It was not as though you had known the bright young student who begged to be your apprentice was anything out of the ordinary. Every pupil who passed through the doors of Elegia was treated precisely the same, and all talk of station and bloodline was struck from the halls the moment one set foot inside. Here, it was said, only talent let a person shine. How were you ever meant to guess that your kindness, your careful eye for promise where others saw none, would one day lead a child of Mary Geoise straight to the worn keys of your piano?
He was dressed as richly as the finest nobleman to ever walk the upper districts, every thread of him whispering of coin and consequence. Anyone who had ever performed for the noblesse would know that particular air at a glance, the unhurried bearing of someone who had never once in his life been told no. And though his gaze swept across your humble instrument, the plainness of your little parlor, and the simple cut of your dress as if cataloguing each modest thing and setting it gently aside, the red-haired prince with the three scars carved across his left eye did not look upon you with anything resembling disinterest.
No. If anything, he looked at you with far too much of it. Far too keen, far too pleased, hanging on every word of his daughter's praise as though it were the loveliest music he had heard all season.
