Maia was bored out of her mind.

She was also terrified, sleep-deprived and had made a habit of jumping whenever she heard any sort of sound.

A few days after arriving in Crimsith, she still hadn't left Lysandra's room. She barely left her own cramped quarters. The princess brought her food but precious little news of the war outside—mostly because precious little had reached them. Messengers from Miras took around a week to arrive in Crimsith given they couldn't risk the seas at this time and had to ride across the Isthmus.

She'd barely been able to sleep in the long days she'd been cooped up here. Lysandra had offered to let her borrow some of her books for entertainment but Maia could never focus on them. The one thing that might calm her nerves was forbidden—using her magic. If anyone sighted lightning flashing within Lysandra's chambers it was game over. The whole city was looking for her—or rather, for either her or her twin, no one was sure which had been sighted—and the sight of any sort of magic would doom her.

So instead she'd passed most of her time worrying. Her nails were chewed down to stubs, she'd worn through the carpet with her pacing and she hadn't slept since her first night here, when she'd been so exhausted she'd had little choice.

At least my ankle's fine now, Maia thought to herself as she waited for Lysandra to return—the princess was currently at a covert meeting with a smuggler seeing if she could get Maia out of Crimsith. When she'd announced this to her that morning she had been touched by the kindness...only for Lysandra to hastily add that she was 'only doing it to get rid of her'. She had then launched into a long rant about how Maia's presence was 'inexcusably annoying', 'a drain on her resources and patience' and 'entirely unnecessary if she hadn't been so utterly incompetent and gotten herself into this whole wretched situation'.

Maia struggled to see how Nala had the patience to be friends with the princess.

Just as she was devising a counter-rant to greet Lysandra with when she returned, a sudden knock on the door made her jump. She cursed her jittery nerves, about to duck into her quarters and hide there when a man burst in.

He was halfway between frantic and joyous, his golden hair an utter mess, his blue eyes alight with triumph and excitement. He was carrying a beaker in his hand but as he rushed into the bedroom he tripped and dropped it. The glass flew through the air, releasing a stream of trapped shadows, hit the bookshelf and smashed all over the floor.

Aaron Crimson, Lysandra's brother and legendary alchemist, was absolutely nothing like Maia had expected. And from the look on his face, he hadn't expected her at all.

"Who are you?" He blurted out, kneeling on the ground and picking up the glass shards one by one. Realising that as a servant she should probably be helping him, she waved him away and gathered the larger ones in one hand.

"I work for Princess Lysandra," Maia said, trying to make herself look small. Medea's son. This was Medea's son and of all people he had to be the one to come in and catch her unprepared.

"Oh," he said, crouching down to help her pick up the glass despite her protests. "You didn't see anything come out of the glass by any chance?"

Maia thought back to the whips of shadow that had escaped the beaker. Lysandra had already told them about what powered alchemy—though she refused to help them use it, given she claimed to despise the art and wanted it to disappear the moment her mother was dead. Maia certainly had seen the proof of it in the shadows that flitted out of the jar, but Medea had ruthlessly protected the secrets of alchemy for years. If Aaron knew she'd just uncovered one and told his mother...

"No," Maia said, the portrait of innocent confusion. "It was empty, wasn't it?"

"Yes," Aaron said hastily. "Of course. Thanks for your help." Maia blinked at that. He was certainly more polite than his sister. "I came to speak to Lysandra about something. Do you know when she'll be back?"

"No, Your Highness." Maia said, belatedly remembering her etiquette. "She didn't say."

"Do you know where she went at least?" He asked desperately.

"No, Your Highness." Maia repeated. Actually, she knew very well where Lysandra was, but given the answer was slightly treasonous it wouldn't do to tell the Empress' son.

"Oh," he said, sounding so put-out Maia wanted to give him a hug. Also not a good idea.

"I can pass on a message to her if you like," Maia offered nervously. What was she doing? She should have escaped this conversation already.

"No, that's fine." He said quickly. "It's um...it's..."

Sensitive information the likes of which cannot be shared with lowly servants such as you, Maia silently finished.

"Can you...can you just tell her I came? And that I need to speak with her." Aaron asked hopefully.

"Of course, Your Highness." Maia agreed.

"Don't bother with that," he said, dismissing the title with a wave of his hand. "Just call me Aaron."  He paused for a moment, then asked: "What's
your name?"

"Evelyn," she answered. It had been her paternal grandmother's name.

She bent down to pick up a remaining piece of glass to relieve the awkward silence that had fallen over the room. Her heart thundered. She needed to end this now, before she revealed her utter cluelessness as to how to be a servant or did something else that would put her under suspicion.

Maia met Aaron's gaze as she pulled herself back up. He blinked at her, blurting out.

"Your eyes are strange." Utterly disarmed by the comment, Maia just stared at him. Had he seen through the illusion to the purple ones she was born with?

"They're an unusual blue," he clarified, and inwardly she heaved a sigh of relief. "Like...copper sulphate."

"In liquid or crystal form?" She asked. He seemed to think on this.

"Both," He answered.

It was, she reflected, the weirdest—and most mixed—compliment she'd ever been given.

Maia vaguely remembered the compound from her chemistry tutors and agreed with the prince. She knew she should have had Talia do the illusion. She might have managed to make it a colour that actually looked real.

"I think you're right," Maia said at last.

"You've seen it?" He asked, surprised. Of course. Most commoners didn't receive even the simplest education in Kallias and would never have seen it in a science experiment or textbook. A stupid slip-up.

"My father was an alchemist," she lied, thinking quickly. "He believed that copper sulphate was the key to the elixir. I saw it all the time."

"Was?" Aaron asked.

"He isn't anymore of course," Maia clarified. "After you distilled the elixir and transmuted gold there was little point in it—and none of the nobles bother to act as patrons for alchemists anymore." 

"Oh," he replied. "So did you study alchemy with him?" He's eager, Maia thought. I doubt he ever has anyone to talk about the sciences with.

"A little," she replied, shrugging. "I stopped learning when he had to find a new trade." True in a way. Ever since the fall of Asriel she hadn't been able to continue any of her studies. She had always loved learning—in contrast to her sister, who'd found hours in a stuffy classroom reading out of a textbook extraordinarily dull.

Aaron must have detected the longing in her voice, because he said a few moments later.

"You miss it." There was a touch of sympathy in his tone. Being such a famed alchemist and scholar, he would probably shiver at the thought of losing all his access to his studies.

"Sometimes," Maia replied.  An awkward silence fell over them for what felt like an eternity.

"I should go," Aaron said quickly. "Maybe I'll see you later."

"Maybe," Maia said, but it was a lie.

Apparent kindness or no, Aaron was loyal to his mother above all else. If she was lucky, she would never see him again.

He was the enemy. Despite the appearance she'd had to put up she hated him to the depths of her soul. It was his mother that had destroyed her home, imprisoned her sister and murdered her parents.

If it wasn't for Lysandra, Maia would have been half-tempted to kill him if only to strike back at the woman who'd ruined her life.

————————————————

Her hatred was tested the next morning, however, when he sent her a pile of books through another servant. A note was attached to them.

Evelyn,

If you want to keep studying, here are a few books that might help when you have free time. Return them whenever you're finished.

Aaron.

A part of her hated him for that small kindness, but she read them anyway.