*
* *
* * *
"You're late."
It was hardly something someone dared to tell a Kazbirati – especially when that said someone was from the Casterian Church Sanctorum – but it was not in Vitale's nature to feign a meek penchant for so long. Perhaps it would get him killed, but that made the act all the more thrilling, really.
"I can read the path of the sun just as well as you can."
Without turning, the alchemist heard the prince flop down onto the cushioned bench by the window of the study – the one meant for tutoring in, not the one that belonged to Bozhidar, himself.
"So, you chose to be?"
The prince exhaled a snort that completely lacked any inkling of amusement.
"It has occurred to me, priest," he began, and even without looking, Vitale could feel the prince's eyes boring a hole in the back of his head. "I am thirteen now, and while you will never be further nor closer to me, you are not even a decade my elder. You are twenty winters."
