Page 42 of A Theory of Dreaming
Southey’s smile was wide and resplendent. He had been gratified after all.
But Preston would not give him the satisfaction of showinga single quiver of fear. Without another word, he stepped pointedly around Southey and out through the door of the classroom. He walked down the corridor, not pausing for a moment, and not looking back. It was only when he was outside the literature college, the snow piling wetly on the gray steps and his breath turning white-plumed in the cold, that he allowed himself to pause, bracing himself with one hand on the wall, feeling sick with all his swallowed rage.
As was often the case, Lotto’s troubles provided a much-welcome distraction.
Preston had gone to the porter’s lodge to pick up the package from his mother, but when he arrived, he found his roommate there, seated glumly on one of the benches. His chin was cupped in his hands and his expression was both defiant and doleful. He looked like a primary school student who had been sent to the principal for paddling.
“Lotto,” Preston said in surprise. “What are you doing here?”
He looked up morosely from beneath dark brows. “I should’ve listened to you after all, it seems... Itriedto go to Damlet’s class, but he wouldn’t have me. Said I’d missed too much. And perhaps—perhaps—there were several choice words I shouldn’t have used in reply...”
Preston sighed.
“He told me to wait for him in the lobby,” Lotto went on, “and when he was finished with class, he’d come out to speak with me. But I knew he’d just send me to Master Gosse for discipline, andGosse would write a letter to my father, so I thought, well, I’ll just preempt that, and write to my father myself, but I didn’t have any paper andhe”—Lotto cast a sullen look at the porter—“wouldn’t loan me any.”
“This isn’t a stationery shop,” the porter said in reply. His accent, like that of all the university’s workers, was nearly incomprehensible, the drawl of Llyr’s lower class. They also seemed to enjoy being as rude and short with the students as possible, perhaps their petty vengeance against the aristocrats they were forced to serve.
Preston had never much minded their rudeness. He was very aware that his financial status was closer to the porters’ than it was to Lotto’s or Southey’s or even Effy’s. So, with another sigh, he opened his satchel and said, “Here. I have some paper.”
“Thanks,” Lotto muttered. “Perhaps you can advise me on how to inform my father that I’m a rotten failure without sounding like, well, a rotten failure.”
As Preston tore a page from one of his notebooks and handed it to Lotto, he considered his friend’s predicament. It was only when he shifted and felt the dragon pin press against his chest that he landed upon a solution.
“Tell him I’ve been made legate,” Preston said. “Tell him that from now on I’ll be enforcing your schedule and disciplining you accordingly. Master Gosse won’t have to be involved at all.”
“Oh, my father will love that,” Lotto said. “If he could alter the course of fate and make you his son instead of me...”
Lotto trailed off, and Preston looked uncomfortably away. Hewas not picturing the earl in his mind. Instead he was seeing his own father, surrounded by those imperturbable and glorious walls of marble. He was seeing the torches that flickered with green flame.
After Lotto finished his letter—which Preston checked over for grammar and spelling—stuffed it into an envelope, and handed it to the surly porter, Preston placed his own hands on the porter’s desk and asked, “Is there a package for me?”
“Héloury, right?” The porter squinted. Preston nodded. “Yes. Just a minute.”
The porter vanished into the mail room. Preston waited, while Lotto paced and huffed and murmured to himself in a very distracting way. After a few moments, the porter reemerged, bearing a sloppily wrapped and battered-looking package. He set it on the counter.
The box was torn in several places, and the tape had clearly been broken and then hastily rewrapped. His mother’s return address was smudged and nearly unreadable. Preston frowned. “What happened?”
“They’ve been checking all the packages from Argant,” the porter replied. “At the border. Looking inside. Making sure there’s no”—the porter appeared to be struggling with the word—“contraband.”
That familiar nauseous feeling of anger overtook Preston. He snatched the package off the desk and marched out of the porter’s lounge without another word. Lotto followed, hastily pumping his legs to catch up with him. When Preston paused down the corridor, slightly breathless, his friend asked, “You all right?”
“Fine.” Preston’s voice cracked. He sat down on one of the benches and began to unwrap the package. His fingers were shaking, making his movements clumsy. After a few moments, Lotto reached over tentatively and helped him peel off the tape.
Preston couldn’t articulate his gratefulness; he was too on edge. He pawed through the crumpled-up paper his mother had used to protect the cargo and pulled out the clothbound book.
It was precisely as he had remembered it: the battered green cover, the spine coming undone, the corners of the pages creased with so many markings.Les Contes de Fées d’Argant, it read,par Ulysse Guégan. The cover had an intricate border of winding vines, surrounding a stamped drawing of a young woman with a serpent’s tail, her golden hair arranged conscientiously to cover her bare breasts.
“What’s that?” Lotto asked.
“Fairy Tales from Argant,” Preston translated. “It’s just a book I read with my father when I was young. I wanted to have it for, ah, sentimental reasons, I suppose.”
“Looks like a rollicking good time.”
Preston let out a short laugh. “Yes, it’s full of drama and intrigue.” He placed the book on the bench and stood to throw the box away. But when he lifted it, he heard something else rattle inside.
He fished through the paper until his fingers closed around something solid, small, and square. He lifted it out and held it up into the light. It was a pocket-size velvet box, which was held with a golden clasp.
Preston knew what it was before he even flipped it open. Nestled within, between folds of velvet, was his mother’s engagement ring. An oval blue sapphire, on a silver band, ringed with smaller cut diamonds. The light played off it, patterning the wall of the porter’s lodge with a quivering rainbow.
