clunky; it was nice.
* * *
He took a public shuttle to Altea, the thought alone of flying himself over being too exhausting. They dismounted at Pilar C, the closest to the Castle of Lions. The first time Kolivan had stepped foot on Altea, he’d first thought it was nothing short of a miracle. A planet that hadn’t been seen in millennia, had endured only the briefest period of Zarkon’s terror, brought back in a state of near intactness. Its allure wore off eventually, becoming just another on the list of places in need of help. Unremarkable until it wasn’t.
Coran changed all that. The Plaza, the Opera, the gardens, the ruins, the fields; places on a map. Places that now lit up in his head and made him smile. The word home came to mind, but he thought that had more to do with Coran than with Altea. He thought of Daibbazal as home too, but only when he knew Coran was waiting for him back at the apartment.
Once reaching the castle, Gixu escorted him to Coran’s location, the rec room. It was dark, a group of people huddled around the display panel.
“Rep—uh, Kolivan just arrived, sir,” Gixu announced. Coran shot to his feet, Kolivan could almost feel the enthusiasm emanating from him. It was only a little too much after the day he’d had. Kolivan squared his shoulders and braced.
“Thank you very much, Gixu. You can join us, if you like,” Coran said, walking around the couch with the brightest smile.
“I’d hate to intrude, sir,” Gixu said rather anxiously.
Coran waved the comment off. “Feel free, honestly. Or maybe next time.”
“Sure thing, sir,” Gixu tried for a smile. Kolivan felt like he should spare her from Coran’s attention.
“You’re free to go,” he said as pleasantly as he could. He wasn’t used to giving out gentle dismissals.
“Thank you,” Gixu said, in a breath that sounded like relief. She hurried out of the room faster than Kolivan expected.
“Let the poor girl breathe,” he said, gathering Coran up in his arms.
Coran chuckled, squeezing around Kolivan’s neck. “Sorry. It’s just—the more the merrier.”
“Right.”
“Right,” Coran grinned, melting Kolivan’s heart. He leaned up on the tips of his toes to reach Kolivan’s lips, smiling into the kiss. “Come on, then. Let’s get you settled.”
Huddled around the table were Curtis, Shiro, and Emi. The table itself was functioning as a map, the terrain’s relief projected onto the hologram. Kolivan wondered if he had walked into a Coalition meeting.
“Alright, here’s your interface,” Coran handed him a small screen. “Input your character information and this’ll keep track of your stats, like your health points, spell slots, skill proficiencies, and experience points.”
Kolivan tried to keep his face clear from confusion, trying to put together the missing pieces of information. He used to be a lot sharper, able to quickly find his footing in a foreign scenario. The years were gaining on him.
“Right,” he said with a facade of confidence. Coran smiled brightly, clearly excited for Kolivan to be there. Kolivan willed himself to put everything together faster.
He sat down next to Emi, studying the map on the table. It wasn’t Coalition. There was no strategy in the position of the figures on the board. There was a die with more sides than Kolivan had ever seen and Curtis was leafing through a book, but Kolivan couldn’t make out the letters on the front.
The figures snagged in his mind. He’d seen them a thousand times maybe, but he couldn’t place them.
His desk. His eyes had settled on one figure, Coran’s figure, for movements. Back when he’d been given the privilege to accompany Coran during his recovery. Kolivan’s eyes had been free to wander anywhere in that room, but they’d always settled on Coran and the little trinkets that surrounded him.
The game was Monsters & Mana. He’d asked Coran about the figure once, since it was so different from the rest of his trinkets, and Coran went on a passionate rant about the game he'd played as a boy and even played once with the paladins and Allura. Kolivan had been a little enamored by the way Coran juggled talking and working with his hands or did his engineering calculations without seemingly fumbling either.
“Do you have your character ready?” Emi asked, somewhat timidly.
“Hm?”
He pointed at the screen in Kolivan’s hand. “Do you need help?”
Ever since The Incident, Emi had behaved more unnerved around Kolivan. Kolivan had never thought him to be a nervous man before that, so it wasn’t lost on him that Emi had developed some form of fear towards him. Perhaps he thought Kolivan resentful, which he wasn’t. But he did find the new way Emi jumped around him amusing.
“Yes,” Kolivan said, genuinely grateful.
“Okay,” Emi smiled, his shoulders relaxing. “With which part?”
“All of it,” Kolivan said in a whispered tone. Emi’s smile reached his eyes, looking back to Coran who was answering Curtis’s barrage of questions. Emi knew now that Kolivan’s affections for Coran weren’t flights of fancy, but it couldn’t have been clearer to him than in that moment.
“Very well,” he nodded, “let’s start with your character class.”
They settled on klazgool, Emi reasoned that it aligned best with Kolivan’s instincts, decision-making during the game would come more naturally that way. The interface filled out a portion of the blanks with klazgools’ average statistics.
“Name?”
Kolivan raised an eyebrow. “Kolivan?”
“No, no, for your character.”
“Is my name not sufficient?”
“Well, no, of course, it’s perfectly sufficient,” Emi said at a near ramble. “But you can name them something else if you like.”
“Like what?”
“Well, I named mine based around their backstory. Trick comes from a long line of mavens and is the eighth of his name, determined to pass on not only his knowledge, but his name as his fathers before him had done.”
“Is that in the Guidebook?”
“No, I made it up. That’s part of the game.”
“Kolivan,” Curtis called his attention over, “if it helps, I named my character Wimbledon, y’know, after the tennis tournament. I like tennis and it sounds fancy, mage-like. It can be as simple as that.”
“Understatement of the century,” Shiro chuckled. “You love tennis. Wimbledon is—and I’ve heard you say this—the most sophisticated word in your vocabulary.”
Curtis elbowed him playfully. “Well, at least I didn’t name my character Gyro. ”
“Look, technically I didn’t name him, but I stand by the decision made before me,” Shiro said with a shrug. “You can absolutely name your character after yourself, Kolivan. I know I would’ve.”
An echo of his headache was creeping back to his temples. They weren’t even playing yet.
“Look here, love,” Coran said gently, placing the player’s guidebook in his hand. “You can pick from the suggestion list here. Klazgools are natural born warriors with a penchant for traditional names, most have between these five.”
He knew this meant a lot to Coran and he was determined to show him that he understood that. He wanted to try.
“Kulda. That’s the name. Kulda the…Loyal, first of his name,” Kolivan offered Coran a smile, handing him back the book. Coran’s marks lit up when he smiled, absolutely endearing.
“Alright, is everyone ready?” Coran asked, taking his seat at the map’s control panel. “Then let the adventure begin!”
As it turned out, Coran had run a small portion of the game already; as the players had arrived, Coran had given them only bits of information.
First had been Shiro: Gyro’s journey had led him to an old man that required a favor in exchange for information. A favor that took him to the entrance to a cave.
Second had been Curtis and Emi: Wimbledon and his companion, Trick, had been tasked with the retrieval of their town’s leader’s war hammer, their only clue leading them to a haunted mountain.
Finally, it was Kolivan, last to have arrived: Kulda had received a poem a few weeks after his sword, Blackrazor, had been stolen. A calling card from the thief that led him to the village of Yellowreach. The “feathered mound” the poem described was only a few miles away.
Kulda opted to investigate the surrounding area at the foot of the mountain, only to find a mage and maven poking around as well. They soon came upon a paladin at the entrance to the cave where they would “burrow away from the sun.”
Coran briefed them of their mission: each were tasked with the same goal—retrieve the three sentient weapons that had been stolen—and delve into the belly of the volcanic mountain, haunted by the demons and traps left behind by the rumored thief—a mage not seen in thirteen hundred years, having had disappeared into the mountain along with his legion of minions. While their allegiances were tied to different wills and masters, they had to work together to wade through White Plume Mountain and escape with their lives.
Coran took them through the cavern, erecting small armies of creatures to get in their way or setting up trap passages to either kill them or impede their progression. Kolivan noticed a growing frustration in Coran when they proved too clever for his puzzles, evident in the furrow of his brow, the notes he seemed to scratch out and rewrite, and the vengeful difficulty at which the puzzles seemed to increase.
The party wandered into a room of permanent darkness early on. The room was guarded by a creature of the night that preyed on the blood of weary travelers. Gyro executed the beast, finding that the old man’s request was under the creature’s protection as well: a trident, the “wave in need of rescue.” Given the choice to abandon the party, his mission complete, Gyro decided against it, being the noble paladin by their side.
Halfway through Coran’s cavern of madness, they emerge above a boiling lake encased in a bubble. A demonic combination of a puzzle and creature encounter, as Wimbledon and Trick faced an enormous crustacean while diverting all harm that would come to the bubble, the delicate barrier that separated the boiling lake from them. The crustacean’s defeat earned them Whelm, the war hammer they sought “past waterspouts double”. The duo remained with the party, thinking their chances of returning alive better if accompanied by the strength of their companions.
Coran seemed a little irked by the camaraderie the party displayed.
Toward what must’ve been the end of that hell dungeon, Blackrazor found itself in the hands of a monstrous mage—“remaining to be won”—wielded more like a rod of magic than an actual sword. With the help of the newly rescued weapons, Kulda managed to subdue the crazed mage, but they knew it wasn’t their thief.
“Warily, you retrace your steps,” Coran told them. Kolivan surprisingly found himself tense and anxious, like he was expecting a real-life ambush. “Can you all roll me a skill check, please?”
“Which one?” Shiro asked.
“Stealth.”
“Shit,” Emi mumbled.
“Success or failure, fellas?” Coran prodded.
“Is fifteen a success?” Shiro asked.
Coran frowned at his notes, Kolivan watching the tendons of his hand flex with the urge to edit something. “Barely.”
“Success,” Kolivan informed.
“Success!” Curtis cheered.
“Oh, quiznak ,” Emi whispered. Coran perked up immediately, ready to savor the words that would follow. “Failure. What happens now?”
Coran grinned from ear to ear, something sadistic and vindictive in his expression. “Trick, you’ve tripped on the rocky path and triggered something. ”
“I cast Arcane Detection,” Curtis said hurriedly.
“Do you have spell slots left?”
“Yes.”
“Are your hands free? That spell has a somatic component.”
“One hand is enough,” Curtis said, checking his interface.
“Fine, you cast Arcane Detection,” Coran relented. “Your senses are flooded, the magic left by the mage extends itself through every crevice of the mountain. As far as your spell ranges, you can tell the path is laced in traps. Anything else you want to do?”
“Run,” Kolivan said.
“Are you crazy?” Emi looked at him, startled.
“There’s already something we’re unaware of unfolding, I’ve got what I came for and I’m not going to wait around to find out what you triggered,” Kolivan reasoned. “Coran, Kulda is running.”
“Wonderful, you run.”
“No checks?” Shiro asked.
Coran simply shrugged. This was borderline psychological warfare.
The party followed Kulda’s lead. Coran allowed them the false hope of spotting the light at the end of the dungeon’s exit, but something crashed upon Kulda’s shoulders, pinning him to the ground.
“ I care not, former owners brave, what heroes you seek to hire. Though mighty, I’ll make each one my slave, or send him to the fire, ” a frayed voice croaked. A mage stood before them, features grotesque and stature small, much too young for someone over thirteen hundred years of age. “I, the one and only Keraptis, have waited a long time for your arrival. It seems it’s time I handle you myself.”
Coran straightened in his chair, typing something in his interface. Emi sat up as well, eyes wide and stuck to the screen in his hand.
“Fellas,” Trick said warily, “he’s lying. That can’t be Keraptis.”
“ Roll initiative. ”
The mage grew enraged at the suggestion, eloquent poems and long speeches vanishing in lue of a rampage. Kulda was prone, Wimbledon was down, Gyro had used his last spell slot to heal Trick; it wasn’t looking good for the unlikely companions.
“I am him, he is me,” the creature rasped in a craze. “There is only one who set the trap to lure in my new legion of minions, and it was me. ”
“You are an impostor,” Trick insisted. “The real Keraptis was a Common-man.”
The creature hissed, lunging at Trick.
“You get a reaction for that, Emi,” Coran informed him.
“Okay, I want to do something, but it might end badly,” Emi said, looking around at the table. “Is that okay?”
“I’m good with that,” Curtis said easily. “These saving throws aren’t looking good.”
“I don’t think it could get that much worse,” Kolivan said with a shrug. “Go ahead.”
Shiro nodded in agreement, clearly still trying to strategize some solution.
“Alright, I cast Fire’s Wick and I try to hold him in place.”
Coran wrinkled his nose at that. “Roll to grapple, contested.”
“Seven.”
Coran went from gleeful to dismayed. “Four.” Coran took a sharp breath. “Alright, you successfully hold on to him as the fire that was spreading from your hands engulfs him. You watch as he screams and writhes and catches on fire. It is not typical for a creature to be so flammable, but as Trick knows, the legion of minions Keraptis kept was an ill-advised one: mlarks, creatures particularly susceptible to fire, creatures that would surely grow mad and disfigured inside a volcanic mountain such as this one. Keraptis had long passed, the impostor before you a mere echo of his most brilliant minion. An echo that was now becoming a dangerous flame, roaring and consuming. What are you guys doing?”
“Can I run?”
“On the next turn, darling.”
“Well, I’m dying here,” Curtis said.
“Not if I can help it,” Shiro said stubbornly. “I pick up Wimbledon and start running to the exit.”
“Alright,” Coran said, turning to Emi. “You take some fire damage, being so close to the mlark.”
“And earn an exhaustion point,” Emi said, frowning at his interface. “I can’t run.”
“The flames continue to spread, the heat from the walls rising, Gyro and Wimbledon are out of the cave in this turn if you keep running,” Coran said to Shiro, who nodded. “Love, you can move this turn. With your full range of movement, you can get just outside of the flames, but you can also try to get Trick away from the epicenter. You’ll take fire damage, but it’ll be reduced. What will you do?”
“Whelm and Wave are with Gyro and Wimbledon, right?” Kolivan asked.
“Yes.”
Easy enough. “I’m grabbing Trick and using the movement I have left.”
“Strength check.”
“Christ, Coran,” Curtis complained. It wasn’t even his check to make.
“Numbers, please,” Coran insisted.
“Twenty.”
“ What? ”
“YES!” Emi nearly leaped out of his seat.
“About damn time,” Curtis huffed.
“Alright, alright. You heroically throw Trick over your shoulder, feeling him lighter than you expected him to be, and manage to get 45 cubes away from the fire instead of 30. The flames lick at your back and you take…two fire damage. Gyro and Wimbledon are now in the safety of the outside. Curtis, how are those saving throws?”
Curtis crossed his arms, somewhat defiant. “I’m telling this part.”
Coran conceded easily.
“As Gyro reaches the mouth of the cave, I see through heavy eyelids the first rays of the morning sun and the shifting colors of the sky as night becomes day. I draw a last peaceful breath as I realize we are out of danger, comforted in the arms of my paladin, and my grip on Whelm goes slack.”
“You died?” Emi whispered like it was a secret.
“I failed my last saving throw, had two successes and two failures.”
Shiro cleared his throat, lacing his fingers with Curtis’s.
“Aw, babe,” Curtis chuckled sympathetically, cradling his face with his other hand.
“Sorry,” Shiro sniffed, leaning his forehead against his husband’s. “We can keep playing, I just wasn’t expecting it.”
Kolivan averted his eyes, knowing the scene to be rather intimate. He imagined the loss of his companion was a rather sensitive topic for Shirogane.
“Darling,” Coran got Kolivan’s attention.
“Yes, love?”
“It’s your turn, unless Emi wants to do something?”
Emi shook his head.
“I keep running, Coranic. Am I out of the cave yet?”
Coran smiled, one of his kind smiles, and sat up in his seat. “As you make your grand escape, the mlark’s growing flames close behind, you reach the safety of the outside. Victorious in your commissions, Gyro heads out with a heavy heart to deliver the trident to the old man and receive the information he sought, and Trick wanders home, missing his friend but able to complete the mission they had set out together to do. Kulda, both master and slave to Blackrazor’s will and wants, continues his duty to appease the sword and solidify his legacy as the first of his name. And that’s the game.”
“Cheers, Coran,” Emi said, standing up with a stretch. “It was a great game. What hour is it, by the way?”
“Late,” Shiro said through a yawn, looking at his phone. “Super later. Coran, can we stay in my old quarters tonight?”
“You can stay in your quarters whenever, my boy. They’re yours.”
“Alright, well, I’m turning in,” Emi said, stepping around Kolivan. “Goodnight, fellas.”
Shiro and Curtis followed shortly after, leaving Coran to clear the minis from the holographic display and Kolivan leafing through the Player’s Guidebook.
“So, what did you think?” Coran asked with excited curiosity.
“It was fun,” Kolivan said easily. “I can also see why you’re so adept at battle strategy. I was very impressed.”
“Oh, uh, thank you,” Coran said, clearly caught off guard.
“You are also a very cruel Lore Master.”
That made Coran laugh. “Yes, I’ve definitely heard that one before.”
“Now, I’m going to bed. It’s been a long day,” Kolivan said, leaning over to kiss Coran’s cheek. “I’m not sure if you have any pending matters. Should I wait for you or...?”
“I’ll be right there. I just need to clear the table.”
“Alright.”
Kolivan slipped heavily into unconsciousness, with only a vague impression that Coran had made it to their bed. The next morning, he woke to find Coran’s side empty. He must have slept in, the exhaustion from the day before a bigger confine than he had realized.
“He lives,” Coran said from his desk. “I’ve never seen you sleep so much.”
“What’s the time?” Kolivan said, sluggishly sitting up and rubbing his eye. His eyesight was still trying to focus.
“Four hours past sunrise.”
“Hmph, great,” Kolivan stretched and dragged himself out of bed, causing Coran to whistle.
“I love when you don’t sleep with a shirt on,” Coran said with a sigh, making Kolivan chuckle.
“I never wear a shirt to sleep.”
“No, no. There was one time, early in our relationship, maybe the first time you stayed over. Massively disappointing.”
That got a good laugh out of him, making Coran brighten. He walked over to Coran’s desk and pulled a chair closer, crossing his arms and resting his chin on top. Coran’s eyes followed his movements, his hand instinctively reaching out and playing with Kolivan’s ear.
“Any meetings today?”
“No, just paperwork, processing requests and the like,” Coran said, his eyes skimming over his filer screen. “Hey, I’ve been wondering about something.”
Kolivan’s eyes were closing again, Coran’s fingers digging at some wonderful nerve just past his ear. “Hm? What about?”
“Where did you get the name Kulda?”
Kolivan gave him a questioning look, managing to open one eye. “What do you mean?”
“I love you dearly, you know this, but you’re not the most imaginative man I’ve ever met, Van.”
Kolivan chuckled at that. “Hm, right. It’s a pet name—a pet’s name. I had a fyukl when I was a boy. Ma let me keep it even though feeding it would be difficult. Her name was Kulda. She was a very good girl.”
“A fyukl. I haven’t seen one of those in—”
“Ten thousand years?”
Coran gave him a soft smile, the kind that hid his lips behind his mustache, yet crinkled his eyes. “Give or take, yeah.”
“They were more common on my side of the universe, but even then, they were rare. I haven’t seen one since Kulda.”
“Kulda the Fyukl.”
“First of her name. So, that makes the klazgool second of his name, technically.”
“So, you had fun last night, right?”
Kolivan rose to his elbows and leaned forward, finally kissing the silly man he loved. “Yes, I had fun.”
He tried to pull away, but Coran held him there, kissing him repeatedly until Kolivan couldn’t help but laugh against his lips.
“You’re sure?”
“I only do things I want to do, Coranic,” Kolivan said, pressing one last kiss to his lips and sitting up. “Speaking of, I’m going to get some breakfast. Have you had any yet?”
“Shiro had left some coffee in the kitchen.”
“ Coran. ”
“ Kolivan. ”
“I’m bringing you something to eat, too,” he said, walking to the dresser and pulling out some clothes.
“You don’t have to.”
“I’m going to. Stop complaining.”
Coran relented, knowing that insisting otherwise would only make them go in circles.
Kolivan was never picky about what was stocked in the kitchen at any given time. He was used to his food being bland and of questionable texture, any diversion from that was always welcome. He leaned on the counter, eating his food while he waited for Coran’s cream to finish heating up.
“Good morning,” Emi said brightly. “Funny how we never run into each other in the kitchen.”
Kolivan nodded politely, still chewing his green slime. He wasn’t sure what the dish was called.
“Hey, I never said thanks for saving me last night,” Emi continued, as he moved to fetch his own breakfast. “I thought your obvious move was to leave me behind.”
“It didn’t feel obvious,” Kolivan said simply. “It’s what you said about instinct. It made decision-making easier.”
“And your instinct was to save me? Why?”
Kolivan scraped the last few bites from the bottom of the bowl and cleaned the dish, before answering: “I have nothing against you, Emi. And it seemed like bad sportsmanship to just leave you.”
“Oh,” was all Emi seemed able to say. “Really? Even after…?”
Kolivan took a breath. He could have all the understanding in the world for the reasoning behind Emi’s actions, but that didn’t mean it didn’t frustrate him.
“You were just doing your job. Like I did my job last night.”
“Well, thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Have a good morning, Emi,” Kolivan said, grabbing Coran’s breakfast and heading back to their room.
He set the warm bowl in front of Coran, pushing away his digital filer. Kolivan had already known that it was a particularly difficult task to get Coran away from his work; he'd thought it was an admirable trait at some point. But as he grew to care about Coran, he realized it was more self-destruction than commitment that drove Coran to his work.
“Kolivan, I told you—”
“Shut up,” Kolivan said, holding him by the jaw and kissing him. “Eat.”
Coran sat back with a blush that was spreading from his cheeks to his ears, his marks glowing lightly.
“Alright, er, thank you—for, uh, the food.”
“It’s nothing, love.”
“How was your movement? I didn’t get a chance to ask last night,” Coran said, watching Kolivan take a seat at their bed and grab the book by the nightstand.
“Fine until it wasn’t,” Kolivan said, searching for his spot in the pages. “Lurok had just left when you called yesterday.”
“Oh.” Kolivan didn’t have to look up to know that Coran was wrinkling his nose. “He’s usually harmless, though, right?”
“He remains so, yes. But he’s fucking obnoxious.”
Coran laughed at that. “Sorry you have to deal with him.”
“Part of the job, unfortunately.”
“Well, I’m all done eating,” Coran said, tilting his bowl for Kolivan to see.
“Good. Let me know when you’re done with paperwork and the like.”
“Why’s that?”
“Believe it or not, I also find it massively disappointing to find you with clothes on in the morning,” he said, closing his book, having had very little left to read.
“Good grief,” Coran breathed out.
“I think I’ll head to the library, find myself something else to read. Pass the time.”
He looked up to find Coran somewhat dumbstruck.
“I’ll see myself out. Leave you to it.”
“Yes, right.”
It was only fair for Kolivan to play Coran’s game last night, following his lead and rules, since Coran had been playing Kolivan’s for far longer. Simple rules and high rewards that kept Coran from burning out from his workload.
Kolivan was sure it wouldn’t take Coran too much time to wrap up with work. And much to his delight, he was usually right.