37. Sabbatical

Hyde glanced up even though Ren still had her hands twisted in his hair. He bared his teeth as he said, "Oh goodie. My knife has a date with his throat."

The ball of foxfire lingering nearby coughed and bobbed up and down. Ren glanced at it and then down at Hyde. Slowly, she smoothed down the hair she'd spiked up. "He can't talk if you cut his throat."

"Then I'll wait," suggested Hyde. "I can start with some other parts first. Mercy isn't part of the plan, anyhow."

"Why are you so pissed at Merlin, Eddie?" asked Astolfo curiously.

"Butt out or I'll cut your nose off," Hyde told Astolfo flatly as he stood up, which had exactly the wrong effect.

Astolfo bounced closer. "Oh, come on, now I really want to know. Or shall I guess?" His head swiveled between Hyde and Ren. He started muttering to himself. "Hmm. Well, it's not that… well, mostly not that. But maybe it starts there?"

"Astolfo, read the room and put a sock in it," advised the ball of foxfire.

"I hate this," muttered Hyde, crossing his arms. "This is what Jekyll's good for. Being sensitive. Nice. Bored. And fuck, I need Merlin to get that floppy little ingrate back again." His hand snaked out to catch Ren by the arm. "Tell you what, I'll give up on Jekyll if you decide you want Petals to die, yeah?"

Ren twisted her hand to catch Hyde's arm. "It's a deal." She glanced at Astolfo. "You're unhurt?"

"Aww, Eddie wasn't really trying to hurt me," said Astolfo. "Just some bumps that are already better. I'm coming along, so don't try to stop me."

"I don't want to let you out of my sight," said Ren firmly and extracted herself from Hyde. "But I want you to stay out of the way, both of you, even if Merlin and I get into it."

Hyde shrugged, looking away again, while Astolfo looked dubious. "You think you can handle him?"

Ren's stomach churned, but her voice was steady as she said, "Better then either of you."

***

The ball of foxfire escorted them to a lecture hall in an airy modern building. The sign beside the door said, "Tricking Your Way To The Top, A Lecture Series by Visiting Professor MERLIN from the AGE OF FAIRIES: Lecture 1: Lying With Flowers."

Jonathan's voice said, "His class should be ending now… best step out of the way of the door."

An instant later, the double doors slammed open and a stream of excited students flowed past. It seemed to go on a long time, and when the crowd finally thinned, Ren saw the truly enormous room beyond. A few students clustered around the table and podium at the center of the hall, and in the middle of them Ren caught a flash of Merlin's prismatic hair.

Quietly, she moved closer, angling herself so she could watch, his floral scent tickling her nose even from a distance. Merlin's usual garb had vanished, replaced by a pearl gray suit with a tie that matched his eyes. The jacket had been tossed on the table he leaned against. He laughed easily as he talked with his fans, who were almost all women.

As Ren watched him flirt, wrapping everybody present around his finger, the churning in her stomach faded away until she felt nothing at all: not anger, not jealousy, not nervousness, nor pleasure or hope or fear. He raised so many emotions in her normally, but looking at him like this, from the outside, she felt nothing at all. She was perfectly cool.

Ah, my lady…? said Cú, unsettled by something. She had no idea what it could be. The ball of foxfire had vanished again, but Astolfo and Hyde had placed themselves high in the seats, earnestly pretending to be the well-behaved Servants they normally weren't. Everything was fine.

Merlin finally noticed her waiting and sent off his fanclub smiling with, "And here's somebody I've been waiting for, so I'll see you all later."

Ren didn't notice as the students left, watching as Merlin gave her a quizzical look and then moved to stack some random papers on the table. Finally, he finished and leaned on the table again. "Well?"

Her limbs like lead, Ren moved closer. "You've been waiting for me?"

"Of course," he said. Then his smile faded. He straightened, peering at her. "Ah, no, what you're doing to yourself isn't any good for either of us."

"Why have you been waiting for me?" she inquired, ignoring his meaningless second statement. Lilacs. He smelled of lilacs and freesia.

Merlin cocked his head and stepped closer. "That's what one does with fiancées, isn't it?

Hooboy muttered the peanut gallery in Ren's head. She ignored it. "Ah, is that what I am?" She was ice, that was what she really was. "Well, let's pretend for a while I'm a student."

Spreading his hands, Merlin said, "You're not jealous of my fanclub, are you? I was just being polite, honest—"

"I don't care." She stepped past him and sat down at one of the two chairs arranged at the table. "Let's pretend I'm a student, here to ask you a few questions about your speciality."

He remained where he was, staring at where she'd been, until suddenly he looked at her, smiling again. "All right." Sitting down across from her, he leaned forward on his elbow and said, "What can I do for you, Miss Student?"

"Illusions," Ren said crisply. "How do you break them?"

"Incapacitate or at least seriously distract the illusionist," said Merlin promptly.

Ren shook her head. "It's not that simple. The illusion persists. It's inside their minds and under their skin."

"Ah. Delusions, not illusions." Merlin looked throughtful. "Well, if they want to emerge, it's simple. Not easy, but simple." He cocked an eyebrow at her. "I think you know that already."

"And if they don't?" asked Ren, a hitch in her voice.

Calmly, Merlin said, "Usually, you have to hurt them." High in the seats, Hyde looked up alertly, eager to assist. Merlin went on. "Some kind of shock might do it, too."

Ren met his gaze steadily. "That's what you'd do?"

Merlin laughed as if she'd made a joke. "Me? I don't know if I'd meddle in a situation like that! But if I did, I have other tools at my disposal. Sometimes a lie about a lie can become the truth, you know? Or something close enough to live with, anyhow."

Ren remained silent, thinking, until Merlin leaned over the table to tuck a wisp of her hair behind her ear. "Are we still playing Office Hours or can we go get some dinner? Perhaps without your entourage? I did send mine away," he added teasingly.

Leaning on her hand, Ren returned to studying his face. "Do you really believe you're engaged to me? And you like it?"

She caught the flicker in his eyes before he said, "Yes, I do. Don't you?"

"I can't quite work out what you get out of all this, though," mused Ren. "Coming here, going along with their magic, but this is what you want?"

"I'm starting to get the feeling we're not actually talking to each other, Serendipity," said Merlin with mock severity. "Is it so unbelievable that I'd want to be engaged to you?"

With a flash of temper, Ren said, "It'd serve you right if I said no and started planning the wedding." She found herself wanting to interrogate him, to see how far back the story went, and how many details he'd made up. But that was a dangerous rabbit hole, and led to the lair of a beast formed of all her fears that would utterly consume her.

Merlin took both her hands in his. "Tell me what's wrong," he commanded, in a voice of unusual authority.

Ren took her hands back again, tucking them under her arms. "No, you tell me what's wrong." She wanted to dump him, break off the pretend engagement, just to provide that hurt he said was neccesary. But she didn't really believe that would do it. She was fairly sure if she tried he'd just laugh at her, tease her, and spin her another lie. If he wanted to stay here, she'd never be able to pull him out. She could barely even reach him. She certainly couldn't hurt him, and she was confident Hyde couldn't either, despite his big dreams.

Merlin stood and came around to pull her out of her chair, looking at her closely. She glared at him as her anxiety and frustration started trickling back from the hole she'd pushed them into.

"You don't trust me," he finally announced, and sighed. His eyebrows swooped down as he considered more. "Well…" he said, and then shook his head. Instead he put his hands on the sides of her head and leaned in to kiss her.

And, although it unearthed all the rest of her buried emotions, she let him. In the situation, she couldn't even imagine doing anything else.

He started with a light, delicate brush of his lips over hers; a flick of his tongue and continued into a slow and shallow exploration of her mouth, as if he might break her by accident. It was certainly a far more gentle kiss than Hyde had ever given her. Her hands came to rest on his chest, but she didn't shove him away. This was part of the lie, an obvious part of the lie, she knew that and yet she couldn't resist it.

But after a moment or two, he spoke against her mouth. "Do it, then. What you came here to do."

Ren pushed then and he released her, giving her a calm, almost pleasant, expectant look. She took a deep breath. "I'm not engaged to you, Merlin. None of this is real, but even if it was… I'm not engaged to you. Pretend I'm flinging the ring at your head. We're over. You're single. No dinner for you."

Merlin's eyebrows drew together in a frown, and he looked from side to side as if confused by something. His mouth twisted and he said with a wave of his hand, "This isn't working the way I expcted it to."

The two of them were suddenly alone in the lecture hall, without even the distant noise of the rest of the campus. The shadows of the hall became strange and twisted, as if the architecture was far more twisted than it appeared. Conversationally, he said, "You know, I didn't expect you'd take so long to get to the point."

"Great, I surprised you," said Ren flatly, her heart pounding hard as the warmth of his kiss faded from her mouth. "Are you going to be annoyed at me again?"

"Oh no," he assured her. "I've learned. I'd only end up with whiplash. Hmm." He looked back and forth again, as if he expected the lecture hall to be different.

"Why did I have to get to the point anyhow?" Ren demanded. "What was the goal of this little charade?"

Merlin smiled at her distantly. "Because I really am under an enchantment, Serendipity. You're thinking I could have fought harder against it in the beginning and we wouldn't be in this mess, and you're right! But I was curious and I didn't think it would be a challenge to escape later. Unfortunately, they have some pretty old magic here."

"You're talking to me here, but you're still enchanted," said Ren slowly. "So what is this, a dream?"

"Something like that. Even enchanted, I'm still me. I'm just convinced I'm on a sabbatical, intent on enjoying your company," he gave her a sidelong look, "even as grumpy as you are. And I have the strangest dreams. Like this one." He spread his arms. "Gettting dumped by you was supposed to snap me out of it. But it doesn't seem to have had much impact. Are you sure you really put your heart into it?"

"Of course I didn't," snapped Ren. "I don't want to drive you off, I want to take you with me and put you to work. The fact that you can talk to me like this, here, now, isn't helping your case any. I can kind of understand it, but it's pissing me off."

"Hmm," Merlin said a third time. "You may have to take me with you as is, then. Put up with my dream-ridden lovelorn self. Won't that be fun?"

Ren clenched her fists. "No. It'll be really—" She stopped. Merlin's gaze had dropped from her face to her chest. "What?"

"What happened to your top?" he asked.

She looked down and saw the rip in her neckline the ambitious Hyde had torn when she'd kissed him outside Jonathan's Raven Tower office. It wasn't indecent. Except for the ragged edges it could have been by design. She opened her mouth to explain and then hesitated over what she actually wanted to tell Merlin. It wasn't as if she owed him details. She wasn't sure he deserved details.

A shockingly dark look flashed through his eyes when she paused, an emotion intense and powerful she couldn't quite identify. Anger? Jealousy? Pain? Hunger? Something only known to half-incubi? She didn't know, but for an instant it transformed him.

Then he said, smiling suddenly and back to himself, "Actually, I think I see my way clear. A bit of a delayed reaction for my waking self. I'll send you back now, and if you can wait for me, I'll rejoin you shortly."

Before she could agree, the sound and lighting of the original lecture hall came rushing back and Merlin vanished. Ren looked around to see Hyde and Astolfo watching her intently. Hyde's eyes narrowed as she turned toward him, his gaze going to her chest just as Merlin's had. She glanced down again and saw the ripped fabric had been neatly hemmed on each side of the tear. It had decorative stitching along the hems and lacing hanging loose from four eyelets, all just as if it had been designed that way from the beginning.