2: Kenet

It took me a long time to realize that being whipped in front of all assembled on his first day in the castle was no less a cruelty than Jorin expected. He hadn’t known exactly that his fate was to be my whipping boy, but he hadn’t expected life to be kind. The orphanage was not a kind place. The castle, at least, would be a step up.

He told me this later, much later. Back then, he didn’t tell me anything, because he hardly ever spoke.

That did not bother me in the slightest as apparently I talked enough for us both. I have only the vaguest memory of that time. He slept in my bed with me and went everywhere with me, except for the meetings with my father, twice a week, the only times my father and I were ever alone, unattended.

Jorin started to speak more than just the occasional word to me after we began formal schooling. Reading, writing, mathematics, ancient tongues, and fencing. Until then I think most of the household believed him mute. But he had to speak when our tutor asked him for answers. He still almost never spoke to anyone but me. And why should he? What did he have to say to guards or maids or attendants?

We spoke the most at night. In whispers.

Some things have not changed, now that we are of age.

~*~

Jorin’s breath was sweet from chewing on sechal bark, and warm...